Ned's head swam as the candle burned low within the study that occupied the top floor of the Hand's tower. The badge of his office remained upon his chest, its dull grey color barely reflecting any of the light in the chamber. Robert had thought this appropriate, even laughed a bit about it since one of the few things he'd remembered Ned telling him about Winterfell was how the Starks of old had iron longswords placed upon their statues in the crypt to better keep potentially vengeful spirits contained within.
He'd joked that perhaps it would help Ned keep his own temper in check dealing with the politics of the realm whilst his old friend drank and whored his way into an early grave.
Considering the stress he'd been under recently the Lord of Winterfell couldn't say he saw the humor in it that his foster brother did.
Perhaps it was his desire for predictability, perhaps it was the fact that he'd lived through a civil war followed shortly by a failed rebellion, but he'd thought virtually nothing short of the last Targaryen and his younger sister Daenerys sailing back to Westeros could have surprised him anymore.
That however, had been before Jon.
Before his inhuman heritage, before his three-year absence, before his teaching of Arya, before his telling Ned that the White Walkers were very much real and lived (so to speak) beyond the Wall.
Compared to that, discovering the crown was deeply indebted to Tywin Lannister & the Iron Bank of Braavos not to mention that Mad Aerys had planted secret caches of wildfyre around King's Landing near the tail end of the civil war was almost a relief.
They were problems doubtless. But they were comprehensible problems: ones that a reasonable man could potentially find a solution to. Between navigating the ever-shifting bramble trapped forest that was the politics of King's Landing and having to avert a wintery apocalypse that might well last forever because of ill magic he knew which scenario he preferred. Even with his natural hatred of lies and the politics that bred them like maggots on a dead carcass.
He'd not even had a chance to try and catch up to what his foster father Jon Arryn had been doing as Hand of the King before Robert had declared that the small council should arrange for a tournament to celebrate the new Hand's ascension. Ned had wanted no part of it. Yet even as he had tried to fight against it, his own nephew Jon had come before him to tell him that there were wildfyre barrels laying dorment inside the derelict dragon pits.
Ned could only pray that the nephew most everyone thought to be his bastard son was wrong. He was not. After Ned had seen the barrels for himself and secretly taken a small amount of pleasure to witness uniform looks of unease upon the faces that populated the small council when he announced his intention to confront the members of the Alchemist's Guild.
He'd promptly arranged to meet with the current Head Pyromancer: a man by the name of Hallyne.
A pale man with a slightly stooped back and white whiskers, Ned had been straightforward enough to demand answers as to why there was Wildfyre beneath one of the great buildings of the capital.
Pyromancer (or Wisdom as they all seemed to refer to each other within the order) Hallyne had been shocked by this blunt accusation that had clearly been leveled at his fraternity, his palms shining slightly as his damp hands ran back across his thining white hair.
"I cannot imagine such a thing my lord hand!" He had declared, after pacing back and forth for a pair of moments, his brown eyes shining in the green torchlight of the iron pillars burning with a light coating of wildfyre still so near the entrance.
Ned thought that it had been perhaps an attempt to impress him with the prowess of the volatile substance. Though he was willing to bet that the Head Pyromancer was now reconsidering that small flourish in light of the reason he'd come here today.
"Do you mean to to deny the evidence I have seen with my own eyes, Pyromancer Hallyne?" Ned asked with quiet menace, not willing to allow more pretending that others didn't see what was right in front of them.
Pyromancer Hallayne became more agitated at Ned's accusation, his small nostrils flaring as they descended into the Halls of the Alchemist's Guild. Ned personally thought it would be more appropriate to refer to them as the Tunnels or Burrows of the Guild. But that was neither here nor there.
Ser Barristan followed faithfully behind him, the green fire playing tricks on his silver and white Kingsguard armor. Even fully equipped as he was, Ned heard no sign the veteran knight had any trouble keeping up with the two men. After two turns down these craggy walking tunnels, Ned and Ser Barristan were ushered into the Head Pyromancer's study: a place that was somehow more and less tidy than Ned had expected it to be.
Having visited Maester Luwin on many an occasion, Ned had grown used to how the older man's study could be cluttered and tidied by turns even as his sleeping area was fastidiously neat.
