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PART SIX
Sentinel
... ... ...
All seven of the serving Kingsguard were rarely ever in the same place.
Such was the very nature of their duties. Those not on guard were either resting or training, or enjoying the rare day granted them to spend as they chose. Paths would cross, certainly, and communication between them flowed regularly - passing either from one man to another or via the palace pages. Yet unless some formal occasion called for it, or there was cause for the entire royal family to gather or travel within the public sphere, it was uncommon for more than four to be assembled at once. With a single exception.
Twice every month - at the dawn of each new fortnight - the Kingsguard left the protection of their sworn charges to the palace guards in order to meet in entirety.
White Sword Tower was set within the southeastern wall of the Red Keep - a slender structure overlooking the Blackwater. Primarily it served as both storage for extra armor and weaponry, and housed the sleeping quarters for each man. The lowermost floor however served as the common room, center of business, and housed the Book of Brothers - where the deeds of every member who served in the three hundred year history of the Kingsguard were painstakingly recorded.
The room was entirely white. White wool hangings upon whitewashed stone walls, the white wood of the table with its richly carven supports, the white shield bearing the sigil of the seven silver swords circling a golden crown hung above the hearth. Supposedly white was associated with honor and purity, a higher purpose. As years passed, Arthur thought it seemed more to indicate the lacking more than it did anything else; the giving over of so much of themselves that what remained of their identity was as blank as the unemblazoned shields they alone possessed the right to bear.
At the very center of the room stood the great weirwood table at which the Kingsguard gathered when called to council. It was at this table that new or amended orders would be issued - should there be any - pertinent news proffered, reports made, votes taken. And, on occasion, secrets shared.
While sworn to keep the king's counsel in confidence, were there something overheard which might prove necessary - even by the slightest possibility - to the others in the effort to protect their sovereign, it was not considered breaking their oath to reveal it. Quite the opposite, in fact. However uncomfortable it might make them, above all else, the safety of the king's person was paramount. Above even his privacy. In some ways they were as one mind - a single unit composed of several parts moving in tandem. That was how it had been explained to him upon his initiation, as the formal cloak of heavy white silk was fixed to the brand new suit of armor tailored precisely to his measurements by the Lord Commander. One mind, one sword, one shield. By this logic, any secret shared among them could be considered having never passed the ears which overheard it.
"Let us keep this council brief," the Lord Commander stated as he strode into the room to take his place at the head of the table.
Ser Gerold Hightower was well into his fifties, an age the ignorant might have deemed as past his prime. Yet even in his age he was a fierce, imposing man with a quick mind and a deft swordhand. Though his hair was far more grayed than golden now, his face craggy, creased, and weather-beaten, his frame was still broad and leanly-muscled, his brown eyes still as sharp as the blade at his side. A man who demanded respect as much as he was a privilege to follow. Only once he was seated did the rest of them follow suit, with a medley of clanking armor and the muted creak of leather.
"As I'm sure you all have been informed by now, the guests for the Prince's nameday celebration will be arriving within the week."
A celebration Rhaegar had neither wanted nor had much to do with, all told.
Glancing to the parchment he carried, Ser Gerold read off the pertinent notes acquired from the latest assembly of the Small Council.
"I have been told we're to expect some forty-five to fifty nobles," he said, his voice, already deeper in register, imbibed with a permanent, growling rasp from the wound he'd once taken to the throat. "plus their parties. Roughly two-hundred guests, not including servants, soldiers, or staff. About one third of these are to be given accommodation within the Keep. There are to be several formal dinners, a hunt, and a tourney…for which there is to be a sizable victor's purse."
Uneasy tension rose around the table - palpable os the shift in humidity before a gale.
Arthur drew a bracing inhale. "How much?"
Eyes flicking back down to the parchment, Ser Gerold read: "Twenty thousand gold dragons for the joust. Ten for the runner-up, and five each for the melee and for archery."
The tension thickened.
A low mutter of aggravation emanated from where Ser Oswell sat, shaking his head. "That'll draw as much trouble as it will anything else," he complained.
Though he did not voice as much, the lack of reprimand for the interruption was as loud as a declaration of the Lord Commander's agreement. Though, in truth, Oswell need not have spoken it aloud.
Occasions which increased the number of people in the proximity of the royal family for any length of time thus required increased security. The Kingsguard had to be on much higher alert than normal simply to account for this, to say nothing of the variations in routine - all of which could and would be susceptible to change within a moment's notice. Throwing a tournament into the mix just added another layer of complication.
Tournaments were dangerous. So many weapons unsheathed and brandished freely made it that much more difficult to pick out potential threats. An assassination upon a lesser prince had once been conducted during an archery contest a hundred years or so back; the killer had never been found - having melted into the crowds of contestants and spectators.
Offering winnings turned the event into a competition rather than sport for the sake of entertainment, with all the stakes therein and the potential to turn ugly. The prospect of gold tended to attract the desperate and the greedy, and the foolhardy. In situations where adrenaline and ego already soared high, where tempers kindled and easily flared to burning, skirmishes often followed - which could (and often did) very easily become more and spread. Which was not something any of the Kingsguard had much desire to deal with.
Resting a palm flat against the surface of the table, Ser Lewyn leaned slightly forward in his chair. "Are we to count on the goldcloaks for support in this?"
"They have been apprised," Ser Gerold stated, the shortness of his words the only indication that he harbored any annoyance about the matter.
Though it was a non-answer, the other men knew full well what it meant. The captain of the palace guard did not take the potential danger of the situation seriously.
"Utilize the usual precautions," he said instead. "I want you all to be as visible as possible, especially during the tournament events."
"That should be easily done," Ser Jonothor noted from his seat at Arthur's left. "I hadn't heard about the offer of prizes, but I did overhear the Hand mention bouts for show. In the lists at the very least."
"Very well, then. Eyes sharp. And should it come to it, strike first, question later. Ser Harlan—" Here the Lord Commander turned to the knight currently seated to his right. "—I want you by the high table each evening and seated near the King during any public appearance. Anything you see, you report to whoever is stationed with you."
Ser Harlan Grandison nodded, white-bearded face calmly resolute. Approaching his seventies, the knight had long since ceased to be an active member on the guard rotation, but in situations such as these, when every set of extra eyes was needed, he was still called upon to serve. Some might have questioned the purpose even in this, thinking it better to remove him from service completely. But a Kingsguard's oath was for life. Naught but death could release him from it.
Lowering his eyes, Ser Gerold skimmed his notes only to visibly pause. Arthur found himself bracing automatically, all too familiar with that particular set of his commander's jaw, the compression of mouth, which almost always preceded something unsavory.
"I have also been informed that at least three of these guests will be here primarily as suitors for Lady Targaryen."
