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Chapter Fifteen: A Lion Among Wolves

Tyrion

"Kind of you to go to war for me," Tyrion greeted his father, climbing into a chair and pouring himself a goblet of his father's ale. A small part of his heart felt heavy, when he was younger he would have wished for more of a reaction from his father upon his return, but now he knew better.

His father neither looked surprised that Tyrion had returned to him after being held captive in the Eyrie or particularly thrilled that his son had returned. He did not ask questions, he did not care to know of Tyrion's experiences. He did not want to waste a second more than was needed on his son.

"By my lights it was you who started this war," Tywin replied without looking up at his son. "Jaime would have never allowed a woman to capture him so easily."

Tyrion nodded, he was used to being compared to his elder brother, this comparison no longer stung the way it used to. "That's one way we differ, Jaime and I. He's taller as well, you may have noticed."

His father did not raise to the bait, "The honor of our House was at stake," he told his son. "I had no choice but to ride. No man sheds Lannister blood with impunity."

"Hear me roar," Tyrion said, raising his cup to his father with a grin before he took a large sip. "How is your war going?" he asked once he had put the cup down.

"Well enough," his uncle Kevan told him before explaining how he and Tywin had been able to destroy most of the troops that Edmure Tully had sent out to stop their raiding his lands. His father cut in and explained to him that Jaime had beaten Lords Vance and Piper at the Golden Tooth and battled with the Tullys outside Riverrun. The survivors had run back to Riverrun and Jaime had taken Ser Edmure as a hostage. Raventree had fallen and Harrenhal yielded. Only the Mallisters, Freys, Arryns, and Starks stood against them.

"No matter," his father had told him. "Frey only takes the field when the scent of victory is in the air, and all he smells now is ruin. Mallister lacks strength to fight on his own. As soon as Jaime takes Riverrun they will bend the knee quickly enough. As long as the Arryns and the Starks do not oppose us, this war is as good as won."

"Do not fret over the Arryns," Tyrion told him, remembering his time at the Eyrie. He had had limited interactions with Lysa Arryn when her husband had been Hand of the King in King's Landing, but even he could see how she had changed after her Jon Arryn's death. Something had snapped in her mind, she was not well, and she would not dream of leaving the Eyrie where she and her son were safe. No, the Knights of the Vale would not willingly join the fight any time soon. "The Stars are another matter. Lord Eddard -"

"Is our hostage," Tywin bit out, his voice sharp. "He will lead no armies while he rots in a dungeon under the Red Keep."

"No," Ser Kevan agreed, "but his son has called the banners and sits at Moat Cailin with a strong host around him."

"No sword is strong until it has been tempered," Tywin declared. "The Stark boy is a child."

"You were an untempered sword once too, Father," Tyrion pointed out, taking another sip of his ale. "At Castamere, you will remember. And you had less of a motivation than the Stark son." He was quiet for a moment then he realized what no one had said. "And what of Lenora?" he asked, his eyes darting back and forth between his father and his uncle. "She has been returned to King's Landing," he assumed. "Under the pretense of attending the King's funeral, but she will not be returned to the Starks, I am certain."

His uncle looked down at the table in front of him and Tywin's fist clenched. "The girl is still with the Starks," he told his son, his voice even harder than it had been before. "Not only has the Stark boy not returned her to her family, but he's dragged her with him as he marches south. She is with him now at Moat Cailin, a hostage.'

Tyrion's eyebrows raised, "I see," he told his father. "So this war was not started for me after all, it is for Lenora." He nodded, "That's better, saves me the worry that you have suddenly decided to care for me, Lord Father." He drained the remaining ale in his cup and poured himself some more. "And what is our fearless monarch doing whilst all this is being done? How has my lovely sister gotten Robert to agree to the imprisonment of his dear friend, Ned?"

"Robert Baratheon is dead," Tywin told him without a blink of an eye. "Your nephew reigns in King's Landing."

"My sister, you mean," Tyrion joked to hide his surprise. This was not at all what he had expected, especially in such a short time.

