LYLE
It did not take Lyle long to find a ship bound for Dragonstone: the Flower of Oldtown, a fat three-masted carrack, whose captain meant to pick up a cargo of dragonglass to sell to the glaziers of Myr.
"And your name?"
"Ben," said Lyle, "and the lad's my son, Petyr."
Captain Willem gave a disdainful glance to Prince Tommen Baratheon, heir to the Iron Throne. "Bald already, is he?"
Lyle shrugged. "Nits, mate. Y'know how it is."
He had heard that very poor boys were sometimes shorn of their hair to get rid of headlice. Going by the captain's response, Lyle supposed that either it was true or Willem did not know enough to contradict him.
Willem grunted. "Don't s'pose you can pay, then."
Lyle put a hand inside the linen clothes he had procured hurriedly from the merchant and it came out with silver. The bag Lord Tywin had provided for his grandson's expenses contained more than enough.
"Well, that'll do," said Willem, arching an eyebrow. "Don't expect anything fancy, mind you. You'll get a cabin big enough to sleep in and a share of the mess, till we're at Dragonstone. Then you get off. That's all I promise."
Lyle and his charge boarded the Flower of Oldtown at once, not wishing to stay on land in this place any longer than they had to. The longer they stayed here, amongst the great host of the westerlands that was encamped where the kingsroad crossed the Trident, the likelier it was that the men who had murdered Lord Tywin would find Lord Tywin's grandson. Late that day, Captain Willem got back on board, and he sent a boy from his crew to show Lyle and Prince Tommen where they would sleep.
As soon as he laid eyes upon it, Lyle realised that even Willem's unappealing description had been an embellishment. This was no cabin. It was a cargo hold where the boy from the crew was hastily setting up two threadbare and moth-eaten hammocks.
Tommen spoke up, "But the captain said—"
Lyle slapped him. Not hard, but hard enough that Prince Tommen stopped and looked up at him in shock.
"Carry on, lad," Lyle said.
When the ship's boy was gone, Tommen said plaintively, "You hit me, ser." Thankfully he seemed more surprised and questioning than angry. That was strange, for a prince who was surely unaccustomed to such. Mayhaps he has more of his father's strength in him than I thought.
"I'm sorry, my prince, I had to. You mustn't complain. We'll sleep here and take what we're given."
"But this isn't a cabin, ser, and the captain said we'd have a cabin," Tommen protested. "He lied!"
"What of it? Of course he did. We're just two poor travellers as far as he's concerned, naught but purses for him to lighten. Petyr son of Ben isn't accustomed to anything better. He was born in the gutter, begging my prince's pardon. You dare not let them notice you're highborn, else this ship will be heading for King's Landing as fast as the wind can bear her, to deliver you into the hands of the usurper. Take care, my prince. One misplaced word could cost your head."
Tommen nodded tearfully. "I'll try, Ser Lyle. I'll do better, I promise."
The Flower of Oldtown sailed downstream along the Trident for more than a day. Lyle and Prince Tommen stood or sat on her deck, watching the bustle of Lord Tywin's camp give way to a rural idyll of small villages and sheep and cattle, marred by patches of rubble, ash and blackened ruins where armies had pillaged. She passed the town of Saltpans, plundered and burnt, and a little island for which Lyle knew no name, then ventured out into the Bay of Crabs. Late in the evening, the riverlands gave way to open water.
The sea left little to look for, though the sailors were hard at work in the shallow, sometimes rocky waters of the bay. Crackclaw Point was not mountainous country. There was no shield between the carrack and the storms that stirred in the Narrow Sea. There were fierce winds that beset her, and rain that poured down upon Lyle's head in sudden and unpredictable deluges, but her crew battled day and night to avoid the rocks and bail out the water, and their skill proved true. After four more days, she passed the utmost tip of Crackclaw Point and left the Bay of Crabs behind her.
Beyond Crackclaw Point the Flower of Oldtown set course southward for a further two days. The waters in Blackwater Bay were deeper and wider than those in the Bay of Crabs. Here were no rocks to be feared; the land where Lyle had stood sank under the horizon and receded into nothing. But these waters were even less sheltered from autumn storms than those before, and amidst the howling winds there could be no easy sleep.
So it was that Lyle's eyes were shrouded with dark circles when the jagged spire of Dragonmount climbed out of the sea. It could be seen long before any other part of the island around it, and every town, every village, every aspect of the rest of the island brooded in its shadow. The settlements in most parts of Dragonstone were little more than fishing villages; no ship of respectable size could sail amidst such cruel and craggy rocks. The Flower of Oldtown had to sail around to the eastern side of the island to find the town of Dragonsport, which had a great harbour for her to moor. And when she did, Lyle saw for the first time the seat of Aegon the Conqueror.
