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EDDARD III
"The day was a warm one, as ever in The Red Keep, as the end of the long summer did its best to drey itself on. Though it was certainly cooler in here than on the streets outside at least. King Maegor the Cruel had seen to that when he had constructed the castle. Any castle with the possible exception of Winterfell, with its hot springs, was mostly cold due to the massive stones, and the Red Keep was no different. If he had had thoughts over, he might have pitied the guards who stood out.
He went down to see how they were having it. Matthys and the others seemed happy enough, happy but sweating indeed. They gave him a report of the day's goings-on so far and he nodded severely, showing that he valued their guardsmanship. Then he took a short walk around the cool outskirts of the godswood, and then back to the courtyard where Moonboy was juggling in front of the ladies, who sat watching the spectacle with drinks in their hands, and then he went back inside again.
...
He came upon Arya at the stairs. She was dressed in her new simple grey fighter dress, the one that her dancing master Syrio Forel had recommended for her, a slim boyish outfit with pants, standing on one leg, balancing at the top of the stairway.
"Arya, what are you doing?" He asked.
"Syrio says that a water dancer can stand for hours on one toe, and not lose his balance."
"Is that so..." He stood quietly watching her, as he regained his breath at the strange sight. But Arya would do more or less as she pleased, and in this, he had encouraged her himself, he supposed. She had continued her training ever since they got back from Winterfell, but she had not yet gotten her sword back.
"Which toe?" He teased her.
"Any toe!" Arya said, exasperated with the question. She hopped from her right leg to her left, swaying dangerously before she regained her balance.
"Must you do your standing here?" He asked. "It's a long hard fall down the steps."
"Syrio says a waterdancer never falls." She lowered her legs to stand on two feet.
"Father, will Mother and Bran and Rickon come back home again from Winterfell now that he's woken up?"
Ned thought about that for a while, before replying.
"Not for a long time, sweet one", he told her. "He needs time to regain his strength. Benjen and Lady Cersei will take care of them in the meantime."
Arya bit her lip.
"What will Bran do when he comes of age?"
Ned knelt down beside her, feeling the stiffness in his back.
"He has years to find that out, Arya. For now, it is enough to know that he will live."
The night the bird had come from Winterfell, King Eddard Stark had taken Robb and the girls to the godswood. The acre of elm and alder and black cottonwoods with its far end side overlooking the river, was more or less the same, even as he had taken a small part of it to the west and [hägnat in] fenced in to make a small hage for the direwolves where they padded around in any time of day when they were not by Robb's or Sansa's side. The heart tree, the great oak where he would go to pray, was large and greyish brown as ever, its ancient limbs overgrown with muralgreen ivy, southern green moss and smokeberry vines.
They all knelt before it to offer their thanksgiving, and for a while, Ned felt that it was almost as if it was become a weirwood after all. He felt safe here, even though the city would always be around them, and the home of his forefathers was a thousand leagues north where Bran lay, or at the moment perhaps sat. It had taken him fourteen years to appreciate it in truth, but now, as he and the girls bowed down before the familiar old tree, he felt that yes, this was finally become his home.
Sansa drifted to sleep as the moon rose, with her Lady similarly laying down to rest in the grass of the hage closeby. Arya several hours later, curling up in the grass under Ned's cloak. Robb barely felt the need to sleep at all. They stood watching the tree and the sky above, father and son, and sleeping daughters, as the moon shone above. After a while, however, he became tired as well and went into the castle. Sansa and Arya were still sleeping.
All through the dark of the night, he kept his vigil alone. Jory was standing somewhere behind, not making a sound, and Ned had only a vague semblance of knowing where he stood, for he did not turn back to look. He was not worried about losing his life, not in general, never for his own, and never here. He was only thanking the old gods for having saved the life of Bran.
When dawn broke over the city, the dark red blooms of dragon's black breath surrounded the girls where they lay.
"I dreamed of Bran", Sansa had whispered to him. "I saw him smiling."
…
Arya woke him up to the present again.
"He was going to be a knight", Arya said. "A knight of the Kingsguard, just like Jory and Erryk, to protect you and Robb. Can he still be a knight now?"
"No", Ned said. "He cannot." He saw no use in lying to her. "Yet some day he may be the lord of a great holdfast, and sit in the king's council. He might raise castles, like Bran the Builder, or sail a ship across the Sunset Sea, or enter your Mother's Faith and become the High Septon."
