S6, Chapter 4: DAENERYS

BAYASABHAD

“You’re going to wake the dragon!”

Mouth gagged with white cloth strained around her head, a knot in the middle, preventing her from uttering audible sound. Frail hands bound behind with rope noosed almost as tight as the two firm handgrips on each of her arms.

A gash on her temple, twin tears of blood traversing her pale cheek. Her grey dress made of meereenese silk, partially covered with mud and sand and stains of fresh blood that had dripped from her chin.

Only the bright full moon lit the muddy, sandy, windswept street where Daenerys Targaryen was being violently dragged like a slave by two Warrior Maids.

Struggling, resisting, using all of the little strength in her arms, hoping one of them would loosen their grip.

She could hear the shouts. Or was it yells? Or chants? She was too far away to discern, but she was getting closer. She straightened her legs and pushed against the pavement, thinking it would slow the pace, but when she hit the pointed corner of carved stone, her bare dirty feet quickly turned from dark brown to bright red.

Dany looked up to her left and saw Moddabha. Moddabha…the kind, generous warrior who offered her turquoise berries as they bonded on the Sand Road… Her grip was so tight that her nails had started to pierce into Dany’s skin.

Muffling, whimpering, pleading with her watered eyes… Moddabha wouldn’t even indulge her a stare. She was marching where she peered, straight in front of her. The warrior to her right was colder still, merciless… but both were dutiful.

They turned the corner, and there it was, the angry mob standing in one gigantic crowd, pushing one another to get the better view, shouting at the top of their lungs, repeatedly throwing their fists in Dany’s direction.

Warriors, elders, mothers, children, even the men…with their shaved heads and white drapes covering their bodies, all smaller in height than the women around them.

Each scream sent a sharp, excruciating pain into Dany’s mind and her frowns formed canyons on her brow. Biting on the knot through gritted teeth, her hands beginning to ache against the strain of the tightened rope.

The violent slurs spitted out by the people of Bayasabhad were indecipherable. Nevertheless, they hurt her inexplicably.

They laughed… “what was so amusing?” As she got closer and closer, the laughter got louder, “Make it stop!” it pierced into her spine.

“You’re going to wake the dragon!” she kept repeating in her mind.

She could feel the wings latching out of her back, but alas, it was only the strokes of the whiplash.

A foot away from the mob and the crowd split itself in two, leaving a path in the middle where at the end of it, a large wooden pier, imitating the one she had built for Khal Drogo.

She saw him up there, sleeping peaceful on a bed of twigs, white drape covering his body. A smile came over her at the thought of a reunion with him, but as she stepped closer, the image of her late husband flew with the breeze and the only shape she could make out, standing at the bottom center of the pier, was the one of Lady Zenad, the old, blind lady who had graciously welcomed her into her home. She was holding a book in one hand, a cane in the other.

“You promised me safekeeping! This place was not so bad, you told me. I will burn you all! Mark my words, each and every one of you will burn under the heel of fire and blood!” Daenerys was screaming with her eyes.

The walk to Zenad felt like a lifetime. Men, women and children alike spat on Dany’s greasy dark-white hair, the saliva dripping onto her face like sap leaking out of a bleeding weirwood. One woman came out of the crowd and ripped at Dany’s dress, revealing one of her breasts.

“You’re going to wake…”

Powerless, sobbing, she arrives in front of Zenad, and the crowd brings the commotion to a halted silence.

Old Zenad, silent eyes glaring at Dany, preaching from the book she was holding in the palm of her right hand, high and loud, a language Dany did not understand, but every word spoken was a dagger in her.

When the recital was over, the crowd roared anew, and the Unburnt was laid down on the bed of twigs attached with cordage stretching arms and legs.

She was still gagged, but it didn’t stop her from sniggering as she stared straight into the starless sky. The moon was more extensive than usual and closer to her than it had ever been.

“I am Daenerys Stormborn of the House Targaryen, the blood of old Valyria, Queen of the Seven Kingdoms, The Unburnt… Do you hear me?! The Unburnt! I’ll show you. You’re gonna wake him. I’ll show all of you!”

