A/N: Welcome to my latest story, The Seadragon's Roar. If you're new to my work, welcome and please do be sure to check out my other stuff, and if you're familiar with my stuff then I hope you enjoy this one as well. Next three chapters chapters on my patreon(https://www.patreon.com/c/Oghenevwogaga)— same username as here and link in bio.
103 AC
"So what are you going to call this one?" Laena asked as we watched my latest invention come off the assembly line. The assembly line itself was one of my inventions. It allowed the shipyards of Driftmark produce ships just as quickly as the famed Arsenal of Bravos. House Velaryon ruled then waves and I would not see our dominance contested by a city of merchants and bankers. Losing my bid for the throne had actually been a boon in a lot of ways. For one, it had shown Father that I could be trusted to handle certain things on my own. I'd turned a sure loss into a narrow thing with a single speech and I'd put that same convincing spirit to work in getting his leave to work on my ships.
"The Red Queen" I said.
"No fair. You already named two ships after Mom. I want one named after me" My sister whined. Just looking at us, it would have been impossible to take us for anything other than twins. We weren't, of course. But enough people made the mistake that it was just less stressful to go with the flow than it was to oppose it.
"And what would you see me name this ship, dearest sister."
"Call her the Laena Velaryon" She said.
"Just your name?"
"Just my name" She nodded.
"That's a terrible idea." I said, but the smile on her face told me it was one she was going to be sticking by.
—
The Laena Velaryon came off the line to applause from a small crowd of Velaryon watchers and well-wishers. Complete, it was a stout, broad-beamed sailing ship. Reminiscent of what would have been a 15th-Century Carrack. Not like I knew how to build one from scratch but the Velaryons employed some of the best shipwrights in the world, and with an idea here and there, we'd been able to create this masterpiece. The hull was rounded, built out of overlapping planks that gave it a warm brown finish. At its stern rose a tall boxy aft castle with two steeped decks, made to make defending the ship easier. The forecastle was at the bow, forming a raised platform in front of the main deck. It had three masts, a towering main mast, a slightly shorter foremast, and a raked mizzenmast behind the main mast. Both the two prior masts carried large square sails hung from horizontal yards with the mainmast flying a smaller topsail above. The mizzenmast was rigged with a triangular sail angled back towards the stern, making it easier to steer and tack.
From the ships bow came a slender bowsprit braced by stays and hosting another small sail, yard swung almost like a mini foremast. Across its body was a forest of shrouds, ratlines, and backstays, acting as crew ladders and helping to stabilize the spars. For decoration, there was a single flag— a grey dragon above a deep blue sea. That was my own standard and every ship I'd designed would wear it.
"How fast is she?" Vaemond asked, looking at my beauty with awe in his eyes. The first things my assembly lines had produced were the kin of ships House Velaryon had made for decades at this point— Galleys. This. This was something new.
"My calculations say we should be able to get her about as fast as a galley" He snorted.
"At that size? Impossible" His disbelief was clear. The Laena Velaryon was the biggest ship in High Tide's harbour, and it wasn't even close.
"Her sails, unique design, and rare components mean she can catch the wing at just the right angle and bearing to move faster than anything her size should even dream of being capable of. But she is only the first of this platform. The Laena Velaryon is a pleasure ship more than anything else, and so is equipped with eight luxury cabins, fifty servant quarters, a massive kitchen, and a wide sailor's cabin. It is to be a castle on the sea, a display of Velaryon dominance even as we travel over the tides. It is to be your ship, Sister" I said to her, turning to her once I said the last sentence.
"Mine?"
"Yes, yours."
"You wanted to go to Bloodstone to look for a certain Bronze dragon did you not?" This is the ship that will take us there" I said finally.
"You're coming along?"
"You think mother and father would let you go alone?" I asked with a chuckle. And it was true. It had taken everything I had to convince them that this was a worthwhile journey. For some reason, Rhaenys had been willing to consent on my word alone, but Corlys himself had needed more convincing. In the end, only the fact that as a Velaryon heir, I was yet to undertake any significant naval voyages of my own and was about to reach my tenth birthday. I might have been a prodigy of never seen before talent, but House Velaryon's power came from our ships and the men who sailed them. Those men would not respect me if they did not see that I could join them in their element and thrive.
"The two of you will sail from here to Bloodstone, spend a week docked there, and then return— Vhagar or no Vhagar" Corlys clearly wasn't much hopeful of us catching the Bronze Bitch but I had a feeling. The kind feeling that I knew not to ignore. It was the kind of feeling that ad made me reinforce the ship's massive aft castle even before the idea had come to use it as a landing platform for Igneel in emergency situations. Well, that was when his dedicated barge could not serve.
