HOTD White Wolf and Blood Queen - 28: The Poisoned Hand (Patreon)

[POV: Aenar Targaryen]

[The Red Keep, 101 AC]

Sleep would not come, and Aenar had abandoned the pretence of trying sometime after the last change of the guards beneath his window. He lay awake beneath his blankets while the Red Keep settled into its uneasy midnight silence, the servants gone from the passages and the last doors closed, until even the distant call of the watch and its answering voice had faded somewhere far below.

In the quiet he could hear his father breathing again, though Baelon was nowhere near him. Weak, wet breaths, each one wrong in a way Aenar could neither forget nor make himself accept. He closed his eyes against the memory, but it remained.

He had seen death often enough in another life, men frozen beneath their black cloaks, Ygritte bleeding in his arms, and Maester Aemon fading until all that remained was an old man dreaming aloud of his brother. He remembered the knives that had ended his own life, yet none of it had prepared him to watch Baelon die. For years now the man had been more than a father borrowed from some unfamiliar history. He was Father, and when Aenar turned beneath the covers and drew them higher, he could not hide from what the maesters had said. Baelon was unlikely to survive the night. Understanding those words did nothing to make the hours before morning bearable.

A faint scrape from the wall opened Aenar’s eyes, and his hand had already found the knife beneath his pillow before he ecognized the sound of stone moving against stone. A slit of darkness appeared in what should have been solid masonry, and he released the blade as Visenya stepped through.

She wore plain dark wool beneath a heavier cloak, her silver hair gathered carelessly and the shadows beneath her eyes suggesting that she had slept no more than he had. Dark Sister hung at her hip, or attempted to. Baelon had only given her the weapon hours earlier, and she had apparently decided that ownership required carrying it everywhere, despite a scabbard nearly too long for her body and a belt that refused to sit properly around her narrow waist. Even walking into the room, she had to steady the hilt to keep the sword from swinging against her legs.

Aenar stared at her.

“No.”

“I have not asked anything yet.”

“You came through a wall in the middle of the night wearing Dark Sister.”

“Then I suppose asking would be unnecessary.” Visenya closed the hidden panel carefully behind her.

"Where are we going?" Aenar pushed himself upright.

"To Father."

The answer drove away what little irritation Aenar had managed to summon, and he glanced toward the door, knowing the guards would still be posted outside. They had been assigned after he and Visenya escaped the Red Keep through forgotten passages, crossed half the city, and climbed onto Balerion, beginning by accident a journey to Valyria. Jaehaerys had searched the passages afterward, but Visenya had found others he had missed.

"You could have used the door," Aenar murmured.

"And explained why I wished to wake Father when the maesters have ordered everyone to let him rest?" She came closer to the bed. "Or perhaps we could have brought Grand Maester Runciter with us. I am certain he would be delighted to watch."

Aenar studied her face.

"You're going to try again."

"I am going to look."

"You looked before."

"Yes." Visenya's voice remained low, but something harder entered it. "When he was healthy. When he collapsed. When half the family was standing around his bed waiting for him to die. None of those circumstances were particularly suited to patience."

"And now?"

"Now everyone believes there is nothing left to do."

Aenar understood. He hated that he understood, and pushed the blankets aside.

"Turn around."

Visenya raised an eyebrow.

"I need breeches."

"I have seen you naked since the day we were born."

"Turn around."

With a sigh of theatrical suffering, she faced the wall while Aenar dressed, and a few minutes later they slipped into the passage, where darkness swallowed them almost at once.

Visenya carried a small hooded lamp, its flame reduced until it gave barely enough light to see the floor beneath their feet. The passage was narrow even for children. Old stone pressed close on either side, rougher than the finished walls of the Red Keep, and the ceiling dipped low enough in places that an adult would have needed to stoop.

The passage smelled of dust, old mortar, and the stale dampness of a place rarely opened to fresh air. Dark Sister soon proved a nuisance, its scabbard knocking against the stone when Visenya rounded a corner. She froze and glared at the sword, while Aenar bit the inside of his cheek to keep from laughing before they continued.

The route twisted through Maegor's Holdfast in ways Aenar doubted even Maegor himself had understood, passing blocked chambers and collapsed stretches before descending so steeply that they had to brace themselves against the walls, only to climb again twenty paces later.

Visenya remembered fragments from her first life, but the Red Keep of her memory had been a very different place, unfinished when she died and altered countless times afterward. Most of what they knew now had been learned by exploration, whispered deductions, and an amount of childhood trespassing that would have killed Alysanne if she knew half of it. Tonight neither of them spoke much. There was nothing to say that would make the destination easier.

At last Visenya stopped beside a section of wall that looked like any other, and when she lowered the lamp, Aenar could make out three narrow vertical slits, each scarcely wider than a knife blade. He leaned toward one and found Baelon's chamber beyond.

