[The Riverlands, Riverrun, 1st Moon, 299 AC]
The silence was what unsettled him first.
It was not the silence of night, nor the brief stillness before battle when men held their breath and waited for the horn, but something thinner and more persistent, stretched across the hours like a cord drawn too tight and left that way until it threatened to fray. It lived in the pauses between words, in the way men spoke more quietly than they needed to, in the way conversations died the moment an officer passed near, and in the way eyes turned, again and again, toward the distant treeline as though something might step out from it at any moment.
Jaime Lannister stood at the edge of the siege lines with one hand resting lightly against the pommel of his sword, his posture outwardly relaxed in the way that had come naturally to him after years of command, though there was nothing relaxed in the slow, deliberate way his gaze moved across the landscape before him.
Riverrun stood unchanged.
Its walls rose as they had the day they arrived, its banners still flew, and its gates remained firmly shut, the castle itself sitting at the meeting of the rivers like something carved from stubbornness rather than stone. It should have irritated him, and for a time it had, but that irritation had long since faded into something else, something quieter and far less comfortable.
It should have been simple.
They held the ground. They held the rivers. The castle was surrounded, and time, as it always did in such matters, should have worked in their favor. Hunger would come. Weakness would follow. And in the end, the gates would open, one way or another.
That was how sieges worked.
That was how they had always worked.
But time was not moving as it should.
"Another raven failed to return."
Jaime did not turn at once. He knew the voice.
Ser Tytos Brax stepped up beside him, helm tucked beneath his arm, his expression set in a way that spoke of unease more than fear, though the two had begun to blur together of late.
"How many now?" Jaime asked, his tone even.
"Four that we can confirm," Brax replied. "Possibly more. We've begun sending them in pairs, though I've little confidence that will change anything."
Jaime exhaled slowly through his nose.
"And the maester?" he asked. "What excuse does he offer this time?"
Brax gave a faint, humorless smile. "Weather. Stray winds. Poor birds with poorer instincts."
"And does he believe any of it?"
There was a pause.
"No," Brax admitted.
Jaime nodded once, slow and deliberate.
"Good," he said. "Then at least we are not alone in recognizing that something is wrong."
He turned then, looking back over the camp.
From a distance, it still held its shape, orderly, disciplined, exactly as it should have been, but up close the cracks were there, subtle but growing. Men checked their weapons too often. Guards shifted where they stood. Scouts rode out with less confidence than they returned, when they returned at all.
Too many eyes.
Too many pauses.
Too much listening.
"They're being taken," Jaime said after a moment.
Brax frowned slightly. "The ravens?"
"Yes."
"And the scouts?"
Jaime nodded once.
"Not by chance," he added. "Not by scattered bands of outlaws. This is a controlled effort. Measured even."
Tytos Brax's brow furrowed further. "By who?"
Jaime's jaw tightened just slightly.
"If I knew that," he said, "we would not be standing here asking the question."
[The Next Day]
They brought the survivors in before midday.
Jaime reached them quickly, Ser Tytos Brax and Ser Damon Banefort, brother of Lord Quenton, falling in beside him, the three of them moving through the gathered men with little effort as the crowd parted.
The smell hit first.
Blood.
Fresh, thick, and clinging.
There were more dead than living.
Three survivors remained, and even they looked as though they might not last the hour.
Jaime crouched beside the nearest, a man whose head had been hastily wrapped in cloth that had already begun to soak through.
"What happened?" Jaime asked, his voice steady.
The man blinked slowly, his gaze struggling to focus.
"They came… out of the trees…"
"How many?"
"Couldn't see… arrows first… then riders…"
"Whose banners?"
The man shook his head weakly. "None…"
Jaime leaned closer.
"Who led them?"
The man swallowed, his voice dropping.
"Old knight… grey beard… calm, like it was nothing…" he trailed off, barely coherent, yet still holding on.
Jaime did not blink.
"Say it."
"The Blackfish."
The name settled over the space like a weight.
Jaime rose slowly, his expression unchanged.
"Where?"
"West road, the… the supply train…"
Jaime glanced over the bodies laid out on the cart.
Clean.
Efficient.
No wasted motion.
"They didn't pursue?" Banefort asked.
The man shook his head weakly. "Gone… before we could do anything."
Jaime nodded once.
"See them tended," he said.
Then he turned away.
"They're not testing us anymore," he said quietly as Brax fell into step beside him.
"No?" Brax asked.
"No," Jaime replied. "They already know how we'll respond."
That afternoon, Jaime rode out.
He did not wait for more reports. He needed to see it himself.
A small force rode with him, Brax, Banefort, Greenfield, and a handful of others, but the mood among them was far from confident.
The road felt wrong.
Too quiet.
They found the site easily enough.
Burned wagons. Broken wheels. Bodies left where they had fallen.
Jaime dismounted and walked among them in silence, his boots crunching softly against charred wood and hardened earth.
There was no chaos here.
No sign of a desperate struggle.
Only precision.
"They dismantled them," Banefort said.
"Aye, clean and swift most like," Jaime replied.
