The Fire Changes Sides

The red woman was Melisandre, servant of R'hllor, the Lord of Light. In an age when magic had dwindled, her miracles were convincing enough to win followers. Among them was Stannis's wife, Selyse Florent.

Selyse trusted Melisandre completely. She believed in the Lord of Light with the zeal of a true convert. Around her, the queen's men grew bold and began pressing against the king's men who still held to the Seven.

When Stannis felt most isolated, Melisandre's hand had reached him. He chose to gamble on her. For his crown.

Everything seemed ready when an unexpected party landed on Dragonstone and disrupted the plan. A soldier came to report.

"Your Grace, a group of sellswords claims they came to help you. They request an audience."

"Sellswords?" Stannis said. "I have no spare coin for hungry wolves."

His mouth was harsh, but he received them anyway. At first sight, he knew these were not the loose, half-piratical mercenaries he was used to seeing around the Narrow Sea.

"Which company are you from?"

The envoy showed no fear of a king's displeasure.

"The Blood Wolf Company."

"Blood Wolf?"

Stannis did not know sellsword names well, but Davos quietly reminded him. The Blood Wolf Company had risen fast. They had fought Dothraki screamers and survived. They had earned a name in the Disputed Lands and the Stepstones.

That meant courage. It also meant ability. No wonder they dared involve themselves in a war between brothers.

"How many men do you have?"

The envoy answered with enough confidence to make even Melisandre look twice. Davos, however, did not dismiss it.

As a former smuggler, he still heard things from pirates and sailors. In recent years, too many of those stories had mentioned the Blood Wolf Company.

He knew one particular matter that would not flatter Westerosi pride, and chose not to mention it before the king.

Stannis liked strong allies, but strength always came with a price.

"What do you want?"

The answer shocked the room. Dragonstone. Stannis's brief approval vanished. The demand was humiliation. How could a man who meant to be king accept the loss of a royal island?

If he gave away such land before taking the Iron Throne, the realm would call him weak before he ever sat it.

The castle was more than stone. It was the seat Robert had given him after the rebellion, the sour prize he had never been allowed to forget.

To surrender it to sellswords would feel like admitting that even his grievances could be purchased. The envoy seemed unmoved by their anger.

"Your Grace, do you know why we came to you instead of Renly?"

Stannis's jaw tightened.

"Dragonstone is not fertile. Even if we hold it, it gives us little beyond a harbor and a name. We can take the burden from you and still swear to your rule. Is that not useful to both sides?"

Davos had expected the company to ask for land closer to Dorne or the Stormlands, somewhere near the Arm of Dorne and their growing base. Dragonstone was symbolically important, but materially poor.

It fed few people, drained stores, and tied men to a hard rock in the sea.

That was why the demand troubled him. It was not mere greed. A greedy company would ask for fat land and ports with trade.

Dragonstone meant ships, legitimacy, and a foothold that could be either burden or blade depending on who held it.

"Why not Renly?" Stannis asked.

He almost did not want the answer, but pride demanded it.

"Because we dislike the men surrounding him," the envoy said. "You are noble as well, but in you we see the qualities of a king. Sternness. Resolve. A gravity Renly does not possess."

It was flattery, but it struck exactly where Stannis was most starved. Further terms would require time, yet once the envoy left, Stannis immediately asked Melisandre for judgment. Davos disliked that reflex.

Still, he endured it and watched the king seek a vision from the flames. Melisandre stood before the brazier. After words Davos did not know, she drew a knife and opened a line across her arm.

Davos stiffened. Then she held the wound above the fire. Her flesh did not burn. Drops of blood fell and vanished into the flame as if the fire drank them.

The sight shook Davos's certainty. He had always disliked the priestess, but this was no common trick.

Melisandre's eyes fixed on the flames. She spoke again, low and strange, while Stannis watched with the devotion of a man who had finally been answered.

It was hard to keep old beliefs before a miracle. What none of them knew was that Melisandre was not acting.

Through the flames, she saw the Lord of Light's revelation. And behind it, she saw the shape that should have been there all along.

Her breath stopped. Visions were often smoke and symbol, fragments that demanded interpretation. This was different. The fire did not whisper of a possible path. It showed her a correction. She had been wrong.

Even the Lord of Light had allowed the error to stand until now.

In the fire, a figure looked back through nothingness. The kingly force around him was so vast that even a servant of a god felt the urge to bow.

He did not look like Azor Ahai reborn. He looked like the incarnation of conquest itself. A king shaped for conquest.

The man Melisandre had truly been searching for. In that moment, she abandoned Stannis.

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