FULL CHAPTER HERE —> NERD IN THE NORTH 7-3

Two chairs stood empty along the table, Cersei’s eyes drifting to them still as none had thought to remove the pair yet. The Small Council sat where they did, Jaime beside the King as his Lord Commander, and the imp across from him entirely; all the while the eunuch, old man, and whoremonger kept their place. 

A Master of Laws they no longer had, and a Master of Ships that had fled as well; one more dead than his eldest brother and the other soon to join him. 

Would-be kings each one of them, the last of the black-haired Baratheons.Pycelle’s wet old mouth kept working in the heat, the smell of sour milk and old honey on the Grand Maester’s breath another insult and indignity. The council chambers in the Tower of the Hand held summer as a kettle did water, open windows doing little as the air off the Blackwater came in thick with the smell of fish and the scent of the city.And winter yet to come. Cersei turned her cup, wine swirling in the goblet. The Queen Mother drank the Arbor gold gone warm, the taste a sour thing at the back of her tongue. Not a moment too soon. “—rom Seagard, by way of Maidenpool, Your Grace, which arrived a mere sennight behind the first…” Pycelle’s thumbnail met the seal, wax flaking red onto the table. “If it please you, it seems that the Northern host continues to disperse as it were, Your Grace, if—”“It does not.”All eyes turned to the smallest in the room.“M-my lord?”“Please you, you said.” The stubby-fingered Hand of the King raised a goblet to his lips, the cup full of a Dornish Red. “I doubt a line in that scroll is going to please any in this room.”“You speak presumptuously, uncle.” Joffrey’s smile was bright as it had ever been, her son’s hair catching the light of noon from the western window; gold atop gold atop gold, the crown he wore sitting back off his brow. Ever the beauty, he was she and Jaime’s both, his boots crossed at the ankle and smile bright as the sun that kissed him.Her son, so lovely a visage at five and ten that something in her breast turned over.“One can’t know the future, no matter how clever they think they are.” His warning to Tyrion was spoken with wisdom despite his age. “One should remember that.”Her brother swallowed his wine, smile fading just so. “This one shall, Your Grace.”

FULL CHAPTER HERE —> NERD IN THE NORTH 7-3