The fires spoke to her. Not with words: no: with pictures of the future! Pictures detailing events far to the north, farther than the Wall: of events deep in the south, in the tall towers of Sunspear and the Water Gardens. Such deceit, yet it was necessary. This night; the fires spoke of old smoke and towers from the city of the Milk men; great fires leaking from these towers, and the men with pale, blue lips. The beautiful, young Queen stood before these Milk men with creatures of fire and ash on her shoulders; drinking fresh milk from her swollen breasts, as ash and heat beat around her naked body. Her hair was alight; snuffing the sky and a great, red comet soaring across silken, Dothraki skies.

Melisandre of Asshai shook away from her fires. The power R'hllor has given me is a gift; yet I must be secluded from time to time. Her copper hair hung loosely around her shoulders, blending with her flowing, red robes of the Red priestesses. The moon hung dark in the sky; mocking Melisandre with his putrid darkness. Shadows are the servants of light.

Black, ruinous tents sat smouldering outside Bronzegate; while the screams of captured soldiers sang through the air as they were offered to the Red God. They are with R'hllor now. Mixed with the beautiful screams; the jolly chants from the King's men echoed into Melisandre's tower; now dubbed 'The Red Tower'. Fires cackled around the Red Tower, the faces of R'hllor's servants chanting and prayer within the reds, oranges and yellows.

A loaf of bread; mixed in sweet honey sat beside her fire. She took a bite, and revelled at the sweetness. It was the first time she had ate in a week; as she had been praying for Stannis' victory. Lord Renly had rode from Storm's End to Bronzegate; and was destroyed Ser Davos Seaworth. They had captured Lord Mace Tyrell; and were planning to raid down the west side of the Kingswood to chase out Paxter Redwyne.

The door slammed open; knocking an old wardrobe to pieces, it sliding to the floor as its old, moth-eaten clothes scattered across the silken rushes, embroidered with the three golden buckles of House Buckler with a background of azure. Ser Davos stood as the doorway, panting after the long climb. His head was dripping with rainwater; his leather jerkin tight as he moved:

"Lady Melisandre" Ser Davos bowed. Melisandre licked the honey from her fingers.

"What is it, Ser Davos?"

"King Stannis has requested you!"

"You look cold, Ser Davos"

"Indeed, the men are considering snuffing the fires outside"

"Let them. These fires are not the only of R'hllor's!"

"Very well, m'lady" Davos bowed awkwardly again. He turned, but Melisandre called for him again "Yes, m'lady?"

"The Lord of Light watches over you, Ser Davos" she smiled "Don't be so timid in his presence; he is proud of his Onion Knight" Melisandre chuckled silently.

"Thank you, Lady Melisandre"

"He holds you dutifully for your slaying of the Knight of Flowers" she smiled again.

"King Stannis has praised me also" Davos turned to exit; and jogged down the stairs. Melisandre sighed, and took her cup of Arbor gold and drank it in one.

She stood; swept her red cloak together and stepped down the Red Tower. The silks flocked behind her as she walked down the dim and damp serpentine tower. The air was hazy; forcing Melisandre to make every breath count. She walked into a small, open air room where rain and darkness invaded. A group of soldiers sat around a small fire in the middle of the room; puffing and trying to keep warm. Melisandre wrapped the silks around her and approached the group. The soldiers looked at her, and muttered:

"Lady Melisandre"

"The Lord of Light granted you this fire. Are you grateful?" she asked. The group muttered between themselves. One with a greying beard that reached his chest decided to say:

"Fires are indeed a gift from R'hllor, Lady Melisandre". Melisandre nodded.

"The night is dark and full of terrors; and R'hllor protects us from those horrors" she smiled; and swept around in a flurry of reddened silk.

King Stannis waited in the dungeons of the keep; waiting astride from Lord Mace Tyrell and Ralph Buckler. Their wrists were chafing under the inner chains and buckles that attached their wrists and ankles to the cold, stone wall. Ralph Buckler was bloodied on the nose; his eyes puffy and hair charred. Lord Mace seemed almost elegant compared to him; his blonde hair still flowing long behind his back but a red, shallow gash opened his shirt from the right nipple to the left hip.

