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Joffrey did not dare disobey Lynn's command.
He did not even dare let the thought form.
He stripped off his soiled clothes in silence and walked into the bath chamber, letting cold water close over him. He stayed there a long time, until his skin went pale and soft and wrinkled. Then he climbed out.
Attendants were already waiting at the door.
They kept their heads down, none of them willing to look at the king's face, and worked quickly and quietly to dress him in the gold ceremonial robes that stood for royal majesty.
When it was done, Joffrey turned to the mirror.
A monster stared back at him , fine clothes, a pig's ruined head, blank eyes.
No. He was that monster.
---
Small Council Chamber.
The moment Joffrey walked in, every councilor instinctively dropped their gaze.
They did not dare look at the king's face.
It was swollen so badly his eyes had nearly disappeared.
Who did it?
Who dared strike the king?
The question lived behind every set of eyes in that room. No one voiced it.
Joffrey ignored their averted stares. He walked straight to the Iron Throne and sat down.
Lynn stood beside the throne, the new Hand of the King. He wore a black Hand's uniform, a faint smile barely visible on his face, watching everything with quiet calm.
Cersei had come as well.
She had changed into black mourning clothes. The careful, polished makeup she always wore was gone, and she looked appropriately hollow, a mother gutted by grief, if you didn't look too closely. Only when her gaze drifted to her son sitting empty on the throne did something shift in the depths of her eyes. A flicker of satisfaction, quickly buried.
"My lords."
Joffrey spoke.
"My brother Tommen is dead."
The chamber went still.
"He died by vile murder."
Those hollow eyes moved slowly across the room, touching every face.
"And the murderers are my two uncles — who sought to commit treason."
"Stannis and Renly!"
Varys's hands shifted slightly inside his sleeves.
The nobles around him went pale.
Accusing two dukes of murdering a prince. That was a charge that meant war.
"They envy my glory and covet my throne," Joffrey continued. "They did not dare come for me directly, so they put their hands on my youngest brother instead."
"That cowardice is unforgivable."
He rose slowly from the Iron Throne.
"I, Joffrey Baratheon, King of the Seven Kingdoms, declare here and now: Stannis and Renly are the murderers of Tommen. They are traitors to this realm."
"By the king's command, they will come to King's Landing at once, kneel before me, and submit to my judgment."
His voice rang through the hall and died in the stone.
Everyone stood frozen.
Come to King's Landing and stand trial. What was the difference between that and an invitation to their own execution? Those two men had armies at their backs and ambitions older than this boy's reign. They weren't fools. They would never come.
"Your Grace, this..." An old councilor gathered himself and stepped forward. "Duke Stannis and Duke Renly command powerful forces. They would not possibly—"
He didn't finish.
"You're saying they can refuse my command?"
Joffrey turned his head slowly. Those dead eyes settled on the man.
The councilor went rigid. He swallowed the rest of his words whole.
"Anyone else who questions my decision," Joffrey said, "will share Lord Baelish's fate."
That name landed like a stone in still water. Every person in that room saw it again , Robert's hands, the blade, Petyr Baelish going down.
The cold started at the floor and climbed all the way to the top of their skulls. No one spoke.
"Good."
Joffrey settled back onto the throne, satisfied.
He turned and looked at Lynn beside him.
Lynn gave him a small nod , the kind you give an obedient dog when it's done what it was told.
---
Dragonstone.
A cold sea wind drove salt mist in off the water, battering the ancient castle's black stone walls.
Stannis Baratheon stood before his great map table of Westeros.
He wore a plain grey coat. The lines of his face were hard as the rock beneath his feet, and his lips, perpetually pressed together, gave him a look of permanent severity. A raven had come from King's Landing.
The parchment bearing the royal decree lay discarded on the table.
"Judgment."
Stannis bit the word out.
His fist came down on the map table.
"Who does he think he is?"
Standing at his side was the Onion Knight , Davos Seaworth.
