Chapter 9: Family Ties (78 AC, Age 10)
The year Maric approached his tenth nameday was a year of dangerous calm. The streets of Flea Bottom, having learned to respect the quiet boy and his ferocious shadow of a friend, left their small enterprise largely unmolested. The memory of the swift, brutal punishment meted out to a pack of bullies, coupled with the convenient and fatal "accident" that had befallen the Dreg Rat known as Weasel, had created a small, protective bubble of fear around them. Within this bubble, they thrived.
Their operations, directed by Maric's ever-calculating mind, grew more sophisticated. They moved beyond simple scavenging and cons into the realm of information brokerage. Finn, with his network of street urchins, would gather whispers—which merchant was expecting a shipment, which ship's captain was looking to hire cheap labor for a day, which cook was willing to trade leftovers for gossip. Maric would then analyze this raw data and devise a way to monetize it. They became purveyors of opportunity, connecting need with fulfillment and always taking a small, quiet cut.
The results flowed back to the hovel on Pisswater Bend. The family now ate meat twice a week. Elara, his now seven-year-old sister, had a touch of healthy colour in her cheeks. Borin's cough had eased with the acquisition of a thick, warm cloak, and the haunted, defeated look in his eyes had been replaced by a weary but bewildered gratitude for the son who seemed to be a living ward against misfortune. Lara's love for Maric had deepened into a kind of religious reverence. He was her miracle, her gift from the Seven, the reason her family had not yet been swallowed by the gutter.
Maric accepted their awe as a necessary component of his operational security. He was their foundation, and they were his. In his mind, they were still assets, but the lines had begun to blur. They were his assets. The possessiveness he felt was a cold, fierce thing, the pride of an architect in his first, most vital construction. He had stabilized his base. He was in control.
It was a catastrophic miscalculation. He had controlled the variables within his small world, but he had forgotten that he lived on the edge of a much larger, more violent ecosystem. He had accounted for the predators in his path, but not for their retribution.
The lesson came in fire and smoke, in the dead of a cold, starless night.
Maric was jolted from a shallow sleep not by a sound, but by a smell. It was the acrid, biting stench of burning thatch and greasy smoke, a smell that cut through the usual miasma of the hovel with the sharpness of a knife. His eyes snapped open. The air was thick, hazy. A hellish orange light flickered through the cracks in the daub-and-wattle walls.
Panic, primal and terrifying, erupted around him. Lara was screaming his name, her voice shrill with terror. Elara was wailing, a sound of pure, childish fear. He heard Borin coughing, a deep, wracking spasm that was drowned out by a low, hungry roar from outside—the sound of a wildfire catching hold.
He was on his feet in an instant. The enhanced endurance from the old beggar allowed him to function through the smoke that was already making his eyes water and his lungs burn. The brawler's instincts from Weasel screamed at him, assessing threats, angles, and exits.
The hovel was an oven. The heat was a physical presence, sucking the air from his lungs. The only exit, the flimsy wooden door, was outlined in a terrifying, creeping line of fire. Kael, his older brother, ever the pragmatist, was already there, pulling at the door, but it wouldn't budge.
"It's blocked!" Kael yelled, his voice cracking with fear. "Something's fallen against it!"
Borin staggered towards the door, his face a pale mask in the demonic light. He threw his shoulder against it, once, twice. The door shuddered but held fast. He collapsed into another fit of coughing, his weakened body unequal to the task. They were trapped.
Lara grabbed Maric and Elara, pulling them into a corner, her body trying to shield them from the inevitable. "The gods have mercy," she sobbed.
Maric looked at his family, his assets, on the verge of liquidation. He saw the raw terror on their faces, the resignation to a fiery, agonizing death. And the cold, analytical part of his mind was drowned out by a single, ferocious, possessive thought: No.
Mine.
He shoved himself free of his mother's grasp and moved to the door. The heat was immense. The wood was blistering, too hot to touch. He could see through a crack that Kael was right; a massive, smoldering roof beam from the neighboring shack, which was now a roaring inferno, had collapsed and wedged itself against their doorframe.
"Maric, no! Get back!" Borin croaked, reaching for him.
Maric ignored him. He stared at the beam, his mind a steel trap of cold logic. He was ten years old. He weighed less than a sack of grain. But he was not just a boy. He was a vessel. He was a repository of stolen life. He reached deep within himself, past the quiet endurance of the beggar, past the wiry strength of the cats and dogs, and seized upon the raw, violent vitality of Weasel, the dead brawler. He called upon the core of heat and strength that had poured into him in that dark alley.
He braced his feet on the dirt floor, bent his knees, and placed his hands and shoulder against the burning door. He didn't feel the splinters. He barely registered the searing pain as his skin made contact with the superheated wood. He focused his entire being, his will, his stolen power, into a single, explosive point of effort.
He pushed.
For a moment, nothing happened. The beam was an immovable object. The fire roared its defiance. He could feel his own hair starting to singe. His family's screams faded into a dull roar in his ears. He pushed harder, a low growl tearing from his own throat, a sound of pure, animalistic exertion. He felt muscles he didn't know he had straining to their absolute limit. The strength of a dozen lesser creatures and the furious, desperate power of a grown man surged through his small frame.
With a groan of protesting timber and a shower of sparks, the beam moved. It scraped against the dirt, shifting an inch, then two. A sliver of night air, blessedly cool and fresh, sliced through the smoke. Hope, fierce and desperate, lanced through him. He gave one final, titanic shove.
