[Kill The Boy] Chapter 77: The Council's Eve (Patreon)

Disclaimer: This is a work of fiction and all rights for character, plots and settings belong to GRRM. I have no ownership.

A/N: A bit late with this chapter but I had a few rewrites to get through to get it to a spot that I like. Hope you enjoy the chapter!

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Year 300 AC

Harrenhall, The Riverlands

As Davos stood at the Kingspyre Tower's window, the unseasonable snow continued its relentless fall. The Riverlands, usually warm this late, now bore an unnatural chill that caused the snow to adhere to the ground.

Davos rubbed at his left hand's knuckles. The four shortened fingers throbbed with the drop in temperature, an old ache he'd long ago ceased whinging about. He read the snow as nothing more than a turn for the worse, an early winter that'd make men lose toes and horses stumble on frozen roads. The dead were real, but what was hauling the seasons south behind them? This harsh winter already promised to be punishing with men risking frostbite and horses struggling on frozen paths.

"Ser Davos," Shireen said, not looking up from her cyvasse board. "Is the column here yet?"

Behind him, Shireen sat hunched over a cyvasse board, her fingers moving the pieces with a soft clacking sound that echoed through the room. A brazier in the corner cast a flickering glow that barely kept the chill at bay as it seeped through the black stones.

"They are just on the horizon, Princess. The mud is half-frozen and the oxen are skittish, but they're coming."

"Ser Davos, are there any elephants among the Golden Company? I've read tales of them and would dearly love to see one in truth."

"Nay, I see no elephants, Princess. And I'd wager they wouldn't have sped the Golden Company's journey, would they?"

"No, I suppose not." Shireen answered, disappointment creeping into her voice. "And the boy who thought he was a Prince?"

Davos turned from the window to look at Shireen. At ten years old, she had her father's jaw and the greyscale marking half her face, yet she spoke of high treason with the same curiosity she showed for her books. "That's the report the ravens brought," he said.

Shireen moved a dragon piece across the board. "Father would have taken his head."

"Your father was a just man," Davos said. It was the truest thing he knew, even when it had cost him his sons, even when it had cost the king his life. "But we serve a different king now. And this king has a different way of settling debts."

Davos turned back to the window and watched as the column from the capital made its way up toward the castle gates. At the center of the column sat Varys inside a wooden cage, and Davos felt a sense of satisfaction seeing the man in chains, even as he wondered why only Varys was caged and not the so-called Aegon.

Leading the column was the defeated prince. Aegon, they called him, with no sword at his hip and his shoulders hunched in defeat. The boy's face was a mask torn off as a lifetime of lies had left him drained, unable to fight back. Like a cyvasse piece toppled off the board, he sat there knowing he is a prisoner in all but name. Riding alongside him was a grey-haired lord that must be Jon Connington whose gaze was fixed straight ahead, deliberately avoiding the sight of the castle's broken towers.

Jaime Lannister rode in next, his golden hand hidden beneath a dark cloak. Davos recognizing the posture of a knight facing inevitable judgment. The Kingslayer, who had slain a king to save a city, now came to confront a ruler who could take dragon form.

Davos let his gaze drift to the back of the column, and something stopped him.

A young man rode beside a red priest in a patched cloak, carrying a warhammer across his saddle and with the thick shoulders and coal-black hair of a smith. But the face hit Davos like a punch to the gut.

It was Robert Baratheon's face.

The same careless strength in his shoulders, the same blue eyes, and the same jawline as the young stag who shattered the Trident. The boy laughed at something the red priest said, at ease in the saddle, unaware of the eyes watching him from the tower.

Davos left the window and descended the serpentine stairs to the Kingspyre's ground floor, stepping out into the frigid air. The snow had picked up, dusting the armsmen's shoulders and the wagon canvas as the column passed through the gates and spilled into the outer yard.

Jaime Lannister arrived and passed his reins to a waiting squire before his gaze crossed the yard and fixed upon the Blackfish. Brynden Tully, unmoving, regarded him as the chill air swirled.

What passed between them was not friendship, nor enmity, but a mutual understanding of survivors. These were two men who had been on opposite sides of enough battles to know one another's worth. It was the quiet nod between those who had paid real prices for their beliefs and lived to carry the scars.