Tywin neither argued with him nor agreed with him. He told Tyrion that since he had arrived they might as well make use of him. His father proposed to give him fifty men to deal with some men that Ned Stark had sent after Tywin's host before he had been arrested. Tyrion had chuckled at that and made a joke of it before telling his father that as much as he would like to help him during his war he had some debts he needed to repay first.

As if on cue his tribesmen crashed through the door, demanding to know where the little lion was with what he had promised them. Ser Kevan looked as though he had wet himself in surprise. Tywin raised a single eyebrow and waited silently for Tyrion to explain. "The fair maid is Chella daughter of Cheyk of the Black Ears. This is Conn son of Coratt and Shagga son of Dolf, they are both Stone Crows. Ulf son of Ulmar of the Moon Brothers. And Timett son of Timett, a red hand of the Burned Men," he introduced them each to his father, finally ending with Bronn, his sellsword.

Lord Tywin stood and was surprisingly gracious when he greeted the savages standing before him. "Even in the west we have heard of the prowess of the warrior clans of the Moon Mountains. What brings you south of your strongholds, my Lords?"

Tyrion started to explain how the tribesmen had ambushed Bronn and himself on their way from the Eyrie and how he had promised them riches and the destruction of the Vale if they saw him safely back to his father, but he was interrupted when the door to the room opened again and a young messenger walked in, quickly dropping to his knee in front of Tywin.

"My Lord," he began, without daring to look up from the floor. "Ser Addam bid me tell you that the Stark host is moving down the causeway."

Tywin did not smile, but his voice held the smug sound of satisfaction, "So the wolfling is leaving his den to play among the lions? Excellent. Return to Ser Addam immediately, tell him to draw back. He is not to engage the Starks until I have arrived, but he is to harass their flanks, draw them further south."

"It would be better to wait here," Ser Kevan suggested. "Bring him all the way to us."

Tywin shook his head at his brother, "The boy may hang back or lose courage if we make him wait too long to meet us. We need to break him now. The sooner the Starks are broken the sooner I can head south to deal with Stannis Baratheon."

Tyrion raised his eyebrows again, another surprise. The Stark boy was not the only one rebelling against the new king, interesting.

Once the messenger had left Tywin turned to Tyrion's mountain men. "Ride with me against my enemies," he offered them, "and you shall have all my son promised you and more." The wild men seemed reluctant to join him, but Tywin had always been a skilled negotiator, today was no different. "The men of the winterlands are made of iron and ice," he told them, "even my boldest knights fear to face them."

"The Burned Men fear nothing," Timett interjected.

"Wherever the Burned Men go, the Stone Crows have been there first," Conn declared. "We ride as well."

"Shagga son of Dolf will chop off their manhoods and feed them to the crows."

"We will ride with you, lion lord," Chella told Tywin, her eyes landing on Tyrion, "but only if the halfman goes with us. He has bought his breath with promises and until we hold the steel he has pledged us his life is ours."

"Joy," Tyrion said, his voice dripping with sarcasm. It was only now that he realized that he would be going to war.

-.-.-.-.-

Lenora

Their ride south to the Twins was not a leisurely one. Robb had his men ride and march hard and fast. Several hundred miles lay between Moat Cailin and the Twins and Robb meant to cover that distance in little more than a fortnight.

They had almost reached the twins, having made it within Robb's timeline, and Lenora could already feel herself adapting to her new lifestyle. When her family had traveled north to Winterfell she had barely managed riding a few hours straight before she had needed a break from her horse. When Robb first started his march south she would ride the entire day, too proud to admit that she needed a break, but she would be sore during the evenings.

Now, she could easily keep up with Robb at the front of the column and when it was time to stop for the day she would jump off her horse with nothing but a slight soreness in her muscles. Her body had changed too, whatever softness there had been to her body was gone now. She had always been slender, but now she was hard. Her stomach was flatter - even without a corset, her muscles more defined, her hair long and windblown, her skin darker from the late summer sun. If her mother could see her now she would have been horrified. Lenora no longer looked like a princess from King's Landing, she looked like a warrior queen, Nymeria reincarnated in the North.