The statement should not have caught Arthur so by surprise. Barely a few days following Visaera's arrival there had already been formal discussion of just this subject - names already produced for consideration. It had been much of the (supposed) reason behind summoning her to the capitol in the first place. Still, he found himself rattled, and more than a little disturbed by it.
The lady must have been made aware of this by now and doubtless she was less than pleased. It was one thing to arrange a meeting with a potential husband, such a thing was customary for marriages among the high families. But to bring several, as if to invite a bidding war - and to do so in such a blatant fashion- was…to call it crass was putting it gently.
Not that this explained the severity of Arthur's distaste.
To treat a highborn lady thus - offering her up to auction in this way - was bad enough, but Visaera was no mere lady. She was the daughter of a princess with direct ties to the royal house. This went far beyond the point of mere shallow insult. It was blatant disrespect.
"I want you to keep a close watch on her. As you're able," Ser Gerold added, glancing around the table at each knight in turn. "I gather I don't need to explain to any of you why."
There was only one reason they might have been issued this order from above, and that was the king's decision that his cousin would surely seek to use the unrest and activity to conspire against him. There was not a man among them who would argue that, though few if any of them believed it viable.
Whether or not any of the original purpose behind this order was founded in the king's belief that Visaera sought to commit some treason against him was not clear. Nor was it entirely relevant. The Lord Commander's intent in repeating it was founded in altogether different reasons.
Aerys had reason to be wary of threats - every king faced them. Yet there was a vast and unmitigated difference between a rational caution and outright paranoia, and the chaotic, brutal form of Aerys' particular paranoia had served him only as self-fulfilling prophecy. The actions he took to protect his reign - as he saw it - were the direct cause of most of the fear, anger, and even hope in those working so diligently against him. This was equally true where Visaera was concerned. The only real difference was that it wouldn't have mattered had she spent her life locked in a tower room and spoke to no other living soul - so long as she was capable of bearing children, she had the power to jeopardize her cousin's rule.
There were those who still believed that from the time of its founding all those generations ago, the Blackfyre line held the true right of rule. A bloodline to which Visaera was the sole remaining heir.
The issue of her legitimacy would not dissuade any who sought to put a Blackfyre on the Iron Throne, nor those who would support any remotely valid claim which would see Aerys and his heirs removed from the succession. There were ways of legitimizing a bastard, after all, as had been the case with Daemon himself - the Black Dragon, first and founder of the Blackfyre name. Many of those who would see his descendants crowned would do so out of loyalties which ran centuries deep and seated with a fervor to match Aerys' own madness.
This marriage being forced upon her was intended to sully and weaken the bloodlines which formed Visaera's claim. Yet this would only prove effective should she have but a single child with a lesser lord, preferably with questionable lineage himself, and die before being able to have another with anyone of more noble blood. Were she to breed with a lord of one of the great houses, House Arryn for instance or (far more dangerous) House Stark, any sons begotten from such a union would be a far more powerful threat to the Targaryen dynasty than she could ever have been on her own.
Arthur knew enough of the lady by now to understand that she held no desire for the throne. Yet that hardly mattered to those who would use her for the value of her ancestry.
It wouldn't matter whether she was willing. She would not have been the first captive bride stolen from her home for the prize of her flesh or her family name. Nor the first of royal blood. The only reason it hadn't happened before now was because the Conningtons were strong, well-armed, and housed within a fortress designed to outlast decade-long sieges. Opening the gates of the Red Keep to visitors en masse invited those who might attempt it as surely as it would invite any potential assassin.
Herein lay the present concerns of the Kingsguard.
They were not politicians, nor were they spies. Their business lay in matters of protection, not in scheming or plots. Within this room and without, they might pretend that as they watched her it was for hints of treason, but their real priorities were to ensure no harm befell her.
"Any further reports?"
When no response was forthcoming, Ser Gerold nodded and rose from his seat, the other six men rising in respectful echo.
"Then this council is adjourned."
Swift, brisk, and purposeful - as was his way - the Lord Commander quit the room, off to take up his post with the king.
With a sigh, Oswell slumped back into his chair, the wood giving the faintest groan under his frame. "Best ready your lances, brothers," he drawled, casting an amused look toward Barristan and Arthur in turn.
Barristan snorted as he pulled on his gauntlets, but offered no reply.
"Is that envy I hear?" Lewyn teased, moving behind Oswell's chair and clapping an affectionate hand upon the other knight's burly shoulder as it shook with a hearty bark of laughter.
"Definitely not! I've no desire to spend a week nursing what bruised bits I have left after a day in the lists, thank you kindly…"
Arthur, already halfway through the door, slipped out and into the vestibule.
Not for the first time, he found himself deeply grateful that the cruel tyrant king he served had somehow managed to gather such a decent and honorable contingent of guardsmen. Whatever each man's personal opinions might be on the subject, Arthur trusted each and every one of them to see to their duty by Lady Visaera. Even still, he felt worry knotted in the pit of his stomach, tight as the threads between a weaver's fingers.
No need to arrange for an assassin if I'm bound to a man that will see to the business for them.
He could recall the words with perfect clarity, complete with the harsh bite of her bitterness and the cold slash of her mouth, more grimace than smile. And in truth he couldn't argue with the statement. It would be far more efficient, and far less risk, to kill her before she ever had the chance to have children. It was for this reason that the king's counselors had urged to have her ripped from her mother's arms and slaughtered as an infant.
Yet the order had never been given. Two decades and a handful of years more and the order had never been given. What purpose would have been served in keeping her alive all this time only to kill her now?
Something about it didn't sit right - the way ill-fitted stones jammed together to fill a gap in an otherwise flawless wall. By all appearances suited to the purpose, and yet…
Many made the error of mistaking the king's madness for something completely absent of anything resembling reason or logic. His mind might be warped and deteriorating, but it was far from gone. It would have been unwise to dismiss him as some unhinged creature stripped of all his cunning or ability to plan.
There was something else at work here, though Arthur had neither proof nor even solid basis for his certainty, he believed it all the same. Whether it was something for good or ill, he supposed only time would reveal.
...
Sipping at her wine, Visaera made her best effort to appear engaged in the tale her dinner partner sought to entertain her with.
It was more difficult than she would have liked, requiring more concentration than usual simply to arrange her face into the guise of interest. She had grown too comfortable in the company of Princess Elia and her ladies and much too lax in playing at social civility, especially where men were concerned.
While technically the formal celebrations were not due to begin for another two days yet, many of the expected guests had already arrived - among them, the retinue from the Vale.
