Chapter:

Pretty Sights


Tywin Lannister.


VI

The tension between the cousins culminated on the last feast of the ten and seven day celebrations. King Aegon had placed Haraella next to Aerys, two extremities of which a dynasty lay, at the banqueting table.

Perhaps to a few it showed unity, man and woman, Heir and Dragonrider, Seven blessed brother and witch, side by side and cross by edge.

Conceivably, to a limited some, it showed an apprehensive sort of divide, the way the two's conversations were stilted, a nod sprinkled here, a wince peppered there, two very different lives meeting over parsley and potatoes.

Possibly, to a band of select Lords and Ladies close enough, such as Tywin Lannister, who had been placed only three seats down and over from the pair, next to Steffon Baratheon and Duncan Targaryen, it was a seer's mirror to what was to come.

It was not a pretty sight.

The last feast had started off well enough, Tywin would admit, if quiet, if disengaged, if Haraella appeared to wish to be anywhere but here, at the head of a swarm next to a crooning Aerys. She did indicate effort, however, the right sort of conversation in the right sort of places, questions to Lords of their daughters and sons, queries of a Ladies new dress, matters to the grey and wrinkled about grandchildren and aches within their bones.

It was never, nonetheless, about herself, Tywin noticed.

Those questions, requests of where she came from, what this land of Eng was like, the people, her friends, were promptly and fluently redirected to something else. Typically to the person who had asked, to what a lovely broach you are wearing, and Did you see the sunrise this morning? Do you study astronomy, Grandmaester? and tell me, was that your son I spied over near the pies? What is he doing now? Squiring? Lord Warmouth you say? How advantageous. I was just visiting him last week and his castle is impeccably made.

Yes, the feast was going well, as well as anybody could expect… Until the serving girls came to pour more wine between courses.

There was one who filled Aerys's and Haraella's dwindling goblets, a small girl, barely ten and four by Tywin's estimation, mousy coloured, bashful, and exactly the right shape for Aerys's eye.

Timid and easily brittle, more bird bone than breast.

The young girl had leant between the pair, as unobtrusive as she could be, tipping pitcher and spilling Arbor Gold.

The movement caught Haraella's gaze, she looked up, and smiled toothily.

"Thank you."

The girl seemed startled to be seen at all, startled enough to freeze where she stood… Startled enough for Aerys to laugh and slip a sly hand over her rear.

Squeezing.

From Tywin's vantage point, he could see Haraella's eye snap to the pale hand on ruffled skirts, saw the emerald gaze flicker to the table, to the Lords turning their own blind eyes down to their scraps, picked bones and picked veg, even to Princess Rhaella, sitting on the other side of her brother, pregnant, staring off to somewhere far away.

The smile on Haraella's face shattered like glass.

Aerys did not see this.

King Aegon did not see this.

Steffon, and Tyrell, and Velaryon did not see this.

But Tywin saw.

Aerys merely laughed, pressed again for good measure, a shocked mewl from the girl who dared not move back.

Haraella turned towards her cousin.

"What the fuck do you think you're doing?"

It was the loudest Haraella had spoken all evening, so loud and clear and bright, the voice washed the table to silence. Calm, most would call it, despite the vulgar language. Calm like the sea, before a horrendous storm hit the shores Tywin would add.

The hand pulled away from the maid to waft in the air noncommittedly.

"Just a bit of fun, to be sure."

Haraella nodded at her cousin's notion of fun, as if it made perfect sense, as if there could not be any other answer, and gestured for the maid to leave with a tilt of her chin.

The poor girl stumbled away on swift feet. Only once the girl was a safe distance away, fleeing the feast back to her homes in the kitchens, did Haraella leap into action.

No one had expected Haraella's hand to lash out quite as fast as it had, no one had expected the shocked whimper of the Crowned Prince as deft fingers wrapped around a frail neck, and no one, least of all Tywin, had expected the thunk of a skull crashing into a wooden table.

It took a few blinks for most Lords to register the sight of Haraella having Prince Aerys pinned down face first in his dish of roast beef and cooked greens.

The Prince yelled in outrage, a pathetic sound, Tywin thought, more wet-cat than man, spluttering on spiced gravy.

