Aelyx - 22
The door burst open and Artys hurried in a wide grin on his face.
"Have you heard the news?" Artys asked, his voice gleeful.
I looked up from the game of draughts at my fourth captain. "I haven't been told anything today that would make me that excited so I suppose not."
"The armies mustered by Tyrosh and Lys are refusing to march."
That gained Artys the full attention of everyone in the room.
"How do you know that?" Rupert, who was seated across from me, asked.
Some of our outriders came on a manse that hadn't been abandoned the owner passed on the news.
"He came out to meet them?" Daeron asked skeptically.
"No, he shouted it down from the wall in exchange for a guarantee that he would remain unmolested. Not that he needed to. From what I heard the place is so well fortified that we would have needed Vhagar or a third of the army to take it."
That wasn't surprising. While many of the rural manses lacked the opulence of their urban counterparts they were equally if not better fortified, and far more extensive with many of the compounds containing what was effectively a small village within their walls. A patricos who was outside the direct path of the army might very well feel secure simply shutting the gates and hunkering down until the storm passed.
I waved my hand ending the tangent before it could truly begin. "So, what exactly did he say?" I asked.
Artys turned his gaze away from Daeron. "The sellsword companies in both armies have either deserted or are refusing to march against us so long as you and Vhagar remain with the army. They claim that their contracts obligate them to fight for the Triarchy but not to commit suicide."
Rupert snorted. "I can't say I blame them for that, there is a fine line between bravery and stupidity, and facing a dragon in the field leaves it in the dust."
"As for the rest of the armies, the militiamen are also refusing to move. Loyalty to the Triarchy doesn't run quite as deep as loyalty to the city and many of the contingents are swearing up and down that while they are ready to die for Tyrosh or Lys respectively they don't see why they should shed blood in defense of Myr."
That was …. unsurprising. The internal stability of the Triarchy had always been a rather delicate thing, as was demonstrated by the collapsing dominoes set off by the Battle of the Gullet in another world. The impetus for the state's formation had been the aggression of Volantis, a polity that the Three Daughters could defeat while working in concert. The revelation of their combined power had held them together, but now faced with an enemy they could not defeat, the old factionalism was quick to rear its head.
"As for the slave soldiers, the Tyroshi had to suppress a riot in their ranks. It's not exactly a promising start when you have to cut down or crucify a fifth of your force before even getting a whiff of the enemy."
"What caused the riot?" I inquired curiously.
"They got news of the poor saps who the Myrish had working the ballista at the Battle of Sebal. Apparently, they didn't fancy getting burned to death by you or ridden down if they very sensibly turned and ran."
While the Unsullied were the most famous example, slave soldiers were common in all the Free Cities except for Braavos, Pentos, and Lorath. Braavos lacked them for obvious reasons, while Pentos and Lorath had long ago learned that when your regional rival was an abolitionist power, slave soldiers were not a particularly good idea.
"They are falling apart already," I said with a grin. "When we march on Kylos we'll only have to worry about the Tyroshi, there won't be a Lyseni in sight."
Sounds of agreement emerged from the other men in the room.
"If you are so certain that the Triarchy will collapse, why don't we march on Tyrosh itself? Between the sellswords Pentos is paying for, all the men we will bring over from Westeros throughout the next two years, and of course Vhagar, we will have enough men to take the city." It was Daeron who voiced the question. Glancing between my three subordinates I saw that neither Rupert nor Artos was surprised by the inquiry. The topic had undoubtedly been on all of their minds since I had informed them of the new deal that I had struck with Pentos, and it was likely they had already discussed the issue among themselves.
"You mean aside from the fact that we would need a navy to take the city and the Pentoshi certainly are not about to offer?"
"Aside, from that," Daeron confirmed, his amusement clear.
"Well to start, it wouldn't be just be Tyrosh, we would have to conquer. It would be all of the mainland territory as well."
"Of course," said Rupert. "There would not be much point in taking the city if the entire place starves, because we can't feed it. But, I see where you are going with this. It isn't enough to just raise the men necessary to hold the city, even with Vhagar, we would need a fairly substantial army to enforce our will over Tyrosh, the Stepstones, and a large slice of the peninsular."
