Ravens had been sent by the King's Regent to Winterfell. And not too late after that, so was the King's mother. Packed with all her treasures; her two youngest children, chests of gold and silk, servants, dozens of barrels of Dornish wine and any other comforts she deemed necessary.
Stark had accepted; just as he had been manipulated to.
"I demand to know who in the Seven Hells you are!" The fury of the Regent, which had previously been leashed, exploded. He stormed into the crammed little room that was the Young Maester's chambers, with a sword ready in hand to extract his rage on the little man that played him like a pawn.
"Seven greetings to you too, my lord," Howland set aside his book and quill to face the Stark lord.
"What is your game?! What do you want? Why have you played my family into this game?"
"My dear Lord Stark, you are the one that put your family into this game. You are the one that listened to the whispers of the various vipers and vermin of this court. You agreed to the match between the hateful Lannister woman and your trueborn son. I only suggested the path. But you walked it."
"Your words are venom. And I swear on my life that I will never let them seep into my ears again!"
"You'll be regretting that vow when you realise that I saved your family."
Stark's flaring eyes pierced into the Maester. "Who are you? What's your true name? Some kind of a Lannister rat?"
"Not a Lannister one."
"Then what? What are you really?"
The Maester considered it and he felt real temptation to tell the proud lord. He wanted to see the stunned look on Eddard Stark's face once the identity was revealed. The satisfaction would be so sweet. "The Pride of the Citadel."
The sword that Lord Stark held in his hand suddenly gleamed and lifted in the air, ready to strike. "I'll ask you again. I demand to know who you truly are, as Regent of the Seven Kingdoms and in the name of our King!"
Howland sat there, all smug and cunning. "You give me an empty threat. You'll never strike me because if I die my secret dies with me. And you will walk out of this room a murderer."
Eddard Stark fumed, growled and slammed his hand on the table but he left anyway. The Stark frozen patience cooled the scorching anger. "This is not over." The door slammed behind him.
The Maester sighed. "I hope not, Father."
-000-
"Your grandson, my lord, Prince Lionel of House Lannister," the usher announced Lionel's entrance into Tywin Lannister's quarters. The Prince came in shortly.
Tywin spared him a glance. He was seated at his desk, writing. Always writing. The scribbling of the quill was a sound that Tywin Lannister was always associated with in his heir's mind.
"You are walking," he stated.
"Sleeping gives strength, I have learnt."
"Why have you come?"
"For your advice about what to do with my father's and brother's outpour of debt. A man of your experience with debt paying should know a thing or two. So the Master of Coin asks the Hand for advice." The steel boy grinned.
In truth, Lionel was not going to lift a finger to aid his brother. He had set his schemes to make the debts swallow his brother whole, for the seat on the Iron Throne to become vacant. After that… well Lannisters pay their debts.
"Indeed. Almost three million to Casterly Rock, is it? Two million to the Tyrrels. One million seven hundred eighty four thousand and five hundred eighty nine gold dragons due to the Iron Bank."
"Right… well, I wouldn't want my inheritance to suffer because the king can't pay off his debts." Lionel smirked. "I'd hate to take up arms against my brother to pay off my debts. Especially if I know my brother's exchequer is empty."
Emerald and golden flecked eyes flicked up to his grandson and then back down at his paper. "Be merciless. Be cruel if need be. Strangle the last copper out. And always remember to never care what the sheep thinks of the great lion; the shepherds will respect you for that."
"Most likely the shepherds will fear me."
"Exactly."
Lionel stood up and took a goblet; he filled it with water. But he never drank. "Thank you for the advice, grandfather. I'll make sure to use it when you're gone… which will not be too long."
Tywin slowly looked up. "Excuse me?"
Lionel smiled. "I've noticed you use a wine taster to taste flagons instead of cups. All I really had to do to poison you was to slip in something into the cups of my own room. Don't you remember visiting my chambers last week and you drank from my goblets? All I needed to do was wait for you and for a servant to warn me of your arrival. That was exactly a week ago; the exact time for the poison to act."
A purple vein popped out, bright and juicy, on Tywin's neck. He struggled to breathe and clutched, hopelessly, at his invisible killer. And then another… and another…
"If I had to count, I'd say you have a few minutes left." Seeing his grandfather scrap for his dear life made the murderer's voice crackle as he said his final words. "You remember my Maester, I trust, the one that brought me back to life… everyone remembers that they are taught in the art of healing, but few remember that they are therefore taught the art of death. This one is called the Cobra's Fangs... I'm sure you've heard of it."
