“-. 273 AC .-“
“What do you know about Rhaenys Targaryen?”
Brandon Stark stared blankly at Rickard Stark. “I’m assuming you mean Aegon’s sister, not the Queen that Never Was.”
“Correct.”
Brandon Stark made the most peevish face Walys had ever seen since leaving the Citadel. “
Supposedly she was graceful, playful, curious, impulsive, and given to flights of fancy, with a mischievous aspect to her personality. She loved music, dancing, and poetry. She loved flying even more, spending more time flying on Meraxes, than her siblings did on their own dragons combined. She’s described as the most beautiful woman ever, with silver-gold hair which she kept long and wore loose, purple eyes, and a slender body. And it’s
said that she was the most kindhearted Targaryen of her generation and that she applied that in everything she did while ruling the realm on Aegon’s behalf. Which she and Visenya did pretty much all the time.” An unexpectedly resentful look came over the boy then as he looked over his father’s shoulder instead of the man himself. “I suppose this is where I’m shocked to discover none of that’s true either?”
“She was everything you said.”
Walys blinked and almost slumped in incomprehension despite the sword at his throat. To his seething chagrin, the boy reacted exactly the same.
“She was all of those things,” Rickard Stark said idly. “And yet she still forced a betrothal of Torrhen’s only daughter to the Arryns of all people. There was no one in Westeros at the time whom we disdained more and who hated us more, after the massive loss in trade they suffered due to our sponsorship of the Manderlys and White Harbour. To say nothing of the
thousand years of strife before that in the War Across the Water. Wasn’t it strange that the kind Rhaenys was the one who demanded that marriage? Wasn’t it odd that she did so when winter was no longer so far away? You think she didn’t know exactly what words Aegon and the King in the North had exchanged back then? It’s almost like she was trying to give her brother deniability while calling an assumed bluff in his place, wouldn’t you say?”
Brandon Stark blinked owlishly at his lord father. “Father…” The boy asked slowly after a time. “What really happened at the Trident?”
“Torrhen understood what most others only got around to later: however dangerous he was with that dragon of his, Aegon was only middling at war, not particularly exceptional in everything else, and as easily angered as he was blackmailed if you had the right leverage. Torrhen's opening words as relayed via his maesters were
very combative. It was his way of putting himself in front of the dragon’s maw to test on the North’s behalf if Aegon had any capability to control himself, and therefore if Targaryen rule could be borne at all. When his nobles counselled Torrhen to fight, that wasn’t because they were all glory-hounding idiots like the Citadel implies. It was because they were willing to lay down their lives for the long view, like House Stark itself has always done. Septons and Citadel maesters write that the Company of the Rose was established from those who refused to bend the knee. What they never confirmed or denied – possibly because Aegon couldn’t be made to look short-sighted in comparison, I assume – was that it happened with Torrhen’s full approval. In fact, second and further sons of our house and most others were already crossing the narrow sea to Braavos with a large chunk of the ancient treasure hoards House Stark still had at the time. It later became a tradition for our ties with the Rose to be refreshed this way – Artos Stark’s entire branch of our family has lived in Essos since his brother, your great-grandfather Willam, married his second wife.”
“I have cousins in Essos?” The boy blurted in surprise, then he quieted immediately when Rickard’s harsh glare reminded him how recently he’d been told not to interrupt the man.
“Cousins, uncles, other relatives removed. They’re not all sellswords either, or even most of them. They have families, businesses, they even own land here and there. The Company of the Rose is effectively a kingdom in exile sworn to the Crown of Winter, a safeguard in case Stark or the other Northern houses that stayed in Westeros ever go the way of the Gardeners. Had Torrhen chosen to fight, Brandon Snow would have gone to assassinate the dragons, or more likely their riders, and the North would have won the fight in the end. Had Brandon failed to neutralise even one dragon, it would have been a second field of fire and Torrhen would have likely lost his life along with his commanders. But our House would have lived on and so would our command structure. We would have lost the battle but still won the
war in the end. All the nobles with him had left heirs at home in case of just that eventuality, and half of Torrhen’s children were already scattered throughout the North ready to wage low war. Even if Aegon somehow took leave of all his sisters’ senses and came up with his entire force despite that little issue down south known as Dorne, the North is far too large to hold. Also, rich in people eager to fight and die in suicide missions instead of going ‘hunting’ in winter. We would still have won no matter how many holdfasts and castles Aegon torched in his anger. I trust you can guess what the swing factor was.”
