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364 AC, Winterfell
Brandon Stark, Archmaester of the Higher Mysteries in the Citadel of Winterfell, and currently one of the most experienced magic users in Westeros, and perhaps even beyond, found himself growling in frustration in his laboratory, which happened to be on the highest tower in the famous fortress, one seemingly built by Bran the Builder himself.
He had mostly chosen it, despite his aching bones, because it was silent and away from the mayhem of the castle. House Stark had grown large over the years, and reunions tended to be loud, something that he found himself losing patience with, as he became older.
Brandon was an accomplished man, having standardised the manner of training of an entire kingdom's Skinchangers, as well as having rediscovered the lost art of Earth Magic, and translated many of the runes littered around the North. As a Greenseer, much of the Seven Kingdoms was visible to him, and most of their secrets were laid bare, both in the present, past, and sometimes even glimpses of the future, though the latter was not his greatest strength.
No, he focused on the past, for it was fascinating indeed, and he learned to appreciate the progress that they had made as a people in the last few centuries. However, there had been something that always niggled in his mind, and that of many historians before him, for the history of the Seven Kingdoms were often separated between the times before and after Aegon the Conqueror conquered Westeros, and yet there was a greater separating point, one that truly designated the start of a new era, and that was the Great Council of 123 AC.
Brandon always thought that the world had changed greatly before the Great Council was even announced, and the evidence of it was littered in parchment all over the table before him. He looked at the first one on top, though he had read it a thousand times, at the very least.
The Scourge of the East during the Year of Calamities
by Archmaester Gyldayn of Oldtown
It was often said that there are decades where nothing happens and there are weeks when decades happen. Though this was said to me by a common man, I must admit that these words were wise indeed. And one needs only to look at a single year, 123 AC, to find proof of that statement, for there is a reason why it is often called the Year of Calamities in the East.
While this year was one of great change in Westeros, as evidenced by King Viserys the Peaceful's infamous Great Council, the continent of Essos suffered many calamities, starting with the Second Doom of Valyria. The eruption of the Fourteen Flames had thankfully been less damaging than the one that caused the Doom of Valyria, but it was, without a doubt, just as damaging in the long run. It was only in 192 AC, when Samarro Saan of Lys discovered that Valyria was safe to sail through once more, and returned to Lys with piles of gold, that the Second Century of Blood truly began, an endless war between the Triarchy, Volantis, and the cities of Slaver's Bay, for the ruins of Valyria. Notably, what little had been recovered of the city were certain warped pieces of gold and Obsidian, but reports claim that not a single piece of Valyrian Steel had been found in the formerly cursed remains, something that made the material even more coveted across the Known World.
This war culminated in a slave revolt in Mereen that spread across Slaver's Bay, founding the Unchained Empire of Ghis, which remains to this day. Volantis's fall in 267 AC, with the Old Blood's infamous massacre at the hands of the Children of the Rhoyne, followed by the sinking of the city by an impressive army of Water Mages, further destabilised the region during the conflict.
At the time, the Children of Rhoyne was a movement created from the dissatisfied Dornish who had fled to Essos after the invasion of Dorne by King Daeron Targaryen, the First of his Name. They had found refuge in the rediscovered city of Chroyane, which had been strangely free of Greyscale, a plague that was infamous in times past, which resulted in skin irritation and madness. The movement hoped to conquer the river Rhoyne in its entirety, though the rising number of Dothraki incursions with the scattered presence of Water Mages across outposts made such expansion short-sighted. It was Princess Elia of Chroyane, a Water Mage of great Renown, who started a conservative movement to focus on the development of Chroyane and toppled the Council of Mages. Her line still rules the New Rhoynar to this day.
However, that paled in comparison to the fall of Asshai in 123 AC, and to this day, it remains embroiled in mystery. The city had become deserted in mere days, with the few survivors having fled to King's Landing, resulting in the infamous Shadowbinders' assault on our capital, and their death thanks to the conjoined efforts of Cregan Stark, the White Wolf of the North, and Aemond Targaryen, the One-eye. Few know the true reasons why the remnants of Asshai left their city so quickly, and any attempts at rebuilding the city and its strategically important port ended in disaster. Mages had been requested to see the presence of a curse, though very little was found.
And so, the text continued with more explaining what little they knew regarding the fall of Asshai, and the affairs of Essos. It had taken Brandon much to find this text, and while it had filled many of the gaps in his theories, many remained unknown. He had re-read it half a hundred times, and he always hoped to find some more insight, a clue given what was to come.
After all, Brandon could not simply leave the North on a whim. He was one of the Kingdom's greatest assets, both as a safeguard against foreign mages and to serve as a deterrent to House Targaryen's zealous desire to consolidate their power over the Seven Kingdoms, especially with House Stark's growing independence in recent centuries.
It did not escape him that most did not like the North's prosperity. It was a Kingdom that made up almost half of the continent, with a rising population, which made it a very attractive target for immigration. The cities built around the gold and silver mines were becoming quite populous indeed. From the looks of it, every kingdom, from Dorne to the Riverlands, wished to see the North humbled, and Brandon had spent decades unravelling their schemes, while also securing their border north. The Wall Lake served as a suitable deterrent to the wilding raids, as it forced them to either build a fleet or swim through, something that Brandon could deal with, but it was their Ice Mages and Skinchangers that posed a true threat to House Stark, that and House Umber's greed for the ample resources in the North, which often resulted in needless conflicts.
