The Infernal Affairs

As they were preparing to leave the hall, Euron suddenly remembered someone who might prove useful.

"Father." Euron's voice was soft, yet carried an unmistakable force. "Among the captives brought back by the Hao Yin, there's a merchant from Pentos."

Kolen's brows shifted slightly, but he didn't interrupt.

"His name is Mario. He deals in spices and smuggles Myrish lace, and he has some standing in the Pentoshi merchant guild." Euron tapped his fingers lightly on the table, his rhythm steady. "I want to make him our eyes."

"Our eyes?" Kolen's voice rumbled like a deep-sea current.

"The merchant ship routes of the Free Cities, their cargo manifests, their guard details... This intelligence is more valuable than the raids themselves." Euron lifted his eyes. His left eye was as black as an abyss that devoured light; his right was icy blue, like a polar storm frozen in place. "But merchants won't betray their own city-states easily, so we need to make sure he stays loyal."

Kolen's knuckles tapped lightly on the armrest of his throne, his gaze sharp as a blade. "How do you plan to do that?"

The corners of Euron's mouth lifted slightly, revealing a cold smile at odds with his age. "Lysa has a poison called 'Siren's Kiss.'" When they had discussed in the Maester's Tower how to control people who might prove less than obedient, Lysa had volunteered that she had talents beyond languages.

"Poison?" Kolen's voice held a note of scrutiny. "You've taken in a dangerous and mysterious girl."

"Yes, but she's my maid now, and I trust her." Euron's voice was calm, but every word was ice. "'Siren's Kiss' requires an antidote every month. Otherwise... the skin rots, the bones decay, and the victim dies uglier than any salt-field slave."

Kolen fell silent for a moment, his gaze shifting to Lysa, who stood motionless in the shadows. The maid's emerald eyes were lowered, as unfathomable as the deep sea.

"Poison is only the first shackle," Euron continued. "The second is the Ironborn's blades."

"The Ironborn's blades?"

"Two Ironborn. One will serve openly as the merchant's guard, while the other will lie low in Pentos, keeping watch over his shop, ships, and family. If he dares betray us, he won't be the only one to die." Euron's voice was soft, yet carried an unquestionable ruthlessness. "Merchants prize profit, but they fear death even more. Bound by both shackles, he'll be more obedient than the most loyal Ironborn."

A sharp gleam flashed in Kolen's eyes. He slowly leaned back in his chair, absently rubbing the rim of his goblet.

"Intelligence is more valuable than brute force," Euron said, his voice low. "If we can learn in advance which merchant ship is carrying Braavosi gold, which fleet is lightly guarded, which harbor is poorly defended... our longships can hunt like sea monsters, strike once, and return laden with spoils."

Kolen's mouth tightened slightly, his gaze fixed on Euron like an iron anchor. After a long moment, his low voice echoed through the stone hall.

"This matter goes no further than these walls."

His gaze swept over Lysa and Maester Craigon in the corner. His grim authority made the old maester's Adam's apple bob involuntarily.

"Lysa, Craigon, you're the keepers of this secret. If even a whisper of it gets out..." He didn't finish, but the murderous intent in his voice froze the air around them.

Lysa bowed slightly, silent and respectful. Craigon, meanwhile, had gone pale. His fingers clutched the maester's chain at his chest as if it were his only protection.

Kolen's gaze returned to Euron. His low voice carried an almost cruel note of permission. "Go ahead. Use your poison and your Ironborn to weave this web."

"The men sent to watch him must be adaptable, clever, and loyal. You must have someone in mind, Father." Euron nodded slightly, a cold glint flashing in his mismatched eyes. Kolen waved a hand, then fell silent for a moment before speaking slowly. "There's no shortage of men like that among the Ironborn. Also, Old Wick is better suited to fishing. Daggmo is trustworthy, and he'll be your guard from now on. Give him these tasks, and he'll see they're handled."

Euron paused. "Doesn't he want to be king of the Hao Yin?"—By Ironborn tradition, every captain was king of his own ship.

"He can become king again whenever he likes, but he'd rather be your shield and spear—and you need him, too." Kolen's mouth curved upward. "So raise whatever waves you like. Let your old man see what you can do!"

"Thank you for trusting me, Father!"

The plan had been approved, and things had gone even better than expected.

[Discovered Pike Island: Salt-field dungeon, gained 15 points]

Deep in the dungeons of Pyke, dampness and despair writhed across the stone walls like living things. The stench of brine, rot, and excrement mingled into a nauseating, cloying reek. The dim, flickering torchlight barely tore through the heavy darkness, illuminating row after row of rusted iron bars. Behind them, figures huddled like discarded rags. Groans, coughs, and the occasional scrape of chains were the only music here.

In a relatively secluded, shadowy corner, one figure stood out. The brocade finery he wore had long since lost its former luster. It was filthy and tattered, smeared with grime and suspicious dark stains, with several tears revealing an equally expensive lining beneath. Yet its fine tailoring, remnants of elaborate embroidery, and a glimmer of dull gold thread at the collar still silently announced that he had once been a man of means—a merchant from the Free Cities. Now he curled on the cold stone floor like a frightened shrimp, stripped of every last shred of dignity and left with a deep-seated fear and numb despair. He was one of the "prey" the Hao Yin had captured more than a month ago, and now he was merely an obscure number on the salt-field roster, a lowly slave who could be swallowed by the waves at any moment.

Euron Greyjoy appeared at the end of the passage like a ghost from another world. He wore no dark green kraken robe to mark his rank, only a thick, dark gray cloak that nearly blended into the shadows. His hood was pulled low, hiding most of his young face. Only when he raised his eyelids did his mismatched eyes suddenly shine beneath the hood, like inhuman, cold flames kindled in the dark. Lysa stood half a step behind him like his silent shadow, her emerald eyes dim beneath the dancing torchlight, like an unfathomable whirlpool in the deep sea.