A handful of candles still burned, though the hearth had sunk to red embers beneath grey ash, and a single lamp beside the bed cast its weak light across the rumpled sheets and the figure lying beneath them.

His face had gone pale beneath the silver of his hair. One arm rested outside the blankets where someone had left it, fingers loose against the mattress. His chest moved so slightly beneath the linen that Aenar had to watch for several breaths before he was certain it still moved at all. A chair stood beside the bed. Empty. A table nearby held a basin, folded cloths, several small jars, and a cup of water.

No maester. No servant.

"They left him alone?" Aenar whispered.

"For a little while, perhaps. Grandfather ordered someone near him all night. They cannot remain standing over the bed every moment."

Visenya found the catch and opened the wall with scarcely a whisper of stone, allowing them to slip into the chamber. Aenar expected his father to stir at their entrance, but Baelon did not move.

Even when Visenya closed the passage behind them, even when Dark Sister's scabbard brushed softly against the wall, even when Aenar approached the bed and the floorboard beneath his foot gave the smallest creak, Baelon showed no sign that he heard them. Aenar stopped beside him.

"Father?"

Nothing. He tried again, quieter.

"Father."

Baelon's breathing continued. Aenar reached toward his shoulder. Visenya caught his wrist.

"Don't."

Aenar looked at her.

"He needs his strength."

"You think we could wake him?"

Visenya's eyes went to Baelon's face.

"No."

The answer hurt more than Aenar expected, and he watched Visenya move around the bed, awkwardly pushing Dark Sister's scabbard aside so she could sit on the mattress beside Baelon's arm. For several seconds she only looked at him before taking his hand in both of hers.

Aenar had watched Visenya work blood magic often enough to know how little there usually was to see. There were no red flames or whispered Valyrian words, no strange light in her eyes, only the sudden stillness of her body as her breathing slowed and her eyes closed. He waited, counting the heartbeats despite himself.

Two. Five. Ten. The silence stretched. Then Visenya inhaled sharply. Her eyes opened. Aenar saw the answer before she spoke.

"No."

He swallowed.

"No what?"

She kept hold of Baelon's hand.

"I cannot save this body."

The words landed with dreadful simplicity. Aenar looked down at his father.

"You said you could feel things that were wrong."

"I can. Sometimes." Visenya's thumb moved once across Baelon's knuckles. "That is not the same as knowing how to mend them. His body is failing in too many places now. His heart is weak. His breathing is worse. There is... more." Her brow tightened. "I cannot name all of it. I can feel what is dying. I cannot command it to live."

"You've done things with blood before."

"Small things. Dangerous things." Visenya finally looked at him. "Aenar, listen to me. If I knew a working that could restore him, I would use it. I would pay for it myself if I had to. I do not know one."

He believed her, which only made it worse, and took his place on the opposite edge of the bed. They sat without speaking while Baelon breathed between them, each faint rise of his chest drawing Aenar's attention until he found himself counting again. One.

A pause. Another. Too long. Then another. His father's fingers did not tighten around Visenya's hand. Aenar stared at them.

"I thought we changed it."

Visenya's eyes lifted.

"What?"

"Everything."

The word came out bitterer than he intended.

"We changed Maegelle's. Balerion lived. Father became Hand instead of Ser Redwyne. Daemon married Gael. Valyria..." Aenar stopped and shook his head. "Every time something changed, I thought perhaps that meant the rest could change too."

"It can."

"Then why is he dying?"

"I don't know."

Aenar searched her face and, for once, found none of the certainty he had come to expect from the ancient queen behind his sister's eyes. There was only anger and grief, both unmistakable.

"I don't know," she repeated. Her grip tightened around Baelon's hand. "That is why I am not finished."

Footsteps sounded beyond the door, quiet and unhurried, and both twins froze as Aenar turned toward the corridor.

Someone was approaching, and Visenya released Baelon's hand as Aenar hurried toward the hidden panel. They crossed the chamber as quickly as they dared, Visenya catching Dark Sister's scabbard before it struck the bedpost, and disappeared into the passage.

The old builders had left the narrow viewing slits for exactly this purpose. From inside the passage, they could see much of Baelon's chamber while remaining invisible in the darkness beyond the wall. The footsteps stopped. The chamber door opened. Aenar leaned toward the slit. A young man entered. Grey robes. Not a maester. An acolyte.

Aenar had seen the young man somewhere in the Red Keep before, though he could not have given him a name. He looked perhaps eighteen or twenty, with short brown hair and a narrow face made younger by the absence of a full maester's chain.

His first actions seemed ordinary enough. The acolyte touched two fingers to Baelon's throat, bent to listen to his breathing, and adjusted the blanket before moving toward the medicines, as though he had merely been sent to tend him. Yet when he lifted the cup of water, he paused to glance at the door, and Aenar found himself watching more closely.

