Chapter 27 24

[100 powerstones Extra Chapter. Thank you for the powerstoness]

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"How can this be?! The Red Viper himself cannot defeat the great Ser Dummy?!" From the look he gave me, my feigned astonishment clearly needed work. Oberyn did indeed resemble his brother, the same stern face with deep-set lines, thin arched brows, and large eyes black and gleaming as mineral oil, with thick dark hair to match.

"And what gave me away?"

"You simply look very much like Prince Doran. Only younger, and considerably better-looking." He gave me a crooked smile at that.

"Ha. And you would be the son of the Great Falcon?" The word "great" came out with a generous helping of venom.

"Being the son of the Great Falcon is my greatest achievement. I am Axel Arryn." I extended my hand.

"Oberyn Martell." He shook it. "I hear you have a habit of picking on little girls."

"The girls may be little, but they are hardly harmless." I ignored his attempt at an intimidating stare and kept my tone perfectly even.

"And what exactly could such 'dangerous' little girls do to someone like you?" He looked me over with visible expressiveness. At twelve I looked closer to fifteen, with a well-defined build and standing at about five foot five.

"Nothing serious, though they certainly tried. Obara kept challenging me to fights, intent on giving me a beating, but ended up on the receiving end herself. When she realized that approach was hopeless she started aiming for more sensitive targets, without success. Nymeria worked on the squires, trying to get them to defend her honor. Poor squires, a little girl looked to them with such hope, and they ended up beaten and humiliated by a boy five years their junior. But the finest of the lot is Tyene. You can imagine my shock when I realized an eight-year-old girl was attempting to poison me. At first I suspected the older ones, so they caught the consequences for Tyene's work." At Obara, Oberyn began to smile. At Nymeria, he started laughing. At Tyene, he was howling outright.

"Hahaha, oh that's too much. I'll have words with them, don't you worry, Axel, they'll hear from me."

It was a strange mixture of pride and indignation.

"No need, the Sand Snakes have already had what was coming to them." It would be wrong to let them catch more trouble after our peace agreement.

"Fair enough. But you will spar with me from now on. Consider it your punishment for tormenting my daughters."

I answered him with a satisfied smile.

...

Oberyn Martell.

"Good day, dear brother. How is your health?"

"Oberyn. Good to see you."

"And I am so glad to be back in my homeland, bearing good news." I gave him a nudge.

"Let us discuss it in my solar." The nudge was received.

Nothing in the solar had changed. The same hall-turned-library, buried in books and lined with cabinets. Though one thing was different.

"Am I imagining things, or was that carpet not here before?" My brother followed my gaze and answered:

"It came to me from Norvos recently, through a trade arrangement with a certain bearded priest."

"A fine carpet. Soft. One could have a very good time on it in pleasant company." I tried to draw him out, but it did not work.

"Save that for later. There are more pressing matters." He gave me a pointed look.

"I found her, but ran into a number of other problems." I tried to say it calmly, but the mere memory of it set my blood boiling.

"I am listening."

"I found Rhaenys in Lys. She is alive, in good health, and well treated. She was taken in by one of the magisters at a friend's request. They refused to give her to us." My teeth ground together at that. My hands closed into fists.

"Well. We anticipated that, and agreed it might even be better that way for the time being. Oberyn, that is not what is eating at you. I can see it plainly." My brother had always been able to read me like a book.

"Someone has put it into Rhaenys's head that Aegon is alive and being kept somewhere safe." That news was enough to make Doran's teeth grind as well. He answered flatly.

"I do not believe Elia would have handed her son to a stranger." His voice was tight with fury.

"Rhaenys says Aegon was carried off somewhere before the assault, but was brought back to his bed half an hour later." I told him everything I knew.

"Be careful. Hope can be a medicine or a poison. I do not believe it. The girl most likely invented the whole thing herself. You do not need me to tell you how the mind twists things." He had a point. I had tangled people up that way myself more than once. They love to find their own explanations for the inexplicable.

"Agreed. Let us leave that there." I paused. "I saw the Arryn boy in the yard. I liked him, and I think the feeling was mutual." At that Doran's face pinched as though he had bitten into a lemon. Unexpected.

"That is Axel Arryn. My ward, if one can call him that." An interesting addition.

"Tell me more." It grew more interesting with every passing moment.

"He avoids me. Will not engage, deflects everything with vague phrases that mean nothing." Whatever they had told him about Doran, it must have been quite something.

"Do you know why he treats you that way?"

"He despises me. He tries to hide it, but it surfaces on his face now and then." The boy was getting rather bold. Someone would need to teach him a lesson. But Doran continued:

"The amusing part is that his contempt has nothing to do with my illness. He despises me and refuses to hear me out because I did not take vengeance for my own kin." I took my words back. I could not entirely accept Doran's choice of peace myself."

Enough. The rest can wait. Now tell me how things went here while I was away."

"Well enough. It was quiet without you, right up until your daughters arrived."

"Now hold on, leave my daughters out of this. They are good girls, and..."

And so the two brothers talked on until evening.

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