Flement

Harrenhal had been just as he had remembered it being. King Harren's enormous castle that had taken forty years and bankrupted two kingdoms to build. And on the day that the final stone had been laid, King Aegon had made his landing in Westeros.

He had been here several times before. Once as a boy, his father had thought perhaps to make a match between Robert and Lady Alayne, once as a young man for the Great Tourney of Harrenhal, and several times now as a grown man, passing through on his way to pay visits to King's Landing or return home.

Yet even for how he had been here before, the castle still was the strangest to him in Westeros. So great that no man in their entire lifetime could explore it all, and know all of the castles secrets, and said to be haunted by the ghosts of those who had died there. Let the Ghosts be as scared of Lord Tywin as the men are, he prayed silently, knowing how nervous many men were about staying at Harrenhal.

'Let them be scared,' Lord Tywin had said when Flement had told him about that. 'Harrenhal is a pile of bricks like any other castle… There are no ghosts to fear.'

Flement could only wonder how much that answer would satisfy the men though.

They had won their first victory, defeating a small host of men from Harrenhal and Darry who had thought to challenge them before they had arrived at the castle. The host had hardly stood a chance, and it had proven to be a victory that they had needed greatly.

Now Flement had a duty of his own to fulfill. He had tasked Flement with taking Darry, in command of two thousand men, to take control of the castle while it was still lightly garrisoned.

'Darry will be the firmest of Aegon's supporters. Make him suffer for it.'

There had been some troubles along the way north, but nothing severe. If he took the castle without issue, Lord Tywin had promised to raise him to be Lord of Darry.

Seeing it now, the castle was not perhaps as remarkable as he thought it would be. It was plain almost, sitting atop a small hill with one major central keep, as well as some smaller towers and castles inside, but it would certainly not be enough to challenge them.

Flement and his men had waited just beyond the keep for a night, surrounding it while men built rams for their assault, and now that dawn had come, the time to attack had begun.

When he finally mounted his horse and began to ride, he saw that most of the men were prepared for the assault too, and were beginning to form lines. Flement spoke with several of his knights, preparing for the attack, but most of them knew the castle would not be much of a challenge.

The south side of the castle was where decided the castle would be weakest, and where he thought to levy the bulk of his assault, but he couldn't imagine there were any more than perhaps fifty men of the garrison left.

It was the Mountain who was tasked with leading the vanguard, and after Flement gave the orders, they started to attack.

The battle was over before it even truly began though, as men began to attack the castle. Some men on the Walls had shot arrows and thrown rocks, but the ram had been brought forward quickly enough, and had been able to break down the gate quickly enough.

Eight and ten of the garrison had been slain, while the rest had all yielded and were taken captive, compared to only seven of his own men being slain. More were injured he knew, but so long as they would recover the numbers had been in his favor.

Some of the castle's servants had been killed too, some of his men brought him the Maester. He was wearing grey robes, with a chain that rang as he walked. An older man, no less than fifty, bald and starting to wrinkle, who seemed to walk with a limp almost.

Flement had stayed at Darry several times too, but he had never met the Maester before. "I am Maester Norwell, my lord," the man introduced.

"I am Ser Flement Brax," Flement told him. "Pray, take me to Ser Raymun's children."

He remembered going against Ser Raymun a time or two in jousts at tourneys, and that the man had children.

The Maester gave a nod, and started to walk. Flement followed, walking with several other men. His men were busy securing the castle, and he figured perhaps that his men might have found the children already.

They had, as when they were walking through the central keep of Darry he saw several of his men struggling with two well-dressed children, a boy and a girl, as though they were trying to bring them to him.

"Take them back to their chambers," Flement ordered the men, and they did as they were told, while they continued to follow after them. He decided it would be best to speak with them there in the safety of their bedchamber

"The boy is Lyman Ser, and the girl is Lynara," the maester said to him as they walked. "Lynara is nine, and Lyman is eight."

"Thank you," he said, figuring it an empty courtesy. He supposed the children might not be so willing to come forward with any information to him, so any he could get now would be for the better.

Flement might have expected that the two had their own separate bedchambers, but his men put the two children both in the same room. He wondered if it was wise to spare the two, and he guessed that Lord Tywin himself might have had them killed, but he tried not to think of that as he stepped into the bedchamber.

Lynara and Lyman sat on the bed, next to each other, both looking nervous. Lynara was a pretty girl, but there was a bruise on her face, while Lyman had an angry look on his face. Both of them seemed to be holding the other protectively, which might have made Flement smile were it not for the situation.

