c8: Kevan Lannister
The setting sun was the color of spilled blood, sinking slowly beyond the distant hills.
A brutal battle had just ended. The air hung heavy with the nauseating stench of iron and death, and the once-smooth kingsroad had been churned into a mire of mud, broken weapons, and bodies clad in the colors of the Iron Throne.
Rain began to fall again.
Thin streams of rainwater ran through the ruts in the road, mixing with dark pools of blood and clinging to the boots of the middle-aged Red Keep instructor.
Splash
He stumbled forward and stepped into the mud, sending dirty water outward and leaving a small crater in the road. Within seconds the hole filled again, the rainwater turning pink as it mixed with blood.
Thump
He staggered two more steps before his strength finally gave out. His knees buckled beneath him and he collapsed heavily into the mud.
One hand slammed against the ground to steady himself. Sweat streamed down his brow despite the cold rain, his mouth hanging open as he gasped desperately for breath like a fish cast onto the shore.
Huff… huff…
His other hand pressed tightly against his abdomen, blood still seeping between his fingers.
He was wounded.
The worst injury was the deep puncture beneath his ribs, left by the dying counterattack of a masked bandit who had driven a short spear upward in his final moment. The blow had nearly pierced his lung. Besides that, there were slashes and cuts across his arms and shoulders—so many that he could no longer remember when each had been dealt.
Not far away, the lame knight struggled to his feet and dragged his sword free.
A final Red Keep guard, one of the last defenders of the queen's escort, tried to raise his weapon despite a shattered arm. The knight limped forward and forced the tip of his longsword against the man's throat.
"You…"
The guard's voice trembled weakly.
"Damn it," the knight muttered coldly.
In the man's numb, fading eyes he raised his blade and slashed downward with brutal force. Blood sprayed into the rain.
Thump
The soldier's knees folded and his body collapsed lifelessly into the mud.
The lame knight swayed slightly after the killing blow and planted the tip of his sword into the ground to steady himself.
His breastplate, dented deeply by a javelin strike during the fighting, rose and fell with each heavy breath. Golden hair, once carefully groomed in the fashion of the Westerlands, now clung messily to his face with sweat and rain.
The black cloth that had once concealed his face had long since fallen away during the chaos of the battle.
But he no longer cared.
In the distance panicked shouts echoed through the trees. One vague figure likely one of the deserters who had joined the ambush for coin kept looking back fearfully before vanishing into the forested hills. Within moments he disappeared among the pines without a trace.
The clash had been savage.
When the fighting first began, the attackers had believed the queen's escort would break quickly. Instead, the discipline of the Red Keep guards proved far stronger than expected. Men fought desperately on both sides until the road itself became a killing field.
When the battle finally reached a stalemate and it became clear the ambush had failed, many of the hired men lost their nerve.
They fled.
The lame knight had attempted to withdraw as well, but his crippled leg injured years ago during a campaign in the west had slowed him. By the time he realized his mistake, the men who had sworn loyalty to him had already scattered like frightened crows.
None of them bothered to help their wounded commander.
They simply abandoned their now-burdensome "master" and ran for their lives.
Now, across the entire battlefield, only a handful of figures remained.
Several of his own men lay sprawled on the ground, too badly wounded to crawl away. A few Red Keep guards still breathed as well, leaning weakly against trees, groaning in pain as rain fell over them.
Then
The Red Keep instructor forced himself upright again, leaning heavily on his sword as if it were a crutch.
He was the only one left on the battlefield who could still truly stand.
The blond lame knight's sharp, hawk-like eyes scanned the road carefully. Despite the exhaustion in his body, his gaze remained cold and calculating.
He understood the truth.
Now that his men had abandoned him, his chances of leaving this place alive were almost none.
Unless…
Unless he could kill every witness here before his strength failed.
Every last one of them.
Including Queen Leila, who still trembled inside the overturned carriage guarded by the few surviving loyalists.
At that moment the lame knight seemed to notice something.
His vision blurred slightly, and he rubbed his forehead before looking again through the falling rain.
Beside Sir William Darryl stood a boy.
The youth's hair shimmered with an unusual silver-gold color beneath the dim light of the dying sun. Mud and blood covered his small figure, and he held a sword awkwardly against his chest as though he had never truly wielded one before.
It was the boy who had helped Sir William back to his feet moments earlier.
The lame knight chuckled faintly, leaning harder against his blade.
"So," he said hoarsely, "there's another man still standing."
…
Not far away, the Red Keep instructor struggled to steady himself. His slightly curly hair clung to his cheeks from rain and sweat. One hand still pressed against his injured ribs as his vision slowly blurred.
A dangerous sign of blood loss.
Yet even through the haze he recognized the man standing before him.
The cloth mask was gone.
The face beneath it was one he had seen once before in King's Landing, standing beside the most powerful lord in the Seven Kingdoms.
His eyes widened.
"Kevan Lannister!"
"It's you!"
The blond knight looked older than he truly was, his face hardened by years of command. Though he appeared nearly forty, he was only in his thirties. Deep-set eyes watched everything carefully, long nasolabial lines etched beside his mouth. A short, neatly trimmed blond beard clung to his chin despite the rain.
Even in disheveled armor, there was still the bearing of a veteran commander about him.
Sir William's lips trembled slightly.
He recognized the man instantly.