Robb and his men did not seem to mind. If anything Lenora caught the men's eyes on her more often now than she had before. She spent her days riding, sometimes with Robb at the front of the column beneath the snow white banner of House Stark, sometimes with Lady Catelyn, or the Greatjon, sometimes with Hallis Mollen, and sometimes she would lead Ser Willum through the ranks of the marching soldiers. Her presence among them seemed to spur the marcher to move faster. Robb told her that on the days she rode among the marchers they marched further than when she didn't.

If these had been her men and they had been marching to an honorable battle this would have encouraged Lenora. But they weren't her men. And they were marching to fight her grandfather. Lenora did not feel well about hurrying these men to their deaths. This was not the foot soldiers' war, they were forced to be here, she felt horrible knowing that so many of them would die for a cause that was not their own.

Once they reached the Twins they set up camp on the bank of the Green Fork just north of Lord Frey's stronghold. Lenora dismounted from Casterly and patted the horse's back as a stable boy led her horse away to feed and water him. As the horse moved away from her she looked up to see Robb standing just ten feet in front of her, watching her carefully.

She raised her eyebrows, silently asking him what he was looking at. He smiled at her and moved closer. "We will rest here for a time," he told her, gesturing toward the tents that were being quickly erected. "At least until Lord Frey agrees to let us pass. Then we will continue the march."

Lenora nodded and shielding her eyes against the late afternoon sun looked toward Frey's castle. "I've never met Lord Frey," she told him as she started to walk toward where she could see her tent being set up. "Is it true that he has nearly one hundred children?"

Robb shrugged his shoulders, "I've never sat down to count them all," he told her, "but he is near ninety and he has had many young wives."

Lenora nodded, pursing her lips as she thought. "One of his sons is married to my grandfather's sister," she told him. "Grandfather never had much respect for him. Wouldn't trust him with anything worth having at least." She smiled grimly, wondering what that mean about Tywin Lannister's view of his sister.

Robb nodded, "My mother's father feels the same way," he told her. "Which is why I won't be trusting him."

"And how, pray tell, will you get his bridge then?" Lenora asked, looking past the castle to the bridge that linked the castle on the other side of the Green Fork, also belonging to Lord Frey. There was a reason he was called the Lord of the Twins.

Robb shrugged, "I don't know," he told her, "at least not yet. My mother will meet with him tomorrow to discuss an arrangement. I meant to speak with him myself, but Lord Bolton told me that if I went in alone Walder Frey would be more likely to sell me to your grandfather than to let us cross his bridge."

Lenora nodded thoughtfully, "Grandfather did always say that Walder Frey felt no allegiance to his liege lord. Lord Frey only looks out for Lord Frey and right now my grandfather has better odds than you do. Walder Frey is sure to know that."

Robb watched Lenora for a moment, his eyes tracing the furrow in her brow. "What are you thinking, Nora?" he asked her as she lifted her hand to her mouth and began to chew thoughtfully on one of her fingernails.

Lenora turned to look at him and shrugged her shoulders, "I'm thinking about history," she told him softly.

"What history?" Robb asked.

"The Frey's have guarded this crossing for six hundred years," she told him, nodding toward the bridge that spanned the large, deep river. "Grandfather says that in those six hundred years they have never failed to exact their toll. I'm just wondering what the cost will be this time."

...

The next evening found Lenora seated at a fire surrounded by Karstark soldiers. Ser Willum stood behind her, his body looked relaxed though the set of his shoulders was tense. His right hand rested on the hilt of his sword, ready to draw it if need be. Lenora had teased him and told him that if she were going to run it would not be while surrounded by Karstark soldiers and Willum had surprised her, "I am not worried about you running, My Lady," he told her, his eyes tense as he watched the men around her.

"These men are not lords or the sons of lords or knights. They will not look at your honor as something that should be protected."

Lenora understood what he meant right away and while it frightened her a bit she was not about to let him know these men scared her. "I know that, Ser Willum," she told him, her voice teasing as she turned to smile at the soldiers around the fire. "That's what makes them more interesting."

She had eaten her supper with them and they had told her stories, northern stories of war and winter that she had never heard down in King's Landing. She had delighted in them. And when the men seemed to run out of stories they asked her for one. She had heaved out a sigh as if she was disappointed. "I'm afraid that none of my stories will live up to yours," she told them, wrapping her arms around her legs and hugging them closer to her. "But I do have a song."

