Father.

I heartily agree that you should restore Lord Tarbeck to his lady in exchange for my three cousins. Returning him to her in three pieces should be sufficient to remind her that Lannisters pay their debts and not everyone else's.

Also, I want to marry Joanna. Please send your consent by the next raven.

Your respectful son

Tywin.

Tywin handed the raven scroll to a servant, watched calmly as the man left the room, then leapt to his feet to go after him. He'd changed his mind.

Tywin got as far as wrenching the door open, making his guards jump a foot in the air, before changing his mind yet again. He closed the door slowly and quietly, and stood leaning against it for a moment, the cool wood surprisingly soothing against his burning forehead.

His mind groaned like the hinges of an ancient gate that longed to be closed, but was kept firmly and cruelly open by its keepers; people and ideas and hate and shame and anger and annoyance and questions and confusion and love and history streaming in and out of it at will and making such an unbearable racket that Tywin felt only mildly conscious of being sane.

Earlier that day, he had come upon Prince Aerys in the library, talking with Cousin Joanna. The prince was standing rather closer to her than Tywin thought appropriate, and was impeding all her chances of escape in a manner of questionable courtesy; standing as she was with her back to a bookshelf, unable to move; a ponderous tome clutched to her chest like a shield. Joanna's hair fell unbound to her waist; she was biting on her teeth to stop herself from crying; and there was something of a threat in her form; something crushed and unbearable trying to pull her apart.

Something is troubling her. Not Prince Aerys, I think. He is simply making whatever it is worse.

Tywin admired Prince Aerys. He was an educated young man, if a little verbose, with a fine mind for strategy, and would make a great king someday soon, if his father and grandfather keeled over as soon as was commonly expected. The discomfort on Joanna's face, however, and Aerys' evident desire to ignore it, left Tywin sorely tempted to ask him how well dragons could fly before heaving him out the window.

Do not think like a petulant child, he had told himself, remember that he does not know her as well as you do.

'I will ask my lord grandfather to provide troops,' the prince was saying.

'This is a Westerlands matter,' Joanna replied flatly, 'and it is certainly not serious enough to involve the Crown.'

'Joanna?' Tywin said simply, causing Aerys to step hurriedly back from her like he'd been scourged.

Tywin bowed deeply.

'My prince,' he greeted.

'Lord Tywin,' Aerys replied.

'If I might beg your indulgence by asking permission to speak to my cousin alone.'

The corner of Aerys' mouth tweaked in annoyance, but he bowed courteously in response and walked to the door.

Joanna let the book drop to the floor, and did not even wait for Prince Aerys to leave the room before approaching her cousin and walking into his arms, nestling her head into his chest and putting her arms around his waist, starting to cry in earnest.

As Tywin wound his arms around her back, he felt her jump at the sound of a sudden hiss of annoyance, followed by the slamming of the library door. He rocked her gently as though nothing had happened, trying to calm her down. She felt impossibly small; improperly fragile; her body not enough to contain her. He could feel her shoulder blades through her gown, delicate as a bird's, her slender waist felt brittle against his, and her hair smelled like breakable things; like jasmine and lavender. How could her body be so unlike who she was? The rest of her was wildfire; and when they had been small, Tywin had thought that when her fire diminished, like it was doing now, he had kept it alive in his own chest for her, until she could take it back.

It had taken him years to realise that that particular sensation was only the physical manifestation of his desire to kill every person that made her cry.

Her tears were making her hair stick to her cheeks, so he smoothed it gently back from her face, his fingertips dabbing lightly at the tender skin beneath her eyes.

'What's the matter, cousin?' he asked softly.

Joanna sniffled.

'They've taken Stafford.'

'Who's taken Stafford?'

She handed him a raven scroll.

A similar one was waiting for him when he returned to his chambers after passing the unwieldy baton of convincing Joanna to rest to her septa ('I don't need a rest, I need my hunting knife and a fast horse!'). The scroll was written in his father's hand, and worst of all, in his tone, and it was that, rather than the words themselves that made Tywin so angry.

It's not my fault I didn't mean for it to happen I didn't mean to offend I didn't want to offend But I do so hate conflict But I didn't know what to do But being generous is surely a good thing It was a moment's madness and now look what's happened Why can't we all live in peace My nerves are not what they once were, my son You are too much like your mother, blessed be her her memory Why do you always desire war.