As Zenad casts a prayer, the pier is put to flames by Moddabha and the other warrior resting the torches unto the wood.

Rapidly, the sound of their chants was drowned by the crackling of the roaring blaze. Dany could hear the dying twigs from under her, gasping for their last breaths before tumbling into ashes. The ropes, cloth, and clothes binding and gagging her, quickly joined the branches surrounding her and finally…she was free. At last, free to speak. Free to move. She sighed with proud relief as the flames engulfed her… Something was wrong!

Although her skin did not burn, she could feel every inch of agonizing pain. Black smoke slipped inside of her as she was gasping for air. All she wanted to do was jump out of the burning pier with all possible haste but the weight of the smoke breathing inside of her was holding her down.

Paralyzed, she ripped open the dark sky with an interminable cry of anguish that shifted into a dragon screech. Her eyes widened.

DANY: Drogon?!

She looked as far as the eye could see but witnessed only darkness, with only the moon shivering in its center.

The screech came from her… She couldn’t hear their chants anymore, and the flames were too thick for Dany to see any shape or form, but she assumed they were still crowded there, staring at her, silently mocking her.

She screeched again. Mightier this time and for longer as the pain increased with every fleeting second. Her voice was so loud she hoped it would carry as thunder all the way to Meereen and even as far as King’s Landing.

DANY: I am Daenerys Stormborn of the House Targaryen, Queen of the Seven Kingdoms, Mother… Of Dragons… Mother of Dragons! Are you hearing me?! I am the Mother of —

— SCREECH! Interrupted by a screech that didn’t come from her, “that wasn’t me!” her mouth was shut. A winged shadow elevated itself in front of her eyes until it covered the entire moon. Dany cried with joy.

DANY: Drogon! Drogon!

Drogon flapped his wings but stayed in place, looking straight into his mother’s eyes.

DANY: Drogon? I need your help, Drogon. Dracarys!

Drogon was stationary. It was almost like he didn’t recognize who she was.

DANY: Mom’s in pain Drogon. Please… Drogon!

Laughs… She could hear them again. Hundreds of voices laughed as one.

DANY: Make it stop! Make it stop! I am the Mother of Dragons!

The laughter got louder alongside the sound of crepitating flames until streams of blood poured out of her ears…

DANY: YOU’RE GOING TO WAKE THE DRAG —

— The laughter carries and the fire still blazes but their volumes have lowered significantly.

A hand was waving in front of Dany’s eyes. Up and down, then down and up. Dany blinked, and turned to her right, where she ended face to face with Moddabha, who was speaking to her in a foreign tongue, offering a small piece of cooked lamb from her hand.

Dany looks at the meat then looks her up and down and freezes. Moddabha smiles and puts the meat in Dany’s hand, motioning that she needs to eat.

DANY (in a soft, shy, trembling voice): I’m okay.

Dany turns to her left and sees six women warriors seated on the same wooden bench as she is, in a semi-circle, listening and laughing at the stories being shared.

Dany’s eyes then move in the direction of the stories being told and witness seven shaved-headed men, two taller than the others, wearing white drapes covering their entire bodies.

The women on one side of the circle, the men on the other and in between them, a crackling bonfire connecting them. Each person holding long, black charred sticks with chicken breasts impaled at the pointy end of them, extended unto the blaze that cooked the meat.

Dany looks up and sees the bright moon in the million starred sky. The tent she was seated in had an open roof and mothers and their children would sometimes come in those tents at night to contemplate their future.

Moddabha’s laugh is contagious and although Dany doesn’t understand a jovial word of it, she follows suit.

Rapidly, what started as a giggle turned into a guffaw and Dany couldn’t remember the last time she laughed like that, or even laughed at all…and she wasn’t sure why she was laughing now. Maybe because everyone was doing so or because she wasn’t burning on a pier for eternity? Nevertheless, she was relieved.