Daggmo stood beside Euron, one hand resting on his sword hilt. With the other, he roughly opened the cell door. The shrill scrape of metal made the merchant flinch violently. Daggmo's bared teeth made him tremble with terror. When Daggmo stepped aside, the merchant saw that a child stood in the doorway. His murky eyes filled at once with disbelief and deeper confusion. A child? Here, deep in the dungeon? No, he'd seen him on the ship. It was him—the second son of the king of the Iron Islands?

Euron didn't step into the filthy cell. He stood at the entrance, his gaze beneath the hood like a precise scalpel, carefully dissecting every crease in the merchant's face: the fear that had sunk into his bones, the pride worn away to nothing, the remnants of a merchant's shrewdness, and deep beneath it all, the faint, instinctive desire to survive. That desire was like the last glimmer in a drowning man's eyes, fragile and faint, but it was the leverage Euron needed.

"Pentoshi?" Euron asked. His child's voice was clear, yet pierced through the air like the dungeon's chill. It wasn't a question, but a cold statement.

A muffled whimper came from the merchant's throat. He nodded instinctively, his cracked lips moving, but no clear words came out.

"Do you know why you're still alive?" Euron's voice was utterly flat, as if he were discussing an object that had nothing to do with him. "Because your tongue is worth more than your bones."

A complex light flashed in the merchant's murky eyes: shock, confusion, and a faint glimmer of hope.

"Work for me." Euron was direct, without the slightest preamble. "Not as a slave, but as... a tool. A tool that can speak and pass along messages." He leaned forward slightly, and the shadow beneath his hood deepened. Only his mismatched eyes shone with a mesmerizing intensity. "I'll let you go home. Back to your silks, spices, and gold. You'll still be that respectable... Mario from the Pentoshi merchant guild, won't you?" He called the merchant by name with perfect precision. The detail made Mario shudder all over, as if invisible needles of ice had pierced him.

"But freedom comes at a price." Euron's voice turned abruptly cold, like a northern wind. He tilted his head slightly and glanced at Lysa behind him.

Lysa silently stepped forward. From within her cloak, she drew a small, inconspicuous pouch. Her slender fingers moved with elegant precision, as though performing some mysterious ritual. She poured a little dark red powder, thick as congealed blood, into her palm, then added a drop of clear liquid from an even smaller crystal vial. The instant the two touched, the air filled with an exceedingly faint but sickeningly sweet, uncanny scent. The powder quickly dissolved into the liquid, becoming a deep purple gel that seemed to writhe with a life of its own. Lysa dipped a needle-thin silver pin into it. The purple poison gathered at its tip into a tiny droplet gleaming with an eerie light.

"Open your mouth." Lysa's voice was as soft as a feather, yet brooked no disobedience.

The merchant recoiled in terror, his body desperately shrinking away as a choking protest rattled in his throat. Daggmo strode forward roughly, his iron-pincer grip clamping around the merchant's jaw and forcing his mouth open. The deep purple droplet gleamed with deadly light in the torch glow. With a precise flick of the silver pin, it landed deep in his throat. A pain beyond description, a mixture of burning and icy cold, spread instantly from his esophagus. The merchant coughed violently and retched, tears and snot streaming down his face as though he were about to throw up his own organs.

"Don't waste your strength," Euron said, his voice like a verdict. "'Siren's Kiss.' Lysa's masterpiece. It's taken up residence in your veins. One month." He raised a small finger. "Before every full moon, you must show up at the designated place on time and collect that month's antidote. One day late..." He paused, looking at the merchant's face contorted with pain and terror. "You'll watch your skin turn the dead gray of a fish, inch by inch, then peel away like rotting seaweed. You'll feel your blood boil in your veins, as though scalding lead had been poured into them. Finally, your bones will grow brittle from the inside out. The slightest touch will shatter them like weathered reefs." Every detail he described was another cold blade cutting into the merchant's nerves.

"No... please..." The merchant collapsed onto the ground, as though every bone had been removed from his body. Only his instinctive fear kept him breathing.

"The antidote is a gift," Euron continued, his voice once again cold and calm. "And your 'loyalty' will be monitored by the Ironborn of Pyke. They'll watch you like gulls watching a dead fish on the shore. Your shop, your fleet, your mistress... everything you cherish will be under their eyes. Any act of disloyalty"—his voice dropped to freezing cold—"and not only will you die in agony, everything you have in Pentos, everything you hold dear, will be reduced to ashes by Wildfire. Believe me, the Iron Islands' wrath is faster and more thorough than wildfire."

The poison's naked control, combined with the Ironborn's ever-present shadow, formed a failsafe web of death. The merchant looked at the child who was calmly torturing him in the gloomy dungeon. Euron's mismatched eyes held no hint of emotion, only the cold certainty of one who controlled everything and the indifference of one who understood human nature. The merchant felt his very soul freeze beneath that gaze. Refuse, and he would be sent straight to hell. Agree, and he would enter an endless abyss of enslavement by poison and violence. In the grip of extreme terror and a desperate yearning for the faintest chance of survival, the once-proud head finally dipped, heavily and hopelessly, in a single nod.

"Good." Euron's voice held no emotion. "Lysa will tell you how to contact us, where to collect your first antidote, and... the first 'bit of news' you'll need to pass along once you're home." He turned. His dark gray cloak swept through the damp dungeon passage in a decisive arc, leaving the merchant collapsed in the filth, utterly hollowed out and gasping. The cloying aftertaste of poison mingled with a despair more pungent than the smell of the sea, the despair of total surrender.

Mario of the Free Cities would be Euron's first nail, but not his last. Before long, every important harbor would be filled with Euron's eyes.