Fire rides the wind!
Lo Quen stopped abruptly, eyes blazing with sudden clarity. He had overlooked the oldest and most effective way the weak could triumph over the strong at sea. Across the vast scroll of history, every miracle of naval warfare that entered legend had used fire as its blade, consuming mighty foes in flames.
"Roro," Lo Quen's voice rang with exhilaration, as though a veil had been lifted, "if we wait for the right wind, strip those heavy merchant ships down to bare weight with only helmsmen aboard, then pack their holds with tinder—dry hay, grease-soaked rags... even tung oil from Spearhandle Village.
Send these 'fire ships' running with the wind, straight into the heart of Salladhor's clustered fleet. Once they strike and ignite... fire feeding on the wind, wind fanning the fire—can you imagine the sight?"
Roro and Hal's eyes lit up at once, as if they already beheld the inferno.
Hal licked his cracked lips, his voice carrying the cruel edge of a pirate. "Burn them to cinders. Those Lysene ships—sails, ropes, tarred hulls—they're perfect kindling. Once alight, no one could save them. But..."
His tone shifted, hard and pragmatic. "To unleash their full power, we'd need to draw the fleet into a strait or bay where they can't spread out or maneuver. Force them into a crush, colliding, trapped. Then none would escape."
Lo Quen's face broke into the most confident smile since the war began. His gaze swept over the two men. "And who better than seasoned sailors like you, who've prowled the Stepstones for years, to know where the natural traps lie? Where can we drive Salladhor and his Lysene allies so tightly that even with wings, they could not escape?"
He clapped Roro's shoulder, then turned to Hal. "Gather every captain who knows these waters. Now. We'll choose a grave Salladhor will never forget."
...
That night, in a stone chamber hastily turned into a war room, lamps burned bright.
A rough sea chart lay spread across a great wooden table. Lo Quen, Roro, Hal, and several veteran pirate captains familiar with reefs, currents, and narrow straits huddled around, voices rising in heated debate.
Charcoal traced routes and marks across the parchment. One site after another was proposed, then struck down.
At last, a name heavy with peril and promise was chosen again and again—Bone-Gnawing Channel.
A narrow passageway hemmed in by jagged volcanic islets, swift waters, reefs thick as teeth. Its mouth allowed only a few ships to pass abreast, yet within lay a deceptively open "pocket."
If Salladhor's fleet could be lured inside, then cut off with fire ships at the mouth and set ablaze...
The balance of victory might be shifted.
The details were refined without pause.
How many fire ships, how to disguise them, the moment to ignite, the covering vessels, the Dragon Soul Guards' ambush onshore—every piece had to align.
By the time the plan was fixed, pale dawn light already touched the sky.
...
The next morning, Lo Quen did not remain on Jawbreak Island to oversee. He left the repairing of ships, the outfitting of fire ships, the drilling of sailors, and the watching of Grey Gallows waters to steady, reliable Roro and Hal, seasoned in pirate war.
He himself, with Jaelena at his side, boarded a swift oared longship and returned to Torturer's Deep.
Though Jawbreak's fortress was broader, more comfortable, with finer walls and lodgings, Lo Quen had never moved his core men and treasures there. To him, Torturer's Deep remained safer—its labyrinthine sea caves, perilous landing points, and perfect secrecy unmatched.
More than that, it guarded what could never be lost: dragon eggs, ghost grass, a colossal block of black stone, and precious tomes carried from the ruins of Valyria.
Janice had stayed there, day and night, tending experiments on ghost grass and poring over those cryptic texts.
His sudden return came from an urgent message she had sent through the Dragon Soul Guards. Her study of the black stone had uncovered something astonishing.
The longship cut through blue waters, winding between jagged reefs, until the grim cliffs of Torturer's Deep loomed into view.
As soon as they landed, Lo Quen and Jaelena moved swiftly through the guarded cave passages, straight to the vast cavern Janice had remade into her laboratory.
The chamber was dim, lit only by a few whale-oil lamps casting pale yellow halos.
The air was thick with brine, the bitter scent of plant sap, and the must of parchment and old ink.
