Game Of Thrones Joffrey Baratheon Purple Days

"She must have overslept," Mother said with a little frown, looking at the closed door by the other side of the dining room.

"Well, she should hurry if she wants breakfast at all," Father mused as he gazed at the window, luxuriating in the late morning sunlight streaming through it.

Arya suppressed a smirk, but Bran could read her mind all too well as he chuckled.

"What's so funny, Bran?" Robb asked him with a knowing smirk.

"Arya," he said innocently as he aimed at her with a fork.

Arya showed him her tongue as Mother's frown turned in her direction. "Arya," she started disapprovingly, "You shouldn't take joy in your sister's misfortunes," she sighed, and it seemed she was scolding her for something else beyond that little smirk.

"I'm sorry she'll get down for breakfast with bad hair," Arya relented, but Mother seemed far from satisfied as she shook her head.

"Listen to you mother, Arya," said Father after she gave him a pleading looking, before hiding his half smile with a slice of bread. He munched on the scrambled eggs as Mother looked at him with another sight.

Jon was -as always- seated on the farthest side of the table, as far away from Mother as he could. It wasn't far enough for him to share a private snort with Robb however.

"Any news about the deserter?" Robb changed the topic, bored with the familiar routine.

"No word on that yet," Father said after a moment.

"Ser Rodrik says they often die before making it past Last Hearth," Bran piped in.

Mother looked about to intervene, when Father silenced her with a look. Arya daydreamed about having that power, if only for a single day…

"It's true. Deserters of the Night's Watch are seldom well received amongst anyone, high and low…" he trailed off, nodding slightly. "If they find him, we'll have to carry out our duty," he said as he turned to Bran.

"He's too young, Ned," Mother tried before Bran interrupted her.

"I'm not! I'll be good, Father!" he said boldly, straightening his back. Arya couldn't help but huff as she looked at Father as well.

"I can too!" she said, but she realized that had been a bridge too far as Mother's frown turned into a glower.

"Absolutely not!" she sentenced as Bran howled in outrage and smacked her in the arm.

"You had to ruin it!" he raged, and Mother was about to stand up and exact retribution when the door opened and Sansa walked into the dining room. Arya felt a sort of vindictive satisfaction as she saw her sister's hair. She clearly hadn't taken even a second to work on it; something Arya knew would bother her for the rest of the day.

"Someone had trouble getting out of bed today," Father called out.

Sansa didn't seem to hear him, walking almost blindly to the table as she massaged the right side of her face. Arya smirking again as she prepared her fresh quiver for the day. Sansa hated being teased about her hair, especially when it was true!

Sansa sat beside her, blinking slowly as she looked at her plate. She looked almost haggard, dazed as she rubbed her eyes.

"Forgot your comb?" she asked with a raised eyebrow, her tone perfectly innocent and leaving no way for Mother to scold her.

"Hey," Sansa whispered as she saw her, ignoring the words as she blinked once more. "Hey," she whispered again, hugged her intensely. Arya was kind of stunned, her protests lingering in her mouth as her sister squeezed tightly.

What is going on?! She thought in a daze, wondering if she should pull Sansa's hair to make her go away.

She started to struggle when she realized this would be the perfect opportunity for her sister to smear an itchy make up or some other terrible substance all over her head… Sansa let her go almost immediately though, strangely reluctant. Arya was relieved and somewhat befuddled when she found no trace of a revenge prank on her hair or clothes... not that Sansa was particularly fond of them, but last night's little prank on her sister's room had left Arya a bit weary; on the lookout for possible retaliation no matter how unlikely.

Her sister seemed to be really seeing her surroundings for the first time, her face shifting through a dozen emotions in half as many seconds before settling in an oddly polite, neutral one. "Good morning Jon," she said as she turned to him, smiling almost apologetically as she reached out and squeezed his shoulder, a sort of acknowledgement in her gaze. Her half-brother –who had been smiling at the unusual behavior up till now- seemed extremely uncomfortable, smiling woodenly at Sansa as she fumbled for a second.

"I'm sorry, it's just… I had a nightmare," she said by way of explanation as most of the table looked at her in mild shock.

"Must have been a bad one," Mother said in confused sympathy, Robb trailing away from the conversation and gazing at Jon in disbelief. He shrugged back awkwardly as Sansa turned to her left, giving Bran a tight hug as she tickled him.

"Hey little knight," she greeted him warmly, messing up his hair. There was something odd in her voice, it sounded vaguely choked.

"Hey!!!" grumbled Bran, and Sansa chuckled as he struggled. She called out to Robb and Mother as Father stood up, placing his napkin on the table before walking around the table. His breakfast was done and a long day waited for the Lord of Winterfell.

"Glad you managed to get up on your own; it would have been the first one in years," he said as he passed her by, patting her shoulder. He was startled when Sansa stood up though, hugging him fiercely.

"Father," she said with a tight smile. Father seemed almost as befuddled as Arya herself as he rubbed Sansa's back, looking at Mother as if demanding an explanation.