Shireen chose to stay inside the castle to avoid the cold, but her mother had not.

Queen Selyse stood near the entrance to the Tower of the Ghost surrounded by her Queen's Men. Ser Godry Farring was a sentinal ata her shoulder with his hand resting on the pommel of his sword. They were a zealous cluster, men of fire and rigid certainty who had already decided a smuggler had no business standing amoungst them. Not that he ever intented to.

"Ser Davos," Selyse said as he approached. "You are neglecting your duties. Stop gawking at these unholy newcomers and bring the princess to me. She has missed the morning prayer to the Lord of Light so that my voice may be heard in the Council."

"My Lady, the princess is occupied with her studies," Davos explained calmly. "She's focusing on her letters, and I see no need to disrupt that. Praying to the Lord of Light isn't something she wishes to do, and I respect that. As for the council, I doubt it aligns with the Lord of Light's concerns."

Godry Farring puffed out his chest, broad as a barrel. "You're forgetting your place, onion knight. The queen wants the girl brought down."

Davos stood his ground and looked up at the Giantslayer.

"I answer to the king, Ser Godry," Davos said. "And the king charged me with Lady Shireen's safety. The cold is bitter today. She stays inside."

Farring stared at him, but he did not draw his steel. The Queen's Men tested his authority, contesting his right to shield the girl against their insanity and the queen-mother's favor, but they knew better than to spill blood in the yard before the dragons arrived.

"My word, ser," Davos said plainly. "I've never broken it, not once."

Farring had no answer for that. He looked to Selyse, and Davos could see the queen-mother's eyes narrow, storing up a grievance to use against him later.

A stir went through the cluster of Queen's Men, and Davos followed it. Movement at the stables had caught their eye, specifically the smith lad with Robert's face who was leading his horse to the trough. Two of the queen's men drifted from Selyse's side toward him with a third following close behind, unhurried yet purposeful, like men who don't want to be seen where they're going. These men turned a dead king's living face into a sign, as if thier Lord of Light answered thier prayers.

The boy's bloodline registered in the smuggler's mind like an echo of thunder. Dangerous, aye, but not the storm in front of him. The storm in front of him was three armed zealots closing on a lad with a horse and no notion what he had walked into. Before he could think it through, Davos was already in motion, positioning himself between the smith and the approaching Queen's Men.

"Lad, listen close," Davos said quietly. "Water your horse on the far side, near the smith's well. Cleaner water there, and the smith'll want to look at those shoes before the road beats 'em to pieces. Move."

The boy looked at him, those blue eyes that weren't his to have, and Davos felt the old grief turn over once and settle. Robert's bastard but

"Aye, ser," the lad said with a carefree nod, then took his horse around.

One by one, Davos appraised the Queen's Men. The third was the first to avert his gaze, and the others squirmed, remembering where they stood and who lingered nearby. The cluster of men broke up, some muttering under their breath. Davos felt a flicker of pride for a sworn duty fulfilled.

Davos glanced at the red woman out of habit, bracing for the calm-within-calm that put him on edge. The snow didn't touch her robes, and she stood apart, watching something only she could see. Her eyes held a peace, as if she'd put down the tools and finished the job. No more reading king's-blood in the boy, but that only made him more uneasy. Seven hells, he couldn't say why.

Suddenly, the sky darkened and a sound like thunder rattled the air. Davos craned his neck, squinting against the dimness as he tried to make out what was approaching. Two massive beasts flew in from the east, their shadows stretching across Harrenhal. Drogon landed on the Tower of Dread, his front claws cracking the black stone as if it were nothing more than rotten planks.

The green dragon arrived mere moments after the black, latching onto the eastern wall like a tenacious barnacle. Though Rhaegal was smaller, his presence sent a chill across Davos's shoulders. Davos found himself drawn to the dragon's gaze, which seemed to look right past the men, the castle, even the queen — as if nothing but the North held any interest. The beast had positioned itself to face that direction, its neck craned toward the snowy landscape beyond the walls. He couldn't fathom what the dragon sought, but Rhaegal's posture resembled a hound that had caught its master's scent, unable to comprehend why he hadn't yet arrived.