"Your Grace" Melisandre curtsied. Stannis stared at her; she noticed his hair was starting to grey, and that he hadn't shaved in around a month; so a beard was starting to grow and extend off his chin. Ser Davos Seaworth stood beside him; a bucket of water sat on the table

"This is Lord Mace Tyrell of Highgarden" he pointed his sword at Mace Tyrell's cheek "A traitor, to a man with no right" Lord Tyrell squealed when Stannis cut a gash into his cheek.

"I'm no traitor!" Mace squealed as Stannis cut in deeper.

"Your Grace!" Davos said. Stannis stopped and retrieved the dagger. Stannis breathed heavily from his nose as he walked; slamming his feet hard on the cement floor.

"These men are traitors to my cause, Ser Davos" Stannis snarled "My cause!" he shouted, throwing the dagger between Ralph and Mace's heads. Ralph Buckler began to pant; his eyes bloodshot and wide. "Where is the bastard?" Stannis growled at Lord Buckler. Lord Buckler quivered "Where is he!?"

"I don't know, my lord!" He is about to shit himself.

"You're speaking to the one true King of Westeros!" Davos put in. Stannis walked forward and received the dagger from the wall; wrenching on it furiously as he pulled it from the cracked stone.

"Thank you Ser Davos; but I don't believe your input is needed" he said, as he cut open Ralph Buckler's surcoat.

"What do you intend to do to him, My King?" Melisandre asked.

"Where is the bastard?" Stannis stated.

"I don't know!"

"I know you do!" Stannis shouted to his face as he put the dagger to Ralph's right nipple. He screamed, but spoke two words, a sort of question:

"Cedric Storm?" Stannis pushed into his nipple.

"Indeed" he pulled the knife back and wiped a sliver of blood away "Where is he?"

"I don't know" Stannis put the knife to Ralph's throat "Not in that way, Your Grace! We sent him off while you were raiding the villages. You may well have killed him already; as he may have gone to his mother. He was a squire here! King Robert sent his mother away after her breasts began to sag, with Cedric still at the breast" in his rage, Stannis sliced off his right nipple; leaving a river of blood to flow down his belly.

"I recognised a body with Robert's hair!" Stannis kicked over a stool next to Davos "I was so foolish!"

"There are many others with the King's blood, Your Grace!" Melisandre reminded him "There is a girl in the Vale of Arryn with the black hair; and the boy Edric Storm you once recognised as Robert's"

"Perfect!" Stannis stated "We can ride for Storm's End, destroying my brother and taking that irritable little wretch as King's blood!"

"Your Grace. You don't mean to kill the boy, do you?" Davos asked.

"All acts done for the Lord of Light will never count as sins, Ser Davos" Melisandre reminded him. We will burn the boy.

"What do you want with me, traitor" Mace Tyrell dared to say. Stannis turned, curled his hand into a fish and punched him across the face. A few bits of chipped teeth fell hard on the cement floor; blood following them.

"You will refer to me as, Your Grace!" Stannis breathed. Mace looked at him like a snake watches his prey; yet a wounded snake.

"I- will- never- betray Renly!" Stannis raised the knife to his nose, and cut at a nostril. Mace Tyrell remained defiant, ignoring the gush of blood.

"Only because your whore of a daughter is married to him" Mace raced forward to attack him; but the chains held him back.

"Margaery is no whore!"

"Maybe- but your son sleeps in the bed of Kings, with the King!" Stannis remarked "Or did- at least"

"Loras was murdered by your men!"

"A worthy sacrifice"

"Worthy? Is it worthy to hang a man from the castle walls: naked and mocked?"

"The men insisted to take the Knight of Flowers away from the flowers"

"You deserve to burn in the Seventh Hell!" Stannis swung a left punch into his cheek; no more teeth came out, but a fresh dollop of blood fell straight out in its place.

"The Usurper that sits on the Iron Throne deserves to; the Usurper of Storm's End deserves to; and the Usurper of the North deserves to"

"Fancy titles for fancy men"

Stannis turned to the table; took a flagon and poured some water into a transparent glass. He downed it in one, and turned back to Lord Mace.

