It was not hard to see Littlefinger had taken care to spare some of the finest chambers in the East Tower for the Waynwoods.
The fire roared loudly, filling the room with warmth.
All else was perfect quiet, save for Sandor Frey standing beside it, fiddling urgently with a brass poker to the obvious discontent of Lady Anya. The matriarch of House Waynwood sat in dread silence, sipping wine from an ornate chalice inscribed with runes galore. He knew this mood all too well. She looked up at him for a fleeting moment before returning her eyes to the fire. He found himself unable to return the squire's uneasy warning smile before moving to the centre of the room and taking a knee.
"Aunt."
The chilly non-reception that elicited impressed upon Harry the need to observe some modest formality on this occasion and kiss his guardian's wrinkled old hand. A show of filial obeisance, subjection even. Once that was done he addressed her a second time.
"Lady Waynwood."
She seemed little swayed by his courtesies, and he rose shamefaced, taking a safe step back.
"The Lady Alayne has granted her favour to the strapping Ser Albar," she said at last. "Your betrothed, Alayne."
"The bastard can grant her favour to whoever she wishes," he countered defensively. "This betrothal is no certain thing, after all. You promised."
Her grim expression told him just how much she appreciated being reminded. Would that he could stop his cheeks from flushing red, as he now felt them doing. His cousin Ser Wallace, sitting at table across the room, was more generous with a smile and a nod before he returned to his reading. His other cousins were just now emerging from a side chamber, still in their smallclothes. Unlike Harry they had not been afforded the luxury of a chamber or bed each, so they had all to share room and bed.
He wondered who had drawn the short straw marked Sandor the Squire.
"Need I remind you that baseborn or no, the girl is heir to Harrenhal with all its lands and incomes?"
Donnel threw his arm around him and planted a wet kiss on his cheek, unperturbed by Harry's mirthless expression. He wiped the spit from his face and focused his attention on his foster mother most stern. Meanwhile Roland was jumping and wriggling like a maddened Essosi dancer at his side, such that Harry felt his member graze his thigh. He deserved a punch then, but Lady Anya's obliviousness (or was it studied blindness?) merited a mere push, albeit one that sent Roland stumbling back.
"All Littlefinger's gold too," added Donnel, taking a seat in the spare chair besides his mother, "and if we don't find a way to pay the many debts we now owe him, Ironoaks as well."
What was meant as a lighthearted jape fell flat, serving only to irritate Lady Anya and remind the Waynwoods of their financial predicament. Donnel saved himself by closing his eyes and basking in the fire's warm glow. Roland tore the poker from Sandor's grasp and seemed to fix whatever was wrong with it immediately. Harry shifted uncomfortably under the burden of having to save or condemn his maternal kin...of having to control his face lest it betray some boyish fantasy of becoming Lord of what was their ancestral castle.
"Littlefinger is young yet. He'll remarry and father trueborn sons," he insisted defensively. "None shall suffer a baseborn girl to follow him as Lady of the Trident."
"Perhaps. Perhaps not. You could be all the son he needs if you wed the girl. A good-son well entrenched is harder to oust from power than a baseborn girl," decided Lady Anya.
"He'll have no need for trueborn sons if you give him trueborn grandsons," offered Donnel, less helpfully than his tone seemed to imagine. The others concurred.
"A good-son is not a son," was all of Harry's rebuttal to that. No more than a ward is a son, no more than a cousin is brother. "He'll wed Randa Royce or some other willing brood mare before long."
"If you think Littlefinger will make so useless a match as Myranda Royce for the singular purpose of breeding some heirs you are more fool than I ever took you for, Harry."
That bit, but he let it wash over him and straightened his back.
"It'll be Cersei Lannister or nothing," japed Roland. His grandmother scowled at him and made him stand back up, where he'd briefly sat cross-legged before the fire. "Or one of the sweet little roses from Highgarden, once their good names are cleared. The man's vanity would abide nothing but the daughter of a great house, and he'll get them for cheap after they've been put on trial.."
"Not even Littlefinger would stoop so low as to wed Cersei Lannister," urged the harridan in lowered tones. She seemed appalled by the mere memory of it all, their golden Queen paraded like a common slattern in the streets. "The woman is disgraced."
"Th-th-the times are d-d-different. B-b-bolton, B-baelish..." began Wallace, against his own better judgement. His mother completed his thought promptly, to his relief.
"The times are different. The Lannisters value loyalty over birth. Obedience over breeding. It is ill luck for Littlefinger he sired no son on Lady Lysa first, but the thing is done, he is Lord of the Trident. The Starks and Tullys are all gone, and our darling Sweetrobin will never take on his beloved uncle Petyr...if he even lives that long. With a good marriage and a trueborn grandson, Littlefinger will have every reason to do as Roose Bolton and legitimise the girl." Lady Anya sounded adamant on that count, making Harry wonder if she was privy to more of the Lord Protector's plans than she was letting on.
"Think, cuz. You are getting a bargain here." Roland was at his side once more, smirking like the cat who got the cream. "Small wonder he hasn't legitimised her already. Most like to make himself more attractive to whichever rich sow he weds next."
"The point stands. She will not follow him as Lady of the Trident."
"The chance is there."
"The chance to be the most powerful man in the Seven Kingdoms," beamed the squire. "Lord of the Trident and the Vale."
"Especially if the good-son in question were Lord Arryn." Somehow he doubted Donnel's lowered tone would be enough to save them from Littlefinger's spies, if they were listening. Such talk bordered on treason, or something like it. "With all the knights of the Vale at his back."
"And all Littlefinger's gold in his pocket," cooed Roland, in a teasing that did not quite conceal his own ambitions. Not from Harry, at least.
"Listen to your cousins. The man owns the very earth beneath our feet. He has sat the Small Council for years. Do not underestimate how many would prefer an ill-bred master than a true scion of Arryn."
That gave him pause.
"The Gates of the Moon are Lord Nestor's seat, not his. If he will not wed Randa, he...the castle is nothing of his.." He seemed more set on convincing himself of that truth than anyone else. None were convinced.
"Lord Nestor's seat by his gift. Do not imagine you will come into your inheritance easily without the man's say so. A royal decree naming him Warden of the East is but a raven away. You are nothing to the Council in King's Landing."
He stood there, mouth agape, feeling a fool in motley. He shook his head slowly. "My right is undeniable."
"Right means little and less, cuz," admonished Donnel. "Need we repeat the bit about the Boltons, how they've come to hold Winterfell, Hornwood, the North? It is all so awfully dull and depressing. Edmure Tully had his rights. The Imp and his little Stark bride, wherever she is. She had her rights too, as does Lady Bolton. We are ruled by a child King who scribbles away rights with glee."
"Her bastard birth is nothing for you to scoff at, Hardyng. It will only serve to make you worthy of her notice and her grateful of your hand," noted Roland, evidently grown tired of such talk. "She is an heiress, and comely to boot."
"The girl is comely, aye, but my Saffron-"
"Makes you happy, yes. Being Lord Arryn will make you happier."
He looked askance at his aunt, and her eyes rose to meet his in solemn admonition. The silence was only broken when she let out a pained sigh and returned her gaze to the flames. Her words, when they came, cut through him like a warm blade through butter.
"Your Saffron is no longer 'your' Saffron, Harry. She has wed another."
