Chapter Thirty Four: Raven, Bull and I Hate My Life.
Fifteenth Day of the Tenth Month, 114 AC.
"Grandfather seems in a poor mood," I mused as I was ushered into Lymon's study. I had passed said prick as he stormed out of said room looking just the most delightful shade of red.
His elder brother nodded while sipping at his tea. "Oh, he is quite crossed with me."
The ghost of his smile made me chuckle.
It reminded me of the Runciter's smile every time he caught one of Barth's grammatical errors.
"Any particular reason?" I slipped into my seat as Ebermen leaned against the wall, Nessa settled beside me and Clearsky slipped her head in through the window.
Lymon nodded with a pleased glimmer in his eye as he sipped. He put down the cup and handed me a missive.
I wordlessly took the message and read over it with an unusually wide smile.
"Do try to not look so pleased," Lymon chidded. "I do not wish another lecture from the Archmaester. Ormund has already caused quite enough lecturing, thank you."
I chuckled. My big lug of a cousin was not stupid but he was not the brightest bulb. His instinctive fear of the Archmaester was hilarious though, even if perfectly reasonable.
"But how can I not?" I restrained my expression to a grin as I finished the letter. "And Ormund's feelings on the matter?"
"Grim resignation," Lymon sighed. "My son is nothing if not dutiful."
I could all but hear unlike his brothers. Garth the elder was dead and Cerwyn was a sellsword in Essos last anyone heard.
"He long expected it," Lymon continued. "The eldest daughter of Lord Corlys's younger brother is perhaps a surprising, he has long expected a Reach match."
A match that would knock both houses clean out of the Dance along with myself and Laena.
There would be more of course but that was the first shot, so to speak.
Corla was supposedly a gorgeous widow but she would be bringing a great dowry on Corlys's budget and seal the beginnings of a considerable trade alliance. I had sort of screwed my little cousin Garth in that regard as he was already promised to a yet-unborn girl as part of the bargain.
At least he too would enjoy a good dowry.
As it happened, all of the matches in House Velaryon's future would be on Corlys's budget.
Hardly ruinous for the man but a firm reminder that his house's future was mine.
Visible kinslaying is the highest taboo in Westeros. I reflected. If I tie the two houses wed into the royal house together with several marriages, then I can do a crippling PR blow to whichever house acts.
I supposed that they were not harsh terms.
Why would they be?
Arral was of the opinion that neutralizing the Hightower as a threat and securing his house's growth as permanent were the chief goals of Corlys.
The matches and deals would do just that. Even if in a way which heavily favored the Hightowers.
Ruining the Velaryons would have been incredibly counterintuitive on my part.
Strangling both houses of the potential to do my family, and most importantly myself, harm? Now that was a grand prize.
In the long term, Nessa theorized that I would actually be making both houses richer even.
That Corlys was now furnishing me personally with fifty dragons a month and would take me as a squire were even better.
Squire in this case meaning that I would enjoy complete autonomy to do what I wished.
"Things are going according to plan then," I said confidently.
I was also being rather careful to align the well-being of the twins to my own. The two Waters would be brought along with Corla and a few relatives in a year's time.
I did not intend to blackmail Laena but they would be put under the care of some of the Hightower nannies. Nannies who liked draconic jewelry.
It was important that they were raised with the right ideas of who was the one in their corner. So that Laena did as well.
Joffrey was also a rather bright boy and Laenor was no brick.
I intended Corlys to come to understand that if he tried to move against me, it would not be in his family's enlightened best interest to follow his lead.
"It would be quite interesting to know how you secured this," Lymon noted noncommittally.
Would it not be wonderful to know that you could eliminate this and keep the earnings? I asked. "I am a very charming boy."
Lymon sipped, "Very charming. Gaemon the Clever sounds quite contrived so let us say that I will not look in this horse's mouth."
It made my teeth itch that Lymon was so compliant with my scheme. I understood that it was of a pure benefit to him. Arral had also made a point that something of the sort had been part of his reasoning for extending an open invitation.
But he was not the only one that could not afford to check the teeth.
I had to count on there being no reason for his support being an elaborate trap.
"The wedding will be within a year if all goes well," Lymon continued will I meditated on his potential for treachery. "I do not foresee the throne moving against the match, I fear that the princess and the queen will be unhappy but I doubt the king will be troubled."
It was fortunate that I was used to keeping myself smiling because that tone seemed suspiciously like a 'thank you'.
Which would have been a dead give-away for a trap.
I had done everything I could to tighten the chain around Corlys without ruining him but I had no such hold over Lymon.
Neither could be fully trusted even if they gave impressions of agreeing to their terms.
Which did not really change much. I liked and respected Lymon but that did not change the fact that he could have turned on me from the first day.
