Grand Maester Pycelle. The name was a snake pit. The man was old, lecherous, and a dyed-in-the-wool Lannister toady. He was the perfect suspect, the obvious culprit. Wade felt a surge of righteous, world-saving fury. This was it. This was the moment he became a hero.
He stormed back to the Street of Silk, a plan forming in his head. He couldn't get into Pycelle's chambers in the Red Keep, not without an army. So he'd lure the snake out of the pit.
His goal was simple and brutally effective: get the Grand Maester alone, get the truth, and get the antidote – or at least stop the poison from being administered.
He found Alayna in the same plush, velvet-lined establishment as before. She was reviewing an account book, a picture of cool, professional calm.
"We need to talk," Wade said, sliding into the seat opposite her. He placed a purse on the table that was so heavy with gold it didn't jingle, it thudded.
Alayna raised a perfectly sculpted eyebrow. "You have my attention, my lord… Deadpool."
"I need to arrange a private consultation with a VIP," Wade said, his voice low. "Grand Maester Pycelle. I know he's a… patron of certain establishments."
"The Grand Maester values his privacy," Alayna said, her eyes flicking to the purse. "And we are the soul of discretion. The price reflects that."
"I'm not just buying his time," Wade clarified. "I'm buying the room. I'm buying your staff's silence. I need him comfortable, relaxed. Drunk enough to get boastful, but not so drunk he passes out. I need him to think he's about to have the night of his life with the most beautiful new girl from Lys you can invent."
Alayna's professional smile didn't falter, but her eyes were sharp. This was more than a simple request. "You're not buying an evening. You are renting my entire establishment for a single performance. And you are asking my girls to put themselves at risk with a man who serves the Queen. That will cost you everything in that purse. And more."
"Done," Wade said without hesitation. He pushed the purse across the table. "Just get him here."
The trap was set.
Two nights later, Wade was hidden in the shadows of a luxurious chamber, concealed behind a heavy tapestry. The room was scented with jasmine and furnished with silks. Alayna had delivered. She'd sent a message to Pycelle about a stunning Lyseni girl, a new arrival too exotic and expensive for anyone but the most discerning connoisseur. The old man's vanity and lust were the bait.
He heard Pycelle's wheezing voice in the hall before he saw him. The old Maester entered the room, looking around with a greedy, self-satisfied smirk. He was followed by a stunning young woman with silver-blonde hair whom Wade had never seen before. She was playing the part of the nervous, exotic beauty perfectly.
"Leave us," Pycelle ordered the attendants, already shrugging off his heavy chain of office and placing it on a nearby table.
The girl, Lyra, poured him a cup of wine. "Is it true, my lord?" she asked, her voice a sultry whisper. "That you are the Grand Maester? The most learned man in the Seven Kingdoms?"
"It is," Pycelle preened, taking a large gulp of wine. "I advise the King himself. Indeed, the health of the entire realm rests in my hands. Even now, I am tending to the Hand of the King himself, Lord Arryn."
"He is very sick, I hear," Lyra said, leaning closer. "It must be a terrible burden."
"A summer fever," Pycelle scoffed, waving a dismissive, liver-spotted hand. "A flux of the bowels. The man is old. His humors are out of balance. Nothing a learned man like myself cannot handle. He complains, but he takes his medicine like a good boy."
Wade tensed behind the tapestry, his hand on the hilt of a katana. Medicine. He means the poison.
"And what medicine does a great lord take?" Lyra asked, tracing a finger along his arm.
"Milk of the poppy for his pain, a drop of nightshade to cool the fever, a potion of my own devising to calm his stomach," Pycelle boasted. He drained his cup and held it out for more. "They are standard treatments, my dear. Simple, effective. He will be right as rain in a fortnight. Or he won't. The Seven decide in the end."
He chuckled, a dry, wheezing sound. Wade had heard enough.
He stepped out from behind the tapestry. "The class is over, doctor."
Pycelle shrieked, spilling wine down his front. Lyra slipped out of the room as silently as she had entered. The Grand Maester stared at the man in the red and black suit, his eyes wide with terror.
"Who… who are you?" he stammered.
"I'm the second opinion," Wade said, advancing on him. "We need to talk about your prescription for Jon Arryn. Specifically, the Tears of Lys you've been mixing in with the 'milk of the poppy'."
Pycelle's face went from pale to ghostly white. He scrambled backward, tripping over a stool. "Tears of Lys? Are you mad? That's poison! I am a Maester of the Citadel! I have sworn an oath!"
"Oaths can be broken," Wade snarled, grabbing the old man's robes and hauling him to his feet. He was furious. This was the villain, right here. "Where is the antidote, you old monster? How do you reverse it?"
"Reverse what?" Pycelle cried, genuine tears of fear streaming down his wrinkled cheeks. "It was a fever! A terrible one, but just a fever! I brought my bag! Look for yourself!" He pointed a trembling finger at a leather satchel near the door.
Wade, never taking his eyes off the Maester, dragged him over to the bag and kicked it open with his foot. Vials and pouches spilled onto the floor. He recognized the milky white of the poppy, the dark tint of nightshade. He saw dried herbs, salves, and bandages. There was no secret compartment, no hidden vial of colorless, odorless poison. It was just the messy, disorganized kit of an arrogant, old-school doctor.
The terrible, embarrassing truth crashed down on him.
Pycelle wasn't a poisoner. Not yet, anyway. He was just an incompetent old fool who was treating a serious illness with outdated methods. Jon Arryn wasn't being murdered. He was dying of natural causes and bad medicine.
