WILOW-Ch.368: Another Day in King's Landing
Red Keep, King's Landing
POV of Jamie Lannister
"T… t… you… Your grace," Grandmaester Pycelle said, looking every bit as old as his age and giving the feeling that he would drop dead just about any moment now. "N… news from the G… l… Golden Tooth."
"Go on then." King Joffrey said, looking bored by the whole court, "Read it. And be quick about it. I want to hear what new victories Ser Devan and my grandfather brought us after defeating the Riverland armies."
Pycelle looked back at the letter and squinted. As if he had not already read the letter over ten times and memorized every detail in it. "The… the… Bolton army… attacked the army around Riverrun."
Jamie's blood boiled at the mention of the Bolton name, and he remembered the boy who had humiliated him in Winterfell all those months ago and had taken the Valyrian sword of his family.
In hindsight, he should not have underestimated the boy. Neither should he have used the Valyrian sword as a bet. But now it was too late for regrets.
"The Bolton army took… took the Lannisters by surprise." Pycelle said, "And… and… used direwolves, wargs, giants, and great flying beasts to… to defeat them."
He frowned.
He had heard about the direwolves, wargs, and giants.
Tyrion had… he had been so excited to go to the Dreadfort and see all those mythical creatures that were only said to exist beyond the Wall.
But he had no idea what these flying beasts were supposed to be.
The Bolton boy couldn't have found extinct dragons, could he?
No, certainly not. If the Bolton boy had dragons, he would be here at Red Keep instead of Riverrun.
But the thought of Tyrion brought another pang of pain to his heart.
The fact that Tyrion had left them, left 'him' hurt.
The fact that Tyrion then went and joined the Bolton boy hurt even more.
And the fact that Tyrion was probably the happiest of the three siblings at the moment hurt him the most.
A Lannister found happiness, acceptance, and security not in his own lands and House, but in the lands protected by an enemy House.
This irony alone was enough to tarnish the Lannister family's reputation.
Then Pycelle continued. Reading about how the Boltons used wildfire to burn the Lannister men.
That news surprised him.
'Did the Alchemists sell their wildfire to the Bolton boy?' he thought.
Come to think of it, he had not seen those bloody maniacs in a long time.
He had been surprised when they didn't come to Joffrey or his sister to ask for some more funds when Joffrey sat on the throne. But if they had gone with the Bolton boy, then that would make sense.
Still, how the hell did the Boltons cross the Green Fork without the Freys knowing about it? And how the hell were they able to surprise the Lannister army?
How many men did the Boltons even have?
Pycelle went on for a few more minutes, and by the time he finished, the King, his son, had gone into one of his moods.
Meanwhile, Jamie was weighing the veracity of these reports in his mind.
The news had come directly from soldiers who had been defeated at Riverrun and fled to Golden Tooth.
Therefore, even if there were some exaggerations or misinterpretations, the reports had to be essentially true.
This indicated that the Lannister army had suffered significant losses.
'What was Father planning now?' he thought.
"Bring Sansa Stark here." Meanwhile, Joffrey shouted, "Let's see how she'll answer for the crimes committed by these Northern savages."
What Joffrey didn't say in front of the court was that, despite being his betrothed, Sansa still loved the Bolton boy.
This was also the reason why she suffered so much under Joffrey's hands.
Jaime suddenly remembered Ser Barristan.
Unlike the other Kingsguards here, Ser Barristan was the only one who had defied the King's order and refused to raise his hand against Sansa.
The Crown had lost a great knight with his departure.
But Jaime could understand him perfectly. The man didn't want to serve another Mad King.
And frankly, if his own son wasn't on the throne, and his sister lover wasn't sitting beside him, Jaime might also have left long ago.
He wondered where Ser Barristan was now and what he was doing. Would the old knight be able to live a happy retirement in his later years?
Before he could think any further about Ser Barristan, Sansa entered the Great Hall a few minutes later, wearing a long Northern dress and looking prim and proper.
But he knew for a fact that she was trying to hide the limp that she received when Meryn Trant hit her too hard on the leg yesterday.
The next few minutes were hard for him to watch.
The humiliation and beating that the girl received...
It all reminded him of the time that he served under King Aerys.
The time when he used to burn innocent people for his amusement.
He wondered… if the Pyromancers had come to Joffrey, then would he start burning people as well?
The worst thing was that he would not be surprised if Joffrey did something like that.
It made him wonder if the thing they said about the Targaryens and incest was true. And if his son was just as mad as the Mad King because of that.
By the time the knights of the Kingsguard were done with Sansa, half of her clothes had been torn, and she had more than a few bruises on her body.
He looked at his sister and saw an amused smile on her face.
He felt numb to it all and wondered if Tyrion had done the right thing when he had left Lannister House.
His father ordered his men to kill babies…
His sister took amusement in others' suffering…
And his son was as mad as the Mad King.
Cersei had not allowed him in her bed ever since he suffered that defeat and lost that sword. And he was sure that she was sleeping with someone else now.
He wondered if he should just leave this all behind and go somewhere else.
Working as a sellsword won't earn him much gold, but he was too tired of all this shit.
At the end of the day, he knew that he would not leave King's Landing.
Because Myrcella and Tommen were good kids, and he wanted to protect them from Joffrey because he knew that Cersei wouldn't.
Still, dreaming about a day when he would be free from all this was better than nothing.
For now, this was just another day in King's Landing.
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Next Chapters' Name:
Ch.369: Baratheon Brothers
Ch.370: We'll Sue for Peace
Ch.371: Not at First