Worry seethed in Arya's blood like bile as she listened to the sound of the chamber door being unlocked, and when Jaime appeared in the gap; pale and exhausted, but alive, she leapt to her feet, walked rapidly across the room and punched him hard in the shoulder. He looked back at her without a word, his eyes pale with anger, and she was tempted to punch him again as she thought of the hours and hours that she had spent locked up in this stupid room, imagining that Myrcella had killed Jaime too.

'Stark,' Jaime pronounced, fiercely but quietly, 'don't you ever do that do to me again.'

'What?' Arya demanded, stepping back and folding her arms, 'punch you?'

'Deliberately place yourself in danger in such a situation,' he clarified, 'don't ever do that again. Ever.'

Her testy response was interrupted by the sound of a throaty whimper, and Arya looked downwards to find Nymeria sniffling at Jaime's side in a thoroughly guilt-ridden manner.

'Traitor,' she accused, taking pride in the resulting yowl.

'Not at all,' Jaime interjected as Arya deliberately looked away from them both, 'it seems the wolf has a better idea of what's best for you than you do yourself. Are you listening to me?'

'Of course I am, my lord husband,' Arya spat in fury, 'I only exist to listen to you, and to obey your words if you command me.'

Jaime slammed the door shut, stalked into the room and began to take his doublet off.

'Now you're being ridiculous.'

'I have every right to be!' Arya shouted, 'who gave you the right to order the guards to just bundle me back into the castle like some stupid lady who's never held a sword in her life?'

'I didn't much like the idea of you taking an arrow to the throat because some lunatic on a rooftop decides he wants some human target practice!' Jaime shouted in reply, looking at her as he would at a stupid child; his expression serving little purpose but to make her angrier.

'If I'd had a sword,' Arya snarled, 'I could have beaten more than half those idiots that you ordered to restrain me!'

'Oh, really?' Jaime mocked.

'Yes, really!' she insisted, 'you've seen me face worse opponents and win; I even beat you once! Or have you forgotten already?'

She was delighted to see that it was the wrong thing to say; his face colouring in wrath as his doublet fell open at the throat.

'I was exhausted and malnourished, you pig-headed little shit!' he roared, 'I was thinner than you!'

'Ah! You were thinner than me!' she repeated mockingly, 'is that what you like to tell yourself when you need a confidence booster?'

'Why, you –'

'And don't even get me started on Cersei! When exactly did you plan to tell me that your sweet sister was in the mood for grand declarations? After she'd told the entire city that you'd been fucking her for twenty-five years? Or were you hoping that I'd look up at the sky and miss it?'

'Stark –'

'How could you keep something like that from me?'

'I did it for your own good, you stupid little fool!

'For my own good?'

Jaime let out a growl of annoyance and rage; the whiteness of his knuckles announcing a contradictory desire to calm himself and to strangle her. He began to pace distractedly; his height and his anger and his beauty so powerful and so devastatingly violent that they seemed to devour the room and make it smaller around him.

'Tyrion was certain,' Jaime explained through gritted teeth, 'that Cersei would say nothing on account of Tommen and Myrcella. Nor did we want to cause you unnecessary –'

'You told Tyrion and not me?' Arya screeched in disbelief.

'- after speaking to him,' Jaime continued, the lowness of his voice enraging her, 'I knew that it was by no means certain that Cersei would talk. I was, however, certain that if she did, I'd be the only one in danger of ending up dead as opposed to dishonoured, so yes, I said nothing!'

Arya couldn't believe it. How could he – how could he be – how could he imagine

'You knew this – last night,' she enunciated, disbelief warring with anger and turning her voice softer and harder, 'we could have – we could have run, stupid; we could have gotten well away from here and –'

'And done what?' Jaime snapped, his eyes roaring with golden flame and his throat pulsing exquisitely in his fury, 'spent the rest of our lives on the run; looking over our shoulders; raising our children to look over theirs? You really think that I would do that to you?'

'And you really think that I'd – that I could –'

'What?' Jaime snapped as her words stopped in their tracks, 'I'm waiting!'

'– that I could go on if you died!'

It was out of her mouth before her pride and her nature could stop her, and she watched in embarrassment as the anger fled from his eyes like darkness; his face softening as she coloured and began to stare at her shoes.

'You – stupid arse,' she added unconvincingly as she watched his boots approaching her; dusty and red from the dirt of King's Landing.

She closed her eyes as his lips touched her forehead and her nose and her cheek; coaxing her head upwards again while his arms fastened around her waist and his left hand came to rest in the small of her back. His lips fell feverishly and heatedly on hers, and she could feel him smiling as she conveniently forgot that they were supposed to be fighting, opened her mouth and let him kiss her. Her fingers tangled in his hair as his tongue ached desperately and shuddered against her own; and she groaned into his mouth as she felt his cock grinding into her; the heat at the juncture of her thighs unbearable; and wanting him. She moved her hips slowly against his, relishing the moan that escaped him in response, but when she moved to undress him, he wouldn't let her; his fingers intertwining with hers and bringing her hand to his cheek; his breath warm as it mingled with hers.