Wade had just spent a fortune, terrorized an old man, and risked exposing himself to the entire Red Keep… for nothing. He had jumped the gun, seeing a conspiracy in what was just a sad, mundane tragedy.
He let go of Pycelle's robes. The Grand Maester crumpled to the floor, sobbing.
Wade stood there, the silence of the room punctuated by the old man's whimpers. He had never felt so utterly, completely stupid in his life. He was a Stark fanboy who had gotten his timeline wrong.
The walk back to the forge from the Street of Silk was the longest walk of Wade Wilson's life. Humiliation was a cold, bitter companion. He'd been so sure, so cocky. He'd played the hero, and all he'd done was terrorize a senior citizen and blow a fortune.
{So, just to be clear, the big bad guy we just spent a king's ransom to unmask... is just a quack with a medical license?}
Healer's license, Wade corrected mentally, his head throbbing. And yes. We're idiots.
{Embarrassing. Truly, deeply embarrassing.}
He stormed into the forge, the pre-dawn light just beginning to filter through the grimy windows. Gendry was already up, stoking the coals. The boy grunted a greeting and went back to his work. The simple, honest labor felt like a judgment.
Wade's immediate goal was damage control. He needed to figure out how to salvage this self-inflicted disaster.
The first consequence of his failure arrived just after sunrise. Mathis, his perpetually terrified manager, burst into the forge, looking even more panicked than usual.
"Mr. Wilson! Sir!" he gasped, holding a stack of pristine, officially sealed documents. "The papers! They're done! The forgers worked all night. It's a masterpiece! A complete history of your Braavosi trading concern, all properly aged and stamped!"
Wade took the papers. They were perfect. Mathis had succeeded. Under normal circumstances, this would be a triumph. Today, it felt like putting a fresh coat of paint on a sinking ship.
"Good work, Mathis," Wade said, his voice flat. "Pay the men and tell them to forget they ever met you."
"But sir, there's more," Mathis said, wringing his hands. "There are rumors… all over the city. They're saying a demon attacked the Grand Maester in a brothel last night. That he was raving about poison and the Hand of the King."
Wade's blood ran cold. Oh, you have got to be kidding me.
Meanwhile, in the Red Keep, a terrified Grand Maester Pycelle was kneeling on the floor of Queen Cersei Lannister's solar. He recounted the story, his voice trembling, embellishing every detail to make himself look like a brave victim rather than a man caught with his robes down.
"...and this creature, Your Grace, this demon in red and black, he accused me of poisoning the Hand!" Pycelle wailed. "He held a blade to my throat! He demanded to know about the Tears of Lys!"
Cersei listened, her beautiful face a mask of polite concern. Her twin brother, Jaime, stood by the window, polishing a gauntlet, his expression bored.
"A demon, you say?" Cersei asked, her voice like silk. "How… theatrical."
"It was terrifying, Your Grace! I fear for my life! I fear for the Hand's life!"
When Pycelle had finally been dismissed, still sniveling, Jaime turned from the window. "A demon? In a brothel? Sounds like the old fool drank too much sour wine."
Cersei was silent for a long moment, her green eyes distant. She tapped a single, perfectly manicured finger on the arm of her chair. The thought had been a whisper in the back of her mind for months. Jon Arryn and Stannis Baratheon, digging into the past. Asking questions. Getting closer to the truth about her children. The truth that would get them all killed.
Pycelle's tale, meant to garner sympathy, had instead planted a seed. A demon accusing the Hand's doctor of poison. It wasn't a report. It was an inspiration.
"Perhaps," she said softly, her voice barely a whisper. "Or perhaps the gods have sent us a sign. The Hand has been a nuisance. And this… demon… has given us a wonderful idea of how to solve the problem. And precisely who to blame when it is done."
Jaime stopped polishing. He looked at his sister, and for the first time, he saw the chilling resolve in her eyes. The game had just changed, and Wade had just accidentally handed the Queen the dagger.
Wade's second consequence arrived that evening. A perfumed note was delivered to the forge by a silent messenger. It contained a single line: "I believe we have business to discuss. Alayna."
He found her not in the main brothel, but in a private, sumptuously decorated apartment above it. The air smelled of wine and sandalwood. She was lounging on a chaise, wearing a silk robe that left very little to the imagination.
She dismissed her attendants, leaving the two of them alone.
"Your performance last night was… expensive," Alayna began, pouring two cups of Dornish Red. "And, from what I gather, unsuccessful."
"He was clean," Wade grunted, accepting the wine. He didn't take off his mask.
"He was," she agreed. "But you are not. No simple 'treasure hunter' throws that kind of gold around to interrogate a Maester about state secrets. You are playing in a very dangerous game, Wade. And right now, you are playing it badly."
She stood and walked toward him, the silk of her robe whispering with every step. She stopped directly in front of him, close enough for him to feel the warmth of her body.
"I have a network," she said, her voice a low, seductive murmur. "Gossip from guards, secrets from lords, pillow talk from the most powerful men in the city. It is a web of information far more reliable than Littlefinger's whispers or Varys's little birds. I can provide you with the truth. For a price, of course."
"And what's the price?" Wade asked, his own voice raspy.
Alayna reached up and slowly, deliberately, traced the outline of his masked jaw with a single finger. Her touch was electric.
"My price is a partnership," she whispered, her eyes locking onto his. "You have the gold and the muscle. I have the information and the access. Together, we could own this city."
She leaned in, her lips hovering just inches from his mask. "But first… I want to know who I'm getting into bed with. Literally. Show me your face, Wade Wilson. Show me the man behind the mask."
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