Dawn had come, and a flashing, blood-red comet was running through the pink and orange eastern sky, pointing south. Without the darkness of the night to conceal the real extent of the damage, everything around Kurt looked clear, but he wasn't liking it one bit. Half of the khalasar had burned down, and the tents containing food and water supplies had been the first to go, together with Kurt and Blaine's tent and those containing the wedding gifts they needed to buy ships in Pentos. It couldn't be casual, and Kurt knew with a certainty that it wasn't. It was someone's fault. Blaine had figured that much, and was currently shouting at the remaining warriors in a fit of tumultuous rage.

"How did it happen?!" he yelled angrily, walking in circles over the blackened sand of the desert. "How could you let it happen?"

"They moved silently, my Khal, and without horses, so we couldn't hear them" one of them said in a hushed, reverent voice. "They set the tents on fire one by one, so as soon as we went to one, another needed attention. And we had no water."

Blaine stopped his pacing to glare at the Dothraki, and for a moment Kurt thought he was going to hit him, but he didn't.

"Wes, David" he said instead, his bloodriders stepping forward immediately at the command. "Did you make the counts?"

"Yes, we did" David answered, arms crossed behind his back and a somber expression on his face. "One quarter of the food left. The only water available is in the flakes attached to the horses' saddles, and it's not enough for everyone. 20,000 dead. The rest fled in fear. It makes barely two thousand left, of which only a half with fighting and riding skills."

Kurt gasped and shivered at the news. His dragons sensed his unease, because they hissed angrily from his shoulders and puffs of smoke erupted from their nostrils. The green one descended down his arm and Kurt stroked his scales with the other, trying to soothe him.

So many people dead because of me, he couldn't help but think. So much blood shed to stop me.

And even though Kurt hadn't died in the fire, they had stopped him. Pentos was too far and they wouldn't survive the trip, and even if they did, a thousand warriors were nothing compared to the armies of all the Lords of Westeros combined. But... he had dragons now. It would take years for them to grow, it was true, but once they did, he could take them to battle.

But what would they do in the meantime? How would they survive?

"If I can give you my advise, my Khal" Finn spoke up, "I think we should go back to Vaes Dothrak. The other Khals can't harm us there, but they will if they find us roaming through the desert as weak as we are."

Blaine bristled at that, his hands closing into fists.

"And let them see me like this? With a khalasar starving and torn to pieces?!" he snapped. "And for what? To beg them for food and horses? A khal does not beg."

Finn lowered his head and took a step back, mumbling an apology. Kurt looked at Blaine closely. He was a mess.

He needs me.

His dragons still perched on his shoulders and upper arms, Kurt walked toward Blaine and took his hand gently in his. Blaine looked up at him from the ground, his expression calmer for a moment, but when he noticed the dragons he flinched back slightly. Kurt held his hand tighter.

"You don't have to be scared of them, my sun-and-stars" he said slowly, as if he was talking to a child. Blaine was so lost and helpless that he looked like one.

"I'm not" he said in a stern voice, as if Kurt had offended him.

"Then touch them" Kurt whispered, guiding Blaine's hand toward the cream-colored dragon, which seemed the quietest and calmest of them. While the black one hissed almost constantly, as if he hated the entire world, and the green one did nothing but seek Kurt's attention like a demanding puppy, this one had fallen asleep right after coming into the world and was now drowsing on his right shoulder, curled in on himself like a snake.

Blaine seemed doubtful, but Kurt knew he wasn't going to refuse a challenge. As his hand came in contact with the dragon's back, Blaine looked as if he was expecting to burst into flames at any moment, but all the dragon did was lift his head and nudge Blaine's hand with it, golden eyes opening to peer at him curiously. Blaine stroked his head tentatively, then he stepped back and lowered his hand to his side.

"See? They know I like you" Kurt said encouragingly. "So they like you, too."

He wasn't saying it just to calm Blaine; deep down, he knew it was true. He felt like he knew what they were thinking, and it seemed to work the other way around, too. He didn't know how to explain it, he just knew it was there. That was how his ancestors must have been able to ride them; not by training them, but by understanding them. They looked endearing now, but Kurt knew they would grow into deathly, enormous beasts. It was said that Balerion the Black Dread, the greatest dragon that ever existed, could overshadow an entire city with his wings and swallow a mammoth whole. The Iron Throne had been forged with the fire coming from his mouth, melting the swords of the enemies Aegon the Conqueror had defeated in the Conquest of Westeros.

