TYRION

Up here, they could see not only the Gates of the Moon in the middle distance, but the crags and the mountains beyond that, rising higher and higher through the bands of blueish-grey sky. Somewhere, too, was the Eyrie, and the Moon Door, and though he had seen it deserted he could feel its presence, looming down, and the Moon Door staring out from the stone like a great eye.

Penny's fingers dug into the back of his jerkin; her voice registered a little nervous surprise. Tyrion willed the dragon to descend a little, whispering under his breath. The wind tore his command away but Viserion heard it nonetheless, and spread his wings wider, and they dropped through ten feet, through twenty, fifty, a hundred, and further still. When they were just skimming over the treetops the white-and-gold dragon levelled out of his dive.

"Look!" Penny called. Tyrion turned his head and looked down into the forest. He could see a few tents in a ring, around a campfire that was little more than a speck. And then he saw another campfire further on, and another. We are getting close, he thought, urging Viserion to slow his glide. He turned back to look at Shagga son of Dolf and Gunthor son of Gurn, both clinging to the dragon's scaled neck with more worry than they'd ever admit to. The clansmen both wore thick, frost-bitten furs and leather cuirasses, and the axes in their belts were freshly honed in the moonlight. With them were five more Stone Crows, which was as many as Viserion could reasonably carry. Tyrion had chosen the Stone Crows for this part of the mission as he trusted them – or, at least, he trusted them more than the other clansmen, and he found Shagga to be stupider than most of the other clan leaders, which was a good thing. Shagga only cared about blood and wine, and once they got onto the castle walls Tyrion could give him once, and Bronze Yohn Royce surely did not keep an empty cellar.

He wondered if Royce had seen them yet, since the night was doing a rather good job of hiding their approach. I hope not, he thought, let the man shit himself where I can see him. Right now Bronze Yohn would be standing on the battlements – in the thick of battle, Tyrion expected no less – wearing his stupid runic armour with its unintelligible symbols that the old man thought would give him courage somehow. "My ancestors have defeated the mountain savages for thousands of years, every time you come out from your nests," his envoy had said. "I will do the same, only I will pursue you further."

Bronze Yohn did not know about Viserion – more than that, Bronze Yohn did not know about Tyrion, who had been planning this from the start. He had told Shagga, Timett son of Timett and Chella daughter of Cheyk to set up camp beneath the Gates of the Moon, in full sight of Lord Royce but out of range of his bows and mangonels. Four thousand men in all: surely not such a fearsome sight. On the first day the clansmen had motioned for parley by waving a flag, but Lord Royce himself, not wanting to sully his honour by treating with savages, had sent instead a knight of his garrison, one Ser Harrold Hardyng, to deliver a message to the heathens. Ser Harrold had been seen off with jeers and catcalls, but no doubt he had returned to Bronze Yohn with a smile on his face: the savages numbered surprisingly few, and half of them were women and children, and their warriors were horribly disorganised, they had not even dug latrine pits. One good sortie would see them dispelled for the hills.

Of course, Shagga's four thousand were not the only clansmen; there were some ten thousand more hidden in the forest behind them, so that if Bronze Yohn rallied his men, routed the savages and pursued – which he had done, on the second night of the siege, keeping his promise, ever an honourable man, Tyrion thought – he would find himself faced with rather more savages than he had reckoned. Or so Tyrion had told Shagga.

Tyrion, though, was not as stupid as to believe this would work. He had met Bronze Yohn briefly at one of King Robert's tournaments, and the Vale's second most important lord was an honourable man, but also shrewd, far more so than Ned Stark or any of his honourable peers. And he knew that Bronze Yohn would know about the clansmen hidden in the trees, whether because of his scouts, or because of experience. So he knew that Bronze Yohn had sent a contingent of men wide to either side, to envelop the retreating clansmen and catch them in a pincer movement in the trees. And nay, more than that, Bronze Yohn had proved his reputation by having his men feed their trebuchets with pitch-coated barrels, which could be hurled into the forest to smoke the clansmen out of hiding. Tyrion almost smiled at that. Why, Father, I think if you were here, you would have done exactly the same. Which would lend a certain additional satisfaction when all of Bronze Yohn's carefully laid plans and counter-plans were burned to cinders.

The forest was falling away beneath them. The thick pines and conifers retreated to shrubbery, and then it was all grass, mushrooms, and craggy rocks, all the way up the shallow incline towards the castle, stately on its rock. The clansmen would not take it alone, not in a thousand years of siege. But Tyrion Lannister would.

