Rhaegar XXIX
9; 275 AC
King's Landing

I awoke in a simple bed, made of simple wood. It was early morning, a crisp golden glow filtering through the open windows, carrying with it the stinging salt smell of the open ocean. I could hear waves crashing against the shore, meaning there would be plenty of tide pools for Jon and Arthur to play with come afternoon. Tiny crabs and fish trapped by the receding ocean always made for good fun and an opportunity to learn. If fortune smiled, they might find something special to eat come nightfall. Not two weeks ago, the boys had found a large sea turtle beached after a particularly high tide. The shell had become a toy shield when the boys played knights and outlaws, while the meat inside was cooked into a delicious stew. Jenny cooked well for never having learned from her mother, something she was remedying with Alysanne and Arya. Most nights, I could find the girls next to their mother, watching carefully as she added a bit of this, a dash of that to our meals.

Speaking of.

My stomach growled as I swung my legs off the bed, reaching for the rough woolen trousers and light tunic by the bed. Jenny was already up by the smell of things, fresh bread and thick bacon and eggs from the neighbor's chicken coop flooding the small house we called home. It wasn't much of a house, as far as these things go, but it had four walls and a roof, and a bedroom for Jenny and I. The children slept in the front of the house, near the hearth, separated from us by a sheet pulled across a curtain rod. I pushed back the sheet on my way to the only other room of the dried brick house, greeted by the sight of my wife of twenty-five years bent over the fire of the hearth, scraping eggs onto a plate.

I snuck up behind her and pulled her hips into mine. She jumped and yelped, only just saving the eggs from landing on the dirt floor by her natural grace. She swatted me, her glare at odds with the curl of her lips and the blush on her cheeks.

"If these eggs end up on the ground, I won't make another one for you for as long as you live. Lecherous old man."

I kissed her and took the plate of eggs out of her hands. "Lecherous? Certainly. Old? I think not." I put the plate on the table behind me and wrapped my arms around her. "I have half a mind to show you different, wife."

She linked her hands behind my neck and stood a tip-toe to kiss me back. "I have half a mind to let you," she said, giggling like the girl she no longer was.

Her face was weathered, more wrinkled than I remembered, but her hair was still a beautiful golden blonde and the wrinkles framed the smile I had gone to sleep beside for so many years. I could scarcely remember a time when she wasn't smiling, not in the last ten years when we had finally settled in this place, this house. Jon had been born that year, making our decision for us. This tiny little fishing village just west of Volantis had taken us in, and the gold I'd hoarded away for so many years had bought a boat to fish the warm waters of the Summer Sea. Here, my silver hair was not so noticeable, not this close to Volantis.

Our kiss deepened and threatened to become much more when a little beast of golden hair and sea-green eyes crashed into my hip, crying and squawking like the birds that circled the beach. The little noise-maker was obviously trying to speak, but they were no words in any human language. Just the terrified, upset, and outraged language of little girls with older brothers.

I picked Alysanne up and set the ten-year-old on my hip. She was nearly too big for me to do that anymore. Or maybe I was too old to do that anymore. The twinge in my back and shoulders was ever more noticeable, now that I was on the wrong side of forty.

The movement seemed to pacify her and she leaned her head into the crook of my neck, throwing her arms around me. "Jon put aneel on me!" she wailed

I hid my smile as best I could, failing horribly from the renewed crying from my oldest daughter. Jenny glared again, taking the girl from me before her own smile was revealed. The stampede of feet pounded on the sand outside, alerting us to the presence of the rest of my brood; my two sons, twelve and eight, leading the six-year-old Arya, held back only by her shorter legs.

I looked to Jon leading the pack, the look on his face innocent until he found out how much we already knew. It wasn't the first time I'd seen that look on his face.

Before I could say anything, Alysanne let loose a blood-curdling scream and pointed her tiny, shaking finger at Jon, who quickly assumed the most innocent of faces. He inconspicuously put his hand in the pocket of his tunic, trying to turn his body away from us.