Davos should have been in awe of these fearsome beasts, gone straight to the one riding the black dragon, and bowed at her feet. But right now, all he could think was how... small they seemed compared to Aemon.

Daenerys Targaryen emerged from the gates a moment later, clad in black with her silver locks braided tight. A knight in white armor and a cloaked man flanked her as she dismounted. She strode across the yard with an air of command, her gaze alighting where Davos had feared it would. Not on Lady Selyse or the dragons behind her, but on the Spider's cage, the false Prince with his stolen name, and last of all, the Kingslayer.

The yard divided between those who'd stood close to a dragon and felt its heat, and those who'd only heard tales. The Queen's Men saw the Lord of Light's judgment in the dragons, the Lannister guards saw their own doom. But Davos, he just saw the beasts and the terrible cost of keeping them fed.

Daenerys kept right on walking, crossing the muddy yard straight for the prisoners. Davos felt the yard close around her like a noose tightening — Lannister guards shifting their weight, the false prince's guards drawing closer, and Jaime's golden hand coming free of his cloak. A reckoning years in the making, and it meant to break right here with every armsman and zealot at Harrenhal watching.

The Blackfish's hand clamped down on Davos's arm, pulling him along as he strode toward the queen.

"With me, smuggler," Brynden Tully barked, not pausing for a reply.

Davos caught the gist at a look. She was a Queen in her own right, and kin to the dragon-king besides. She had to be met by men of standing and of level mind, else every fool in the yard would take her approach as the start of something. Best get the Queen into the hall before old grudges start a blaze.

Together, the old soldier and the onion knight approached the Queen, the Blackfish bowing just enough to acknowledge her rank without overdoing it. "Your Grace, welcome to Harrenhal and the Riverlands," he said, "I am Brynden Tully. I know you've had a long ride, and the entrance is not the place to size up these men." His eyes flicked to the prisoners, not needing to name them.

Daenerys replied, "The Blackfish. I have heard much about your exploits, even in Essos. And who is next to you?"

"Your Grace," Davos said, introducing himself. "Davos Seaworth, once Stannis's man, now in your nephew's service. Come inside, I beg you. The hall's warmth, and the shelter of its roof, will serve us better for the questioning to come."

Whatever she saw in their expressions was evidently satisfactory. With a nod, Daenerys let the Blackfish escort her to the great hall, and Davos exhaled a silent breath of relief.

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Ah, look at this place. The Hall of a Hundred Hearths built to house a whole bloody army. Now just a broken shell of its glory with that gods-damned cold seeping in from the Gods Eye, it's clear this Great Council is going to be a real treat.

Tyrion trailed after his Queen as the Unsullied spread out like a wall of spiked helmets and grim silence along the edges of the hall.

Unease rippled through one half of the hall where only rumors of the black dragon had reached. Eyes darted to the broken ceiling and fingers tightened around cups. The other half, those who had witnessed their king's unnatural power, stood with a quiet resolve.

Tyrion scanned the faces around him, taking stock of their reactions, and realized that the fears of the absent dragon outweighed those of the one already perched above. As he surveyed the assembled lords, his gaze fell upon the gold hand.

Next to the eastern hearth stood Jaime and if his eyes did not deceive him, it looked like Bronn stood at his side. Jaime posture showed none of the swaggering arrogance Tyrion remembered. But Bronn his sellsword hadn't changed with good steel paid for by Lannister gold and a cup already in hand looking bored by the way he looked around everywhere.

Their eyes clashed and the distance between them evaporated. The old scar still throbbed, as Tysha's name dangled in the air, a memory Tyrion hadn't voiced in over a decade before Brandon Stark tore it open.

Jaime crossed the hall with Bronn ambling a pace behind, moving with a slow indifference for the lords in the room. When Jaime halted three paces short, Tyrion felt the air tighten between them. He waited for the bite of his own wit, expecting some sharp-tongued joke to cut through the silence or anger at thier fathers murder. But it never came. Not for Jaime.