“… Summer,” Brandon said eventually, despite obviously not knowing the point of any of this anymore. “Winter was coming, but too slowly. If even just one dragon survived, there would be nothing stopping Aegon or his sisters from burning down all our harvests, which were clustered together a lot more back then. Even if we bled them dry and threw them out in the end, the hit to the North’s food supply would have been catastrophic. We’d have won the war but lost the peace.”
“Quite so,” Rickard agreed with a light tap on Ice’s hilt. The faint vibrations travelled all the way to Walys’ brain, somehow. “So he didn’t choose to fight then and there. Instead, Torrhen bled Aegon dry in negotiations and then swore to abide by his vows to the
letter. He used
our wording when he made them. And though the Crown of the North was laid down, the Crown of Winter never was.”
Walys almost couldn’t contain his renewed outrage. What, was the young lord really going to claim they weren’t the same thing?
Rickard smirked mildly, because the answer to that was apparently yes. “It never even occurred to Aegon or his sisters that they weren’t the same thing. And the fact that none of the subjugated nobles with him raised the matter proves how many in Aegon’s new demesne were secretly rooting for us.”
“That…” Brandon Stark breathed, amazed. “So Torrhen only agreed to terms that would let him choose the field and time
later if it came down to it. He bent the knee expecting that Aegon or his line would sooner or later break his side of the pact of fealty.”
“Using Rhaenys as a proxy to do just that did not endear him to anyone above the Neck, I’ll tell you that much. A pact is worthless if it’s sworn with those whose words are just wind. With those not worth believing in. I don’t need to tell you which of the oaths that broke, do I?”
“… And justice to all.”
“And justice to all,” Rickard said gravely.
Maester Walys was hard-pressed not to show his aghast disbelief of the two hypocrites before him. He almost couldn’t believe he’d really heard what he thought he heard. It was almost like the eternally oathbound Rickard Stark had just admitted that his ancestors had bent the knee on a false pretense.
“But then…” And of course the demon would taunt him by mimicking his own insights- “Why
didn’t Torrhen recant?” But no, the thing had instead chosen to pretend like it didn’t find anything objectionable in Torrhen Stark’s actions at all.
“What do you know of the matter?”
“Only that there are letters at the Citadel implying that Torrhen only agreed to the match after much protest and that his sons refused to attend the wedding.”
“Ah yes. Letters. Implying. Doesn’t say whose. Doesn’t say how. I’m always surprised the Citadel chroniclers chose to be so vague on this, seeing as this is one of the few cases where our house did actually correspond with them directly. Because of course southrons would so easily believe us Northerners not to have even the most basic common sense. Westeros had just been conquered by a foreign power. All laws and pacts prior to that conquest were worth less than the syphilitic cunt of a whore afflicted with leprosy. If Alaric never found any leverage during the New Gift cockup, there was never going to be any at a time when the conquest technically hadn’t even finished.”
“… What did happen then?”
“Torrhen was stalling for winter while he finished decentralizing his logistics and communicated with his banners and envoys across the Narrow Sea. Then his daughter eloped on her own because she wanted peace, his youngest son helped her because the dragons scared him, and word came from Essos that Brandon Snow had disappeared.” Walys Flowers blinked rapidly at the sudden turn in the story. The switch in mood in those last words would have given Walys whiplash if not for the sword at his throat still keeping him in place. “One of those would have sparked anger. Two could have been borne. But all of them at once? By the time Torrhen caught up to her, by the time it could be ascertained that Brandon Snow’s disappearance
hadn’t had anything to do with Aegon or his cronies, the fool girl was already in the Vale and Torrhen’ window of opportunity had passed completely. And so we stayed subdued, the craven son was delivered into exile by his remaining siblings, and the daughter married the boy-king only to be murdered by Jonos Arryn’s rebels before the year was past. I can only hope she went peacefully.” Rickard Stark’s gaze on his son no longer seemed friendly in the least. “All because children thought they knew better. All because they went over their father’s head. Like
you just did with
me.”
Brandon Stark gaped at his father, completely taken aback.