Lord Arryn himself had come with several of his banner lords, including Lord Royce and his son. The presence of a greater lord had prompted the relocation of evening meals to the Grand Hall rather than the informal dining hall, and no time had been wasted on the part of the Small Council to ensure that she was seated with the young man among the prospects for her hand, with no way for her to shirk the obligation.
Meddling, blood-hungry leeches, the lot of them.
She had seen Lord Royce once as a little girl, when he had visited Storm's End for the sake of some business or other, and remembered a dour, balding man with a perpetual frown. Evidently his son favored his mother, for Kyle barely resembled his father at all.
He was younger than she had thought he would be - around her own age, by a year or so, which was a rarity in such an arrangement - with curling tawny hair and a strong nose, a shallow cleft in his chin that still required some growing into. He was well-spoken, quick to smile, and, as she discovered in short order, possessed a singular passion for archery.
"Will you be participating in the hunt, then?" she asked when his story - an animated retelling of having once broken a bowstring as a boy and startling the pheasant he'd been stalking - reached a natural lull, inviting some contribution on her part.
His blue eyes brightened, as they seemed to every time she made some gesture of effort.
He certainly seemed eager for her attention when he had it. She couldn't yet tell if it was because he was the sort to go a bit starry-eyed at the prospect of a wife with ties to the throne, or if it was because she was comely enough to increase the appeal of an arranged union, but it was likely one of the two.
"I had planned to, yes," he said with a nod. "Will you be joining us, My Lady?"
It was common for women of the court to accompany the men on a hunt, trailing behind out of the way but near enough to praise and exclaim over every conquest. Of course. Visaera flatly refused to take part in such a pointless, ridiculous farce.
Offering her best regretful smile, she shook her head.
"Sadly no, My Lord. I'm afraid I have no stomach for such things."
A lie, and a blatant one. She had hunted before, and killed her own food more than once. It wasn't the activity she objected to, but rather the concept of being expected to behave in the prim, submissive manner expected of a lady rather than participating in equal measure. As though she didn't have better things to do with her time than coo over men half of whom were so miserable at the spot that they would simply spout some nonsense about the weather or terrain to excuse having made no kill in a wood full to bursting with game.
"You will have to regale me with a thorough recounting after," she added sweetly. He returned her smile, evidently satisfied.
By small mercy, the serving staff arrived with the next course that very moment. The young lord's attention moved to the golden, steaming savory pie set before them, excusing her to a few minutes of quiet while they served themselves and ate.
The pie was delicious - baked to perfection with bacon inset between two layers of thick, flaky crust. Her enjoyment of it, however, was somewhat dampened by the fact that they were only on the third of five courses with yet more conversation to come. She almost felt bad for her disinterest. He seemed sweet enough, if a bit overly attentive. It wasn't his fault he was being forced upon her. Still, it hadn't taken her long to get a read on him, and she could tell that he lacked the fortitude to handle her temperament with anything other than misery.
It would be better to keep him at a distance anyway. In no circumstance would her cousin ever allow him to marry her. Aerys was far too vindictive for such a mercy, and far too shrewd to allow her so close to the Arryns and the power there. No, Kyle was here to dissuade any suspicion that his intent was outright malicious and for no other reason.
Taking up another forkful of pie, she gazed aimlessly out at the hall while she chewed, letting the dull roar of a thousand murmured conversations wash over her.
Second only to the throne room, the Grand Hall was a marvel of a room in terms of splendor - large enough to seat nearly five hundred guests at its expansive tables.
For Visaera, it was the details more than the scale of the room which spoke to her of its richness. Not simply the quality of the glassware, the fine cloth of the linens, or even the huge tapestries hung throughout depicting scenes from long generations of Targaryen rule, but the molding of the stone pillars and the edgework where it was visible.
The stonemasons hired to construct the Keep had been fine craftsmen, and the signs were visible throughout the buildings. She had yet to find so much as a single niche where the rock was not expertly shaped, the edges straight and corners sharp, surfaces perfectly smoothed; yet it was in the intricate vines carved into the red-gold pillars both here and in the throne room, the graceful unfurling leaves and delicate Valyrian fireflowers where the real skill shone brightest. In the light from the enormous braziers spaced about the hall and enclosing the base of each pillar, the vines almost appeared to move as though growing within the stone.
Glancing to her right, her eyes rested briefly upon Prince Viserys - doing his damndest to shovel as much pie into his mouth as he could fit. Hiding her smile, she looked past him, inadvertently chasing the subtle golden flare of light upon metal at the far end of the high table.
Her cousin Rhaegar was perhaps the most beautiful man who lived – certainly no one would have contested this – but he was by no means the only handsome man in the Red Keep. Jaime Lannister, for one, though he was too young and a shade too pretty for Visaera's taste. Symond Staunton, Master of Laws on the Small Council, was appealing enough in an austere, distinguished way. Even the young lord beside her was easy enough on the eyes, if perhaps a bit boyish still. And there were plenty of others. Still, of all the reasonably good-looking men in residence, only the one continually caused her eyes to stray. Which they did, and often of late. She hardly seemed able to help it.
Rhaegar was beautiful, yes. In a regal, ethereal fashion. Ser Arthur, however, was beautiful in an entirely different, far more visceral way.
She hadn't wanted to think him attractive in the beginning, resentful of the distraction to her assessment of a possible adversary. But the more she learned of him, the more time she spent around him, the more difficult it became not to acknowledge the reality that she was, in fact, quite attracted to him.
He cut quite the imposing figure in his armor just below the dais, all that white and gleaming metal drawing out the warm golden tones in his skin. He had shaved recently, she noticed, and she discovered that she missed the hint of shadow leant by a few days without a razor, which somehow seemed to highlight the elegant cut of his cheekbones and the shape of his lips. While his left hand rested upon the hilt of his sword as it often did, something in the way he stood there, solemn and alert, sharp eyes missing nothing as he surveyed the hall and the people in it, made it seem more latent warning than anything casual.
A warning best heeded well.
Strangely, it had been when dressed down in plain trousers and shirt that he had felt the most dangerous to her - something which had very little to do with the plain evidence of just how deadly a force he was.
Even in spite of the loose shirt she had been able to see the heavy muscle in his chest where his collar gaped, where the sweat-soaked cloth clung to him. In his forearms, exposed by sleeves folded back to the elbows. She had felt it against her hip where the inside of his thigh had brushed her. A faint, almost imperceptible touch, yet she had felt it all the same. As solidly as she had felt the power in the blow he'd dealt her half a second before, the very instant time had ceased to hold any meaning beyond the connection of two dulled practice swords.
She hadn't fully allowed herself to acknowledge just what had set her pulse to racing or caused the anxious constriction in her belly, not in the moment in any case. Adrenaline, she had called it. Even long after she had left the dirt outside the training yard. She would have been quicker to call it fear than what it had truly been, but however she might try, she had not been able to hide from the unexpected intensity of her own interest. Not that any interest of hers mattered.
