The Warlock

When Xaro turned, he saw Ronan idly handling a powerful bow with the string half drawn.

Xaro was grateful he had not tried anything reckless. Only a man who wanted to die would play tricks under the eyes of someone like that.

He spoke quickly to the slave, gesturing frantically until his instructions were clear.

After the slave returned upward in the wicker basket, he did not disappoint Xaro. With the consent of the officials above, especially one warlock, the tightly shut gates slowly opened again.

The man leading the group wore a robe sewn with countless beads. Blue marked him everywhere, even his lips and eyes.

Ronan knew the color came from long use of a potion called Shade of the Evening. As for why the warlocks drank it, the greatest reason was to draw near the power of magic.

This warlock, who introduced himself as Pyat Pree, focused on the dragons the moment he left the city. After that came Daenerys. As for Ronan, he barely looked at him.

Pyat Pree seemed almost impatient. He paid little attention to Xaro, as though the merchant no longer mattered. What interested him was extraordinary power.

Yet when he passed Ronan, Pyat suddenly stopped. His sharp gaze snapped toward him, and something in those blue eyes seemed to read an impossible phenomenon in Ronan's body.

"The House of the Undying..."

His murmured tone was no different from an old witch muttering prophecy. The Qartheen officials walking with him did not dare show what they truly felt.

They looked down on the warlocks, yet feared them as well. With the disappearance of dragons, magic in the world had grown thin. Everyone knew the warlocks used tricks and mysteries, but no one dared expose them openly.

No one had been fearless enough to face them until Ronan. When the curious warlock could not resist reaching out to touch him, Ronan slapped his hand aside without hesitation.

"Those who offend me rarely end well."

The next instant seemed to prove his words. Pyat clutched his arm and let out a raw, strangled sound. Xaro and the others watched nervously.

Unexpectedly, after the pain passed, the warlock revealed an eerie smile. The burning in his arm had not vanished, but he had endured it, and within that pain he seemed to taste what he desired.

When Pyat looked at Ronan again, he was not angry. Instead, his expression became almost perverse in its delight.

He made no attempt to hide his fascination and invited Ronan to enter the House of the Undying.

Even Daenerys felt they might have met a madman.

Yet from the faces of Xaro and the others, there was clearly more at work. The merchant princes who had been haggling a moment before agreed to the difficult terms after one look into the warlock's eyes.

Xaro's face tightened in pain as he accepted the loss, but he did not refuse the warlock's demand. Everything now depended on whether Ronan was willing to follow Pyat Pree into the House of the Undying.

Pyat longed for the vast power surrounding Ronan far more than anything he had sensed in Daenerys. At this moment, Ronan's importance had already surpassed Daenerys and the dragons combined.

"Well?" Pyat asked. "Dothraki warrior from afar, you will win ten large ships for your princess. That is a rich price."

As the master of the Dothraki Sea, Ronan had not brought Daenerys across the Red Waste merely to find money.

Entering the House of the Undying was one of his goals.

He did not trust the Undying Ones, but he respected the prophecies hidden in their house. He wanted to know whether these half-dead warlocks could speak of his past and future.

"Fine. I agree. But you will provide the ten ships first."

Xaro frowned. "Do you intend to let them leave first?"

"No. I simply trust real benefits more than spoken promises."

That little caution wounded Xaro deeply, but at this point he could only give orders to his trusted men and arrange the transfer as soon as possible.

When Ronan, Daenerys, and their people officially entered the inner city of Qarth, nearly everyone was drawn in by its luxury and prosperity.

Who would have thought such a rich city waited beyond the Red Waste? Compared with the palaces of Pentos, even these streets were more than splendid.

The buildings of the city shimmered in shades of rose, violet, and warm brown. They passed beneath a bronze arch carved as two mating serpents, their scales set with jade, obsidian, and lapis.

Slender towers rose everywhere. In every square, delicate fountains took the forms of griffins, dragons, and manticores.

A great arcade ran through the city, where ancient heroes stood upon white and green marble columns three times the height of living men.

Everything seemed to proclaim that Qarth was no ordinary city. This was the pride and capital of its merchant princes.

Under such grandeur, however, Ronan's expression showed little wonder. He had seen too many marvels across worlds.

To him, these patterns, carvings, jeweled statues, and displays of wealth were at most the taste of prosperous merchants and a little cultural boasting.

Compared with civilizations that had endured for thousands of years, Qarth could not truly stir his interest.

Perhaps only the mysterious House of the Undying gave him a trace of curiosity.

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