Janice sat with her back to the entrance, bent over a rough stone table, reading by lamplight from a tome so heavy it could have served as a shield.
Her long, silvery hair was tied simply at her nape, though stray strands fell against her pale neck and ears, glinting softly in the light.
Her face was calm and intent, violet eyes racing across the page, long lashes casting faint shadows on her cheeks. In that cold, dark cavern, the glow of her focus made her strikingly beautiful.
Sensing a familiar presence, Janice lifted her head.
When she saw Lo Quen's tall figure at the doorway, joy burst unrestrained in her eyes, like a lantern flaring alight in the gloom.
"Lord."
She set the book aside and hurried forward, her voice carrying a faint, barely restrained excitement. "It's such a relief to see you return safely. The battle at Jawbreak Island..."
Lo Quen smiled warmly and waved a hand. "It went more smoothly than I expected. We gained much, which is why I was delayed."
He moved to the stone table, his eyes falling on the massive tome Janice had just set down.
Its cover was bound in some unknown black leather, the edges badly worn. The spine bore faded gold thread stitched into flowing, intricate runes that seemed almost to shift, radiating an indescribable air of age and mystery.
"Is this your new discovery?"
"Yes, my lord."
Janice lifted the heavy tome with great care, as though it were a priceless relic, and solemnly placed it in his hands.
"Please look here... and here."
She opened the book, pointing to passages written in deep red ink, her neat, crowded notes filling the margins.
"According to this Treatise on the Secret Origins of Valyria, in the distant age before the Valyrian Freehold was founded, the ancestors of the Valyrians mastered a forbidden blood magic ritual of immense power."
Lo Quen accepted the tome. It felt unnaturally heavy and cold in his grasp. He leaned closer, eyes narrowing at the passages she indicated.
The words were in ancient High Valyrian—dense, archaic, laden with symbolism and metaphor—barely legible even to him.
Janice spoke softly at his side, her voice trembling with a scholar's excitement. "The ritual is described as a sacrifice to the stars, meant to gain a power beyond mortal reach... until at last, the stars themselves descend upon the world."
"The stars descend?!"
The words struck Lo Quen like thunder. His heart jolted.
At once, he remembered the frenzied woman shouting in the harbor of Volantis.
Archmaester Marwyn had said she was a priestess of the Cult of Starry Wisdom.
And if the bloodmage of Tyria had spoken true, then the ancestors of Valyria—the emperors of the Great Empire of the Dawn, those named for the colors of their eyes—had been the ones to perform such forbidden rites.
But what was it they had sought in their sacrifices?
What did "the stars descending" truly mean?
A source of great power? Or some catastrophic doom?
Lo Quen's fingers absently brushed the cold, rough parchment as his thoughts surged, speculation and doubt crashing against one another. Could the Doom of Valyria itself be tied to this mad pursuit of the "Descent of the Stars"?
Sensing his shock, Janice pressed on, her words trembling with excitement.
"My lord, the key lies further. To fuel a blood ritual of such scale requires vast stores of magic. The text makes clear this magic does not come from nothing, but is infused through a special method into the core of the rite—this very black stone. That means..."
Her violet eyes glimmered with insight as she turned to the cavern's depths, where the massive stone loomed in silence. "This black stone is itself a vessel, capable of holding magic in unimaginable measure."
Lo Quen followed her gaze. In the dim lamplight, the monolith's surface seemed deeper, its natural runes breathing faintly in the shadows.
Janice drew a steady breath and voiced her boldest conclusion. "Even more remarkable, the text claims this stone possesses powerful powers of purification and refinement. It can draw in chaotic, unstable magical energy from its surroundings—even cursed currents of blood magic, like those that tore loose in Valyria after the Doom—and cleanse them, transforming the chaos into pure, stable magic that sorcerers can safely wield.
No impurity, no curse, no violent surge of energy resists it. All is refined into pure essence.
This stone has stood in Valyria for thousands of years. The power it has gathered within may be beyond all imagining... though for now, we cannot access it."
Lo Quen's chest hammered as if struck by a warhammer, his heart pounding furiously.