"Now, show me the other thing you have been working on, my son" He said.
"Well, this one is less showy, but here we go" I said, waving at the man on the other end of the harbor. He waved back to show he got the message. And my second ship began to make its way from the line.
The second ship was something that I'd gotten the idea of from my previous life. It was an aircraft carrier— designed for the only kind of aircraft that called this world home— Dragons. That meant it was essentially a massive barge. I'd designed it for igneel, an taking his seemingly endless rapid growth into account, made it suited for something half again his current size so that meant ti could carry a wagon like meleys even if it would be a bit cramped for the red queen herself.
It had a massive deck that was essentially one. Giant mechanized platform. With a set of pulleys and levels, the deck could be opened to reveal an internal hold large enough for Igneel to nap within for a few hours quite comfortably; I'd checked a few times to be certain. Even the darkness within was not much of an issue for the dragon as they were used to sleeping in dark caves. I had no idea how he would react to the rocking of the vessel in the open seas or how he would manage the colder knights when he would be unable to heat up his surroundings with his breath— on account of being a boat made of wood. But both of those were concerns that could be addressed in time— would have tone addressed in time more like.
The potential of being able to ship around our weapons of medium destruction was too massive not to be pursued, If it meant I would have to figure out how to build a boat from steel with present resources, then that would be it.
"For Igneel" I said to Corlys' look of confusion.
"I call her the Dragon Carrier. She is designed to be crewed by no more than half a dozen people. It would get smoked by most things on the open ocean in a race, but it wouldn't struggle to keep up at cruising speeds. If it ever came to it, the dragon would never be more than an hour's flight away from the rest of the crew.
"So this is your insurance. The thing you think would make it impossible for me top refuse you and your sister this trip" He said. I shrugged. He'd already given his permission but if he wanted to play it up for some reason then that was his right.
"Assemble your crew and sail forth in a sennight, my son. Go do me proud" He said, placing a hand on my shoulder even as his voice softened. I nodded, not quite understanding where he was coming from. Laena was the one with a task to carry out. I just had to make sure she was safe while she did it.
—
Early on in our journey, I had to make a choice on what to do when we encountered Pirate vessels. We were a modest fleet— if you could call two ships a fleet, that is. And the Velaryon sails we flew were more bait than warning. This world was too large for anyone to care much the danger of posing off House Velaryon by taking two ships. The Laena Velaryon with her unique size and bearing was also a tempting target for many, or at least I had suspected she would be and wasn't surprised to see black sails gaining on us as we cut a straight path to Bloodstone.
The Stepsons were pirate infested at their best, and so we weren't caught my by surprise. "Position, Lord Laenor?" The true captain of this vehicle called out. I simply stared down the approaching ship. The Dragon Carrier was behind us, but not much so.
"Send a signal to the crew of the Dragon Carrier" I said and watched with a telescoping eye— a far eye in local parlance as the top half of the deck was removed. My bond with Igneel meant he could feel exactly what I wanted him to do, and his nature meant he wanted to do it as well . The Dragon Carrier lurched abruptly as Igneel shot into the air. I had a theory about dragons.
Sure, they were all roughly the same species, but I was beginning to doubt that they were all the same race. Some dragons were just much too different from others. For example, looking at Caraxes and Meleys next to each other made it clear that Caraxes was far more serpentine than the rest of his race. Most of his mass was concentrated around a long neck and an even longer tail. Why did this matter? Because of Igneel. Igneel was different from both Caraxes and Meleys. His body, while massive had a lot of mass in his midsection, legs, and wings. His tail and neck were shorter even than Meleys. That meant that when he pushed off it was with those powerful legs and he pushed himself so far into the air before his wings caught a wind and began to rapidly flap, carrying him high into the air faster than any other dragon I'd seen could manage.
At present, his straight-line acceleration was better even than Meleys. She could turn with far more grace than my missile of muscle and fire could so she still won most of our races but they were close things now rather than being the farces they used to be. In no time at all, Ignoble made it to the ship approaching us. With my far eye, I could see the pirates begin to panic as they realised what was upon them.
"Dracarys" I whispered to myself, and just like he had heard my voice, Igneel's mouth opened and from it came a torrent of blue flames that carved a trench in the ship in one blow. I smiled at the result of our training. Dragon flames were not just hot, but they were also explosive. That was the trait that Aegon the Dragon had used to deadly effect in many of his sieges, and it was the same one Igneel used to put an end to our enemies.