Since the wit would not serve for his brother, Tyrion turned it on the sellsword instead. "Ser Bronn of the Blackwater," he said, finding the old, easy cynicism a welcome shield. "Or have you moved up to Lord Stokeworth this season? My ledgers are quite out of date regarding your various marriages."

"Stokeworth still," Bronn said, "seeing as your brother couldn't quite manage Highgarden." He looked Tyrion over with a casual lack of surprise. "I see you’re still breathing. Last I saw, you were trussed up for a headsman and I expected the crows to have finished with you by now. Instead, you’ve gone and found yourself a queen to serve, and a beautiful one at that."

"They headsmen were outbid," Tyrion replied. "But Highgarden? Your greed was always your most reliable quality, Bronn, though even you must see the futility of it. How did you expect my family to topple the Tyrells for you, given the sorry state of our own house?"

"Aye, but I had to throw it out there just in case," Bronn said, his mouth twitching toward a grin that died before it could land. "At least until I learned who was backing your brother." The sellsword shivered, a rare crack in the armor, and Tyrion knew exactly which shadow had crossed his mind.

"Which leaves us with the only question that matters. Why did he choose to keep my brother in his service when it would have been so much cleaner to shorten him by a head? Anything you woukld like to share with us Jaime?"

Jaime had been content to play the silent gargoyle through Bronn’s posturing, but Tyrion's question fianlly made him flinch.

"That is between me and the King," Jaime said. The courtly grace he used to wear like gilded plate had vanished, leaving only the soldier. Tyrion watched his brother’s hand and wondered if it still remembered the weight of a sword. "I could say the same of you, dwarf. You met him and yet you live. Perhaps I should just take your head here and see if the King objects."

This Great Council was convened not only to address the resurgence of the Long Night, but also to determine who should be their monarch. Yet even Jaime addresses Aemon as king. At this point, the outcome is just an afterthought.

"You have a great deal of nerve, Jaime," Tyrion said, his wit failing him as the anger rose hot and familiar. "I am not the one who pushed a boy from a window and—"

"Oi, oi, oi," Bronn said, stepping between them. "This ain't the time or the place. I can see you both want a go at the other's throat, but you Lannisters ought to save the bloodletting for a private room. Preferably with me in the audience to watch the show."

Tyrion studied the stranger his brother had become; the gold and the glory had been scrubbed away, leaving only the exhaustion etched into the lines around his eyes and the gaunt hollows of his face. He wanted to ask what had done the carving, but the only thing that rose in his throat was a name he could not say.

Instead, he said. "We will speak later."

"Will we?" Jaime asked.

Bronn had already lost interest. "When the pair of you are finished with your lovely reunion," he said, "let me know. Your queen looks ready to make a speech." He drifted off toward the wine and left the brothers to the gap between them.

Like every other thing in this half-frozen world, the reunion was soon swallowed by the needs of the queen and the press of a coming winter. The truth of what they were to each other was still unresolved, a blade left unsheathed on a table. But Tyrion turned from it all the same as he found his place and his purpose again.

The high seat was a twisted monstrosity of fused black stone, yet Daenerys remained standing before it. She held her ground instead of taking the chair, a bit of theater that forced the lords to come to her.

Tyrion took his place at her right hand, a half-step behind, to read the room and steer the queen through the treachrous terrain of Westerosi politics.

As a towering figure in bronze armor drew near, Tyrion murmured, "Lord Yohn Royce of the Vale. A man who has witnessed your nehpew's might firsthand, and one who does not easily succumb to empty praise."

Bronze Yohn stopped before the queen, bowing with the deep, grave movement of a man steeped in old blood and First Men pride. "Your Grace. The Vale remembers its oaths."

"Lord Royce," Daenerys said. "This is our first meeting, so you will have to excuse me if I make any assumptions. Does Lord Arryn not travel with you?"

"My lord, Robert Arryn, is but a boy and a sickly one at that," Royce maintained a courtesy so stiff it served as armor. "Given the state of the realm and the horrors we now have to face, I will speak for the Vale until he reaches his majority."

"Entirely understandable, Lord Royce. It is heartening to know the Vale is held in such capable hands while its lord grows into his own. You have come down from Winterfell, I believe; tell me what you saw in the North."