"What do you think we should do, moon of my life?" Blaine asked. Kurt stayed silent, thinking, but nothing came to him. He knew Sandy would help him, but he didn't know if they would reach him before starving to death, and Sandy's money would not be enough to give him what he needed. An army.

As he kept thinking, his gaze shifted toward the early morning sky. Orange was changing into light blue and the sun was coming up, but the red comet still blazed in a long swoop of fire.

It's red. Red like fire, red like blood.

Maybe it was a sign. Maybe it meant something. But he wasn't going to lead what remained of the khalasar to a random destination just because a mysterious star was pointing toward it.

"I think we should send four outriders in exploration" he answered at last. "One north, one south, one west, one east. As soon as they reach something, a village, a city, an oasis, they will turn around and come back here. We'll see who comes back first, and what he has found."

Blaine's eyebrows almost reached his hairline, and Finn looked surprised as well.

"That is... a great idea, khalees" he said in an impressed tone.

I know, Kurt almost snapped, but he kept his mouth shut. His dragons made him feel bolder, he had realized, but he mustn't let it show too much.

"I agree" Blaine said. "We'll do it."

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The first outrider came back after three days. Blaine had told them to come back in five days even if they didn't find anything, because whatever they would find after that amount of time was too far for the khalasar to reach anyway. In those three days, they ate and drank little, trying to save as much as they could for the upcoming trip, and without water to wash themselves with their skin became dried and cracked. They had managed to build little huts with semi-burnt wooden trunks and strips of cloth from the destroyed tents, but the lack of proper hydration was unforgiving.

Kurt's dragons were restless; he could sense that they were hungry, but he didn't have any meat to feed them, and they hissed angrily whenever he tried to give them fruits or cheese. On the third day, Kurt found himself hoping that one of the horses would die of thirst, so they could eat something. It was mean, he knew, but they would die soon if he didn't put something in their stomachs, and Kurt couldn't let the only living dragons in the world starve to death before they could even spit fire. They were a miracle, magic and legend and history come back on earth after centuries of nothingness.

The worst of it all were the children; Kurt could hear them at night, complaining about their empty bellies and asking what they were going to do. Their mothers said they didn't know, and Kurt didn't, either. Some of them eyed him with resentment during the day, knowing that whoever had started the fire had done it to stop him, and Kurt knew that the only reason they didn't say it out loud was Blaine. And the dragons. That, too.

When the outrider finally came, Kurt and Blaine left their hut to greet him. Blaine was thirsty and hungry like everybody else, but he was hiding it for the sake of the others. They couldn't see him weak. Only Kurt could hear his stomach grumble angrily in the middle of the night, or feel how dry the skin of his hands had become.

"What did you find?" Blaine asked the rider as he climbed down from his tired horse.

"There is an empty city, down to the south. Its gates are smashed and there is no one inside, but there are water fountains, and gardens with trees" the man said, swiping the sweat off his forehead with his upper arm.

Kurt looked up at the sky. The comet still pointed south.

"It will do" Blaine said. "We'll move as soon as the other riders return."

After two other days, they did. None of them had found something, so the ghost city was their only option. Since it had taken the rider three days to reach it and then come back, at their pace they would probably need three days just to reach it. They had carts to carry those few supplies they had, and children, old men and slaves without horses to ride on.

On the first day of march, a horse did die as Kurt had hoped. The Dothraki didn't eat them, as sacred as they were (with the exception of the heart ceremony in Vaes Dothrak), but it belonged to someone who had died in the fire, so there was no one to bury the animal with, and they were hungry. For the first time since Kurt had joined them, he saw them throwing their traditions out the window. When he tried to feed his dragons raw meat, they shook their heads in distaste, but when he roasted a little chunk for himself they crowded on top of it like crows over a corpse, so he let them eat it and found another.

Blaine refused to eat it.

"I'd rather die than dishonor my God like that" he said in a somber tone, watching the crowd of people as they tore the carcass to pieces with their hands. Kurt wanted him to eat, but he knew better than to question him about something so important.

On the second day of march, it was the people who started dying. They needed water more than food, and they were starting to run out. They buried the first as a sign of respect, but as the day went on and people kept dying, they realized that the burial of all of them would take too long. So they kept marching, leaving a sickly long line of corpses behind.