Then the boy slowly sagged in his chair as words and revelations came together in his mind so quickly that even Walys couldn’t read all of them. But he didn’t need to, did he? Long-winded or not, it turned out Rickard Stark’s entire lecture had been wholly meaningful.
“Oh,” the son said weakly.
“Yes” the father said flatly. “Oh.”
Brandon Stark visibly shrunk in his chair.
“Generally, when someone thinks they’ve hoodwinked you, the best immediate path forward is to let him believe it so you don’t actually have to promise anything. It leaves you free to cooperate and oppose as you see fit. But the key word is that it’s only the best
immediate path forward. You
know this, son. You don't try to win a game with a master, especially when he’s the one who sets the rules. You flip the table over and stab him in the chest when he's distracted by the pieces falling around him.”
The bottom of Walys’ stomach seemed to fall away as an inkling finally dawned on him of why he was even being allowed to act as witness to all this. It wasn’t that Rickard Stark was teaching him a lesson. It was that Walys himself
was the lesson. The maester had never felt so condescended to or disrespected. He’d also never felt true terror before, but the lump of ice in his lungs and belly could hardly be called anything else.
“Yesterday at dawn I sent you a summons but you were nowhere to be found in the Great Keep. Since I’d let you off training beforehand, I let it be. But I also sent for you at noon while you toiled in your workshop cellar, and you yelled at the servant that you were busy without even coming to the door. Then, in the evening, you either ignored me or didn’t hear me call for you and knocking on the door.”
“… I was skinchanging,” the boy rasped shamefully, face buried in his hands. “I’d barely gotten any rest yesterday night and I worked and skinchanged the whole day yesterday and… now I’m just making excuses. Fuck.”
“You weren’t skinchanging. You were asleep. I was the one who carried you to bed.”
Brandon flinched.
“I invited you and your mother to sit in on this game so we’d all be here when I discussed this whole matter with the good maester here.” Lord Stark’s words were calm and steady and completely merciless.
The boy’s head, which had steadily dropped the more his father spoke, was now bowed as low as it could go.
“Son, look at me.”
Slowly, torturously, the boy did.
Rickard held out an arm entreatingly and motion to come hither. “Come here.”
Brandon Stark stumbled out of his chair and went to stand before his father almost in a daze, except he wasn’t so much shaken as mortified. Seven curse him, Walys couldn’t spot even the slightest sign of artifice in it.
Rickard stark laid a hand on his son’s head. Firmly. “You’re not the only one who’s been watching through raven’s eyes.”
Walys felt the ground fall out from under him.
“I…” The boy’s voice wavered almost hoarsely as he failed to say the words he wanted. “Fuck,” the boy tried but couldn’t hold his father’s gaze so he closed his eyes and dropped his head again until it lay on his father’s knee. “I messed everything up, didn’t I?”
“You did.” Rickard stark stroked his son’s head. “I’d hoped this could be postponed until I finished handling a matter out east. I was in error to do so. I should have looked closer to home from the moment I first overshadowed the mind of a raven for the first time. My priorities were gravely unsound in hindsight and you are right that this issue has laid undiscovered and unresolved for far too long. But I also meant to let all parties air what all they had to air and unravel this issue with at least some modicum of grace. Instead, decorum was trampled over, you nearly made us into a line of oathbreakers, and the shock of finding out she’s dying in such a ghastly manner now has your mother crying all alone in the hopes she’ll manage to recover the strong front she always puts in front of you and your siblings.”
Brandon Stark covered his head in his hands then crossed his arms over one another in his father’s lap as if he could hide his face more than he already had.
“It is the curse of our house that others will always be the first to break faith with us. That’s what happens when you never do that yourself. Sometimes we can use it to prepare for betrayals and put upstarts in their place as legends did in olden days. But other times, those who break faith are our own children. And so are born new cautionary tales, telling us bluntly and plainly why the world is no song or story.”
For all his revulsion, Walys couldn’t tear his eyes away from the sight before him, of Brandon Stark literally being taught the ugly side of rule at his father’s knee.