"If you swear your banner-men to me; then I will spare everyone and anyone sworn to Highgarden"

"Never!" Stannis threw the glass at his head. The glass lodged in his skull and cheeks; blood and bone leaking onto the floor. A small, weepy tear leaked from his eye down his cheek.

"My King, I don't believe this will work" Melisandre said. Stannis turned to her, but quickly turned back. He brandished the dagger again, and began to cut at Mace Tyrell's stupid, blonde pubic hair-like beard.

"Are you trying to threaten me by cutting at my fucking beard?" Stannis stared at him with malevolence; and plunged the dagger through his finger. Mace burst into screams of pain; as Stannis drew the dagger into the fleshy part of his hand. "What's in it for me" Mace Tyrell panted.

"Your life; and your banner-men's life"

"You murdered most of my fucking infantry anyway!" Stannis plunged the dagger into his hand as a last resort. He left the dungeon as Mace Tyrell was left screaming; it was now that Melisandre noticed that Ralph Buckler had fainted.

Mace Tyrell had been reduced to a slobbering mess; so Melisandre walked forward and removed the dagger from his hand:

"Thank you, my lady" he whispered.

"Fire is the purest death" she told him.

Stannis had told her to win him over; and so she would. He sat across from her; as they ate a dinner prepared from the venison of the Kingswood and the trout from the Wendwater in the Red Tower. Two glasses of Dornish red was lain out for them; a flagon for anymore needed. Lord Mace trembled as he ate; and trembled more when he held his tankard. His wounds were patched over with bandages, mandrake root and wine over the bandage to clear the cuts. He flinched as he ate. Melisandre feared that blood was going down into his stomach when he ate.

"Are you bleeding within your mouth, Lord Mace?" she asked. He nodded. "Drink with the wine; it's a proven method in Asshai" Mace tried it. Even though he squirmed at the soggy bread and soaked trout, he no longer complained of blood.

"What do you want?" Mace asked.

"Peace, my friend. There is no hostility between us; there is no man behind the tapestry waiting with a knife" she giggled, slightly taking aback Lord Mace "A jape. I do believe your daughter has married Lord Renly Baratheon"

"A fine suitor! Capable of many great things"

"Indeed" Melisandre picked a pear from a selection of fruit and bit into it, the juice running down her chin. "I have seen your Margaery in my flames. A beautiful Queen she will become; but to whom I cannot decipher"

"So she will become a true Queen?"

"Yes; a beautiful one, with many sons and daughters"

"She detailed to me that she has not yet been able to bed King Renly" Melisandre smiled.

"Maybe it is not the Lord Renly she is to breed from. Many Kings roam the lands of Westeros, and many Kings roam the lands of Essos. Be it a Khal of the Dothraki, or a triarch from the Free City of Volantis; she will be a Queen" Melisandre placed the core of the pear on the table. She smiled and said: "Are you sure you agree to King Stannis' terms?" Mace Tyrell stared at his food solemnly, and shook his head. "No matter" she wiped the pear juice on a napkin.

Melisandre of Asshai stood, and walked to one of the brazier's around the Red Tower. She took a match from her robe, lit it over one of the many candles and threw it into the fire. It erupted into flames; and Melisandre saw strange blue signs within.

"Come her, my lord" Mace Tyrell did as he was bid. He limped as he walked; most likely from the shock "Look into the fire. You may see nothing; you may see a man sat upon a throne of iron. This may be the Usurper Joffrey; or the Lord Renly; or maybe one of their sons. They all sit upon the same throne of iron swords and shields. Does it matter who sits upon the throne, Lord Tyrell?"

"Of course!"

"And who do you believe should sit upon the Iron Throne?"

"The rightful King should"

"And who is the rightful King?"

"Joffrey is a bastard; and Renly is the younger brother. King Stannis"

"Very good: Lord Mace. I will pray to my fires for R'hllor to heal your wounds" she went to sat back her chair; as a selection of trout was still sitting untouched.