GOT: The Great Khal — Chapter 131 - I am a king!
"Broad daylight is too conspicuous. We should attack at night..." Xue Ce trailed behind Nimiz, voice low, still pushing his case.
After Barristan Selmy was thrown in prison, he'd been assigned as Nimiz's steward. Now he was following the man on a waterborne assault against King's Landing.
Nimiz stood at the flagship's bow, watching the distant silhouette of the Red Keep sharpen against the horizon. Blackwater Bay lay flat and still. Not a single enemy ship in sight.
"Khal Drogo specifically told me to attack during the day." His tone was even. Final.
Xue Ce opened his mouth. Closed it. Said nothing.
On the walls of King's Landing, Tyrion Lannister stood with the golden Hand pin on his chest, eyes sweeping the water.
The fleet covered Blackwater Bay from shore to shore. Hundreds of warships, their sails overlapping like a moving forest, oars rising and falling in unison, churning the water white. Foam trailed long tails behind every hull.
Sunlight caught iron armor and spearpoints across the whole fleet. The sea itself seemed to glitter.
Tyrion swallowed and pulled his gaze back to the wall beneath his feet.
The battlements were packed. Archers crouched behind the crenellations, fingers resting on their quivers. Spearmen stood in rows, the clatter of iron armor constant and close.
"Send out the wildfire ships! Ram them!" Joffrey stood on the wall in that gilded lion armor crusted with rubies, chin up, chest out.
He was a different creature from the day Stannis attacked. All bluster now, determined to command in person and claw back whatever dignity he'd lost.
Tyrion glanced at him. "Dozens of fishing boats sailing into the enemy fleet while dumping wildfire overboard. Even someone as stupid as you can see the problem. One flaming arrow and our ships are ash before they get anywhere near them."
"I am a king!" Joffrey roared. "Do as I say!"
Joffrey had grown tall enough that Tyrion couldn't reach his face to slap it anymore. But he held the boy's eyes and spoke each word like he was driving in a nail.
"Do you have any idea how many battles have been fought these past 2 years just so you could shout that? 'I am a king.' All of this — every last bit of it — started because you, you idiot, cut off Ned Stark's head."
Saying it out loud made Tyrion's own blood rise.
He jabbed a finger at the old scar on his face. "I won the defense of King's Landing for you. And what did I get? Your mother tried to have me killed."
Joffrey's face went crimson. His hand dropped to his sword hilt. The sword Tywin had given him on his wedding day to Margaery Tyrell, forged from Ned Stark's "Ice," melted down and recast into two blades. The other one hung at Jaime's hip.
Tyrion didn't wait for a response. He turned and walked toward the stone steps on the inner wall.
He knew the math. Joffrey's plan was a death sentence. King's Landing wouldn't last a day on it. He descended the steps and rattled off orders to the officers behind him without breaking stride.
"Blackwater Bay is too wide. Wildfire ships can't block the whole fleet. Get every jar the Alchemists' Guild has stored and bring it up to the wall. One barrel every 10 paces behind the crenellations. Find 50 men who aren't afraid to die, put them beside the barrels with torches. The moment enemy ships near the shore, they throw."
"Is the harbor chain still intact? The one we raised when Stannis came. Pull it up again. Stretch it across the narrowest point of the bay. When their big ships sail in, raise the chain and cut off their retreat."
"No ship moves without my order. Wait until they're in catapult range, then loose the wildfire on my signal. Anyone who jumps early loses his head."
Officers scattered in every direction. Tyrion leaned against a merlon and looked out at the mass of ships blanketing the bay. His small frame didn't move in the wind.
He watched the dozen or so enemy ships feeling their way forward. Oars bit into dark water. Bows pushed through the chop. Closer. Closer.
Tyrion drew a slow breath. "Catapults — loose."
The arms swung. Jar after jar of green wildfire arced out over the water.
They traced low, flat curves through the air. Tyrion tracked every dark speck with his eyes. He knew what wildfire did. Once it touched something, it didn't let go. Water didn't put it out. Nothing did.
The first jar was still falling when Bronn released his bowstring.
The flaming arrow caught the spinning clay jar dead center. BOOM. A ball of green fire bloomed in the air, shards of pottery and burning wildfire spraying in every direction.
A second arrow. A third. Jars burst above the fleet. Wildfire rained down onto sails, onto decks, onto the sea itself.
More jars hit the water, and still nothing was wasted. The green liquid floated and kept burning. Fire walls erupted across the bay in seconds, green flames and black smoke coiling upward together.
Several of Nimiz's ships were already burning. Soldiers beat at the flames and ran for the gunwales. Some of them were on fire. They screamed and went over the side.
Nimiz watched all of it from the flagship.
His pupils went tight.
"Retreat! All ships, pull back!" He kicked the gunwale and screamed at the hornblower. The horn blared. The fleet lurched into chaos, oars reversing, every ship clawing to get clear of the spreading fire.
A few lightly damaged ships limped out trailing black smoke, soldiers still beating at embers with wet cloth.
Nimiz stared at the green hellscape. His face was iron. He said nothing. The fingers he had braced on the gunwale trembled faintly with rage.
Smoke still drifted off the water. Burnt-out hulls listed at the bay's edge. The fleet had pulled back beyond catapult range, and the sea between them was strewn with broken planks and scorched canvas.
Tyrion was turning to go back down when he spotted a soaking-wet enemy soldier thrashing toward shore, trying to slip away in the confusion.
He raised a hand. Soldiers poured off the wall and dragged the man up from the shallows.
"Don't kill me! Please, I beg you, " The soldier was shaking so hard he could barely stand.
Tyrion looked him over. "You're lucky. You get to keep your life. In exchange, you're going to carry a message to your general."
He called for paper and pen, wrote the letter leaning against a merlon, folded it, and tucked it into the prisoner's soaked collar. He patted the man's shoulder once.
"Swim back. Hand it to your commander, Nimiz. Tell him Tyrion Lannister is coming to Dragonstone to meet your master, Khal Drogo."
A cold smile touched the corner of his mouth. "Go on. Try not to drown."
Two soldiers walked the prisoner to the wall's edge and lowered him down on a rope. The moment his feet hit the ground he was scrambling, half-crawling into the surf, swimming hard for the fleet still retreating in the distance.
On the flagship, Nimiz took the wet letter, shook it open, and read two lines.
Then he slapped it flat against the gunwale and said, without expression, "Does he think Khal Drogo will just sit around waiting for news of the war?"
➤ Next: I Am a Barbarian