The man’s voice changed then, his tone and cadence less like himself but more than it usually was, somehow. “’Do not talk down to me, boy. I’ve bent neither knee yet, nor will I ever to a fool that doesn’t know a dragon from a hammer. You think you and yours are new to me and mine? My forebears have ruled as kings unbroken since the elder days, when firewyrms and flying lizards like yours prowled and nested from the Summer Sea to Land of Always Winter. Dragons come and go. They’ll come and go again long after the world is free of pretentious children like you and your witch sisters. Think yourself the first upstart with delusions of grandeur? There have been many like you, yet none of what they built has ever lasted beyond three centuries. Try to take my crown and I will kill your dragons. Try to burn my army and I’ll kill your sister-wives and
then your dragons. Even if I don’t get them all, I’ll spread the knowledge of how to do it to every corner of the world. Bring war to the North and I’ll have you chasing smoke from one ocean to the other while your army starves in burned fields and dies to the cold and poisoned well water. Kill me and my sons will do it in my stead. Half are waiting for you scattered to all corners of the mighty lands I rule beyond the marshes. Try to find them! Freeze your years away burning farms and stone towers. My other sons will just make common cause with your many other enemies. They’ll come sailing back from Essos with coin and scorpions and every last sellsword the Free Cities are hiring even now. The Century of Blood is all they see of your kind’s legacy, they’ll pay through the nose to prevent the return of that hell known as Valyria. And don’t think I don’t know how petty you are in victory, after you tarnished the name of a man so much older and wiser and more accomplished than you. Argilac Durrandon was your better in every way, proven through both long peace and war across two continents. And you had the gall to shit all over his reputation and then sully his legendary line with bastard blood. Try to besmirch my good name and I’ll turn all my wargs and greenseers to aid those at your back, who
hate you and yours for how you swooped and burned and murdered your way into power over their mothers’ and fathers’ corpses. Try with me what you did to the Storm King, and my sons will dig out all our tombs and barrows and every last treasure hoard built over the last eight thousand years. Then they’ll pay the House of Black and White to put the name Targaryen down on the lists of the Faceless Men for the next ten generations. These are the words of myself, Torrhen of House Stark, King of Winter, King in the North, Lord of the First Men and Green Men and the Children True, Steward of Vows New and Ancient. Now go ahead and speak yours, dragonlord. Tell me why Winter should let the North bide under the auspices of Summer, for a time.”
Maester Walys… Walys Flowers just… He just stopped. He knew the words. He was familiar with their individual meanings. But of the order they’d just been spoken in… he couldn’t make any sense at all. All he heard was pride and madness and empty boasts.
When Brandon Stark raised his head to look up at his father, Walys almost couldn’t gather his thoughts fast enough to consider him. When he finally managed it, he didn’t know how to feel on seeing in him that same brittleness that he himself had so carefully cultivated and taken advantage of in the boy’s father for all those years. But Rickard Stark didn’t take advantage of it. He just sat and waited as the window of opportunity passed him by, even though he’d just lamented his ancestor being forced to do just that. The man sat stroking his son’s cheek and let the boy gather his wits for as long as he needed to shore up his frayed nerves and master himself again. Walys could almost see the moment when the boy accepted what he’d just heard and started forming his own opinions about it, instead of being fed one as his father would have been wise to do. Either Rickard Stark had always been a foolish idealist beyond Walys’ worst estimations, or he hadn’t learned anything from Walys at all.
Or that was the maester’s thought, until he actually moved his eyes from the boy to the man and found Rickard Stark already gazing at him. Pointedly. Disdainfully, almost, before the man dismissed him and resumed his regard of his firstborn. “That these words lie empty and worthless is the greatest shame and failure of our lineage. That’s without the added quandary that the entire mess also undermined every other valid secession clause thrown in our face thereafter. For want of a craven and girl’s lack of sense, history was changed and instead of Torrhen Dragonbane we got the King who Knelt. All for nothing.” Rickard Stark reached under his son’s chin and made him look up until his eyes couldn’t be avoided. “Don’t make a second Torrhen out of me, my son.”
Brandon Stark couldn’t hold his father’s gaze any better than he had during that whole oration. As soon as he was released, he dropped his gaze again. And when he spoke, his voice was faint. Feeble even. “I really am an idiot aren’t I?”