'I will die before you,' he whispered, his skin scalding her fingers, 'probably quite a while before you, as much as it pains me to say it. I do so like living. But when it happens –'

'No,' she whispered back, shaking her head, 'not you. You're not like other men. You don't live like them; you can't die like them – '

He cut her off by kissing her again; the force of his body backing her into the wall; and she rested the back of her head on the sandstone as she felt Jaime's lips on her neck and his hand moving slowly from her face, to her breasts, to the laces of her gown.

But then Nymeria whimpered with something like indignation, and Arya was reminded of the day that she had spent in the confines of this room and of her own imagination; her mind tortured and brutalised by thoughts of Jaime dying in the same way that Cersei had; of Myrcella's wanting him dead too. And she tensed up, and he felt it, and embraced her without a word; understanding, and knowing, and staring at her, waiting for her to speak.

Arya could not imagine the princess killing Cersei in the name of pure mercy. While mercy would certainly have played a large role in her decision, there was something destructive, condemnatory…vengeful about murdering her own mother seconds before her execution. There was an element of self-loathing and self-destruction buried deep in the very act that was far too powerful to be merciful. It created the beginning of suffering when Myrcella should have been seeking the end.

She knows the secret of her parentage. I don't know how, but she does. And she did this thing for revenge as well as mercy. That much I do know. I know it.

Jaime had not moved away from her, his arms still warm on her back and waist, his face still inches from hers, and she touched his shoulder, briefly, as though making sure that he was real.

'Did it occur to you,' Arya asked softly, 'did you think for one second that I might also be worried about you? Would it have killed you to send word once in a while?'

That seemed to please him.

'I was perfectly safe, little wolf,' Jaime replied affectionately; his fingers warm against her cheek, 'Nymeria was with me.'

'Yes, but you don't know that you were safe,' Arya insisted, 'you don't – '

The flow of Arya's words stopped as she watched Jaime's face transform from quiet amusement to suspicion and worry; and as she stared at him she was once again reminded that she couldn't lie to him anymore.

But she didn't yet know if she could tell him that Myrcella was the one who had snatched justice from the countless people that Cersei had wronged by sending her to hell in her own way. Jaime needed to know, he deserved to know; but in spite of everything; in spite of his constant insistence that Myrcella was nothing more than his seed, his words could not change the fact that he was her father; the father of a girl who had killed her own mother, out of mercy…and revenge. The architecture of the act was despicable, but so heart-breaking that even Arya, a woman with no blood ties to the girl at all, could not think of it without being moved. But Jaime did have a blood tie to her; whether he wanted to admit or not; and he was a compassionate and emotional man; whether he wanted to admit that or not; and if she told him what Myrcella had –

'You know who did it,' Jaime said simply.

Arya stared at him in an agony of indecision; her lips parting in silence as the words remained within her; unspoken and unhurting.

'Tell me, Stark,' Jaime commanded softly, his fingers brushing flagrant strands of hair from her forehead, 'tell me.'

She looked into his eyes and saw herself reflected in them; saw the stubbornness and the grief and the humanity; and when she reached out and cupped his face with both her hands, his skin was icy cold, and he might have known already.

'I am so sorry, my love.'


Tyrion's meeting with Myrcella had ended almost as badly as it had begun: with his niece intermittently declaring herself an abomination and crying bitterly and hysterically in his arms while he fervently struggled to hide the fact that he was crying too: crying at the madness and the pointlessness and the senseless grief and hurt that this miserable mess of a trial had left in its wake.

Having assured himself that Myrcella had been given essence of nightshade to help her sleep, Tyrion began the walk back to his solar and found his sadness transforming into blinding, excruciating anger: anger at Cersei for what she had done, and anger at himself for being unable to condemn Jaime for his equal part in causing the girl's misery. True, he could not blame his brother for the spectacle Cersei had made of the trial, but he could blame him for not being able to keep his cock out of his own sister; a fact that was partly responsible for Myrcella's misery and entirely responsible for her newfound disgust at her own existence. Tyrion could blame Jaime for that – he was certain that he should blame Jaime for that – but he couldn't and he didn't, and he wondered if that made him the monster everyone believed him to be.

His mood worsened when he reached his solar and found two extra guards outside his door.

If it's Mace Tyrell come to see me again about the bloody Regency, I swear by the Seven I'll have him –

'Lady Sansa is within, if it please my lord,' one of his own guards informed him, 'she insisted on waiting for you.'