"What do you think you are doing?!"

Haraella did not let Aerys up, not at the Queens question, not at the stunned guffaws of the Lords around her, and not even as Aerys himself squirmed and heaved beneath her tight grip.

She was strong for her size, Tywin noted.

Rhaella's chair scattered to the floor as she stumbled away from the table, away from the spitting windfall. From beside Tywin, Lord Duncan stood too, not for Aerys surely, Tywin thought, as Duncan's hand slipped to the hilt of his sword at belt, but for the Kingsguard turning their attention to Haraella.

The King himself joined the fray, standing, though he made no movement, no indication of his judgment, possibly waiting to see what would transpire.

Haraella, through the chaos, only laughed merrily.

Too merrily.

"Just a bit of fun, to be sure, right, Aerys?"

Another thunk as Aerys struggled to a half bend, only for Haraella to ram his head back down again. And then she bowed in close, uttered, loud enough for all at the table to hear.

"It doesn't feel nice, does it? To be touched without permission. The next time you feel the need for some fun, Aerys, with anybody of any birth who has not given their strictest consent to be touched, I will make sure you can't piss standing up ever again. Are we clear?"

The Prince resisted in vain, and Haraella roared.

"Are we fucking clear?!"

The Prince gagged on a carrot.

"Yes! Yes! Now release me!"

Haraella did, eventually, let go, dusting her hand off on the leathers of her breeches, as if the feel of the Princes skin against her own offended her.

Silence.

Haraella stood from the table, turning her nose up at her half-touched plate.

"It seems I have lost my appetite. Being in the presence of cowards can do that, you see."

She went to leave, hurtling into the stunned crowd below, through the mute and pallid Lords and Ladies, down to the gates out of the summer gardens.

Tywin Lannister watched her go, watched that back in black leather, the stiffness of a spine, the resolute hang of a shoulder.

There was no regret, no fear, to be found in that little frame.

Not a drop.

King Aegon bellowed through the hush.

"I have not given you permission to leave!"

Haraella did not deign to turn back to the King, to bow and plead a departure. She merely answered back on the breeze.

"Then try and stop me old man!"

It was outrageous, to be sure. The language she used so freely, unrepentantly, the disregard she exhibited, to Privy Council and King alike, to status and order and gold bedecked coffers, and yet…

Yet the King laughed.

The King with his long hair that shone like beaten gold with strands of silver woven together. The tall, slender, handsome man who wore the crown of Aegon III. The King who was as bold as he was compassionate, well educated and low from his times as Prince and pauper, respectively.

King Aegon was a man known for quick wit, quicker lies if it suited his needs, and his proud holding. Some men considered him insolent, particularly in youth, and yet, many more considered him kindly, approachable, beloved by the Smallfolk.

And, perhaps, Tywin thought, this was the moment he saw it.

If ones Heir was not to be in line with order of birth, there was no doubt to be found that Haraella and King Aegon were uncannily similar, two pieces of a very Targaryen puzzle box.

His Queen, Betha Blackwood, slapped a soft bejewelled hand upon the King's arm, tugging, spluttering much as her grandson had moments prior.

"She has assaulted your Heir! Have her brought back here right now and-"

The King's laughter stopped abruptly as he brushed off the Queens hand, as Haraella disappeared through the gate.

"Be quiet, wife. There's been no blood spilled, only gravy. Perhaps it will do our grandson some good to have his actions challenged once and again. The Gods know his parents do not do it often enough."

The two in question, Shaera and Jaehaerys, silent in repose, glanced down to the floor and away. Jaehaerys, as predictably, appeared sickly looking, pale and frail with large, watery eyes. From a young age, the King to be had been suffering from numerous ailments, maladies that kept him bed bound for many weeks. It was a miracle he was at the feast at all, having fallen ill, anew, only a moon tide ago.

Amiable and clever, yet ailing and young.

Never a good combination, Tywin would say.

Perhaps the King saw that too, as Tywin did, having put most of his efforts not in his own son, Jaehaerys, but upon the shoulders of his son's son, Aerys.