“No you’re not, my clever, clever boy,” the man smiled fondly and gently stroked his son’s head. “You just trust my judgment even less than I trust yours. Not entirely without reason. It’s my fault for giving you such low expectations over so many years. I took far too long in beginning to suspect the good maester here as well. And when I gained the means to look at inward matters without casting suspicions, I chose to gaze outward instead. Nevertheless, you decided to force this confrontation because you thought I was in his grip all this time. You underestimate me, son. Whatever I feel about your judgment, I’ve never questioned the worth of your information. Not once. And you overestimate him and underestimate yourself in all the ways you shouldn’t. How could you possibly think his hold on me could ever measure up to yours?”
Brandon Stark’s head flew up in astonishment, then the boy flushed in total embarrassment.
For some unholy reason, that shocked the maester most out of everything he’d seen and heard that day. That... that was just such an authentically
childish thing to do.
“You are good and kind and you will make the North strong,” Rickard told his progeny, then tapped his brow with the back of his fingers. “But up here you’re still fragile. It’s not just about you anymore either, if others are beginning to catch glimpses of what comes through.”
That… sounded like rather more than just… Walys didn’t even know.
The boy didn’t seem to put his mind to it though. He just leaned into his father’s touch, quiet and almost timid. Forlorn even. “I’m sorry I keep disappointing you, father.”
“I forgive you,” Rickard Stark said. Then something like amusement actually showed on his face. “Chin up son, instead of one moonturn I got to be proud of you for almost a year this time.”
Brandon Stark succumbed to uncontrollable burst of laughter, despite himself. It was loud and short and watery and ended almost as abruptly as it started, but at the end of it the boy seemed to stand lighter, even if his mood just settled into the same, grim thing his father conveyed now. “How long have we been preparing for war?”
The sudden turn in the conversation felt like a club to the face. The change in topic was even worse, like egg-sized balls of hail on his bare skull. Despite that, the maester was perversely glad for it. Far be it from him to call attention to his presence during these talks of secrets.
Rickard’s gaze only thawed though, somehow. “We’re always just one step removed from war.” The man sighed, but firmed again almost immediately. “Your grandfather would have broken us away during the long winter. Let them try to hold us amidst blizzards and snowfall. Our people would have gladly fought a winter war instead of starving to death as so many were by the middle of it. But then Aegon V send us twenty times our taxes’ worth in food despite the complaints of the Tyrells and many others. Even the Karstarks and Umbers couldn’t stomach the thought of secession after that, not as long as it was him up on that ugly chair.”
“... The North remembers,” Brandon murmured
“The North remembers.”
“And then Summerhall happened."
“And then Summerhall happened,” Rickard agreed with a grave nod. “The only reason we aided Jeahaerys in the War of the Ninepenny Kings was to clear that debt of honor. Then Edwyle Stark and Jaehaerys Targaryen died in the same year. So now it’s our turn to live with the knowledge that House Targaryen has never gone more than a generation without inflicting on us some major wrong. The next to come will not be borne.”
“And you think it will come in our lifetime,” the boy said, sounding not even half as despairing as he should have been, Walys thought darkly. Or even all that surprised.
“I can only hope it will be in
my lifetime so that the burden of past debts does not fall wholly on you,” the man told his son. His soft tone was at odds with that expression of resignation. “Or that’s what I would say, if I had any choice other than to lay part of that burden on your shoulders right now. You know why. Don’t you?”
“… Fostering Eddard at the Eyre gets us the Vale,” Brandon Stark said as he stood away from his father, defeated. “Jon Arryn is already fostering Robert Baratheon, so if Ned befriends him we’ll get the Stormlands
and the Vale. Between me and Lyanna, even Benjen, that’s three or more of the Seven Kingdoms.”
“You’re also convinced your mother is dying of consumption,” Rickard threw in as if it didn’t weigh on him at all, something which the boy didn’t seem to appreciate. Somehow, Walys couldn’t muster the amusement he should have felt from that. “If Winterfell sees a second outbreak, she and you and I and everyone else may well be dead this time next year.”
Brandon Stark was just as grim. “But House Stark will at least live in Ned.”
“That could just as easily be done by sending him to the Cerwyns or elsewhere of course. I mean to have Lyanna and Benjen vacation there until this ends one way or another. But to not leverage Eddard… That would just be ignoring reality.”