And Tyrion Lannister did.

The dragon's descent and all that followed it did not require much recounting. Even then, he remembered it only in fragments; Viserion's great white wings spreading, more bird than reptile for a moment, his scaled feet crashing down on the ramparts; the dragon blowing out great bursts of pale yellow flame, scorching the stones; arrows firing back and being turned turned into black dust even as they flew, never reaching their target. Then the Valemen were falling back, and surrendering, and in a matter of minutes the wallwalk was clear and he had men rallied to him. They went up to the gate, and they opened it, and below, the forces of the mountain clansmen streamed it.

All of this lasted a matter of minutes. Then he dismounted Viserion, and went to find Chella daughter of Cheyk and Timett. Their men were clearing out the castle proper, he was told, defeating whatever forces Bronze Yohn had managed to keep onside with a dragon bearing down on them. And then that was done too, and together they headed through to the heart of the castle.

The lord's solar was well-furnished in some dark wood, and large windows looked out over the blue-lit forests. There were sky-blue Arryn banners hanging above the hearth. "Take these down," Tyrion instructed the clansmen. He had no Lannister banners to replace them, but surely there were idle women among the clansfolk who were good with a needle and thread.

Once the banners were carried off he found a flagon of red wine in a cupboard, and warmed it in a cup over the hearth while he waited for the Valemen. Shagga and Timett sat at the table by the door, tucking into a supper of bloody beef and pease. Tyrion waited at the window, watching as the last of Royce's men surrendered in the courtyard and as the mountain clansfolk rumbled steadily through the gate. He was beginning to wish he had left orders to close the gate after a time, since the Gates of the Moon could not have nearly enough in its larders to accommodate them all, but it was too late now.

Then there came a succession of rough grunting noises from the stairway and up came Bronze Yohn Royce, Lord Redfort of Redfort, and Robert Arryn, the Lord of the Eyrie and the Warden of the East, looking as snotty and brattish as ever. Tyrion went and took his seat behind the lord's desk, wine cup affixed firmly in his hand.

Lord Royce began: "You will regret this, Imp. You may have taken this castle through treachery, but the Belmores and the Waynwoods are on their way, and your army of savages has no way of holding this castle."

"Perhaps," said Tyrion. "But my army of savages have a habit of fighting rather fiercely on open ground. And with a dragon behind them… no, you delude yourself, my lord. The Belmores, the Waynwoods, and all your other allies will surrender as quickly as you did. Unless, of course, they have some way of killing dragons that I do not know about."

Lord Redfort said, "If you think you can steal the Vale—"

"I have stolen the Vale, my lord. Pathetic though you look, you three are the most powerful lords in this part of the world. True, you might have sons and heirs to follow you, but I can fly to Runestone on the morrow and to Redfort the day after, and I will do them as I have done here, only worse. I will do to your castles as Aegon the Conqueror did to Harrenhal, as my lord father did to the Reynes of Castamere. I will burn your smallfolk alive and reduce the ancient seats of your families to rubble. But I do not need to. Swear your fealty to me here and now, and I will spare you that fate."

There was a long moment of silence. The Arryn boy's jaw was wobbling, and Lord Redfort looked a little taken back. But it was Bronze Yohn who spoke out. "Here is for your offerings." He spat on the ground at Tyrion's feet.

This will not do. "Shagga," Tyrion called. "Come and teach his lordship what the Stone Crows do to those who defy them."

Shagga rumbled to his feet and unslung his axe. "Gladly, Halfman." He turned the flat of his weapon towards Lord Royce and raised it.

"Stop," Tyrion said. "Not to him. To the Arryn boy."

Shagga stopped. "To the boy?"

"I don't like the way he looks at me. And if he is as I remember, the brat could do with a good sharp lesson. Wouldn't you say so, Lord Royce? And you, Lord Redfort?"

Neither of the Vale lords moved a muscle. "Well," said Tyrion. "Lessons must be taught." Shagga raised the axe.

"Stop!" shouted the Arryn boy. "Lord Royce, do something, do something, do something!" His arms flailed through the air.

Lord Royce let out a choked noise of disgust. "We cannot surrender to him, my lord."

"He was going to hit me!" Robert wailed. Tyrion reckoned the brat was on the verge of a shaking fit. "You're supposed to defend me! I'm the lord of the Vale! I'M THE LORD OF THE VALE!"