"A song?" one of the men asked her, he poured ale in his horn. "It's not a hymn about the Seven is it?" Lenora shook her head, "Then let's hear it, little bird," the soldier told her, offering his ale up to her.

Lenora waved his offer off and turned to Ser Willum, requesting a goblet of wine instead. Ser Willum looked uncomfortable, there was no wine near their fire and he wasn't about to leave her unguarded with the men. They were both surprised when Robb's voice called out from the other side of fire, "Go Ser Willum, I'll watch the Princess."

"My Lord," Ser Willum agreed with a nod before he quickly left the fire.

Lenora squinted through the smoke at Robb for a moment and nodded to him before she looked around at the other men surrounding the fire. "It's a southern song," she told them. "A Dornish snake charmer came to the Red Keep for my brother's fifth nameday and he was all very well behaved until my mother, my siblings, and I left the hall at the end of the evening. Then the charmer got drunk and sang this song while charming that poisonous snake of his to dance to it. My mother didn't know that I had snuck out of bed and back down to the hall with my father and my uncles. It's called The Dornishman's Wife, do you know it?"

The men all shook their heads, "Good," Lenora told them with a nod. "The snake charmer taught it to me and now I will teach it to you. Though, keep in mind, the song is really just about the end."

She sat up a little straighter on the log that she was sitting on and then she started to sing.

"The Dornishman's wife was as fair as the sun,
and her kisses were warmer than spring.
But the Dornishman's blade was made of black steel,
and its kiss was a terrible thing.

The Dornishman's wife would sing as she bathed,
in a voice that was sweet as a peach.
But the Dornishman's blade had a song of its own,
and a bite sharp and cold as a leech.

As he lay on the ground with the darkness around,
and the taste of blood on his tongue,
His brothers knelt by him and prayed him a prayer
and he smiled and he laughed and he sung.

Brothers, oh brothers, my days here are done,
the Dornishman's taken my life.
But what does it matter, for all men must die,
and I've tasted the Dornishman's wife!"

The men around the fire all burst out laughing and clapping as she reached the end of the song. Lenora laughed too, she hadn't been lying when she had told him that the best part of the song was the end. Several of the men cried out for her to sing the song again. She had shaken her head, but she would sing the last stanza again as long as they joined her.

"Brothers, or brothers, my days here are done,
the Dornishman's taken my life.
But what does it matter, for all men must die,
and I've tasted the Dornishman's wife - I have!
I've tasted the Dornishman's wife!"

She heard the men laugh, one of them announced that she was much more fun that he had imagined a princess to be. She decided to take that as a compliment. Robb was by her side, at some point during the song he had moved around the fire until he was standing behind her. He bent down, his lips brushing her ear as he whispered, "Come with me."

For a moment Lenora thought of saying no to him. There had been a reason that she had dragged Ser Willum among the marching foot soldiers over the last fortnight. There was a reason she was sitting with lowborn Karstark men now listening to northern ghost stories and singing southern ribald songs. She wanted the common soldiers on her side so that when/if she decided to try to escape they wouldn't stop her. At the same time Ser Willum's warning about her honor still played in her head. One song would not make them love her, Robb was still very much keeping her alive and unharmed. She'd do best not to anger him.

So instead she nodded and held out her hand to the man so that he could raise her up from the log she had been sitting on. The men around her groaned in disappointment and Lenora smiled at them as she threw her arms out to her sides and sank into a mock, playful bow. The men cheered and clapped and began to sing their new song. Lenora could hear their rousing chorus as Robb led her away.

Robb chuckled and shook his head, his hands clasped behind his back as he steered her toward his tent. "What business does a princess of the Seven Kingdoms have knowing that song?" he asked her.

Lenora shrugged her shoulders, her left hand held her skirts off the ground so that she could walk faster, her right hand reached up to brush some of her hair out of her eyes. "When I was younger I told my father that the last thing I wanted was to be a princess. He asked me what I wanted to be and I told him I would be an innkeeper. And I would sing this song every night."

Robb laughed and shook his head, "What an appropriate song for a woman in-keep."