"Must have been a terrible nightmare," he said awkwardly. Sansa was trawling her arms through Father's back, as if to make sure he was real. She was breathing deeply, her face buried in Father's shoulder as if she were five years old again. With a start, Arya realized Sansa was sobbing.

They were few and far between, but the muffled sound was unmistakable before she let him go, smiling apologetically and cleaning a few stray tears with her sleeve.

"Sansa, what happened-"

"It's just- I had a really bad nightmare…" she said as she swallowed another sob. "I'm glad you're okay," she said meekly before returning to her seat, taking a deep breath before looking at the table. "I'm glad you're all here," she said after swallowing one last sob and grabbing one of the freshly baked loafs on the bowl. She chomped it down quickly, ignoring the confused looks all around.

-: PD :-

Joffrey cleared the last of the underbrush, slipping into the familiar clearing around Winterfell's heart tree. Sansa was leaning on it, gazing at its blood red eyes as Joffrey quickly walked towards her.

"Left me a little concerned when you didn't show up in the courtyard," he said as he embraced her from behind.

Gods I missed her, he thought as he breathed in her scent. Sansa's mind seemed far away though, grabbing one of Joffrey's arms and placing it around her belly as she kept staring at the Heart Tree.

"You alright? None of the wounds aching or hurting?" he asked her, concerned as Sansa kept looking at the Heart Tree.

"No, not really," she said after a moment.

"You don't sound convinced," said Joffrey, smiling lightly as he saw Lady sitting by her wife's side. The little pup seemed oddly formal, sitting back and gazing at Joffrey for a moment before yawning.

Sansa sighed, keeping a grip on Joffrey's hand as they sat on one of the white roots. "I felt so powerless…" she began, trying to give words to the feeling which had been gestating inside her during the past month.

"We'll take her seriously this time," Joffrey told her earnestly, "I've already got a few preliminary plans for a repeating ballista, as well as a variation on the mangonels used by the Dawn Fort."

Sansa smiled as Joffrey squeezed her hand, gesticulating as he kept explaining. "We'll burn down a few warehouses, but when I get the firepowder right we can set the ground for when the bitch returns… or rather, the skies," he said.

"Oh?" Sansa asked, humoring him.

"A trick I learned back in the Dawn Fort. Paint the sky red with incendiary and shrapnel charges; we could take out Daenerys pretty early in the battle if we time the first volley just right. With her gone the dragons should be a lot more stupid, and we can bait them into prepared killing grounds after-"

"We could also just send a killer after her, a competent one who's not in Varys' pocket," she pointed out.

Joffrey stopped mid explanation, hand in the air as he mimed the great explosions of the concussive charges. "Right, we could do that too," he said after a pregnant silence.

Sansa smiled wistfully before shaking her head, looking at the freshly fallen summer snow. "I'm not just talking about the dragons," she said finally. "Them, the shadow, Lyra's death, the war that is to come… the Others…" she trailed off before her voice her gaze hardened, "Seeing my own father getting stabbed to death by a shadow right in front of my eyes and not having a clue about how to stop it just put it all in perspective."

"I can go to Dragonstone around the fifth month or so," he pointed out, "Stab Melissandre in her sleep. In and out, no one will know."

"You're being foolish again, love," Sansa told him with a familiar sigh. "Racing around to fix my ills," she said warmly, caressed his hand.

Joffrey smiled sheepishly, "Wouldn't exactly help with the feeling of powerlessness, right?" he asked after a moment of introspection. "Gods know that having the might of the Seven Kingdoms under my thumb didn't help me back then," he said.

"It's not just about me, it's about having all the tools we can at our disposal," she said with a decisive nod, "It's about carrying my half of your burden, it's about making sure my family and my friends make it out alive from it all, it's about stopping the Red Priests and the dragons and the White Walkers and whatever other horror decides to come after the people I love," she said.

"You have another plan for this life," said Joffrey, and it was not a question.

"Magic," said Sansa, Joffrey's eyebrows shooting upwards and hiding under his long hair.

"Never could get my head around that," he commented idly.

"But I can. How did you put it? 'My very own sorceress'?" she asked with an impish smile.

"Something like that," Joffrey smiled back.

"I know I'm a warg, but I just know there's so much more I could do," she whispered, "The blood of the First Men sings true within me; I know this Joff… What if instead of spending a fortune preparing for Daenerys, I could face her mind directly, beyond the dragons? What if I could scout beyond your armies' van, rooting out enemy scouts and plans? What if we could… gaze beyond the frosts at the enemy's lair?" she said the last in a hush, a small undercurrent of awe within.

"You want instruction," he said.

"Yes," she answered back.

He stayed quiet as he studied the silent determination writ clear in her expression. "I've seen magic, Sansa. What it does to people, what it can turn them into if they're not careful…" he said as he gazed at her eyes.

She didn't have to tell him he'd be there for her. Her guardian against the madness and the insanity.

"Partners," he said after a moment.

