Chapter 16: The Dragon's Wrath Unleashed
The dawn broke grey and ominous over Myr, the air thick with salt, anticipation, and the distant, mournful cry of war horns. On the eastern horizon, a seemingly endless forest of masts materialized – the combined fleets of Tyrosh and Volantis, a vast armada sailing with grim intent. Simultaneously, Lyra's outriders reported the dust clouds of the allied land army, tens of thousands strong, a glittering river of steel and legionary banners, marching inexorably towards Myr's landward defenses. The siege was to begin by land and sea.
Vaelyx Targaryen stood upon the highest tower of the Magisters' Palace, a dark, slender figure against the turbulent sky. His seven dragons, now colossal beasts whose wingbeats stirred the very air around the tower, circled above him, their roars a defiant challenge to the encroaching storm. He had no intention of being passively besieged. Today, Essos would learn the true price of challenging the Dragon's Dominion.
As the Tyroshi-Volantene armada, confident in its overwhelming numbers, began to form a blockade line, intending to seal Myr's harbor before landing their main assault troops, Vaelyx gave his first command.
"Tempest," his mental voice, amplified by the blood bond, resonated with the stormy blue dragon. "They dare sail upon my waters. Show them the ocean's fury."
Tempest, largest of the seven, peeled away from his siblings with a roar that drowned out the enemy's war horns. He climbed high, then plunged towards the center of the enemy fleet. As he descended, the sky around him darkened unnaturally. Gale-force winds, summoned and directed by the dragon's innate power, whipped the sea into a frenzy. Massive waves, far larger than any natural swell, rose from the deep, smashing into the tightly packed Tyroshi galleys and Volantene troop transports. Ships collided, oars snapped, and panicked cries were lost in the wind's howl. Tempest himself, a living maelstrom, swept low over the enemy flagship – a gilded Volantene behemoth carrying several Triarchs – and unleashed a concussive blast of air and dark blue flame, shattering its mainmast and sending burning debris raining onto its packed decks.
Into this chaos, Argentus, the bronze and silver dragon, followed. He darted through the Tempest-induced storm clouds, a living conductor of sk Maly. Crackling bolts of blue-white lightning erupted from his maw, striking with terrifying precision. One bolt incinerated a Tyroshi fire ship before it could be launched, another disabled the rudders of a squadron of heavy Volantene quinqueremes, leaving them helpless in the churning waters.
Vaelyx's own enchanted fleet, led by Captain Orzono aboard "The Sea Serpent," now surged from Myr's harbor. They were outnumbered, but not outmatched. Exploiting the confusion sown by Tempest and Argentus, Orzono's ships, faster and more maneuverable due to Vaelyx's enchantments, struck like vipers. They targeted isolated and damaged enemy vessels, their magically enhanced ballistae loosing bolts that punched through hulls, while fire siphons, a Myrish specialty improved by Vaelyx, spewed clinging dragon-inspired flame.
Vorlag and Ignis, meanwhile, took to the skies near the coastline. As enemy ships, battered by the storm and trying to flee Tempest's wrath, drifted too close to shore, the twin bellows of black-red and scarlet fire engulfed them, turning seasoned warships into floating pyres. Aurumel, weaving gracefully between Vaelyx's ships and the enemy, projected shimmering golden shields that deflected enemy arrows and catapult stones, while simultaneously casting disorienting illusions of phantom reefs and monstrous sea creatures amongst the panicking Tyroshi squadrons. The naval battle became a slaughter, the proud armada of the Grand Alliance broken and scattered before it could even properly deploy for a siege.
On land, the Volantene legions, renowned for their discipline, began their methodical advance towards Myr's western walls, their serried ranks moving like a ponderous iron glacier. Tyroshi sellswords, a riot of color and diverse weaponry, fanned out on their flanks, their siege engines – massive trebuchets and ballistae – being slowly hauled into position.
Vaelyx watched their approach, a cold calculation in his eyes. He allowed them to come within extreme crossbow range before unleashing Boros and his Dothraki. The Dragon's Horde erupted from concealed sally ports and the plains beyond Myr's immediate defenses, a wave of savage, screaming horsemen. They did not charge the main Volantene formations, but struck at the more vulnerable Tyroshi sellsword companies on the flanks and, more importantly, the cumbersome siege train.
The Dothraki, fighting with the terror of dragons at their backs and the promise of plunder before them, were a whirlwind of destruction. They overwhelmed the sellsword outriders, their arakhs flashing, and set upon the engineers and work crews struggling with the siege engines.