"The North is emptying. Following the King's orders, Lady Sansa and the King's Hand Wyman Manderly have taken a whole kingdom off its land and put it on the road south, holdfast by holdfast." Royce’s voice changed when he named her, the nearest a Royce of Runestone came to fondness. "I knew that girl when she came to the Vale wearing a bastard’s name, a frightened thing hiding from her own house. She has buried that name and grown into a true Stark."

It was one thing to hear a rumor of a retreating kingdom, but quite another to hear it from Bronze Yohn. As he spoke, the hall realized the North was truly giving up the ground it had held for eight millennia, and the testimony giving more strength to the coming clamanity.

"And when they arrive," the Queen said, naming the problem that had been haunting Tyrion. "Where do a hundred thousand Northerners and Free Folk sleep, my lord?"

"The Vale can hold its own, Your Grace. The sea-lanes through Gulltown will keep thousands fed so long as the grain holds." Bronze Yohn looked as though he were already measuring the distance between the granaries and the graves. "But we are marching an entire nation into a wasteland of ash and hunger. Without the agreement the King has gotten from Braavos, we would have nothing for them; as it stands, we have enough to stave off famine."

"Dorne can host a portion of the Northerners," Doran declared, Aero Hoath's steady push propelling his wheelchair forward. "It will not be said that Dorne has not contributed to this war effort. I have already sent orders to conserve grain, and the King has wisely secured the Iron Bank's backing. But the crux of the matter remains the food."

Tyrion had been balancing the ledgers in his head for days, a losing game that only grew bleaker when spoken into the air. "The belt-tightening must continue, Your Grace," he said, his gaze lingering on the southern lords who still dined with such hearty indifference. "No one is exempt from this hall, not even the men who sit before us. The cold is deepening, and we cannot be certain how much more the Reach is able to send us."

"By the time I left Dragonstone, the miners from the Vale had already starting arriving," Daenerys said. "But what of the West and the Riverlands? I understand the Riverlands is in a terrible state and will take years to recover, but we do not have years."

"The Riverlands is a ruin, Your Grace, you have the right of it," the Blackfish said, stepping into the light. "But even a ruin has hungry men. I have a contingent ready for Dragonstone, bought with the promise of silver and steady meals. The West is a different matter." He looked briefly at Jaime, his expression unreadable. "The word has been sent that their tithe is due. So far, they seem inclined to pay it."

Tyrion noted the look the Blackfish gave his brother, a silent acknowledgment of the hold Jaime still carried. Despite the wreckage of their house, the Westerlands remained loyal to Jaime but then again, he not the one who had seen fit to put a crossbow bolt into their father.

"There is one thing the Vale would have settled," Royce’s eyes moved across the hall to the low bench by the western hearth. "There is still the matter of the boy who calls himself the third dragon."

Aegon Targaryen, or whatever bloody name they'd sewn into his head, sat like a man with no purpose left. Blackfyre given up, allies scattered, waiting to be told what he was now. Beside him sat Jon Connington whose face was pale.

Daenerys marched down the aisle and Tyrion fell into pace beside her, his mind already crunching through the implications. This wasn't some trial where they might let the lad off with a slap on the wrist. Nay, this was a public hanging of a claim, done in front of everyone so no one could later whisper it back to life.

"You were told that you were the son of Rhaegar Targaryen and Elia Martell," Daenerys said, her words echoing through the Hall of a Hundred Hearths. "You were told that you were the rightful heir to the Iron Throne, saved from the sack of King's Landing by a loyal eunuch."

The boy's head came up, his dark eyes meeting their gaze from a face drawn and pale, but no words passed his lips.

Daenerys continued, "Did you truly believe the claim, or was the allure of the Iron Throne too powerful to resist?"

The boy's silence, as the Queen's question sank in, was worse than any defiance. No shout of outrage, no cries of lies. Just the slow painful realization of a life unraveling in public. Tyrion felt pity as the pretender's mask slipped away.

"Your Grace, a moment—" Tyrion began, but Daenerys' attention already shifted.

She looked at Jon Connington. "Lord Hand, you raised a lie and marched an army across the sea to die for a ghost."

