Magic Wing

Orys was demonstrating how one could rejuvenate rotted fruit back into fresh fruit. It was easily his most peculiar talent, one that had eluded maesters, warlocks, and shadowbinders for millenia. He was brutal and callous and quite mad, but somehow, that madness had guided a rebirth for alchemy in Westeros, and now the madman was turning death into life and the decrepit into the beautiful. He then ate the apple, and consumed it without fear of the disease that had wrought it earlier. He then directed his students back to their own meals, and reconsider what it is to give one's life to the ethereal.

Orys prepares to return to his own studies, when he spies his mistress. He approaches the younger woman, this time wearing his official robes, (almost never seen in the Red Keep itself.) "Your Grace..." He bowed in a way which was not quite a bow, but still earnest for the sorcerer.

"It would be a tedious endeavor but-Oh." He glared at the students, who scampered off, then turned his softening gaze to Rhaena. "Could I interest you in a drink in mt office? There's something I've been meaning to discuss with you for sometime, something not fit for the ears of... novices."

Orys grinned like squire with his first love, and lead her to his office. It was much cleaner than his chambers in the Red Keep. Noone outside the Guild had ever seen his actual workplace, but here could be seen several beakers and vials of various unnameable liquids. On a chalkboard was written an incomprehensible formula describing a chemical process that might never be exploited. Orys grabbed a Volantene liquor and began pouring a pair of glasses.

"It's beautiful, isn't it? I find myself scrambling to collect every bottle that's made it out of the so-called New Valyria." He sipped his glass first as poisontaster, then passed her a glass. "Just think... this drink was distilled in the Freehold... I have bottles that were opened and tasted by dragonlords..." He grinned. "Those drops are worth more to alchemy than a thousand knights will ever be to a lordling."

"My mother was a Lannister. That's a fine marriage in terms of land and wealth, but the blood of the dragon must continue in full strength if we wish to maintain our dominance over the great beasts. Incest is a notoriously faulty process, with my father already suffering the consequences with his constant moodswings. So I made it my life's work to preserve our bloodline through any means necessary without compromising our strength or consistency. Thus my attention turned to... other bloodlines." He sipped his wine and set it down before turning the board.

"Rejuvenating an apple is easy, their lives are so short. But to preserve a human being... you need an alternative source." He turned and gave her an inquisitive look. "Did Mandisa ever discuss the power of royal blood? The literal nature of divine right?"

"In the Art, we believe in the idea that all forms of energy are finite, but can be contained and supplemented if we need to. Its the core principle our ability to manipulate the elements to suit our intentions. Now..." He began writing something on the board in chalk. "Several years ago, I developed a means of preserving my own... energies through supplanting it with other similar strains of... energy." On the board was a chemical formula that would horrify anyone with the alchemical training to read it.

Orys sat on a tall stool beside it and gestured. "There's a mistaken belief by certain practitioners of the Higher Mysteries that the blood of a king holds certain mystical properties. Properties enabling to commune with higher powers, direct the fates of unseen adversaries, even bestow life upon the unliving. As a young man, I was intrigued by this idea, until I began conducting my own experiments as an alchemist. The first thing I discovered, through collecting the fluids of certain Andal and Northern houses, whose reign far out lasted our own, was that there was little in the way of, shall we say, potential. But then after I began leeching my own blood, I realized where the misconceptions had stemmed from."

He paused to take a drink. "It was never the blood of KINGS, but rather the blood of Valyria that sparks desirable reactions. I began comparing the blood of other Valyrian houses, a Baratheon child's knee scrape here, a Velaryon bastard there, a few immigrants gone missing. You see, after a few years of..." Orys halted, decided not to bore his mistress with the tedious details.

"Well, suffice it to say, if you perform certain processes to the scion of a Valyrian bloodline of a certain purity, you can maintain your youth and health indefinitely. Eternally even, though I confess I haven't tested that yet." Orys giggled, as though he had told a really funny joke at a party.

His smile vanished. "I cannot guarantee its process will preserve you in the same fashion it preserves me. I was blessed with more singular gifts than the rest of our family but... I suspect I could synthesize the correct reaction..."

"Thus far. I had found a woman who may have demonstrated potential, a young girl from Volantis with exquisite breeding, but once I explained the process, she cut her own wrists." He sighed. "Such a lovely specimen. I'd have made her my paramour and apprentice, but few can stomach the costs of true greatness."

"Well, you simply ingest the vitae of your own descendants. It's actually kind of obvious really, all this talk about royal lineages and king's blood and other Andal trite. I had been slicing open vagabonds and refugees so many years, I could only scold myself for not putting the knife to one of my own bastards. Why waste time looking at Baratheons and Kymeryens and Starks and dead Targaryens if the goal was explicitly to maintain one's own life, not theirs? So I started making frequent visits to the brothels and seeding any wretch I could corner. And then, before the year was out... I had reinforced my own constitution by simply reclaiming the life force I had given away..."

He drank his Volantene liquor. "Such a fine brand. I do hope the breweries are the same quality even under occupation..." He sighed.

(I had discussed all this with Marie beforehand, in case you're wondering.)

"People disappear every day, Your Grace, and noone pays mind to the demise of a bastard or peasant. There are so many secret places in and outside the city. And I rarely need to perform the ritual, only every few years." Orys paused, before lowering his voice. "You are far too beautiful and unique to face such a banal fate as aging. And what we have built here, in this new land... it cannot go to waste on some mongrel idiot heir. The dragon cannot cease its flapping or we risk plummeting to the earth. My father and his father understood that, but the last civil war made me realize that their ancestors are just as flawed as the Andal savages we govern. We need you to remain as Queen as long as as possible."

"Well..." he ran his hand over his shaven head. "One doesn't have to carry to full term. It's the blood itself that's vital, not the personhood of the vessel. And there are always grandchildren... I'm told your sons are virile enough. Perhaps there are whores even now bearing your needs to fruition." He considered the idea. "Yes, I can't see why not. They may only possess a fraction of the potency... but we don't need much. And time will be on our side regardless, Your Grace.

"Your Grace, I can't save you from knives and spears. I can't make your enemies vanish. What I can do, is preserve your youth and health indefinitely, and thus the dynasty. This is not a miracle cure for all your woes... but if you'd like to remain young and fit, so you can continue facing those woes and not leave us in the hands of another Maekar Waters or Seven-loving fool." He frowns. "The process works. I am proof. Now all I can do is offer you the same gift."