Kevan Lannister brother to the formidable Lord Tywin Lannister, Warden of the West and Lord of Casterly Rock. A man known across the Seven Kingdoms for his discipline and loyalty to House Lannister. Many said he had fought beside Tywin since their youth, commanding Lannister forces in several campaigns and serving as one of his brother's most trusted captains.
He was also the uncle of Ser Jaime Lannister, the young lion who now wore the white cloak of the Kingsguard in service to the Iron Throne.
Yet here he stood.
Leading an ambush against the queen's escort on the kingsroad.
Realization struck Sir William like a blade to the heart.
"So the Lannisters…" he rasped.
"Have betrayed the Iron Throne!"
Shock filled Ser William's voice despite the pain.
If House Lannister had truly turned against the crown if Tywin Lannister himself had chosen rebellion then the fate of King's Landing and the Iron Throne was already hanging by a thread.
Before they had even set out on this bloody ambush, the Westerlands host had already begun its march toward King's Landing, advancing under the golden lion banner of House Lannister and claiming they were riding to defend the king.
Word had spread through the realm that the armies of the west were coming to aid the crown. Yet anyone who truly understood the ruthless cunning of Tywin Lannister knew that such a declaration could hide darker intentions.
If Aerys II Targaryen truly believed the message and ordered the city gates opened to welcome the Westerlands army, then the mighty capital protected for centuries by its towering walls and the Red Keep above Blackwater Bay might fall without a single siege engine striking the walls.
King's Landing had never been conquered from the outside.
But it could easily be taken from within.
And with Jaime Lannister already standing at His Majesty's side inside the Red Keep wearing the white cloak of the Kingsguard and sworn to guard the king's life the situation became even more terrifying.
If the Lannisters had truly decided to betray the Iron Throne, then the Iron Throne itself was already surrounded.
"Ser William."
"Perhaps we can compromise."
Kevan Lannister did not even attempt to hide his identity anymore. The cloth mask had fallen away long ago during the fight, and in the current situation secrecy meant little.
Survival meant everything.
Kevan leaned on his longsword with one hand, raising the other slightly in a gesture that was meant to appear calm and sincere despite the rain and blood dripping from his armor.
There were very few reckless hotheads within House Lannister. Cunning, patience, and adaptability had long been the traits that defined the lions of the west. The house had grown powerful not merely through strength, but through calculated decisions and ruthless pragmatism.
Everyone in the Seven Kingdoms knew the Lannister words:
Hear Me Roar.
Yet it was the quiet calculations behind that roar that made them truly dangerous.
Now, trapped in this deadly stalemate on the muddy kingsroad, Kevan had not given up hope of surviving.
However, he did not try to persuade the Red Keep overseer to surrender.
Both of them understood that was impossible.
If Sir William had intended to surrender, he would have done so long before the battle reached this desperate point. Instead, the loyal knight had fought stubbornly until nearly every man on both sides lay dead or dying.
Kevan therefore chose a different approach.
A compromise.
Despite the presence of Queen Leila inside the carriage, along with several frightened maids and the silver-haired boy standing beside Sir William, Kevan remained confident in his own ability.
Since childhood he had received the martial training expected of a noble son of Casterly Rock. He had fought in campaigns beside his elder brother and commanded men in battle.
A few women and a young boy did not frighten him.
Even with his crippled leg, he believed he could kill them all if necessary.
The only true threat standing before him was the man clutching his wounded ribs.
The severely injured overseer of the Red Keep.
Sir William.
And even that threat appeared to be fading, as the man's condition was clearly worse than his own.
Hearing the words spoken by the crippled knight whom Sir William had just identified as Kevan Lannister, the silver-haired boy felt a tightening in his chest.
The rain drummed softly against the broken road.
Viserys slowly lifted his head and looked toward the man beside him.
The wounded instructor.
The knight who had just been speaking.
The man who had been teaching him how to hold a sword only moments earlier.
"Impossible!"
Sir William's voice cut sharply through the rain.
Clutching his ribs tightly, his face pale from blood loss, he rejected the proposal without even a moment of hesitation.
There could be no compromise.
He could not allow Kevan Lannister to leave this battlefield alive. If the man escaped and regrouped with the scattered deserters hiding in the woods, then the situation would reverse instantly.
The hunter would become the hunted.
And they would be the ones doomed to die.
Sir William then lowered his gaze toward the boy standing beside him.
"Child," he said hoarsely.
"Do you remember what I just taught you?"
Learn to use the sharp end to stab the enemy.
Viserys swallowed and nodded heavily, tightening his grip around the sword in his hands.
The weapon felt far heavier than before.
"Come with me!"
The middle-aged instructor pushed himself forward.
Using his sword as support, Sir William staggered step by step through the mud toward Kevan Lannister.
Kevan immediately understood that the other man's resolve would not waver.
There would be no negotiation.
There would only be one survivor.
With his crippled leg he could not outrun the approaching knight, and retreat was no longer possible. His eyes hardened as he raised his blade and drew his longsword fully into a fighting stance.
Rain dripped from the edge of the steel.
The two once-noble knights now faced one another across the blood-soaked road.
Gone were the banners, the armor polish, and the dignity of courtly titles.
Now they resembled two wounded, starving wolves circling each other in the rain and mud, staggering through exhaustion as they prepared for the final struggle that would decide who lived… and who would never rise again.
....