Limpick looked at them and felt something shift in his mind. Not the dragon bone — that had stopped pulsing weeks ago — but something older and deeper, buried in his bones and blood, in a sense he still hadn't learned how to use. Silver hair. Purple eyes. Put those two things together and there was only one bloodline left in the world: Targaryen. Dragon's blood. The Conqueror's heirs.
He stared at the pair for a few seconds, then pulled his gaze back and kept chanting. His voice stayed steady, calm and even, every word clear and precise. Same as before. But his thoughts were turning fast.
The Targaryens had fallen in Westeros. Robert Baratheon sat the Iron Throne. The Targaryen children had fled overseas. Limpick had heard the stories — on the docks in Riverrun, in the old scrolls Melisandre made him read on Dragonstone, and from Terys right here in Pentos. Viserys Targaryen, the so-called Beggar King, dragged his sister Daenerys from one free city to the next, begging for help to take back the throne. No one wanted to help. No one would lend him an army, or gold, or a daughter to marry. He'd spent time in Pentos, but Limpick hadn't known. He hadn't cared. All he knew was that these two stood in front of him now, silver hair shining like moonlight in the sun.
He didn't look at them again. He lowered his head and kept chanting. The brazier fire burned hot, orange flames licking the rim and pushing waves of heat against his face and chest. Viserys grabbed Daenerys by the wrist and pulled her away, walking fast like they were late for something. Daenerys stumbled after him, then glanced back once. Just a quick look. But Limpick saw it — her purple eyes caught the light for half a second, like two tiny amethysts catching fire.
The next day they came back.
Same time. Same spot. Viserys stood under the awning, arms crossed, chin high, watching Limpick preach. Daenerys stood beside him holding a piece of bread she never ate, knuckles white around it. Limpick finished a section, paused for water, and glanced their way. Viserys met his eyes for a split second, then looked away, pretending to study the pottery stall next door. Daenerys didn't look away. She kept watching him with that same intense, puzzled expression — like she was trying to figure out exactly what she was seeing.
On the third day Viserys finally spoke.
Limpick finished a passage and stopped to rest. Viserys stepped out from under the awning, walked straight to the brazier, and stood in front of him. He was half a head taller and looked down with those pale purple eyes.
"You're a priest of the Lord of Light?" he asked in the Common Tongue. The accent was thick but clear.
"Yes."
"Where are you from?"
"Westeros."
Viserys's eyebrow twitched — the smallest movement, but Limpick caught it. His face gave nothing away, yet something flickered in his eyes, like a fish rolling under dark water. "Westeros," he repeated, voice dropping. "Which part?"
"Dragonstone."
Viserys's face went stiff for less than a second. His mouth twitched on the right side, just once, like he'd been poked with a needle. His fingers curled, then straightened. He swallowed. Dragonstone. The ancient Targaryen seat for centuries. Robert Baratheon had taken it and given it to his younger brother Stannis. Viserys had never seen it — he was born there, but the nursemaid had carried him away the day he was born. He'd never walked those halls, never seen the dragons carved into the walls. But he knew what it was. His home. The home he'd never been allowed to return to.
"Dragonstone," Viserys said, voice back to normal, chin lifting again. "Stannis Baratheon's seat. The Lord of Light's seat." He glanced at Limpick's red robe. "Your people burned a lot of idols. The Seven, the old gods, the Drowned God. Then you scattered the ashes in the sea and called it purification."
Limpick said nothing. He knew the stories — Melisandre had burned idols on Dragonstone, Stannis had done the same at Storm's End. It was one of the ways the red faith spread in Westeros. Limpick hadn't taken part, but he knew.
"Do you know Melisandre?" Viserys asked.
"I do."
"Can she really see the future in the flames?"
"That's what she says."
Viserys stared at him for a long moment, purple eyes narrowing. He opened his mouth like he wanted to ask something else, then closed it. He turned and walked back under the awning, grabbing Daenerys by the wrist. She looked back one more time as he pulled her away. This time her gaze lingered on Limpick's face, then dropped to his hands — long fingers, sharp knuckles, ink stains still caught in the nail beds from all the High Valyrian he'd written. She watched those hands for two full seconds before Viserys dragged her off.
On the fourth day Viserys didn't come. Daenerys came alone.
She stood under the awning without her brother, looking smaller. She wore the same faded gray dress, hair braided down her back, clutching a cloth bundle that looked full. She watched Limpick preach for a long time. He finished a section, drank water. She didn't leave. He started another section. She still didn't leave. He stirred the coals and added two fresh pieces. She took two steps closer to the brazier.
"How old are you?" she asked. Her voice was soft, almost shy.
"Eighteen."
"I'm fourteen." She paused. "Viserys says I should be married by now. But no one wants me. They say I'm too young, too thin, too —" She looked down at her shoes. The toe was split open, showing her toes. She curled them in. "Too poor."
Limpick watched her and didn't know what to say. When he was fourteen he'd been hauling cargo on the Riverrun docks for two coppers a day, eating black bread, sleeping in a leaky shack. Marriage had never crossed his mind — not because he didn't want it, but because he never knew if he'd have enough to eat tomorrow. She was different. She was Targaryen. Dragon blood. The Conqueror's blood. Yet here she stood with broken shoes, an old dress, white-knuckled hands clutching a bundle. She looked like every poor girl he'd ever seen in Riverrun — thin, small, scared, but with something hard in her eyes that refused to break, like hammered iron.
"Do you believe in the Lord of Light?" Limpick asked.
Daenerys thought about it. "I don't know. Viserys doesn't. He says gods are lies rich people use to fool the poor. But I think —" She looked at the brazier fire, orange flames dancing in her purple eyes. "Fire is real. Whether there's a god or not, fire is real. It burns when you touch it. It grows when you feed it. It doesn't lie."
Limpick looked at her and suddenly remembered someone — not Melisandre, but himself, years earlier in Riverrun. Squatting in the broken shack by the city wall with a dying fire in front of him, thinking the exact same thing. Fire is real. Whether there's a god or not, fire is real. It burns when you touch it. It doesn't lie to you if you don't lie to it.
"You're right," Limpick said. "Fire is real."
Daenerys looked at him and her purple eyes brightened — not from the firelight, but from something else. Like she'd found someone else in the world who understood that fire was real and meant it.
On the fifth day Viserys came back. This time he didn't stay under the awning. He walked straight to the brazier and stood in front of Limpick, closer than before. His purple eyes locked on him, chin still high, but Limpick noticed his fingers were trembling — not from cold or fear, but from something else, like a man who'd been hungry for a very long time and had just smelled food.
"I need a favor," Viserys said.
"What kind?"
"Help me speak to the high priest here. Terys. I want to meet him."
Limpick looked at him and waited for the rest.