The castle of Dragonstone, named for the island where it lay, was great and towering, though it was dwarfed by the vastness of the mountain from whose eastern face it arose. It was wrought entirely of a single form of stone, dark as a midnight sky, yet glittering, and countless beasts of queer legend and dreadful history perched all about it as its gargoyles.
Ruddy light lined the horizon when the Flower of Oldtown docked in the harbour of Dragonsport, though black-bottomed clouds had stolen the sight of the sun. The berths were full of ships. Many of them were fishing boats, the lifeblood of Dragonstone. Many were cogs, with sigils of seahorses, stags, swordsmen and swordfish. Many were merchantmen like the Flower of Oldtown. But Lyle's heart was most gladdened to see the galleys of the royal fleet, hundreds of warships flying the black stag on gold of Baratheon. The heart of Dragonstone's power, at least at sea, had not been as diminished in the Battle of King's Landing as he had feared.
Lyle watched the sailors work and the bustle of piers, market squares, brewhouses, inns, smokehouses, storehouses, stalls, shops and shacks come closer. The rain was torrential, water droplets crashing hard and fast against the ground. Drop-drop-drop-drop-drop.
When the Flower of Oldtown's anchor had dropped, Lyle grasped his charge's hand. "Father?" Prince Tommen replied, instead of "ser". The boy was getting better at that. Lyle suspected that, of the two of them, it was himself who was the more uncomfortable.
"We must check for anything we've left behind," Lyle said, and the prince followed him out of the rain, down to their sorry excuse for a cabin. Lyle removed the bag that he held always beneath his cloak and dug around in it. The patched, grey and brown servants' clothes that he and his charge had worn so briefly in Lord Tywin's camp, which he had kept in case they be needed to hide later, were at the top, to conceal the rest; they were the least necessary of his possessions, most bearable if they were lost. The coins of silver and gold, the allowance Lord Tywin had provided to his grandson, lay underneath. Hopefully any thief would take those, count himself blessed and stop looking. Below them, most precious of all, was Lyle's fine snow-white cloak, gifted to him by the Lord Regent of the Seven Kingdoms when he was raised to the order of the Kingsguard, and, wrapped within it, the curly golden locks that he had cut from Prince Tommen's head: the best proof he had of their identities to the Lady Dowager of Dragonstone.
"I don't think anyone took your possessions, Ser Lyle," offered Tommen.
"That is not why we are here, my prince," said Lyle, though in truth he had worried a little, however foolish such fears might be. "We must speak of our plans for today." He kept his voice quiet, though it meant Tommen had to come close to hear him, for even here raindrops could be heard hammering on the deck above. Drop-drop-drop-drop-drop.
"Aren't we going to my lady aunt's castle?" said Prince Tommen, blinking. He added, "Though it would be nice to have some supper."
"No. Or I should say, not yet. Lady Selyse won't be as likely to trust us if we creep in at this hour, like thieves in the night. Moreover, I don't know where she stands."
"You mean, she might be like the westerlords who betrayed Grandfather?" said Tommen. Lyle had explained the truth behind Lord Tywin's death to his charge. It would do the prince no good to be sheltered from knowledge of the treachery of men.
"Yes," said Lyle, pleased at how well the prince listened and how quickly he grasped the situation. Not for the first time, he wondered how Prince Tommen could possibly be a brother to Joffrey. "We'll go to an inn—a dirty sort of inn, not some grand place fit for lords or rich merchants—and hear what common fishermen and sailors say in their cups. They ought to know whether Lady Selyse has made peace with the usurper, and they'll speak of it with less care than the powerful. Then, if we think your lady aunt is loyal, we'll go to the castle, joining the men seeking audiences with their liege, and reveal ourselves to her on the morrow."
"And if she isn't?"
Lyle winced. "We must hope not…" The voice of the Lord Regent rang in his head: Come blood, come battle, come the Others from the seven hells, you will keep him safe. "If Lady Selyse is a traitor, I will take you across the Narrow Sea. If neither the westerlands nor Dragonstone holds true, we have no hope of taking back your father's throne."
Prince Tommen absorbed this solemnly.
"Now when we leave," Lyle said, "remember this, my prince. We left the capital before the war. Your father is a trader, and not a rich one. Avoid speaking to people if you can help it, though don't be so silent it makes you suspicious. If anyone speaks with you at length, they might understand you know little of what a trader's son should know and too much of what he shouldn't. I beg your pardon, but I dare not call you by your title any more, even in our room, until we're safe in your lady aunt's castle. Men are treacherous. If they knew who you are and knew you have only one man to protect you, many would kidnap or kill you in a heartbeat for a little of Lord Renly's gold."
With that, Lyle and his charge left the Flower of Oldtown behind them. After setting foot on a pier in Dragonsport, he rushed for an inn, not the first one that Prince Tommen saw—a smart-looking place with neat brickwork and clean glass windows—but another, grimier and in the other direction. Lyle was drenched as he ran. There was no lightning, but the rain was thunderous. Drop-drop-drop-drop-drop.