The man reached into his robe, and Aenar held his breath as a small glass vial appeared in his hand, scarcely longer than one of Aenar's fingers. Then the liquid inside flowed into the water.

Having replaced the stopper, the acolyte slipped the vial, empty or nearly so, back into his robe and lifted the cup. Aenar turned toward Visenya, whose expression told him she had seen it too.

Furious. As the acolyte turned toward Baelon's bed, Visenya lunged for the passage opening, and Aenar caught at her cloak a moment too late.

The hidden panel swung open, startling the acolyte into turning just as Visenya stepped into the chamber with Dark Sister already drawn.

The cup struck the floor and water spread across the rushes, while for one long moment the acolyte could only stare at the sword in Visenya's hand.

"Princess?"

His voice cracked. Visenya pointed Dark Sister at him. The point wavered slightly from the weight.

"Do not move."

"I, Your Grace, I don't understand. You frightened me." The acolyte looked down at the shattered cup and gave a breathless laugh that convinced Aenar of absolutely nothing. "The prince needs water. I was only bringing, "

"We watched you."

The laugh died when Aenar shut the passage behind him, and the acolyte looked toward the chamber door, only to find Visenya watching him. She adjusted her grip on Dark Sister, jaw tightening with the effort of keeping the long blade raised.

"You may decide whether you walk into that passage yourself or whether my brother and I begin screaming loudly enough to wake every Kingsguard in Maegor's Holdfast. I would advise the passage."

"I don't know what you think you saw."

Aenar stepped between him and the door. The man could have thrown him aside. That fact was painfully obvious. He was grown. Aenar was ten. Adult memories did not give him adult weight, and Jon Snow's training could not make a child's arm strong enough to stop a desperate man. So Aenar smiled.

"You put something in Father's water."

"Medicine."

"Then you won't mind explaining what it was."

"I was ordered,"

"By whom?"

The man hesitated for no more than an instant, but it was long enough for Aenar to see Visenya's expression change, if only slightly.

Aenar knew her well enough to see it.

"Into the tunnel," she said.

The acolyte swallowed.

"Princess, you misunderstand. The Grand Maester…"

"Then Grand Maester Runciter can explain it after you do."

The man's gaze moved again toward the door. Aenar reached beneath his night-cloak and drew his knife. It looked rather pathetic beside Dark Sister. Still sharp.

Still steel.

"Don't," Aenar said.

The acolyte looked from one twin to the other.

"You are children."

Visenya smiled without humor.

"Yes."

Dark Sister's point lifted another inch.

"And you should be very frightened of that."

They moved him toward the wall. Aenar opened the hidden panel while Visenya remained behind the acolyte. The young man stared into the black opening, then back at them.

"What is this?"

"Walk," Aenar said.

"I have done nothing."

"You poisoned a cup beside a dying man's bed."

"It was medicine."

"Good." Aenar stepped closer. "Then this will be a very short conversation."

The acolyte did not move. Visenya pressed Dark Sister's point against the back of his robe. Not hard enough to pierce.

Enough for him to feel it.

"Walk."

He obeyed, with Aenar following him into the darkness and Visenya bringing up the rear. The hidden door closed behind them, leaving Baelon asleep in the chamber beyond.

[POV: Jaehaerys Targaryen]

Jaehaerys had outlived too many of his children. That thought had followed him from Baelon's chamber and into his own, where it had remained no matter how fiercely he tried to drive it away.

The hour was late enough that the Red Keep had fallen mostly silent. A fire burned low in the royal bedchamber, casting more shadow than light across the familiar furnishings. Their attendants had been dismissed. The Kingsguard remained beyond the doors, close enough to answer a call but far enough away that the king and queen could grieve without an audience. Alysanne sat near the hearth.

Her cane rested against the side of her chair, close enough for her to reach without standing. She had changed from the gown she had worn beside Baelon's bed, but she had not dressed for sleep. Neither had Jaehaerys. There seemed little point. They were waiting. He hated that most of all. Jaehaerys stood near the table with one hand resting against its edge, staring down at nothing.

"He knew what he was doing," Alysanne said quietly.

Jaehaerys looked at her.

"When he gave Visenya the sword."

There was no need to ask which sword.

"He believed he was dying."

"He is dying."

The words were barely above a whisper. Jaehaerys's jaw tightened. "The maesters have been wrong before. They have given men a night and watched them live another twenty years."

"They have."

"You argued with them often enough."

"I did."

"And now?"

Alysanne looked toward the fire for so long that he almost wished he had not asked.

"Now I would give every jewel I own for one of them to come through that door and tell me they were fools. I would apologize to every maester I have ever insulted and spend the remainder of my days praising their wisdom if only one of them could be wrong about Baelon."

Jaehaerys lowered himself into the opposite chair, feeling the small humiliations of age in his knees and back, although he had once imagined such frailties belonged to other men.