More blood on my hands, Kurt thought bitterly, sprawling on top of his horse to hug its neck and close his eyes, his dragons laying behind him on the animal's back. He was tired, dirty, thirsty. He didn't know if he could survive another day, and he feared for his slaves, too. They were afoot, and looked weaker at every passing hour; when the sun set, Rachel almost fainted from exhaustion and Finn put her on his horse for the rest of the march. Mercedes, even though her body looked stronger than the others, was visibly thinner, her cheeks hollow and her full lips too pale. Santana and Brittany walked with their arms around each other's waists, supporting one another weakly.

Kurt didn't sleep that night. He stared at Blaine as he slept and stroked his curls, dust getting stuck to his fingers every time he eased them out, wondering. What have I done? Did I condemn us all?

He didn't know how it was possible for him to cry, but when a little, almost shy tear escaped one of his eyes, he took it with his fingertip and let it fall over Blaine's dry lips, tracing them gently to dampen them.

On the third day, not a single word was exchanged. They were all too tired, and breaths were something precious. Kurt couldn't remember what was the last thing he had said, or to whom. It felt as if those three days of march were all that had ever existed, with a giant black hole sucking up everything that had been or ever would be. The sand under his horse's hooves was all Kurt was able to see, and his own breath coming out of his mouth the only thing he was able to feel. When he closed his eyes that day, he wondered if he would ever open them again.

In the end, he did. Someone found the strength to shout, and Kurt lifted his head to see tall, grey walls looming up in front of them, getting taller as they walked toward them.

"We found it" he said in a hysterical half-laugh, bouncing on his horse. "We found it!"

The gates were smashed indeed, hardwood splintered and crashed at either side of them as they passed by it. The streets were empty, but here and there you could see a broken cart, and the sand and the lower walls of the houses were black.

"Dothraki work" Blaine muttered under his breath, loud enough for Kurt to hear. He remembered dully the Lamb city their khalasar had destroyed; the corpses had still been there, but the city had been a wreck just like this one. He guessed that the Dothraki way was to burn the bodies of the dead before leaving. He was too tired of death to mourn for this people too, though.

The main square of the deserted city had a big circular fountain in the middle of it, and even though the water didn't sprout upward anymore, the lower pool was still full. The sun had certainly made it hot and disgusting, but they didn't care at this point. Kurt made to climb down from his horse to run to it as the others were doing, but Blaine stopped him with a hand on his shoulder.

"Come with me" he said in a hushed voice, almost drowned by the cries of joy that were erupting around them. Kurt nodded silently and led his horse behind Blaine's.

The khal led him to a far corner of the square, in front of a well made of bricks. He got down from his horse and retrieved the wooden bucket attached to it from the ground, then lowered it into the well. When it came back full of fresh water, Kurt climbed down too, stumbling when his feet got in contact with the ground, and they drank long, heartfelt gulps of water in turn.

"I can't believe we are alive" Kurt said when he felt like he couldn't drink anymore, the freshness of the water making him feel suddenly stronger. He lowered the bucket once again, and when it came back, he put it on the ground and left it to the dragons.

"I know" Blaine agreed, turning away slightly, frowning. "Such a great khal I am. Not even able to keep my people safe."

Kurt gasped.

"Don't- don't think like that" he whispered. "You are an amazing khal."

"Yes, because you met so many of them" Blaine snapped. He carded his fingers through his hair in a nervous gesture, still avoiding Kurt's gaze.

"You're right, you are the only khal I know" he said gently. "But that doesn't mean I don't know-"

"It means that you know nothing about khals" Blaine looked up at him angrily, but he looked rather desperate to Kurt, with his sun-burnt face and sand-covered tangle of hair. "It means that you don't know what it feels like to know that you have let down the people you were supposed to protect. They- they are my responsibility, Kurt. What if I have been wrong all along? What if we can't do this after all?"

Kurt took a step back at that, gaping at Blaine. The sharp sting of betrayal burned his cheeks as if he had been slapped.

"You- you mean you don't want to help me anymore?"

Blaine seemed to realize only then what he had said, because his expression softened and he took a step forward.

"Of course I want to" he said, taking Kurt's hand in his. "But I have to think about my people, too. I have to think carefully about what we are going to do now. Do you understand what I'm saying?"

Something in the condescendence of Blaine's tone made Kurt snap.

"Yes" he said through gritted teeth, wrenching his hand free from Blaine's grip. "You're saying that we are going to be stuck in this hellhole forever!"