Tywin stared hard at the wall for hours and hours, ignoring each knock at his door, sending the servants scurrying when they entered to light his candles and cursing his father to the seven hells for bringing their family to this.

When Tywin had been small, he had thought it a wonderful thing to have a father that made people laugh. Every Westerlander, from the renowned drunks of Lannisport, to the stable boys of Casterly Rock, to the bannermen that owed House Lannister allegiance, laughed when they spoke of him and laughed when they saw him, and Tywin loved him for it. His father had a good heart. He would tell Tywin funny stories, and give him sweets whenever he asked for them, and he had a strange way of scratching his head when he was confused that made him look like an owl, making Tywin hoot in laughter and shout at Father to do the same.

Father made Tywin happy by making him laugh, and created happiness in other people by making them laugh. And each time Tywin sat at lessons, learning of the characteristic sternness of House Tully of Riverrun or House Stark of Winterfell, he would be relieved that he did not live at Riverrun or Winterfell, but at Casterly Rock; a place where laughter was welcome.

But then the younger Lord Tarbeck had visited with them and had shouted out for all the world to hear that Father was too much of a coward to ask for his own money back, and a roar of laughter had gone up across the entire practice yard. And Tywin's heart had wrenched and frozen in his chest and his head had almost caved in under the humiliation of it as he had realised that people laughed at Father because they found him ridiculous, not because they loved him. And that imbecilic little fool Tarbeck could do nothing but laugh; dancing and gesturing like a lord throwing coins to a crowd. Tywin remembered very little of what had happened next, only the sound of Joanna's voice.

'Don't kill him! Please! Please don't.'

He had wanted to slaughter every last person who had laughed at his father that day. It hadn't taken him long, of course, to realise that his father had more than earned each gale of laughter that was directed at him.

The family's coffers might as well as have been left abandoned on the Kingsroad, for all the care that Father took of them. It was common practice for bannermen to ask Lord Tytos for enormous amounts of coin to fortify a castle or to rebuild a village ravaged by flooding, and to use the money to hold lavish feasts and tourneys. Extravagant furnishings for their castles, rooms of gowns for their wives and daughters, and unfailingly large quantities of weapons for their sons were funded almost entirely on coin from Casterly Rock. On the rare occasions that Lord Tytos did not prove accommodating, it sufficed to bark an insult at him to get him to yield. The worse the insult, the more coin he would give, because he would do anything to be left alone.

Naturally, the taxes charged by Lord Tytos' bannermen increased each time their greed did, and not one of them thought to use their ill-gotten coin to ease the suffering of the poor; so starvation, theft, murder and whoring increased exponentially in the Westerlands, and brigandage proved such a serious threat to the lands of some of the smaller Houses that their lords soon adopted the habit of applying to House Tarbeck or House Reyne for protection rather than to their rightful overlord, House Lannister.

And all the while, people would laugh, as though the whole sorry business were the greatest joke ever conceived of.

Tywin would wince each time he heard a cackle, or a giggle, or a snigger, however unconnected to his father it might be. Sometimes he would cry so hard that he thought his heart would rupture. And eventually, he built castle walls around the winging, whining weakling of an organ that was somehow responsible for keeping him alive, and forced himself to listen, and think, and watch every smile and every laugh on every face in Casterly Rock; feeling nothing, but swearing that one day he would have silence.

He didn't mind so much when Joanna laughed, of course, but there was no mockery in the way Joanna laughed, only joy; and though the emotion was almost foreign to him (now), watching her giggling about something she found funny (him, most likely) would be enough to make him feel something like happiness. When she left, the feeling would leave with her, and he would pray that Father would send him to foster somewhere far away from the jokes and the sneers. It never happened.

Casterly Rock was honoured, shortly after Tywin's tenth birthday, with a royal visit from King Aegon. 'Renewed vows of friendship, two great Houses such as ours should not be strangers,' and so on. How very quaint. Tywin knew, as did everyone else, that the King was really coming to tell Father that he'd turned the Westerlands into a riotous, disorderly disgrace and that his Wardenship of the West would be revoked if he failed to do something about it.