"Partners," she said as well.

Fight fire with fire, he thought as he leaned back, letting the weight of the moment settle around them.

"Where do we go? The far north? If the rumors are anything to go by then there's more knowledge about warging there than in any place in the Seven Kingdoms," he said.

"I need more than warging, Joff," she said as she shook her head, "A lot more," she whispered as she swept Lady up in her arms, the tiny direwolf looking back seriously.

"Qarth?" Joffrey asked, twitching his nose, "They knew of magic, but there was a sense of decay there, of faded glories gone stale with time…" he trailed off as he looked at Sansa, "Not enough for our purposes," he said as he shook his head.

"Take us East," Sansa muttered, scratching Lady's head as the direwolf yawned again, "Let me devote a life to understanding what I have within me, what I am," she whispered as she gazed at Lady's drowsy eyes.

"Yi-Ti, the fractured empire… the land of a hundred princes and eternal civil war, of scheming chancellors and arcane tomes…" he mused, frowning in recollection.

Sansa turned to look at him as he thought, his eyes heavy with memories of cultists and shadow weavers.

"No, beyond," he said as he shook his head. "If we are to do this, then we will do it right," he sentenced, determination welling within him as well.

"Straight to the source," Sansa smiled, "You were never one for half measures."

"Not in a long time," he said as he took a deep breathe. "If there's a place where magic is felt in the very air, it's in the Shadow Lands," he said.

"Asshai-By-The-Shadow," Sansa whispered as the hair at the nape of her neck stood on edge, Lady's fur rising in unison as she stayed still, huddled within her mistress' grasp.

"And beyond, if we have to," he sentenced.

"Together," she said as she squeezed his hand.

"Together," he said as he squeezed back.

-: PD :-

"Take care not to touch the water, it brings only memories of deep sorrow," Zehian told them with the air of an oft recited saying. They crossed the ancient looking stone bridge quickly enough, same as the few local denizens of the city; all figures garbed in black and grey, hiding their bodies from the murky sunlight that struggled to reach the roads.

"Talk about redundant warnings," Joffrey whispered in Sansa's ears, her hand squeezing back in brief acknowledgement. Anyone foolish enough to drink water from a river that turned into a greenish black during nighttime deserved the consequences.

Asshai-By-The-Shadow was a quiet city; murmured whispers carried far by gentle winds that seemed to flow unimpeded by the ever present banks of heavy fog. The sprawling city was as big as Volantis, King's Landing and Braavos combined, but its population seemed perhaps a fifth of what it should have been. Figures between the mists were few and sparse, their masks and robes more in common with ghostly apparitions than flesh and blood humans.

"What is that?" Joffrey asked their paid guide as Zehian brought them to a small plaza where purpleish bushes scrawled out of the mortared stone road with a will of their own, seeping through the cracks and giving the illusion of movement as they swayed with the wind. Lady regarded the Ghost Grass with suspicion, sticking close to Sansa as their guide nodded.

"That is Master Hejias," murmured Zehian, gazing respectfully at the figure in the middle of the purple bushes. The man brought memories of cults and ancient whispers to Joffrey's mind, as he shared the look of a Grey Whisperer but for the color of his robe; white instead of grey, of a color with his long beard. His eyes were closed, and ramrod discipline straightened his back; perfect posture, unmovable arms near the waist, fingers joined and legs folded with an air of long practice and diligence.

"How long has he… been like that?" Sansa whispered in turn as they stopped walking, gazing at the good five or so meters of empty air that lay between the floating Master and the ground. It was as if the old man were sitting on an invisible cupboard, sturdy and unmoving.

"Decades, at least... Centuries, some whisper," said Zehian, only to hurry them along the almost deserted street.

"Why is he doing it?" Joffrey asked as he reluctantly returned his gaze to his small guide.

"The motives of the Aeromancers are not of this world. They seek beyond, to become one with the wind and be blown astray," he said before leading them through a side street. "Come, the day is short and there is much to see," he whispered urgently.

Sansa shook her head lightly when Joffrey arched an eyebrow, and their search continued. Her gaze wandered through the towers of paper and dark wood that seemed to emerge from the mist every few blocks; artful designs of understated craftsmanship throwing themselves up into the sky and loosing themselves within the mists above. Small lanterns placed at the corners of each block swayed with the wind, old Yi-Tish script drawn upon them and pleading salvation for long forgotten gods. Robed figures avoided her gaze as they emerged briefly from the mist, only to disappear again. It was noon and the darkness was barely held at bay; light fleeing from the shadows as the sun swayed above back to its slumber.

"The House of the West, blessed be they in blood," said Zehian as he stopped along with the road. The stones turned abruptly into a blackened dirt path, a snaking trail that turned upwards until the slope was crowned by an ancient manor, its windows barely bigger than the arrow slits of a westerosi keep. Unlike the rest of the city it was made out of chipped black stone and granite, topped by weathered pillars of twisting black that peeked from the mists above.

