The chamber of the Small Council was thick with the scent of parchment, beeswax candles, and the faint must of old stone. High windows filtered in the cold light of a grey morning, casting long bars across the polished table shaped like a seven-pointed star. Six chairs were filled. The seventh, the king's, remained empty.
Lord Brynden Rivers, Hand of the King, sat where the Hand always did, beneath the sigil of the crown. He wore black, as ever, his long white hair pulled back behind his shoulders. The shadow of his eyepatch—absent now—left his empty left socket exposed, a hollow warning for all who dared to look too close.
The Master of Ships, Lord Arryck Massey, cleared his throat. "Will His Grace not be joining us today?"
Brynden's single red eye did not waver from the scroll before him. "The king is otherwise occupied. He is reviewing ancient tomes within the Royal Library."
A murmur passed between the lords. The Grand Maester tilted his head. "Another study into prophecy?"
"Perhaps," said Brynden, voice cool as river ice. "But we are here for matters more pressing than ink and dreams. I bring word of a wedding tourney."
"Ah," the Master of Laws, Lord Raymond Harroway, said. "Lord Ambrose Butterwell, is it not? One of our duller lords. Good coin, bad blood."
"Worse blood than you know," Brynden said. He let the weight of his words hang, then continued. "Lord Butterwell means to wed a Frey girl. To mark the event, he is hosting a tourney at his seat, Whitewalls. The victor is to be awarded… a dragon egg."
That stilled the room.
"Surely not a true egg," said Ser Rolland Redwyne, Master of Coin. "Perhaps a gilded trinket, a jape for the crowds."
"It is no jape," Brynden replied. "The egg was gifted to Lord Ambrose by King Aegon IV when he served as Master of Coin. One of the last of the Targaryen clutch, laid in the dying days of the dragons."
The lords exchanged glances, uneasy now.
"Then why give it away at a mere wedding tourney?" asked Lord Harroway. "He has no dragonrider's blood. Why not keep it as a relic, or offer it back to the crown?"
"Because the tourney is no mere wedding celebration," Brynden said.
He unfurled a parchment, though the words were already committed to memory.
"My informants have overheard Lord Gormon Peake speak of dreams," he said. "Not idle fancies. Dragon dreams. Dreams of a dragon to be born again… at Whitewalls."
"Daemon," Lord Massey whispered.
"Daemon Blackfyre the Younger," Brynden confirmed. "It is said he dreams of banners flying above the Red Keep, of dragonfire reborn. This is not some hedge knight's boast. It stinks of prophecy… and treason."
Ser Rolland frowned. "But surely Bittersteel—"
"There has been no word of Bittersteel," Brynden cut in. "No word of the Golden Company. No raids, no musters. Nothing out of Tyrosh or Myr, no ships hired, no sellswords stirred. A silence far too loud for my liking."
"Then perhaps there is no danger," the Grand Maester offered cautiously. "Perhaps Bittersteel has abandoned the boy. Perhaps it is only a dream."
"And perhaps fools dream peace when war is waking," Brynden replied sharply. "I do not trust dreams, but I trust those who chase them far less."
A silence settled over the council.
"I am not one to leap at shadows," Brynden continued. "But I have studied this enemy for near two decades. If Daemon is here, it will not be with banners flying. It will be in secret, with smiles and whispers and hidden swords."
Lord Massey exhaled. "What do you propose?"
"We keep watch," Brynden said. "We send agents to Whitewalls. Quiet ones. If a second Blackfyre Rebellion is in the making, I would see it stillborn in the cradle."
"And the egg?"
Brynden's red eye gleamed. "Let the boy dream of dragons. And when he wakes, let him remember what befell his father—the so-called Conqueror Reborn—and his brothers, when they reached for fire and found only blood."
He stood then, tall and cold and grim.
"This council is adjourned."