One could not hold a crown long for another who could be dead by seven and thirty.

The King addressed the crowd, and the true show began.

"What are you all waiting for? Return to your meals! Squires, bring us some more wine!"

And that was to be that.

Only it was not if one had the eye to see.

And Tywin Lannister saw many things.

Aerys began wiping what he could of his meal from his snarling face and limp hoary hair, as Rhaella fretted beside him. Betha, who had grown red of cheek, even as she sat, glared darkly around her as the Lords slowly but surely reverted to their meals and idle chatter.

Tywin watched, silent, observing.

A lion knew when to intercede, and when to examine.

There it was.

The first square on the board being drawn.

Steffon Baratheon was the first to leave, with no preamble or false excuse given, lumbering out the same way Haraella Targaryen had gone.

From the corner of the gardens, the recently knighted Ser Selmy slunk through the same gate.

Unsurprisingly, Duncan Targaryen was swift to follow, a lacklustre goodbye to his brother his last parting words.

These men Tywin had expected, as any good Cyvasse player would. The Knight, the Lord, and the Farewell King… Haraella was particularly fond of them, and they her, and to any man, any beast, it was easy to see the court being constructed.

More surprisingly, however, was Lucerys Velaryon, thought to be the next Master of Ships once his father passed on, who too left on their trail.

His father stayed stout and still at the main banquet table.

Lord Tyrell, contrarily, slipped out without much fanfare, at just long enough to not be drawn into much if his departure were to be questioned.

Most telling, however, was the withdrawal of Duncan the Tall, a lowborn Ser who had once been the childhood friend, and protector, to King Aegon himself, now Lord Commander of the Kingsguard.

One by one by one, they left the revelries, hunting a Dragons shadow.

Master of Ships, Master of Coin, Lord Commander… Impressive.

Very impressive.

The board was being drawn in squares of green and black, and wasn't this, Tywin thought idly, history repeating itself?

The Greens and Blacks and a court being torn to sides…

Haraella Targaryen had said she did not want the throne.

Tywin had warned her it might not be her choice to make.

The Queen, so ruddy now, must have seen what Tywin saw too.

As did Aerys, the way his knuckles bled white as he fisted the soiled handkerchief.

Tywin himself did not move.

It was not his turn just yet.


VII

Tywin Lannister did not see hide nor hair of Haraella Targaryen until a fortnight had passed since the ill-fated feast. He had heard of her, of course. Expressions of her dispersed like ripples in a pond, reflections just out of his reach, if one left an ear open to courtly gossip in corridors.

Did you see her by the fountain? Laughing so brazenly with the Lord Commander? For shame, and so crass. Did she not have a Septa growing up?

I saw her riding down to Fleabottom this morn. The girl can man a horse, I'll give her that much. Makes you wonder how well she rides that Dragon of hers, if you catch my-

Leather breeches… So indecent…

I heard she's particularly fond of peaches. Do you think if I-

My father was speaking to Lord Verton, and he said his brother's blacksmith had seen Haraella down in the forge. No one quite knows what she was having made, but I know a maid who has a cousin who works down in-

Most of it, certainly, was inane chatter. Some, however, not so much.

Duncan has not dined with his brother, his Grace, for a while now. He sits with her, the Princess, in a solar most days.

Lord Steffon's wife is making her way here right now as we speak. It seems the Baratheons are here to stay for a while longer yet.

I saw the Master of Ships and his son having… Terse words in a passage the other day.

My boy squires for Ser Selmy, and was tasked with sending a Raven last eve. It was addressed to Winterfell, baring the signature of the Lord of Dragonflies. I tell you, sister, if I am forced to dine with unwashed Northerners I will leave this place and never return. I am a Lady in Waiting to the Queen herself, and should not have to sit mum while savages roam-

Tywin listened, but he did not act.

He should have left for Casterly Rock three days prior; he had much work to undertake at home, garrisons to set, men at arms to train, perhaps even a wife to choose and a brother to wrangle in, Gerion always needed wrangling in, and yet Tywin had stayed, and he had listened, and he had not acted.

He could not tell you rightly why, exactly.

Perhaps the Gods were playing their own games too, for three days after Tywin should have left he found the lost Princess.