Tyrion grunted in response, and pushed open the solar door to find Sansa rising from a chair by the fire; her hair falling about her shoulders like liquid copper; every line and curve of her form lovely, as she always was.

'Lady Sansa,' he greeted, bowing low and gesturing to her to take her seat again.

'Lord Tyrion,' she responded, her voice nervous and…was it compassionate?...as she complied.

Since her return from the Vale, he hadn't spoken to her once. He'd seen her, of course, and recited his courtesies like a good politician; but he hadn't had the time, or, quite frankly, the inclination for anything more. There was Tommen to worry about, and Myrcella, and Cersei, and Lancel (I really should decide what to do about Lancel) and madness and weakness and greed and grubbing all around him. He couldn't speak to her, or think of her, when everything was such a mess. He needed to keep his wits about him, and he couldn't keep his wits about him if he thought of her. Thinking of her would be to think of himself, and he had no interest in thinking of himself.

And suddenly it all became too much. He couldn't see her now. He couldn't prattle off courtesies and talk of the weather and let her look at him with her devastating, sad blue eyes and say how sorry she was, because her compassion would make him break, and he could not let himself break.

'How may I be of assistance?' he asked coldly, crossing the room and standing in front of her rather than sitting, hoping it would convince her to leave.

'I – I merely wanted to see if you were alright after this morning,' she stammered, her cheeks colouring beautifully, so beautifully, and he needed her to leave; he wanted her to leave; she was a smart girl, couldn't she see just by looking at him that he wanted her to leave? 'I heard about what happened, and I wanted to see if you were alright.'

And suddenly Tyrion was angry.

Alright? She wanted to see if he was alright? Was the girl simple? Didn't she have eyes – or a brain – in her pretty little head? What the fuck did she think?

'I am perfectly alright,' Tyrion replied in a tone that she couldn't possibly misinterpret, 'I spent three weeks watching my sweet fucking sister torture and destroy her own son just to save her own worthless hide; today I saw the fucking bitch killed by arrows when decapitation was what she fucking deserved; I spend every hour the gods give pleading with the Iron Bank of Braavos to forgive Cersei's follies, hammering into Mace Tyrell's impossibly thick skull that he will be Regent over my dead body, and trying to turn an innocent young boy into a ruler that would make Tywin Lannister quake in his boots. Myrcella is hysterical and very likely suicidal; Tommen hasn't said a word since this morning so I imagine that he's in a similar condition; I haven't slept in six weeks, and I imagine I won't sleep for the next six either; and to confess the truth I want nothing more in this moment than to drink myself into a stupor, stumble down to Chataya's and fuck four whores at once before my little drunk cock shrivels up from lack of exercise; so yes, I'm alright, I'm perfectly alright, there is nothing the matter with me.'

Sansa hit him hard across the face; the sound cracking like a whip in the air as pain blazed across his right cheek and anger woke up in her eyes.

'You miserable little cunt,' she growled.

Tyrion stared at her, dumbfounded.

She never swore. Never. For a time he had been convinced that she didn't even know what swearing was. But then Jaime and Arya entered his head; and he considered that any extended period of time spent with those two, especially together, would be nothing if not an education in the art of vulgarity.

She was glaring at him with a kind of fury that reminded him of the dying embers of a fire; scalding hot, but dying, and he continued to stare at her, transfixed, as she spoke to him.

'Every day that I was with Littlefinger,' she said, 'every single day – I thought about – I thought that we – '

That we what? Tyrion wanted to say to her in spite of himself, that we what?

But she had already checked herself, and as he watched her eyes travel over his face; trying to meet his eyes, drawing them up to hers, calling them, singing to them; he knew that she was thinking of his silence; of the way that he hadn't been able to look at her or speak to her beyond a greeting in the throne room or a hallway; nothing like the comforting silence of previous years that had always existed between them. This was deafening, and empty, and agonising: a shield that was also a sword.

The siren song of her eyes was too strong for him, and when he looked up at her, he saw the years that they had known each other; the years that she had been Joffrey's, and then no one's; the prisoner and hostage and ward of the Crown that everyone took for a weakling and an idiot; and that he had loved wildly and deeply for all of that time, because she was nothing of the kind. Nobody at court saw her. And nobody at court saw him either – no one except her. And Varys, of course; though he certainly didn't love Varys.

'You can't answer me even now,' she said, and he didn't reply. He couldn't.

And she was looking down her nose at him and getting up to leave, in the very moment in which he realised that he didn't want her to leave ever again.

'Thank you for seeing me, my lord,' she said with iron courtesy, 'and please accept my best wishes for the health and happiness of your little drunk cock. I'm sure you'll be very happy together.'

As she swept across the room, flung the door open and slammed it behind her; Tyrion felt his fingers balling into fists; his nails biting into his palms like talons, and hurting him just as badly.