"Are you going to kill us?" Lynara asked nervously.

Flement shook his head. "You're prisoners now, but you will not be killed… I promise you."

"What about father?" Lyman wondered.

He wondered what he would wish Robb Stark would say to his sons if he were having this conversation with them. Telling them their father was a traitor didn't seem like it would serve with these too.

"Your father is still at war," he said to them. "Perhaps he will bend the knee or-"

He might have allowed his voice to trail off, but it was Lynara who spoke up. "Father won't bend the knee!" She said, and there was the faintest bit of a tear in her eye. "The Targaryens are the true kings of Westeros."

At least she's loyal to her family, he thought to himself. Flement turned to the men. "Keep them here, and make certain their needs are attended to. They are not to be mistreated" he said to them, before turning to the Maester. "Come with me," he said.

The two of them walked out of the room, and back into the hallway. "You Maesters are sworn to the lords of your castle, are you not?" He asked, while some men were still going through the castle. He heard a woman scream a little a ways off, and he was certain it would be more of the same throughout the castle.

"I am… A Maester's vows bind me to the castle, not the lord," he said.

"I am the Lord of Darry now," Flement told him. "You will serve at my pleasure."

"What of the children?" Asked Norwell. "What do you mean to do with them?"

Flement considered the notion for a moment. He didn't quite know what to do with the boy, but the girl seemed simple enough. "Lynara is of an age with my eldest son, Robert. I'm sure she'll come to love him as fiercely as her father, and when the two are old enough they'll wed. She'll one day still be the Lady of Darry at least." It seemed the wisest course, to secure their claim.

"And Lyman?" The Maester asked.

Flement bit his tongue. The boy would always remain a challenge to their claim, but he could hardly bring himself to have the boy killed. "The Night's Watch ought to be suitable for him. I'll send him south soon enough, and he can be sent North to the Wall from there, to swear his vows quickly." There the boy would be sworn never to hold lands, titles or incomes or father trueborn children, and so the line of Darry would die with him, and live with his grandchildren instead. There was the risk of the boy falling into Stannis's hands, but the boy would be no less a hostage on Dragonstone either. "Do the children have a mother still?"

"Ser Raymun married one of his cousins, another Darry, a little after the Rebellion, but died birthing Lyman, Ser. After that Ser Raymun chose not to wed again," the Maester told him.

Then there would be no more possible Darrys to contend with. Ser Raymun would no doubt need to be beaten in battle, but it would most likely be death for him when he was. Flement figured that day would come sooner than later.

"What should I tell the children?" Norwell asked.

"Tell them what you will," Flement said. "Tell Lynara that she is to wed my son, and Lyman is to go to the Watch if you will. I'll need to speak to her on the matter soon enough. But I'll have ravens I'll need to send soon enough."

He bowed his head, and began to walk back towards the room where the children were being kept, while Flement continued on.

Though he didn't know his way around the castle very well, he was able to find what he guessed was Ser Raymun's solar quickly enough. Most of his things had been hidden away, or burned he suspected, by the Maester the night before when he saw how they were surrounded, but there was still some blank paper.

Flement wondered who he should write to first. He decided that he would write to Lord Tywin at Harrenhal first, and wrote that they had won the battle and taken the castle. After considering it some, he decided he would be able to tell most of the details to Lord Tywin when they next spoke, rather than to write them all in the letter.

The second one he decided to write to King's Landing, writing with his instructions on what was to be done with Lyman. He figured he would be giving away a useful hostage, but Lynara would still be his hostage as well.

His third letter to Morya proved difficult. He told her of the battle, and that he was still well, and that Lord Tywin had risen him to be the Lord of Darry, and the match he had made for their son. He ended it by wondering how their younger two sons were, as well as how she was, and told her to write two letters if she was going to reply, one to Harrenhal and the other to Darry.

It was his final one that proved most difficult. He wrote to Robert, who was still at Casterly Rock where there he served as a page. Flement told him how he had found a girl for him. He hoped that his son would take to Lynara well enough, that they might have a happier marriage than what Flement had with the boy's mother, or Tytos with Lady Wylla.

All Flement could hope was that he could see them soon, no matter how unlikely it seemed.

Author Notes:

So the situation with Darry is a little different here, largely just because Tywin hasn't been playing it the exact same.

I don't have too much to say with this chapter, other than thanks for all your feedback.

Who's excited to go to Dorne?