AN: Obligatory reminder, slavery in Essos is consistently depicted in a way that makes the worst IRL excesses in that regard often look tame in comparison.
Disclaimer: I don't own A Song of Ice and Fire, the Game of Throne or the Star Wars books, TV series or games. They belong to their creators, publishers and/or copyright owners. This story is not for sale or rent.
Chapter 8 Part 4
=Sith=
291 AC
in the vicinity of Astapor
After taking the city, Viserys seldom left Astapor. Most of those trips didn't carry him far beyond the wall. They concluded on pleasure barges sailing the Worm River, where one of his supporters invited him and Dany to entertain them or in inspections of the area around the city so he could better plan its defense.
Today, it was the river, its bridges, and crossings that brought the Prince away from Astapor. The Worm was a slow and meandering river, wide and deep enough for barges to go far to the east, bringing goods from small settlements and mines in the mountains. Wooden islands dotted the riverbed, making for nice secluded meeting places or covert observation posts.
Viserys' first instinct was to fortify or destroy the nearby bridges to make the Worm a better shield against Dothraki and other possible invaders. A glance at one of the best available maps told him that holding three large stone bridges and destroying half a dozen smaller ones would, in theory, secure the river for hundreds of leagues.
In practice, Viserys was glad he decided to ride up the Worm and see it for himself beyond what he observed from his supporters' barges. Fortifying the large bridges was a project worth the expenses and manpower. Holding those would significantly increase Astapor's security. The mountains to the south and the ruins of Old Ghis beyond them provided a shield from Dothraki and New Ghis. Lookouts in the few viable passes and relatively small detachments of Unsullied would be able to keep that flank secure nearly indefinitely.
An invader would have to march from the north or land in the plains and hills to the southwest, with the sea and distant mountains trapping them for Viserys to deal with at his leisure. Arguably, the best ways to assault Astapor were from the sea, by seizing the harbor, or from the south side of the river, which offered a nice plain for a besieging force to deploy and dig in. Control of a few bridges or crossings would secure the enemy's logistics and provide a way for them to retreat in good order if necessary. Anyone assaulting from the north, even if they could take the bridge first, would be stuck between the walls and the river and have only a single choke-point to move through or flee.
The many wooden islands dotted all over the Worm made the river a questionable defense. Most of the smaller and two of the large stone bridges used such islands as anchor points. Those could be fortified, making a crossing there that much harder, if not impossible. However, there were simply too many other islands that anchored shallow parts of the river, creating crossings that could be forded by determined infantry or cavalry.
Viserys didn't have the industry or manpower to do something constructive about those. His best bet to prevent a fording in such locations was a rapid mobile force able to turn such attempts into bloodbaths before disengaging. He needed cavalry, mounted archers, and dragoons.
Viserys lacked enough horses for such an initiative, much less the trained cavalrymen.
"I've seen enough," the Sith grouched. "We will be building a series of lookout and messenger towers to warn us in case of a hostile force trying to cross the river. We will also fortify and defend the two large bridges closest to Astapor," Viserys decided. They would have to face any invading army at the city's walls for the foreseeable future. In the long term, he might have the tools and military to keep prospective enemies at bay, but that would be years from now.
Fortunately, he wasn't facing a modern military because giving them this kind of operational initiative would be pure madness. To an extent, that was the case now as well – Viserys simply lacked the assets to credibly defend the outlying settlements technically under Astapor's aegis. This wasn't infantry's game. He needed a lot of reliable cavalry backing infantry detachments stationed at every settlement to protect them. The logistics alone made such things infeasible, not to mention the price. Stationing credible defenses at the outlying towns and villages would turn them all into a net drain on Astapor's resources. Enemies would have to be destroyed in the field before they could ravage the countryside, paid off, or the settlements would be forfeited.
"Do any of you have a plausible idea on how we can protect the towns and villages beyond the city walls?" Viserys asked the Royal Guards riding beside him.
"Destroy the enemy before they can reach them," Lonmouth suggested. "We'll need cavalry for that. Stationing forces to deal with small-scale raids might be a good idea if we are at war. Otherwise, we either abandon them to their fate or evacuate their people behind the walls."