But he will never run beside his wolf again, the thought with a sadness too deep for words, or lie with a woman, or hold his own son in his arms...
Arya cocked her head to one side. "Can I be a king's councillor, and build castles, and become the High Septon? Even though I'm a girl?"
"You..." Ned said, kissing her lightly on the brow, "will marry a high lord and rule his castle. And your sons will be princes and high lords and knights and... yes, perhaps even a High Septon."
Arya seemed to think on that, as if accepting the fact that she would only ever be a woman to a man.
"When will I have Needle back?" She said, suddenly.
"In a [month?]'s time, as I told you. I will not change my judgement because you have behaved."
"All right. ... I suppose I will have to fight with sticks until then."
She folded up her right leg and resumed her balancing. Ned sighed and left her there.
Inside his chambers, he took off his sweat-stained silks and sleuced cool waters over his head from the basin beside the bed. Then he told a servant to fetch him a hot meal of supper before the night.
...
The next day was equally warm as the previous one, if not even warmer even.
He sat in his solar, alone with his thoughts in the pressing heat of the day. He had covered the tall great windows with the thick grey curtains bearing his sigil, the sigil of the King, but even so, some hard sunrays found their way in to the room, making him fret with the heat. It nearly burned on his skin. He had to fight to remind himself of the precious luck that was summer, and the terror that the winter would bring when it came in time.
And he also found himself fighting to not think about something else. It was so strange, but he had not heard a word about it ever since that last time, he realized. That almost made him more scared. He needed to finally know, to get it off his chest, if Littlefinger was plotting something, something which it would be of good use for the Lord Protector of the Realm to know about... Sure, the man was always coming up with strange schemes, but what else could one expect from a Master of Whisperers? He needed sorely to be kept under stern watch from the King, Ned was certain.
Ned had never even wanted the position left, to be filled by anone at first, as he saw it for the terrible conspiracies and madness it had sewn into the mind of Aerys Targaryen, but Jon Arryn had told him to keep it all the same, and after a long time he had listened. And now, as it turned out... The seat was taken by his wife's old, and equally trusted and distrusted friend Lord Petyr Baelish.
Ned sighed, telling himself again inside his mind for a tenth time to resist the temptation or curse, whatever it was that made a man ask that which he did not wish to know the answer to.
And yet he must surely know. Was this some trick of Littlefinger's, to try and not speak of the matter any more? He had always been far more pressing with his ideas before, the ones about loaning from the Iron Bank, and lending out money to various houses in the Vale and the Westerlands, as well as insisting that the taxes on his brothels be lowered. That had been the last straw of it last time around. But now he had suddenly not spoken about the matter ever since they had came back from their enormously long journey to Winterfell and back... Not a word out of Lord Baelish's mouth about Lord Hoster, nor of the Princess Daenerys. It made him worried. It made him curious. It made him go near mad.
What was it that the ever-smiling man had even said? Some plot about trying to find Lord Varys over in Essos, yes, that much was all clear, but there had been more. Something about ships, and the Velaryons instead of the Royal Fleet... Ned found it all so strange.
But he knew now that he had to take the courage to his heart, and the grit from his soul, and make himself to ask, or else remain in the dark about the lord of the Fingers's secrets more and more for each passing day... Perhaps, he tried and told himself, if he knew what Littlefinger was planning, he could try his best and stop it before anything had occurred.
And so, on the afternoon, as the sun stood at its highest, shining high in the sky above the tall towers of the Red Keep, he called for the girl [Marylda? ] to fetch him a large caraff of iced honeymilk and two glasses, and when she was back and had returned all the way up with the drink, he told her to go and fetch Lord Baelish.
…
Littlefinger had a knowing smile on him, as ever, when he walked inside the door. He was wearing his silvery and [green? Teal?] tunic, with his silver mockingbird pin on the side of his elegant collar. He looked every inch slick and droll with his entrance into the King's solar for a late summer talk.
"Your Grace", he smiled, his voice thick with innuendo, "how glad I am that you have brought me here. It is a fine day to be having a glass of swallor in this blasted heat, is it not?"
"Welcome, Lord Baelish. Indeed it is. You may sit."