The deal changed nothing in that respect.
"Well enough of that," The elder man put down his cup. "Your lessons are not for half an hour. I assume you have a reason to be early? Beside watching Otto's tantrum of course."
"Of course," I smiled. "Nessa?"
…
It did not snow in Oldtown.
It did rain.
A lot.
"And it is raining today," I sighed as we emerged from the study. "Again."
"Winter is coming," Nessa commented. "Those are House Stark's words, if I have the right of it."
"I have always found those words rather obvious and uninformative," Ebermen quipped.
"Perhaps they are the words of House Bulwer then," Nessa shot back.
"If only," the Bulwer sighed.
I had long given up on interfering whenever those two began quipping at each other.
Strange to say, I found that I trusted those two.
Actual trust.
Even if a part of me knew that I might regret it.
My bull and my raven.
Or more precisely, my Bulwer and Doggett.
"In any case," I interrupted them after they had been sniping for a few minutes. "We are left with twenty gold in the budget."
"Forty, my prince," Nessa corrected. "The establishments were profitable during Lord Lannister's stay in the Landing. The invested funds should be delivering dividends at a greater rate but I prefer not to chance it."
I snorted at that, Nessa was born to the poorest and lowliest branch of her house but she took a hilarious amount of pride in what even ladies of similar rank would not be caught doing.
"A not-insignificant sum," Ebermen scratched his beard. It mildly annoyed me that my shield had a better head for numbers than I did.
"I had actually wondered of you had a use for it, Ser," Nessa offered.
"Not even going to ask for my approval?" I joked.
"Oh, but you always give it for the White Jaws," Nessa protested. "There is no point in asking you, My Prince."
Even Nessa had fallen into the habit of using the irksome nickname.
"Yet you call me paranoid," I rolled my eyes while knowing that I had every reason to be.
"Only because you are like as not thinking to yourself that you are correct to be so, My Prince," She pointed out.
She is getting as uncanny as Ebermen and Sky, I grumbled internally.
"To answer your question, my lady," Ebermen snorted. "We are quite prepared as things stand. It would not be undue to acquire a third set of plate to each man however."
Arral had taken Laena's arrival in an odd way.
Odd in that he took her staying as reason to deliver the gifts which I suspected that he had already been making.
Ten of them to be exact, one of which encased my shield.
Sublime plate, articulated in the queer fashion of the eccentric maester and etched in the flowing patterns he liked so much.
My guards had been quite pleased with them. The mobility, the surprising ease of maintenance and the strength of the plate was uncanny. More fit to the armor of a lord paramount than a mere guard.
If only I did not suspect that it was quenched in something unspeakable or at least incredibly gross, I reflected.
It came as no surprise to me that Ebermen would look at all of that and think that a third sst of plate to each man might be necessary.
"That would only require twenty gold," Nessa sniffed. "I had hoped to suggest a two-stag increase to staffing pay, with the remainder being given over to personal ventures."
Her begrudging way of suggesting an emergency fund.
"I approve," I said while trying to hold back a smile. Nessa hated to hold money, in her mind a coin that was not duplicating itself was pointless.
My former caretaker had nearly rolled her eyes back in pleasure after learning the finer points of credit and debt-collecting.
"Very well," she sighed.
The glare she gave Ebermen when he chuckled made me imitate him.
The two got along rather well in their own way.
"When will the purchase be done?" I asked Nessa, referring to the parchment she held in her hand.
She pushed up her glasses while giving it a thought, "With Lord Hightower approving of the purchase? Three weeks at most, Prince."
One particular use for Velaryon coin was buying up a few trading companies that did business along the Western coast. Fairly middling ones but ones which would see considerable inflation as they always did with winter shipping.
Fruit preserves did rather well out of the Reach during winters and Nessa was quite pleased to enact a macro-scale of her small venture.
Regrettably, such a large purchase would have been difficult to get past Lymon, so his tacit approval was necessary. Officially, he had merely approved of the purchase of a smaller venture by a larger trading company of course but Nessa did not like having even a letter of her name on any contract.
If all went well, then my portfolio by the age of eight would a ridiculous web of small to middling businesses ostensibly held by no less than twenty individuals.
There was little fault to find in that, especially as my budget grew more and more demanding.
I had nearly eighty pendants working on my behalf, to say nothing of my informants, servants and guards at various stages of clearing. Each had relatives to protect, dreams to fulfill and ambitions to monitor.
To say nothing of the bulk of my funds being tied in business ventures to scattered to be readily tallied or stolen by onlookers.
It was already intimidating enough to think about before having to think about adding the fruit importing to the whole ordeal.
"Are you certain that this can be managed?" I finally asked, somewhat hesitantly.