Ah, but it was not his problem, not anymore. He had trained his replacement, the shield of the North, his nephew Cregan, allowing Brandon to truly focus on his true passion, the discovery of what truly occurred on 123 AC.
Even to a Greenseer of his calibre, the year was almost completely hidden from his sight, at least any notable event was. To this day, people debated on the fall of Pyke and the supposed Death of the Drowned God. Truthfully, Brandon had tried, out of curiosity, to see the Iron Born before the Kingdom's all but became a smaller section of the Westerlands. He had once pitied their loss of culture until he observed their people. To this day, Brandon did not know how a culture built almost entirely on reaving could have existed for so long, but he did not mourn their disappearance. The fact that they were slavers in all but name helped assuage what little pity he had about their fate to this day.
And yet, despite this day, the day of Pyke's fall was lost to him completely. Merely approaching it was suffocating, as if he had been drowning. Harrenhal was much the same, with it shining a blinding golden light that stopped Brandon from seeing anything.
Brandon was not the only one to have suffered. Divination through Glass Candles was a known skill across the Citadels of Westeros, though it was concentrated in the Citadel of Dragonstone. The instruments had replaced the slow ravens of the Citadel of Oldtown through the efforts of Prince Baelor the Seer.
Divination into the past was tricky, and many events were hidden from them. Brandon had been surprised to know that not many had impressions of the event, not like he did, which he pushed to create a ritual to stop it.
For example, prior to Cregan Stark's return from the Far North, the lands North of the Wall had been completely and blind to anyone, and Brandon had long since given up, after he felt the chill cold that still brought him nightmares.
Brandon's best theory was that these locations had been affected by magical events of sorts, with high concentrations of magic that muddled any attempt to witness them once more. This gave some credence to the legends surrounding Cregan Stark, especially those spread by the Free Folk of the far North, which had rendered him into an almost divine figure. The White Wolf, the man who slew Winter itself. Aside from Bran the Builder, Cregan Stark was arguably one of the most well-known Starks in history. It was claimed that he ranged North of the Wall, which had been seven hundred feet high at a time, and defeated the gods of winter, decreasing its length. He had also presumably bartered with the last Children of the Forest to turn the North into a fertile land.
Brandon did not know if it was true, only that he recognised that some kind of blessing was present only in the North.
Of course, common folks in the South nowadays did not believe that winter had ever lasted more than a few moons at a time, and perhaps even some lords did not care. However, the North remembered. Winter had been etched in their memory for thousands of years, especially as Starks, and it was evident that something in 123 AC changed the seasons.
Again, with that cursed year. Brandon swore that it was taunting him, luring him with the mystery that would not be solved. Ice, House Stark's blade, was another mystery that would not be solved. He only knew that Cregan Stark had somehow found it beyond the Wall and had left his former weapon, one made of Valyrian Steel, behind, claiming that it was lost. There had been many attempts at finding the sword, given its immense worth, but all were unsuccessful.
The weapon itself was strange and glowed in a manner that was similar to Dawn, the ancestral sword of House Dayne, which suggested similar origins. However, reports of Cregan Stark's prowess in battle during the Shadowbinders' assault on King's Landing defied anything that any wielder after him was able to do.
People thought that it was a boast of a treasured ancestor, one who had saved the royal family and their dragon with a handful of men at best, one who had slain Shadowbinders and their beasts alike, a man who had brought the Gift back to the North, though that act became meaningless after the inevitable dissolution of the Night's Watch. He had ruled for decades, growing into an old man, and brought prosperity to the North and saw the Kingdom rise to unseen heights, and it all started in that cursed year, in 123 AC.
Brandon had a theory that many of these events were perpetrated by a single man. It was no coincidence that so many strange and extraordinary events occurred in the same year, all of which started from Dragonstone. The fortress itself was utterly and completely hidden from any form of Farsight for a decade, and it was set up first, marking it as a potential source of the mystery that plagued much of Brandon's mind, and there was one single figure, a rumour, truly, that could fit: the legendary sorcerer of Dragonstone.
Accounts of the man were sparse, and even the name was drowned in mystery. A few thought that it was this Harry Potter, whom King Viserys the First had personally named a few hours before the Shadowbinders' attack on the Capital, though most thought that it was either a disgraced member of House Potter of the reach, or just a merchant that the King had befriended in his youth.
Finally, Brandon would have the truth. He had done it, after decades of work. He had seen a crack in the protections of King's Landing, specifically on the exact same day that the Great Council of 123 AC was announced by King Viserys.
And finally, Brandon would have his answers. It had taken him decades of delicate work to do it, but he was finally ready to finish it.
He knelt down and cut through his palm. The Greenseer used his very blood to write the runes of the first men, his runes, and he closed his eyes, preparing to weave through the roots of possibilities that the Weirwood provided him.
