A.N. Sorry for keep you waiting, here is the next chapter. As always, thanks for the reviews. :)
Cersei was sitting in a limousine on her way to a rally, this time at her former university, and she finally had some time to video call her daughter in boarding school.
'Hi, Mom!' Myrcella smiled at her from the screen. 'Can I call you back? Lisa's mom is taking us for ice cream.'
The smile disappeared from Cersei's face and a frown took its place.
'I'm running for president. I'm sure my schedule is a bit busier than yours. Lisa's mom can wait for five minutes.'
'Okay.' Myrcella agreed, but she kept nervously looking behind to see if her friends were still there waiting for her.
Cersei shook her head disapprovingly, but she decided to let it go.
'How was your week? Did you make it to the swimming team?'
A huge grin spread across her daughter's face. 'I sure did. I had the second best time.' she boasted.
'Second best? That's great. I'm proud of you.' Cersei remarked with a smile.
'Do you think I should have won?' Myrcella asked uncertainly.
'You have the whole season to win. It will keep you motivated.' Cersei said with ease.
Her daughter looked behind her back to check on her friends, then turned back to the screen. 'What about you?'
Cersei shrugged.'I still hate the road.'
'But you are campaigning for yourself now, not for Dad. That must be better.' Myrcella remarked in a soft voice.
Her mother didn't want to bore her with further details so she decided to change the subject.
'Listen, I want to show you something.'
'What is it?' Myrcella asked eagerly.
Cersei made sure that the partition was pulled up between her and the driver, then she looked back at her daughter with a knowing smile.
'I'm sending you now. It's a video. Did you get it?'
Myrcella nodded and clicked on the video with a curious look. Cersei could see the concentration in her eyes as she tried to figure out what she was looking at. The sound of tiny heartbeats echoed from the screen and Cersei instinctively put her free hand on her stomach.
'Is this…' Myrcella's eyes widened with the sudden realization. 'Is it yours?'
'Yes.' her mother replied proudly. 'You and your brother are going to have a new sibling.'
Happiness was written all over Myrcella's face. 'When can I see him? Or her? Is it a boy or a girl?'
Cersei couldn't hold back a satisfied smile because her daughter reacted just the way she had expected.
'It's too early to tell.' she explained to Myrcella. 'By the time you come home next month, we'll probably know more. You can come to the doctor with me if you want to.'
'Yes, yes, yes!' Myrcella cried out in ecstasy. 'Mom, I want to go home now! Does Tommen know?'
Cersei shook her head.
'No one else knows. Just you.'
'Just me?' her daughter asked in surprise.
'Just you.' Cersei repeated. 'And I would like to keep it that way. So please delete the video right now and don't talk to anyone about this. All right?'
Myrcella tried to protest, but her mother's serious expression squelched her desire to argue.
A few moments later, the car slowed down and finally stopped. Cersei looked out the window and saw her younger brother standing on the sidewalk with a yellow umbrella.
'I have to go, darling' she turned back to her daughter. 'Take care. I love you.'
'I love you too, Mom. Bye!' Myrcella replied, then her smiling face disappeared from Cersei's phone.
'I'm still not sure about this.' Cersei frowned as she was walking the old college hallways with her brothers. 'I have Loras now. Why isn't he the one out there chasing the Millenials?'
'He is. But it never hurts if you are trying to score some points with young people as well.' Tyrion remarked with ease.
'Score some points or completely humiliate myself?' Cersei scoffed.
Her brother rolled his eyes. 'You and Jaime were rock stars.'
'For five minutes. We only had this one song.' Jaime interrupted him while he pushed a door open for them.
'Still, it would be stupid not to use it to get votes.' his brother followed him inside.
They were in the backstage. Tyrion sat on an unused amplifier while his sister leaned against the wall, biting her nails and listening to the noise of the crowd from the great hall. Jaime was standing between them, trying rather clumsily to adjust the strap of his bass guitar on his shoulder.
'Can you even play at all?' Cersei furrowed her brows.
'It's gonna be fine, don't worry.' her twin smiled reassuringly, but his attention suddenly turned to something next to his sister. Cersei followed his gaze and noticed a young man standing in the door leading to the stage.
'Who are you?' she snapped.
'Oliver Frey. I'll be playing the drums.' the student replied, a bit surprised by her rude tone.
'You better be good. I'll remember your face if you are not.'
Oliver, visibly shocked, replied with a quick nod.
'She is joking.' Tyrion said in mock ease and Cersei feigned a smile.
She exchanged a quick look with her twin brother, then followed Oliver to the stage.
'It's good to be back!' Cersei cried, with mock enthusiasm, once she got behind the microphone. She waited for the loud cheering to quiet down. 'I'm supposed to talk to you about my educational and health care reform plans, tax cuts and women's rights, and all the other things I usually talk about at my rallies; then answering any of your questions regarding my policies… But being here, once again on this stage, reminds me of an other question people keep asking me for fifteen years: Who are the Reynes of Castamere?'
The crowd hailed her words with loud cheering and shouting, which made Cersei pause for a moment.
'Vote for me and you'll know. Let this be the first promise I will keep when I'm elected President.'
Howls of disappointment swept through the great hall and Cersei had to admit that she had underestimated the power of one stupid song.