"Not anymore," said Tyrion. "I am the lord of the Vale now. And unless you want Shagga to hit you, you had better get down on your knees and say it. Say 'I relinquish control of the Vale of Arryn to Tyrion of House Lannister.'"

Robert stood there shivering. "I… I re… relinquish… relin…" Suddenly he ran out of breath, shaking his head. "I won't do it. I won't, I won't, I—"

"Very well. Shagga, hit him."

For a moment he thought Shagga might object to hitting a child. But whatever the mountain clansmen understood of honour, it did not include objections to this. Shagga swung the flat of the axe, straight into Robert's shoulder. The boy howled and toppled to the ground, and erupted into screams as though Shagga had hit him with the sharp end instead of the flat.

That may have been misjudged, Tyrion reflected. We will not get another word out of him for the rest of the night, and we will certainly not get anything out of Royce or—

"Imp," said Lord Redfort, tersely. "If we surrender to you, will you have mercy on Lord Robert, at least? The boy is…"

"—currently lying on the floor and screaming," Tyrion said. "Well. He should be thankful that at least one of his lords bannermen has some sense. I will spare your family and your castle, Lord Redfort. And… yes, I think Lord Robert has been punished enough for one night. I cannot offer the same mercy to Lord Royce, though. I'm sure you understand."

"I… yes, I do."

"Yes? Aren't you forgetting something?"

"Yes…" Redfort swallowed. "My lord."

"You will have heard that a Lannister always pays his debts, Lord Redfort," Tyrion said. He paused. Let them wallow in their fear a moment. "Well. 'Tis true. Timett, see that Lord Redfort is given comfortable lodgings within the castle. As for the others, a cell will suit just fine."

Lord Royce gave him a look like thunder. "I spit on you, Imp. You and all your twisted family. You think this will last forever, eh? Mark my words, you will lose the Vale soon enough, and you will end up dead in the ground same as your father and your nephews."

"Oh, believe me," said Tyrion. "My father and my nephew long for my comp—" Then everything went cold. "You said nephews? With an S. What did you mean?"

Lord Royce fell silent. But by then, of course, Tyrion already knew. I swear, uncle, I will not let them take you. "King Tommen is dead?"

"From what we have heard," said Royce. "Your sister reigns in Casterly Rock now. Or that vile daughter of hers. Were you planning on delivering the Vale to them, Imp?"

Was I? "Not anymore." His face became a mask of steel fury. "And here you sit gloating."

"I bore the boy no ill will," said Lord Royce. "As for his sister, and the plans she hatched with Littlefinger—"

"Littlefinger?"

Royce frowned. "You don't know, do you?"

"Know what?"

He was about to speak, but his lunatic lord got there first. "I married Myrcella!" he shouted. "And she tried to kill me! She poisoned me!" His arms flapped, his face went pale. "She and Lord Petyr, they tried to kill me, they did, they did! We should have killed her, killed her, ki-i-i-illed her!" Abruptly his whole body started to shaking. "Ripped off her head and threw her the Moon Door!"

Royce, seeing Tyrion's face change, put a stern hand on his ward's shoulder. "My lord—"

"Should have cut her up and hanged her and killed her and b-b-burned her!" Froth coated his lips. "Killed that… that… that… b…" His face went bright red, and finally he blew out the last syllable. "Bitch!" There he stood awhile panting, his eyes bulging and rolling like great slimy eggs.

When Tyrion spoke his voice was ice-cold. "Lord Royce," he said. "I know your sons have all been killed. But you have a daughter, do you not?"

Royce's eyes were like brimstone. "I do."

"And I assume you would want her to survive the coming winter?"

"I would."

"Then you would do well to follow my instructions. Else I might take a leaf from my lord father's book."

Royce did not reply.

Tyrion said, "Hit Lord Arryn."

"What?"

"You heard me. Hit Lord Arryn. Strike him. Do to him as his mother should have done, a long time ago."

"Lord Arryn is my liege lord." But even then, Royce did not sound so sure.

"Not anymore. You do not serve the Arryns, Royce. You serve the Lord of the Vale, and the Warden of the East. I am the lord of the Vale now. You will do as I command you."

"I will not."

"You will. Unless you want your daughter and the rest of your House to suffer the fate of the Reynes." Or worse yet, the fate of Tysha. The cold anger in him was not a sensible one anymore: it never had been. But right now, it was all he had. "You say my nephew is dead. You say Tommen is dead. And yet this vile wretch—" He pointed at Robert Arryn. "—still baffles the Seven Kingdoms by continuing to live. I despise him. I want him gone. For now I have decided to be merciful – maybe soon I will realise there has been no point to this – but for now… for now, I will be content to see him bruise."