"There was no reason for me to leave. Whatever rest they thought I required, I was not going to find it here. I should have stayed with him," he said.

"He was asleep."

"I could still have stayed."

"And done what?"

"Been there."

Alysanne's expression softened, though her eyes remained red.

"You have been there his entire life. You held him when he was small enough to sleep against your chest. You watched him grow into the strongest of our sons. You were there when he claimed Vhagar, when he married Alyssa, when Aemon died and the burden neither of us wanted for him became his." Her voice caught, but she continued. "You named him heir. You made him Hand. You prepared him for everything that was supposed to come after us. Do not turn one hour away from his bed into a lifetime of absence."

"Not enough."

"No parent ever thinks it was enough when the end comes."

Jaehaerys looked sharply at her. Alysanne did not withdraw the words. For a moment he wanted to be angry with her. Anger would have been simpler than what sat beneath his ribs. Instead he looked away.

"I named him heir because I thought he would outlive me."

"I know."

"He was supposed to."

"I know."

"He was supposed to sit the Iron Throne after me. He was supposed to complain about every problem I left him, curse my name when the treasury was short, and discover that half the lords who promised obedience to a prince became much more troublesome once that prince became king." Jaehaerys rubbed a hand across his face. "I spent years preparing him for it. Aemon first, then Baelon. I thought I had done what a king was supposed to do. I thought whatever else happened, the realm would not be left wondering who came after me."

Alysanne lowered her eyes without answering, and he knew she had followed the thought to its end. If Baelon died, the succession that Jaehaerys had thought settled would become uncertain again before his son was cold.

Questions Jaehaerys had believed settled would become questions again before Baelon's body was cold. Jaehaerys's voice roughened.

"I was supposed to die first."

"Yes."

One word. No false comfort hidden inside it. That was why he had loved her for so long. Alysanne leaned forward, hands folded tightly in her lap.

"When Aemon died, I thought there could be nothing worse. I truly believed that. Then every child after him taught me how foolish it was to imagine grief had a bottom."

Jaehaerys closed his eyes as the names returned to him, Daenerys, Aegon, Daella, Aemon, Alyssa, Valerion, Gaemon. There had been so many losses that the names came more readily than the memories of happier years.

"No," he said.

Alysanne studied him.

"No?"

"Not yet."

Her mouth tightened. "Jaehaerys, "

"He is still breathing."

"And I pray he continues."

"Then do not speak of him as though he is already gone."

Alysanne was silent for several moments. When she answered, there was no anger in her voice. Only weariness.

"I am trying to survive the night."

Jaehaerys looked at her. That ended the argument. He reached across the space between their chairs and took her hand. Her fingers closed around his immediately, and for a long while neither of them spoke. There was nothing left to say that they had not said after Aemon, or Alyssa, or any of the others. Words changed. Grief did not. A faint creak came from the wall. Jaehaerys's head snapped around. Alysanne straightened. The sound came again. Stone.

At the scrape of moving stone, Jaehaerys rose before the seam in the wall had even become visible. Blackfyre stood within reach beside the bed, and his hand moved toward it as the panel opened.

"Grandfather."

Jaehaerys stopped. Aenar's face appeared in the opening. For one stunned heartbeat the king merely stared at his grandson. Then Alysanne made a sound somewhere between a groan and an oath.

"Oh, for the love of the gods."

Aenar stepped into the chamber. He was dressed beneath a dark cloak rather than in his nightclothes. His silver hair was disordered, and his face was so grim that Jaehaerys's first anger died before it could properly form. Alysanne's did not.

"Aenar, I am an old woman with a damaged hip and a heart that has endured far more than any heart should be asked to endure. If you and your sister continue appearing from walls in the middle of the night, one of you is going to kill me before age has the opportunity."

Aenar glanced at her.

"Grandmother..."

"No. Do not grandmother me. Your grandfather had these cursed passages searched after the last time the two of you decided walls were merely suggestions. Evidently the search was worth considerably less than I was told."

"Alysanne," Jaehaerys said.

"I am correct."

"You are."

"I know I am."

Aenar did not smile. That troubled Jaehaerys more than the passage.

"Come with me," the boy said.

Jaehaerys frowned. "Where?"

"I'll explain when we arrive."

"You will explain now."

"Grandfather,"

"Aenar, it is the middle of the night. Your father may not live until dawn, your grandmother has just discovered that my efforts to secure this castle were apparently inadequate, and you have entered our bedchamber through a wall. You will tell me why before I follow you anywhere."

Aenar stared at him for a moment. "Father was poisoned."

The chamber fell silent, and although Jaehaerys understood what he had heard, he could not at first make himself believe it.

"What?" she whispered.

Aenar's face remained grim.

"We saw it."

Jaehaerys stared at him.

"Say that again."

"Father was poisoned."

