The Red Keep loomed atop Aegon's High Hill.
The castle that had witnessed the rise and fall of the Targaryen Dynasty shuddered faintly in the aftershocks, shedding dust like the final gasps of a dying giant.
Before its main entrance, broad stone steps rose tier upon tier toward a heavy oak door studded with bronze.
Now those steps lay in disarray, covered in dust, rubble, and fragments of ornamentation fallen from the walls.
Aegon stepped onto the highest stair.
He removed his fearsome Dragonwing Helmet, revealing his handsome face. His long silver hair streamed in the gale, laden with dust and the smell of burning.
Black Valyrian steel armor fitted closely to his body, tracing his tall, powerful frame. Its dark surface gleamed coldly beneath the wan daylight, as restrained as his gaze.
The red cloak behind his shoulders snapped in the wind.
He stopped and raised his eyes to the castle before him.
Dark red walls stood in silence, their pointed towers piercing the gray sky.
This was where he had been born, and where all his suffering, wandering, and obsession with revenge had begun.
Fragments of memories-family, flames, a usurped throne, and slaughtered kin-should have surged through him at that moment.
But the thought only flickered in the depths of his violet eyes, like a pebble cast into a deep pool. It stirred the faintest ripple, then sank into utter stillness.
In the end, only fathomless coldness and indifference remained, like the surface of a frozen lake.
The past was gone.
Here, he would settle every old score and bring it all to an end.
Behind him stood an army in suffocating silence.
The Black Banner with the Three-Headed Red Dragon flew high at the front of the ranks, cracking in the gale with the thunderous sound of