When Father emerged after spending the entire first afternoon of the royal visit cooped up in his solar with King Aegon, he did not even have the good grace to cast doubt upon this theory, drinking glass after glass of wine at the welcoming feast while the King glowered at him with barely-suppressed disgust from his place of honour at Lord Tytos' side. Having drunk nothing but water and willow tea for the past twenty years, Father was irredeemably drunk by the time the dancing began, and worst of all, everyone could see it.

As Tywin returned to the high table after a rare dance with Cousin Joanna, his head hanging in despair at the very idea of sitting down again, he observed a servant attempting to refill Father's glass, causing his mother to place her hand firmly on top of it in refusal. To Tywin's horror, Father simply seized the pitcher from the servant's hands and drank from that, wine spilling down his chin and onto his doublet. The hall roared with laughter, and Tywin turned to face them, murder in his eyes.

The laughs died away immediately.

There was an unbearable tension in Tywin's limbs that made him feel like they were turning to stone. His hands clenched into fists, his mouth was reduced to a painful gash; and he prepared for the moment when the silence would be broken, when someone would whistle, or catcall, and everyone would remember that he was just a boy, a mouse, the son of a doddering old fool.

But the silence did not break, and as Tywin continued to glare at them, the tautness in his muscles fading away, the sound of his breath returning to his ears, and his heart beginning to beat, very quickly, he realised that he was doing nothing more threatening than looking at them; feeling no emotion more crippling than disdain, and they were staring at him in fear, as though he held a jar of wildfire in his hands.

It was exhilarating.

Tywin relished the feeling for a moment more, then turned to the musicians.

'Proceed.'

And they did, striking up an unusually raucous rendition of The Bear and the Maiden Fair with something like relief.

As Tywin regained his seat and called for wine, his blood singing like the battle fury, someone slumped into the vacant seat beside him, and he turned to ask whoever it was to leave him alone.

Tywin almost upset his wine glass, then, because his unwanted neighbour was King Aegon Targaryen, his silver-golden hair shining so brightly beneath his crown that Tywin found it difficult to tell where his hair ended and his crown began.

'You have not said a word to me since my arrival, little lord,' the King declared, taking the pitcher of wine from the servant and pouring out Dornish red, first for Tywin, then for himself.

Tywin would have been flabbergasted had he been in the habit of losing his composure. Instead, he cast about for something flattering to say. Flattery was the sort of thing kings liked, wasn't it?

'It is difficult to think of something meaningful to say when faced with the most powerful man in Westeros, Your Grace,' Tywin said eventually, feeling rather proud of himself.

Aegon's eyes narrowed.

'You think a crown gives you power?' the King asked casually, as though addressing an equal.

Tywin, grateful for the gesture, replied without hesitation.

'No. I think fear gives you power.'

Aegon nodded in approval, and drank deeply from his goblet before continuing to speak.

'I have spent most of the afternoon speaking with your lord father. And we have agreed that he will remain Warden of the West, if only to keep up appearances, but that it will be your lady mother, and no other, upon whom the burden of power will rest.'

The concept was too revolutionary for Tywin to wonder why the King was condescending to discuss this with him.

'Mother?' Tywin repeated, frowning slightly.

The King dismissed the question with a wave of the royal fingers.

'Lady Lannister's handling of the Tarbeck matter was ingenious.'

'She's a woman,' Tywin insisted, 'Father's bannermen will not like it.'

'If he breathes a word of this to his bannermen, I will have him executed,' Aegon declared, 'More wine.'

The servant poured, and the King drank.

'Excellent,' he pronounced, smacking his lips with perfect gentility before laying a hand on Tywin's sleeve, 'I wish to invite you to King's Landing, little lord. As my guest.'

Tywin's heart leapt in his chest, but he kept his face calm, as he had taught himself to do. Never let them see.

'For – for how long, my lord? Your Grace?' Tywin stuttered.

The King pursed his lips.

'Indefinitely. I had intended to wait two years, but after what I have seen tonight, I have realised that I cannot delay any longer. If you remain in the care of your parents, you will fall on your own sword before you're fifteen, and out of sheer boredom.'

Is this his way of telling me that Father is a fool and he wants to keep me away from him?