"I never said it was appropriate," Lenora defended. "I said it was fun."

Robb was quiet for a moment. "I was surprised that you didn't tell them about House Reyne and Castamere."

Lenora's eyes narrowed, "They will be at battle with my grandfather and his forces within a month," she told him. "Many of them will die. Why should I scare them with that now?"

They were at Robb's tent now. He pulled the flap aside and held it open so that she could walk under his arm and enter. There was a squire boy, one of Lord Tallhart's boys, in the tent, he had just finished pouring them each a goblet of wine. He bowed quickly to the two of them and all but ran from the tent.

Robb handed her glass to her and Lenora held it high for a moment, a sarcastic toast before she took a large sip from it. She looked around his tent, her eyes lighting on something new. It was a large wooden table, carved in the shape of the Seven Kingdoms. There were wooden pieces all over it, house sigils marking where various troops were.

She walked closer to the table, her goblet in her right hand, her left hand tailing over the grooves and ridges in the wood, marking forests, rivers, mountains. She felt Robb's eyes on her, but she did not look up. Her hand stalled for a moment at where King's landing was, she thought of her mother and her siblings and how much she longed to be near them. She shook her head ruefully, "My family must be so worried about me," she whispered, more to herself than to Robb, "and here I am singing drinking songs with men who mean to kill them." She took a large sip of the wine, smiling darkly as the alcohol burned its way down her throat. She had never been much for drinking, but now she felt as though she needed to.

Her eyes traveled the table and landed on one of the lion carvings near Riverrun. "Uncle Jaime," she whispered as she picked the piece up. Robb planned to march on Tywin first and then go after her uncle, at least that's what he told her. Either way, her rescue was not long off. She placed her goblet down on the table and reached out to grab one of the carvings of a direwolf. She held them each in separate hands. The lion and the direwolf, at one point not long ago they were to both be her family. Now she was a single lion surrounded by wolves.

She turned to look at Robb, "This is lovely," she told him, nodding toward the table. "Truly."

Robb nodded, "It was a gift from Lady Mormont," he told her, "from bear island."

Lenora nodded and moved away from the table, she still had not put down the wooden pieces in her hands. She took a seat near the fire. "I'm sure you did not bring me here just to show me your new table," she pointed out "Why am I here, Robb?"

"My mother has returned," Robb told her. "Lord Frey has finally named his price for letting us use the Crossing."

"And what is it?" Lenora asked him, wondering what this could have to do with her. Why would Robb need to tell her the price?

"He will give us the crossing and his men, less the four hundred that he will keep here to guard against the Lannisters. I will leave four hundred men of mine here as well to ensure that Frey stays faithful. He asks that two of his grandsons travel north to Winterfell, they will be my mother's wards. They're both named Walder, it would seem."

Lenora chuckled, "Very original," she joked. "I assume they were named by two of his sons, trying to gain favor with their father?"

"No doubt," Robb agreed with a nod.

"That can't be all," Lenora told him. "Walder Frey would never take such a personal risk to grant your crossing for that. What else?"

"Smart girl," Robb praised her. "His son Olyvar will be coming south with us. He is to be my personal squire. Frey hinted that he expected a knighthood for his son at some point."

"And?" Lenora asked, knowing that there must still be more.

"Arya, should we get her back safely, will marry his youngest son, I don't remember his name, once they both come of age. "

Lenora laughed out loud at that, "I only knew your sister for a short time and even I know that she will not be pleased with that." Lenora was quiet for a moment, "If Lord Frey handled all potential crossing deals like this he would have no unmarried children left," she joked.

Robb did not smile as he nodded, "And," he said.

"And?" Lenora asked, sitting up straighter in her seat. "What more could there be?"

"As you said Walder Frey would never take a large personal risk for so little a price," Robb told her.

"And what, Robb?" Lenora asked him, her voice hard. He was stalling which could only mean one thing: she was not going to like what she heard next.

"And, should they live through the war, your sister Myrcella is promised to one of his younger sons," Robb told her. "And Tommen will marry a daughter, he has many and will give the boy his choice."