“And then the consequences of ignoring reality will eat us alive.” The boy started to pace restlessly as his words continued, uncaring of who was there to see. “The Vale would give us a near unassailable redoubt and force projection across half the Narrow Sea. The Stormlands would give us a major distraction right next to the capital and force projection across the
other half of the Narrow Sea. Say either me or Benjen is tied to a Northern house so our bannermen don’t get any wrong ideas. You’d still have one groom to spare, and could then bind Lyanna to the Reach or the Lannisters-“
“And this is where you once again begin to overreach and misjudge me, as usual,” Rickard said flatly. It was enough to strike Walys and the demon-boy both silent. He seemed to be doing a lot of that, Walys thought grimly. “The Tyrells are more likely to hold a daughter of our house hostage for the Iron Throne, marriage or not. And Tywin Lannister butchered two families down to their infant children and has put personal ambitions over everyone up to his own king ever since. My trust in his willingness to abide by the terms of a marriage alliance are even lower than my belief in his ability to raise a son that could treat my daughter well.”
“… You’d be surprised,” Brandon Stark muttered unexpectedly, not looking at anyone. “And if you’re going to say that, you’ll have to rule out the Tully sisters too. One of them will probably get me killed and the other one won’t even bother before she poisons me herself.”
Maester Walys couldn’t fathom what the demon-boy was rambling about now. The very idea he had any worthwhile input was already absurd, but to spout such outlandish claims about two girls barely a few name days old was-
“We’ll talk.”
Walys was astounded. His neck scraped painfully against the Valyrian edge, drawing a wince and making him pull his dropped jaw back up to grit his teeth instead.
Somehow, though, the boy-thing seemed even more astounded than he was. “Dad, did you just…?”
Rickard sighed, then eyed his firstborn ruefully. “I wish I could just order you to stop relying solely on yourself. It’s given you a blind spot relative to everyone else. Not least of all me. So let me make my meaning plain. It took much hindsight before it came to me, but it came to me. Anagrams are not subtle. I
understand, son.”
Walys
didn’t understand. At all!
But it was plain the boy absolutely did because a look of raw, vulnerable hope abruptly stole over his face and Brandon Stark suddenly seemed like he could be blown away by the faintest breeze. That was the sort of weight his father’s words seemed to take off his shoulders, however nonsensical. “Dad… You… I…”
“I’m here now, Brandon. I
am listening now. I
am watching now. I will always listen to you, my son, no matter what you have to say. So please. Don’t do this again. Come to me first, no matter what it is.”
The boy suddenly looked about to cry. “Dad…”
“Ah-ah!” Rickard stark abruptly poked him in the middle of his forehead. The boy almost fell on his arse. “No losing your composure in public. We are the Starks of Winterfell. Noble in peace, terrible in war, and always self-possessed in our bearing. Hold it in till later, when we’re in private. We’ll hug it out properly then.”
But being told that only made the boy’s composure worsen. “I… Oh come on, Dad, you think you can just-”
“I can.”
“You think I can just-“
“You can.”
“That’s not what I-” Composure lost, the boy literally started sniffling as tears leaked from his eyes. “Right. Right! I can do that.” Except he didn’t, because he failed miserably to do precisely that. “I
can do that. I
will.” But the boy’s effort to swallow his tears and put up a valiant front was absolutely pathetic. Heartfelt. Too earnest by half.
Walys felt sick just watching it.
“Go on now, son,” Rickard said, wiping his son’s tears away. “The maester and I have unfinished business.”
“I…” But Brandon Stark seemed to finally realise that he didn’t have anything worthwhile to say. “Alright.”
Rickard Stark nodded in satisfaction, then abruptly removed the sword from Walys’ neck and dropped it on the back of the chair next to the
other side of his neck, as if a barrier between his son and him. Then he nudged the boy towards the door.
Walys Flowers’ mind raced madly as the boy made his way to the door. He had a lot to think about. He had a lot to
quickly think about
. Chiefly, what he could glean from the words spoken here about himself. What Lord Rickard knew about him and, more critically, what he
didn’t know about him. Couldn’t know. Couldn’t suspect. Ever. No matter how much Lord Rickard had spied through the eyes of his most trusted friend and companion, it could only go so far if there was nothing to see. It didn’t sound like the young lord had suspected him for more than a few moonturns, if that. Walys had sent and received less than a handful of his private correspondence in that time, and they were as vague and roundabout as ever even accounting for the cipher. He’d also always burned them immediately after. There was a good chance Rickard Stark didn’t know anything certain beyond the fact that his maester didn’t work
entirely alone. If it was true that this was the first time the boy confronted Lord Stark on it, the young lord may not even suspect the extent of their numbers and organisation. Which he well shouldn’t, considering that Walys himself had only acquired that information through his own deductions and guesswork.