"No." Jaehaerys took one step toward him. "Do not give me the conclusion. Tell me what you saw."

Aenar glanced toward the chamber doors.

"Not here. Please. Visenya has the man who did it."

Alysanne's cane slipped from where it leaned against the chair and struck the floor. Neither of them looked down.

"The man?" Alysanne said.

Jaehaerys felt as though the room had tilted.

"You have him?"

"Yes."

"Alive?"

"Yes."

"Who?"

"Come with me."

For once Jaehaerys did not argue. Alysanne was already bending for her cane. Her hand trembled enough that she missed it the first time. Jaehaerys crossed the room and picked it up for her. Neither spoke.

The passage was narrow and dusty, plainly designed by men who had never imagined a king past sixty forcing himself through it, and Jaehaerys found the journey more uncomfortable with every turn.

"Where is Visenya?"

"Where we're going."

"Is Baelon alive?"

"Yes."

"Did this happen tonight?"

"What we saw did."

"What does that mean?"

"We saw an acolyte put something into Father's water."

Jaehaerys stopped walking. Alysanne almost collided with him.

"You saw him."

"Yes."

"With your own eyes."

"Yes."

Alysanne's breath caught.

"An acolyte?"

Aenar nodded. Jaehaerys looked at the boy's back.

"And you took him."

"Yes."

Two ten-year-old children had apparently caught a grown man beside the bed of the Prince of Dragonstone, dragged him through a hidden wall, and held him somewhere inside Jaehaerys's own castle without a single guard knowing. Under any other circumstances, Jaehaerys might have spent the remainder of the night shouting. Tonight he only said, "Keep moving." Eventually Aenar stopped beside a low door Jaehaerys had never seen before. That alone should have angered him. It barely registered.

"This is inside Maegor's Holdfast?" he asked.

"Yes."

"And my searchers missed it."

"Yes."

Alysanne looked back at him.

"Not now."

Jaehaerys stared at the door. For perhaps the first time in his life, he had no desire to discuss a failure in his castle's security.

"Open it."

Aenar opened the door onto a small, windowless chamber that might once have served as a guardroom or hidden store. Two lamps illuminated a table, two stools, bare walls, and a man tied to a chair. Jaehaerys stopped so abruptly that Alysanne nearly came against his back, and neither of them spoke.

The acolyte's head sagged against his chest, with dried blood beneath his nose and along his mouth, and his bound wrists rested awkwardly against the chair.

Jaehaerys had seen battlefields and executions, had ordered deaths and witnessed what torture could do to a man, yet the sight of this bloodied acolyte sitting in a hidden room beside his grandchildren struck him differently.

"Visenya," Jaehaerys finally managed.

"He is alive."

Jaehaerys stared at her.

"That was not going to be my first question."

"You were looking at him as though it was."

Alysanne found her voice.

"Seven hells, child, what did you do?"

Visenya looked down at her knuckles as though she had forgotten the blood was there.

"Enough."

"Enough?"

Jaehaerys's gaze shifted to Dark Sister.

"Did you use the sword?"

"No."

That loosened something in his chest. Only slightly. Alysanne stepped farther into the room.

"Explain. All of it. Now."

Visenya's expression lost some of its sharpness.

"Aenar and I went to see Father. He was asleep. We heard someone approaching, so we hid behind the passage door. There are narrow slits through the stone. We could see most of the room."

She gestured toward the prisoner.

"He entered alone. At first he behaved as though he had simply come to tend Father. He checked him, adjusted the bedding, moved around the table. Then he picked up Father's water, looked toward the door, reached inside his robes, and pulled out a vial."

Visenya pointed at the table. Jaehaerys followed her finger. A tiny glass vial lay beside Dark Sister. Empty.

"He poured it into Father's cup."

Alysanne's face drained of what little color remained. Jaehaerys stared at the vial. For several moments all he could hear was the faint hiss of one of the lamps.

"No," Alysanne whispered.

Visenya did not soften it.

"We both saw him."

Jaehaerys moved toward the table. His fingers hovered above the vial but did not touch it.

"What was inside?"

"We don't know. He dropped the cup when we came out."

Jaehaerys looked at the unconscious man.

"And then?"

"We brought him here."

"And?"

Visenya's gaze hardened.

"He confessed."

Alysanne's eyes widened. Jaehaerys slowly turned.

"To putting something in the water?"

"To poisoning Father."

Silence. Alysanne shook her head once.

"No. Baelon was already ill. He was already dying before tonight."

"Because tonight was not the first time," Visenya said.

Alysanne stopped. Her lips parted. Nothing came out. Jaehaerys felt the meaning strike him a moment later. Not one attempt. Not a desperate act committed tonight. Someone had been doing this for days. Perhaps longer.

"He said that?" Jaehaerys asked.

"Yes."

Aenar moved beside his sister.

