The capital had become a tomb of grey stone and weary politics, but the air in the deep woods of the Reach tasted of starlight and ancient secrets.

Reports had reached the Red Keep of a woman with blood as pure as the Valyrian fires of old, a sorcerer who had made her home in a forgotten grove where the laws of nature bowed to her whim.

It was said she could take a handful of common river silt and let it fall from her fingers as a rain of perfect, milk-white pearls; she could strike a jagged stone with her palm and watch the grey granite blush into veins of twenty-four-karat gold.

The rumors had trickled into the Red Keep like a slow-moving poison, whispered by travelers who arrived with eyes wide and pockets heavy with impossible wealth.

They spoke of a pureblood sorcerer residing in the deepest, most ancient tangles of the Westerosi forests—a woman who breathed life into the dying and transformed the very debris of the earth into treasures of the gods.

They claimed she could turn common river sand into lustrous pearls and rough granite into veins of pure gold.

Prince Baelor Targaryen, the Hand of the King, had lived a life of logic, heavy armor, and the cold weight of the law.

Yet, for a moon's turn, his sleep had been a battlefield of visions.

He saw you walking through fire that did not burn; he saw you mending the broken limbs of the smallfolks with a touch that felt like a summer breeze.

Driven by a desperate, silent yearning, he led a massive host of knights—a sea of black and gold steel—into the green heart of the forest.

Behind him, Prince Maekar rode with his mace at his side, his eyes narrowed in a fury of skepticism, convinced this was a trap of the Blackfyres or a delusion of the weak.

They broke through the final thicket of ironwood trees and stopped as if struck by a physical wall. Before them stretched a massive riverbank where the water did not flow brown or blue, but in shimmering, translucent ribbons of iridescent violet and liquid diamond.

There you were.

You were not merely standing by the water; you were walking across its center, your bare feet pressing against the rushing surface as if it were a floor of polished sapphire.

You did not sink. You did not stumble.

With every step, a soft glow erupted from beneath your heels, sending ripples of gold through the current.

In your hands, you held a dying fawn, its breath ragged, until you pressed your lips to its brow; the animal leapt from your arms, its fur turning to a shimmering silver as it sprinted across the water and into the trees.

Baelor dismounted, his movements slow and reverent.

He pushed past his knights, his dark, salt-and-pepper hair windswept and his noble face etched with a profound, terrifying awe.

He did not draw his sword. Instead, he unbuckled his heavy, gold-inlaid cloak and let it fall into the mud of the bank, a sacrifice of his royal dignity.

As you drifted toward the shore, the water rising to meet your steps like a loyal hound, Maekar and his soldiers drew their steel, the sound of blades a harsh discord in the holy silence.

Baelor did not turn. He stepped into the shallows, his heavy boots sinking into the silt, until he reached the point where the water met your feet.

He reached up, his ungloved hand trembling as he cupped your face. The lines of exhaustion and duty on his forehead seemed to melt away under your gaze.

With a sudden, fierce grace, he pulled a heavy gold ring from his finger—the seal of the Prince of Dragonstone—and dropped it into the river.