He stepped inside, clutching his sopping wet cloak, and entered a loud common room filled with dozens of rough-faced sailors and salt-smelling fishermen. Most of them were drunk. Lyle clutched Prince Tommen's hand hard amidst the press of men, not daring to risk losing the boy. Heads turned to look at them, for Lyle was a big man, tall and broad and well-built; it was not for his martial prowess alone that men called him Strongboar. But he refrained from pushing his way through the other men to get closer to the hearth, trying to act as if he were accustomed to being in places such as this, and soon the heads turned away.
Lyle hung his cloak near the fire, ordered a pint of what turned out to be blisteringly sharp ale and took a seat far from the hearth. All of the warmer seats were taken. Prince Tommen sat beside him on a rickety wooden chair much too large for a boy of eight. They rested, and listened, and said nothing.
To Lyle's frustration, the men did not seem to wish to speak about the war. They spoke to each other about recent hauls of fish and the closure of an ironmongery and complaints about the weather and who was sleeping with whose sister. Perhaps they knew of Lady Selyse's decisions about the war, but if they did, they all knew, and they did not have new tidings of it to share with one another. As Lyle listened to more and more of this drivel he wanted to shake them awake. He was not here to hear the petty gossip of peasants. Did these fools not know that their island was a centrepiece of the war that was raging across the Seven Kingdoms? The Iron Throne is seat to a usurper, and here I stand, hearing about where it has lately been best to find haddock!
Yet he dared not attempt to redirect the conversation to his ends. Doubtless there would be some genuine traders in this inn's common room. If he spoke, some might ask about his supposed occupation, and he would know little of what he should. Nor did he dare to drift between seats to try to eavesdrop on different men, lest he reveal that he was here for information.
In a foul mood, Lyle bought a room for the night and led his charge there. He gave Prince Tommen the bed and took the floor for himself. Though he was tired and the hard, dry wooden panels were not as uncomfortable as some places he had slept on on campaign, he slept little, for the roof and the walls were thinner than they should have been. They failed to block out the noise of the downpour, rainwater battering the ground incessantly. Drop-drop-drop-drop-drop.
The next day, Lyle took his charge outside and had to explain to him, without truly explaining, why they were not heading to the castle, with cryptic words about not knowing "how things lie". He wandered around the shops and piers and market squares of Dragonsport with Prince Tommen. It was against Lyle's instinct as a knight of the Kingsguard to take the prince through such a dangerous place, with far too many men to count and watch, any of whom could be Lord Renly's hired knives, when there was only one man, himself, to protect him. However, leaving the boy alone without him would be worse.
Nonetheless, the folk of Dragonsport seemed more interested in matters of herring, cod and plaice than in matters of roses, stags and lions, so Lyle heard naught of what he was seeking for three days more. Then, late one afternoon, more ships arrived from the south: a little fleet of cogs rendered for the movement of men-at-arms, each and every one flying a banner that was mostly white but had three stripes across its upper right corner, as golden as the lion of Lannister.
When the whiteness of the banners could only just be made out in the distance, a man behind Lyle remarked to his neighbour, "Them's Chyttering men, I reckon. Only old Lord Hendry's folk still comin', then I s'pose they're all goin' off."
The other man grunted and spoke no more of it, but that was enough. Lyle's heart was racing. He recognised the name of the Chytterings of Fenmouth from the south of Massey's Hook, one of the six greatest vassal Houses sworn to Dragonstone, and when, later, the ships were close enough for him to see the bendlets he knew that the sigil was correct as well. The Sunglasses of Sweetport Sound were another such House, and Hendry Sunglass was their lord. Those few seconds had given him more of the information he needed than the previous few days. Lady Selyse was gathering her bannermen, and not just to make a strong garrison at Dragonstone. She intended to send them forth to war once more.
Lyle had to force himself to be calm. He did not yet know where they would be sailing to. Quite possibly the rest of the island did not know; Lady Selyse might prefer secrecy. Mayhaps she meant to collect an army of stormlanders and Reachmen at King's Landing and carry them to the mouth of the Trident, and then upstream, to confront the western host, for she might not know that many of the lords and highborn knights of the west had already betrayed their king and murdered their liege for Renly. But if he stayed and watched, he might obtain a better idea of Lady Selyse's intentions.
Lyle watched them come upon the port with a soldier's practised eye. These ignorant fisherfolk might be impressed, but he knew better. Groups of House Chyttering's men reaching land clustered together uncertainly as gaggles of friends before eventually, with the aid of their sergeants, arranging themselves properly in formation. These men knew how to hold their weapons and don their armour, and they knew formation, but they were too slow to react with order and discipline in a situation they were not prepared for. These men are green as grass, Lyle thought. He hoped that the rest of Lady Selyse's men were more seasoned but feared that they would not be. The lands of the Narrow Sea had lost thousands of their menfolk in the Clash of the Stags and a goodly number more at King's Landing, and they had never been a populous domain in the first place.