Sansa nodded when Joffrey looked at her, and he nodded back. "I can feel the… power. The weight of this place," she whispered as Lady's fur stood on edge. Four Houses had they seen, and it seemed they had finally found their match, the strongest of the four.

Tonight then, thought Joffrey.

-: PD :-

"More tea?" asked the masked figure, extending a delicate hand for the ornate pitcher. About the only fact that Sansa could deduce from her was that she was a woman, and skilled in shadowing her thoughts and emotions. Unsurprising perhaps, for someone who was in all likelihood a shadow weaver of great skill.

Meheesa of the House of the West had been waiting for them the moment Sansa and Joffrey had knocked on the manor's door, her face hidden behind a white mask and her body wrapped in a strange black garb that bordered between a robe and a multitude of interlocking bandages. She had bid them forward, and what had followed was one of the most tense conversations Sansa had ever had in any of her lives.

"Yes please," she agreed, looking at the way Joffrey tensed, eyeing the room suspiciously as he'd done a dozen times since they had started talking. They hadn't seen another soul since entering the House, but Joffrey was convinced they were being quietly watched… her beloved had communicated that and many other things through his gaze, his slow blinking a sure sign of wariness.

"There are few who would dare the path of shadows, even fewer still those who would hail from the Sunset Kingdoms in search of such a path," said Meheesa, revolving her tea with a small silver spoon.

"Those who would dare seek the truths of this world are few indeed, both in my land and elsewhere. Is it not the nature of mankind to close its eyes and reject what lies beyond?" said Sansa.

"Well spoken, especially for one so new to the language as you," the woman let slip the tiny bit of information.

Sansa skipped the probe without a second thought, tilting her head, "Are we agreed then? Secret for secret, instruction for limited servitude?" she asked her would be tutor, the tongue of Yi-Ti and most of the true East flowing smoothly as she gazed beyond the mask, looking at her eyes.

Meheesa tilted her head minutely, "It is a hard bargain you drive, young one. And you've given so few morsels of information… so few prizes for knowledge that most in this city would kill for…" she trailed off with a whisper.

"Knowledge of the future for knowledge of the past, practical instruction for temporal servitude; a more than adequate bargain for both our parts," said Sansa, her face giving nothing away as she sipped her tea. Lady was a statue by her side, following Meheesa's every movement.

"Perhaps… what an interesting couple you both make," Meheesa said in turn, looking at Sansa's 'bodyguard'. She took a long sniff of air, before letting it go with a pleasurable sigh, "So strong the power in both your bloodlines… have you begotten a child with him yet?" she asked Sansa as her gaze lingered on Joffrey.

Sansa frowned minutely, her teeth clenched for a moment as her composure fractured. Her mind moved quickly through denial to misdirection, racing through possible courses of action.

She saw right through the bodyguard act… She's a powerful player, to have seen through Joffrey's composure so quickly, she thought.

"We have not. Such concerns are far from my mind at the moment," she said instead, smoothing her face back into blankness. Meheesa's mask made reading her twice as hard, and left her at a disadvantage considering her own lack thereof.

She seemed to eye them for a short while, before nodding lightly as she stood up. "I must confer with my peers. Please, make use of our hospitality in the meanwhile," she said as she waved at the room with a hand. There were bookshelves and small liquor cabinets arrayed throughout it; padded carpets and tropical wooden tables holding artwork and glass hookahs. Sansa ignored the understated finery, taking a deep breath of air instead. She nodded respectfully as she stood up as well, gazing at Meheesa as the hair at the nape of her neck tingling and her heartbeat sped up.

Meheesa of the House of the West smelled of lies, lust, and sick, impending treachery.

"Joff," she called out to him lightly as Meheesa turned her back upon them, walking towards the door at a sedate pace. Her husband understood her implicitly and acted without doubt; long strides carrying him to Meheesa's back in but a second. Brightroar had not fully materialized when it pierced the shadow weaver's back, the fractals mixing with her blood as Valyrian steel emerged through her heart and chest.

"How many of them?!" Joffrey shouted as he extracted the blade from the gasping woman, shadows of blood and darkness forming around her wounds before Joffrey decapitated her cleanly in one swift cut.

"At least six more, behind that bookshelf!" Sansa told him as Lady snarled lowly, the bookshelf in question collapsing down to the floor and revealing cloth wrapped men wielding long, curved knifes. They said nothing as they charged, Joffrey filling the silence with a roar of his own as Stars emerged into this world from behind him in mid leap, slamming into the first wave and savaging the men with claw and fang as he reached them half a second later, twirling Brightroar in a spectacle of golden light and severing limbs and heads.

Sansa felt goose bumps around her right shoulder as Lady twisted around, and she ducked just as a small bolt flew past her. Daggers fell from her sleeves as she turned, jerking her head aside as a curved knife tore through her cheek. Her riposte was instinctive and instantaneous, cutting through the man's hand with one dagger and piercing his throat with the other one. He gurgled as he tumbled back, replaced by another attacker as he leapt from a sudden hole on the ceiling. The black robed man landed on the floor with barely a sound, knives glinting and dripping with something.