'I can do one thing though.' she feigned excitement in her voice 'Since my brother, Jaime happens to be here today, we decided to mark this occasion with the second ever live performance of The Rains of Castamere!'
She looked to the side of the stage and waived her brother to come up. Oliver had already been at his place behind the drums, waiting for her sign to start.
'This is for you, Robb Stark!' Cersei cried into the mic while her brother began playing the first notes of the song.
She didn't enjoy it, just like she didn't enjoy it the last time. It was only because Jaime had lost a bet that they had entered the Battle of Bands in the first place. They had never expected it to go this far.
Cersei looked around the great hall full of ecstatic students, shouting the lyrics with her, and the horrible events of that night fifteen years ago came rushing to her mind. Her eyes looked for Jaime's for reassurance and her brother gave her a cool smile. Cersei lowered her mic and stepped a few steps back to let him enjoy his solo.
She couldn't hold back an absent smile as she watched him. For a second he even made her forget how much she hated to be there.
The students were crazy about the surprise concert.
'But now the rains…'
they sang along and Cersei could barely hear her own voice from theirs.
'… weep over his hall with no one there to hear.'
they chanted in choir repeatedly, even after the song was over and the music stopped.
'Yes, now the rains weep over his hall with not a soul to hear.'
Cersei couldn't wait to leave the stage and get some fresh air. She instinctively went to the one place she had gone the last time. The dumpsters. Except this time, she was alone in the heavy rain. The irony was not lost on her. Cersei retreated to the side of the building to protect her expensive coat and skirt from being wet.
She stood there for a while, leaning against the brick wall with her eyes closed, listening to the sound of the rain.
The approaching footsteps almost made her jump. She shot her eyes open and saw her brothers standing in front of her. Jaime quickly stepped closer and held his umbrella over her head.
'Where all the magic happens. The world-famous dumpsters. I can only imagine the sorts of things that went on out here.' Tyrion remarked, amused.
Cersei gave him a look of sheer contempt, but Jaime just laughed.
'It depends on what kind of things you are imagining.' he said with ease.
His twin sister poked him with her elbow.
'Let's go.'
It was already too late though. Tyrion picked up on something and now he acted like a dog on a scent.
'Why the rush? Do you have some bad memories?' he asked with a scornful grin, looking from one sibling to the other.
Cersei's face turned into a painful grimace that didn't escape her twin brother's attention.
'Let's call the staff and go home.' Jaime remarked firmly.
He tried to put his arm around his sister to comfort her, but Cersei pulled away. She was now determined to tell the truth to Tyrion.
'This is where everything started, little brother.' she said in a mock-solemn tone. 'The reason we are all here right now, acting like fools instead of lions, to make me the President of the Seven States of Westeros.'
'You chose the perfect spot.' Tyrion took a look around and snorted in amusement. 'A great metaphor for the state of our country. Reeking from corruption and overflowing with garbage.'
'And Lyanna Stark's blood.' his sister added casually. 'This is where the stupid bitch slit her throat in front of me. Right there where you are standing.' she pointed her cane at the shoes of her younger brother. 'She was high on drugs just as usual when I told her I had slept with Robert.'
Tyron listened to his sister's story with a puzzled expression up to that point, but suddenly his campaign manager self came forward. 'Does anyone know about this?'
Cersei shook her head.'I only told Jaime. He sent me home and then… took care of it.'
'I told the police that I was the one who found Lyanna, but she had been already dead by the time I arrived.' Jaime explained to his brother's questioning look. 'She was a junkie. No one cared.'
'The Stark family would beg to differ.' Tyrion mumbled.
Cersei rolled her eyes. No matter how much she hated her brother, she couldn't believe he was taking the Starks' side.
'She only killed herself to ruin my life.' she scoffed. 'Robert wouldn't have given a shit that he got me pregnant. He would have never married me if Lyanna had been alive, no matter how much Father paid him or threatened him.'
Tyrion looked up and gave her a surprised look. 'You were pregnant? I didn't know.'
'Why do you think we had to marry in such a hurry?' his sister hissed in a sarcastic voice.
'Thank goodness, you lost the baby. That miscarriage was a blessing.' Jaime remarked followed by a soft chuckle.
His siblings stared at him in shock and disgust.
'How can you say that?' Cersei cried, outraged. 'I sacrificed everything for that child. My career, my future, my dignity. Lyanna Stark killed all of those things, just as she killed Joffrey, when she cursed me to a life with Robert.'
Her brothers seemed surprised by her sudden outburst. For a moment, none of them seemed to know what to say, then Tyrion broke the silence.
'That sounds like a bit of an overstatement.' he said matter-of-factly.
Cersei snorted in disdain. What does he know about anything? She ignored her brother's remark and continued in a cold, emotionless tone.
'Robert has never stopped grieving for her. Not for a second.' she tried to remain calm, but after all those years her anger was still too strong. 'Lyanna was a corpse and I was a living girl, and he loved her more than me.'
She spat on the ground with the full force of her hatred.
'I pray to God that she is rotting in hell.'
She stepped away from the wall she was leaning against and made her way to her limousine, accompanied by the rhythmic tapping of her cane.