Lyle was not a lone watcher. A crowd gathered in Dragonsport to see the men of House Chyttering disembark. So did a welcoming party of Dragonstone men, a hundred men-at-arms wearing surcoats with the crowned stag of Baratheon.
From among the ranks of Chyttering soldiers, a tall broad man in silvery armour strode forth to greet the Baratheon men. His herald named him as "Ser Arthur Hartford, the Knight of Hartford, sworn bannerman and brother to Danelle of the House Chyttering, Lady Regent of Fenmouth."
A stout, hairy man with a double chin, armoured but allowing the newly arriving men to see his face, stepped out from among the Baratheon men, and his own herald cried, "Announcing Axell of the House Florent, Lord of Brightwater, victor of the Blackwater, master of ships and lord commander of the host at Dragonstone for His Grace the King!"
They have stayed true. Lyle exhaled with relief. His fear had been needless. Lord Axell Florent would not still be calling himself a member of the king's small council if the king he meant was Renly. The usurper would never allow one of the men who had brought about his humiliating defeat in the Battle of the Blackwater to hold such a lofty place.
"Greetings, Ser Arthur. It is a pleasure to meet you and welcome you to Dragonstone on my lady niece's behalf," Lord Axell said. "I look forward to working with you." He gave Ser Arthur a firm handshake.
"Likewise," said the knight in gleaming armour, shaking hands, and then his left hand cut Lord Axell's throat.
Fenmouth men charged at the men of Dragonstone, arrayed in neat lines as if for parade. The first line of Baratheon soldiers scarce had time to process what had just happened and lift their swords before the enemy were upon them. Ser Arthur Hartford's men slew them swiftly, then came at the others. The Chyttering men were inexperienced, but the Baratheon men were equal in that, and the Chytterings had the numbers, more than two to one. Screams and shrieks of men and metal filled Lyle's ears, and the world turned to shock and savagery.
He spent seconds there, gazing, feet rooted to the ground; then he got over his surprise, judged in an instant that there was no chance, and ran.
The crowd split in all directions, screaming. Old men, young men, mothers, maidens, boys, crones… all turned on their heels and fled. Dragonsport emptied itself of people, fast as their legs could bear them. It was a crush of mankind, too many people too close, and any who were small or frail could easily be trampled by the big and strong. Few were bigger or stronger than Lyle, but Prince Tommen was different. His hand was torn from Lyle's in an instant by a pair of brothers rushing for their lives, and Lyle had to stop, turn around and force his way through the crowd through bulk alone to find him and pick him up again. It was tiresome work forcing himself against such a fearsome flow of men, even for Lyle. By the time he found the boy bruised and bleeding on the floor, most of the watchers had already gone. He bent down, picked him up, and fled for his life and for the life of his charge.
At first he was just running, thoughtless, fleeing in blind panic. Then it occurred to him where he must run. This was surely the prelude to a grand attack; Danelle Chyttering would never dare to be so bold alone, else Lady Selyse's men elsewhere on the island would retake Dragonsport and defeat her. This only made sense if the men of Fenmouth meant to burn the royal fleet and enable Lord Renly's southerners to seize the island. Dragonstone must not fall, or the cause is lost. But there was a way to stop it. He needed the men-at-arms in the castle of Dragonstone. If they came quickly enough, they might be able to keep the royal fleet and defeat the Fenmouth traitors.
Lyle made for a place he had seen before to be a stable. It was empty, its owners recently fled, so he put his charge down, shoved some silver on the table and found a dapple grey mare. He hastily saddled her, then, gasping with the effort, plucked plump Prince Tommen up high and put him on her back. He himself mounted, holding his trampled prince, and left the blood and chaos of Dragonsport behind him.
The only straight way to Dragonstone from the eastern side of the island, where Dragonsport lay, was a perilously steep climb. Instead, Lyle spurred his mount to a gallop on a path that went past the castle and then back again, winding around Dragonmount, several times. It was a journey of miles, and though he knew it was faster this way than climbing, he fretted for the lost time. Dragonstone the island was too large; Dragonstone the castle was too far from Dragonsport to see or hear what was happening unless the Fenmouth men torched the ships, and, Lyle realised, they would probably seize the royal fleet, not burn it. Danelle Chyttering's men did not need to hold Dragonstone against the strength of its loyal defenders for long, only long enough for the true enemy to arrive. Every moment he delayed was another moment Lord Renly's men would get to reach the island.
