Chapter 19: The Unchained Hydras of Astapor
The humid air of Astapor, usually thick with the scent of brine, dust, and despair, now carried the metallic tang of fresh blood and the acrid smoke of burning ambition. Lyra's agents, moving like ghosts through the city's underbelly for weeks, had meticulously laid the tinder. Whispers of the Dragon Lord in the west, a breaker of old chains and a forger of new, glorious destinies, had slithered into the hearts of Astapor's enslaved – from the stoic, disciplined Unsullied in their barracks to the defiant gladiators in the fighting pits, and even to the resentful household slaves who witnessed the Good Masters' decadent cruelties firsthand. Key figures had been identified, small caches of crude weapons distributed, and clandestine meetings held under the cover of darkness.
The signal, when it came, was subtle yet unmistakable. Veridian, Vaelyx's jade-scaled shadow, cloaked in a magically woven veil of invisibility and silence, soared high above Astapor on a moonless night. With pinpoint precision, the dragon unleashed a focused burst of its eerie green fire – not hot enough to cause a widespread conflagration, but potent enough to bypass the mundane wards on the Plaza of Pride's main watchtower, causing its massive signal brazier to erupt in an uncontrolled, unnatural emerald blaze. This was the pre-arranged beacon.
Simultaneously, Lyra's most trusted operatives, Myrish and Lysene assassins now fanatically loyal to Vaelyx, eliminated key sentries and commanders within the Good Masters' garrisons. The fuse was lit.
The uprising began in the barracks of the Unsullied. Grey Worm, a young but respected officer whose quiet defiance had been carefully nurtured by Lyra's agents, drove a sharpened spear through the heart of his Astapori trainer during the pre-dawn inspection. His cry – "Dovoghedhy! Unsullied! Today we choose!" (No Masters! Unsullied! Today we choose!) – echoed through the barracks, and thousands of his eunuch brethren, armed with their training spears and a lifetime of suppressed rage, turned on their Astapori overseers. The fighting was brutal, disciplined, and utterly merciless. Years of conditioning for obedience were channeled into a terrifying, focused fury.
Elsewhere, gladiators, armed with smuggled weapons, broke free from the fighting pits, their roars of defiance challenging the screams of their former masters. Household slaves, armed with kitchen knives and burning brands, turned on the families they had served, their vengeance swift and personal. Astapor, the Red City, began to bleed.
As the sun rose, casting its first rays on a city consumed by fire, internal strife, and the sounds of slaughter, Vaelyx Targaryen's vanguard fleet appeared off the coast. It was not his full armada, but a swift squadron of fifty warships, led by "The Sea Serpent," their dark sails bearing his three-headed dragon banner. The Good Masters of Astapor, already reeling from the internal revolt, now faced an external threat of terrifying proportions. Some attempted to rally their remaining loyal slave soldiers and personal guards, others made for the harbor, hoping to escape the carnage.
Vaelyx did not immediately intervene in the slave revolt itself. He allowed the fires of their fury to burn, to weaken the Good Masters further, to demonstrate the consequences of their brutal regime. Instead, his dragons – Vorlag, Ignis, and Tempest, who had been transported within the suitcase aboard his flagship – took to the skies.
Their target was not the rebelling slaves, but the symbols of Astapori power and any attempts by the Good Masters to flee or organize a defense. Vorlag's black-red fire consumed the Pyramid of the Good Masters, the heart of their governance, sending its gilded spire crashing down in a shower of molten gold and screams. Ignis turned the harbor into an inferno, incinerating the ships the terrified Masters were attempting to board, their treasures and their lives turning to ash upon the water. Tempest, with roars that shook the city, patrolled the skies, a dark blue harbinger of doom, ensuring no vessel escaped the bay.
The message was clear: the old order was being systematically dismantled, not just by its slaves, but by an even greater, more terrible power.
By midday, the internal revolt had largely succeeded in overthrowing the Good Masters' immediate control, but the city was a chaotic battleground. It was then that Vaelyx made his grand entrance. His ships landed marines – Serpent's Scale veterans and Myrish Legionaries – who secured the harbor and key plazas, not attacking the former slaves, but establishing an imposing, disciplined presence.
Vaelyx himself, flanked by Kaelen and Boros, and with Astra and Aurumel now unveiled, descending gracefully from the sky to land behind him, strode into the Plaza of Punishment. Astra's snow-white, regal form and sapphire eyes radiated an aura of absolute authority, while Aurumel's golden luminescence seemed to promise a new, albeit still terrifying, dawn. Thousands of Unsullied, their spears stained with the blood of their former masters, stood assembled, their disciplined ranks a stark contrast to the surrounding chaos. Other freed slaves, armed with makeshift weapons, watched with a mixture of hope and trepidation.
The few surviving Good Masters, dragged from their hiding places, were thrown at Vaelyx's feet.
"Men of Astapor!" Vaelyx's voice, magically amplified, boomed across the plaza. "You have tasted the bitterness of chains. You have felt the lash of the Good Masters. Today, those chains are broken! Today, their whips are silenced!" He gestured to the cowering Astapori nobles. "Their reign of cruelty is over!"