Lenora was out of her seat before she could stop herself, her fists clenched around the wood pieces, she could feel the wood biting into her hands, but she did not care. Her eyes narrowed as she looked at Robb, "And have you agreed to this?" she growled at him.

Robb nodded, "I sent a messenger to him an hour ago."

"They are not yours to give," Lenora told him, her fists clenching tighter. "Even if you were to win this war, which I find very unlikely, they are not yours to do with what you please. You do not have the right to give them to anyone, least of all to sell them to the likes of Walder Frey!"

Robb bristled at her reprimand. He had known she wouldn't like what he had to say, but he had expected her to cry, not to yell at him. "What else was I supposed to do, Nora?" he asked her. "Give you to the man?"

Lenora's hair flew as she turned to look at him, "What do you mean?" she asked him.

"He wanted you for the crossing," Robb told her. "My mother sent out one of his bastard sons out as a messenger with that early this afternoon. He wanted me to marry one of his daughters and for you to be his new bride."

"He has a wife," Lenora bit out, her head spinning as she dropped herself down into her chair again. Her legs were shaking so much from her anger that she could not stand.

"He was more than willing to set her aside for you, Nora," Robb told her. "Would you like that? To be trapped here at the Twins. Wedded and bedded, many times over, by an old man. To be forced to give him sons and daughters that he names Walder and Walda? Because that was the future that he wanted for you."

Lenora had felt the blood drain from her face at the words wedded and bedded. That was the last thing she wanted. What she wanted was to be back with her family. Unbidden she felt tears fill her eyes, "They're but children," she whispered, trying to change his mind.

"It was them or you, Nora," he told her, his voice tense and urgent. "And I would never give you to him. I would never leave you here. I couldn't. So I told him no and offered up Myrcella and Tommen instead." He shook his head, "I couldn't give him you."

"Because I'm too valuable of a hostage?" she snarled at him, standing again from her chair. She had been stupid over the last few days to hope that maybe he had started to change his mind about her. She was a hostage, a valuable one, much too important to leave with Walder Frey.

"No," Robb practically yelled at her, so desperate to make her see the truth. "Because I care too much for you."

"But not for my family," Lenora pointed out. "If you really cared for me you would care for them too. They're children, they need to be protected, not traded to Walder Frey so that you can cross his fucking bridge!" Her legs were still shaking and this time she wasn't able to reach her chair before they gave out. She fell to the floor, her skirts billowing around her and her tears spilling from her eyes and running down her cheeks.

Robb looked down at her and for a moment she saw pity flit across his features before his face hardened, "I am sorry to tell you this, Love," he told her, "Gods know I sorry." He did not look very sorry though, his mind had been made up and no amount of her tears was going to change it. "But the truth of the matter is that what happens to your sister and brother is no longer up to you. If I win this war, as unlikely as you say it is, they will be worth nothing. You think that I will march on your brother in King's Landing, get my father and sisters back and just head home to Winterfell?" He shook his head, "No, I will take Joffrey's head for my troubles before I do. And then you and your siblings will be nothing more than the disgraced siblings of a dead king. Considering what they will become, a marriage to a Frey will be far better than they deserve."

Lenora nodded, "If that's true, than I'm not worth more either. Why not just give me to Frey while you're at it."

"Because I mean to keep you for myself," Robb told her, finally revealing to the girl in front of him that he meant to keep their betrothal. "And so, you see, as your Lord Husband, Myrcella and Tommen will be mine to give away as I see fit."

More tears slipped down her cheeks as Lenora looked up at the man, the one she might have loved at one point, but could not love now. "The Lord of Winterfell could do much better than the disgraced older sister of a dead king," she whispered, parroting his words back to him.

"Aye," Robb told her with a nod. "But I gave our fathers and you my word. I will not break it."

Lenora stood up from where she had been on the floor, looking down at the wooden direwolf and lion pieces in her hands. So she was still to be a direwolf, after all. She walked toward the map table, "I don't know where these go," she told him, gesturing to the two pieces in her hand. Robb told her to put them wherever she wanted. Without thinking she put them side by side near Riverrun.

She was too upset to notice the way Robb's eyes widened slightly at this.

She missed the way he moved quickly to the table and grabbed the wolf piece, placing it back with the rest of the sigils of his bannermen.

