Chapter 27: The Lion's Fall and the Dragon's Gold
The submission of House Tyrell and the vast, fertile expanse of the Reach transformed Vaelyx Targaryen's invasion from a audacious gamble into an undeniable existential threat to Robert Baratheon's fledgling reign. Highgarden, with its bountiful granaries and tens of thousands of fresh levies, became the new staging ground for the Dragon Emperor's war machine. Mace Tyrell, though outwardly fawning and eager to please his new sovereign (and future son-in-law, a prospect that both terrified and thrilled him), was carefully managed by the ever-watchful Lady Olenna, who saw in Vaelyx not a beloved monarch, but a catastrophic force of nature to be appeased and, if possible, subtly guided for House Tyrell's ultimate benefit. Margaery, poised and intelligent, played her part as the dutiful future Empress, her interactions with Vaelyx a delicate dance of courtesy and observation. Vaelyx, for his part, treated her with a cool, imperial distance, his Voldemort-derived mind viewing the betrothal as a purely strategic asset. Loras Tyrell, the Knight of Flowers, was inducted into Vaelyx's personal Kingsguard – a gilded cage that kept the famed warrior close and under watch.
With the Reach pacified, its resources flowing into his coffers and its armies swelling his ranks to a truly colossal host of over one hundred and twenty thousand, Vaelyx convened his Dragon Council in the opulent solar of Highgarden. The target was unanimously, vindictively clear: the Westerlands, seat of House Lannister, the gold-rich domain of Lord Tywin, the man whose betrayal had sealed King Aerys's fate and whose bannermen had butchered Elia Martell and her children.
"Tywin Lannister believes himself the master of the Great Game," Vaelyx stated, his voice a low rasp that nevertheless silenced the assembled lords and commanders. His pale lilac eyes, reflecting the light from the tall arched windows, seemed to pierce through them. "He orchestrated my brother's downfall, murdered my kin, and now props up a drunken Usurper on my throne. He is a cancer upon Westeros. We will cut him out, and take his gold to fund the restoration of true order."
Prince Oberyn Martell's dark eyes burned with a feral intensity. "My Emperor, the spears of Dorne thirst for Lannister blood. Give us leave, and we shall paint the rivers of the Westerlands crimson."
Mace Tyrell, eager to demonstrate his new loyalty (and perhaps hoping to seize Lannister lands for himself), blustered his agreement. "The chivalry of the Reach will ride with you, Emperor! We shall teach the Lions the folly of their treason!"
Even Lord Randyll Tarly, his face a mask of grim resignation but his eyes holding a flicker of martial interest at the prospect of a campaign against his old rival Tywin, nodded curtly. Vaelyx had kept Heartsbane, a constant reminder of Tarly's submission, but had also begun to consult him on matters of Westerosi military strategy, a calculated move to bind the formidable commander, however unwillingly, to his cause.
The march into the Westerlands was a terrifying spectacle. The Dragon Emperor's army, a multi-hued serpent of Essosi discipline, Dothraki savagery, Dornish agility, and now Reach chivalry, flowed north-west, its passage marked by the terrified silence of the countryside. Veridian and Astra often flew high reconnaissance, their forms like distant, deadly stars, while Vorlag, Ignis, and Tempest served as a close, thunderous escort, their roars a prelude to the doom Vaelyx intended to unleash.
The border forts of the Westerlands, manned by Lannister bannermen like the Leffords and Crakehalls, were the first to taste the Dragon's wrath. Those that offered immediate surrender were spared, their lords forced to swear fealty and add their levies to Vaelyx's ever-growing host. Those that dared resist, like the ancient keep of Castamere's Folly (a name Vaelyx found grimly amusing), were annihilated. Ignis and Vorlag, with contemptuous ease, melted their stone walls, and the ensuing sack was a brutal object lesson.
Their first major obstacle was the Golden Tooth, the formidable castle that guarded the main pass into the Westerlands. Commanded by Ser Harys Swyft, Lord Tywin's father-by-law, a man known more for his cautious nature than his brilliance, it was nevertheless a strong fortress, heavily garrisoned and prepared for a siege.
Vaelyx, however, had no intention of a prolonged conventional siege. After a perfunctory demand for surrender was met with a nervous but defiant refusal, he unleashed his dragons in a display of surgical destruction. While Tempest conjured localized, blinding dust storms to screen his ground troops' advance and Argentus neutralized the castle's scorpion batteries with pinpoint lightning strikes, Vorlag and Ignis focused their combined fury on the massive gatehouse and the adjoining towers. Under their relentless assault, the ancient stones glowed cherry-red, then cracked, then flowed like molten gold. Astra, her pure energy beams slicing through ramparts and battlements, cleared paths for the Aegis Guard and Golden Company, who stormed the breaches with terrifying efficiency.
Ser Harys Swyft, seeing the utter hopelessness of his situation, surrendered the castle within hours. The Golden Tooth, a bastion that had defied armies for centuries, had fallen before lunch. Its capture opened the Lannister heartlands to Vaelyx's legions.