"One of the first things a good Maester is to learn Lord Stark;" Luwin had once said when Ned had asked how he might get his children to keep their rooms as clean without the help of the servants.
"Is that where we rest will influence everywhere else we go outside of it."
Pyromancer Hallayne's study by contrast was mostly messy with some bare spots of order mostly due to how barren it was in that part of the room. Its strange sense of teetering between the two states was more than a touch unsettling to Ned.
The ledgers on the bookshelf behind the desk where thick beheamoths but were also neatly filed according to a system the newly minted Hand of the King could not begin to guess at. This was not due to any outstanding ignorance on the northman's part, but the fact that the spines were labeled with strange symbols that came closer in resemblance to some of the equations he'd seen Maester Luwin write in his astronomy notebooks. Though the fact that it was entirely shapes and symbols with no recognizable numbers present likely had something to do with that as well.
In an alcove to the left of the entrance was an ingredients storage cupboard and worktable that Ned guessed must be something akin to Maester Luwin's back in Winterfell save that his resident scholar did not have his cupboard made entirely of stone nor did it have quite so many scorch marks on it.
The smaller desk held only one stool just behind it while the slightly warped wooden surface itself held multiple scrolls, an inkwell holding a quill that might have been made from a raven's feather and one large tome lying open upon it.
"I hope you do not expect me to believe that the Alchemist's Guild has not the faintest idea how so much of their vaunted creation came to be placed under the Dragon Pits." Ned warned as Hallayne quickly closed the book that had been sitting open on his desk.
As he placed the shut manuscript on the shelf with its brethren, Ned saw Ser Barristan move inside to stand just to the right of the door, his silver-white Kingsguard armor reflecting the more mundane torches that barely chased away the gloom of the Head Pyromancer's lair.
Seemed the wildfyre torches were not considered safe enough for Hallayne to risk them in his own chamber.
As the older man picked up another of the volumes to be brought back to the desk Ned couldn't help but think that the alchemist seemed older than he should. His hair, though white like Ser Barristan's seemed more like wisps of smoke peeking out from beneath his leather cap, making his head seem like a wrinkled log that smoked without catching aflame.
Hallayne carefully opened the great book, his lines of worry blending seamlessly with his lines of concentration.
"I tell you Lord Hand that none of us could've been party to such a thing. We of all people know the danger and risk of this pursuit we chose!" He answered vehemently even as his fingers automatically brought him to a collection of pages near the back of the book.
"King Aerys was obsessed with Wildfyre, it is true." He admitted preemptively, Ned closely watching as his right index finger skimmed down the writing on the pages as though he were a surgeon on the battlefield, seeking the first place he was to cut.
"But we suffered from a severe lack of supplies before the Rebellion! And we certainly haven't gained the funds or the patronage to recover from such a shortfall." He finished matter of factly, turning one page over to the next as his questing finger did not seem to find what it had been seeking.
"And yet the seal of the Alchemist's Guild is upon the barrels I saw and the green substance within would certainly fit the descriptions of Wildfyre I've heard." Ned responded, arms crossed in front of his chest as he carefully watched the Pyromancer scan the pages of what he realized must be a ledger as rapidly as his finger descended through the scrawlings.
Yet his words seemed to fall on deaf ears as the head pyromancer's brows suddenly furrowed and his lips silently formed words Ned could not begin to guess.
Hallayne's left hand rested on the crinkled page even while his right hand brought up the previous page to continue the writing he had left behind. Slowly his frightened brown eyes came up to meet Ned's grey, a thin bead of sweat now visible on his upper lip. He appeared to steel himself, drawing a small but sharp breath.
"It seems I was mistaken my lord hand, when I said that none of us could be party to this." Hallayne said stiffly.
"If you would follow me…" He requested with a jerky nod of his head, he came straight around the desk and headed straight for the door even as Ned reached out a hand to stop his abrupt departure. Ned's hand caught pyromancer Hallayne by the elbow, halting the slighter man in his tracks.
"Please Lord Stark: If what I've read is the truth, there isn't any time to waste." Hallayne said, his eyes looking close to wild despite his seeming composure.
"Tell me what it is you think you've found!" Ned demanded, paranoia beginning to set in about what he was not being told.