'But what I am to do in King's Landing, Your Grace?' Tywin asked.

'Anything you like,' Aegon replied, 'you may squire, if you wish to. You may train with the finest knights in the Kingdoms, if you wish to. You may study, if you wish to. And you may spend all your time doing nothing, if that is your desire. But I don't think it is. Do you?'

The King's purple eyes were trained on him, and for the first time in his life, Tywin felt that he was understood, understood by a person who wasn't Mother or Joanna. Tywin shook his head.

'No, Your Grace. I don't want to spend all my time doing nothing.'

When the King turned away from him to speak to Father, Tywin's heart exploded with excitement, then imploded as he realised that going to the capital meant leaving Joanna. She was his only friend, and the only one he was likely to have in the foreseeable future. He was made for solitude. He should value those friends that he had.

He hissed at himself not to be a fool. He had been praying for years for the gods to send him a way to leave Casterly Rock, and now that they had, he was worrying about a little girl.

Don't be ridiculous, he told himself, go to King's Landing. Escape.

When Joanna had heard the news, she had refused to talk to him, or even to look at him, and when the King had finally left Casterly Rock, taking Tywin with him, she had refused to come and say goodbye, screaming through her chamber door that he was a traitor and a coward.

He did not see her, or hear from her, in three years. Sometimes entire weeks would pass in which she did not even enter his thoughts. The capital was a distraction; a new world; a world where a boy could choose to lose himself, or to become himself. In King's Landing, weakness was crushed the moment it reared its head; vengeance followed every insult; and giants could rise through intellect alone in the playing of the only game that truly mattered: the game of thrones. Sometimes, after hearing some intrigue, he would find himself thinking 'How very interesting. I must tell Joanna.' Then he would remember that Joanna had been angry with him for the past three years, and would probably tear his letter up without reading it.

Joanna eventually came to King's Landing herself, as a companion to Princess Rhaella. She arrived on the hottest morning of the year, the sun seeming to hang higher in the sky than it did at noon, making Tywin feel faint as well as nervous. He was eager to see her again, but he had no desire to have his teeth punched in in front of half the court. She had a terrible temper.

When she arrived, he spotted her immediately as she rode astride like a man into the forecourt of the Red Keep, wearing a forest green hunting gown and high boots, two simple braids adorning her golden hair. She smiled when she saw him, as though the past three years had never happened.

'Well met, cousin!' Joanna chuckled charmingly as he helped her off her horse, and as she had crushed the breath from his lungs, laughing and dancing on the balls of her feet in delight, he had fallen in love.

Tywin started as he realised that the room around him was completely dark, and that he could barely see the opposite wall. His limbs also seemed to have gone numb. As he rose to his feet and felt blood flow back into them, he thought once again of his accursed father; Lord Tytos the good man, the coward, the fool who had remembered he was a Lannister, twenty years too late. When Tywin had read the words 'I have seized Lord Tarbeck,' he had almost leapt into the air with pride, even though he already knew, from Joanna, that Lady Tarbeck had imprisoned three Lannister hostages in retaliation, which would probably scare Father enough to give in to her demands.

When Tywin had read the words 'I am quite at a loss as to how to proceed,' he had bitten so hard on his lip that he drew blood. Was the old man simple? All he had to do was chop that old bastard Tarbeck into three chunks, one for each imprisoned Lannister, and send the pieces to Lady Tarbeck as a gift. None of Father's bannermen would ever bother him again.

Tywin stood alone in the dark, thinking of the advice he had sent to his father, hoping that he would follow it, knowing that he wouldn't, and thinking, fleetingly, of the words he had added to the raven scroll: 'Also, I want to marry Joanna.' He had realised it in the library today as she had fought against her tears, refusing to yield to them until he was near her, her own vulnerability too terrible a thing to face alone. In that grim determination, and in that looming helplessness, he had seen himself, and he had known that just as he protected her, she protected him, because she loved him, as he loved her.

The room was so dark that he could barely see his own hand in front of his face. He walked, stumbled, stubbed his toe, and opened the door.

Tywin tapped his sleeping guard on the helmet, relishing the yelp of surprise that ensued.

'Bring me some candles,' Tywin ordered, and walked back to his desk; leaving the door open; letting in the light.