Margaery stood being undressed by her ladies' maids, and bathed with rosewater and a shift for bed, were the doors to her rooms in the Maidenvault closed, and she was left alone at last.
Or at least, with Megga, Alla and Elinor sleeping in rooms nearby, and with Tyrell guards posted on the door, for it had been a trial to watch Joffrey clutching his throat.
It is no sooner a relief that the next in line should be Tommen. Wedding Joffrey was the price for the Tyrell alliance; Cersei will argue there is no need for me to wed her other son.
As much as Margaery could rely upon her family to present a united front, and that Lord Tywin would seek to strengthen his alliance with their House, Cersei was no fool, but nor could she be such a mummer as to have her own son killed to prevent the Tyrells entering the royal fold, for all that she had wept over Joffrey's body.
I have enemies already who would not see me on the throne. Worse still, they have the reach to kill the king. Who can say if poor, young Tommen will not perish so?
Margaery could not sleep that night. She tossed and turned, for in this land, there was so much still uncertain. She could no longer look down the vista of years as she had in Highgarden, three ringed-walls safe while King Robert kept the realm together, if not prosperously so.
Every moment counted. At court, for which Margaery had been raised to perform, even here she felt her doubts, and she wished she could know an outcome to still her mind - but none soothed her sleep - and when she forced herself to remember the young girl she once was, she imagined Willas reading to her, and how the pictures he drew of the stars made her wonder…