"The containers my Lord! The containers!" Came the manic answer from the Head Pyromancer. Unwilling to keep answering Ned's questions, Hallayne ripped his spindly arm free with a strength that surprised Ned.
The Pyromancer was out the door in a flash, Ned and Ser Barristan scrambling to keep the pace with him. Ned's pulse was pounding in his ears as he hurried after the alchemist, unable to imagine that the few barrels Jon had discovered were the reason for such sudden haste.
The Hand of the King and the Commander of the Kingsguard were brought to a workshop deeper within the guild wherein an older alchemist was teaching what few younger apprentices there were.
The ensuing confrontation had brought to light the fact that Aerys had gotten Wisdom Rossart to talk other members of the Alchemist's Guild into making a great deal of Wildfyre and place it beneath the floor of the Dragon Pit in addition to other locations around the city.
Ned still felt a shiver when he imagined what might've happened had the Mad King managed to set them off when the rebels had invaded the city. But that left the question of why Wisdom Rossart had not ignited the barrels. For surely Aerys would've ordered them done so when Lord Tywin had begun to sack King's Landing.
The unanswered question haunted his thoughts even as the small council debated what to do with this, the severity of the problem even managing to drag Robert into the meetings to agree on what was to happen with the Wildfyre. Ned was all for having the Pyromancers pushed out of King's Landing to perhaps Hightower where the maesters could more closely monitor them. Grandmaester Pycelle argued that charlatans that dabbled in the so-called science of alchemy did not deserve to darken the doorstep of the citadel and pushed for them to be expelled from westeros entirely.
Lord Baelish had wondered with a speculative gleam in his eye whether it might be wiser to sell the excess wildfyre to the free cities for a profit, perhaps working to lessen the crown's debt. Whereas Lord Varys, the master of whispers, thought it should be stockpiled somewhere outside the city in case it was needed in the future. Lord Renly, the King's younger brother had laughed and remarked he hadn't heard about any invasion force on the horizon since yesterday.
Eventually a compromise was reached wherein a portion of the Wildfyre would be sold overseas to the free cities interested in buying it, the rest being relocated to a new guildhall that would be constructed with some of the proceeds of the sale but primarily financed by the Alchemist's Guild themselves so that they would think twice before blindly seeking patronage from men like Aerys again.
Between the potential disaster to the city and potential disaster to the realm that was Robert's spend happy nature, Ned had been forced to table not only his efforts to send more men north to man the wall but his investigation into Jon Arryn's death. He had thought, even with his nephew Jon's showing at the tournament, that perhaps things could return to being relatively quiet and he might be able to make some headway at running the kingdom and his following through on his personal projects.
But alas his hopes were in vain.
Apparently, his friend had gotten it into his head that he should put aside his current squire Lancel Lannister in favor of Jon Snow. And in typical Robert fashion, the first Ned heard of it was when Robert ordered Ned to bring Jon before him so that he may present him with an honor the way he had his father. Ned had dutifully sent one of his guardsmen to find Jon but had tried to find what it was Robert wanted from Jon. When his old friend told him with all the bluntness of his old Warhammer that he intended to name Jon his squire, Ned tried to talk him out of it: citing the displeasure of the queen's family and the fact that he already was going to wed his eldest son to Ned's eldest daughter to tie their families together. Mentioning Cersei's displeasure was evidently the wrong tack to take judging by how Robert had one of his attending Kingsguard fetch the queen's twin so that he may be witness to the king's elevation of the hand's bastard.
"Let her hear about it from him rather than one of her little rats." Robert had chortled even as Ned tried uncomprehendingly to fathom the level of mutual spite they must hold for each other that needling his queen animated his old friend more than any discussion and talk of ruling as king did.
He internally shuddered to imagine having such a relationship with his dear Cat, a small pang in his heart as he thought of her back in Winterfell: doubtlessly trying to carry on the plan his baseborn nephew had talked them both into.
Jaime Lannister and Jon Snow arrived at roughly the same time, Jon standing aside to let the renowed swordsman through first before entering closely behind. Jon entered, bowing at the waist toward Robert even as his friend's face lit up at the sight.