Daenerys was so focused on her own laughter that she didn’t even realize everyone around her was standing in silence; Lady Zenad had entered the tent. Dany ceased the hilarity abruptly and stood in her turn.

Moddabha spoke some words to Zenad which Dany assumed was an invitation to share a seat with them. The white-haired lady politely declined.

ZENAD: Lady Dany.

Daenerys swallows the bite she had been chewing, smiles at Moddabha, and leaves the tent as the rest of the flock resumes the festivities.

Daenerys and Zenad ambled on the stone pavement illuminated by the fires burning in the surrounding tents, and the moon, and stars adding a transparent glow. Daenerys looked where she walked and she could see herself be dragged again but when she looked around, there was no lighted pier or laughing crowds; only the chuckling of men and women exchanging stories around the flames.

Zenad’s blind stare was somber and silent and Dany was wary of its meaning. Why has she called on me? Dany was waiting for Zenad to speak but the words wouldn’t come out. Did she find out? Did she find out who I am? Is she disappointed? Is that the meaning of her silence? SPEAK! She wanted to command.

Instead, she remembered that in the five days she’d been here, Zenad had never called on her, and if she was not going to speak, Dany would take advantage of this opportunity to ask all of her questions that have been desperately looking for answers.

DANY: The men seem nice. I don’t speak their tongue but they seem to make the women laugh.

ZENAD: You can ask me what you really want to ask. There’s no secret here.

DANY: Why are they —

ZENAD: — We are the daughters of the Great Fathers, the descendants of Hyrkoon himself, an ancient hero.

From an early age, we are raised to be warriors as it has always been believed that only those who give birth are permitted to take life. We’re trained with bow, knife, sling, spear, name the weapon…

The sons of the Great Fathers, on the other hand, become Eunuchs when they reach the age of manhood. They serve as cooks, craftsmen, farmers, priests, scholars, scribes, servants.

DANY: And… the children? How do you create life?

ZENAD: The most promising males, one out of a hundred, are permitted to mature, breed and become Great Fathers in their turn. Our infants come from them.

Dany, speechless.

ZENAD: It must seem strange… from your point of view, of course. But it is not as cruel as you may think little lady. It is a system that has worked for millions of years.

DANY: Millions?

ZENAD: We were here long before the gods little lady.

Dany didn’t question it. After all, the Targaryen queen never believed in the gods and why would she, her ancestors breathed just as well as gods; pure dragons towering over the lesser with fire and blood.

She was never taught of them; she had nothing against them but she never thought about them.

It was she who rose from the fire that night of Drogo’s funeral, not the doing of some invisible lord in the sky…

DANY: I’m not sure I’ve thanked you enough for everything Lady Zenad. Your people have been most kind to me. I promise to repay that kindness.

ZENAD: No need little lady, no need. We pride ourselves enough on our differences. The savages have their way and we have ours and we survived so far.

The old lady attempted to speak on why she summoned Dany but now, there was no more silence to give her opportunity.

DANY: The savages that you speak of? I did want to talk to you about that. I’ve been hearing horses trotting from my tent. I thought they came from one of you, but the sound was too distant.

Zenad’s pace came to a stop; she felt Dany’s worried stare.

DANY: Last night, I looked through the crack of the stone, in the woods… they were there…

ZENAD: Yes, we’ve had reports. How many have you seen?

DANY: I only saw two. Maybe there were three. They were far away.

ZENAD: You see the archers atop the walls.

Dany looked up and saw dozens of bow women patrolling left, patrolling right, overseeing the grasslands beyond the city’s walls. Although, she couldn’t see them clearly, as the gleam of moonlight made them look like shadows of themselves.

ZENAD: The Joghos Nai may roam in the woods in pairs of twos or fours but if they so much as step a foot into grasslands, an arrow will find their throat before clean air does.

DANY: So, what do they do? What do they want?

ZENAD: What they’ve always done. What they’ve always wanted. They try to find entryway into our city. They’ve been trying for moons and moons. Their last attempt was a failure and the attempt before was too.