Nessa gave me a half-smile, "I do fear I will get rather bored otherwise, My Prince."
"Some of us would love a little boredom," I pointed out as we neared my rooms.
"No you would not," Nessa pointed out. "You have not stayed still for a moment since I had you on the breast."
If she did not make those comments, I would forget that she started out as a wet nurse of all things!
…
"We-welcome back!" Laena stammered with a bow as I entered my apartments.
In the three months since her arrival, Laena had developed the unfortunate belief that she needed to wait for me at the door of the rooms we shared to a bit of gossip.
Well, a bit of gossip before the bored cousin responsible came down with an unfortunate illness that left her quite unable to spread slander and was married off to some lordling.
She waited in as modest a dress as she could find and with a rather tired looking Westerlands!Hubert behind her.
"Hello Laena," I smiled while I kissed her hand. "How was your day?"
I had come to believe that my terms with Corlys had given Laena the mistaken idea that she was a hostage. And she tried her damndest to be a good one.
"Good, I have been with Ser Hubert," she nodded quickly as if I had somehow implied that she was somewhere else.
Laena had been putting too much effort into being as ladylike as she could manage. Case in point, she refused to go anywhere without a Whitejaw. As if I would make some accusation if her location could not be confirmed without witness.
...alright, that last one is fair, I conceded.
That she was trying so hard to be good was hard enough, that she seemed at a loss for how to deal with my overtures was worse. She seemed to take every kindness as if it were undeserved and every slip-up on my part as well-earned.
"She has somehow yet to light the Starry Sept on fire, My Prince," Hubert commented with a miserable tone. Serving Laena was generally seen as a somewhat depressing duty.
The truth of the matter was that no one that earned a pendant was the kind of person that did not sympathize with the girl. Her endearing kindness and eagerness to be helpful only made it worse.
I feel like I am one cat away from evil stepmother territory with my own fiance, I sighed.
Even in a shapeless gown, she was radiant.
"And Vhagar?" I smiled.
The enormous beast had made its home on a fallow field not far from the city and one of the few things that brightened her mood.
"She likes the weather here," Laena's face cheered up instantly, gloominess giving way to sunny expression for only a moment before remembering to strangle anything resembling a personality. "She seems well, my prince."
"I was hoping to go flying with you both soon," I suggested as we entered the dining room. It was my habit to try and eat privately with Laena at least once a week.
The suggestion was not random, I knew that flight was what the Laena of another world had loved most dearly. A pleasure she denied herself for months despite my prodding. I hoped that a change in tactic might give her an excuse to indulge.
"I would not-that is to say," she hesitated before collecting herself. "Clearsky is a wonderful flier, my prince. Her wing structure is very nice. But…"
"Go on," I nodded patiently as we sat. "You are far more experienced than I, Laena."
That is not even a lie, you like to fly more than most any other living rider.
"My mother, she likes the old way. She rode with me and Vhagar but I rode with her on Meleys a few times first," she explained. "To become used to it."
… I do not think that you will drop me. You might turn on me later, but you are not so cold.
"That would be lovely," I smiled.
She blushed away and I had the feeling that I said the wrong thing.
With nothing to do other than to poke at our dinners, I was finally down tk talking about the weather.
"Will this be your first winter out of Driftmark?" I asked while a voice in my head shouted. Of course it is, you fool!
"Y-yes, my prince," The style annoyed me coming from her. From others it was fine. My staff said it with various tones of endearment, amusement or even sarcasm. Outsiders said it with formality. Laena said it with fear.
"It will be my own as well," I tried to rally. "Supposedly, the Reach is quite lovely in Winter."
That worked, surprisingly.
"I read that as well," she nodded slowly. "When I was younger, I often thought that I might come see it myself. The Arbor especially-" She broke off as if she just remembered that she was not supposed to have agency. "It is a silly thing to say, My Prince. I apologize."
"Do not worry about it," I smiled at her.
We lapsed back into silence.
I need to get you comfortable with me.
Then the impulse hit me.
"Why not?" I asked suddenly.
"My prince?" Laena seemed puzzled.
"Why should we not go to the Arbor?" I smiled. "We have dragons, it would only be a day to and from!"
I reached over to touch her hand, thanking my luck that she did not recoil.
"I will have it arranged!" I nodded. "Lymon will not begrudge me a day, I think."
And maybe it will show you that I am not holding you hostage.
An unfortunate part of my mind considered that I needed to do some research into what passed for swimsuits in Westeros.
Because I really doubted that I could withstand the sight on a disrobed Laena without killing myself so that I might go to Westerosi!Heaven and strangle all seven heads of their gods.
There was only so much that a sane man would take before he considered deicide.
Granted, a year of the same dream made the 'sane' part dubious.