"I thank you most humbly", Littlefinger said, as he made a small semi-mocking bow, and sat down on the chair in front of him. Between them stood the table with a couple of books, a candle, some maps, a black iron compass and the caraff of iced honeymilk with two glasses. Marylda poured them two glasses, and Ned thanked her kindly for it.
As she went out and closed the door behind her, Littlefinger took a sip of his drink and expressed his delight.
"You certainly are fortunate to have ice brought all the way from the snowy mountain tops of the Vale, Your Grace... " Lord Petyr Baelish noted.
King Eddard Stark regarded him with a considerful look.
"Yes... Indeed I believe that I am, my lord."
They both drank for a while, saying nothing, as Littlefinger looked out through the windows behind.
"Ah... Now there is a true summer sky. All blue and bright at its expanse, and yet orange and pink, already turning into the calm of the afternoon by the horizon. Only think, Your Grace, how soon the days do grow shorter for us all to make our decisions..."
"Indeed...", the King said again, sipping on his drink and regarding Littlefinger with a silent stare.
The little man only smiled, as content as can be. As if he had all the time in the world, and that he knew full well exactly what the king wanted out of him.
…
Littlefinger was watching Ser Barristan and the other knights of the Kingsguard practice at swords in the yard down below him.
"If only old Selmy's mind was as nimble as his blade", he said wistfully. "Our council meetings would be a good deal livelier."
"Ser Barristan is as valiant and honourable as any man in King's Landing."
Despite his having fought for the Targaryens in the war that made him king, Ned had come to have a deep respect for the aged white-haired lord commander during all of his years on the throne.
"And as tiresome", Littlefinger added. "Though I dare say he should do well in the tourney. Last year he unhorsed [The Hound – Ser Gilbert/Ser Aron/[ ]], after all, and it is still only four years ago since he was champion."
"Indeed I had not forgotten", Ned said. But the question of who would win the tourney interested Eddard Stark not in the least.
…
Littlefinger went back to his chair and sat down again. He said nothing more, as Ned waited.
They sat so for a good while. Two good whiles, even.
Finally, the King let him have it. Else they would never get out of this room, he thought. And he did after all need to know what folly he was planning, so that he could do his best to try and steer him away from it all, if such a thing was even possible.
"Lord Baelish..." He began.
"Your Grace.", Littlefinger said.
"I fear that it has finally come the long pressed time that I must take my pride and swallow it, if not for my own sake, then for the good of the safety of the realm, and all those who live within it. It has been a fortnight since I returned, and to your good credit you have spoken naught more of the matter, just as you promised. But now I fear that I must ask it of you all the same, although I did swore to myself that I would not."
"How wise of you, Your Grace..." Littlefinger mocked.
"Last time before I left for Winterfell, you spoke to me of the incident with Lord Varys, as you thought it to be. The attempted attack at Princess Daenerys at Riverrun."
"I did, Your Grace", Littlefinger confirmed.
"Why?" Ned asked. "Why speak of Lord Varys?"
Littlefinger seemed a bit taken aback, he who never was, while he sipped on his cold honeyed milk and no doubt thought of an answer that would serve him best.
"For the safety of the realm, as you say, Your Grace... And for that of the Lady Daenerys, surely."
"The safety of Lady Daenerys is not of your concern. That concern falls to me and Lord Hoster. You are Master of Whispers. Your concern is any conspiring ongoings in the realm and threats to my rule."
"Surely, Your Grace... A conspiracy to kidnap the princess would be considered treason towards your rule...? Your Grace...?"
He had him there. There was nothing he could say to that.
Ned felt stupid, then angry, close to boiling, then up-given. He sighed and rephrased his statement.
"You seem awfully concerned with the Lord Varys in particular. It is almost as if you held some personal grudge to him... Why could that be, I wonder? Does this have anything to do with the Iron Bank? Has the eunuch had some business with them? Or has he ordered the faceless men to abduct the princess, same as the sellswords?"
"This I cannot say, Your Grace... An interesting proposition, no doubt... But hardly mine own motivation for acting and planning as I did, no... There are other reasons for his involvement."
He seemed genuine enough in his reply, Ned supposed. More genuine than he had ever seen him before, almost. For once his sentences did not sound as rehearsed lines in a play that he had gone over and around in his mind a hundred times before. But he still could not be certain.