He rode on, and stopped at a place near Dragonstone's main gate. They were not actually at the gate—that would take one more circuit around Dragonmount—so Lyle prayed his voice was loud enough to be heard from more than a hundred feet below.
"Danger!" he roared at the top of his voice. "Lady Danelle's a traitor! They're attacking! The Chytterings are attacking now! I need to speak to the lady!"
The guards on the gate must have been gazing down at a single, apparently unarmed, inoffensive-looking smallfolk man and his son. The gate did not open. Lyle's heart sank. Clearly they had heard that he had spoken, but they had not made out the words, or, if they had, they were not going to let him in.
I've no need to reach them. I only need be heard. Leaving the mare with Tommen, he pulled himself up the jutting dark rock with his bare hands, struggling to climb. "Treason! There's an attack!" he called, again and again. "Send help!"
At last, to Lyle's surprise, the gate opened and a man walked out, surrounded by armoured men whose surcoats bore sigils of stags, seahorses and swordfish. He was slender as a rapier, handsome and exquisitely well-dressed, wearing silks of blue-green and a shade of silver that matched the colour of his hair. He craned his head to look at Lyle, forty feet down.
"I am Aurane Waters, of Driftmark, second-in-command of this castle by the will of Lady Selyse," the slender man said. "Speaking to me is as good as speaking to her ladyship; I've just been dining with her now. What tidings do you bring, goodman?"
Lyle slumped against the rock face in relief. "Danelle Chyttering has betrayed the king!" he yelled. "Her brother murdered Lord Axell in cold blood and her men attacked his escort."
"Warrior defend us!" Waters swore. "Such treachery!"
"I think she has two or three hundred," called Lyle, trying to make sure the relieving force had as much information as he could give them. "Dragonsport is theirs by now, most like. You'll need—"
"Roses."
A moment of silence—then the Bar Emmon and Velaryon soldiers fell upon their Baratheon comrades with swords in hand. The men of Dragonstone had no chance to defend themselves, surprised and surrounded. With hideous suddenness the men with sigils of swordfish and seahorses cut them down.
Lyle's grip on the rock slackened and he almost fell. No, he thought, numb and terrified, no, Mother give us mercy, no…
Amidst the bloody slaughter the bastard of Driftmark was shouting orders. "Jon! Go to the Windwyrm and pick up more of our men. Kill any Baratheons or Farrings you see. Fast as you can, don't let them get organised. Tom! Take your men and secure the armoury, and keep a watch on Sea Dragon Tower. Don't try to kill all the Imp's cocksuckers, we'll do that later, but I don't want any Lannisters getting their hands on weapons." There are survivors from the Battle of King's Landing here, all kept in the same tower, unarmed, Lyle realised with a lurch in his stomach. Lady Selyse did see betrayal, but her mistrust was in the wrong place. "Androw! Put men inside each of the entrances to the Stone Drum, except from Exile's Tower. Hold them as long as you can until Jon's men can reinforce you. Take it then."
Parties of men with red-dripping swords rushed into the castle with each command. Waters turned back towards Lyle.
"You stupid fucking peasant, you brought word early," he snarled. "Now if you have half the wits the Father gave a mouse, run."
Aurane Waters and the last of his band of traitors disappeared inside the gate.
Lyle leant wearily against the sharp dark stone, his hands bleeding. Prince Tommen was his charge, assigned to him by the Lord Regent, and both Prince Tommen and himself would be best served by running. House Chyttering, House Bar Emmon and House Velaryon had all betrayed Lady Selyse Baratheon. House Celtigar had betrayed her long ago, and House Sunglass's men had not yet arrived. Only House Farring and her own Dragonstone men remained true, and they were being taken by surprise. The king and his cousin were as good as dead already. If Lyle went up there, all that it would do was kill him.
The best leader of men he had ever served under had given him the highest honour anyone had ever bestowed on him. He had sworn a vow.
Mayhaps I don't have half the wits the Father gave a mouse, Lyle thought. I'm going anyway.
It was forty feet up, but getting down to reach the horses was further than that. He had to go onward. Gritting his teeth, Lyle grasped for handholds and pulled himself up with all his strength. No man could walk here; the slope was not quite sheer straight up, but it was closer kin to that than to a level surface. Many times he cut his palms and fingers on the jagged jutting rock, and had to wipe them where he could, so that his hands did not slip on his own blood. Worse, Dragonmount was treacherous. Twice he put his weight upon a handhold or foothold that suddenly gave way, leaving him flailing to grab anything he could to stop himself from falling.
It was cruel work, bloody, and frustratingly slow. Every moment he had to stop himself from thinking of his king and the loyal men in the castle, being murdered by Waters's band of traitors. They were threatened, true, but it would not give them any succour if he fell. He needed every ounce of concentration. At last his bleeding fingers grasped and clutched and pulled, and his torso collapsed forward onto the patch of carved-flat rock in front of the gate. The ground was littered with dead men.