I sense worry in your eyes little lady. There is no reason for it.

Dany remembered what Zenad told her about them and their torturous ways. She wasn’t sure if her worry came from the idea of being attacked by them or if it was due to the announcement Zenad had yet to tell her.

ZENAD: They are savages that do not understand discipline. They may attempt attack again but the walls around us have always protected us.

DANY: And the animals they were riding… When they came into the moonlight… I had never seen… They did look like horses but…

ZENAD: Horses… Black striped? White striped?… The enemy calls them Zorses… Some say the Jogos Nhai themselves painted them until the paint became skin, some say the gods cursed the animals during the time of the yellow emperors. And some simply say the mounts are the result of breeding horses with another horse-like species from the southern region of Yi-Ti or the isle of Leng.

No one knows for sure and they may be intimidating at first look but rest assured, the only difference lies with color.

DANY: I apologize for all of the questions but you’re the only one who speaks my tongue and —

ZENAD: — No need to apologize little lady… This is your home now.

DANY: My home?

Zenad’s tone was different. Dany could sense something was wrong.

DANY: Lady Zenad, If I may, why have you summoned me out of the tent?

ZENAD: I traveled as far as my eyes could see. Wherever a new horizon, I would go. I mastered the Common Tongue, the High Valyrian, The Old Ghiscari…

Before I had grey eyes and white hair, I visited Meereen many a times.

When I was there, I would spend my days looking up, admiring the pointy end of the stone triangles who touched the clouds. I would always wonder, how long it must have taken the builders to create such a majestic city…

I wanted to call it my home when I was a girl but my home was here and I had a duty and I stuck by that duty ever since. And my daughter Moddabha will do the same when I join the gods…

I know Meereen is your home but I’m afraid that going back will mean another life in chains.

Dany’s worry turned into fear.

DANY: I don’t… I don’t understand…

ZENAD: The information came from a Yi-Tish trader. We received the report when the sun came down. What we know so far… The masters of Slaver’s Bay have taken back their land.

The city of Meereen is a ruin. Burned… The people, dead or back in chains. Your master… Your friends, they may still be alive but if you go back…

Daenerys was voiceless. She wanted to cry.

ZENAD: I grieve for you little lady, I really do. You could go back to Pentos. Or you could stay with us. You’re more than welcome to stay with us.

Dany wanted to yell but only silence came out to dwell. A small part of her didn’t believe…

She thought of Rhaegal and Viserion, Missandei and Grey Worm, Jorah and Daario, Tyrion… “Were they captured? Were they branded slave again? Did they manage to escape? Were they… dead? They can’t be dead. They must have gotten out. They must have. Somehow?”

Above all, her lingering painful thought was her children: Rhaegal, Viserion. Blaming herself for chaining them in a lifeless cell for a crime they were innocent of. She never meant for them to stay this long; merely to teach lesson… days turned into weeks and now… now, she may never see them again.

“I am the mother of dragons…” She kept repeating in her head over and over again until the words ceased to hold meaning.

ZENAD: I could hardly believe it myself… Where was the queen of dragons? Three dragons beaten by common slavers?

Dany did not respond.

ZENAD: I always hated the slavers and their ways, and I was of the mind that Queen Targaryen would make a better place of Slaver’s Bay, a new thriving land like Essos had never seen before. At last, a fierce, ambitious woman in her rightful place!

A child… Like all child rulers before her. Grand ideas and not one mean to execute them.

Zenad looked into Dany’s tearful eyes like her blindness had expired.

ZENAD: Where was she? Sleeping? Traveling?

Dany looked right back into Zenad’s angry eyes. Her words were daggers she could feel sliding down her spine. And Dany knew the daggers were piercing truth.

The city she had sworn to rule and protect was back in the hands of the enemies she had sworn to destroy. Above all, failure was the hardest fact to swallow for the queen of… the queen of… She wasn’t sure what she was queen of anymore.

