[right][sub][@LadyRunic], [@Ruby].[/sub][/right]
King's Landing was a a mud hole.an interesting mud hole to be sure, but sat between the three crowning hills the shit of human existence collected neatly at the bottom. Jeyne had been less than pleased that her father thought appearing in King's Landing to discuss some trade deals was a good chance to drag herself and her sister with him to show them to potential suitors. Hanna had been over the moon about it, hoping as she always did for a wealthy young lord of some rank. Their sister had married high, how could she not? It irked Jeyne who had no thought of marriage. There was so much wonder jn the world and she wanted adventures like their older brother Damon had.

Which had led her to avoiding her lessons just in time to see the most beautiful creature winging over the capital. A dragon that put any other to same with blue shadings of some sort she couldn't name. Unlike her sister, Jeyne only cared enough with thread and needle to please their mother, not to natter at it all day. Her feet scrambled down the steps and into the street. Dressed in clothing she had bullied a young servant out of, she thought she made a passing lad. Never minding no lad was so clean as she and her brown tresses stuck out from under the cap she had tucked them under. It was an old trick of hers when she wanted to go back to her days as a child in the town, not then a young lady of Harrenhal. Soon she was dodging down streets following the talk of 'dragon woman' and the whispers of Valyrian either in awe or curses. It took her far longer than she would have thought, her boots dusted by mud and dung and other things that rotten in the foul streets. She hardly paid attention, after ducking behind a stall and glaring at the peasant woman who protested her being there. "Why would I steal your wares?" She snapped scornful of the rags hung about. As she peered after the woman dressed as a man with a sword at her side and boots so elegant and tall. Jeyne wanted boots like that. Her fingers itched as she began to follow the woman. To her, she was a shadow. But to all else she was as obvious as if Vaera had brought her dragon behind her. Pots clattered, she argued with vendors, and insulted a browsing pig that wondered the streets after it stepped on her foot

In no way, at all, was the ‘master spy’ behind Vaera her concern. Around every corner she turned there were just more of the bloody gnats—in brown roughspun, with little more than metal sticks and rope about them to do any kind of threatening with. Not that they did any outward threatening to her. Instead, their dark glances gave away their intent, and she found none of them filled with the warm light of love so many gods promised.
Her own gods numbered a thousand, and the history and stories passed down to her, that she would further pass on to her siblings, was that no one gave a damn if you adhered to this god or that god. It was your choice, in the Freehold of Valyria. The only thing that mattered was power and influence and wealth. She knew of the Targaryens that abandoned Valyria, selling everything in exchange for Dragonstone and enough to bring some of their hangers-on along, namely Velaryon and Celtigar, but there were a few others, too.

Westeros was not, at all, the Lands of Always Summer. It wasn’t close to the Freehold, in more ways than she could rightly count just by glancing around. To start with, their capital, this King’s Landing, was little more than a war camp that had overdeveloped and overgrown without so much as a single plan for the city’s growth. It was a sprawling, stupid, mess. Each of the three hills, she learned talking to a merchant of tiles, was named after the King and his Sister-Wives: Aegon, Visenya, and Rhaenys. Aegon’s Hill was the taller, where she landed Caeryx.

The big temple, ‘sept’ she was corrected by the merchant, was the Sept of Remembrance, and it was Rhaenys’ Hill. What she thought had been another temple, that was actually a little fortified manse compound, was Visenya’s Hill. That hill, not the hill with stones and stilts being turned into a castle, was where the King had lived until most recently. For the hundredth time since landing, Vaera of House Balaerys was glad to have been born and raised in Volantis, despite the things about the city she had started to dislike, which oddly measured up with the things her brother hated about the place.

At a wine merchant, where she purchased a skin of something strong and red, she learned the gnats had a proper name: The Poor Fellows. What’s worse, those she assumed had been some kind of heavily armored watch of the city were not at all…they were Knights of an Order sworn to the Faith: The Faith Militant. Or as some of the common folk had called them, the Stars and the Swords. Too many of them looked at her with darkened gazes, adding a tension that she hadn’t been expecting.