Greenfield crouched beside a corpse, examining the arrow lodged in its throat.
"Longbow," he said. "Strong draw."
"Northmen," Banefort muttered.
Jaime said nothing.
He turned slowly, scanning the treeline.
All was still as far as he could see.
The forest was calm, eerily empty.
As if it was watching them, gauging their next move.
He felt it then, not fear, but awareness.
The sense that they were not alone.
"They're out there," Jaime said quietly.
"Where?" Brax asked.
Jaime shook his head.
"Not where we can reach them."
[Later that night]
The attack came after midnight.
It was not a full assault.
It never was.
A strike.
Fast.
Precise.
Fires erupted among the supply wagons, and before the alarm had fully spread, men were already shouting and scrambling to respond.
Jaime was mounted within moments.
"After them!" he called.
They rode hard.
Too hard.
The ground shifted beneath them as they pushed into the trees, the darkness swallowing them whole.
For a moment, it seemed they might catch them.
Then… Nothing.
No riders.
No sound.
Not even a small trail for them to follow.
"They were here," Greenfield said, breathless.
Jaime stared into the darkness.
"Aye," he said quietly. "They were, but not for long, it would seem."
[The Next Day]
The rider came at dusk the next day.
Exhausted. Mud-streaked. Half-dead in the saddle.
"The Twins have fallen," he said, voice almost gone, lungs heaving up and down in quick succession
Jaime did not react at first, he was almost too shocked to even fully comprehend what he had just heard.
"Say that again."
"The Twins have fallen. House Frey is broken, the male line extinct; all are executed except for the boys, who were shipped off to the Wall, the Citadel, or the Faith. The Twins now have Stark banners flying."
Silence followed.
"And the army?" Jaime asked.
"Split. One host moving toward Seagard. The other south down the King's Road."
Jaime closed his eyes briefly.
Then opened them.
"They've cut us off from the easiest crossing to join back with Lord Tywin's host," Brax said.
Jaime nodded.
"Aye," he said.
He looked back toward Riverrun.
Then to the roads.
Then to the treeline.
"They've done more than that," he said quietly.
Brax frowned. "What do you mean?"
Jaime's voice dropped.
"They've fixed us here."
That night, Jaime stood alone at the edge of the camp.
The silence was still there.
But now… now he understood it.
The ravens.
The raids.
The missing scouts.
The burned supply lines.
The fall of the Twins.
It all fits.
They had not been besieging Riverrun.
They had held in place, watching and waiting for any slight sign of desperation from the defenders.
And yet, they were the ones who were being corralled in and contained, maybe even watched
Jaime rested his hand against the pommel of his sword once more, his gaze fixed on the dark treeline beyond the camp.
Somewhere out there, the Blackfish was watching.
Waiting.
Choosing when and where to strike.
Jaime knew bitterly that he was not the hunter here.
He was the one being hunted.
And the worst part was that he could not yet see the trap closing around him.
The realization did not leave him.
It lingered.
Sat with him.
Pressed at the edges of every thought as the camp settled into another uneasy night, the kind where men slept lightly, if they slept at all, and every sound carried farther than it should have, every shifting shadow seeming to hold meaning where none ought to exist.
Jaime did not remain alone for long.
"Ser Jaime," came a voice from behind him.
He turned slightly to see Ser Damon Banefort approaching, Ser Tytos Brax already not far behind him, along with Ser Garth Greenfield, the three of them moving with purpose, though not urgency. That alone told Jaime enough.
"This won't wait until morning," Banefort said, his tone measured.
Jaime studied him a moment, then nodded once.
"No," he agreed. "It won't."
They gathered within Jaime's command tent shortly after, the lamplight casting long shadows across the table where a rough map of Riverrun and its surrounding lands had been laid out, marked and re-marked over the course of the siege as positions shifted and small adjustments were made.
Now, it seemed almost useless.
Jaime stood at the head of it, hands resting lightly against the edge of the table, while the others took their places around him.
"They've taken the Twins," Brax said, as if the words might somehow sound different spoken aloud again.
"They have," Jaime replied.
"And split their forces," Banefort added.
Jaime nodded. "Aye."
Greenfield frowned slightly. "Then we still have time. If one host moves west and the other south, they cannot be everywhere at once."
Jaime's gaze shifted to him.
"No," he said. "But they do not need to be."
A brief silence followed that.
Brax leaned forward slightly, one hand resting against the table.
"Then we consolidate," he said. "Pull the outer camps in, tighten the siege lines, make one strong position instead of three weaker ones."
Banefort shook his head immediately.
"And abandon ground we've fought to hold?" he said. "That leaves the river crossings exposed and opens routes for relief from within the castle."
"It keeps us alive," Brax shot back.
"It weakens the siege," Banefort returned.
Greenfield raised a hand slightly.
"Or we end it," he said. "Press the attack. Take Riverrun now, before the Starks can reach us."
That drew Jaime's attention fully.
"Take it how?" he asked, his tone even, though there was an edge beneath it now. "With what ladders? What engines? Against walls that have not yet so much as cracked?"