He did one more pass over the ship— or what remained of it— sending red flames all over her body, setting it on fire before flying back to his carrier. The crew who had gathered to watch suddenly began clapping and hooting. Even the skeleton crew of the Dragons Carrier were letting out their own cheers before Igneel landed in the hold a few seconds later, making the boat lurch again, and this time sending one man overboard.
"Man overboard" I cackled.
"That was so cool" Laena beamed from my side. How the hell had I forgotten about her?
"It was, wasn't it?"
"Hell yes, it was. He went vroom, and then he went whoosh, and the ship just went crack, crack, boom. It was over in like seconds" She said with all the glee of an eleven year old witnessing wanton destruction. Could I have pursued less violent means with the pirates? Probably. They'd probably have turned away, giving up on trying to take us if I had shown Igneel as a threat rather than using him immediately. Even just telling them I was an actual son of the Sea Snake and not just a random cousin flying the Banner would probably have had them turning around not wanting the smoke, but those were probabilities. What was a certainty? Putting them in the ground for good and leaving them there.
"You can't wait till we find Vhagar, can you?" I asked with a smirk. She shook her head and then began enthralling me with tales of what she had read about the Bronze beast that would have in another world burned her name into history with her actions in the Dance of Dragons.
—
It turned out that finding a massive dragon at least double the size of every other known living being was harder than it seemed. The report had said she'd been roosting on Bloodstone. But when we arrived, the locals had been more than willing to tell us that she hadn't been spotted in weeks. Instead, she had moved to some of the other islands. So that was what we did. We went from port to port searching for the dragon. The sailors had opposed, trying to adhere to Corlys' earlier instructions but the Sea Snake was a sea away and my dragon had burned three ships on the way here. All I had to do was ask and all Igneel had to do was roar.
Everywhere we went, we received word that the dragon had been by just recently before relocating to another island. It was like the thing was laughing at us. Especially when our supplies began to dry up and the Laena Velaryon began to develop faults. Her sails had gotten tangled more than once. We'd had the foremast nearly snap during a sudden storm just out of Torturer's Deep— an isle that had more than earned its name, and had to stop at one of the ones too small to get a name to both wait out the next storm we could see coming and make repairs. Just another barren set of storm-swept rocks in this kingdom made of barren sets of storm-swept rocks. I could see why Daemon had given up on this place when he had taken it.
But then I could also see why Corlys had made common cause with him to take it in the first place. The Stepstones had potential. They were not a kingdom in the vein of somewhere like the Reach where everything from wine to grain could be sourced locally. No, its economy would always be dependent on trade to see it survive but that was not a bad thing. It was perfectly placed to take advantage of said trade— place smack dab between Dorne, Westeros, and the Free Cities of Essos. There was a reason this place managed to keep so many pirate bands alive and prospering after all. The more I saw of it, the more I knew I wanted it, and even better I would not need to convince Corlys to take it.
Daemon would come to him with his harebrained scheme, Corlys would make common cause with him and then I would find myself fighting for the fate of these islands. Except that I would be sure to swoop in once he got bored of them and turn them into something more. Something worthwhile. Maybe he would press a claim once I developed them, but then he would be far too late.
It was while I schemed, staring into the ocean that I saw a flash of Bronze off to the side. I turned to find the Bronze Bitch herself nary an island over dragging a whale into the beach. Gods, she was massive. Easily five times Igneel's size and more. While she couldn't just rip him in half with one large bite like she had with Arrax, she wouldn't need three at his present size.
Against my better instincts, I froze with fear. Luckily for us all, my sister had no such higher functions, and she'd turned once she saw me frozen. "There she is" she yelled for all the sailors to hear.
—
With Vhagar's size it proved difficult to convince the crew to sail The Laena Velaryon over to the next island. I considered just flying Laena over on Igneel but then that would bear the risk of having her smell like another dragon and maybe drawing Vhagar's ire. In the end, the best choice was a boat. A small fishing boat. Two of the bravest— or greediest for I had offered a substantial amount of gold for those willing to take the chance— bore the burden of rowing the two of us over to the next island.
By the time we arrived, Vhagar was just about being done with meal and so I was forced to temper Laena's enthusiasm to get her to wait for the dragon to finish polishing off the last bits of charred flesh. When she did, there was naught I could do to keep her from her chosen dragon.
"Vhagar, Lykiri" She screamed her will in the massive beast's direction.
A/N: And so we get more Velaryon-ing, It's unknown when Laena claimed Vhagar but it was probably later than 103 AC— not much later though since we know she had the dragon at some point during her being considered as Viserys' wife. Here, she claims the dragon earlier spurred on by a sibling with a cool dragon of his own. Next three up on patreon(https://www.patreon.com/c/Oghenevwogaga)( same username as here and link in bio), support me there and read them early.