When the Lannister Lord barged into their chambers, Sansa was busy with her friend and Septa Mordane in a studious and focused knitting session. The crash of the door brought their full attention to him and he had to face a room full of bewildered females.
"My Lord," they all curtsied in unison upon seeing the king's brother and heir.
"Uh… Good evening ladies… Septa Mordane may I have a word?" The old septa rose, curtsied another time to him and followed him out. Outside the corridor, the Lord began his interrogation. "Where is Arya Stark, Septa?"
"She is with her Dancing Master, my Lord… If I may, what is this about?"
Lionel checked that no one was in the corridor. "Lord Stark is to be taken into custody by my brother. I need to get his daughters out of the city and out of danger's way. One of my henchmen has gone to warn Lord Stark of the threat. Septa, I need you to pack up the girl's bare essentials and we three will leave immediately. Prepare the Stark household too and follow us to Casterly Rock. My estate should be safe enough."
The new information whizzed in the Septa's mind. "My Prince… I …."
"Septa do as I command. Take it as an order from the future son-in-law of your liege Lord."
The woman immediately took action. "Where do we meet?
"Bring Sansa to the stables. And remember, bare essentials. I'll buy the ladies new dress and whatnot in Lannisport myself, but for now they need their bare essentials." And the Septa ran in, while Lionel departed to find the Dancing Master's apprentice.
-000-
Cloaked like a dark shadow with a hood covering her face, Sansa Stark ran down in great speed the long, winding steps of the Tower of the Hand towards the stables, as per the Septa's command. It was urgent and she was to meet her sister and her sister's betrothed in the stables.
Thinking back, Sansa was frightened of the Septa's harshness. Never before had there been such urgency or distress in the Septa's face. She had no choice but to obey the command.
The golden hair of the Lannister Lord gleamed in King's Landing's sunlight as his back faced her and be saddled a third horse. Her sister was already on one of the horses, watching him do the last horse.
"Where are we going?" Sansa marched up to the young Lord. He turned around to her and patted the saddle of the horse which he finished saddling.
"Casterly Rock, my lady. I hope you know how to ride." He extended a hand to aid to climb onto the chestnut mare. Sansa internally groaned; she hated riding. She looked at her sister and then at the Lannister, with distrust.
"Does our father know about this? Where is my Lord father?" Sansa questioned.
"Soon to join us. Now get onto the horse. You may end up thanking me for this at the end of the day, my lady." Lionel insisted and there was a similar kind of harshness in his insistence as was with the Septa. Sansa obeyed and threw a leg over the mare's saddle.
Lionel was on his own stallion within moments.
"Are we not taking any guards, your lordship?" Arya hissed at him, still angry that her Dancing session had been interrupted.
"Guards attract attention and indicate the identity of their lords. We need to sneak out of the city."
"Why sneak out? You're the king's brother, surely they'll let the blood of the King to do as they please?" Sansa asked.
"Blood of the King is more vulnerable and endangered than the slaves in Slavers Bay." He kicked the sides of his horse and galloped, a great sword strapped to his saddle and another sword on his hip managed to catch Sansa Stark's eye.
What was happening? And more importantly, where was their father?
-000-
When the three rogues came to the appropriately named Lion's Gate, they found that the gates were fortified with the City Watch. They were stopping people from coming into the city and checking people that were leaving the city.
Lionel stopped his horse and dismounted.
"What are you doing?" Arya asked him. He ignored her heading straight into the inn that was on the side of the road. He came out a few moments with a large sack of coins in one hand and in the other was the longsword that was on his saddle. He strapped that onto Arya's horse instead, hiding it under a flap.
"The City Watch is looking for us. We need better disguises." He gripped both the horses' bridles and led them to a dyer's workshop. In the common streets of King's Landing, it was easy to find things as everything was very predictable.
The dyer saw them coming. Knowing the difference between rich and poor was as easy as identifying water from ice. He advanced to them quickly. "What can I do for you, my lord and ladies?"
Lionel looked at the dyer. "What makes you think we're high born?"
"You walk like rich men."
Lionel kissed her teeth in a scowl. "I need you to dye this lady's and my own hair black," the young lord extended a hand to Sansa Stark. Arya, with her boyish, leather clothes could always pass as a boy, but Sansa carried herself with grace and her Tully red hair was as recognisable as his Lannister gold. Lionel dug a hand into his pouch and pulled a handful of silvers. "I realise this is not the work you are used to but I would advise you work carefully. I would like to restore the colour at some point in the future."
"Yes, m'lord."
With their appearance masked and Lionel charging the dyer's apprentice to buy more common clothing, they managed to leave the city within two hours without any problems.
-000-
When the Lannister-Baratheon guards of the King grabbed Eddard Stark by the shoulders and subdued him, none were more surprised than himself. They threw him into the deepest and darkest of cells and had no chance to save himself or to understand what was happening.
