House of The Dragon:The Rise of the Emperor of the Seven Kingdoms

Night fell quickly.

Outside Matthos’s chambers, twenty guards stood at the ready; not even a fly would slip past House Tyrell’s elite soldiers.

The guards spoke quietly under the flickering light of the torches around them. But even with the torches, the place wasn’t properly lit. The distance between each torch made it impossible to illuminate every spot.

Suddenly, one of the guards caught a strange smell in the air.

"What’s that smell?" The guard said in an uncertain tone.

The second guard beside him caught the smell too and spoke in a confused tone. "It smells sweet, mixed with a hint of sourness."

"Captain, do you smell that?" The second guard asked the captain of Matthos’s personal guard.

Luke, a man in his thirties with blond hair and eyes, looked like a knight straight out of the pages of a book. Handsome, smiling, and warm. At that moment, however, he seemed distracted by something.

When he heard his subordinates’ words, he unconsciously sniffed the air and caught a sweet smell mixed with a hint of sourness.

His eyes went wide as something occurred to him. He drew his sword, and just as he was about to speak, a weakness spread through his body. Before he could do anything, his body collapsed, and the sound of the sword hitting the ground rang out particularly clear in that moment.

After the first man fell, came the second, and then the third. Within moments, all twenty men of Matthos’s personal guard had collapsed to the ground, completely drained of strength. They were awake but couldn’t even speak, only move their eyes desperately.

At the end of the corridor, shadows emerged, and as they passed the torches, crimson masks caught the light. There was a drop of black blood below the eyes. There were about five figures, all dressed in black.

Looking at the fallen guards, the apparent leader of the assassins gestured with his hands and made a cutting motion across his own throat.

All five figures drew red daggers and got to work. One by one, blood spread across the black stone floor.

Matthos woke at the subtle sound of his chamber door opening; he opened his eyes and gripped the dagger he kept under his pillow. He rose from the bed extremely fast, but before he could do anything, he found himself surrounded by young men in dark robes.

They wore red metal masks over their faces; there was a drop of black blood below the eyes. Each of the five assassins held a red dagger.

"Lord Matthos, my prince wishes for you to drink this." One of the assassins stepped forward and placed a glass vial containing a crimson liquid on the table.

"No pain, only a calm and peaceful sleep." The assassin added.

Matthos didn’t respond and shouted. "Guards!!!"

What followed was a frightening silence. Matthos couldn’t help feeling a chill run through his body. He had many guards, but now not one had answered his call. The meaning of that was more than clear.

"I may die, but I’ll take the first one who attacks me with me to the Seven Hells." Matthos looked at the five assassins and spoke in a calm tone, though his trembling hands showed he wasn’t nearly as calm as he appeared.

Perhaps the threat could have worked against ordinary men, but the Children of the Blood were not mere soldiers; they were elite spies. Shadows that Maekar used to watch over everyone and everything.

All five advanced at once.

Matthos didn’t want to die and fought back fiercely but soon found himself pinned to the bed. He thrashed violently, trying to break free from his captors’ grip.

"LET GO OF ME!!!"

"I AM THE LORD OF HIGHGARDEN!!!"

"LET ME SPEAK WITH YOUR PRINCE!!!"

"I CAN SWEAR LOYALTY TO HIM!!!"

Two assassins held Matthos’s head firmly and forced his mouth open. Matthos, knowing his words would go unheard, fought even more violently. He didn’t stop struggling for even a second.

"My prince will build a kingdom where everyone can choose what they want to be." The first assassin said, opening the cap of the vial holding the crimson poison.

"Strict laws from which not even nobles will be able to escape." The second assassin said in a calm tone.

"A world where evil will be judged by an impartial, indifferent justice." The third assassin added.

"A world where we will truly be the beacon of civilization." The fourth assassin said.

"And you, Matthos Tyrell, stand in the way of that future we so long for." The fifth assassin said, while forcing Matthos’s head upward. "Your willing sacrifice will not be in vain."

The first assassin carefully poured the liquid into Matthos’s mouth, who still thrashed violently, though still pinned down.

Matthos tried to use his tongue to keep from swallowing the poison but found himself helpless when the liquid was no more than a few drops, which he couldn’t stop from sliding down his throat.

The Lord of Highgarden was desperate. He never imagined he would truly die on this day. Everything had been normal until this moment.

Suddenly, a feeling of drowsiness came over him, making Matthos’s eyelids feel heavy. He tried desperately to stay awake but found himself helpless as a cold sensation began spreading through his body, making him lose control over it.

Yet the feeling was comfortable, as if he were floating among the clouds with nothing left to worry about. Matthos no longer cared about anything else in that moment. He seemed to be in a garden full of laughing, drinking women.

The body that had been thrashing now lay still, and a comfortable expression appeared on Matthos’s face. He seemed to be smiling in that moment, though it was a strange and oddly unsettling smile.

"The Crimson Tears Mira created are terrifying; the target simply dies thinking they’re living out a beautiful dream." The second assassin said in a calm tone, though there was a touch of admiration when he mentioned the woman named Mira.

"Stop wasting time; let’s go." The first assassin said in a cold tone and stepped away from the bed with a rippling motion of his black robes. The other four assassins exchanged a glance and followed their captain in complete silence.

As soon as they left the room, they all caught the iron smell in the air. Looking down, the floor was stained dark red; twenty corpses lay along the corridor. All wore armor, but each had only a single wound, a clean, precise cut across the jugular.

The assassins didn’t concern themselves with decency and stepped on the bodies to avoid touching the floor, then vanished into the shadows at the end of the corridor. They moved through the shadows, their footsteps silent as a cat’s; only the sound of their robes hung in the air.

Turning one corner, then another, the five assassins climbed the stairs and arrived before a dark oak door. The captain knocked three times on the door, but there was no answer.

Then the door opened.

The leader of the assassins saw a slight figure wearing the same robes as him and a mask over the face. However, unlike him and his companions, who had a tear of black blood below the eyes, the person before him had a red moon.

Unlike him, an Executor, the figure before him was an Observer. One was responsible for executing targets; the other was responsible for gathering information. There was a third type, the Administrator, responsible for running everything at a base.

(Note: Executor, Observer, and Administrator.)

However, the leader of the assassins didn’t look at the Observer, but at the figure seated in a chair, under the candlelight.

A pair of violet eyes watched him with a rather calm gaze.

"My prince." The leader of the assassins entered the room and knelt, as did the other assassins.

"Is he dead?" Maekar asked, his gaze distracted by something. He wore a comfortable black tunic of fine silk. He looked as though he had just bathed.

"Yes, my prince." The leader said in a calm, respectful tone.

"Very good, now we’ll spread rumors that it was Daemon’s retaliation, ordered by Viserys." Maekar said in a calm tone. He felt nothing particularly significant about the death of a Lord Paramount.

He had already killed Loreon before, what was one more?

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Read my other books:

House of The Dragon:The Rise of the Emperor of the Seven Kingdoms

Game Of Thrones: The God-Emperor of Planetos

Percy Jackson: Godwyn the Golden.

Game Of Thrones: The King’s Court Wizard