"It's in his hand," Alysanne screamed, nearly coming out of her mother's grip in an attempt to get further away from the offending creature – eel or brother, I couldn't tell.

Jon's face made it clear that he would deny it until proven otherwise and I contemplated how long I could keep a straight face in front of the children. Jon was the adventurer, always ready to jump in feet first or play with a strange animal. Arthur was quieter, more thoughtful, with no intention of jumping anywhere. I had high hopes for Arthur and high fears for Jon; I wanted to send Arthur to a school, something akin to the Citadel, let him learn and grow. I feared Jon would join a sellsword company as soon as my back was turned. That wasn't the life I wanted for either of them.

The same went for the girls. Beautiful as Alysanne was, there would be no shortage of marriage proposals for her, but I wanted more for her than this village could offer. Married off to some butcher's son who had no prospects other than inherit his father's village business? Or worse, fall in love with a mercenary captain, living that life as a sellsword's wife?

At least with Arya, things were different. Arya would straight-up shank a boy if he tried to kiss her. At six, she already hit nearly as hard as Arthur.

Raised voices came from outside the house, more than just the usual sounds of the village waking up. I walked outside my home, my neighbors and friends all staring to the west. Robert the butcher, his wife and newborn child beside him. Regan, the neighbor who had traded Jenny the eggs. Boros, the carpenter, and Anton, the blacksmith. All standing in the middle of our little village green, dried brick houses trailing off into the foothills, a beaten path winding between them. More and more neighbors walked down that path toward the green, joining the crowd as I did. As I walked into the crowd, I turned to find what they were staring at.

A long line of people walked across the beach, heading toward the village. They walked slowly, all carrying packs or leading horses and mules loaded down with supplies, weary and trudging their way along the coastline.

I walked to the side of my home, climbing the ladder that I used to rethatch the roof last summer. From the top of my home, set as it was on top of a hill by the shore, I could see the rest of the obvious refugees moving east.

The line stretched for miles. I couldn't see the end of it.

I climbed back down the ladder and walked toward the first of the refugees. By now, they were close enough to see clearly; the men in front, dirty, dressed in rags, the women hiding behind them. There weren't many children that I could see, nor were there wagons. Most everyone was on foot, the pack animals used solely to carry their belongings.

I walked up to the men in front, doing my best to appear consoling and trustworthy. "What is it? What brought you here?"

The man refused to speak, staring back at me unblinkingly, accusingly.

"We don't have much food, not for all of you. Volantis is only three days away by foot. We can send a rider, perhaps they can meet you halfway with food and supplies."

Still the man refused to speak, never blinking.

"We can send out hunters if you need to stay here," I said, trying to think of something that could help. "I don't know that we'll have enough food, but we will do whatever we can."

A girl of about ten, the only child I'd seen in the refugees, peered out from behind the unspeaking man. She was blonde, dirty, scared. Her blue eyes were haunted and staring.

I kneeled down, looking at her from her level. "My name is William. What's yours?"

The girl stared at me, then whispered something too low for me to hear. I leaned in closer, watching her cracked and dry lips move in near silence.

"Winter is coming."

My eyes shot open and every muscle in my body screamed with the strain of my exertion. I was covered in sweat and my hands and legs shook with the adrenaline still coursing through my body. I flung off the light cover and swung my legs off the bed, looking around my small apartments in the Globe.

It was all a dream, I told myself, over and over. Jenny lay asleep behind me, murmuring softly in her sleep. I put a hand down beside her, the sheet soaked through with my sweat. I went rummaging through a chest of drawers, finding a clean tunic to wipe myself off with. The humid, sticky heat of the night didn't help, but it was better than nothing.

It wasn't a leap to figure out what the dream was supposed to mean to my worried, anxious mind. Leaving Westeros behind would be leaving them to the Others when they came down from Beyond the Wall in twenty-five years. That one day, winter would follow me to wherever I ended up.