"Welcome my boy!" Robert greeted, standing with only a slight grunt of effort to bring himself to his feet: his complextion already slightly ruddy from the wine he had started the day with.
"Quite a showing you made in the tourney the other day!" His friend boomed, as Ned stood by the chair Robert had recently vacated. He kept his face as blank as he could make it, mind racing at how he was meant to get them out of this when there was already so much happening that could complicate what they had to do.
The black-haired king poured two goblets full to the brim with arbor gold, Ned sourly wondering to himself if this was the same wine his former foster brother had drunk earlier in the day before he called his nephew and himself here.
"Made me think back on my days in the Rebellion, yearn for the days when I could show them all what I was made of." Robert said, the nostalgia bringing a bright smile to his face. He took a deep swig from the goblet before offering the other goblet to Jon with a gesture.
"Drink up, your king commands it!" Robert said, moving toward a slitted window, looking out over the sprawl that was King's Landing.
"I see a great deal of myself and Ned in you dear boy. So there's no need to drag this out: I would name you my squire!" Robert declared. Ned remained still as stone even as out of the corner of his eye he saw Ser Boros Blunt's small set eyes slightly squinted, as though uncomprehending of what he was seeing. Jaime Lannister's face however twitched as though he longed to scowl even as his handsome features settled into a stony mask similar to Ned's own.
Ned's heart sank as Jon sank to one knee before Robert, unsure of what it would mean for Jon to accept being Robert's squire. What could he learn from Robert that he had not already learned from Ser Rodrik at Winterfell and across the Narrow Sea over the last few years that would be worth the antipathy of House Lannister and the other noble lords of the realm?
"Forgive me my king but I cannot accept this honor you seek to give." Jon answered even as he rose to lock eyes with Ned's dearest friend.
Ned couldn't prevent the surprise from creeping into his own features. Ser Boros and Ser Jaime were of a similar mindset it seemed judging by the raising of the Lannister swordsman's eyebrows and the widening of the Blount man's eyes. Robert squinted at Jon as though he were unsure of what he was seeing at this moment.
"Any man who wishes to be knighted must prove his faith to the Seven. And I am no man of the Seven." He explained, standing tall again, expression carefully neutral in a fashion Ned recognized from the times he himself had held court with the lords of the North.
"I would ask a boon of you instead my king." Jon said, arms folding behind his back.
"What in the name of the old and new gods is this boon you would have of me that could possibly be worth refusing my offer?" Robert asked in a slightly lowered voice, Ned tensing as it seemed his friend was edging into one of his states of anger.
"The chance to buy the Dragon Pits from the crown your grace." Jon answered promptly.
Boros Blount's mouth flapped a few times as though trying to find words to say. Robert however became more still. Ned started to move forward to try and prevent the boy he had raised as his son from compounding this error further before Jon spoke again.
"What better way to prove the Targaryens have no more hold on the capital?" He asked, as though the answer to his question were obvious. Robert blinked and shook his head before refocusing his gaze on Jon again.
"Explain yourself." He ordered gruffly, eyes sharp in a way Ned had only seen last during the battles of the Greyjoy Rebellion that had quashed the Iron Island's dreams of independence and seen Theon brought to his household as a ward.
Jon's expression showed a hint of puzzlement before complying with Robert's request.
"The dragon pits may not house the dragons they once did when the Targaryens ruled Westeros your grace. But it still stands atop one of the three hills of King's Landing: reminding everyone of the Targaryen legacy even now when the last of them have fled across the sea. If it were to be claimed for another purpose, to have that last symbol of their power stripped from them…"
Jon bowed his head briefly before bringing his grey eyes up to meet Robert's sharp blue.
"Well it seems as great an insult as one can level at them whilst making use of it as something more than a ruined shell." His nephew finished.
"And how then might you look to afford this thing boy?" Robert asked, expression slightly relaxing. Likely due to Jon speaking of the possibility of spiting the Targaryens: one of the only things remaining that Robert showed any enthusiasm for aside from his drinks and whores and hunts.
"Much as I love your lord father, I don't believe the Starks would hold any interest in the Dragon Pits." He said, laughing somewhat at the end, causing Ned to relax internally even as he wondered where Jon was going with this.