"Why—…?" Tywin croaked out. There was no air in his lungs. It was a miracle that he could even breathe out the word.
"Why?! You ask that? You should know! I've always hated being told to do anything. I've always hated to be cast down. I've never been able to accept being second. My mother, my father, my brother, even you, have always told me that I could never do something. Most importantly… that I could never be king. Well, Lord Lannister is a certain step towards being king."
Tywin continued to stare in dread at him, with bloodshot eyes and a purpling face.
"Don't despair, grandfather. I am too much like you. The only thing that matters is the Lannister name. And I shall make a dynasty that shall last millennia of Lannister kings on the Iron Throne."
With the reassuring thought of his name being preserved, Tywin drew his last breath.
"…Only I'll do it my way. And just to spite you, the millennia of Lannister kings will begin with a Stark mother. Frozen gold will last a very long time." Lionel then dropped his goblet and charged out of the room with a face that looked like a witness to a ghost. "Guards! The Hand of the King is dead! Call the Maesters! Tell the King! Go! Quickly, man!"
-000-
"How did he die?" Joffrey demanded of the two Maesters in the room. The King and Master of Coin stood around their grandfather's corpse, which had been pulled onto the Hand's bed by order of the Young Maester, against the advice of the Grand Maester.
"Poison," the Grand Maester told the king, clutching a cloth to his nose to cut out the putrid smell. He couldn't bear to be near the abominable smell.
"The king can see that his Hand didn't die of the common cold," Lionel hissed at the old man. Joffrey looked at his twin.
"The Master of Coin is correct, you old fool. What exactly killed my grandfather?" Joffrey's pesky, rotten voice commanded.
"That I cannot say, Your Grace," the wise Grand Maester told him
"Manticore Venom, I believe, Your Grace," Howland stated, kneeling beside the body. Perhaps he thought he was being impressive. "A common poison but no less affective… it takes a couple of hours to come into effect and the patient dies in painful agony. Your Highness, you say that your grandfather started to swell up and purple in your presence?"
"Yes, he did." Lionel confirmed. The alibi of a few hours instead of a week took suspicion off the heir to Tywin's lands and titles.
"It won't be Manticore Venom, boy!" Pycelle shouted at the youth on his knees. "His lordship Tywin Lannister died abruptly."
Howland turned viciously towards to white bearded, drowsy old man. "Perhaps you have forgotten your studies in the Citadel, Grand Maester. You would remember that all bodies are different and they all react differently to different substances."
"Well… I suppose so," Pycelle admitted. His drowsy half-lid eyes drooping in their sockets. He was an extremely old man.
"Or perhaps the Grand Maester is too tired," Joffrey said, aloud. "Too tired and drowsy for his position of Grand Maester. Perhaps it's time that you should be replaced, Grand Maester."
Pycelle starred in shock at the golden boy king. He had been Grand Maester for 40 years for three kings, only to be deposed by a boy?! "Pardon, Your Grace?! I… I… swore a vow to serve the crown!"
Lionel looked at the Grand Maester. "You've served three kings and two have died. Must mean you're not good at your job." He clicked his fingers and two Lannister guards came in and grabbed the Grand Maester. "You are not fit to advice my brother." The guards dragged him out as Pycelle protested and struggled in their grip.
"I've always found him irritating," Joffrey said. "The fool was lucky to get out of this castle with all his limbs intact." He looked at the corpse. "So… you are now the Lord Paramount of the Westerlands."
"And you need a Hand and a Grand Maester now."
"Uncle Jaime?"
"Is a warrior, not a politician."
"Great-Uncle Kevan?"
"A cowardly fool."
"Lord Stark."
"He has too much already. Regency. Lordship. Three marriages to our family."
"…You?" Joffrey chuckled at the absurd notion.
"Of course not. I'm busy being Lord of the Westerlands and Master of Coin. Have you considered Uncle Tyrion?"
Joffrey looked at the younger twin with a crooked eyebrow. "You and I both hate the little monster—Where is the little beast anyway?"
"Uncle Jaime said he was visiting the Wall. My best guess is that he's taking his time coming back to the capital. Drinking and whoring in every tavern and alehouse on the Kingsroad."