"We've barely built a couple of siege towers, much less siege engines to bring down the gates or walls." He continued, slightly annoyed at having to bring up the obvious
Greenfield hesitated, just enough.
"We have numbers—"
"We have numbers because we are spread," Jaime cut in. "Pull them together, and we give up the very positions that allowed us to surround the castle in the first place."
The tent fell quiet again.
Jaime let the silence sit for a moment before continuing.
"Riverrun is not like other castles," he said, his voice steady, measured. "It sits between rivers. Water protects it on all sides. We could not encircle it with one camp even if we wished to. So we did what was required."
His hand moved over the map.
"Three camps," he said.
He tapped the western marking.
"The camp to the north, commanded by Lord Andros Brax. 4,500 men holding the crossings and preventing any relief from that direction."
His hand shifted east.
"The eastern camp, under Ser Forley Prester. Another 4,500, holding the far bank and watching the approaches."
Then, finally, his camp.
"And here," he said, tapping it once, "the main siege. Our position. Five thousand men before the gate, because if Riverrun breaks, it will break here."
Banefort nodded slowly.
"It was the only way to hold it," he said.
"It still is," Jaime replied.
Brax frowned.
"Then we're divided," he said. "Too far apart to support one another quickly."
Jaime's gaze met his.
"Aye," he said quietly. "We are."
And that was the problem.
"The attacks," Banefort said after a moment. "They're increasing."
Jaime nodded.
"Not larger," he said. "More frequent. More precise."
"They're testing us," Greenfield said.
"No," Jaime replied. "They've already done that."
Brax crossed his arms.
"Then what are they doing?"
Jaime did not answer immediately.
Instead, he reached out and adjusted one of the markers on the map slightly, sliding it just a fraction.
"They're shaping us," he said at last.
The others exchanged glances.
"What does that mean?" Banefort asked.
"It means," Jaime said, his voice lowering slightly, "that every time we react, we are doing exactly what they expect us to do."
"That's how war works," Brax said.
Jaime looked at him.
"No," he said. "That's how a trap works."
That settled over them heavily.
"We can still strike back," Greenfield said, though there was less certainty in his voice now. "Set a trap of our own. Let them come to us."
Jaime considered that for a moment.
Then nodded.
"Very well," he said. "We'll try it."
The plan was simple.
Too simple.
A supply column, lightly guarded, sent along a route that had already been struck once before. Hidden riders positioned just beyond sight, ready to close in once the attackers revealed themselves.
They waited.
And waited.
Nothing came.
Then, near dusk, the horn sounded.
Not from the road.
From the eastern camp.
By the time the riders returned, breathless and bloodied, the report was already clear.
"They hit Ser Forley's lines," one said. "Burned three wagons and were gone before we could form up."
Jaime said nothing.
Brax swore under his breath.
"They knew," Banefort muttered.
Jaime nodded once.
"Aye," he said. "They did."
That night, Jaime walked through the camp.
He did not announce himself, nor did he bring more than a single guard, choosing instead to move through the lines quietly, listening rather than speaking.
"should've gone west…"
"can't see them, can't fight them…"
"they're letting us sit…"
The voices were low, careful, but not quiet enough.
Jaime paused near one fire, just long enough to hear a man say:
"It's like they're watching us."
Jaime was afraid that the man was right: if they were truly watching them, there was no telling what they hoped to achieve by playing the long game and waiting.
Shaking his head clear, Jaime continued onward.
[Later in the evening]
The report came before midnight.
Another scouting party.
Gone.
Not killed.
Not found.
Just simply disappeared… they were gone without a trace.
"No tracks," the rider said. "No bodies. Nothing."
Jaime studied him for a moment.
"Nothing?" he repeated.
The man shook his head.
Jaime dismissed him with a nod.
"They're not just killing them," Banefort said quietly.
"No," Jaime replied.
"They're removing them."
Jaime's gaze drifted toward the treeline.
"Aye," he said. "And we're letting them."
By the time the night had deepened and the fires had burned lower, Jaime found himself once more at the edge of the camp.
The silence had returned.
But now, it was no longer unfamiliar.
He understood it.
He looked out across the land, his mind mapping what lay before him as clearly as if it were etched in stone.
"They don't need to defeat us," Jaime said quietly.
Banefort, who had joined him without announcement, glanced at him.
"No?" he asked.
Jaime shook his head.
"They only need to make sure we cannot move when the time comes."
Banefort's brow furrowed.
"What time?"
Jaime did not answer immediately.
His eyes remained fixed on the dark line of trees beyond the camp.
"When they choose to strike," he said at last.
"And from where?" Banefort pressed.
Jaime's expression did not change.
"Everywhere," he said.
The camp settled.
Fires burned low.
Men rested where they could.
Guards stood their posts, eyes straining against the dark.
Jaime remained where he was, one hand resting against the pommel of his sword, his gaze fixed outward.
Somewhere beyond the trees, they were there.
Watching.
Waiting.
And for the first time, Jaime did not wonder if they would come.
No, that was a foregone conclusion, now, all he could wonder was when they would come.