"I never said-"

"But you're thinking it! Am I ever going to be your khalees, truly? Because if I was, you would say our people, our khalasar, our responsibility. You think I don't know how many people died? You think I don't care?"

Blaine seemed taken aback by Kurt's outburst. After all, Kurt had never acted like that with him. It was the exhaustion, and the hunger, and the rage when he thought about the corpses left in the desert and the burned bodies in the fire, but how many people died every time a khalasar sacked a city? How many people burned? Was it so wrong of him to give this one a higher purpose? Was it so wrong to want back what was his by right?

"And you know what?" he went on, before Blaine could do so much as open his mouth. "It's fine, really. Because as soon as my dragons grow up, I won't need you anymore."

He regretted it the moment it left his mouth.

Blaine stared at him for a long instant, his jaw working as if he was choking back a mean retort, but he said nothing. Which was even worse than hearing him yell angrily. Instead, he eyed Kurt one more time before turning around and stomping away, leaving Kurt alone by the well, the dragons now perched on its rim with their heads raised and their eyes narrowed suspiciously, wings flapping restlessly. They could feel his anger.

"Fuck" Kurt muttered, kicking a stone with his feet.

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They settled inside what remained of the city's houses for the night. The one Blaine claimed as theirs had a little backyard, where plants were starting to grow again among the ashes of the sacking and an orange tree was in full blossoming, filling the air with sweetness. It reminded Kurt of the gardens in Pentos, with trees of so many different species that he didn't know them all. It reminded him of how life could still overpower destruction and despair, of how something thought to be dead could come back to life, like his dragons had.

After an awfully long bath and a fruit-based lonely dinner (theirs wasn't the only tree survived inside the city, thankfully), he had stared at it until the sun had disappeared and then some more before going inside, where Blaine was lying on an old mattress they had found, stuffed with goose feathers and hay. He was looking at the blackened roof, and when Kurt lay down next to him, he didn't even turn around.

For a while, Kurt stayed silent.

"I'm sorry" he said, when he couldn't think of something better to start with. "You know I didn't mean what I said."

"Which part, exactly?" Blaine whispered in the dark, his frame unmoving. "The one when you said I don't treat you as my khalees, or the one when you said you are with me because you need me?"

"All of it" Kurt said, because it was true. Why would Blaine put so much at stake, if he didn't consider Kurt his true khalees? And if Kurt wanted to be treated like one, he had to think about the khalasar's needs, too, together with his.

"Because you're right, you know" Blaine continued, as if Kurt hadn't spoken at all. "As soon as they grow up, you can fly away on one of them."

Kurt turned around on the mattress, but Blaine's eyes were out of reach.

"I don't know if I could do it without you" he admitted to Blaine, and to himself, too. It was the truth, and it was scary. Because it meant that if Kurt found himself face to face with a choice between his throne and Blaine, he didn't know what he would choose.

Finally, Blaine turned around. A hand came up to cup Kurt's cheek in the dark.

"Then don't" Blaine whispered, inching closer. "Don't run away from me."

"Never" Kurt said, closing his hand over Blaine's wrist. "I just- I felt like you were thinking about leaving me on my own."

Blaine shook his head, and Kurt could see a little smile on his lips, his teeth glistening in the moonlight coming from the little window of the room.

"You don't get it, do you?" Blaine said, stroking Kurt's cheekbone with his thumb.

"What?" Kurt asked, nuzzling in his touch. Gods, he had missed it so much.

"What binds a khal to his khalees. What binds me to you" Blaine explained, puffs of breath grazing Kurt's lips now. "Whatever a khalees desires, a khal desires. Whatever you want in this world, I shall give it to you."

They kissed then, lips still dry but soft somehow, gliding blissfully against each other. Kurt released a breath he didn't even know he was holding, wrapping his arms around Blaine's neck. When they parted, he curled up against Blaine's chest and sighed.

"The truth is, I don't know what to do" Kurt revealed after a long, silent pause. "If I look back, I am lost."

"We will figure it out together" Blaine answered, one hand caressing Kurt's spine softly. The simple touch made Kurt suddenly restless, as if it wasn't enough, as if they weren't close enough. So many things could come between them, only then he realized. His vengeance, his dragons, the khalasar, Blaine's mysterious past. Whatever awaited them, it would threaten what they had, he was sure of it.

"Hold me" he whispered, burying his face in Blaine's neck. "Just- hold me."

And Blaine did.