In the end choices were not really choices at all. A mirage at best.
"Brandon had a choice. He had a choice to believe me when I told him you are not dead, that you are sitting in the black cell awaiting trial."
"Why should he believe you? The king himself told Brandon he already had me killed for my supposed treason. Without trial, without justice."
"I told Brandon the truth." Defied the king and told Brandon Stark the truth about his father's fate. "Why should he doubt my words?" And why was he such a reckless fool to call the king a murderer, to shout and proclaim it loudly for all the world to hear?
"You are the King's Hand. My men and I were arrested as soon as we left your castle. They were waiting for us outside the gates of Storm's End, the king's men. Do you really wonder why Brandon did not trust in your words?"
"Lies," Brandon Stark had shouted in the throne room. "You are trying to shield your mad king even now. Even after he murdered the father of your own wife, grandfather to your unborn child."
"It's the truth," Stannis had insisted, futilely. "Ask the Kingsguards. Tell him, Ser Gerold." The old bull stayed silent, intent only on doing his duty and protecting his king. "Ser Barristan, tell him," Stannis exhorted the Kingsguard who had once told him that sometimes a king needed to be protected from himself. But perhaps Barristan Selmy's conscience was only pricked when it came to Queen Rhaella, for he stayed silent, this time. All six of the Kingsguards stayed silent, out of duty, mindful of the vows they took; or perhaps, mindful also of the fate of one of their own sworn brothers Arthur Dayne, currently languishing in the dungeon for daring to defy the king.
They stayed silent when Aerys pronounced Brandon Stark a traitor to the realm for threatening the king's life. They stayed silent when Brandon Stark demanded a trial by combat. They stayed silent during Stannis's long entreaties for Brandon to rescind his demand for atrial by combat and for the king to try Brandon alongside Rickard Stark and Rhaegar Targaryen. They stayed silent as Aerys made a mocking game of picking his champion.
"Will you be my champion, Stannis? My Hand, my right-hand man, will you serve as your king's champion to defeat this traitor?"
My father, my brother. Who else would you betray, Stannis, for the sake of your king? For the sake of duty?
I didn't betray anyone!
"There is no need for a trial by combat, Your Grace. Brandon Stark needs only to be told the truth about his father's fate, and he will bend the knee and beg for your pardon."
Aerys stood, trembling with fury. "The truth? Are you calling me a liar, Stannis?"
Stannis did not falter. "We both know Rickard Stark is alive in the black cell. A trial date has been set, and the judges are on their way to King's Landing at this very moment. You agreed to this. You told me to go ahead and write the letters telling the judges and witnesses to come to King's Landing for the trial. Lord Stark is alive. He is not dead."
Aerys smiled, a chilling smile. "That's what you think."
For a moment, Stannis faltered. But surely … if Rickard Stark had been executed, he would have known?
Wouldn't he?
"But you have decided to hold a trial, Your Grace. That was your command."
"No, you whispered endlessly in my ears about trials and witnesses and judges. Oh they warned me about you! You and those traitorous wolves you now call family. You have been working for the Starks all along. You wouldn't betray me for Rhaegar's sake, I know that well enough, but I should have known you would betray me for your wife and her family."
They? Who were they? Varys? The voices in Aerys'head?
"I should have believed them when they warned me about your treachery. But I was a fool. I looked at you and I saw your father's face. Dear Cousin Steffon's face. He would never have betrayed me! Not for anyone, not even his wife or her family."
"I have never betrayed you, Your Grace."
"You are not worthy to be Steffon's son. You won't do as my champion after all, Stannis. I need a more reliable champion. A Targaryen champion."
A Targaryen champion? Did the king mean to force his son Rhaegar to be his champion and battle Brandon Stark to death? It was monstrous. And yet, to a mind like Varys', whose words proved to be far more successful in influencing the king than Stannis, it must have seemed like a brilliant solution to an intractable problem. Whoever lost, be it Rhaegar or Brandon, it would rid the king of one problem, at least.
But as it turned out, even Varys was out of his depth this time. Aerys was not listening to anyone – not Stannis, not Varys, not anyone – only to the voices in his own head. The champion he picked was more monstrous than anything Stannis could conceive.
"Did he scream? Did my son scream?"
Murderers. You are all murderers, Brandon had shouted, when the flame started to rise. Is this how you murdered my father?
Brandon was still shouting as the fire consumed him, but the words were no longer decipherable.
"They did nothing to stop it? They did nothing to help my son? The Kingsguards?"
"Their duty is to the king," Stannis replied, tonelessly repeating the words Gerald Hightower and Barristan Selmy had told him as they were dragging Stannis out of the throne room.
"You tried to stop it. That's why you're here now."
"It was wrong. It was unjust. Brandon demanded a trial by combat, against the king's champion. Against a man he could battle fairly and squarely, not against … that." Stannis could hear the screams still. Could smell the burning flesh still. Could feel the heat of the hungry flames still. When words and pleas had failed to move the king, Stannis tried to grab hold of Brandon, only to have the flames licking his own hands and arms.
Aerys had laughed, a high, maniacal laugh that seemed to go on forever. "Do you want to battle my true champion too, Stannis? The pyre is big enough for two." But then Aerys' gaze had wandered to that portrait of Rhaelle Targaryen holding the babe Steffon in her arms, and he ordered Stannis to be dumped in the black cell instead.
"You should have been the king's cousin and his childhood companion. Perhaps then he would have spared your son's life too," Stannis said. He started laughing, uncontrollably. The laughter trailed off into a sob. "I'm sorry."
The face looking down on Stannis had tears falling down his cheeks. Stannis blinked, and suddenly it was his father's face he saw, not Rickard Stark's. "Father," he called out.
"Your father is not here."
"Are you a ghost?"
"My son is dead. I might as well be."
But then the ghost who might not be a ghost started yelling at the guards demanding to know when the maester would come, and Stannis' last thought before losing consciousness was that a ghost could not possibly be shouting that many swear words.