Or rather, she had sent a squire to his rooms and demanded his presence within her personal solar.

Who was he to turn down such a gracious invitation?

Tywin arrived at the rooms within the upper floors of the Red Keep by midday and found only mayhem. The rooms themselves were pleasant enough. Sparse, barren, with barely the softness of a fur rug to be found on sandstone floor, water-rosemary scented incense burning thickly in the air.

A favoured scent of Haraella's mother, Jenny of Oldstones, if Tywin was not mistaken.

The only personal affects to be uncovered there were the line of trinkets across a marbled hearth. Straw dolls, painted stones, and a misshapen reed-weaved talisman picturing the Warrior.

The anarchy, then, came from the inhabitants.

Steffon Baratheon stood at the end of a long table, the only table in the rooms, fisting parchment and barking loudly at Lucerys Velaryon, who was meeting fire with fire. Duncan the Tall was murmuring to the Lord of Dragonflies, Duncan his namesake, at the other far end of the table. Lord Tyrell was flittering between Lord Baratheon and an ashen faced Selmy to the side of the oak spread.

At the heart of it all sat Haraella Targaryen, wrapped in a threadbare cloak.

"Lord Tywin Lannister, my Lady."

At the introduction from the squire, her distant gaze flittered over to the door, over to Tywin, and lit up in a dimpled smile.

The only face to brighten upon sight of a Lion prowling through their doors.

"Ah, brilliant! Come in. Mind the mess. Things have been a little hectic today."

Steffon pulled away from the table, sneering.

"You sent for the Lion?"

No matter what this clandestine meeting was regarding, Lucerys appeared to be of the opinion with Baratheon.

Tywin Lannister was not welcome.

"He is close with Aerys, Haraella."

The lurking contempt in the Velaryon's voice could not be mistaken.

Haraella, however, brushed them off with a wave of her hand flippantly.

"I told you, this was not Aerys."

A muscle jumped in Lord Baratheon's jaw.

"Who else could this have been orchestrated by? I say, we should corner that little twit and squeeze until he sings us a pretty song. If we-"

Lord Tyrell scoffed heartily.

"Of course the Baratheon resorts to gratuitous violence at the drop of a silver crown. Why do we not march ourselves straight to the Black Cells while we are at it? Save King Aegon the time when he discovers we abused the Crowned Prince on hearsay and-"

Ser Barristan Selmy shook his head woefully.

"Attempted murder is not hearsay, my Lord. I was there. I saw what happened with mine own eyes. Perhaps if we seek audience with Queen Betha and tell-"

Duncan the Tall loomed over.

"The Queen will not be much help. I will gather my Kingsguard and search Fleabottom-"

Lord Tyrell laughed incredulously.

"Search Fleabottom for a child? Do you hear yourself Ser? We may as well sit here and twiddle our thumbs for how long it would take to comb Fleabottom for a nameless child and-"

"Enough!"

The room rinsed to quiet on Haraella's voice.

"Leave."

The Lords around her blinked.

"What? Are we to-"

Haraella stood from her chair, careful of her left side, Tywin noted.

"Leave. I need to talk with Lord Lannister privately. We'll meet back here by nightfall. I have guards stationed outside my chambers… Please, leave."

Anew, one by one, they left, muttering between themselves.

It was a strange sight, Tywin would admit, that seasoned warriors, Lords of castles and seas, could be so irrevocably ordered about the board by a girl no taller than woodland imp.

Strange, and something else that was never uttered within polite company.

Prince Duncan, nevertheless, lingered close, laying gentle hand upon his daughter's shoulder.

"Are you sure about this?"

Haraella smiled and nodded.

"I'll be fine. I promise. Do not worry so much. You'll turn grey long before your time."

Duncan chuckled lowly, bent and kissed her forehead, right above that peculiar scar.

"If that is the price I must pay."

With one last goodbye, a promise of being close should she need him immediately, Duncan made for the door only stalling momentarily beside Tywin.

His mauve stare ablaze with something hot and fierce.

"Be careful of how you tread with my daughter, Lord Lannister. Be very careful, indeed."