[i]Maegor is either a fool, uninformed, or both.[/i]

She had to send word to Vhandyr, was her thought, when her spine froze at the sharp sound of a squeal…until she realized it was a pig, followed by the cursings of the master spy that had been following her for a little bit of time, now. The presence of the gnats and a few of the silver, shiny, Faith knights kept her from pulling a dagger and killing the fool girl…though in truth, she likely wouldn’t have, anyway.
But it added restraint as she sighed, turned sharper on her heel to turn around than most dancers could muster, 
and leveled her lilac eyes on the girl as she quickly closed to the distance between them.

“YOU.”

The girl seemed to turn this way, that way, somehow certain the dragonrider wasn’t talking to her. Though she only occasionally shouted, there was dragon fire in the eyes of the Valyrian dragonrider as she got loud, and confronted the girl.

“Yes, fool girl, YOU. Shall we draw steel and have our contest for life here and now? The only reason I can imagine being followed in such a way is if you’re an assassin, or a spy, and both are not but enemies to me at this moment SO YOU TELL ME…which is it?”

The shout had caught Jeyne off guard. Surely it could not be her to be so scorned, but oh it was. The woman called her assassin and spy, both which made her pleased even as she squirmed at the unwarranted shouting and anger that was being directed at her. "I? Neither!" Her voice was sharp with alarm and offended dignity. "I just- I saw you fly over and…" This was not going how it was supposed to at all and Jeyne knew she was blushing as she fumbled for something, anything to say. "It was astounding." She finished lamely, knowing it could not give full meaning to what she felt to see that living jewel. "Why would I spy or try to… You have a sword!" She pointed out, that quite correctly Vaera indeed has a sword and the upper hand.

A sweet smile came over the pretty features of the Valyrian dragonrider, her voice dipped itself in honey, and lowered its volume as she grew closer to the girl, and closer to the girl, until she was a dagger’s distance away. The height of the dragonrider neared six feet, prompting her to lean down in order to get closer to the girl still, enough that they neared something close to eye-level. 

Vaera could smell the fear. The girl would smell a hint of brimstone and jasmine; which belonged to the dragon, and which the rider seemed obvious enough. “I’ve killed enough men and women to lose count. I’ve flown so far that I’ve seen parts of creation that no other living soul can claim to have seen. Do you want to know what the demons of Sothoryos look like? Can you imagine how shadows whisper in the mountain passes of Asshai?”
She moved, but not away, if anything somehow she achieved the impossible of getting closer as their shoulders brushed, Vaera Balaerys encircling the girl like a predator in the dark, cutting steely glances to the bustle of bodies around in the street that were beginning to stop and look, the icy shock of her voice no more than a whisper, sneaking in from behind, her lips close enough to the girl’s ear to touch, “You’re too clean for those rags you’re wearing, you have the subtlety of a zorse, and you have made a spectacle of me in a city that doesn’t seem to like those like me very much. I should tie you to a bed and…”

Vaera paused, and let the single, small, sigh escape, rounding back before the girl, not facing her, but keeping her to the left of her body. The tone had changed; honey had dripped away to reveal Valyrian steel: “You shouldn’t be out without escort, you never know the types of people you might run into on the muddy streets of such a place.” 

Lilac eyes cut left, catching the girl’s eyes, “I’m sorry your life is stuck in a pious, gilded, cage. Pray to the Valyrian gods your next life is kinder to you. Your gods,” she said, lilac eyes drifting around those looking on, “seem as dense as they do cruel,” words finished with a chuckle. 

Jeyne was trapped in horror as the Valyrian woman looked her in the eye and spoke of what she had seen and tying the young Harroway to a bed. Those thoughts made the young noblewoman quiver in concern. Her mother had always been clear about what awaited a despoiled daughter. A daughter made useless and sullied. “I’m not stuck!” Jeyne protested with a stubborn thrust of her chin, her eyes flashing as she gave a challenging look to Vaera, awe for the woman still on her face. “I can do whatever I please, escort or no!” Though she did recall how correct this woman was that she should have a guard, and she had slipped from the halls of the nobles and king to avoid just that.