The King had named him traitor and ordered them to seize him to await the King's justice. That was everything they or he knew.
What treason? What traitor? Why? What had he done wrong? What was wrong with Robert's boy?
Little did he know that beneath his very feet, the shrewd Maester was following their steps in a secret tunnel that Maegor the Cruel himself had designed. With a burning torch in one hand, a map he himself drew in the other and encapsulated by pure darkness the Young Maester followed them. If one remained quiet enough and the fire torch didn't crackle too loudly, he would hear the steps of the people above his head.
The guards were leading the Stark Lord into the Throne room. In there, there weren't any tunnels that Howland knew of so be waited and listened.
"Lord Eddard Stark of Winterfell! You have dishonoured your King, the Realm and your name! You have committed the heinous crime of treason! By plotting to overthrow the King in favour of your future son-in-law! It is His Grace's pleasure that you and Lord Lionel of House Lannister both hang for your treacherous misdeeds." Maester Pycelle read from a scroll.
Ned stood there in utter shock.
"Does His Grace have proof of my treachery because I swear on my honour and by the Old Gods and the New, that I have done no such thing," Eddard professed.
Joffrey grinned and waved at his Master of Whispers.
"Here I hold a letter written in Lord Stark's hand," the eunuch, who held no loyalty to any master or desire, held up a letter in his dough like hands. "It reads: the realm that Robert left to his eldest son is in ruins and his eldest son is to ruin it further. The boy is mad with cruelty and if he should remain on the Iron Throne he shall deserve the name of the Mad King. But his younger brother is clever and kind and to wed our daughter, which should make me the most powerful Lord in the land, should the Gods allow him to ascend the throne. Pray, we must advance the God's blessing in haste. Your Lord and Husband and Father, Eddard Stark." Varys packed the false letter into his pockets. "Addressed to his wife and eldest son."
"Your Grace, I swear on my honour and gods both Old and New that I had never written such a letter."
Howland waited in the underground tunnel listening to his father pleading and being sentenced. It was very ironic, he thought. When he was murdered, Eddard Stark knew nothing of it. In fact, the great Lord of Winterfell probably hadn't known that his second son had ever died.
The Maester thought back to all the bitterness he remembered so very clearly…
There had been four of them… the exact number of blood brothers that he had.
His sworn brothers had each shoved a knife into his back for reasons he did not know. Each point dug deeper than the last and the grey robes of a Maester turned crimson and black and spilling onto the creamy marble floor of the Citadel's floor.
Howland's shocked body stepped forward, the daggers still punched into his spine. The murderers watched him with smirks on their faces. His feet slipped on his own blood pool and the frail, weak body that was his own pulled him down onto the cold, unfriendly pink stone.
As his cheek was pressed to the marble, he heard the mocking, bold voice of the dumbest of his sworn brothers. "Why don't you howl to Lord Daddy now, bastard?"
Then there was nothing.
For a very long moment, Howland reconsidered undergoing with this mission. He had been betrayed by his sworn brothers and the pain was insufferable, but that was not as insufferable as the feeling of bitter silence that was the response to his letters to Winterfell.
"I SENTENCE YOU TO DEATH!" Joffrey screamed from the top of his lungs. Howland had been too absorbed in his thoughts to keep track of the conversation.
His original plan was to loosen several of the secreted tiles and to unleash a smoke grenade of Howland's own design, and then he would have to secret his father into the whole and escape from underneath everyone's noses.
But as the Maester stood on the pivotal point of his life's greatest mistake, he was not sure whether he should carry out with his plan. Yes the man was his father and it was his duty to himself and his family to save him if he had the opportunity.
But the man had given him so much pain. And the family was never his.
He was a Snow. He would always be a Snow. Howland Snow the Bastard of Winterfell, Maester of the Citadel, scorn of House Stark.
"Ser Illyn!"
The axe with the chopping block came in that very hall. Joffrey had decided to be efficient and entertained, not giving the man a chance for a trial. War with the North was what Joffrey wanted and what better way to start the war than to publically and unjustly murdering the Warden of the North.
Or perhaps the foolish boy was simply bored. Either way Eddard of House Stark was to die in the very halls his father and brother had perished on account of another mad king.
In all of Howland's years of training to think, he couldn't choose: senseless duty and blood bond or sweet vengeance and desired pain.
The sword was raised.
A flash of sunlight blinked in everyone's sight, except Howland, who saw everything too clearly once the sword had fell… and his father's head rolled on the floor.
…he had killed his father… as much as Illyn Payne's sword did.
-000-
I am really sorry about this late update. As it happens, I am currently taking my exams and find myself with little time to spare. I hope you liked this chapter.
Please review.