"More here!" She shouted as she stepped back, avoiding a flurry of strikes as Lady leapt at the man's heels. Sansa spun and dodged, her reflexes barely keeping up with the whirling dance of death that was the black-bandaged man, but it was not enough. One of the knives sliced through the tendons on her left hand, and Sansa screamed through clenched teeth as she dropped one of her daggers. She took a step forward and received another cut on the shoulder before she could ram her remaining dagger through the man's heart, making use of Lady's distraction.

She felt as if it had been her own heart the one which had been torn apart as wind blew throughout the room, putting out candles and lamps as shadows deepened. Lady mourned in agony as her own shadow somehow came alive; a twisting dark mass of viscous substance that strangled her in moments, covering her body completely and pressing her against the ground in a sickening crunch until she was dissolved to nothing in a second.

"Lady!!!" Sansa screamed, feeling somewhat sleepy despite the horror. Joffrey was limping towards her, his sword held at the ready as a woman strode slowly into the room, garbed as Meheesa had been. Her mask was midnight blue instead of white, streaks of darkness running through it as blood bubbled out of the slain assassins. It seeped through the floor, reaching her heels and crawling up her legs as she raised her hands.

"I've been poisoned," Sansa managed through the encroaching darkness both within and without, "They want our blood," she whispered, feeling weak, the shadows somehow growing deeper still as she realized the cut on Joffrey's shoulder as well.

They wanted them alive.

"I'm ending it," he said as he reached her, holding her by the shoulder as Brightroar pierced her heart cleanly. Sansa gasped, blood bubbling from her mouth as Joffrey tore the blade through her wound in an instant of agony that soon gave way to seeping purple fractals. She fell on the floor as Joffrey turned the blade around, angling for his own heart.

"Not yet," whispered the blue mask as Joffrey's own blood erupted from his wrists, forming thick, dark red pillars that bound him to the floor.

"S-S-Staaaaaarsss--" Joffrey gurgled as the Silver Lion blinked across the room, its form indistinct as it dissolved and reformed in front of Joffrey until it was almost gone, a lone, disintegrating paw tearing through Joffrey's throat.

"No. Tell me your secrets," whispered the blue masked figure as it reached Joffrey in but a second, hundreds of black tendrils emerging from her back and cradling Joffrey as if he were a child, darkness pouring into his mangled throat.

NO, thought Sansa, folding within herself as the Purple squeezed, pulling his/her's/the Purple Pillars with all her might as Joffrey gasped in surprise and the fabric of the encroaching Purple thrummed in strained harmony, his body jerking wildly for a millionth of a second as the world folded on itself and she felt him reach her, his presence reassuringly close as they directed their attention upwards and the Pillars pulled them backwards at unfathomable speed, pain blooming around them.

-: PD :-

"Your turn," Sansa told him with a wayward smile.

"Right, sorry," said Joffrey, shaking his head lightly before returning his gaze to the cyvasse board. He spent a few minutes thinking of a way around Sansa's trap before smiling deviously and arranging a double feint, moving his elephant forward as a fake sacrifice.

Sansa hummed as she leaned on the table, her elbows holding her head up as she scanned the board.

"More wine?" asked a brown skinned man, and Joffrey even managed to hide the scowl at the sight of his slave collar… this time.

"Please," he said with a nod, waiting for Sansa to make her move.

"I don't know how you can stand that wine," she said, still eyeing the board and pouting every now and then, her hand floating around the air in search of the right piece to grasp.

"Persimmons are not that bad," he said, his gaze returning to the street in front of the small, open aired tavern. He examined the marching group of legionaries closely, nodding approvingly at the tight formation and stern gaze of the soldiers. Freemen and slaves moved aside quickly as the century marched through the street, the optio at the head carrying the thunderbolt wielding harpy of New Ghis, identical as the one drawn across the wide tower shields of the legionaries.

He frowned when he gazed back at the board. "How did you know it was a ruse?" he asked her.

"You've never liked sacrificing troops," she said after a little sigh, "You scrounge your eyelids a bit and your hands fist like a baby's… it always gives you away," she continued with a sly smile.

"Oh," Joffrey nodded along, "I'll be sure to keep my hands in check then. Especially when your eyes flutter like drunken butterflies."

"Please don't," she said as she blushed a bit, "It was only a jest," she clarified as Joffrey moved his elephant away from the failed ruse, rapidly coming up with another plan that saw two of Sansa's siege towers destroyed.

"I thought so," he said with a snort. The game continued for a while then, the patrons coming and leaving as they relaxed for the rest of the afternoon. Most of the others were freemen dockhands, working long shifts at the docks that kept the lifeblood of trade moving. A few sailors of the New Ghis Navy also called the Ghe'zeras home, coming in with happy smiles and leaving with brawls and scowls as they ran out of gold.