Dany was frozen in her thoughts and all she could hear outside of her mind was muffled sound. A bell was ringing in the distance and she could feel commotion shaking the ground around her. Zenad was speaking in her native tongue. She was shouting to Moddabha, who had just come out of her tent with ten Warrior Maids. They ran towards the Main Gate of the city while the white-clothed men ran the opposite way.

A second bell rang. This time, louder. From the South and North. Ding-a-ling! Ding-a-ling! The sound grew louder as the cries of children invited themselves to the choir. The hurried footsteps on the flying gravel was the most declared sound of all, which then decreased as the sound of drawn bowstrings increased.

Dany looked up at the bright circular moon. Her stare was transfixed when the glowing globe was darkening.

Perhaps she hadn’t woken up from her nightmare yet. Maybe Ser Jorah Mormont would knock on her door and wake her up any second now, and she would be in her bed in Meereen, and everything that happened since the gladiatorial pits, was just an awful dream she would soon forget.

As tight as her eyes were shut, the reality was in front of her, descending rapidly. The dark dots of the moon, the size of little comets were approaching, closer and closer until Dany realized…

Dany grabs a frozen Zenad tightly by the arm, and runs out of the radius. Covered under the ramparts, their back, as stiff as the stone wall while a rain of arrows digs into the muddy ground. Dany looks around her, witnessing everyone else covering under the same ramparts; it would seem her intuition was the rule of conduct under this kind of duress.

Zenad wipes the sweat off her wrinkles as she yells out commands in her native tongue. The silent wind blows on the shafts of arrows, only visible by the moonlit dimness.

Dany tightens her grip on Zenad’s forearm while standing straight with a drop of sweat twinkling down her pale cheek.

ZENAD: Do not fear little lady, They can surprise us with their arrows in the dark but they cannot step outside these woods and breathe.

Dany hides her fear. Fear? What did she have to be fearful of? Or for? What did she have to lose? Her life perhaps, and what did that mean? Now that her children, her friends and armies, her people were soon to be memories… For what was there to live?

“Drogon is still alive! Is he? Why is he not by my side when I need him the — No! Why am I not by his side? Why was I not by HIS side when HE needed me the most?”

Clawing at a stranger’s skin, listening to a foreign tongue, standing on unfamiliar land while attacked by yet unseen bandits whose tortures she could already feel, Dany was a little girl again, afraid and alone, with only an old blind foreign lady to trust and count on.

For a moment, nothing more came from the sky beside the warm wind and the rustling twigs. Then, shouts in foreign tongue began again and arrows were shot from the balcony rampart above the main gate.

Dany witnesses the archers sending down arrows and arrows but when they realize the arrows are piercing wood instead of flesh, they cease.

Moddabha in the front, around thirty Warrior Maids had regrouped on the ground in front of the main gate; two to three arrows drawn on the string of every bow, swords unsheathed.

When Dany turned to look to the other side, soldiers on horses galloped through the windswept streets, covering every hidden space of the northern part of the city.

SMASH! Dany quakes where she stands as she turns her frantic gaze to the main gate. Zenad, in her turn, grabs Dany’s forearm, not out of fear but protection.

DANY: What- What was that?

SMASH!! The earth trembles and so does Zenad, Dany and everyone standing on firm ground.

DANY: It’s coming from the main gate!

ZENAD: They used this before. A long time ago. Batter ram I believe they call it in your tongue. A weapon made to destroy wooden gates. But our gate is not made of wood. They cannot come through —

— SMASH! Zenad had a questioning look on her face that did not reassure Dany.

DANY: I thought no man uninvited could come out of the woods. How did they bring the ram to the gate?

Zenad seems to be looking for the answer to that question as well. Dany looked up and saw four dozen female archers on each side of the city balconies, running on their toes, one behind the other, slightly crouched under the crenels as to be protected by the stone. They stopped behind the archers already there.

The entire upper balcony is filled with bow-women, aiming at the outside of the city but the arrows are stuck on the strings refusing to let loose.

Zenad shouts in her native tongue and gets a shout in return.