"Tell me, my lord... If Lord Varys should be so kind as to grace us with his presence on this side of the Narrow Sea... What would you do? Have him executed? Is that the way of it?"
"Would not you, Your Grace...? You had him spared one time, on account of your old friend, Lord Robert, and some other foolhardy advisors, who thought it less dangerous to set him free and in exile forever, but apparently now we can all see the fruits of those seeds that were so unnecessarily sown... And Prince Viserys is at Dragonstone, only a... forgive my jape, Your Grace, but only a stone's throw away from Essos on the other side of the Narrow Sea... What if the eunuch has reached him too?"
"Prince Viserys is under the protection and guardianship of Lord Stannis. I have no worries about that.", Ned said, putting emphasis on his words.
"Oh, I am only all too sure about that, and the honour and righteousness of Lord Stannis, Your Grace, but... Well... Is a young boy truly still a boy once he has turned a goodly twenty-and-two? … Or after he has taken the full command over his own island and keep? Once he has taken a wife?"
"Lord Stannis assures me that he and Prince Viserys still share the power over the goings-on at Dragonstone. He remains as lord castellan, with powers equal to that of the Prince. That is the way of it, and so it shall remain, for a good number of years more, until I have made my decision on it."
Littlefinger looked up at him, smiling with his grey-green eyes flickering to and fro across the King's face and around the room. Then they suddenly stopped, intensifying on the sight of the map which lay infolded on the table in front of them both.
"Forgive me, Your Grace, indeed, if you would, but I fear I must take a different approach entirely to the question of the Prince's loyalty to you and Lord Stannis..." His voice was hoarse with conspiracy, his eyes gleamed with secrets long concealed.
"What? What is it? Why would you say something of the sort? Do you claim to have any knowledge of the prince, any possession over his secrets that I do not? Speak."
"Perhaps, Your Grace... And perhaps not."
"Speak. Tell me all there is, if there indeed is something. I command it." His tone was hard. Angry, even. Aye.
Littlefinger bowed, satisified.
"As you wish, Your Grace..." He put up his hand into the air, as if stroking an invisible feather or bird that sat on his shoulder or arm.
"It is only... That our dear Prince Viserys happens to have a certain affliction about him... An affliction which is quite well-known to you and me both... One that is called by many names, but which has a certain one which we know all to well." He paused. … "Targaryen madness."
"This is no secret. None at all. Viserys is Aerys's son. What of it? There are no great signs so far. I am certain of it."
"No? Then you are surely a more naive king than should suffice to sit on that throne, which was made out of the thousands of swords melted and hammered by his ancestors from the kneeling of yours own... He is a dragon, Your Grace. A Targaryen. And a Targaryen alive in this world without that which he craves, without that which is entitled to him by his birth, is a dangerous thing, has he been raised by our good friend the stubborn steward stag of Stannis Baratheon or no."
Littlefinger liked to rhyme his words at times. He smiled with smug self-satisfaction.
"You see, Your Grace... Loyalty can in some men certainly be raised and bred from a young age. In others, however, its presence or absence... Stems entirely from other things... the fire, and the blood."
"I do not believe that. Viserys is a good man. He has overcome his ailment. Stannis has made sure of that, ever since the prince was a young boy. No more than eight years old."
"So far, perhaps..." Littlefinger allowed, shrugging his shoulders underneath his silver green tunic, "but there is always a morning day, Your Grace. And your rule will never be truly safe so long as the former inheritors of your throne are left in power strong enough to take charge. Take my word."
"Enough talk of this. I am already fully aware of what it would take for Prince Viserys to overtake my throne if he ever wanted to. He does not have the power. Nor the men. Dragonstone and the other lands of the Blackwater are a small place, and with little fertile soil or riches, at that. Aegon the Conqueror himself did not have an army bigger than to conquer the mouth of the Blackwater Rush, in truth... Only a large enough fleet...- "
"And dragons, Your Grace..." Littlefinger filled in before Ned had a chance to finish.
"And dragons", Ned agreed. "Have you seen or heard of any such of late? If so, I'd be glad to hear."
His tone was mocking, his gaze hard at the little man with the silver bird pin in front of him.
Littlefinger laughed, a hearty chuckle which began deep down inside his chest, the slender, somewhat and somehow still youthful and lanky chest which had once gotten a slashing from his elder brother Brandon, an eternity ago, and yet so close in time as it seemed, when he regarded the man that stood before him... Still in his prime. Still as arrogant and knowing as ever before. Still thinking that he could outmaneouver any man that he found. Even the king.