At a nod from Vaelyx, Vorlag, who had landed with a ground-shaking thud nearby, leaned down and with a snap of his immense jaws, consumed one of the most notorious Good Masters, Kraznys mo Nakloz, in a single, horrifying gulp. The crowd gasped, then a wave of savage cheers erupted.
"I am Vaelyx of House Targaryen, Lord of the Seven Flames!" Vaelyx declared. "I have brought you the fire of retribution. I gift you your freedom!" He paused, letting the words sink in. "But freedom without purpose is but another form of slavery – slavery to chaos, to hunger, to weakness. I offer you a new purpose! Serve me, and you will be slaves no more, but soldiers of the Dragon! You will have pay, honor, and the chance to visit upon all who would oppress others the same justice you have delivered today! Serve me, and you will be the iron claws of my legions, the unbreakable spear of my empire! Unsullied! Will you trade your broken chains for dragon steel and a destiny of glory?"
Grey Worm, his face still streaked with blood, stepped forward. He drove the butt of his spear into the plaza stones and knelt. "We are Unsullied, Lord. We were made to obey. We will obey you. You have given us our vengeance. We will give you our lives."
One by one, eight thousand Unsullied warriors knelt, a forest of spears thudding against the ground in perfect unison. Their loyalty, forged in the crucible of their shared upbringing and the terror of their former lives, was now transferred, utterly and completely, to the Dragon Lord who had overseen their bloody emancipation. Vaelyx would reforge them, re-arm them with the finest Myrish steel, and give them a new name: the "Aegis Guard," the shield of his new Valyrian order.
Astapor was swiftly brought under Vaelyx's control. Ser Damon Sand and his Golden Company, whose discipline and experience in urban pacification proved invaluable, were tasked with restoring order and overseeing the "re-education" of the city, assisted by Kaelen's Myrish Legions. The city's vast wealth – accumulated through centuries of slave trading – was seized by Malakai's agents. The slave trade itself was not abolished, but "reformed." Astapor would no longer sell slaves to others; instead, its infrastructure would be used to process and integrate "prisoners of war" from Vaelyx's future campaigns into his labor force or specialized military units, their loyalty ensured by magical means if necessary. He was, as ever, pragmatic.
The news of Astapor's fall and the "liberation" of its Unsullied sent shockwaves through Yunkai and Meereen. Yunkai, the Yellow City, known for its Wise Masters and its reliance on less disciplined slave armies and pleasure slaves, was gripped by terror. They had already heard tales of Myr's destruction and Lys's subjugation. Now, with the formidable Unsullied swelling Vaelyx's ranks, their position seemed untenable. A delegation of Wise Masters, laden with an even more extravagant tribute of gold, slaves, and exotic beasts than Qarth had offered, was dispatched almost immediately, effectively offering to become Vaelyx's willing vassals in exchange for being spared Astapor's fate. Vaelyx, seeing little strategic value in a prolonged siege of Yunkai at this stage, accepted their terms, bleeding them dry of resources and demanding a significant contingent of their slave soldiers for his armies.
Meereen, the largest and proudest of the Slaver Cities, with its immense pyramid and its traditions rooted in Old Ghiscar, proved more defiant. The Great Masters of Meereen, a council of ancient, feuding families, publicly denounced Vaelyx as an upstart barbarian and began to bolster their own legions of spiked-helmeted slave soldiers, preparing for a siege. Lyra's agents within Meereen, however, reported that the slave population was seething with unrest, inspired by Astapor's example. The Great Masters were sitting on a powder keg.
Lyra also brought Vaelyx news from Westeros, her network now surprisingly efficient. "My Lord," she informed him, during a private briefing aboard his flagship, now anchored in Astapor's harbor. "Word has reached us from King's Landing. The madness of your brother, King Aerys, deepens daily. He has executed Lord Rickard Stark and his heir, Brandon Stark, with fire and mockery, accusing them of treason. He has now demanded that Lord Jon Arryn surrender his wards, Eddard Stark, now Lord of Winterfell, and Robert Baratheon, Lord of Storm's End. It is said they have refused. Rebellion is brewing in the North, the Stormlands, and the Vale."
Vaelyx listened, his expression unreadable. The fan-memory supplied the missing pieces: this was the spark. Robert's Rebellion. The war that would shatter the Targaryen dynasty. His brother was indeed a fool, but a useful one. The self-destruction of his House was proceeding ahead of schedule.
"Interesting," Vaelyx murmured. "Continue to monitor the situation closely, Lyra. This… rebellion… could create opportunities for us, when the time is right. But our focus, for now, remains here." He gestured towards a map of Slaver's Bay. Meereen, with its proud pyramids, stood out like a defiant challenge.
With Astapor secured, its formidable Unsullied now the core of his Aegis Guard, and Yunkai effectively a tributary, Vaelyx Targaryen stood as the undisputed master of the western Slaver's Bay. His empire in Essos was growing with terrifying speed, built on a foundation of dragon fire, ruthless ambition, and the shattered remnants of old powers. Meereen's defiance was an insult he would not long tolerate. The Dragon Lord's gaze was now fixed upon the Great Pyramid, and the last major bastion of resistance in the Ghiscari lands.