Connington stared at her, his voice a rasping murmur. "I raised a boy, Your Grace. I gave him everything I had."

Doran spoke up then. "Queen Daenerys, Dorne has a stake in this matter, just as the Targaryens. The false prince, knowingly or not, claimed to be my nephew. To seize a dead child's name and invade under false pretenses is an affront that demands punishment for all involved."

"I understand how you feel Prince Doran," Daenerys said. "The penalty for treason is death."

Before the boy could speak, before Connington could protest the indignity, Jaime stepped forward from the shadows, moving towards them with an authority that commanded attention.

"The king summoned him here," Jaime said, each word clipped to a soldier's report. "For what purpose the King has left him alive, I do not know. But he has left him alive and if you were to exectue him without the King's authority, that in itself is treason."

Tyrion observed his brother's maneuver, by framing the queen's verdict as something only the King can order, Jaime had neutralized the bloodlust that was moments away from being quenched. It was a masterful defusion that he never expected from his brother.

Daenerys turned her attention to Jaime.

The Queen's eyes on Jaime held a flicker of respect, but it wasn't warmth, not really — that would have been a lie. They both knew what he'd done to save the lives of Kings Landing.

But the rest of it was also real.

"Ser Jaime Lannister," Daenerys said. "You killed my father."

"Yes, I did," Jaime said firmly. "I killed the Mad King, and I would do it again if given the chance."

Daenerys held his gaze. "I know what you have done for the people of Kings Landing, twice. I do not fault you for that act, Ser Jaime. It saved the city."

Tyrion saw the twitch of the mouth and the way Jaime’s shoulders finally dropped. Seventeen years of being the Kingslayer had been wiped away with a few courtly sentences, and the look in Jaime’s eyes was almost painfully bright. It appeared the debt had been balanced at last, or so my brother thought.

"But I have not forgotten the sack of King's Landing," Daenerys continued. "I have not forgotten Elia Martell and her children butchered on the steps of the throne... nor what you did to Brandon Stark."

Jaime did not argue and offered no excuse of love for his actions. "I pushed him," Jaime said. "It was a crime I cannot undo, though I have wished it otherwise a thousand times. I will answer for it before the gods and on the front lines."

Daenerys regarded him, balancing the man's deeds against his legend, the city's savior against the almost child-killer. "Since you are to be a man of the Night's Watch soon, anticipate a quicker fulfillment of your redemption," she said.

"I... understand," Jaime said.

The Kingslayer swallowed the queen's pronouncement like one more bitter tonic. Useful, not forgiven. But breathing, and with a purpose.

As Daenerys turned back toward the high seat, the audience ended and the lords began to murmur. Tyrion exhaled slowly and rubbed his cold hands together. The tension in the hall fractured into a dozen separate conversations.

Tyrion murmurs to Daenerys, "Your Grace, perhaps we should end this now. The council is yet to convene, and we wouldn't want it to appear as if you've come solely to pass judgment, particularly with your nephew absent."

Daenerys exhaled slowly, "You're right, Tyrion. This journey has been long and arduous. I believe we should retire for the day."

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Olenna let the footman hand her down from the wheelhouse, and waited for the stool before she trusted the mud. The cold came up through the cane and into her knuckles, a damp Riverlands spite the Reach was spared and would be paying for regardless.

Dragons roosted on Harrenhal's melted stone like lords, the black one draped over the Tower of Dread as if it felt at home, the green one perched on the eastern wall with its head turned north. Queen Daenerys had claimed these towers as if she herself built them, while Olenna could only trail an ox at the speed of a grain wagon for weeks.

The column stretched out for miles, a slow procession of grain wagons, draft teams, and armed retainers with a square of spears at the head. Randyll Tarly led them, performing a duty he considered beneath him with more competence than any other man could muster. He was the Reach’s finest soldier and knew his worth. She knew that becuase he saw fit to remind her of it throughout their journey.

The Blackfish stood waiting. A Warden of the Riverlands in the absence of a Lord Paramount, she assumed, since Edmure was still a guest of the Lannisters at the Rock. Not that he would remain there. The Starks were back in the world, and they would hardly leave their uncle to rot in a cell.