A hand, slim and long-fingered, gripped Jeyne’s shoulder as a third woman with a guard in the black and orange livery of Harroway joined the pair. Giving a deep curtsey to the sword-toting woman, the silver-haired newcomer was dressing in clothing that had seen better days and was slightly out of fashion. Her curling silver locks framed a gentle face with sea eyes that turned on the youngest of the group. “Lady Jeyne, your lady mother is searching the halls for you, it would be best to return.” Her voice was meek, mild, as she entreated the youth to return to her rightful place. Endless patience that explained this had happened before. “My Lady, I apologize for any trouble that might have been caused.” Elayne, was oblivious to the origins of Vaera and with reason. The woman, so armored and so clearly Valyrian was most likely Targaryen and thus of the ruling House of Westeros. It would not be wise to raise their ire, even if their sister was married to the brother of King Aenys. “Please, my Lady, your mother will worry about you.” She turned her attention back to Jeyne, concern and worry in her face.

“I am talking with her.” Jeyne protested, her eyes flashing with annoyance at this interruption. “You know not to interrupt your betters. Mother will be furious!”

“Yes, she was busy showing me how she can do whatever she pleases.”

Vaera barely got the words out before her elbows were brought closer to her sides, her hands clasping as her waist nearly bent at the sheer depth and width of laughter that overtook her in that moment. She was still mid-laugh when she saw the guard, and held up a single index finger at him, a motion to come no closer.
“This is funny enough without my getting a giggle out of how fast my Valyrian steel would cut through your armor, flesh, and bone.” The man-at-arms seemed to only see getting laughed at. She noticed a puff of his chest and set of his eyes. In a second, her laughter was gone and her body straight as a steel blade. Fire seemed to set her lilac eyes ablaze as she pointed right at the man. “…I will not fucking warn you again. STAY.”

Her eyes pivoted, finding the girls yapping at each other. Finding the first girl, and narrowing her gaze, as the volume of her voice dropped. “Gods, has the Freehold been gone so long? Look at her.” One step and she was behind the sneak and the spy wearing clothes that barely fit her, let alone hid her. Vaera didn’t touch the girl. Yet, all the same, the girl seemed to know better than to so much as twitch without Vaera’s leave. “That is Valyrian blood,” she began, pointing at the other girl. “Do you see it? My dragon would eat you like a snack without me with you. Her? Because of that blood she would at least have a chance. You cannot IMAGINE the power in that blood. Betters?!”

The moment she heard the noise beside and behind her, the sword was out: the blade was dark, hints of blue and green lapping with the dark blackness that seemed to simply contain the magical steel of the blade along the edges. It seemed, in her hand, lighter than a feather, the guard’s eyes immediately drawn to it and the way the color in the steel seemed to dapple and darken even as the sun of the day hit it. In a beat of her heart the blade was drawn and it’s point nearly at the man’s chest.

“I. Warned. You.” Staring at the guard she could kill with a flick of her wrist, she spoke now to the other girl, the new girl, the one who ought to mind her ‘betters.’ “Valyrian girl apparently worth nothing to these people—this guard, here. Is he a good man to YOU? Not to anyone else, but TO YOU?”

Jeyne had a look of alarm on her face, her brown eyes huge as she hesitated on taking a step away from the woman. Yet she couldn’t help the protest that slipped from her lips, despite seeing how quick the woman was with her sword. “But she’s only a bastard! A Rivers. So what if she has some special blood, it’s not like she’s my father’s bastard- at least then she might be useful.”

The older maid flinched at the words it was subtle. Something she had learned to hide, but she cringed either way. Hesitating, she stepped delicately forward and gently laid a hand on Vaera’s sword arm. “Please, My Lady. You draw a scene and infringe upon your image. Lady Jeyne is but a girl, though she is correct in her words. Though I am Valyrian on my father’s side through his father, I am a Rivers. It is naught but truth.” Her hand quickly fell away and her gaze was fastened low as she shivered at her own daring. “Please, don’t injure our guard. It would only earn the ire of our Lord for this scene and bring his wrath on all of us.” A pleading note entered her voice as it shook slightly. “Lady Targaryen, I urge you if there is a problem, please take it up with Lord Lucas Harroway.”

“Two noble Houses survived the Doom; Targaryen, and Balaerys. One rules your Seven Kingdoms, the other the last outpost of Old Valayria; Volantis.” Her voice shifted like the color of her blade, instant and in strange ways, this time becoming more that of a tutor teaching a lesson. The blade dropped, it’s length replaced in it’s scabbard with a motion so easy it looked like she might, actually, literally, do it in her sleep.