And then he was gone, and there was only he, her, and the smell of water-rosemary in the air.

"I presume this invitation was not for another game of Cyvasse, then?"

Haraella grinned, lazily strolling around the table to come before him, kicking back against the wood, still weary of her left side hidden beneath cloak.

Injury?

Conceivably.

"Someone tried to kill me this morning."

Tywin's golden brow cocked high; voice dry.

"How regrettable."

Haraella chortled.

"Regrettable, and not un-meditated."

She veered for the table, gesturing with a bend of her chin over the pile of parchment to the only item there.

A rounded cane basket knitted in orange and red stained reeds.

"Do you know what that is?"

Tywin strolled closer, plucked up the basket.

It was empty, lid discarded by its side.

Unmistakable in its craft.

"A Rhoynish water creel made by the Children of the Green. Fashionable in Dorne but not often seen above the Reach."

Haraella nodded.

"I saw a lot of them when I visited Doran. He even gave me one. Not this one, however. This one came with a little surprise."

Tywin lowered the basket back into its home on the table.

"Not a pleasant one, I predict?"

Haraella eyed the basket, as Tywin eyed her.

Like something that could maul.

There was something… Poignant in those green eyes, a rigidity to the moors of her carven face.

Miserable and nostalgic.

"I am currently trying to build an Orphanage down in Fleabottom. This is not a secret. I go there in the morning until midday generally. I spend time building, and then I play with the children down there by the Blackwater Banks. Sometimes the children give me gifts in return."

She motioned over to the marble mantel, to the straw dolls and trifles.

"You do not seem the type to be sentimental over ornaments and baubles."

Haraella shuffled beneath the cloak.

"I'm not, typically. But I know what it's like to go hungry. I know what it's like to give everything to just… Surviving. If I can make it so one less child has to go through that, then you can pray to whatever fucking gods you believe in that I will."

There it was. The tension. The rigidity.

Abandonment?

No…

Violence?

Yes, Tywin thought.

The same hackles as a kicked dog.

A kicked dog that had learnt to bite back.

Haraella seemingly came back to herself, from whatever dark coasts her thoughts had swept her to, and coughed, squaring her shoulders.

"A child came up to me this morning carrying that basket. I thought nothing off it. I smiled, went to say thank you-"

"And the child was already dashing away."

The chuckle that came was tinged with self-derision.

"It seems odd now, yes, with hindsight, Lord Lannister."

Haraella shrugged coolly.

"But I took it all the same. Selmy tried to warn me, he keeps me company down there most days, but I already had the lid halfway off."

She bowed back against the table, met his eye, shoulder to shoulder.

"And what should come leaping out from the bottom of the basket but this."

With a flick of her shoulder, the worn cloak flapped open.

A banded viper was coiled up her left arm, hooped, arched.

Tywin, upon instinct, scuttled back.

Not an injury, then.

A hidden surprise.

Haraella laughed at him, bright and cheerful.

"Don't worry. She won't hurt you… Not with me around."

Tywin gawked at the snake, as long and thick as, feasibly, his own arm, the dazzling streaks of orange and red and terrible yellow.

"That is a thrice banded Vaith Viper. A deadly snake known for its aggression. Excuse my… Caution."

Haraella reached with her free hand to stroke at the horned head, as if she were petting a sleeping kitten. Tywin glanced to the basket, back to the slumbering snake.

"A Rhoynish creel and a Dornish snake. I had believed you could add two and two together and get four, Princess."

So why had she summoned him?

This was not, surely, to show off her survival? Certainly not. Haraella Targaryen was not the type of person to boast. Her prominent wince at Tywin's reminder of her title, of being a Princess, was proof enough of that. Subtlety Haraella had obviously not picked up on.

"That's quite clearly what they wanted."

Tywin's head skewed curiously.

"They?"

Haraella sighed at him, almost disappointedly.

"The ones who have orchestrated this. A Dornish basket and a Dornish snake, makes one point straight to Dorne, does it not? But I can't figure out why… Why set up Dorne? To seed distrust between me and the Martells? To, upon my death, have a viable target for outrage? It's no mystery that relations between Sunspear and King's Landing have become… Strained, shall we say. Perhaps someone did not like me mending those bridges."