The Kingsguard were sworn to celibacy, just as they were from fatherhood and from responsibility to land or people, lest any loyalty or devotion be prioritized over that which they held for the king. And of the lot of them, the very least likely to betray this oath by so much as looking at a woman less than chastely was the virtuous Arthur Dayne.
Which, in truth, was for the best.
All the same, he was a lovely man and she liked looking at him, even when it would have been wiser not to. And if that had been all it was, she wouldn't have concerned herself. But it wasn't.
If his looks appealed to her, it was no more than did the endless patience, the acceptance, the courtesy which asked nothing in return. His loyalty, and his gentleness toward those in his charge. The respect for those weaker than himself. He was steady in a way she was not accustomed to, having been brought up around men with a much louder, brasher manner, and something about his easy calm made her calm. Something she so rarely was anymore.
She thought back to the way he had cradled her hand while he studied it - the careful pressure, the graze of gloved fingertips. She thought of his offer of balm to soothe the ache, and of how easily she could have given over to the part of her that was lonely and scared and desperate for some kind of comfort.
Oh, that was a dangerous path to follow. To want was one thing. To toy with emotions was nowhere near so harmless, and she had neither the time nor the freedom for infatuation.
She was careful not to let her gaze linger long enough to be noticed, making sure to glance down the length of the table along the right of the hall as though perusing the faces there before dropping her eyes back down to her plate and the remnants of the pie she had little interest in finishing now. She spent a few moments absently pushing the bits of crust and braised quail about with her fork before giving it up as a lost cause.
As if he had been waiting for just such an indication, almost the instant she lowered the utensil to the table the man beside her cleared his throat.
"If not hunting, what manner of pastime do you enjoy?"
Visaera considered the question, weighing the possible answers she could give, and decided to give the honest one.
"Riding," she admitted to him. "I love to ride more than anything else."
"Truly?"
She shot him a quick glance, yet it was curiosity, not censure, in his voice, and his face was open, inviting her to continue.
"Mm. At home, I would spend hours out on the cliffs over the water, just me and my horse."
Something wistful had crept into her words, and likely her face. Carefully she tucked the lion's share of the homesickness away, allowing but a little to linger as she summoned up the pleasant innocuous mask of a court lady too polite to allow too much of herself to impose on those around her.
Kyle was nodding, looking thoughtful.
"There are a great many cliffs in Runestone," he offered after a moment. "Not sea cliffs, but I think there are some high enough that you might be able to glimpse the sea from the top of them."
He sent her a bright smile, and something in her chest twisted sadly.
Poor lad, he truly was trying. Whether for his own sake or for the will of his father, perhaps even for her.
Conjuring a smile of her own, she coaxed him to tell her more about these sky-carving cliffs, waiting until he was well and thoroughly engrossed in doing so before lifting her cup and draining the wine within - suddenly far more tired than she should be and wishing she could be somewhere else. Though, if she could choose, she would gladly have returned to the corridor in the holdfast, with her hand back in Ser Arthur's gloved one.
For the Mother's sake. She was a woman grown, not some ridiculous girl too naive to see the danger in getting wrapped up in a man.
Though she supposed if she must act the silly girl, better to do so with a man who would never return the sentiment. All she need do was keep it shuttered away until it took its natural course and burned itself out of her mind.
Swallowing a sigh, she poured herself some more wine.
...
During formal dinners, Arthur preferred a post some yards from the high table; the better to see the entirety of the table itself - and thus those seated there - the space of floor before it, and the passage from the kitchens. It forced him to keep his eyes at almost constant motion, but he had long ago found that things and people out of place tended to stand out to him more clearly that way. The added benefit was that every time he scanned the length of the table he could do so however slowly he chose, and no one was the wiser if he happened to linger a bit longer at the left hand side.
As he had watched them enter the hall, Arthur noticed that the Royce boy looked mildly nervous to hold a dragon on his arm. Wisely so, if not necessarily for the reasons he should have been. Still, he seemed pleased enough to have been selected as one of the choices for her to wed.
Of any potential prospects, Arthur would not have guessed Lord Royce's eldest son to be among them. Theirs was a powerful vassel house, both reputable and highly respected. Yet he followed the logic. It would be their seat up in the heavily mountainous regions of the Vale which made them a candidate. Sending her to Runestone would isolate her completely, allowing her to diminish into obscurity and, hopefully, be forgotten.
Dread weighed heavy in his chest at the prospect.
He could lie to himself, pretend that he was merely worried for the sake of Rhaegar's plans and the part she had played in them, and should play yet for things to continue so smoothly. It would likewise have been a lie to claim this was not among his concerns. But it was neither the foremost, nor the loudest.
Whether Visaera resented the young man beside her, he could not tell. She seemed to find him amusing enough to bestow the odd smile or laugh at the conversation the lad attempted, but she also seemed rather distant, and it seemed to Arthur that she would rather have been anywhere else.
On her other side, Prince Viserys was struggling to cut his venison into bite-size pieces. Rather than do it for him, Visaera showed him how to turn his fork so that the tines curved downward, more effectively holding the meat steady for cutting. The little boy's face set, pleased by the trick as he set to his meat with all the more vigor, which brought a smile to her lips - a smile Arthur recognized as one of real happiness. The kind which caused her nose to crinkle ever so slightly. When she turned back to the younger Lord Royce, he could see the mask slip smoothly back into place, exchanging affection for the artificial semblance of interest.
Though not as common as it was in the other six kingdoms, arranged marriage was not unheard of in Dorne; the crucial difference was that they did not believe in doing so at the point of force. No one would have dared coerce the kin of a king to marry as she did not wish. Not even that same king. Not without dire reason. And that was precisely what this was.
He did not know whether Lady Visaera held any real desire for marriage, were she to have the choice. From what he had seen - and more from what he had thus far only glimpsed - he knew she was not the kind of woman to thrive when bound to a man who would seek to cage and control her, shape her will to his desires. Any man that sought to possess her would only succeed in smothering her. But they would try anyway.
And he was making assumptions.
Arthur didn't presume to know her mind or her heart. All he knew was that he did not care for the idea of her being stripped of her freedom, tied to some lord she did not want and dragged away to some corner of the kingdom to spend the remainder of her life in misery. The thought distressed him - far more fiercely than it should have - gnawing at the back of his mind even when he directed it elsewhere.
Her life was none of his affair. She was none of his affair. Yet no amount of repeating this fact to himself seemed sufficient to make it stick.