"Take my hand."
Father Above, no. He knew that voice far too well.
Lyle swung up his legs, then stood unaided at the edge. All his limbs were exhausted and his bloody hands were screaming. "What are you doing here?" he demanded of Prince Tommen. "It is perilous. There are traitors near. Ride away; we'll meet at the foot of Dragonmount, or if I don't, take the bag of gold and flee."
Tommen said, "No."
"My prince, this is for your safety. Go. Now. Go."
"I'm not leaving you, Ser Lyle," the trampled prince said stubbornly. "You're coming for Joffy and our cousin, aren't you? Joffy's awful, but he's my brother still, a Baratheon, and so is my cousin, and Grandfather says a man can't let his blood get hurt or his House is worth nothing at all."
Lyle's first instinct was to decline; he certainly would not take the prince into danger, whatever the late Lord Tywin said about Houses. Then it occurred to him to wonder whether Tommen would be safer alone, even temporarily, as a child prince in an island full of traitors, or with a knight of the Kingsguard.
"Fuck me with a rusty axe," he muttered. "Stay close."
They got on the horse.
The great gate was open and abandoned. Aurane Waters had not closed it after the slaughter here, probably to allow for Chyttering reinforcements. Holding the heir to the Iron Throne, Lyle rode the grey mare over a company of cooling corpses into the Conqueror's castle.
The front yard was deserted by the living and crowded by the dead, most of them wearing Baratheon and Farring surcoats. House Farring remains true. That is some blessing at least—not quite all of Dragonstone's vassals have turned traitor. The traitors' men, it appeared, had moved on to fights further inside. Lyle glanced around. There were three towers he could see at the outer walls. Metallic clangs and shouts were coming from two. The third was as silent as the grave. There was a sept wrought of glittering black stone and a surpassingly lovely garden, neither of whose names he knew, but their beauty was tarnished; the windows of the sept were broken, filling the floor with thousands of fragments of stained glass of ever-so-slightly different shades, and the red in the garden came now from blood as much as roses.
A great tower stood at the centre of the castle, taller than any of the others, in place of what should have been a keep in an ordinary Westerosi castle: doubtless what Waters had called the Stone Drum. He could hear the sounds of battle from its upper levels. It looked more defensible than the rest of Dragonstone, and was probably the royal family residence, but Lyle recalled what the bastard of Driftmark had ordered. It would be too heavily guarded. There were walkways from the three outer towers, but two of those were still full of fighting soldiers—the noise told it—and the third was so far away that he would have to run all the way around the Stone Drum, and would probably be seen. There appeared only one hope. Lyle saw a huge black dragon lying on its belly, so vast that it made any dragon that ever lived seem as a pygmy. It was a hall made of the same glittering dark stone, like starry night, which made up so much of this place, and, though it was far, he would not have to go all around the Stone Drum to reach it. He was not sure, but the way the dragon's tail rested against the Stone Drum made it look like it might contain a passage, to rescue the young king and his betrothed and take them away to as safe a place as could be found in treason-blighted Westeros.
Or, of course, it might be solid stone.
There was no time for doubt. Lyle dismounted from the mare—she was no war-trained destrier—and ran into the mouth of the black dragon. Four mailed men were waiting there with surcoats of blue swordfish on silver and white. He put his sword through one man's face before the man had even noticed he was there; with the force of a charging bull, he barrelled over another, breaking several bones. His ribs ached, but that did not stop him from stepping back, pulling out his sword and exchanging a series of blows with the last two Bar Emmon men. Parry, feint, lunge, stab… they had some grasp of form and footwork, but it was deficient, and the sheer strength behind Lyle's blows rattled their arms. A minute later, both were dead, and so was the wounded man on the ground, put out of his misery.
Prince Tommen's eyes were wide with amazement. "How do I do that, ser?"
"Those poor bastards were young men, green as grass, and I'm bested by the likes of Jaime Lannister; and I got them by surprise," Lyle said curtly. "There's the lesson. Now come on."
The hall inside the dragon was a graveyard. There had once been tables here and a fine high seat; those had been hacked to pieces, and shards of plates mingled with the bodies of dead guests and servants. It was full of the freshly dead, and, unlike elsewhere, many of them were Bar Emmon or Velaryon. It was hard-fought here, he realised. The traitors here didn't come upon the loyal men with such surprise. The inside of this building was shaped more like an ordinary hall, but Lyle knew how the outside was shaped; unless they were purely decorative, solid stone, there ought to be ways into the dragon's wings and legs and tail. He started looking for passages in the sides of the hall that might lead to the tail and hence the upper Stone Drum which it lay upon. Moments later, his eyes fell upon a door, in the right place that it could lead to where he sought. Lyle had no time to hesitate. He dashed to it, tried to pull it open, failed to turn the handle, hacked it open and went through. Prince Tommen followed. That turned out to lead to a dark, dank spiral staircase that went up and up and up…
…to open air that struck his face as a cold blast. His head poked out of a trapdoor on the roof of the dragon hall. The top of the Stone Drum loomed a long way above him; he heard it before he saw it, from the enraged shouts and metallic clashes of battle.