Tywin Lannister found himself drifting closer.

"You seem to be a few more moves ahead of me. Why discount Dorne so thoroughly in this attempt?"

Haraella reached for the basket, and the voice from her mouth was… Foreign. Strange. Not entirely human.

Hissing.

If hissing could sing, that was the language she had abruptly shifted into.

The snake about her arm awoke at the noise, hissing back, before it slithered from her arm and into the basket without any physical prompting, only that hissing song, nestling down deep.

Haraella met Tywin's uncharacteristically wide eyes through her lashes, dimples flagrantly mischievous.

"Because I'm a Parslemouth, I can speak to snakes, and the Martells know this. I spent many an evening during my trip laughing about it with Doran over their wine. The Martells, other than my father Duncan, are the only ones to know of this."

The rumours then were not so much stories.

Sorcery.

Real, true, sorcery.

Suddenly, the board was clear, the rows all neat and lined and glimmering.

Tywin whistled long and low.

"And if the Martell's knew of this ability, there would be no point in them sending such a luckless gift your way. It would be redundant. That is how you survived this attempt, was it not?"

Haraella unclipped her cloak, tossing it across the back of a velvet plush seat now that she had no need to keep the viper warm. Beneath she only wore a pale shirt, a man's shirt, laces loose about her delicate neck, and her customary pair of black leather breaches.

Tywin pointedly looked away.

"I managed to bark an order for stop out before the viper lunged, yes."

Tywin's tongue lapped over his teeth.

"Then someone wishes for your death to be at the Dornish doorstep, or, if you had survived as you have, to have your own suspicion caste their way. It is… Clever. Shrewd but not overtly so. They did not know you spoke… Snake tongue, and so…"

From the corner of his eye, Tywin watched as Haraella retreated away from the table, beginning to pace.

"And so here we are."

Tywin swivelled to face the girl head on, just as he had over that Cyvasse board.

"And why am I here, Lady Targaryen? You had man aplenty when I entered your chambers. Men who would do as you say when you say."

But that is not what she wants.

As it was never what Tywin wanted.

Puppets were dull affairs.

People who could keep up, however, who could think as fast, plan as fast, do as fast-

Haraella halted in her steps, turned, looked.

Her face was frank, wide and sincere.

No one had ever looked to-

Upon, and there was a distinction to be made there, Tywin Lannister thusly before.

There was no restrained civility. No careful batting of eye. Not a sideward glance to be made, in either suspicion or envy or contempt.

Only honesty.

"Because you lasted twenty-three moves against me."

And there it was again, that grin, that keen little smile.

And there that was again, that fissure of heat in the pit of his belly.

"No one's ever done that before."

As no one had ever beat him in at Cyvasse game either.

Perhaps they could both be pioneers.

Perhaps that meant… Something.

Something Tywin Lannister was in no mood to uncover further than he had.

It was there, and it meant something, and it could, and would, be picked apart to bone and marrow later.

When he wasn't being watched, as he watched, with such seeing eyes.

"Have you perhaps thought this was Aerys's doing? You did… Humble him at the feast."

Haraella shook her head.

"That was Lucerys's primary conclusion. Aerys is clever, and perhaps a little rash enough to act so glibly, but…"

Tywin nodded.

"But he would not have planned to level responsibility onto someone else. A dark alley and a swift blade would have been more his tastes."

Haraella winced.

"Do you think Aerys would truly…"

Tywin could not fully hide his own answering grimace.

"Before? I do not see it. Aerys has always been brash and bold, but he was… He is my friend. A friend I do not recognize as much as, perhaps, I once did."

That was Tywin's own truth.

Since he had arrived in King's Landing from Casterly Rock, Aerys had been… Changed. Age did that, Tywin had thought. They had spent nearly two years apart, as men of their stations often had to, Tywin filling his father's dead shoes, Aerys learning to fill his own father's when the time came, and surely time and space would do that to a man, whittle him new bones and new faces, but…

Neither had Tywin missed Aerys's flashes of temper, so hot lately, so wild.

How he locked himself away in his chamber for days.