"Give me seven days to offer the gold your grace and I swear you will be satisfied." Jon vowed, briefly bringing his right hand to his breast.
"As uptight and serious as you Ned!" Robert roared, clapping the hand not occupied with his goblet to Ned's shoulder as he laughed loudly.
Ned could see Ser Jaime and Ser Boros smiling slightly, though theirs seemed likely to be tinged with condescention and pity. For how could a bastard, even one born to the Hand of the King, raise the money to buy such an important building from the crown?
"I should hope so after having raised him." Ned answered, eyes telling Jon they would speak of this later.
"Seven days then my frozen faced lad! Seven days to raise your gold dragons to steal from those damnable dragonspawn!" Robert guffawed as he turned toward the window again, clearly done with the conversation.
Ned had heated words for Jon once they were safely back within the Tower of the Hand, but his nephew would not be moved. He was absolutely sure he had a way no matter how Ned tried to get him to back down from this foolishness.
Ned would never have believed it had his nephew not presented himself alongside the exiled Summer Island prince Jalahbar Xho and the youngest son of the Highgarden Loras Tyrell and sworn that they could collectively offer the 90,000 gold of the tourney money and an additional 10,000 gold dragons from the Tyrell coffers to pay for the ownership of the Dragon Pits so long as the king would grant a two-year grace period to get the pit repaired and functioning again.
Robert had slapped his knee and declared Jon had quite some audacity to offer to pay the King with the prize money the royal coffers had offered from the tourney. But Robert had never been known to disapprove of boldness in Ned's experience; save when Rhaegar had been bold enough to abscond with Lyanna. And true to form, Ned was ordered by his oldest friend to transfer the deed and ownership of the dragon pits and the land it stood upon to his bastard.
Ned could only wonder at what his nephew had promised these men to convince them of the gold's usage, especially the Lords of the Reach as a whole, given that the Tyrell boy was speaking on their behalf in a way he was certain Lord Mace could not possibly have heard of and approved of before now. He had seen the way young Loras had glanced at Ned and then at Jon as though asking him a question, only for Jon to minutely shake his head and the Tyrell boy's shoulders to slump slightly before he regained his posture: almost as though they had not exchanged any kind of conversation.
When asked later what that had been about, after both men had made their exit with a firm handshake to Jon and a respectful bow to Ned, Jon would tell Ned that Loras had been convinced his sister Margaery resembled Ned's sister. Jon had disabused him of that notion evidently but, judging by the look Loras had shot him, perhaps not completely.
Ned's head throbbed again as he attempted to focus more on the the ponderously long and dornishly dry tome open in front of him: The Lineages and Histories of the Great Houses of the Seven Kingdoms, With Descriptions of Many High Lords and Noble Ladies and Their Children
Whatever else Grand Maester Maellon might have been in life, one could not accuse him of being frivelous if his writing was any way to judge.
Grand Maester Pycelle had been quite certain in his doddering rambling way that this was the last book Jon Arryn had been reading before his death. But even as he tried to force himself to stay awake he just couldn't see what possible bearing a book on westerosi geneologies from the time of the first blackfyre rebellion over a century ago could have on the present.
Ned's head thumped gently onto the pages from the physical and mental exhaustion. He briefly considered reaching out to Lord Baelish or Lord Varys for help in finding any remainders of Jon Arryn's household that hadn't been spirited from the capital by Cat's sister Lysa but thought the better of it. Judging by Jon's constant exploration of the city turning up a secret not even the Spider or Littlefinger had been aware of, perhaps he could look into the matter. He'd already uncovered one great thorny tangle for the council to unknot. It wasn't unreasonable to think his mystical father would be kind enough to illuminate him toward another while he was at it.
As Ned gently closed the book shut, he resolved to impress on Jon the importance of this search for the truth about Jon Arryn's death. If he was to prepare the rest of the kingdoms for the potential rise of the White Walkers, he would need to start by getting the capital in order. He strode through the door, pulling it closed behind him and more confident in his resolve than he had been since Robert had offered this accursed position in the Winterfell crypts: allowing himself to hope that they had a chance of facing this menace together.
A/N: Up as promised. Next will probably take a bit longer. I love it when characters are completely unaware of the storm about to crash down on them.