There was a small surge of activity as the kitchen staff bustled about serving the next course of cheeses and fruit - winter oranges, persimmons, and sugared plums. He paid careful attention to the servants that approached the high table. No new faces among them, though that was not a reason for negligence. All it took was a single moment of carelessness to result in disaster.
Upon his next scan of the table, he found Rhaegar speaking with Jon Arryn, his hand closed gently around that of his wife. Elia might not have been aware of it for how steadfastly she seemed focused on the lady at her other side, but her palm was turned up into her husband's, her thumb softly stroking the side of his index finger in unmistakable affection. Too small a thing to go noticed by all but the most observant.
His eyes slid next over the king's empty seat - not an unusual occurrence as Aerys preferred to take his meals in the company of none but his tasters - then to the queen, who appeared downright radiant in her husband's absence, even when forced to bear the company of Tywin Lannister, whom she had never much cared for.
Viserys had piled far too many plums onto his plate than was good for him. Something the lady next to him was quick to notice.
Resting the fingertips of her right hand upon the linen tablecloth, she walked them across the surface - slowly, like some strange approximation of a cautious, many-legged creature. Though creeping as if to go unnoticed, she clearly intended for Viserys to see. As she approached the prince's plate, Visaera extended her first two fingers and, quick as a flash, snatched up a plum and popped it into her mouth, not caring that the action sent a rain of sugar crystals to dust her sleeve.
She quirked a slender brow while she chewed as if daring the younger prince to say something, her fingers already beginning the slow, spidery trek back across the table. Viserys, obviously working not to laugh, copied her, snatching up his next bite in the same fashion.
For all his insistence of maturity, the prince was still a child. He was not yet so grown that he no longer enjoyed the simple pleasure of having someone to play with; and if the game also served as a way for his cousin to ensure he didn't consume too many sweets, he either didn't appear to notice or didn't care.
Her head turned as Lord Royce leaned near to say something to her, and Arthur thought he caught her concealing a yawn behind a hand - a motion which she disguised as a reach to adjust a strand of hair where it tangled around the glittering cabochon dangling from her ear. He felt a dull pang of sympathy, for her certainly, but also for the young man who seemed so eager for the attention of a woman who simply wasn't interested.
As to the exact why behind her lack of interest, that was less clear.
Of the three suitors expected, he was the first as of yet to arrive. He would also almost definitely be the most pleasant of them by any measure - certainly the highest in terms of status. He was near her own age, and he was a good-looking lad. Perhaps he was a horrid conversationalist, though that was hardly the worst quality in a prospective husband. Yet Arthur could not rightly say he didn't understand if being asked to settle for so little felt less than adequate. Especially if she was comparing to something else.
Or someone else.
It had occurred to him before, yet somehow the very real possibility that she had left someone behind when dragged into this snakepit of a place felt different now than the first time he had considered it. What had been a passing consideration was no longer so quickly dismissed, the pity was far sharper, and far more…well, more than simply pity. There was a weight to it, and a bitterness that he couldn't fully justify.
Perhaps it wasn't that at all. Perhaps she was bored or else simply tired. Perhaps she preferred the company of other women, in any potential context. Perhaps it was all or none of these things.
Either way, it was not his place to surmise.
Deliberately he turned his head away from the high table, and the next time he looked that way, he did not linger.
...
Guard shifts during the night were spent in one of three places: with the king, with the crown prince, or at the mouth of the bridge leading from the lower bailey into the holdfast. Though the latter never changed, the former two occasionally did from time to time, depending on where either chose to spend their night.
Of the both of them, Rhaegar was by far the most consistent. Though he and Princess Elia kept separate chambers, he spent as many nights with his wife as he did alone, and very rarely did he traverse from one to the other in the early hours.
Barring those which found Aerys in an especially volatile mood, most nights were uneventful. To the mind which required consistent stimulus to retain focus, this might have seemed an agony - long, monotonous hours stretching endlessly on. Arthur had never much minded them. True, they required a different manner of vigilance, but the time was often peaceful; and in such a frequently busy and tumultuous place, any amount of peace was welcomed.
When he had been new to his duties, he had found it difficult to be positioned so close to private quarters and thus to the things which occurred within. Not for any embarrassment on his part, but because he had been very much aware that his presence was as much an intrusion as it was an insurance of security - the reconciliation of which he had wrestled with for some years. By now the number of nights he had spent outside the bedchambers of one or several of his charges were impossible to count, and he no longer found it trying as he once had.
Simply due to matters of required proximity, a brother of the Kingsguard must become very accustomed to - and then very good at - not seeing things meant to go unseen, not hearing things meant not to be heard. Occasionally it was as much for self-preservation as it was a part of the position. Especially when dealing with a king whose proclivities strayed toward savagery. But other times it was simply a matter of turning focus outward and away in order to grant a semblance of something like privacy to a husband and wife who could never have a moment to themselves unwitnessed, even if through a door.
By the same measure that he must know when to ignore certain things, a Kingsguard must become quickly adept at differentiating between what belonged and what did not, whatever the situation. He must be able to tell when something felt off, and be able to balance when it was necessary to act on it and when something simply required a little extra attentiveness.
As a rule, it was better to act than not. An unnecessary disruption was harmless in comparison to potential danger gone ignored.
Rhaegar was often a restless sleeper. Less so when with Elia, but it was not unusual to hear him get up and move about the room once or twice in the night. Because of this, the creaking sound of shifting wood that Arthur heard in the late hours was not odd enough in itself to have broken him from his half-meditative listening state, but rather from where it had come.
It had taken him all of a second to understand that the source of the noise had not been the room behind him. In addition to the direction, the tone was wrong. If something was amiss, it was elsewhere in the corridor, yet near enough to reach him.
For a moment he merely listened, casting his focus outward.
Another sound. Quieter, not quite the same, but emanating from the same direction. He left his post to follow it, careful to keep half his attention fixedly behind him in case he must return at any haste, moving slowly down the wide passage with a silence not easy to achieve when wearing a full set of plate and mail which were wont to clank with any but the most infinitesimal of gestures.
A soft thud met his ear, like that of something cast to the floor, just as he approached the nearest set of rooms.
Lady Visaera's rooms.
He paused outside the door, head tilted to better hear. At first there was silence, and he was half a moment away from deeming it the symptoms of yet another Targaryen struggling with broken sleep when he heard something else.
The distinctive wooden creak of a bedframe. A hushed moan.
He pulled back, startled.
Was she with a lover?
He was no prudish western lord scandalized by the prospect. She was entitled to her pleasure where she could find it, as any other lady was, whatever propriety might attempt to dictate. He couldn't remember seeing her show any particular favor to anyone before, though that meant nothing.