But King Eddard Stark was not just a glorified soldier, as some men and women still seemed to think. He had a mind, although he was wont to use it on account of his heart, and the many duties which ly before him, and so he rarely played the game of thrones in truth... He had little care for it. But now he felt that he must press the matter, as it showed itself before him.
He thought again of Sansa's cyvasse table which still lay on its shelf in the common room some flights downstairs. Had Lord Baelish ever picked up the game? He was sure that he knew of it, but the board still lay where Ned had left it the last time. When he had opened it, merely a couple of days ago, not a single piece seemed to have been moved in the time that they had been up north. And how strange that was...
"Enough talk of this. As I said... You spoke to me of catching the eunuch last time. And you spoke of ships. Using the Velaryons's ships to catch him. Or some other game like it. What of that?"
"Now you are understanding me, Your Grace", Littlefinger smiled. "You remember. Yes... Yes, indeed..."
"Why?" the King said. "Why would we be better off using the ships of Lord Monford, the man most of all others sworn to his good-son Prince Viserys, of whose great power you warn me?"
"Ah, that is precisely why we must exercise caution, Your Grace... But the Velaryons are and have always been master shipmen. That much all men know to be true. If their ships were to vanish in the storms of the Narrow Sea... Well... I can barely remember when it happened the last time..."
"So...? What is it that you are telling me? That it would be a good thing to show them as incapable, or poor sailors? To stir up Lord Monford's wrath to see how he would ally himself closer with Viserys?"
He was speaking faster now, growing angry, but also growing desperate to for once keep up with Littlefinger's strange trail of mind if he could at all help it to try and do so.
"Almost, Your Grace, but not quite so. No... But as you might recall from our last talk of this, the Velaryons have always made the route from Driftmark and King's Landing to the Free Cities, bringing riches to and fro. In comparison with our own ships, bearing the white and grey direwolf of House Stark of King's Landing on their sails... A Velaryon ship or fleet would raise less suspicion when sailing towards Pentos, or Lys, or any of the other nearby cities along the coast indeed, before such time that our men can make port and step onto land in the city to try and find the eunuch once and for all."
The King was quiet, as he considered the proposal.
"Perhaps..." He allowed. "Perhaps you are right in that Lord Velaryon's ships are a more common sight in the Free Cities than our own bearing my sigil."
"That was all I ever claimed, Your Grace.", Littlefinger smiled his frivolous, slimey smile.
"But you spoke of the sinking of ships as well. What of that malice? Two, if I don't misremember. "
"Indeed you do not, Your Grace."
"Tell me. Why? Why would we sink our own ships? Or even worse, those of Lord Monford?"
"To take away the blame from us, of course, of what is to occur. The eunuch has many powerful friends, especially in Pentos, from what I have heard and seen. My little birds have made that much at least quite clear. If we were to feign an attack on our ships, while the rest of the small fleet made port, then... well... It would certainly make us seem less guilty all the while the surviving ships' crew went ashore and searched through the city for him."
"To make us seem less suspicious, even before we begin the search? That is surely no reason to sink ships of our own fleet! Are you gone mad?"
"If it is for the lives of the sailors that you worry, Your Grace, rest assured. I know that you don't want to deal with such bloody sacrifices. We need not have more than perhaps a dozen men die. Just enough for the coast guards to see the proof of the horrors we have suffered through. We can take them from the score of prisoners among the black cells and dress them in sailor's clothes before the incident. Men who have killed, men who would be dead anyway. Noone need ever be the wiser."
"The prisoners which we hold are to be sentenced according to their crimes, and then either sentenced to man the Wall, or to go down underneath mine own Ice."
"Trust me, Your Grace... They would not feel much the difference. Be it by Ice or water... dying is dying, for a condemned man."
"And then what?" Ned asked. "What is the brilliant continuation of your plan?"
He was truly speechless now, although admittedly curious, outrageously outraged, yes, but curious to hear more, if Lord Baelish possibly could slinger his way out of this absurdity he had just proposed. Try... Try, my lord, and we shall see how well you chirp about it... This ought to be good.