"He said Father had been given small amounts over time. Enough that it would look like illness until it became too late."

Jaehaerys stared at the unconscious man as the room seemed to narrow around him, leaving only the chair, the grey robes, and the blood.

Baelon lay a short distance away, struggling for breath, and suddenly Jaehaerys could no longer think of it as mere sickness or misfortune. Someone had done this to his son.

"Who?"

The word came out rough. Visenya answered without hesitation.

"Grand Maester Runciter."

Alysanne staggered. Aenar caught her arm. Jaehaerys did not move. He could not.

"Runciter?" Alysanne whispered.

Visenya nodded.

"The Grand Maester?"

"That is what he confessed."

Jaehaerys stared at her. Runciter had stood in his halls. Sat in his councils. Tended his family. Been allowed beside his children and grandchildren with medicines in his hands and the Citadel's chain around his neck.

"Runciter."

"Whether Runciter conceived it himself is another question. I doubt he did." "That is what he said," Visenya repeated.

Jaehaerys's attention snapped toward her.

"Why?"

"Because it makes little sense for him to do this alone. This man says his instructions came through Runciter, but he claims he does not know who stood above him."

Alysanne was still staring at the prisoner.

"Why?"

Her voice was almost lost.

"Why would Runciter want Baelon dead? Baelon has done nothing to the Citadel. He has never threatened them."

Jaehaerys knew. Or thought he did. The answer came from somewhere old. Older than Baelon. Older than the reign he had built.

"The maesters hate us."

Alysanne looked sharply at him. So did both children. Jaehaerys's gaze remained fixed upon the grey robes.

"They always have. Not every maester. Perhaps not even most. But there were men among them who despised everything they could not reduce to ink and measure. Dragons. Prophecy. Sorcery. Valyria." His fingers curled into his palm. "I knew that when I was young. I knew it when I became king."

"Jaehaerys."

"I thought it had been buried."

His voice rose. Alysanne fell silent.

"I thought they had accepted what we were because they had no choice but to accept it. I gave them peace. I gave them a realm where roads were safe enough for their ravens and their learned men to travel. I listened to their counsel. I welcomed their chains into my castles."

His eyes moved toward the unconscious acolyte.

"And one of them has been poisoning our son."

Alysanne flinched. Jaehaerys barely noticed.

"I let Vaegon go to them."

That struck her differently.

"Jaehaerys."

"I let our son take their chain. He wanted it, yes, but I thought there was value in it. If old hatreds still lived in the Citadel, if there were men speaking against our house behind closed doors, then surely a prince among them would hear something eventually."

"You never told me that."

"What would there have been to tell? He found nothing. Years and years, and nothing." Jaehaerys laughed once, without humor. "Perhaps I should congratulate them. They knew enough not to whisper treason where a Targaryen might hear."

Alysanne shook her head.

"We do not know that the Citadel ordered this."

"No."

Jaehaerys turned toward her.

"No, we know only that an acolyte has confessed to poisoning the Prince of Dragonstone on the orders of the Grand Maester. Forgive me if I find the distinction less comforting than you do."

"I did not say it was comforting."

"No. Only that we should be careful."

"Yes."

Careful. Jaehaerys had built his reign on that word. Careful judgment. Careful compromise. Careful laws hammered out until even enemies could live beneath them. For more than half a century, he had measured consequences before allowing anger to choose for him. And where had it brought him tonight? Aemon was dead. Baelon was dying. The second heir he had spent years preparing might not see dawn.

Jaehaerys could feel age in his bones each morning. He could feel it when he rose from a chair, when he climbed too many stairs, when another winter left him a little slower than the one before. His years were numbered. He knew it. Everyone knew it. And after Baelon?

Viserys was a good man, but goodness was not training. He had not sat beside Jaehaerys year after year learning the thousand small cruelties of rule. He had not been shaped for the crown because there had been no reason to shape him for it. Daemon had fire enough for three princes and restraint enough for half of one.

Rhaenys had already been passed over once, and Jaehaerys knew well enough that old arguments did not vanish merely because a king declared them settled. He had spent decades building certainty into the succession. Aemon. Then Baelon. One prepared heir after another. If Baelon died, there was no third. Something inside Jaehaerys finally broke.

"Daemon has Caraxes."

Silence. Alysanne stared at him. Aenar's brows rose. Visenya looked as though she had misheard. Jaehaerys continued.

"He could be in Oldtown before they understood we knew."

Alysanne opened her mouth without speaking, while Aenar looked toward Visenya, who seemed equally stunned by their grandfather's words.

"Jaehaerys," Alysanne said at last.

He ignored the warning in her voice.

"One command. One. Daemon mounts Caraxes before sunrise and flies south. By tomorrow the Citadel could be burning."

Alysanne rose so suddenly that her chair scraped against the floor.

"Have you lost your senses?"