"Why are you advocating him?"
"Because, although he besmirches the Lannister name with his lecherous habits, he is a clever man and you need a clever man to rule the Kingdoms, not a man you may necessarily like."
Joffrey put his arm on a chair and leaned on it. "Don't you drink and whore, brother?"
"I don't drink anymore. And I don't whore so publically or so much."
"The crow calls the raven black," Howland smiled, standing up from his seat. "Excuse me, Your Grace and Your Highness."
"It's 'My Lord' now, Maester. My brother is after all a lord. He's demoted from the title of Prince. Lord Lionel Lannister of Casterly Rock, Lord Paramount of the West." Joffrey smirked and his brother's face remained placid; lords, although not as fancy as princes, were a great deal more powerful and flexible in the Game of Thrones. "Of course 'Shield of Lannisport' was grandfather's earned title and not yours—"
"There should be a Warden of the West somewhere in that title, Your Grace."
"You're not of age to be a Warden. You've won no battles."
"Four words for you brother: Battle of the Goldroad—"
"In which you died… what a shitty soldier. My definition of winning a battle is coming back alive from it."
"I won that battle and the soldiers worship me, whereas you cowered and ran away during the Battle of the Blackwater. I deserve the title! It is mine by right!"
"I am king. I revoke your right. It is a gift that you have your title of Lord Lannister."
Lionel began to laugh. A laugh full of rage. "Who else is grandfather's heir?"
"Uncle Jaime, mother has made me promise of disbanding him from the Kingsguard soon. Uncle Kevan. Uncle Tyrion even, if only to spite you." Joffrey's cruel little eyes stabbed Lionel a thousand times into his pride. He seemed to stand taller than his little brother, even though they had always been of one height. "I am the king. Bend your knee and swear to me your fealty and I will not name you an enemy of the realm."
"What treason have I committed, then?"
"I can always frame you for some kind of treason, brother." Joffrey smirked. "Kneel."
It was humiliating. It was degrading for the Lord of Casterly Rock. But the king's word was law and the second-born always kneeled to the firstborn, so Lionel kneeled and swore empty vows of loyalty to a brother who did not deserve them.
"I will not name you Warden of the West, and the world will burn before I name you or that little monster the Hand of the King. In fact, I don't see why I need a Hand at all. Or a regent for that matter."
-000-
Arya had been dragged out by her sister and father from their tower in a dress and forced to socialise with other lords and ladies. By dress, it meant Sansa and Septa Mordane and a few of the household guards were to hold her down, scrub all the dirt she had accumulated from her lessons with the Dancing Master. Then she would be forced into a dress that her sister would sacrifice, knowing she would ruin it. And by 'socialise', it meant that she would awkwardly stand beside her father or sister as they talked to one lord or another.
It was the death of the Hand, Tywin Lannister. Every lord and lady, squire and servant, knight and Maester in the Kingdom was there it seemed. Everyone wanted a piece of the corpse.
The doors crashed open and the new Lord of Lannister stormed out. Fuming and angry and white-fisted, he looked ready to kill a man. The moment he emerged, a swarm of courtiers clung to him like a beehive, apparently blinded from his rage.
"Lord Lannister!"
"What about His Lordship Tywin Lannister!"
"Does Casterly Rock revert to you? Where does his fortune pass?"
"Are you the new Warden of the West?"
"Have you been named Hand of the King?"
Lionel managed to march out of the Throne Room without punching anyone. She doubted that he had even noticed the crowd in his storming anger. His face astonishingly matched the crimson of his garments. The courtiers melted away the moment he stepped through the door.
"Perhaps you should talk to him?" Sansa told her sister as they starred at the swarm of courtiers at the doors.
"I don't think he wants to chat."
Moments later, the king emerged and declared at his grandfather's funeral will commence in a week. Then he added: "My brother is not the Warden of the West! He is too fool to be a Warden, isn't that right? I instead will name Kevan Lannister as Warden of the West!"
"That title is Lionel's by right!" Arya whisper-growled to her sister
"I'm sure that the king has his reasons," Sansa replied, half assured. Her opinion of her dream prince had greatly deflated since their journey to and stay at King's Landing. Sometimes she really dreaded being wedded to him. Eddard had not yet revealed to her or anyone else for that matter about her betrothal to Ser Jaime Lannister.