"A Beast in the Grass"
Title: A Beast in the Grass
Disclaimer: Not mine.
Rating: PG, just to be safe.
Author’s Note: I’m fairly certain the metaphors in this are about as subtle as a knock on the noggin, so hopefully this doesn’t break any rules about not being about the main characters. Anyway, for a long time, I’ve been fascinated by Jaime as a hrakkar. I mean, he’s essentially a white lion, right? If I still had any skill with a pencil or tablet, I’d be all over the idea of drawing his personal heraldry but I guess I’ll just have to be content with the image in my head.
The Dragon stood alone in the great green vastness of the Dothraki Sea, surrounded by grass taller than even her massive frame, yet she was unafraid.
The Dragon does not whimper at blade of grass, she thought. If I cannot see through them, I must simply rise above them.
And just like that, she was flying above the Sea, her passage stirring up waves of green below her. If her khalasar could not find her, then she would simply need to find her khalasar.
A flash of white caught her eye. A sheep? Out here? Forgetting the hunt for her khalasar, she tucked her wings under her and dropped into a dive, screaming out her hunting cry as she neared her target.
However, the prey her claws raked down was not a skittish ewe or a confused lamb or even a belligerent ram. It was a lion. In fact, it was a hrakkar, the white lion of the Dothraki Sea. Its claws were like lightning and though dragon scales could not easily be hurt by such, the sheer surprise of resistance was enough to make her back off for a moment.
The hrakkar, she instantly saw, had taken far worse than he had given. Its right paw was a mess of blood, bone and fur and, though it growled a warning at her, it seemed unable to retreat.
Then again, perhaps there is another reason it cannot retreat, she thought, looking past the hrakkar to see two small cubs mewling on the ground behind it.
The adult growled again, drawing her attention back to itself. This time, she saw that his muzzle was covered in blood- old blood, black and dried. He has bested a man, she thought, instantly certain. Was he defending his pack or has he taken to hunting men as men have hunted him?
Before she could think on her question, there came a small rustling from her right and slowly, a shape emerged from the grass. For a moment, Daenerys couldn’t tell what it was but then a wind blew, carrying with it the smell of the sea, and there, standing before her, was a lioness. The she-lion was a freakish creature, not only massive compared to all the others Daenerys had ever seen but also with a mottled gray and white coat and eyes as blue as the lips of the Undying. She also bore more battle scars than the Dragon could count. One particularly prominent one had left half of her muzzle completely devoid of fur.
There is no cunning in this one. She faces her opponents head on, thought the Dragon. No matter the cost.
The she-lion stepped between the Dragon and the hrakkar, then laid her ears flat against her skull and issued a warning cry. Behind her, the male joined his voice to hers in a harmony of promised violence.
The Dragon reared back, preparing to fight if the pair decided to make good on their threat, but before she could, the howl of a far off wolf interrupted them. The she-lion immediately fell silent and turned her head in the direction of the sound. The male kept his eyes facing forward, toward the more immediate threat. The only sign that he had heard it at all came in a slight twitch of his ears.
The Dragon watched them both, considering. By the time the female turned to face her again, she had made up her mind.
There isn’t enough meat between them to make it worth the effort. Besides, I still need to find my khalasar.
With a great downward stroke of her wings, she heaved herself into the air.
Daernerys opened her eyes to see the ceiling of her Great Pyramid sprawling above her. The dream had been an odd one and yet, for all that, it had given her the same disquieted feeling that she had had upon viewing the strange apparitions in the house of the warlocks- the feeling that there was truth there to be seen had she but the key to unlock it. Yet even only a few moments after waking, the details were already becoming fuzzy.
With a sigh, she rose and sought out the hrakkar pelt Drogo had given her, wanting the comfort of its familiarity. Yet when she found it, she found herself unable to pick it up. Instead, she looked into the shadows where its eyes had been and was struck by a thought that she somehow knew was fact.
Green. The hrakkar’s eyes were green.