"Perhaps."

That stopped her. Alysanne stared at him. Aenar stared at him. Even Visenya's expression changed. Jaehaerys knew what they were seeing. He had never been this man. Not with them. Perhaps not with anyone. He turned away and began pacing the little room.

"For sixty years I have been sensible. I have weighed every lord's pride, every septon's complaint, every merchant's coin, every damned consequence before I moved. I have spent my life making certain the realm did not pay for a king's anger."

His hand struck the table hard enough to make the empty vial jump.

"And our son is dying because men I allowed into my own household have been feeding him poison."

Alysanne flinched at the sound. Jaehaerys did not stop.

"Baelon was not merely my heir. He is my son. My son." His voice cracked across the room. "I watched that boy grow from an infant into a man. I watched him bury Alyssa and continue because his children needed him. I watched him take Aemon's place when neither of us wanted him to have to. And now I am supposed to stand beside his bed and watch him die because some grey-robed bastard decided his life was theirs to take?"

No one answered, and Jaehaerys could hear his own breathing growing heavy without caring who noticed.

"And when he dies, what then? I bury another child and walk into the council chamber the next morning to decide which unprepared descendant inherits the realm I spent my entire life holding together?"

"Jaehaerys," Alysanne said quietly.

"No."

He turned on her.

"No, I will not be calm about this. Not tonight."

Alysanne went still. So did the twins. Jaehaerys almost never raised his voice to her. He knew it the instant the words left him, and continued anyway.

"I trained Aemon. He died. I trained Baelon. They murdered him." His hand closed around Blackfyre's pommel. "I am an old man, Alysanne. I do not have twenty years to take another boy and make a king of him. I may not have ten. I may not have five. I have no trained heir waiting behind Baelon because there was never supposed to be a need for one."

His gaze moved between them.

"Viserys has not been prepared for this. Daemon has not been prepared for this. Rhaenys was passed over and has every reason to remember it. The moment Baelon dies, every lord with an opinion on the succession will suddenly discover the urgent need to share it."

His mouth twisted.

"And all of that happens because I trusted the men standing beside my son's bed."

The room had become completely silent. Alysanne looked shaken. Aenar had lost whatever answer he might have offered. Visenya simply watched him. Jaehaerys drew a breath.

"So yes. At this moment, burning the Citadel sounds remarkably reasonable."

Visenya held his gaze for several seconds before closing her eyes and sighing, a small sound that infuriated him more than an open challenge might have.

"You would not get them all."

Jaehaerys turned on her.

"What?"

"You would not get them all."

Visenya opened her eyes. There was no fear in them. Only exhausted frustration.

"The Citadel is not a basket of kindling you can throw into a hearth and declare the matter finished. Maesters serve in castles throughout the Seven Kingdoms. Ravens could leave Oldtown before Daemon arrived if Runciter has any means of warning them. Anyone important enough to know what happened could flee, destroy records, silence accomplices, or simply deny everything."

Jaehaerys stared at her. For several moments he seemed to have forgotten that the girl arguing with him was ten years old. Visenya had not.

"And even if you burn the Citadel, what do you tell the realm afterward?" she continued. "That Aenar and I saw an acolyte pour something into Father's water? We are ten. That matters, whether you like it or not. Lords who do not wish to believe us will call us frightened children who misunderstood what we saw."

Jaehaerys's jaw tightened.

"You did not misunderstand."

"We know that."

"So does he."

Visenya glanced toward the unconscious acolyte.

"At the moment he knows very little of anything."

Aenar almost smiled. Almost. Jaehaerys did not.

"He confessed."

"To the two of us," Visenya replied. "In a hidden room, after Aenar and I dragged him here and I hit him until he decided answering questions was wiser than refusing them."

Alysanne's eyes moved toward the blood on Visenya's knuckles. Visenya noticed.

"Yes. Exactly."

Jaehaerys looked toward the table.

"We have the vial."

"Empty."

"We have what was in Baelon's cup."

"No, we do not. It is soaking into the floor of Father's chamber."

"We have two witnesses."

"Two ten-year-old witnesses."

"A prince and a princess of the blood."

"Children of the man who was poisoned."

Visenya stepped closer to the table and pointed toward the vial.

"If Runciter denies everything, what do you have that proves otherwise? Not what convinces us. Proof. Something you can place before the realm and say, there, that is why I sent a dragon to burn the Citadel."

Jaehaerys said nothing. Visenya waited. That made the silence worse. At last he said, "We seize Runciter tonight."

"And then?"

"We question him."

"And if he denies it?"

"Then we make him stop denying it."

Alysanne stared at him, Aenar's head rose, and Visenya's eyes narrowed, but Jaehaerys heard the words he had spoken and did not withdraw them.

"Grandfather," Aenar said carefully.