Royce stepped between Tyrion and the boy. "Lord Arryn is a child."

"Your daughter is not."

"I offer myself in his place—"

"My father always said you were an honourable man, Lord Royce. And a stupid one. No. It is the boy I want to see struck. And you will do it now. Else I will fetch your daughter right this moment, and – what was it the boy said? – I will rip off her head before your very eyes. So you will hit him." He could see Royce's thin, angry lips contorting into an expression of utmost anger. But it was not entirely directed at him. "And no games now. You will hit him hard. If he does not bleed, you will hit him again until he does."

"My lord," said Royce.

He says 'lord' now. Tyrion held up a hand. "Five."

"Lord Tyrion—"

"Four."

The boy Robert opened his mouth. "Hit him, Lord Royce, hit him!"

Shagga gripped his axe.

"Three."

"My lord Tyrion—"

"KILL HIM, LORD ROYCE!"

"Two."

"I ORDER YOU TO KILL HIM!"

"One."

"KILL THE IMP!"

Lord Royce swung round. Robert Arryn crashed to the floor, hard. When he rolled over, blood was pouring from his nose in fits and starts. The boy made a thin, whining sound that reminded Tyrion of Joffrey, choking at his wedding. Lord Royce stood above him, eyes dull with horror. "You will burn in hell someday, Imp," he said in a very calm voice.

"Says the man who just struck down his liege lord." Tyrion felt no pity for the snivelling thing on the floor. Bitterness, perhaps – it did not have to be done – and yet resignation too – because it did. "If I am headed for hell, Lord Royce – and I don't doubt that I am – I will not be there alone."

He was done with Bronze Yohn now. He turned to Shagga. "Take them to their cells."

Lord Redfort had stood by quite placidly watching it all. Now he turned to Tyrion. "Neither of them will forget that, you know."

"I do not intend for them to. I do not intend for Lord Arryn to forget what Lord Royce did to him. If you wish to kill a snake, chop off its head. If you wish to kill two snakes, save yourself the effort and watch them kill each other.

He motioned for Timett to lead Lord Redfort out. When that was done, Tyrion stood alone in the lord's solar of the Gates of the Moon. From the walls the stone busts and tapestries of Arryn lords past stared down at him through eyes like bright blue sky. Judging him, he did not doubt. Everyone else had already judged him a hundred times over.

The Andals had landed here in the Vale thousands of years ago. They had brought those most stalwart of judges with them, the Seven Who Were One. He imagined the Father staring down at him, with his marble stare even colder than the eyes of Tywin Lannister. I wish I was the monster you seem to think I am, he thought. I wish I was as cruel and twisted as you all want me to be to prove yourselves correct.

The door of the solar opened then, and Penny crept in, closing the heavy iron door behind her as quietly as she could, which was not very quiet at all. Tyrion looked round at her and tried to smile. Doubtless that was even more horrifying than his already unsettled expression. Penny seemed to shrink back a little. Then she summoned her courage, and advanced. "Tyrion—"

"Don't," he said. "Don't talk to me about anything you heard while you were waiting outside."

"I wasn't—"

"You were. Don't lie to me." But even so the fear on her face was enough to make him soften his tone. "It doesn't matter, though. What you heard shouldn't have been a surprise to you. And before you say anything, I know you're right. I didn't have to do it. But I did. Because I wanted to. How does that make you feel?"

Her eyes went wide. "Tyrion," she said at last. "My lord… I wasn't… I really wasn't, I just got here, I swear. I saw Shagga taking the boy-lord down the steps, but nothing else."

To believe, or not to believe? At last he relented. "Have a drink, Penny."

"I... a drink, my lord."

"Tyrion. Not 'my lord'. Call me by my name. I tend to seek deference from taller men. But we have a charity in height. You can hardly tower over me." As he spoke he poured her a cup of wine, and set it down on the table. "Come and drink. If you do not, I will have to drink it myself. And I think we will both regret that."

Penny did as he had asked, sort of. She held the cup in uncertain hands and sniffed the contents suspiciously. Then she took a cautious sip. "It's good," she said.

"I should hope so," Tyrion replied. "I haven't had Arbor red since the Sealord's palace."

"I haven't had Arbor red in my life," mumbled Penny. But she took another sip. Tyrion watched her drink.