ZENAD: They tell me they don’t see Joghos Nai, just the ram.

DANY: How can that be?

ZENAD: They must be. They have to be inside the ram.

SMASH!! Zenad shouts at the archers.

DANY: What did they say?!

ZENAD: They can’t see them, they must be protected by the wood of the cart.

.

DANY: But you’re saying the ram cannot destroy the gate. I don’t understand their strategy.

SMASH! Zenad stands unresponsive. She controls her panic. She thinks and thinks until she barks orders at her soldiers. Half of the already small army disperses from their position and ride out south of the city.

DANY: What did you say?

ZENAD: It could be a diversion. They could be attacking from the south. Or sending men to climb over undefended areas. Why are they battering a gate they know won’t give in?

DANY: Maybe they don’t know? Where is the rest of them?

ZENAD: Most likely in the woods.

DANY: How do they expect to reach the gate without being swarmed with arrows?

Zenad doesn’t answer and the battering stops instantly. The shouts of warriors too; with only the distant sound of their fingers tightening on their bow strings.

No man or bird in sight… Tsssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssss.

The strange hissing sound was coming from inside the cart. The sound was unknown to Dany, like a snake slithering its way to its prey and she knew nothing good would come at the end of it.

ZENAD: Yi-Tish pow — It can’t be…

Zenad yells in her tongue as she grabs Dany by the arm and hurries from the gate, her old legs running as fast as she can; and that wasn’t fast enough.

The archers jumped from the balcony into the main square and sprinted. The Warrior Maids on the ground followed while Moddabha grabs her mother’s arm and puts it over her shoulder. Dany does the same with her other arm. Both of them run as fast as they can, holding Zenad, her feet slightly grazing the gra — BRRROOOOOoooMMM.

The battering ram, the wooden cart around it and the main gate of Bayasabhad had vanished into a large puff of gray black smoke that licked the belly of the sky; only small cornered metal debris were still hinged to the stone wall.

Laying on the ground, Daenerys could taste the thick grit of ash and char floating in the air as she was wiping the dust from her eyes. The sounds around her were muffled again and all she could hear was blurry cries of pain and repeated sounds of explosions coming from the south.

She looked to her right and Zenad and Moddabha were lying unconscious. She gazed to her left and dismembered bodies were floating in the dust while children were running hammock.

Dany didn’t see the people of Bayasabhad though, but the people of Meereen. She imagined the carnage that must have went down in her city. The women and children, the former slaves… The butchery!

And when Dany looked in front of her, where the Main Gate once stood, she saw the horses and the Second Sons mounting them.

Except it wasn’t the Second Sons nor their horses cantering in front of her…

The Joghos Nai, a head shorter than the Dothraki, Dany realized first. Squat, bowlegged and swarthy with large heads, small faces, and sallow-colored skin. It was hard to say whether the enemy approaching were women with bald heads or bald men with a single strip of hair running down the center of their pointy skull.

Their mount looked precisely as she had pictured the night before, exact as Zenad described. Zorses…white stripes, black stripes. Dozens and dozens of them quickly surrounding both the old and little ladies, warriors and servants alike…

When the Joghos Nai took away the blindfold from Daenerys, the compact room she was in was barely lit; cold on the right side where a small amount of moonlight penetrated through a small opening in the dry old stone; warm on the left where only a shut wooden door blocked the extreme bright amber light coming from a room on the other side. A room bright as fire where the only cries were ones of torture and song.

When she looked to her right, she saw Zenad and behind, countless of chained women, seated in a single file, chains stuck to a long metal barrel encrusted into both ends of the wall.

When she looked to her left, she saw where Moddabha sat before she was taken into the bright loud room. All Dany could see now is an unarmed bald robust man, guarding the wooden door.

If it was any indication, Dany knew she would be the next one to scream and then it would be Zenad and then the others… The Joghos Nai didn’t seem to respond well to pleading, even less so in a foreign tongue. Their language was less harsh and more melodic than that of the Bayasabhadi, if only their actions were as delicate as their words.