"Do you think that other people… see the Purple, when we die?" He asked her as the game flowed back and forth.

"I don't know… maybe," Sansa said as she nursed her mug of strong ale, "Brightroar certainly gives out a light show every time you pull it out of your soul. Maybe it's like that for our bodies but in reverse," she thought out loud.

"Hm. If that's the case then we must have left quite the riddle after every death…"

"Have you ever thought about what happens to the worlds we leave behind… the lives within it?" she asked after a moment.

"Many times… I reckon they all have their souls reversed as well, carried along with the rest of the cosmos and none the wiser for it."

"To think otherwise would be madness," Sansa said after a while, nodding repeatedly as she gazed at the board.

"Hm. The sheer amount of power though… to make everything crawl back, years upon years," Joffrey trailed off as he moved his horseman to the right, slaying Sansa's dragon.

"It's certainly on a scale undreamt of by any mage or sorcerer of our era, that's for sure. How our… creators managed such a feat but couldn't bring an end to the Long Night itself is a question I've wrestled with a lot, some nights," she confessed.

Joffrey snorted, "An endeavor doomed to failure," he said.

"The Deep Ones seemed to have a pretty firm grasp of the order of things, and they were as mortal as you or I."

"They also, oh, orchestrated a master plan spanning eons of foresight and dimensions beyond our comprehension. There's a difference between mortal and mortal, Sansa," he said.

"Hey!" he protested when he felt a muzzle emerge from between his arm and his waist. He was too slow, and before he knew it Lady was happily munching through his long slice of sweetened ham.

Sansa was smiling and making baby noises as she scratched the happy direwolve's cheeks, ignoring Joffrey grumbling. "You'll be the one to bargain with the innkeeper for another loaf," he told her.

"As if it were that hard. One little jiggle of these and he'll sell us another loaf for a bent copper," she said as she moved her breasts slightly.

"Using your own body as a weapon. Lady Teyia would be proud," he said after a hearty chuckle.

"Her Braavosi ways would be wasted on this bunch," she said as she flicked her eyes towards the burly innkeeper menacing a long piece of iron at an arguing dockworker.

"Hm, too much subtlety. And pelts, she did love her snowfox pelts," he added.

"You did too."

"They suit you rather well, what can I say?" he said with a smile.

Sansa hummed as she smiled with him, her hand going for one of her footman.

"He'll get killed by my dragon," Joffrey offered.

Sansa stopped, gazed at the board again, and tried to move her elephant.

"He'll die in two turns. Knights are powerful like that," he said. "Wisdom of our homeland."

Sansa scowled, leaned back on her chair, and tapped her chin. She gazed at the board for a good long five minutes before grunting in exasperation. "Is there any way to get my Archon out of there?!" she asked him.

"Nope."

"But I had this double flanking maneuver prepared with this group of footmen that-"

"Would have been stopped by that siege tower, once I moved it three squares up and two left," Joffrey completed the sentence as he pointed at his siege tower behind two footmen, strategically placed to block the whole future move.

"I don't like this game," she said with a grunt.

"You liked it well enough back in Winterfell."

"That's because you were going easy on me!"

"So you admit you'd prefer the easy way? I thought you didn't want me to patronize you," Joffrey asked as he raised an eyebrow high, leaning on the last word.

"Bleahg," said the once Queen of the Seven Kingdoms, weaver of mercantile plots, and warg. His wife truly was the peak of eloquence.

"Best of five?" he said.

"Gods no!" she said before standing up, giving a tiny bellow as she stretched like a lazy cat. Lady followed her motions as she shoved her paws forward, her tail wagging slowly as she blinked and stretched with an almighty yawn. "I want to go for a walk, stretch my legs. Besides, it's getting late."

"Good idea," he said as he stood up, bending his neck a bit and working out the cricks.

Sansa paid the barkeep –leaning forward suggestively as she haggled the price- as Joffrey stashed the cyvasse set. Soon enough they were walking atop the cobbled streets of New Ghis, the yelling of a thousand traders speaking in a dozen tongues mixing with the high pitched shrills of the seagulls. They sorted through the jeering and partying privateers, slave hunters and dockhands toasting their meads of fermented milk, and walked past the great statues of dead generals and legates of ages past, born when the Valyrian Freehold was but a dream within the minds of errant goat herders. They took the high road away from the docks, up the cliffs and around the naval dockyards. From there they could see the high stepped pyramids of the city center; great bonfires roaring from their yellow tips.

They walked with their hands intertwined, Lady chasing multicolored birds that sometimes swooped down to the earth and pierced the ground with their long beaks.

"She'll catch one one these days and end up with a hole in the head for her troubles," said Joffrey.

"Direwolf's skulls are made of sterner stuff," said Sansa, their walk carrying them through a dirt path overrun with cart grooves and the occasional tree looming over the road.

"Don't I know it," said Joffrey, hiding a smirk. They sat on a big tree stump to watch the sunset, Lady yawning again as she trotted to their side and lay on her belly.