Littlefinger looked serious now, scanning the small key hole in the door behind him to make sure that noone of the guards or anyone else was standing outside just then and listening. As it was, however, only Jory was with them, as usual. Littlefinger went on.
"What I propose is... taking a small sacrifice of cargo, and either burning it or dumping it into the waters of the Narrow Sea, just outside of Pentos, for a change. Such things often happen further south, from what most men will tell you. Closer to the Stepstones, or even south of that. But no matter, if we are wise about it. Pirates are to be found most everywhere where there are men. And tales about them, even more. So... "
He harkled his mouth, turning in closer and leaning across the table, his [greyish green/teal/silver grey] sleeve of his elbow angled close to the iron compass which lay next to the map. His grey-green eyes gleamed intensely, with true excitement, at for once being allowed to tell his plans.
" We will then report the ships as having been sabotaged by pirates, reporting the incident to the council of the city, and then soon after making the port of Pentos burn with riots. We will set our best sailors and fighters to stir up some action, and then strengthen our claim for justice and safe travel over the sea with another sixteen to eighteen ships from Lord Velaryon's fleet, making port this time by either allowance or by force, though this time both traders and warships, making port with angry sailors and captains taking up the quays of the city's harbour, taking out the guards and the Pentoshi city watch – a small enough force mostly consisting of weakly willed slave soldiers, as I'm sure you are well aware, Your Grace – until the doddering Pentoshi council of magisters at last will have no choice but to rouse themselves from their powdered silk beds and listen to our petition. … Unless, of course, they hire sellswords or should enlist the help of the Dothraki, that is.
...And when there finally becomes such a rousing in the city that they are forced to listen to our demands that they seal the city's gates to find the pirates, we shall see who comes to claim the exit point."
"You mean that you are to trap Lord Varys in Pentos, if he is there, by having the city closed off?"
"Indeed I mean quite the opposite, Your Grace. We shall have him found out by letting him escape. For when ordinary folk cannot leave the smokehouse, and the mice are trying their best to get at the cheese before they choke on their own deathly fumes, then who will be the only one to make it out of the labyrinth, to make it out of its secret web, with all of his wriggly eyes and legs?... The spider."
King Eddard Stark was at a loss for words. He simply sat in his chair, his mouth slightly open, as he regarded the mad plan that had been hatched before him.
"My lord... I do believe you must have become mad from the heat.", he finally said.
"Mad and mad... Of course there is a madman needed to catch another one. That much is sure.", Littlefinger said, his voice hoarse and chiding. His accent had slid into Braavosi again, as it did.
"To launch all of Pentos into chaos and strife merely for the capture of one man, who we do not even know if he is innocent or not?"
"Not a man, Your Grace, so much as a shadow and a eunuch. A man in almost all accounts considerable quite different to other men."
" … This goes beyond war, my lord, this is sabotage and schemeing of the highest kind, and all for a goal which you have no reason of even knowing if it will succeed..."
"I can not know, Your Grace. In that you are correct", Littlefinger admitted. "But I can know that if we do not act quickly, and at least try with this, on this or some other scheme, then by the certainty of darkness in men's and eunuchs's hearts, someone else will soon hatch something worse towards ourselves. Like they already have with the attack toward the Princess Daenerys. And we will be all the more sorry for it. When the eunuch at last returns from his travels, we shall be just as sitting ducks... In the capital of the old enemy."
"Instead you mean to attack Pentos." He still could not quite grasp it. War across the Narrow Sea...
"'Attack' seems so violent a word, Your Grace. Rouse, I would call it. We shall rouse the city to its core. That way we will flush out the spider.
We will keep close watch on any secret roads out of the city, many of which I have already found, and they shall be so fewly occupied that it will be easy to find the passing by of a single silent spider in the black dead of night, leaving the chaos of Pentos once again for his old home city of Lys. ...And a hidden gem in Lord Velaryons declaration of his intentions at all of the nasty business that comes with it, of course.", Littlefinger declared, his grey-green eyes flacking back and forth with madness and a sick sense of mirth.
" That way, Your Grace... We shall find out who is on our side, and who is merely trying to protect himself."
Ned sat still for another long, long moment, as he did his best at gathering his thoughts.
Finally he took courage to his mind and voice, and spoke. He spoke about Lord Monford, as that was the subject he felt the most familiar with. He knew still precious little of the politics of the Free Cities of Essos, as did most men of Westeros, even though the crown's best and finest ships made port there every day and back. Littlefinger would have had better luck with a captain than a king.