Next came Lannisport, the bustling port city that lay at the foot of Casterly Rock, the source of much of House Lannister's mercantile wealth. Grand Admiral Orzono's Dragon Fleet, now augmented by Tyrell and Redwyne warships from the Reach, blockaded the harbor. Lannisport, though possessing walls, was not a true military fortress. Its primary defense was the Lannister fleet.
Tempest and Argentus made short work of that. Tempest's summoned squalls and colossal waves smashed Lannister galleys against the breakwaters, while Argentus's lightning turned their sails to ash and their masts to splinters. As Vaelyx's army invested the city by land, Vorlag and Ignis delivered targeted fire upon the city gates and key defensive towers. The Lannisport City Watch, though brave, was overwhelmed.
Vaelyx offered terms: surrender the city's wealth, its ships, and all Lannister loyalists, and the common folk would be spared. The city fathers, seeing the inferno in their harbor and the dragons circling overhead, swiftly capitulated. Lannisport was sacked, but it was a controlled, methodical plundering overseen by Malakai's agents and the ever-efficient Ser Damon Sand. Gold, silver, trade goods, and ships flowed into Vaelyx's possession. Key Lannister agents and supporters within the city were rounded up by Lyra's operatives and dealt with… discreetly. The great port was now his.
From Casterly Rock, the ancestral seat of House Lannister, Lord Tywin received the catastrophic news: the Golden Tooth fallen in hours, Lannisport sacked and occupied, his fleet annihilated, his bannermen either dead, captured, or swearing fealty to a Targaryen with seven dragons. Tywin Lannister, a man who had never countenanced defeat, who had drowned rebellious houses in their own mines and orchestrated the fall of kings, was now faced with an enemy against whom conventional warfare seemed utterly futile.
His cold, calculating mind raced. He could not meet Vaelyx in open battle; that was suicide. Casterly Rock itself was a near-impregnable fortress, carved from a colossal stone mountain, its roots deep in gold mines, its defenses legendary. It could withstand any conventional siege for years. But could it withstand seven dragons indefinitely? Could its deep-delved halls resist the kind of power that had vaporized the apex of Meereen's Great Pyramid?
Tywin recalled his forces, abandoning lesser keeps and consolidating his strength within Casterly Rock and a few other key strongholds. He sent ravens to King's Landing, his message to his daughter Cersei and King Robert Baratheon blunt and urgent: the Westerlands were facing annihilation; the full might of the Iron Throne and its remaining allies must march west at once, or all was lost. He also, it was rumored, began to explore other, less conventional avenues – alchemists, pyromancers, even whispers of darker, forbidden lore – seeking any weapon, any defense, against the coming storm.
Vaelyx, now master of Lannisport, did not immediately march on Casterly Rock. He knew of its reputation. Instead, he began a campaign of systematic subjugation across the Westerlands. His dragons became his mailed fist. Vorlag and Ignis burned Lannister armories and supply depots. Argentus and Tempest patrolled the coast, ensuring no aid reached Tywin by sea. Aurumel's illusions and Astra's precision strikes were used to isolate and force the surrender of outlying Lannister castles, their lords given the same choice Tarly had faced: bend the knee or burn. Most, seeing the fate of those who resisted, chose submission.
Veridian, the jade hunter, was tasked with the most perilous mission: to scout Casterly Rock itself. Cloaked in powerful enchantments woven by Vaelyx, Veridian soared high above the colossal fortress, its empathic senses and keen eyesight mapping its defenses, its patrol routes, the disposition of its garrison. It even dared to explore some of ancinet, forgotten sea caves that led to the Rock's lower levels, seeking an exploitable weakness in the lion's very den. The information it brought back was invaluable: Casterly Rock was indeed formidable, its garrison vast and disciplined, its depths a labyrinth. But even the Rock, Vaelyx noted, had its vulnerabilities, particularly to the unique capabilities of his dragons.
The wealth of the Westerlands began to pour into Vaelyx's war chest. Lannister gold mines were seized, their output redirected. The commonfolk, terrified but also impressed by the discipline Vaelyx enforced (his Dothraki were kept on a surprisingly tight leash when not actively engaged in punitive actions), began to whisper that perhaps this Dragon Emperor, for all his terrifying power, might be a less capricious master than the proud and ruthless Lion of Lannister.
As Lannisport burned – its key military and Lannister-loyalist sections targeted, its port largely intact for Vaelyx's use – and the banners of House Targaryen were raised over the captured castles of the Westerlands, Vaelyx Targaryen stood on a hill overlooking the smoldering city. His dragons cast long, dancing shadows in the firelight. He had broken the Golden Tooth, seized Lannisport, and was now systematically dismantling Tywin Lannister's power base. Casterly Rock, the Lion's pride, loomed in the distance, a defiant silhouette against the darkening sky.
Vaelyx knew that the true test of his Westerlands campaign, the confrontation with Tywin Lannister himself, was yet to come. But he had crippled one of Robert Baratheon's most powerful allies, seized unimaginable wealth, and demonstrated to all of Westeros that no lord, no castle, no lineage, was safe from the Dragon's wrath. The noose around the Usurper King was tightening with every beat of his dragons' mighty wings.