Crone curse me witless, he thought, that was the wrong passage! "Come down, my prince," Lyle said, and started to descend the staircase. When Prince Tommen made no move, he barked, "Come down!"
Tommen pointed, trembling. "Look."
He looked. Somewhere at or around the very highest level, a girl had burst out onto a balcony of glittering black stone shaped like a young dragon's wing. She was near the prince's age, the nominal Lady of Dragonstone, a panicked graceless child with big ears and a half-grey face and long black hair that flowed over a dress of white and blue.
Lady Shireen. The king's cousin, and the prince's. Tommen's eyes had never left her.
"They're killing one another!" she cried over the sounds of steel and screams. "Everyone's gone mad! Someone make it stop! Someone—"
The arrow took her in the chest.
She stood still, for a moment, mouth opening. Red welled out over the white of her dress. Then her legs collapsed beneath her, and she fell.
Lady Shireen tumbled face-first off the balcony, tumbled and tumbled, over and over, her dress streaming, the wind playing in her hair.
Lyle closed the trapdoor to spare his charge the final horror of the crunch. In the darkness of the staircase he hissed, "We are going now."
"We can't!" Tommen was distraught, babbling. "She fell, you have to pick her up, we can't go without them, we have to save them…"
"They're dead! The traitors have already chased them to the top of the tallest tower; they can't go further. Your cousin is dead, your brother too, or else he will be within minutes, and so will be you unless you run."
Lyle darted back down the stairs and re-entered the black dragon hall, silent and full of corpses. He fled out the dragon's mouth and crossed the front courtyard, reaching the main gate. Beyond the gate, crows were already pecking at the bodies of the good true men he had watched Aurane Waters slay. The gate was still unattended, but either the dapple grey horse had bolted from the noise of war or somebody had stolen her.
He swore. "We're walking, then."
And so they did. Lyle had no strength to run. His every muscle ached with overuse and no matter how many times he wiped them clean his tormented hands were badly bleeding. It felt as though he could not possibly go on… but he and he alone stood between Prince Tommen Baratheon and all who would harm him. He went on.
On he walked, for a long while, almost to the foot of the mountain, until Prince Tommen pointed up the slope of Dragonmount and said, "Look," and he saw a party of men on horseback, hundreds of feet above them. The castle was secured. Now they were coming for the rest of Dragonstone. And some of them were looking down and had seen Lyle and Tommen, here on Dragonmount, at a time when almost nobody would want to be.
"Father damn them all," Lyle growled. "Changed my mind. Run."
The prince tried to keep up with him, but those legs were too short. Lyle had to pick up the plump boy and forced himself onwards. His legs howled; his chest screamed; his heart hammered like the hooves of a galloping horse; his arms felt like they were going to burst from their sockets. This was no mere weariness that would be righted by a night's sleep, or a dozen nights. He was breaking himself. Lyle knew the gods had blessed him with greater strength than they had given most men, but they had not made even him able to withstand this. He had done too much today, far too much.
Come blood, come battle, come the Others from the seven hells, you will keep him safe.
What else could he do? He went on.
He needed to get Prince Tommen off this godsforsaken island full of treachery, and for that he needed a boat, but at the foot of Dragonmount he went west, not east to the town of Dragonsport or any settlement near it. There were too many traitor soldiers there, and Aurane Waters knew his face. One of the little fishing villages in the west of the island would serve to save his charge's life.
Onward he ran, on and on and on. The prince felt like a lump of lead bearing him down. His faint hope that all of the men coming from the castle would go to Dragonsport was unsurprisingly unanswered. Some did, but most spread out elsewhere. On horseback, and not near as exhausted as Lyle was, dozens of them pursued him, under a Bar Emmon leaping blue swordfish banner. Lyle took pride in his skill at arms, but he did not delude himself into believing that he stood a chance against a force like that. The only recourse was escape.
As his straining limbs cried out at him, he sped up to a sprint, moving as fast as he possibly could. He had got most of the way. A tiny village was very near now. The Bar Emmon men were making up ground fast but right now they were a thousand yards behind. He could get Prince Tommen off this island alive. He could. He would. He had to.
Then he saw that the village was almost deserted.
The sight hit like a hammer to his hopes. The villagers were terrified. By now they might well have heard of the massacres elsewhere. They were fisherfolk, accustomed to fierce sudden storms. To survive this storm of battle and betrayal on land, they had taken to their boats and fled to wait it out at sea.