"Lady Olenna," he said. "Welcome to Harrenhal. Mind the towers and where you walk. They shed stone."

"Dragons as well, I see." She had been looking up since the approach road. "You have come up in the world, ser. From escaping your enemies to hosting them as if they were just an afterthought."

The Blackfish held his tongue long enough to show his displeasure. He was counting the Tyrells among the enemies he had once fled, and she knew the tally as well as he did. It was only the king’s peace that bought them together.

"The King has yet to arrive," he said. "But Queen Daenerys arrived yesterday. Mind your manners Olenna."

"What for? No one will mind an old woman and her ramblings."

He looked once at the green dragon and its northward stare. "Tensions are high enough. Keep your sharp tongue in check and don't cause more trouble than we already have."

Something had happened, then. Most likely it had come with the Queen's arrival, and seeing the few Lannister and Golden Company men about the yard, she could guess at the who of it.

"After such a long journey in your cozy carriage, you must be weary. The rooms are prepared, and you're welcome to explore the castle at your leisure." With that, the Blackfish summoned a steward to assist them in settling in.

"Rooms with broken roofs," Olenna retorted, her eyes darting up to the castle. "Lovely." She paused, then added, "But pray tell, where is our illustrious king?" ignoring Brynden's jibe.

A knowing smile played across the Blackfish's face as he spoke. "The king hasn't arrived yet, but believe me, his presence will be unmistakable."

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The Hall of a Hundred Hearths was a ruin full of men waiting for a command they hadn't the wit to anticipate. They clustered by their banners and called it politics, but sixty years of this game had taught her better. She read the room and found a room of nervous lords who held thier tongues and sidelong glances. Something had broken the spirit of the place before she arrived, and every man in the hall was treading as if the floor were made of glass.

She saw the Vale and the Dornish, the Riverlanders and the Crownlanders, and even a few of the Northerners. The Ironborn were missing and they were better off for it, as there wouldn't be a single kingdom without a score to settle with the squids. The Kingslayer and the pretender were absent from the gathering as well, which only served as confirmation of her thoughts.

What gave her pause was a soft creature perched among the Dornish, looking like a fish out of water. He was a round-faced boy, just out of the Citadel, and she spotted the Tarly coloring peeking through his fear.

Loras appeared at her elbow and waited for the turn of her head.

"Samwell Tarly," Loras said. "I saw him at the king's shoulder in Sunspear. The king calls him friend and I think he means it. He set the boy to guard that horn and the green dragon minds him like a hound."

If the boy at the pillar was indeed Samwell Tarly, and the horn valued as highly as the dragon's breath, then the Reach had been holding an advantageous position without realizing it. How the cowardly boy she remembered being dragged by Randyll to the feasts at Highgarden came to the position he is now, she could never guess. But as she sized up the young man a second time, she mentally promoted him to a more significant role.

Margaery angled herself to Olenna's other side, turning her body so that the old woman could see her granddaughter's face.

"Grandmother," Margaery said, "I'm asking again, be cordial. Even with peace banners flying, it's clear many here are furious at us for backing the Lannisters. That our agreement ended badly doesn't mean we're welcome."

Olenna set her cane down with purpose. "That girl needs no explanation from me. I know well our standing, and the others need us as much as we need them. Consider Bitterbridge and Loras's return — or lack thereof." She leaned closer, her voice dropping to a hushed murmur. "Your future husband remains a mystery, one that requires more than idle speculation. Go and speak with the northerners present. Find the weakest link who will tell you the most."

Margaery starts to protest, "Grandmother, that...", but the words trail off as she sighs in resignation. "Yes, Grandmother," she concedes and slinks into the crowd.

It was a relief to see Margaery at her trade again, weaving through the thicket of lords with that sweetness she had spent years perfecting. Olenna let her eyes travel past the girl to find a partner for the dance.

Doran Martell sat in his chair like a monument to patience, unruffled while he tallied what each lord spoke or more likely, what they left unsaid. Behind him remained the golden collateral of the recent wars, Princess Myrcella and his youngest son, two high-priced pieces waiting in the king's purse. He did not grant her an immediate glance. He simply waited, letting the strike of her cane announce her before he deigned to acknowledge that she had finally arrived.