It was Walys Flower’s own curse that even the hope of finally being free of the demon’s presence was one he wouldn’t get to enjoy. The boy stopped after passing him by, stepped back and looked Walys in the eye. Sullenly. “I’m not a demon you know. I'm unnatural and strange and I was self-aware since before I was even born, but I'm not a demon and I stole no one's body or life. It's me. It's always been me.”
It sounded like a condemnation and confession and offer of peace all in one, but Walys could only wonder why the boy thought it could make any difference now. All the man could think about was that even then the boy had stopped just barely outside his stabbing reach, sword at his neck or not. The Maester could only hope that was the last he heard of his mind-twisting words, at least for a while.
Unfortunately, that hope proved to be as vain as all the ones before.
“What should I tell mother?” The voice came from right next to the door.
“Tell her I’ll be with you both within the hour.” Rickard Stark answered, then turned thoughtful. “Unless that raven I’m expecting proves a better flier than I think it is. Then it might take a while longer.”
“Raven? If you think I should even know I mean.”
“It’s no great secret, the line of the Red Kings is ended,” Rickard Stark said with an idle shrug and wait, what?
“Dad, what?”
He hated agreeing with demons on anything but by the Seven, what!?
“Whatever they were doing up in the Dreadfort that called justice down on them must have been quite ghoulish,” Lord Rickard of House stark said as cool as a glacier. “I’d ask someone in the Rose, but the Boltons never consented to sending anyone of their line there, more’s the pity. I can’t imagine it would happen just for breaking a law of men. Or women in this case. Lord Bolton was about to initiate his son Roose into the custom of First Night. Then their horses threw them from the saddle within heartbeats of each other and accidentally trampled each of them on the back of the head five times, terrible business.”
The maester stared up at Lord Stark, slack-jawed.
“Dad… Dad holy
shit!”
“I love you, son. Off with you now. And no watching or eavesdropping.”
“Holy shit, Dad, holy shit.”
The door opened and closed.
And Seven damn it to the Seven hells, he could and
would still work with this. Even if he had to pretend to betray his oh so dark and looming masters, he could work with this. In fact, there had been times and tests with his Archmaester Father when he’d made do with less.
“Gods, I’ll be a shit parent to the others if that boy spoils me much longer,” Rickard Stark fondly mused once the footsteps faded entirely. “A bleeding heart is what he is. Wonder how long it’ll take for him to realize I never said
how long I’d been fooled. Oh well, I’ll make a lesson out of it and then indulge whatever new invention he’s made by then so he doesn’t lose heart.”
“That was the most biased croc of shit I’ve ever heard,” Walys uttered suddenly, not entirely unplanned. If anything would throw the young man off, it was blunt honesty.
It didn’t throw him off at all. “Croc of shit, no. Biased? I’m only a man, of course it was! But so is everyone else who ever had something to say about our business, only in the other direction. I’d say it cancels out quite neatly.” Rickard Stark slipped off the desk and finally pulled Ice away, but only to put its tip right beneath Walys’ chin. “The dagger up your sleeve. The bottles in the
pockets of your sleeves. The vials in the belts around your legs. On the table. All of them. Now.”
“Y-you’d have me lift my robes to my neck like some whore?”
“That or I cut it off of you completely, possibly with various bits and pieces of you depending on how tired my arms have grown this past while. Just so I don’t mistakenly behead you when you reach for some surely harmless pouch or other, you understand.”
Face burning, the Maester divested himself of his knife and emptied his sleeves and pulled at his robes as if a woman bundling up her skirts until he was completely bare of all his tools and his potions and pouches. He still ended up feeling naked when he was done.
Only then did Rickard Stark sit back in his chair across the game table. There, he lifted one foot to rest on his knee and laid his sword upon it as if to symbolise the new barrier between the two of them. “Maester, maester, maester. What ever will I do with you?”