She grabbed her goblet off the table and drained the wine in one long draw. She turned away from Robb and walked toward the doorway of his tent. She turned to look at him again before she left. "You gave me your word that you would not hurt me," she told him, her voice cold as ice. "I see that you mean to break that one, at least." And then before Robb could defend himself she left his tent.

-.-.-.-.-

Robb

After Lenora had left Robb threw his goblet, still full of wine, against the wall of his tent. That conversation had gone much worse than he had expected. He had known that Lenora would not be happy at the news, but he had not expected her to get that upset with him. Over the weeks of riding from Winterfell she and he had fallen into a sort a peace. She made it clear that she did not like being his hostage, but she didn't fight him too much. And she did not try to run.

That time was over now. She wouldn't be easy on him, she would fight him on everything. He called out to the squire, the Tallhart boy and told him to bring a message to Ser Willum, to tell the knight to keep a close watch on the princess from now on.

"Aye, My Lord," the boy had told him. Then he handed him two scrolls of parchment, one had been opened and one remained sealed. "These come from Lord Frey. The sealed one is from him, the unsealed one was sent to him, but he means for you to see it."

Robb nodded and took the scrolls of parchment from the boy before he sent him on his way to find Ser Willum. He opened the sealed scroll from Lord Frey before the other one, though once he read it he realized he had looked at the opened scroll first.

Frey's letter told him that he believed that Robb had not known the contents of the first scroll and that he had made their deal in good faith. Frey told him that he would agree to hold up his end of the bargain as long as Robb promised to find one of his close relatives to marry one of Frey's daughters as well.

Robb raised his eyebrows, wondering what had made Frey add that to their bargain after it had already been agreed to. He unrolled the unsealed parchment and read:

All men know me for the trueborn son of Steffon Baratheon, Lord of Storm's End, by his lady wife Cassana of House Estermont. I declare upon the honor of my House that my beloved brother Robert, our late king, left but one trueborn issue of his body, the princess Lenora. The boy Joffrey, the boy Tommen, and the girl Myrcella being abominations born of incest between Queen Cersei Lannister and her brother Ser Jaime, called Kingslayer.
As King Robert's one trueborn child is a girl and unfit to rule, by right of birth and blood, I do this day lay claim to the Iron Throne of the Seven Kingdoms of Westeros. Let all true men declare their loyalty.
Done in the Light of the Lord, under the sign and seal of Stannis of House Baratheon, the First of His Name, King of the Andals, the Rhoynar, and the First Men, and Lord of the Seven Kingdoms.

Robb wished he had not throne his wine away now. But Frey was right, he had not known that Tommen and Myrcella were bastards when he had struck their deal. He clenched his fist around the letter from Stannis and left his tent quickly looking for his mother, of course they would agree with Frey's additional demand, he wondered who is mother would suggest for the match with Frey's daughter.

He briefly thought of sharing the letter with Lenora, but he changed his mind. He had hurt the girl enough for one night, this news could wait.

Author's Note:

Hey friends, just you friendly neighborhood fanfiction writer. Out with another chapter for you. (I do spoil you don't I? This will be the fifth update this week!)
Well I hope you enjoyed it, I particularly liked this one. Especially the song, I don't know if you guys have been able to see it yet, but I really enjoy adding songs and lore into this story. There's just so much in the ASOIAF universe to draw from and I get to pick and choose my favorites.
Just like you! What was your favorite part of this chapter? Drop a note about it in that handy little review box down there! You know those make my day!
Thanks to those who commented on the last chapter, as always. You are all wonderful people (just in case you were wondering)!
ZabuzasGirl: Glad you enjoyed it!
RHatch89: Hello new review friend! Welcome to the cool table, we wear pink on Wednesdays! Anyway, glad that you enjoyed the last chapter! Thank you for your review! I hope you enjoyed this chapter as well.
HPuni101: Another cool new kid to join the Review Group! In addition to wearing pink on Wednesdays we also don't talk about Fight Club! But we do talk about how much I hope you enjoyed this chapter as well!
That's all I've got for now! Maybe we'll see each other again tomorrow.
Until then,
Chloe Jane.