This time, smiling, she repeated herself to the guard: “Do. Not. Move.” Finally, to the man’s visible relief, her eyes moved away from him and to the ‘Rivers’ girl. “How did you come to be born, girl? The full story.”
It was a relief to the group that Vaera had relaxed to sheath her sword. Yet it was her question that caused Elayne to truly shrink within herself. Her eyes turned haunted and Jeyne flinched. It was not tale either girl liked to know, hear or tell. “You are aware of the Westrosi’s Right to the First Night?’ Elayne’s voice was barely more than a whisper as her gaze fastened on her slippered feet. “The Lord of Harrenhal at the time was Gargon Qoherys, he claimed the Lady Catelyn from then Ser Harroway as was his right. I was born of that result.”

“A stain on mother’s honor and father’s. Mother should have drank moon tea.” Jeyne sneered, her eyes snapping as her temper came up to be her shield against the shadow between her parents. “So you’re a Balaerys then? Come to wed one of the Targaryen Princes?”

Her face twisted, as if she had caught a whiff of the worse smell known to men and beast, “Marry a…? No. Be serious, child. Only a fool would marry into that ruin.” Her head shook, her fine Valyrian features still looking confused, even as she shook away the stench of the question posed. Everything changed in the woman. Her posture, the intensity. When she looked back at the girl, there was sadness in her light purple irises. “Qoherys were always high on ambition and low on much else…hey.”

Vaera called out with a careful, measured, tone. The same gloved hand that a minute before held Ascendant now delicately touched fingertips in impossibly soft leather to the chin of the Qoherys spawn, and raised that face until she could see that girl’s eyes. “I’m sorry, girl. Lord Gargon was a monster, but sometimes we come from 
monsters.”

[i]You should hear some of the stories of my House.[/i]

Vaera let go, her eyes looking around once more. The crowd was thicker. The pious fucks looked confused. She liked that, enough for a tiny little chuckle to escape her body as a snort might, “Lord Lucas, you said? Yes. I think I, or my brother, ought to have a chat with this man. And you?” She turned back to the brat, “you live in Harrenhal. You see the wraith of dragonriders every day of your life, and yet this is how you act? Be glad I 
don’t take you with me. What are your names?”

She twisted her body, and her neck, to smile at the guard. “You too, M’Lord.”

The Valyrian whelp froze as she felt fingers pull her chin up to look into violet eyes. Shivering, Elayne blinked owlishly in confusion. Yes, the man who had sired her had been a monster, she heard the whispers of the maids and saw the glares cast her way. She had been branded his bastard from the day she was born. Scorned for wrongs she had never committed and never could commit on her own sex. When Vaera let go, Elayne let her gaze fall to the ground once more, though she did not move away. She couldn’t move. Her feet felt frozen as she longed to disappear from the crowd gathering about them.

Jeyne for her part was quite furious, but she had the sense to remain polite. Her gaze lowering at the mention of the fire that had ruined Harrenhal not so long ago. Still her chin was strong and proud as she kept it raised and her shoulders firm. “Lady Jeyne Harroway, I am. That bastard, is Elayne Rivers, and the guard…” She paused as the man gruffly added. “Thom Cooper.” The young lady repeated such. “And our sister is wife to Prince Maegor.” She declared proudly, ignoring Elayne’s flinch or the loud whispers of the ‘whore of Harroway’, ‘Maegor’s whore’ around them.

“Maegor? The one with Balerion, warring against Dothraki victims with my brother?” Her head snapped to the peasants of Faith and poor clothing choices with even poorer weapons as she heard their loud ‘whispers’. Vaera’s face illuminated with understanding, and something that bordered on pure joy, “Aaah, that’s why Maegor is in Essos. I didn’t care to listen as he explained it. How long until your sister is thrown away like his first wife?”

Vaera asked, starring so deep into Jeyne’s eyes that she might have seen a hint of the girl’s soul. “Be seeing you again, girl.” Vaera couldn’t have denied her grin even if she wanted, her body backing up and turning on a heel as she simply walked away. With blood hot and stomach angrier now, Vaera had an idea of where she needed to go now. Somewhere fool girls wouldn’t follow.