"You look remarkably well-rested," Olenna said, "considering you have spent the winter crossing a continent."

"Sleep is a simpler matter when the sky belongs to your allies. There are few men left in these lands who would dare trouble a dragon's shadow. I am sorry your son could not be here to see it. I would not wish his manner of death upon the worst of my enemies, though perhaps I might have made an exception for Tywin Lannister."

"My son died as a father should, shielding his daughter. Grief is for the private hours, but the pride I take in the boy is more than enough to sustain me. It is only a pity the Reach was not permitted to be the one to bring that mad bitch to justice."

"It is a curious thing. You were close enough to touch her, and yet the Reach saw nothing," Doran said. "The glare of a throne has a way of blinding a house to the nature of the people sitting upon it."

"We were blinded," she conceded, "But I also find the Lannister brothers walking these halls as free men. I wonder if the glare of this new throne has made you forget your own blood, or if you have simply lost the will to hold a grudge."

"Tywin is dead, and my grievances are buried with him. There was a certain justice in it, I think. To be struck down by the son he spent a lifetime hating was a finer end than any I could have provided. Ah, but here is the man himself."

The Imp approached with a wine cup and a look of practiced unconcern. Watching him, Olenna wondered how a man could walk so lightly through a room where most of the occupants were merely waiting for a reason to see his family extinguished.

Tyrion offered a shallow bow. "A welcome sight, Lady Olenna. I trust the road was kind. With this snow, your grain has settled the worst of the weights on my mind."

"Yes, Lord Tyrion, it is marvelous to see you hale. After escaping your own father and the sentence he—" Olenna broke off, her words trailing as the sight of Randyll Tarly arrested her attention.

Lord Randyll crossed the hall with the singular purpose of a man marking a target. He came to a halt before his son where he stood by the pillar, and Samwell remained on his feet despite the heat behind his father’s gaze.

“I sent you to the Night’s Watch so that you may become a man,” Randyll said, his voice the same one he used to break green levies. “But all I see ia a maester before me. When will you stop shaming me, boy?”

Samwell Tarly stuttered out an answer. "I-I was ordered to take up the post of maester. I..."

Randyll ground his teeth. "You were ordered to be useless," he said, "because you are useless with a sword."

Before Lord Tarly could say more, the girl standing with Samwell moved to shield him, placing herself directly in Randyll’s path. There was fire as she spoke. "Samwell is not useless. He is a brave man, the first of any of you to kill the cold gods."

The girl was trembling with a mixture of fear and fury. Olenna did not know her name, but she found she liked her spirit.

"And what is this? Not only are you no ranger, you break your oaths for a whore." Randyll Tarly spoke with barely restrained fury.

The fat boy found his spine all at once, drawing himself up to match the older man’s venom. It was a rare enough sight to make Olenna blink. "Her name is Gilly," he snapped. "You will not speak of her in that manner."

Olenna knew it was time to step in before the man did something foolish, but she saw her grandson was already of the same mind.

Before the older man could strike, Loras was there, his hand on Tarly’s shoulder. "That is enough, Lord Tarly. You forget yourself. These are the king’s friends you are insulting."

"This is a matter for my own house," Randyll snapped, turning his glare from Loras to Samwell. "I will deal with it as I see fit."

Olenna’s cane snapped across between father and son. "Lord Randyll. You are tired, you are making a spectacle of yourself, and I have run out of patience. Now, you will—"

The green dragon gave a scream that cut her short.

Olenna watched the green beast launch from the eastern wall and clear the northern battlement, a sudden weight lifted from the castle. Every soul in the hall turned with the dragon's flight, their eyes following that motion toward the windows and the white sky beyond.

Against the northern sky, a black speck grew larger with every pulse. Olenna saw the shape of a dragon taking form, yet it was not like the pair roosting on the towers. This one moved with six limbs. The thing grew until it defied the scale of the world. Olenna’s grip failed her, the cane clattering to the floor as the dragon’s shadow swallowed the horizon, turning the afternoon into a sudden, suffocating night.

The Blackfish had promised a presence that could not be mistaken. Watching the sky, Olenna finally found the truth in it. The King had arrived.