"… The House of the West was a bad idea," said Sansa.

Joffrey grunted acknowledgment, taking a deep breath. "Yeah."

"… I was thinking of trying for the House of the South," she said after a while.

"What makes you think it'll go any different?"

"They're the weakest of the four houses, for starters. Something happened about a hundred years ago that almost wiped them out, and according to what we found out in the Imperial Library they never really recovered."

"Yei-Kuh was less of a historian and more of a buffoon. They almost laughed us out of the library when you asked for that tome back in Yin," said Joffrey.

"You said his sources seemed legitimate enough…" she trailed off, "At least for his scholarly work," she added. "They won't be in a position to gamble or backstab, not when what we offer could set them back on their local equivalent of the game of thrones."

Joffrey tilted his head from side to side as he hummed, "We'll need something more than mere information about the future. All this talk of 'secrets for secrets' may sound poetic, but nothing prods greed like the physical... it would be a good idea to arrive bearing gifts."

"What're you thinking about?"

"The Warlocks," Joffrey told her. "I remember the bastards had a Valyrian glass candle the last time I was there. The thing was just lying there atop a table as the Warlock used it on my tablet… We should loot it from them, and maybe set the whole building on fire on our way out, do the world a favor."

"We won't lose too much time. We need to resupply at Qarth anyway," Sansa thought out loud.

They trailed off into silence as they weighted their options; the way forward filled with unknowns. Joffrey stared at Sansa with slight smile until she blinked slowly, a smile of her own growing amidst the uncertainty. "What?" she asked him.

He grabbed her by the shoulder and kissed her deeply, and she returned the kiss in full after a second. She leant on him until his back was against the stump, her red locks spilling over his chest as she rested her head over it.

"We'll be okay Joff," she whispered as she nuzzled his neck, holding him tight. A deep flame tickled her chest, her gut, and she held him close as she breathed slowly, "Nobody will stop us. Not Stannis, not Aegon, not Daenerys, not all the sorcerers in the world."

"Nobody," said Joffrey, looking at the darkening sky and the seagulls whirling overhead, dancing in the air.

Is this calm resolution what it feels to be an adult? Joffrey asked himself. Fate had never allowed him to grow old, to watch his body turn frail and see his seed grow into a loving family… He didn't know what was waiting for them in the Shadowlands, but his course was set; his motions sure. The Captain knows the way forward, the tiller is set.

All that remains is to sail into the storm, for he can do no other.

"Nobody," he repeated, holding his wife close. He let the sound of the sea wash over him, mixed with the gentle swaying of Sansa's chest. "Don't lose yourself," he whispered, stroking her hair as he remembered the shrieks of cultists and madmen, shadows and illusions warping their perception of the world into a mixture of pure madness and terrifying reality.

"We'll be lost together," she whispered back.

-: PD :-

Qarth had brought mixed memories, old days of confusion and fear and wonder. Of Daenerys he'd seen nothing and heard little, for it seemed the latent madwoman had not yet reached the City of a Thousand Years. Joffrey had long ago learned about his curiosity, catalogued and ordered it, breathed and lived in it, and so he'd learnt to prioritize. For all his curiosity about the how's and why's of Daenery's journey, the reasons behind her descent into madness, there were deeper and much more important mysteries still on the horizon.

When the tablet disappeared, Joffrey made the journey to the House of the Undying. He had turned right again and again, right and up the stairs as the wisdom of the Undying demanded. He'd ended up in a circular room with no other exits, a lone altar in the middle of the room showing nothing for his efforts.

"Your curiosity betrays you, Prince Joffrey of House Baratheon," said Pyat Pree as he emerged from the only entrance. Joffrey gazed at him, watching the way his bronze rings jingled lightly around his unnaturally stretched neck.

The man smirked as another one emerged from behind one of the room's pillars. The second Pyat Pree's eyebrows –though he barely had them- were raised in apparent surprise as he examined him. "You are quite arrogant, little prince, to seek which was meant for greater minds," he told him.

"Quite arrogant indeed," said another Pyat Pree as he hefted a chain. Joffrey realized his right hand had been clapped in irons from one second to the next, the chains appearing as if from thin air. "No matter," said another Pyat as he pulled from the chains clasped to his left hand, "Rejoice, for you shall be opened up for your secrets, your body a source of illumination so that the shade may run deeper," he intoned as both of Joffrey's arms went taut, held horizontally.

Joffrey sighed as he looked at the irons, "I feared you once, you know?" he said, tilting his head lightly as he gazed at the chains. The warlocks seemed slightly amused, and Joffrey smiled with them.

"I've lived for so much time…" he mused, gazing at the manacle around his right arm, "There's a sort of rhythm to this world, to existence perhaps… a sort of raw stuff that floods silence and noise, steel and rock, water and sky, storms… almost like a song… its so hard to put into words…" he said before trailing off, eyes clouded. "Have you ever heard it? The… melody? The harmony?" he asked them earnestly, almost pleadingly.