The name came from the final stage of Robert's Rebellion, when Stannis had held Storm's End against Mace Tyrell's besieging army. The garrison was starving. Davos, then a smuggler, had taken a small boat through the Redwyne fleet's blockade in the dark, and delivered a hold full of onions and salt fish to the castle. It had kept the defenders alive long enough for relief to arrive.
After the war, King Robert crowned himself and gave Stannis lordship of Dragonstone. Stannis remembered what Davos had done, and summoned him to court. He knighted him. He granted him lands and a small castle near Storm's End, founding House Seaworth.
Then, because Davos had spent years as a smuggler, Stannis took a blade and personally cut away the last joints of the four fingers of Davos's left hand. The law was the law.
Davos accepted it. He bore no grudge. If anything, the act seemed to deepen his loyalty , here was a man who rewarded him and punished him with equal measure, whose word meant exactly what it said. From that day on, Davos had followed Stannis as his most faithful advisor and the one man he trusted to tell him things he didn't want to hear.
"It's obviously a trap," Davos said, his voice heavy with unease. "He killed Tommen himself. Then he hung the blame on you and Duke Renly. He's just looking for a reason to be rid of you both."
"I know it's a trap!"
Stannis's voice was low and tight, fury barely leashed beneath it.
"That throne was mine by rights. Robert is dead — I am first in the line of succession. And now some boy has the gall to summon me like a servant!"
He could feel the rage burning up through his chest.
"What about Renly? What's his answer been?"
Stannis looked at Davos.
"Duke Renly appears to be courting Highgarden," Davos said. "He's rallying the southern lords. He means to declare himself king." He paused. "He also sent you a letter. He says if you bend the knee to him, he'll name you Prince of Dragonstone and give you a seat on his Small Council."
"Bend the knee to him."
Stannis stared as though Davos had told the worst joke in the world.
"He is my little brother. What right does he have to a crown? Because he knows how to flatter ladies at supper? Because he enjoys his peaches?"
He put his boot through a nearby chair.
"Robert won his throne with a warhammer. Not with a smile and a plate of fruit!"
He started to pace. Back and forth across the stone floor.
Ahead of him , the mad dog sitting on the Iron Throne in King's Landing.
Behind him , his own brother, already raising a banner.
He was caught between them.
"Davos."
Stannis stopped. He looked at his most loyal man.
"Tell me what to do."
Davos looked back at him. His weathered face was lined with the kind of worry that had no easy answer.
He wanted to say ally with Renly, deal with Joffrey first. He thought it was the only sensible path.
But he knew Stannis. That stubborn, unbending nature would never let him kneel to his younger brother. Not for any reason. Not for anything.
There was nothing to say.
Then a shadow fell across the doorway.
A woman in red robes stood at the threshold.
Melisandre.
A quiet, knowing smile rested on her lips.
"My king."
Her voice was warm as flame in that cold stone room.
"Are you troubled by a road you cannot find?"
Stannis turned. He looked at her , this woman who had brought him something that felt like hope, and something that felt like dread, and he could never be certain which was stronger.
He looked into her red eyes. Those eyes that seemed to look straight through you.
He made his decision.
"You." He pointed at her. No softness in his voice. No room for equivocation. "Tell me what your Lord of Light can actually give me."
Melisandre's smile deepened.
She moved to the fireplace at the center of the room, where the flames burned high. She reached out her hand toward the fire , close, too close , as if she felt no heat at all.
"The flames do not lie."
"My king. Do you wish to see the future?"
Stannis said nothing. He only watched her, his dark eyes fixed and unblinking.
Melisandre turned slowly to face him.
"The flames have shown me. Your enemies will meet their end. Soon."
She leaned close, until her lips were at his ear, her voice dropping to something only he could hear.
"And you will be crowned king."
A breath. Then:
"All it requires is a small shadow from you."
➤ Next: The Strangeness of Authority
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