"Tysha was fond of wine," he said, out of nowhere. "In truth, that should have been the clue. She was innocent, truly. She had never known a wine-flush in her life. I thought as much, then, but later… after… I dismissed it as the trick of a mummer." He looked at Penny. "You were a mummer. Tell me, Penny, is it not easy for a mummer to play a role of far greater power than they truly boast?"

"It… is. Not for me, because I was always too small to pretend to power, but for some. Groat could do it, even. He made voices. And he made Crunch look like a great stallion rather than just the dog that he was."

"But it was easy, wasn't it? Not like weakness. The great and the powerful have never known weakness, so they never know how to feign it. Weakness, nervousness, fear, insecurity, you cannot pretend them, unless you have truly known them. Just as kings and high lords can never know the perils and worries of their lowly subjects." He considered that a moment. "Or, at least, it is very rare."

Penny was listening intently. Her eyes were blue and big as speckled eggs. "I don't think I have ever known it either. Weakness. Not properly. My name always kept me from the worst of it. My father mistrusted laughter. Whereas I… I despise it. If they had laughed at me, I would have struck them down. I would have proved to them that the monster inside me was real. I would sooner die than be laughed at, Penny. Do not forget that."

Now it was Penny's turn to heal him, to soothe him with her naïve balm. "You won't, though," she said. "You won't die, not here, because you haven't gotten back to Gerion yet."

She was right, of course. Because if I am right about Gerion, I am right about Tysha, and I cannot die without knowing the truth about her. And when I learn that truth, it may be that I cannot live with it.

"We had best set about finding him, then."

"Where?" she asked.

Where indeed? She meant Gerion, but he was thinking of Tysha. And he knew, at once, where to find her. "I have been travelling for years now, Penny," he said. "I have gone as far as I can alone." From the Rock to King's Landing to the Wall to King's Landing again, to Braavos and then to here, to end of this road. "And when you have come this far, there is only one place to go. Back."


Author's Note:

Often, when I am writing Tyrion, I ask myself "can I see Peter Dinklage saying these words?" I do this with other characters, but I think Dinklage and Tyrion are so synonymous now for me that I can't see anything else.

I do think show Tyrion has fallen a long way in Seasons 6 and 7. I would be willing to defend Season 5 Tyrion - his journey to Meereen was largely an improvement over endless repetitions of "where do whores go?" (Yes, I am a Season 5 apologist). I also think Tyrion was at his best in Season 4, at his most tortured and vindictive. I think, sadly, that this is a point to which his character is always forced to return. We never got this in A COAT OF GOLD, since forces intervened to prevent Tyrion from making his fantastic trial speech, but I see this chapter as something of a substitution.

I hope you didn't mind me skipping over the early parts, such as the siege - for what it's worth, it's pretty much exactly what we saw with Daenerys and Brightwater Keep earlier. The focus of this chapter, though, is the scene in the Lord's solar, which is uncomfortably, even agonisingly, long and torturous. And it is here that we see something that the show has forgotten, and indeed, I think, has never been brave enough to recognise: that Tyrion Lannister is no saint. Tyrion is most definitely his father's son, as Genna Lannister wisely noted in A Feast for Crows. The ultimatum has aspects of The Rains of Castamere to it. It's up to you whether you believe Tyrion was genuine in his threat regarding Royce's daughter, but bear in mind that he threatened to have Tommen beaten in A Clash of Kings after Cersei took possession of Alayaya.

Towards the end of the chapter, Tyrion makes this speech to Penny:

"The great and the powerful have never known weakness, so they never know how to feign it. Weakness, nervousness, fear, insecurity, you cannot pretend them, unless you have truly known them. Just as kings and high lords can never know the perils and worries of their lowly subjects. Or, at least, it is very rare."

The irony here is that Tyrion doesn't know what these things are truly like, either. Which, I think, is the purpose of Penny as a dramatic foil to Tyrion: she is proof that he has, in truth, not had it too bad after all.

We end this chapter with some musings on the great unresolved thread of Tysha. And the Tyrion's intentions are regarding her and Gerion is a matter of perception, too.

More news: as a result of several busy things converging all at once, there will be no further updates on KNIGHTS OF THE NIGHTINGALE until at least June 20th, 2018.

That being said, you can probably expect a greater number of updates over the summer: I hope to get to Chapter 60 by September, which may seem like quite a big ask, but there's a lot of stuff planned out that can be, for want of a better phrase, "scrawled down".