One of the Pree's scoffed, walking closer to him, "You are naught but dust and dreams, impermanent and mundane. How can you even try to understand what is beyond you?" he asked, his hollow voice rebounding within the room.

Joffrey nodded thoughtfully, gazing at the man, "That's the thing, warlock," he said, "If we are all but dust and dreams, then what is a dream's dream?"

The warlock frowned as Joffrey let out a big breath.

"Less than nothing," he mused. The man stumbled back, mouth agape as Joffrey's sight returned to his right hand.

The manacle was gone, along with the chain.

"The absence of the song gives the dream's dream away," he told them, "Illusions of shadow and light which are not actually real… as much as any of us can claim to be at least," he said as he materialized Brightroar and the room bloomed in eldritch purple light. He struck the sword against the other chain, the striking of Vlayrian steel against shadow and falsehood a sharp twine of noise which was gone as soon as it was felt.

"What are you?" whispered the Pree who'd been in front of him, stumbling back.

"A weapon," said Joffrey as he grabbed him by the shoulder and ran Brightroar through his chest. "This blade. My wife and I. We were made by the dreamers above us," he explained as the man gurgled and Joffrey twisted the wound open, extracting the blade upwards and tearing the man's shoulder apart.

"How many dreamers beyond them? What are we all to them?" he asked them as Pyat fell to the ground, the other Pree's jumping at him with bared blades and blurred steps. He avoided their daggers as Brightroar carved long lines through their forms, cutting their unarmored bodies in half until the last Pree raised his hands to the heavens and took in a harrowing breath, staggering Joffrey.

Joffrey felt as if his blood were boiling, an invisible hand choking him as he stumbled to the ground. He snarled as Stars roared with him, the Silver Lion emerging into reality right behind the last Pree and tearing the man's head off with massive jaws. He breathed easily as he stood up, massaging his throat before Stars prowled to his side, jamming his big head against Joffrey's thigh.

"Good job," he said with a smile as he patted the lion's head. He turned towards the door and made his way out of there, following the call of the tablet.

"Let's hunt," he told Stars.

He started with a light jog, the tabled homing him in, Brightroar a flash of light in his hands as he cut down surprised warlocks. He was running now, mind adrift as he turned corners abruptly and crashed against trios of warlocks, their surprised expressions turning into disbelieving pain as Valyrian steel painted the walls red. He ambushed them with Stars, the lion renting them apart before they could work their twisted sorceries; panicked shouting turning into screams of horror that locked in their throats as Joffrey moved silently and let his ears guide him to the nearest prey in his way. He entered their quarters unannounced, walking behind warlocks as they desperately gulped down goblets filled with Shade of the Evening. The black, purplish liquid didn't spend long inside them though; and the sorcerers gazed at their bellies in confusion, stunned as they watched the droplets of their hallowed liquid lazily travelling down Brightroar's edge, the blade itself pinning them to walls and cabinets.

He went up and down stairs, through thresholds of solid stone and obsidian, past twisted nightmares and illusions and startled yells as Stars roared and hunted the warlocks through corridors and ritual chambers. After confronting the horrors of K'Dath and the twisted cultists from the Beyond, after glimpsing the morsels of true darkness hidden between the crevasse of Asshai by the Shadow, after learning the harrowing truth of what most mortals called the Red Comet, Joffrey regarded the Warlocks of Qarth as little else but faded echoes of a long dead scream; shadows of shadows weaving dreams out of dreams, feverishly drinking their drinks and poultices in the vain hopes of reaching apotheosis.

Once their coherence had been broken, their ritual circles torn asunder, the vast majority of the rank and file were nothing but petty conjurers.

He emerged into a study he barely remembered, sheathing his bloodied blade in intricately carved dragonbone. There he found Sansa, red spear in hand as she surveyed the room. "Distraction did the job?" he asked her as he closed the door behind him.

"Like a charm," she said, fascinated as she gazed at the twisted form of the glass candle. The thing was wickedly sharp; a twisting pole of obsidian no longer than Joffrey's forearm and black as night.

"Last time I was here that thing was warping color as if they were mere suggestions," Joffrey said as he approached the candle warily, right next to the whalebone tablet. "Did he give you any trouble?" he asked her as he gazed at the dead warlock.

"None, he was too busy obsessing over the tablet… and the glass candle. It was distorting light like nobody's business too," she said, grabbing the artifact gently. "Think it'll be enough? We could stay a while longer, look for more…"

Joffrey bit his lip, gazing at the twisting candle. "Let's not push our luck, by now they must be rallying," he said instead.

Sansa nodded quickly as she grabbed a nearby oil lantern and smashed it against books and tables filled with parchment. She'd already grabbed a few of them and stuffed them in a satchel, but the rest went up in flames as Joffrey did the same to drapes and carpets, the fires soon raging out of control as they ran through the lower levels.

They would stop in Yin as they'd done before, to gather supplies and a braver crew… and after that, Asshai would beckon once more.

-: PD :-