"Most mercenaries tend to camp in such places and demand tribute instead of burning them down," another former Pit Fighter, now turned Royal Guard, pointed out.
"I don't think that anyone moving against us will be so gracious," Viserys noted. "But any slavers coming for us might be more interested in dealing with Astapor and what it now represents instead of ravaging the countryside. We'll station messengers in some of the outlying settlements to warn us of Dothraki or other undesirables coming down the river from the East. We should have evacuation plans, though they might be useless if a cavalry heavy force attacks."
Most people would have to move on foot or carts, and that would be slow. In case of war, evacuation of anything but the closest settlements might be a pipe dream.
Viserys turned his horse around and had it trot towards Astapor. He didn't like the situation and hand and liked even less that he could do little to change it anytime soon.
=Sith=
291 AC
Balerys Iron mines
the Ghiscari Mountains
The second time Viserys left Astapor for more than a few days was to inspect the closest mines to the city. A few were less than a sennight of riding through a rough terrain. The travel time to Yunkai was roughly the same, though the distance between the city and the mines was far smaller.
On the way there, it became clear that utilizing water power to enhance mining productivity was out of the question, at least in this area. A couple of small streams provided fresh water to the mines before sneaking their way to the Worm River. However, they were too tiny to even hope to power a waterwheel, so that was out of the question.
The mines themselves… Viserys had seen primitive mines in his time as a Sith in locations where shipping in expendable slaves was far cheaper than using droids. That was often because the security situation meant no credible manufacturer would provide long-term maintenance contracts, and high-end industrial droids were expensive. Depending on what you wanted to mine, there were locations where it was cheaper to fly in slaves in bulk, have them die from hard labor in dangerous conditions, rinse, repeat, pay for basic security, and still come out ahead.
The mines here made all those death traps Viserys remembered look like resorts. As it turned out, his worst estimates about what he would find here were nowhere close to the truth. If a Sith designed this place to dispose of people in cruel and unusual ways through heavy labor, then the setup would have made a twisted sense. Instead… sheer incompetence and slaves being cheap couldn't explain this, surely?
The mine was a massive open pit with steep walls that people crawled all over. A row of crosses with people nailed or roped to them surrounded the mine, so the slaves down there had a great and constant view of the dying wretches. Five of the unlucky bastards lost their grips on jagged rocks and fell to their deaths while Viserys party approached. A closer look explained it – most miners were little more than skin and bones. They haven't been fed properly in ages.
This explained why the Dark Side was strong in this place. The more Viserys saw of the mine, the clearer it became that he lacked the assets to turn this place into something productive that didn't devour people by the trainload. Hells, the distance through rough terrain meant that supplying the place with enough food and water, much less bringing out the mined ores, would be a logistical challenge.
The way to go forward might be to keep the place open as a small-scale operation, with the bare minimum of people that could be supported while still making a profit. Viserys certainly didn't have the people to waste on this kind of idiocy… and it was clear no one here had gotten the memo that slavery in Astapor was no longer a thing. Or the local slave masters didn't care because this wasn't Astapor. Technically anyway.
An hour later, Viserys has his people crucify the slavers and their guards while wondering what to do with the liberated slaves. Most of them were in such a condition they wouldn't make it without the kind of support that was out of the question this far from Astapor. Those people were in no shape to get to the city by themselves. Only the newest two batches of slaves haven't been worked to the bone yet and might be salvageable.
"Gather all the available food and water. Those of you who believe they might make it back to Astapor, move behind me," Viserys' voice carried all over the open mine. "The only thing I can do for the rest of you is grant you a quick, clean death."
Once upon a time, seeing hundreds of wretches grateful at the prospect of dying, for the pain would finally go away, would have been upsetting. The only thing that really bothered Viserys was the sheer idiotic waste.
When everyone willing to live gathered behind him, the Sith raised a hand, and the Dark Side jumped at his intent. Viserys focused, bending the Force to his will. Tendrils of twisted Force lashed out, touching the wretches and draining what little life force they had left. As soon as the Dark Side energies touched them, they siphoned away the last drops of life from the miners. One after another, they collapsed, dead.
Doing the same to a similarly large group of hale people would have taken significantly more time and power. However, these former slaves were on their last legs, wishing for the sweet release of death.