The beam shifted just enough. With a splintering crack, the door flew inward, torn from its leather hinges. A wall of heat and smoke billowed into the hovel, but beyond it was the alley. Beyond it was life.
"Go!" Maric screamed, his voice raw. "Now!"
The spell of terror was broken. Kael was the first to react, grabbing Elara and pulling her towards the opening. Lara, her face a mask of utter disbelief, snatched Maric's arm and dragged him with her. Borin stumbled after them, his hand pressed to his mouth, his eyes fixed on his youngest son with an expression of profound, earth-shattering awe.
The alley was a vision of hell. The shacks on either side were burning, the narrow space a wind tunnel of flame and choking smoke. Embers rained down like malevolent fireflies. The world was screams and heat and the terrifying roar of a slum being devoured.
Maric's mind was preternaturally clear. The panic of the crowd was a liability. He took command. "This way!" he yelled, pointing down the alley, away from the heart of the fire. "To the river!"
He didn't wait to see if they followed. He grabbed Elara from Kael, hoisting his sister over his shoulder. She was a feather-light weight. He then grabbed his father's arm, his small hand surprisingly strong, and pulled the weakened man along. "Kael! Mother! Stay with me!"
He led his family through the labyrinthine chaos. He was no longer a child. He was a commander executing a tactical retreat from a compromised position. He used Weasel's street-knowledge, the phantom map of alleys and bolt-holes now his own, to navigate the inferno. He chose paths that were shielded from the worst of the flames, his mind processing the shifting dangers with inhuman speed.
They burst out onto the wider thoroughfare of River Row, joining a terrified mob of Flea Bottom residents. They were safe. They huddled together, a small, soot-stained island of survival in a sea of despair, and watched as the fire consumed their world. The hovel they had called home, the small life they had built, was gone, reduced to ash and glowing embers.
Lara was on her knees, clutching Maric to her chest so tightly he could barely breathe. She wasn't crying for their lost home. She was rocking back and forth, whispering prayers of thanks, her eyes never leaving his face. Borin stood beside them, his usual stoop gone, his gaze fixed on the impossible strength his ten-year-old son had just displayed. He looked at Maric's hands, red and blistered from the door, and then at his face, streaked with soot but calm and controlled.
Kael stood a little apart, his arms wrapped around himself. His usual cynical, street-hardened expression was gone, replaced by a look of stunned confusion. He had been there. He had seen the beam. He knew what it weighed. He knew what his father, a grown man, had failed to do. And he had seen his small, quiet younger brother move it. The rules of the world, as Kael understood them, had been broken.
In the midst of the chaos, a small figure detached itself from the crowd and sprinted towards them. It was Finn, his face pale, his eyes wide with fear. "Maric! I saw the fire! I came as fast as I could! Are you…?"
"We are safe," Maric said, his voice level, cutting through his mother's frantic prayers. He looked at Finn, his mind already shifting from survival to analysis. "The fire. Where did it start?"
"The shack next to yours," Finn said instantly, his training kicking in. "Old Man Hemmet's place. It went up like a torch. Too fast to be an accident."
"Who?" Maric's voice was cold.
Finn's eyes darted around. He leaned in close, his voice a conspiratorial whisper. "The Dreg Rats. Harl was seen running from the alley just before it started. Lyra saw him. She said he was laughing."
The final piece of the puzzle clicked into place. The cold knot of certainty in Maric's stomach tightened. This was not a random tragedy. This was retribution. It was the answer to Weasel's death. It was a direct attack on him, executed through his most vulnerable point: his family. They had tried to burn his foundation to the ground.
He looked at his family, huddled and homeless, their faces illuminated by the dying glow of the fire. He saw Lara's terrified, worshipful gaze. He saw Borin's bewildered awe. He saw Kael's shattered certainty. He saw Elara's tear-streaked face. For the first time, he felt the crushing weight of their reliance on him not as a strategic consideration, but as a physical burden. These were not just assets on a balance sheet. They were his name. His blood. His House, however pathetic its current state. An attack on them was an attack on the very core of his new existence.
His ambition, which had been a quiet, personal flame, a project of self-aggrandizement and secret power, was now fanned by the inferno into a roaring blaze. The small-time schemes, the accumulation of coppers, the dominance of a few slum alleys—it was all childish nonsense. It was playing in the dirt while a war was being waged.
He had been thinking like a gangster, focused on turf and profit. He had been wrong. He needed to think like a Lord. A Lord protects his people. A Lord provides a safe demesne. A Lord builds walls, not just of stone, but of power and fear. A Lord does not suffer his enemies to live.
He stood before the smoldering ruins of his childhood, his family behind him, a living testament to his failure to protect them adequately. And in that moment, his life's purpose crystallized. He would not just survive Flea Bottom. He would not just escape it. He would rise so high above it that its flames could never touch him again. He would build a fortress for his family, a real one, made of stone and steel and wealth. He would give them a name that commanded respect, not pity.
And the Dreg Rats, the arsonists who had almost taken everything from him, would be the first stone in that foundation. He would not just defeat them. He would eradicate them. He would scour their memory from the streets, a lesson in absolute power for all to see.
He looked up from the ashes of his past, his ten-year-old face a mask of grim resolve. His gaze was fixed on the distant hills of King's Landing, where the wealthy and powerful lived, their homes dark and safe against the night sky. That was where he was going. The climb had just begun.