"Any man that you might pick, out of all of my hundreds of thousands of subjects, Lord Velaryon or anyone else who has sworn me their fealty, is only trying to protect himself, surely.", Ned said flat out. "You told me so yourself once. I had not forgotten."
"Indeed I did, Your Grace, but surely you would agree that there is a difference inbetween a man making a living for himself and his family and a rich Pentoshi spice merchant saying no to trade from one of his best customers? ...
Lord Monford Velaryon is a wealthy enough man, but fretting for the future of his legacy. He has not seen many years yet after the birth of his young son. His rule of his own family's line is still resting on what lies ahead. If his daughter, the Lady Maldaena, and Prince Viserys... If he and her should find it in some ways problematic to conceive, then... He will care little about his riches, and far more about finding himself a new wife and heir. And just as it so happens, he has been courting the pale-haired daughter of the Magister Heranos Nykanos."
"I recognize that name", the King said suddenly, though he was far too caught up in Littlefinger's mad throes of thought to understand why it would matter. His mind was dizzy from the words. "Magister Heranos... He is the former master of Lady Pellegrara. Sansa's harp trouvere."
"Indeed so, Your Grace... It is a small world. And a Narrow Sea." He blinked, taking another sip from his glass of honeyed milk. The ice had almost gone all close to melting, but seemed still cold.
Ned regarded the Master of Whispers, the little man called Littlefinger for all the realm to hear, once again, as he tried his best at getting at the dozens of loose net tugs cast out from the man's spastinatiac mind...
Lord Monford Velaryon... Lord Monford... Make him show his true allegiance in the face of a burdenous mission from the crown. … Prince Viserys... The prisoners from the black cells, taken to be dressed up as sailors, feigning an attack from pirates... And Pentos... All the horrors to afflict the port of the city... Hundreds of people would be hurt, killed, burned or worse. It was far more than anyone could justify for the possibility to capture an old spymaster who had not been seen for fourteen years, no matter how certain Littlefinger was of his little birds.
Ned scoffed out of his deepest disgust before the seedy man who thought that justice could ever be paid for by the blood of innocents. The men and women of Pentos had not sworn to fight for a lord, they had no idea of such an attack on their city... The mere thought of it made Ned sick to his stomach.
"No", he said simply. "I will not have it. Nor will you, or I shall have you exiled once and for all, same as the eunuch. And then you can plot together, or do your best to strangle each other with your webs of deceit. At any rate... Leave me and the realm out of it. And Lord Velaryon as well."
"Your Grace... I know that you are one far from such bouts of judgement, but in times of war...-"
"This is not a time of war", Ned said sternly. His voice was iron. "This is my long peace. And I will not bloody it for a single drop based on the wind of your little birds, as you call them. I'd rather give the eunuch a holdfast of my own land than put such terrors on any innocent people of the land."
"Essos is not your land, though, your Grace... Pentos is on a different continent altogether, in the east. The same continent where all our troubles usually arise from. The Golden Company, The Blackfyres, the Targaryens, the Rhoynar, when they first came bringing war and hungry mouths... Even the Andals, for you, who are of the North and would do well to remember... Perhaps, for once in our long and bloody history of conquest and subduction, Your Grace, we should be the ones to strike first, instead of waiting silently on all of our fate to come and claim us."
And you are come from Essos, as well, my lord, he thought. I wonder if your great grandfather had such great plans on aiding towards my demise when he first planted his flag and boot in the stony soil of the fingers of the Vale all those years ago...
"I will not have it", the King said again. "Call me a traitor to my own, if you will. That won't make it so. The Seven Kingdoms shall not go to battle against the Free Cities. Not for any such cause."
"Your Grace", Littlefinger said again, intensifying his tone of voice. "This is Pentos we're speaking of. A land of fat rich slavers, the morally corrupt, the broken and the mad... It is already far from the gods' favourite place. If only your... stern hand of justice might cleanse it, Your Grace..."
"That is enough! You will not mis-use my own reign against me. I have never put down my fist on those weaker than me for the chance of finding an old foe. The people of the city are innocent, whatever the crimes be of the magisters. I do not forget, my lord... But I can leave it be. For the good of the rest of it all.