As the Tyroshi lines buckled under the Dothraki assault, Vorlag and Ignis, having sated their initial fury on the enemy fleet, turned their attention landward. They swept low over the advancing enemy columns, their shadows causing horses to rear and men to cry out in terror. Then came the fire. Vorlag's black-red flames engulfed entire cohorts of sellswords, their screams lost in the inferno. Ignis, with his more focused scarlet blasts, targeted the newly assembled siege towers and trebuchets, reducing them to blazing wreckage before they could loose a single stone against Myr's walls.
Kaelen, commanding the Myrish Legions and Serpent's Scale veterans atop the city walls, directed a withering hail of crossbow bolts and scorpion-launched projectiles into the disorganized enemy ranks. His men, witnessing the dragons' devastating power, fought with a grim, unshakeable resolve. They were on the side of gods, or demons – it mattered little, so long as they were winning.
But the Grand Alliance was vast, their numbers immense. Despite the chaos sown by the dragons and the Dothraki, the core of the Volantene legions, under the command of a grim, scarred Triarch named Nyessos Vhassar, pressed on, their discipline holding against even the terror of dragon fire. They began to establish siege lines, their engineers working frantically to construct new engines from pre-cut timber they had brought on their transports.
Vaelyx knew he needed to deliver a decisive blow, something to shatter their will, not just attrite their numbers. Veridian, his jade scout, had been a silent shadow over the battlefield, its empathic senses relaying the enemy's dispositions, their morale, and the precise location of Triarch Vhassar's command post – a large, fortified pavilion complex several miles behind the main Volantene advance.
"The time has come, Astra," Vaelyx whispered, his mind connecting with the snow-white dragon, his queen. "Show them the meaning of Targaryen majesty, and the finality of our judgment."
With a grace that belied her immense size, Astra launched herself into the sky, her sapphire eyes blazing. Vaelyx himself, clad in his black armor, was not riding her – his bond was such that direct physical presence was not always necessary for command, and he preferred to maintain an overview of the entire battlefield. Instead, Astra flew as a symbol of his will, accompanied by a small, elite unit of Serpent's Scale veterans, led by Lyra, who had infiltrated close to the Volantene command post under cover of the Dothraki raids.
Astra did not breathe fire. As she approached Triarch Vhassar's pavilion, surrounded by the elite honor guard of the Volantene Tigers, she unleashed her unique power. A focused beam of pure, colorless energy, like a lance of starlight, lanced down from her maw. It struck the central command pavilion with pinpoint accuracy. There was no explosion, no fire, but the massive structure simply… ceased to exist, vaporized into fine dust, along with everyone within it, including, as Lyra's agents later confirmed, Triarch Vhassar himself.
The effect on the Volantene legions was instantaneous and catastrophic. Their supreme commander, the linchpin of their entire land operation, was gone, obliterated by a power they could not comprehend. Astra then circled the stunned Volantene command echelons, not attacking further, but her mere presence, regal and terrifying, coupled with the shimmering sapphire shield that effortlessly deflected any panicked missile attacks, broke their nerve. Command cohesion shattered. Orders became contradictory, then ceased altogether.
Lyra's unit, capitalizing on the chaos, struck at the secondary commanders, their Valyrian steel daggers and Lysene poisons finding their marks.
On the main battlefield, the news of Vhassar's death, relayed by frantic messengers, spread like wildfire through the Volantene ranks. Their disciplined advance faltered, then stalled. Kaelen, sensing the shift, ordered a counter-attack from the Myrish Legions, who poured from the city gates with a roar, their spirits lifted by the sight of Astra's divine judgment.
Boros, leading his Dothraki, who had witnessed Astra's devastating power from afar, charged with renewed, almost religious fervor into the now wavering Volantene lines. They were no longer just fighting for plunder; they were fighting for their Dragon Khal, their god of fire and battle.
Vaelyx, watching from his tower, allowed himself a moment of cold satisfaction. The naval arm of the Grand Alliance was crippled, scattered, burning. Their land army's command structure was decapitated, their morale shattered. He had met their overwhelming numbers with overwhelming, multifaceted draconic power.
Yet, the day was not entirely won. Tens of thousands of leaderless but still dangerous Volantene and Tyroshi soldiers remained on the field, a vast, panicked rabble. The city of Myr was secure for now, but the remnants of the Grand Alliance, if allowed to regroup or escape, could still pose a threat, or worse, carry the full tale of his dragons' might to a now truly terrified Essos.
As the sun began to set, casting long, bloody shadows over the ravaged landscape and the burning hulks in the bay, Vaelyx Targaryen prepared for the final phase of the battle: the complete annihilation of the invading forces. His dragons, far from tired, circled restlessly, their hunger for destruction barely sated. The Dragon's Wrath had been unleashed, but its thirst was not yet quenched. Myr would be the anvil, and his seven flames, the hammer that would shatter the Grand Alliance into oblivion.