It didn't make me want to change my plans. Nothing could do that. Leaving was the best thing I could do, Lord Tywin the best de facto ruler in the kingdom. I would just need to tweak the plan a little. Once the king was dead and I ascended, the first order of business would be revitalizing the Night's Watch. Dragonglass daggers could be made, enough for thousands of men, from my personal domain of Dragonstone. I could send them as a gift, a token of my appreciation for their duty. There would also need to be some kind of recruitment that wasn't for life, a term of enlistment for five years or so. That could get messy, on both sides. Lordlings wouldn't want to waste five years of their lives standing guard over ice and snow, and the Night's Watch wouldn't want dilettantes in their organization, not when its name was synonymous with a lifelong commitment.

But in order to make the Night's Watch, I might have to break it first. Winter was coming, after all.

I heard footsteps in the foyer to the apartments, then a slight knock at the door. Arry, sounded like. Arthur slept one room away and his knock was markedly different.

I walked to the door, leaving Jenny asleep in our bed, opening the door quietly so not to wake her. Arry stood on the other side, illuminated by the light of torches.

"The Hand is here, Your Grace."

Tywin XI
9; 275 AC
King's Landing

The prince strode across the stage like one of his mummers, like he belonged there, hurriedly straightening his tunic and smoothing his long, silver hair back.

Tywin nodded to Ser Ilyn as the prince approached, the larger man taking his cue and walking a discreet distance away, eyes on the entrances of the playhouse.

"How many?" Tywin said without preamble.

Prince Rhaegar considered the question, as he usually did any question before answering. "Twenty-two that are likely to be for. As for the rest," he said, shrugging, "eight that are probably outright against. Fifteen more that will likely remain neutral for various periods of time."

Tywin thought on that for a moment. For the last few months, Rhaegar had been carefully ferreting out information on which of the Crownland Houses would support his ascension to the throne in the wake of the king's death. Not asking them outright, of course; that would have been dangerous and foolhardy in the extreme, letting the pack of jackals learn of their plans. Merely gauging whether or not they believed they had something to gain from Rhaegar on the throne. It was agonizing, tedious, frustrating work, having to infer meaning through the flowery and perfumed speech of lifelong courtiers. Like shaking poetry out of a stone.

On the surface, twenty-two against eight seemed like perfect odds, but it was the number of men at arms each house could call on that made all the difference.

"Which Houses?"

Rhaegar rattled them off from memory, including the eight that were against. The numbers were not in their favor, not with the eight being the most powerful and having more to lose from a shift in the status quo.

"In the first two weeks of a given engagement," Tywin began, "the Crownlands can mobilize perhaps twelve thousand men, from local villages and household garrisons." It seemed a paltry number, compared to the more than double the number the Westerlands could call upon in the same amount of time. "The eight houses arrayed against us control roughly a third that number, and more than half of the knights in the region, and the fifteen that are likely to remain neutral control another quarter."

Rhaegar nodded. "That's the conclusion I came to as well." Arms folded, his brow furrowed, he looked the king his father never was, thoughtful and calm. "The problem is, the houses that are most powerful are the ones with a vested interest in the way things are. Removing Velaryon, Stokeworth, and Thorne might have given them pause, but it's also alerted them to the fact that my reign will be much more beneficial to you than they thought. Which is hazardous to them by default."

Tywin nodded, acknowledging the point. "The three small council houses, Staunton, Chelsted, and Cressey, all fear you would replace them as king, on my advice–"

"Which I certainly would, with or without your advice," Rhaegar interjected. "Staunton can barely read the laws he writes, Chelsted is stealing from the coffers more and more each year, and Cressey couldn't uncover a plot if it rolled him over in bed and fucked him in the ass." The prince shook his head, frustrated. "And Celtigar knows he has his position thanks to my suggestion?"

Tywin nodded distractedly. Lord Crispian was a non-entity on the small council, agreeing with whomever spoke last, even if it contradicted an earlier position. The man was determined not to lose his positon and the wealth it brought him. "Perhaps we should think strategically, instead of tactically."