Lyle fell to his knees. Tommen clutched his shoulders and sobbed in wordless fear. For all the horror of the nightmarish time since Lord Tywin had died, and of today especially, he had not felt such an acute sense of hopelessness.
It was the end, and he had failed.
"Father Above, judge me justly," he prayed as death drew closer to him on the hooves of warhorses. "Reward me according to the measure of my virtues and punish me according to the measure of my sins…"
And then he saw it. One small boat had not yet gone too far from the shore. It was a fishing boat with three men—by their looks, likely brothers—and their wives and brood of children, crammed with what looked like a sizeable amount of their earthly possessions. They must have been afraid of looters. Soldiers tend to do that. They were only a hundred feet away, albeit getting further. If they stopped, he and the prince could reach them.
With an effort like lifting a mountain, Lyle rose to his feet. He waded into the water, followed by the prince. It was yet another sudden pain; in addition to the fury of his legs, the sea of Blackwater Bay in an autumn's night was ice-cold. "Stop!" He plucked a gold dragon from the bag that was tied to his belt, the bag that had once been Lord Tywin's allowance for Prince Tommen. "I'll pay you!"
"That ain't worth my life!" one of the fishermen yelled back. They kept rowing.
"I'll pay you more!" Lyle did not stop wading. He had to reach inside his cloak to take out a whole handful of gold and silver coins. To a poor smallfolk family, even one gold dragon was a huge sum; this was a fortune.
Two of the brothers exchanged glances. One hollered back, "Only if we gettin' it all!"
Father curse his greed. They would need that money, but what choice did they have? "Done! Now stop!"
He waded as far as he could, then took a deep breath and plunged himself under the water. It was like rubbing ice against burnt skin. His whole body shuddered. Fighting his own weight and the weight of the coins, he pushed himself to the boat.
Lyle's head emerged from the surface, gasping. He grasped a hand from one of the fishermen and allowed himself to be pulled aboard. His clothes were sodden through, and the cold was biting. When the fisherman reached for the gold straight after pulling him up, Lyle barked, "Help him in first!"
He looked behind him.
"Oh holy Seven, no." In the leap from the pit of despair to exultant hope, he had not thought to wonder: I didn't know whether Prince Tommen can swim.
Lyle took a deep breath and dived back into the sea. He dared not leave the gold with the fishermen, else they would go off without him. This time he did not fight his weight and the weight of the coins; swiftly they dragged him down. The world became dark and cold, and even as it did he was still forcing his oppressed limbs to keep swimming, back towards the shore. He crawled about on the sea floor, opening new wounds on his arms and legs from the jagged rocks. He had lost so much blood. The world seemed distant and blurry. A strange new sense of warmth was spreading in place of the cold.
There! At last his hands found what they were seeking: the touch of soft skin. He grasped, hard, and pulled, and kicked the water, pushing himself up with every effort he could force from his legs, every effort of his will. But they did not feel fiery, straining and screaming now. They felt almost like they were not his at all, cool, insubstantial, foggy, far away.
He turned around and pulled the boy along the sea floor, away from the shore. That, at least, he could do. His lungs felt burning, but that pain had to vie for attention against the rest of his pain, and all of it was fading. Several times he tried to push himself upward with all the strength that he could muster, all the strength of the man whom men called Strongboar. But his body felt heavy as a mountain, and his limbs felt weak as a child. It was too much for him.
The bag of coins was still at his belt and his fingers kept an iron grip on the boy. Could he rise if he were to let go of either? Without the bag, the fishermen would leave him, and anyway he doubted that he had the dexterity, now, to undo the knot that tied it to him. Without the boy… No. No. No.
I must not give up, Lyle told himself. I must not fail. He will die if I fail.
I made a promise.
He gathered the last dregs of his strength, kicked down against the cruel cold water, pushed hard, pushed up with his arms and legs, hoping, praying that it would be enough, propelling, lifting himself off the rocks…
…and could not sustain it. His legs faltered. He was falling in the dark and the cold.
That was when he knew he was going to die.
Before he hit the floor again, something strangely hot gripped him painfully tightly. He could see nothing and hear nothing. It dragged him somewhere, some sea creature, its watery lair. He remained curiously relaxed. He was going to die anyway. He wondered whether this was what it was like to be eaten by a dragon—
—then sudden shock of sensation flooded through him. He had never before felt so grateful to feel cold wind strike his face.
They helped him onto their family boat, him and the boy whom his fingers were still clutching. Somebody thumped him; he coughed and spluttered out a mouthful of seawater and took deep, shuddering breaths. He was utterly spent; twitching a finger felt beyond him. His salted cuts stung at him, and his clothes were soaked through, piercing him with a dagger of cold. But he lived yet, and so did his charge.
"There you are," said one of the fishermen, looking down at him with satisfaction. "You ain't dyin' without givin' us that gold."