He doubted it would be Lord Dustin. The two of them had barely spoken at dinner that evening, even for the sake of exchanging the most meager of expected pleasantries. But there were plenty of new faces in the Keep, it was not a stretch to imagine one or several among them had caught her interest. He simply hadn't seen anyone approach or enter the room, and he would have…but perhaps they had already been with her by the time the prince had retired. If so, they had been there for the better part of the night now. Though that hardly would have been a chore with such a woman.
Heat spread from his ears down his neck to meet the dull, sour clench in his gut. Whether the lust or the jealousy was more pronounced was difficult to say.
Lust he could accept. Whatever the stories might have said, he was no sainted knight of legend, nor some paragon of virtue. He was only - and very much - a man. But jealousy…that went way beyond the bounds of what he could excuse. Jealousy was an indicator of things he had no right to feel, and had no concept of how to control. That was a problem.
Another noise reached him: a rustling, like that of someone struggling beneath a heavy weight, immediately followed by a sharp, muffled cry.
Ice filled his veins, chasing out both warmth and envy.
That had not been a sound of satisfaction, nor pleasure. It had been a sound of fear.
His hand went to the hilt at his right side, fingers closing to loosen the blade of the knife by an inch. Swords, while efficient for their purpose, were cumbersome in close quarters, and often more dangerous than helpful. The last thing a guardsman wanted to do when walking into a situation with so many unknown variables was to inadvertently put his charge at risk of injury. He could always draw another blade.
For the space of a second he considered knocking first, just to be sure. Then the second cry came, clearer than the first, and ragged, raw. Frightened.
In a single motion, he burst into the room and drew the knife from the sheath, instantly adjusting his grip to throw.
From the sounds, he had expected to find a struggle. Visaera would not have lain quietly and accepted death at the hand of some would-be assassin, she would put up a right hell of a fight first. Yet he found no fight, nor even the remnants of one.
There was no one else in the room.
He took the time to be certain, clearing the corners where the light from the hearth didn't reach and the darkness fell thick, the door separating bedchamber from the attached bathing and dressing room - locked from within - and the windows, shuttered and veiled, and also locked. Once satisfied that the room was secure, he turned back to the bed where Visaera lay, alone, thrashing in her sleep.
Not thrashing...convulsing.
She shuddered, her back arching taut as a drawn bow, her head tossing first to one side, then the other. Her eyes were closed but the lids fluttered, as if she were not asleep but in the grips of some awful pain.
Hastily guiding the knife back to its place at his side, Arthur crossed swiftly to the bed, a new terror gripping at his chest.
He had been relatively secure in his estimation that Aerys wouldn't see value in having her killed, at least not so soon. But whether or not he was mistaken in that, there were plenty of others - both those loyal to the king and those with other motives - who would gladly have taken an opportunity presented to do so.
Poison, he thought at first, with a surge of panic, for violence was not the only means of dealing death. There were far more subtle methods, ways slower, hard to detect, and harder still to reverse.
He should yell for the maester, for someone…and yet he hesitated.
She wasn't choking or failing to breathe properly, nor was she gray-faced or showing any other signs that would accompany such convulsions were a toxin present. And in truth, she wasn't so much convulsing as she was struggling, as though she were fighting against some unseen force holding her down. If this was the work of poison, it was like none he had ever seen. In fact, though he had no name for whatever this was, he rather doubted that was the cause.
He lowered himself to one knee, armor silenced by the pool of furs and blankets kicked clean from the bed.
"Lady Targaryen…"
His hands hovered as he leaned over her, uncertain, not quite daring to touch.
How did he help her? Was it merely calming that she needed in order to wake, or else to ride out whatever had gripped her? Or did she require assistance beyond his ability to provide? The thought of leaving her now, even to fetch someone, was nigh to unbearable.
Again, her body stiffened, writhing as if in some terrible agony, and the strangled sob which wrenched from her throat her stabbed deep up under his ribs.
One of her hands flew back, clawing at the sturdy oak of the headboard. He caught it, grasping firmly and drawing it back down against the mussed sheeting to cradle it beneath his own hand. His other went to her face - unable to curb the impulse - cupping her cheek, pale and burning fever-hot even through the leather of his gauntlet.
"Lady Visaera," he called again, louder. It was pleading, the desperation clear even to his own ears, and he did not care.
Whether it was his touch or his voice which broke her from the thrall, he didn't know. Suddenly she jerked, drawing in a tearing, shuddering gasp, and her eyes flew open to stare, unseeing, at the heavy drapes above her. The hand he held flexed once, compulsively, and then went still.
"My Lady?" he murmured, softly, not wanting to distress her further. "Are you all right?"
Her head lolled toward him, her eyes glassy when they lit upon his face.
"Arthur…"
The informality of how she addressed him was startling, but that wasn't what he found truly worrying. It had left her as a whisper, barely more substantial than a breath, and for a moment he feared that the danger, whatever it was, had not passed. Yet the tension was leaving her, draining from her form like water through a sieve. After a handful of heartbeats she seemed to come back to herself. Her eyes cleared, her brow creasing faintly with a hint of puzzlement.
When she spoke again her voice was steadier, if a little hoarse as she asked: "what…are you doing in my room?"
Uncontrolled by his better sense, his hand turned to stroke the hair spilling in a white tangle about her, not minding the sweat damp at her temple. He supposed it was instinct or reflex, forged from his years as a brother to younger sisters. The tenderness in the touch, however, was not at all brotherly, and carried more than the simple desire to soothe. One he could not quite restrain.
"I heard you cry out," he offered, knowing this would be sufficient to explain the initial intrusion. "I found you thrashing, and..."
He didn't rightly know how to finish that thought. Fortunately, it seemed he did not have to.
Visaera was nodding absently, unsurprised. "I apologize for having disturbed you. I was—having a nightmare."
A nightmare. Spoken with such resignation, as though it were entirely commonplace.
She had not been sleeping well when she'd arrived at King's Landing, he remembered. That had been some months ago now, though that was not a guarantee that the mind would settle, especially considering the various circumstances. He had assumed the difficulty had been related to a difficulty in getting to sleep, or else an issue of frequent waking, of the kind that Rhaegar dealt with - frustrating, tiring, but endurable. He had not considered it might be so bad as this.
He wasn't actively aware of doing so, yet Arthur found himself rising from the floor to sit at the edge of the mattress instead, conscious mostly of the plush feather filling shifting beneath his weight.
"It was no disturbance, My Lady," he assured her. Abruptly realizing that her hand was still nestled in his, he gently released her. "I'm only relieved that you are not unwell."
Tiredly she ran her other hand over her face.
"Not entirely well, I confess. My dreams are not always so violent so as to sound as though I am being murdered in my sleep. But when they are, it takes something of a toll."