"No." Jaehaerys turned toward him. "You found a man poisoning my son. He named the Grand Maester. I will not leave Runciter free to walk through this castle while Baelon lies dying twenty rooms away."

"Neither would I," Visenya said.

Jaehaerys rounded on her.

"Then what exactly are we arguing about?"

"Whether you arrest him publicly before we know anything useful."

"He ordered my son's murder."

"He may have."

"He did."

"The acolyte says he did."

"And apparently his confession is evidence only when it suits your argument."

Visenya's mouth tightened.

"No. It is enough to act on. It is not enough to burn Oldtown."

Jaehaerys's hand closed around Blackfyre's pommel. Alysanne watched him closely. Visenya continued before he could answer.

"Get Runciter away from Father. Immediately. Have someone we trust watch him. Search his chambers while he thinks no one suspects him. Find his letters. Find out which ravens he has sent, who visits him, which servants carry messages for him, which maesters he corresponds with. If he is part of something larger, then arresting him tonight tells everyone else involved that we know."

"And leaving him free gives him time to act."

"Then do not leave him free. Just let him believe he is."

Jaehaerys stared at her.

"Have guards outside every passage he could use without telling them why," Visenya said. "Put someone on the rookery. Watch the gates. If Runciter attempts to leave, stop him. If he sends a raven, take the message. If he speaks to another maester, remember the name. You have an advantage right now because Runciter does not know this man failed."

She gestured toward the acolyte.

"The moment you drag him from his bed in chains, you lose that advantage."

Jaehaerys's temper, already stretched beyond anything resembling reason, snapped again.

"And while I play this clever little game, Baelon dies."

The accusation struck hard enough to still the room. Visenya stopped moving, Aenar looked down, and Alysanne closed her eyes, leaving Jaehaerys with a clearer sense of what he had just said.

"Your father is lying in that bed because I allowed these men near him. I trusted their chains. I trusted their learning. I listened when they told me there was nothing to be done, and now I discover that one of their own has been putting poison into his water while the Grand Maester may have been directing the entire thing."

His voice rose.

"And you are asking me to wait."

"I am asking you not to warn everyone else."

"I am asking what difference it makes if Baelon is dead by the time we find them!"

Visenya's grief had not vanished, nor had her anger, but something harder seemed to settle over both as her expression changed.

"Think!"

The word cracked through the chamber. Jaehaerys stared at her. So did Alysanne. Aenar slowly turned toward his sister. Visenya stepped forward.

"You have one prisoner, one empty vial, two child witnesses, no written orders, no poison left to examine, and no proof that reaches beyond the man sitting in that chair. You have a name. One name. Perhaps Runciter is the end of it. Perhaps he is one link in something much larger. We do not know."

"I know enough."

"No. You know enough to be furious."

Jaehaerys's face hardened. Visenya did not retreat.

"You want to act because acting feels better than standing beside Father's bed unable to help him. I understand that. I want to put Dark Sister through Runciter's throat and ask questions afterward."

Alysanne's eyes flicked toward the sword. Visenya ignored her.

"But that would be stupid."

Jaehaerys's eyebrows rose. Aenar shut his eyes for a moment. Visenya continued.

"And sending Daemon to burn the Citadel would be stupider. You would destroy evidence, kill men who know nothing, warn every conspirator who survives, turn half the realm against you, and still have no idea whether you killed the people actually responsible."

Jaehaerys took one step toward her.

"I have ruled these kingdoms for longer than your father has been alive."

"I know."

"I have put down rebellions, faced the Faith, settled wars without fighting them, and held kingdoms together while better men than Runciter tried to tear them apart."

"I know."

"Then perhaps do not speak to me as though I am some angry boy reaching for a sword because someone insulted him."

Visenya's eyes flashed.

"Then stop behaving like one."

Alysanne drew a sharp breath as Aenar turned toward his sister, while Jaehaerys could only stare at her. For one long moment, Visenya appeared unaware of what she had let slip.

"You have one prisoner, one empty vial, two ten-year-old witnesses, no poison, no written orders, and a confession that would be very easy for Runciter to dismiss. Your answer is to put Daemon on Caraxes and burn the Citadel before we learn anything else?"

Her voice sharpened.

"Is this the sort of half-baked plan she taught you to make on Dragonstone?"

Alysanne frowned. Jaehaerys stared at Visenya. Aenar slowly turned his head toward his sister. Visenya's anger disappeared almost at once. Jaehaerys caught on the words only because they made no sense.

"She?" he asked.

Visenya said nothing. Alysanne looked between them.

"Who are you talking about?"

Jaehaerys's confusion deepened.

"Visenya, how do you know what anyone taught me on Dragonstone?"

For the first time that night Visenya hesitated, and Aenar gave her a sidelong look that Alysanne noticed at once, frowning as though she were no closer than Jaehaerys to understanding. Visenya drew a slow breath.

"Is this how I taught you?"