Seven fucking hells. I am the Kingdoms' greatest fool.


Tommen stroked the soft and delicate fur between Ser Pounce's ears and smiled softly as the kitten began to purr; a tiny, sweet and fragile thing for Tommen to take care of, instead of its being the other way round.

It always seemed to be the other way round.

Uncle Tyrion, Uncle Jaime and Uncle Kevan had spent most of the day leading the gold cloaks and the red cloaks in a city-wide search for the archer that had killed Mother. Word had been sent to him almost an hour ago that the hunt had been called off for the night, and though Tommen imagined that the collected Lannister stubbornness of his three uncles would cause it to start again at the crack of dawn, he didn't have much hope of their finding anything. Mother was always going to die today – what difference did the manner of it make? She had been condemned to die and she had died. That was enough.

Mother hadn't stopped crying during her trial. Uncle Tyrion had asked her to, but she hadn't. She had stared at Tommen day after day and wept, and sometimes it had felt as though his heart were eating him alive. But today she hadn't cried. Today, they had led her out to the scaffold, and she had looked at him, and for a while, Tommen had smiled; trying to comfort her; trying to show her that he still loved her, even though he wasn't crying…but then she had looked away from him and had started to smile at something else that he couldn't see; a horrible smile, like the one Joffy used to wear whenever he hurt Sansa. After that, she hadn't looked at him again. Not once.

Ser Pounce shifted in his lap as the guard knocked noisily; giving every impression of wanting to batter the door down.

'The Lady Janei Lannister, Your Grace!' he roared through the door.

'Send her in,' Tommen said quietly to his manservant, continuing to stroke Ser Pounce and embarrassedly watching his hands turn pink as the door was duly opened and his cousin bounded into the room; curtseying with comical rapidity. She was very small and very pretty, and her pristine lilac gown looked lovely on her; a sharp contrast to the shock of impossibly tangled and rebellious golden curls that some dutiful and no doubt long-suffering servant had attempted to restrain into two braids. Tommen ground his teeth at how deeply he was blushing; quite aware that he was twelve and she was six and he was supposed to be marrying Lady Margaery and that if Uncle Tyrion were here, he'd be telling him not to be a pervert.

But I'm not being a pervert; I don't want to kiss her or…or do anything to her; I…I just think it would be nice to talk to her, or maybe hold her hand.

The very thought made him blush further, and he prayed that his cousin was too young to notice the way his complexion changed every time he saw her.

'Won't your lord father be wondering where you are, cousin?' Tommen asked formally, not getting up on account of Ser Pounce, 'I pray you will excuse me for not rising.'

'My lord father is always wondering where I am,' Janei replied, staring first at him and then at her shoes; before shuffling to where he sat at the window.

'To what do I owe the pleasure of this visit?' Tommen continued as she came to a stop in front of him and began to stroke Ser Pounce.

When she did not reply immediately, he bit on his tongue and sighed inwardly. He was talking to her in his king voice. He didn't want to do that.

'Father told me what happened to Cousin Cersei today,' Janei said quietly, her eyes flickering upwards to meet his, 'it must have been a terrible thing for you.'

'My mother was a traitor,' Tommen replied in a steady voice, 'it isn't a terrible thing to watch a traitor die.'

The flecks of gold in her pale green eyes ignited in shock; then faded away to nothing as a kind of understanding seemed to grip her. She reached out with one tiny hand and touched his shoulder in a gesture of such sweetness and innocent commiseration that he closed his eyes immediately; fighting the tears as they came; knowing that he had to fight them; that kings didn't cry; that kings couldn't cry. But when the first strangled sob burst out of him, he couldn't stop the others from coming, and soon Ser Pounce was leaping out of his lap as he bent over and gripped the arms of the chair and howled; hating Mother and hating himself and hating everybody in this hateful city that had come to laugh at her and see her die. The tears were blurring his vision and turning the world to raindrops and lava, and when he looked up at Janei through that tear-stained veil, her face looked like his mother's, and he didn't know if he should love or hate her for it; for reminding him of what he felt, and why.

'I could have saved her,' Tommen whimpered, trying to stem the flood of tears but only succeeding in making himself cry harder, 'if I'd been born earlier and been older then I could have been her champion and saved her, and she'd still be alive now; if I'd grown up sooner and been as good with a sword as my Uncle Jaime, then I could have beaten whoever was going to fight against her and she would still be here –'

Janei stepped closer to him, threw her minuscule, waif-like arms around his neck and embraced him. Her curly hair tickled his nose as his head came to rest limply on her shoulder and his arms wound tentatively around her back; and when she gave him a tiny, very wet kiss on the cheek and held him tighter, he felt safe and warm for the first time in weeks.