While she had not meant them to be, the words served as a stark reminder nonetheless. Now that he was assured she was not in any danger, he ought to take his leave. She was in bed, after all, and he should not be there.
She moved to sit up, and before he could stop them his eyes dipped down, taking a long, illicit look of the gown she'd worn to sleep, of the skin he could glimpse beneath cloth so fine that it was almost sheer in the dim flickering glow from the tapers placed near the door. He could make out the shape of her in pale silhouette - the shadow at the apex of her thighs, the blushing pink of her nipples.
His mouth went dry and his chest tight, his pulse a sudden thunder in his temples and heavy in his groin.
It was far from the first time he had seen a woman in some state of undress, nor had it been all that long since he last had (even if the incident had been a rather unpleasant one). But this was different in every way it could be different. None of those women had been this one.
With a small sigh, she shifted, back curving as though to ease an ache there. The movement thrust her breasts upward, small and soft and perfect, and he had to work to swallow the beginnings of a moan.
He wrenched his eyes away, head jerking roughly for the effort it required.
He should go. Now. Yet he was rooted in place, unable to move as he traced the motion of her hand in his periphery - a slim white shape in the dim glow of the firelight.
The touch upon his arm was so light he shouldn't have been able to feel it through all his protective layers, yet he was so bloody aware of her that he doubted he would have failed to feel her breathe should she do so near enough.
"You truly believed me in danger," she murmured, almost as much to herself as to him.
His answering nod was brittle and stiff. "I feared that your predictions regarding the potential threat to your life might have been correct."
While he hadn't said it explicitly, he knew she would follow his meaning. If he had expected anything other than calm acceptance of this, however, he was mistaken to do so.
"You should have let me die, then," she mused, so matter-of-fact, as though she were speaking of something other than her own murder. "He would have thanked you f—"
"I would sooner slit my own throat."
The words left him in a tumble, a terse, snapping growl that forced its way from between his teeth. He was utterly unable to stifle it, and once spoken, it could not be taken back.
Her eyes widened, a flare of shock flickering across her face and her hand going slack to slip from his vambrace.
Arthur tried to gather his wits and spin some manner of recovery. He should clarify that there was no way he could have simply stood by and allowed someone to harm her, even when that wasn't entirely the truth. He was bound to protect her, yes, to shield her with his own body if he must, but he could not protect her against the crown he had sworn to defend and obey should that crown demand the price of her life.
Yet what had just come out of his mouth, and the harshness with which it had done so, told a very different story. He was floundering within his own mind, unable to cobble together any thought more substantial than the one calling himself five kinds of an idiot.
It was the sheer warmth of her which reached him first, then the faint hint winter rose, half an instant before her hand touched his cheek. He didn't know when she had moved closer, nor how he had failed to notice her do so. He could not feel the swell of her breast against his arm, but he felt the subtle pressure, the way the scale pattern of his mail flexed under the gentle weight of it.
She shifted, drawing her bent knees closer to her body so that she sat a bit taller, her face tilting ever so slightly upward. And in that face - so delicate and fierce - he found her utterly stripped of all the layers of marble and steel and pretty artifice she used to guard herself, leaving only the tender, vulnerable, powerful woman underneath. The same woman looking at him with something burning in the blue of her eyes and soft upon her lips.
Lips so close that he swore he could almost taste her.
"Lady Visaera…"
It was a warning, or at least he had intended it to be. Yet he could hear in the roughness of his own voice that it did not entirely sound as if he were warding her away. He saw the visceral shiver which chased along her body at the sound, saw her pupils dilate, and if there had been any semblance of caution in it, he understood that it had gone unheard.
Her fingertips trailed down the side of his face, the touch light as the brush of a bird's wing as it followed the back of his jaw to curl into the hair at his nape, and he felt what remained of his self-control leave him in a jagged rush.
His arm slid around the dip of her waist, hand splayed low across her back to pull her against him, his mouth lowering to meet hers. The supple shape of her was hot and soft and all but melting where he pressed her to the suddenly all too confining cage of his armor. She offered no resistance, merely made a small sound and parted her lips beneath his, and it was all he could do to lock the groan deep in his chest.
He inhaled sharply, pulling the sweet, ever so slightly spicy scent of her into his lungs. Before he could think to do it he was angling his torso toward her, lifting his empty hand to cup her bare shoulder and press her closer still. She made another sound at the slick, luscious slide of his tongue against hers. A breathy, gasping thing he caught with his own mouth, relishing the gentle vibration of it as much as the searing heat of her. Her nails scraped gently down the side of his neck, her hand grazing his high collar and flattening against the front of his cuirass to brace herself as though she must to keep from falling. As if he would ever have let her fall.
His palm slid up along the curve of her spine, fingers spread, greedy to feel more of her where he could. The diaphanous fabric of the gown was so fine that he could have rent it with his bare hands, and for a single reckless moment he considered it, the idea of having her unveiled and open rendering him lightheaded and half mad…
…what the fuck was he doing?
He wrenched away as though scalded, surging up and away from the bed with such force that he felt her falter and catch herself with a palm against the edge of the mattress. Instinct would have had him reach for her again, to steady her, to amend the harsh action. It was an instinct he ruthlessly silenced.
She was staring at him, beautiful eyes wide once again - this time with alarm.
"Forgive me."
He all but threw the words at her, yet the clipped cadence was insufficient to mask just how husky and ragged they were.
"I should not have…"
She blinked, alarm shifting into something halfway between confusion and a soft sort of amusement. "It was freely given," she said gently, "not theft."
There was some comfort in that, he supposed - he had not forced her. That would have been impossible to forgive. All the same, he wished she hadn't chosen to be quite so lenient. It would have been easier to condemn this as a gross error of judgment and misstep on his part had she offered even the slightest rebuke.
He risked a glance down at her, and immediately recognized the mistake.
Her hair was just one of the many things that had driven him to distraction of late. Hair made for a lover's hands: to be brushed by firelight, to be smoothed against a rough cheek and tangled between fingers. Just now the silvery mass was wild and curling where it had tumbled forward over a shoulder to veil one of her breasts. The rise and fall of her chest was quicker than it had been. Her lips were reddened and ever so slightly swollen. The sight of her brought a sharp pang of carnal hunger to pool within his belly. Lower.
Stop. Now.
With agonizing effort he forced himself to speak. "Even so. I should not have done you the dishonor."
He didn't expect her to laugh, yet she did; a blunt exhalation of wry amusement.
"I am no maid who need be concerned for her virtue, Ser," she told him frankly, folding her knees more securely beneath her where she sat.
A bit of her humor faded as she regarded him, the faintest hint of a frown pulling at her mouth. "If anyone is dishonored," she added slowly, "it is I who have dishonored you. I'm the one who should ask forgiveness."