How he would not touch Rhaella, not even to guide her into the dining halls.

The lank limp of his once silver hair getting limper.

Yet, Aerys was Tywin's friend. They had grown together, been green squires together, fought battles together, and-

Stress makes a man tired, that was all.

Aerys was tired.

He had a dynasty upon his brow, and once Rhaella secured his line with a Prince, all would be well.

All would be well.

Haraella, likely seeing something within his own face, respectfully altered direction.

"Not Aerys then. Another."

Tywin gestured to the basket snug and sound on the table.

"If you can speak to it, have you-"

"Questioned her? Yes, I have."

Haraella rubbed a tired hand over her upturned nose.

"Snakes don't… Think as we do. They notice even less if it is not to do with mating, food, and warmth. She remembers a dark place, a bustling sound of people moving about, shouting… A market I think. Then she remembers being jostled. Sticks jabbed through the wicker to prick and prod at her. Getting her defensive, I think. Angry. Then, when the lid opened… Pop. That is all."

Unfortunate for them, and entirely fortunate for this would-be-assassin.

Nevertheless, Haraella was not finished.

She slipped closer, step by step, the smell of rosemary light and hot and heady.

Instinctually, Tywin breathed in deeper.

Held the scent deep in his lungs.

Deeper than appropriate.

The breath burst free at the thought.

"The child that gave me that basket would be long gone by now, and we both know it was not her that intended this. For all we know that snake had passed several hands before it reached my own."

That was, perhaps, Tywin's own guess.

It was what he would have done if this had been him.

A delicate hand reached across the distance, clasped delicately across his bicep.

Scolding through his velvets and linen.

Almost imprinting something Tywin was sure he would feel for hours more.

"I do not know this land as you do, Lord Lannister. I need your help to get to the bottom of this. Will you help me?"

He should be heading to Casterly Rock.

He should be securing his own seat.

His Lannister Legacy.

He should be dining, right now, with Kevan, Genna, Tygett, and Gerion.

He should be going through his betrothal matches, responding to offers and suggestions. It was not proper that he, the Heir, the Lord of Casterly Rock, was wifeless while his siblings were married and baring children and-

He should be-

"If you play another match of Cyvasse with me."

Her hand slipped from his arm, her chin tilting just so, and the smile upon her lovely face blossomed.

Perhaps this is what her father, Duncan, felt under the thrall of her mother, the Woods Witch Jenny.

"Don't you see, Lord Lannister?"

She tipped in close.

Rosemary, clove, and cold, sweet mint.

"We're playing it right now."

Wildfire eyes gleamed, and then-

Then she was gone, marching for the door of the chamber.

"Come along then."

Tywin blinked.

"And where exactly am I coming along to?"

She glanced back over her shoulder, door thrown open wide, silver curls wild, eyes wilder.

"We're going to take a little jaunt to the market, you and I. Do keep up, Lord Lannister."

And then she winked at him, full of mischief and trouble.

Perhaps he had been right in the beginning.

Perhaps she truly was a woodland imp.

"You know, you're ever so lucky you're pretty. A slow and hideous husband would be a terrible deal for your betrothed."

Tywin sputtered indignantly as Haraella's laughter echoed out into the halls.

"Pretty? I am not pretty."


A.N: I could not pass up the thought of someone calling Tywin Lannister slow but pretty lol, and in my mind, Harry is the only one with the balls enough to do it, and perhaps get away with it. This, of course, is all meant in good fun, this whole fic, and I hope you guys read it as such and enjoy it. Some characters have been moved around, so ones who would have been young during this time, children really, might be aged up a little to fit the story and because, well, I want them involved lmao. It's fanfic, if you want canon go read the books.

Sorry for the long wait. I'm back at uni, and it's my final year, so everything is very hectic right now and I have the dreaded dissertation to do (Yes, I'm dawdling XD). I can't promise when the next update will be, but I can say I am working on it.

A huge thank you to everyone! Silent readers, followers, favourite-ers, reviewers, if I could, I would give you all a hug, but I'm afraid my thanks will have to do.

As always, please drop a review if you have a moment, they keep the muses chattering.