Pentos, or King's Landing... A noble lord or a slave, with his back near broken across the Narrow Sea, knowing not what is to come next... Whatever the case be of the differences between my kingdoms and the eastern lands... A man is still a man. And I would not sully my sword or reign with the blood and suffering of innocent men. … For the good of honour, and what is right."
Littlefinger arose from the table, slowly, angrily, disappointed, disgusted with the King's never-ending talk of honour, he knew. He did not care. Not particularly much, at last, if he could keep himself from it. It was Littlefinger, after all.
And besides, he thought, when he realised his own harsh words... The King needed not always be at the best terms with his Master of Whispers, out of all of his seats and posts, for he most of all the time represented the very worst of his fears and threats, made loud for his ears to hear when the noise of all the trivialities were quieted down. So had been the case with Aerys and Varys. It would mean to accept and be one with the blackest parts of his own heart, Ned thought to himself.
And he did not intend to become like the Mad King, who had listened to whispers of plots and conspiracies at every corner, silencing any dissent with fire and blood. He would not. He would never. He would rather see that from his foes, he reflected. He intended to keep the peace, both within his realm, and without it, for as long as he could, even if others would try and stab at it.
If the gods were with him, and if he held trust in himself, despite all of Littlefinger's terrible words to constantly try and rouse him as best as he could to go and do the opposite, to break away from honour, to cut a dagger in the bond to his people, to sully the cloth of his rule... No. I will not do it. I will not bend down to fear. My reign is safe. My throne is here, and no whispers of conspiracies from a mockinbird shall ever be allowed to waver me in my decision. My word is Ice.
"I thank you for your honest council, Lord Baelish, such as it is..." He said, his words dripping as cold as the ice waters of the Last River. "I blame myself for having you speak so freely of your ill-made plans. In the future, I will try harder, to not ask for that which I do not wish to hear."
The King and his Master of Whisperers regarded each other, both coolly, and still as two statues.
"...As you say, Your Grace." Littlefinger bowed down again.
"You will not act on any of this. Not a single piece of it. I hope and pray for your own safety that so much is understood. … Is it so?"
"But of course, Your Grace... Your word is my law, and your law is my word."
He made a queasy smile back, weak in upholding it, showing that even he himself was at last grown tired of the conversation when the King did not bite, after near an hour of null trial at persuasion.
Then he rose up ordently from his chair, steadying himself and brushing himself off of the dust from their talk from his [ ] tunic, and seemed to pretend to look, still now, at the invisible feather of a bird sitting at the edge of his shoulder. Then he smiled, and went towards the door, as Ned sighed and buried his face into his hands, feeling the despair creeping over him, despite the clarity he had said, and felt, before Littlefinger's terrible schemes, his terrible words, his frets...
The caraff of iced honeymilk was still a little more than half full, he saw and realised, as he [ ], and called for Marylda to come back and clean off the table, which had gone wet with the melting of the ice already.
As the serving girl made her way around the table, bowing before the King and Lord Baelish alike,
Littlefinger cast one final weaselly look back, slingering with his voice as slick as a snake, damn near undressing the King with his uneasy gaze, as he spoke the terrible words of the fret to still come, the fret which he had awakened from his mouth in less than an hour of speaking his plans to the King. Ned looked at him, as he cursed his own curiosity, and promised himself to never again...
Littlefinger spoke, as he was about to turn in the door and leave the king. Aye. Littlefinger spoke.
"War is upon us, Your Grace. Trust my word in this, if not in anything else. … Princess Daenerys was only the first trial. War will come to our doorstep, be it from the eunuch or from some other source. The Long Summer is almost gone, and autumn oft brings with it clashings and storms...
Yees, Your Grace... War will come, take my whispering word for it, for this single thing at least.
And in war, Your Grace, we do not stake our claims on who is right. … Only on who is left, at the end of it all."
...
NOTE: Since the middle of September, there has been some problem with the TrafficSite viewcounter here on . I don't know what it is, but it has stopped to show the new views and is still at the same counter as more than fifteen days ago. I can still see the amount of new followers, which I very much appreciate, but I must be honest and admit that not being able to see how many people read every chapter has had a negative impact on my motivation for posting.
I have written to but so far I have not gotten an answer. IF anyone knows how to fix this, please let me know and I will be very grateful. Thankyou all for your continuing support