He could scarcely believe he'd heard her right.
She dishonor him? She had taken no oath. His charge was to protect her, not to take advantage, which was exactly what he had done. A woman need not be virginal to be subjected to grievous insult by the touch of a man. Whether she had been willing or not, she had also been in a state of distress. It had been wrong. Wrong to touch her, wrong to kiss her, wrong to stroke her hair and offer soothing or comfort.
He had been right, he realized numbly, as he watched her frown deepen with a different sort of distress - one which he had caused. This went beyond the mere physical. Alarmingly so.
He took a deep breath, grounding himself in the sensation of the air filling his lungs, the stone beneath his feet, the familiar shape of the pommel of the ancestral sword of his house against his palm.
"No, My Lady," he said. Softly, but with a firm conviction that did him proud. "You have done nothing to require forgiveness from me."
The bow he gave her was slightly deeper than her station required, yet he felt it appropriate considering the situation.
Straightening, he turned and left the room, shutting the door quietly behind him.
He wasn't sure how long he stood at his post before he heard the distinctive muted clatter of armored boots ascending the shallow steps at the end of the corridor - moments only, no more. Certainty in no way long enough to catch back the breath he had left in the room down and across the hall.
Ser Barristan came into view, arrived to relieve him for the remainder of the night, and Arthur was sharply reminded as to yet another reason why his actions had been so terribly thoughtless.
Had the other knight come but a little sooner he would have found Arthur gone from his post and Visaera's door open, and of course he would have been compelled to investigate. Worse, it might not have been Barristan. It could easily have been a servant, brought by her cries as he had been. And unlike the Kingsguard, servants were neither so skilled nor so inclined toward holding their silence. Even if he hadn't been caught entangled with her, simply being in her room alone in the dead of night would have been enough to cause gossip, and in the Red Keep gossip spread like so much rot across dampened bread.
Of the two of them, it was she who would have felt the sting of it more keenly simply by virtue of being female, and he could not condone that. To have put her in such a position was not simply imprudent, it was entirely unacceptable.
It didn't matter that she had welcomed him. It didn't matter that he would never be able to get the spice-and-honey sweetness of her mouth out of his head, or that he would forever regret that he hadn't had the thought to strip away just one glove. It never should have happened, and it could not - would not - happen ever again.
"Go on to bed, lad," Barristan ordered with affection, shooing him with a lazy flick of a hand.
To bed.
There would be no sleep for him this night. He didn't dare try - he knew where his dreaming would take him, and he was in no condition to withstand the torment.
When he'd taken his second set of vows, he had been arrogant enough to believe he would find them no hardship to keep. He had believed he could never have feeling enough for a woman to compare to the strength of his conviction. Foolish boy, he thought now, the sweet, sick ache in his belly spread to twist like a knife in his chest. Foolish man, half in love with a woman he could not have.
If this was how the gods had seen fit to punish him for that arrogance, he doubted they could have chosen better.
NOTES:
So...
That happened.
Most of my stories - fanfic or otherwise - tend to run at a much slower burn than this (I have a rep). Technically I'm only sidestepping a little bit, because of course it can't be that easy (gimme that sweet, sweet angst, baby). I'm also having to remind myself that more time has passed than appears, due to the structure I chose and all that, but it still feels odd to me to be here so soon!
I've got a few of silly technical notes (I'm sorry, things like this matter to me):
ASOIAF history and lore are...insanely complex, and I have trouble keeping things straight on occasion. When I first started writing this, I was just so happy to find something that worked for the rough-sketch scenario in my head that I overlooked a couple details - such as why the Blackfyre rebellions were kind of a big deal. I downplay it a bit, but there's technically a whole-ass army in Essos that would more than likely 1000% cross the sea and take on a massive slaughter-heavy coup to put a Blackfyre on the throne. Sooo...we're just going to pretend that's not AS much of a thing as it would have been canonically. Just, if the severity of things seems to have increased a bit, it's both an accident and somewhat by design (my reasoning for a few things is a bit loose, but this is fanfic and I'm ok with it).
Kyle Royce's relation to the current Lord of his house is not known. It's doubtful he was the lord's son (there probably would have been a passing mention considering his fate), but I chose to make him so for plot reasons. He's also possibly a bit younger canonically than I made him, but whatever. Runestone – where the Royce family seat is – actually IS a coastal city. I moved it inland for reasons.
Historically, forks did not exist in the medieval period around which GoT is based. For the life of me, I cannot remember if I actually saw one being used on screen or if I made it up, but I decided to say fuck it. It's a fantasy world. Let me have forks.
Visaera's general exasperation with herself at catching feelings humors the heck out of me.
In the show, the Kingsguard are almost always depicted as wearing their helmets, which makes sense if they're supposed to be constantly at the ready for a fight to the death. At the same time, Barristan Selmy is depicted without his more than wearing it – the better so we can see his actor act – which I'm using as an excuse to keep Arthur's face visible, even if it's impractical.
I hope that I made it clear enough that some time passed between the last scene and the two before it - different dinners with different dinner-partners are being referred to. It's hard to depict passage of time without constantly literally stating it. Maybe I just should...it just bothered me every way I tried to here.
More of a housekeeping item, and a bit less fun. As to the subject regarding the speed at which I do or don't update. While I truly appreciate and understand the desire to read more of an engaging fic - trust me, really I do - please keep in mind that I work a full-time job, have other hobbies that also clamor for my time, and other things going on. Plus, there is the fact that the world is currently on fire and much of my life of late is spent as a tangled-up wad of stress and exhaustion, and very often unable to do much of anything. I fully understand that questions about updates or requests to do so faster come from a place of excitement and positive things, but the way it lands causes me to feel a lot of guilt and self-disappointment and a sense of inadequacy that aren't intended, but hurt nonetheless.
I will never have an eta for an upcoming chapter. My life and the way I write simply do not allow me that, and I don't believe in offering false promises. I know that sucks. It sucks for me, too. But it is what it is. I don't know when I will be able to update, but please rest assured that as soon as I'm able, I will do so.
Lastly (and much more pleasant) - as someone who has come into fandoms/pairings/love of specific characters through fanfic before (the reason I ended up drawn to Arthur in the very beginning was through fic!), I realize not every reader here came here specifically for Arthur. So, to those of you who didn't: what is it that prompted you to search for fanfic of this character? Were you a book-reader or a show-watcher, or both? Is it more the period in this world's history (I would so much rather we were getting a show of this than the Dance of Dragons, but that's just me)? I'm genuinely very curious!
On that note, I will scoot for now. Please consider leaving a comment - tell me what you're enjoying so far or what you'd like to see happen, predictions, anything of that nature - if you can. If not, enjoy, and take care of you.
Until next time!