"How so?"

Tywin folded his arms. "We'll never be able to match the eight houses that are against us, and if the fifteen neutral houses haven't chosen a side yet, they likely won't until after all is said and done. But if we had key elements in specific parts of the Crownlands, we could compensate for their numbers." Tywin paused, rolling the numbers in his mind, a map of the region appearing in his head. "We have enemies on both north and south; Darklyn from Duskendale and Thorne from the south. House Throne still has influence over a number of Kingswood Houses who can call up men. If we could limit their avenue of attack, we might be able to hold out for Lord Steffon to arrive with his men." Lord Steffon, being the closest of the Lords Paramount, would be the first to respond to the raven message that Tywin planned to send out at the first sign of trouble.

"We don't want a war on two fronts," Rhaegar said thoughtfully. "How long will we have to hold out?"

"Two months," Tywin said abruptly. "It will take two months for Lord Steffon to arrive and relieve the city if necessary. Four weeks to call his banners and four weeks to march here."

Rhaegar nodded. "If we can keep Blackwater Bay and the Gullet open, we can keep supplied. That's the biggest danger of a siege."

"You're counting Monfred Velaryon among your supporters?" Tywin asked.

The prince seemed confused by the question. "Of course. Monfred has taken every opportunity in the last four months to show his loyalty to me, short of wiping my ass. He's attached himself to me like a barnacle to the bottom of a ship." But Tywin was already shaking his head.

"The boy's loyalty may be true, but the Velaryons are hanging by a dangerously thin thread. At the first hint of rebellion or revolt – which our enemies will surely call it – Velaryon may take it upon himself to stay at Driftmark. Oh, to be sure, he'll call it 'patrolling the Gullet' or some such nonsense, but there remains the distinct possibility that he will not enter on either side, or will enter on the side of those who claim they are defending against insurrection."

Prince Rhaegar seemed unconvinced. "Even if Monfred were to–"

"If Monfred Velaryon stays neutral, King's Landing starves," Tywin said bluntly. "Even if I were to begin now, setting aside every bit of grain we could spare for the next year, it would not be enough to feed a city of five hundred thousand for more than a month. The city simply consumes too much grain daily, and importing it from the Reach or the Westerlands will only make it obvious that we are preparing for a siege." Tywin considered the playhouse, eyes unfocused. "Blackwater Bay has to remain open and under our control for there to be any hope of surviving the assassination."

"What of the Royal Fleet?"

Tywin snorted indelicately. "The Royal Fleet is, as of now, twenty-six ships manned by green sailors. Velaryon had supplemented the fleet with his own ships, ships that now are under the control of Monfred Velaryon. And no," Tywin said to Rhaegar's unspoken question, "Celtigar does not have the naval superiority to keep the bay open. Not with Darklyn's expansion efforts for his own navy."

Rhaegar shook his head, pacing in a slow straight line. "It would almost be better to wait until we can rebuild the fleet."

"That's not an option either. Right now, the nobles hold you in high regard, not out of any particular love, but because you're the man that maneuvered Lucerys Velaryon – a player of some renown – into confessing to his crimes in front of the Hand of the King, the Kingsguard, and the small council. That will last a short time; the Crownlanders are a fickle people, quick to love and even quicker to leave."

Rhaegar nodded. "I'll talk to Monfred personally." He paused, thinking again. The man was always thinking. "What of the other?"

"We need Thorne," Tywin said simply. "He can protect the southern flank and allow us to devote our energies to the north, stopping Darklyn and Stokeworth from laying siege."

Rhaegar stopped pacing at that. "Lord Alliser will never do that. Not after everything that has happened."

Tywin looked into the darkness of the playhouse, thinking quickly. "You'll need to offer him something. A position of some sort, perhaps the Watch. But be careful," Tywin warned. "If he gets an idea of what we plot, he will not hesitate to turn on us."