"Aegon didn't have a large army, and he took seven kingdoms, well six." Artos objected.
Daeron grimaced thoughtfully. "True but all Aegon really did was another layer of governance. Everyone knew that he his dragons could destroy any uprising against him, but besides collecting taxes and enforcing the King's Peace he left all the kingdoms to their own devices. It wasn't until the Conciliator that the Seven Kingdoms were bound together into a unified entity, rather than a collection of states held together by a warlord."
That was something of an exaggeration, but it wasn't entirely wrong either.
"And it is not as though we can do the same thing in Tyrosh." I put in.
"Couldn't you just declare yourself Archon of Tyrosh and take over the old system?" Artos pressed his point.
"Expect it would not be the old system," mused Rupert, "after all if we were to take the Tyrosh, I assume we would free all slaves."
"Of course," I confirmed. My companions and I could stomach working alongside slaveowners, but ruling over a slave state would be a bridge too far.
"So even if we did take Tyrosh our options would be to disrupt the status quo as little as possible, which none of us could countenance, or to destroy the social order, which would make ruling it virtually impossible." Artos summarized.
"Would freeing the slaves cause that much disruption? After all, they would certainly be loyal to those that freed them and the slaves outnumber the freeborn, we could use them to control the country" Dareon asked, his tone considering.
"I think so, yes," I responded. "When it comes to freeing the slaves, we essentially have two options. We can simply declare the slaves free and that they now must be paid for their labor or we can seek to destroy the slaveholding nobility of the city root and branch. The first option is barely better than allowing them to remain slaves. We can pass all the laws we want, but the fact will remain the old guard will maintain power over their former slaves and functionally treat them little different than they did before. So, then you would have a population of former slaves who aren't loyal to us, both because we have done little materially to change their circumstances and because they see us working with their former enslavers, and we would still be resented by all the freeborn who see us as foreign conquerors, who are upending their way of life. We lack the numbers to enforce the law without the cooperation of the local elite."
"Then we destroy the local elite," Daeron said, as though that conclusion was simple and obvious.
"And replace them, with what?" I asked. "We need a nobility to govern."
That brought a round of grimaces.
"We could replace them with Westerosi knights and lords." Artos offered hesitantly. "We all followed you here because we had no chance of inheriting anything in Westeros. We could bundle up all the estates into lordships and parcel them out."
"That might work for the mainland, and even then, dotting tiny garrisons throughout the countryside where they do not speak the language and the former rulers are actively hostile would be a delicate task and not one that could be accomplished without significant upheaval" Rupert opinioned. "But, the true wealth of Tyrosh comes from its merchant princes, and I am not certain about the rest of you but I am not particularly confident in my ability to manage a textile empire seized from a local magister."
"We could raise up some of the slaves to take over the properties of their former masters." Offered Artos.
"Yes, because spending their entire life chained to a loom would somehow run a transcontinental trade network," Daeron muttered sarcastically.
"You're the one who suggested dispossessing the magisters in the first place." Artos snipped back.
"At least I'm trying to think of a solution of a solution." Daeron enough.
"Enough," I said raising my voice slightly.
The burgeoning argument was cut off, as my three captains turned their attention to me.
"Ultimately, it does not matter why we will not attempt to take Tyrosh. I could tell you that King Viserys' gave his tacit support to the endeavor only so long as I limited my conquests to the domain claimed by my father. I could tell you that I believe that a conquest and mass emancipation would plunge the entire region into famine and economic depression. I could even tell you that we will not conquer Tyrosh because I don't want the headache of trying to govern the city. All that matters to you is that I am telling you that we are not taking the city. The matter is closed unless I decide to reopen it."
I fixed my gaze on each of them in turn waiting until they nodded, before I looked to the next. When they had all signaled their understanding, I leaned back in my seat.
"Now if anyone wishes to discuss our upcoming siege of Myr I would be happy to address that."