Here, all these women sat, on the cold, dusty ground, helpless, broken as the chants grew louder.

ZENAD: Moonsingers they call themselves, the priests of the Joghos Nai. They worship the moon and when it’s whole and bright like tonight, they believe to be guided by Justice herself. Justice for every Joghos Nai killed from Hyrkoon himself to the Great Fathers of now.

Can you blame them? We would probably do the same to them.

DANY: You said we were safe. No matter what, they couldn’t breach the gate.

ZENAD: I could have foreseen close to everything little lady but Yi-Tish powder…

DANY: Powder?

ZENAD: You put fire to powder and boom… Only the Yi-Tish have that power. They protect it more than their gold. And they hate the Joghos Nai more than we do. How? How did the savages get their hands on it?

Zenad was still stubbornly trying to understand a question she had no answer to; maybe blaming herself in the process for not having anticipated it.

The chants were choking on the cries which became louder and louder.

Dany could hear the slow painful death of Moddabha and she wondered if Zenad could recognize her daughter’s cry amongst the others. It was hard to tell, the blind lady was void of emotion, likely blocking out the sounds of agony, or maybe overwhelmed with thoughts of failure, or perhaps denial took its toll.

ZENAD: Do you think there’s a chance your dragon hears the cries?

Dany turns to Zenad in shock.

ZENAD: When the Warrior Maids found you, they sent a scouting party in the area… They brought back reports of unusual claw marks on a mountain top, then they interrogated nearby small villages, one old man said he witnessed the shadow of a giant falcon.

Dany looks down at her chains, embarrassed by her lies.

ZENAD: We all know giant falcons don’t exist and word that the queen of Meereen was missing spreads fast…

DANY: I apologize. I did not —

ZENAD: — Please. I barely trust my own. In your position, I would have done the same. Your lie held up, I was impressed.

The cries ceased and only faint voices were heard, speaking to one another.

DANY: I failed my people.

ZENAD: So did I. We’ll both die with that dishonor.

DANY: The last time my dragon saved me, I ended up here. And he ended up wounded and weak. I don’t deserve to be saved again.

ZENAD: Deserve… We don’t deserve anything in this life, we take what we can. All we have is our duty and each decision we make, good or bad, must do right by it. And when we are truly lost, we ask help above. Sometimes, they listen and sometimes even, they answer…

Face your death with pride, little lady. Think of all the good you’ve done. It counts for more than you think.

DANY: For what it’s worth, I want to thank you for all you’ve done for me. You might not think it was much but in all my life, I have never been common and for the time spent in your company, I wasn’t queen of Meereen or the breaker of chains, I was Daenerys. I was Dany. I was a little lady. It felt good… I felt free.

Dany cracks a smile as she relieves a weight she never knew she held…

Hearing the wooden door squeaking and feeling warmth filling the room, Dany holds Zenad’s hands, holding back her tears, as a steady firm grip tightens around her arm as it lifts her weightless body to a standing position and forces her feet into the gleaming room.

As she is bound to a wooden structure, her feet still barely touching the ground, she notices the mutilated corpses, the severed blooded head of Moddabha in particular. She sees the bald men singing and praying above and around them. The room is large and round and there seem to be a hundred Joghos Nai marveling at the spectacle.

Daenerys swallowed her fear as she looked up to find an open roof; the same as in the huts of Bayasabhad. Was it the same hut? Were they still in Bayasabhad? Dany wasn’t sure but she was sure she recognized the same stars in the sky. The moon was the same as well and just as bright until a shadow started to take its light away. The moon was darkening while the binds around her wrists were tightening.

Drogon? When is the nightmare going to end? But it didn’t feel like a nightmare or a dream; black dust was covering the moon until it vanished and became one with the sky.

Only the stars were visible and when Daenerys Targaryen looked back down inside the hut, she was stunned to gaze at a hundred Joghos Nai, silent, with fright in their eyes, on their knees, bowing at her feet.