He navigated back, and the further he went, the more pressure he felt, especially as he narrowed down to that dreadful and cursed year. He growled as he pushed through, as he sneakily flew in between the oppressing darkness, until finally, he found it once more, the crack.
Brandon jumped into it and gasped as the pressure dissipated. He looked around and saw a world turned grey. He hummed to himself in thought. This was likely the remnants of contamination from the Shadowbinders' attack, maybe.
Brandon moved towards the King and saw him remove the disgraced princess Rhaenyra as his heir, a sensible move given her actions. A few postulated that it was a cruel one, given the fact that a movement of supporters claimed that her madness was the result of a bargain with the Red Faith, which they gave her the 'Phoenix Tear' that healed her father, though there was no proof that Rhaenyra Targaryen had any contacts to any members of the fallen faith before their attack in the Capital, and that she had been simply put under a spell.
Truthfully, Brandon cared very little for the motivations of a princess who had been dead for centuries, for it took only a few looks at her eldest children to understand that King Viserys's actions were correct ones. It was obvious that the rumours of her children's parentage were true, given their features, which meant that it would have all but guaranteed a civil war in the near future. Some might even call it kinder that she was disgraced by suffering under some kind of magic, instead of publicly declaring her to have borne three bastards.
As he looked at Princess Rhaenyra, he stiffened as he noticed one of the Targaryens turn towards him, in confusion. The first thing that Brandon noticed that was unusual was the fact that her eyes were purple, which contrasted with the lack of colours in the rest of the world around her.
Brandon quickly recognised the woman as Helaena Targaryen, a very mysterious figure in House Targaryen's history. Not much was said of her in public records, but it was strange that most private accounts of her painted her as some kind of terrifying figure, though most of the accounts sounded almost hysterical in nature. Perhaps the rumours of her magic held a spark of truth, given how different her eyes looked compared to the rest of the monochrome world.
"She can see you, you know," a voice spoke up behind him, making Brandon jump in fright despite his age, his heart beating more strongly than it ever had in decades.
Brandon quickly conjured a wolf made of mist against his attacker, which immediately scattered away. Finally, he looked up, and his eyes widened as he looked at a thin, ordinary man wearing strange clothes and who wore spectacles before their invention. But his eyes almost glowed green, illuminating the monochrome world around him.
"You're certainly a long way from home, Stark," the man answered in amusement.
"You're…" Brandon stammered, "You're the sorcerer of Dragonstone."
The man snorted, "Is that what they call me, in your time? I suppose it's humbler than my other titles. Daphne never lets me hear the end of it."
"How are you speaking with me? This… This is history. It is the past. It is finished."
"A wise man once said that people assume that time is a strict progression of cause to effect, but actually, from a non-linear non-subjective viewpoint, it's more like a big bowl of wibbly wobbly, timey wimey, stuff."
Brandon gave him an unimpressed look, which made the legendary figure chuckle, "Don't think too much about it… Now hush; this is getting good."
The Archmaester found his mouth unable to open, as the man continued to stare at King Viserys, especially the outrage as he called for a Great Council. It was a momentous occasion, one that he was likely the only person of his time to have witnessed, but Brandon found it to be a curse, as he could not voice any of the questions that he asked him.
Finally, after a few torturous minutes of being unable to speak, the sorcerer turned to him and blinked, "Oh. I forgot about you. I suppose that you have impressed me well enough. Don't do this again, though. Have a nice trip back, little wolf."
Brandon opened his mouth to protest, only for the sorcerer to raise a finger and touch his chest. Immediately, the world turned green, and the Greenseer found himself yanked back from the vision, through the endless network of roots, and finally stumbling back into Winterfell, falling on the floor of his solar.
The Archmaester groaned as he stood up, only to freeze as he noticed a green glowing fingerprint on his chest, one that slowly morphed into a wolf, before settling like one of these Essosi Tattoos.
To think that there could be magicks that can be affected throughout time itself. Brandon had never entertained the idea.
As he touched it, a small spark of knowledge lit up in his subconscious, which called this… thing a magic crest, which was a magical way to store and pass down magical skills to the next generation. It was… It was a great gift indeed; perhaps it was because he impressed him somehow.
He looked back and remembered those green eyes, the casual way that he wielded magic so efficiently. Brandon couldn't help but shiver at the helplessness he had felt, becoming literally speechless, from the power of a sorcerer who was centuries in the past. Brandon's mind still rang with the warning that he was given.
Perhaps he should set aside his obsession regarding this 'Year of Calamities'. After all, he had enough to preoccupy him with this new magic crest. Better to leave the past undisturbed, where it could not harm him.
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AN: This is a bit of a mixture between an interlude and a historical chapter. I always wanted to show a bit of the long-term consequences of Harry and Daphne's actions and thought that this would be a neat way to do it. It's a bit of an experimental chapter, so if you like to see similar ones, please leave a comment. As usual, please let me know what you think and if you have any suggestions.
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If you want to support me, check out my patréon at https://www.patréon.com/athassprkr
I tend to upload drafts of early chapters on there to get people's opinions on them, so you can read up to 20 chapters ahead as a bonus.
Thank you guys for your support in these hard times.