Two days ago
The Red Keep was blanketed by a heavy, starless night. The ocean winds howling off the Blackwater Rush did little to dispel the suffocating tension that had gripped Maegor's Holdfast for the past week.
But inside the royal nursery, a suite of rooms adjacent to the Queen's master bedchamber, the atmosphere was a world apart. Here, the air was warm, smelling of sweet milk, honey, and crushed lavender.
Queen Cersei Lannister stood near the doorway, the newborn Yoriichi swaddled securely in her arms. She looked down at the center of the plush, Myrish-carpeted room, where her two older daughters were currently surrounded by a fortress of painted wooden blocks and plush rag dolls.
Little Myrcella, a sweet-faced toddler of two years with a halo of spun-gold curls, was busy trying to brush the yarn hair of a doll.
Beside her was Jeyne, who was barely a year old but already possessed the fierce, demanding green eyes of her Lannister mother. Jeyne was currently hoarding three wooden knights, refusing to let her older sister touch them.
Cersei felt a sudden, unexpected pang of guilt constrict her chest.
For the past week, she had been entirely consumed by her paranoid guarding of Yoriichi. She had barely spared a glance for her golden daughters, leaving them entirely in the care of the wet nurses and handmaids.
She looked at their innocent, bright faces, and for a fleeting moment, the cold, pragmatic armor she wore cracked. They were her blood, her beautiful lionesses.
I am neglecting them, she thought, a rare flicker of true motherly sorrow washing over her.
But as her fingers brushed the thick, heavy parchment of the letter hidden in her gown—the ciphered scroll from Lord Tywin that had arrived that very morning—the softness vanished, replaced by the ruthless steel of the Rock.
No. It is necessary, Cersei reminded herself, shaking her head slightly to clear the sentimentality. I am doing this for their survival. In this court of vipers, love without power is a death sentence. To secure their royal status, to protect my perfect son, I must be the monster they need me to be.
She stepped fully into the room. The two toddlers looked up, their eyes lighting up with innocent joy at the sight of their mother.
"Mom!" Myrcella chirped, dropping her doll and trying to stand on her chubby legs. Jenny merely babbled, pointing a demanding, pudgy finger at the crimson bundle in Cersei's arms.
Cersei knelt gracefully onto the carpet, whispering sweet, honeyed words to her daughters as she kissed their golden heads. "My beautiful girls. Be good for the maids tonight. Mother has... a very important task to see to."
She carefully lowered Yoriichi, placing him into a soft, heavily cushioned nest of pillows right on the rug beside them. She signaled the three trusted handmaids standing by the walls. "Watch them closely. Do not take your eyes off the prince for a single second until I return."
The maids curtsied deeply. "Yes, Your Grace."
Cersei gave her children one last lingering look before she stood, smoothed the wrinkles from her breathtaking, emerald-green silk gown, and walked out of the nursery.
As the door clicked shut behind her, separating the innocent world of children from the dark, treacherous game of adults, Cersei's face transformed into a mask of chilling, seductive intent. She had a task tonight. A vital one. She was going to tear the truth from her twin brother's chest.
She walked the short distance down the private corridor and gripped the heavy iron handle of her own bedchamber.
Inside, Ser Jaime Lannister was already waiting.
He was not wearing his Kingsguard armor. Instead, he wore a simple, unlaced tunic of crimson linen and black leather trousers. For past few days, he had been exiled from this room, forced to pace the cold corridors, jumping at shadows and haunted by the apocalyptic vision of the corpse mountain. The emotional starvation had carved deep, exhausted lines around his eyes. He looked less like the Golden Lion and more like a whipped, desperate hound.
But when the door opened and Cersei stepped inside, his entire posture shifted.
Cersei leaned back against the heavy oak door, her hands resting behind her back as she pushed it shut. The lock engaged with a heavy, definitive click. She looked at him from beneath her long, golden eyelashes and offered a slow, impossibly sweet, and deeply seductive smile.
For Jaime, it was as if the sun had suddenly burst through from endless, suffocating darkness.
He felt like he was floating over the moon. She had invited him. Alone. In the middle of the day, she had sent a maid with a whispered message to attend her chambers tonight. And best of all, the strange, terrifying boy—the "demon" that had haunted his waking nightmares—was nowhere to be seen. He was in the adjacent room. It was just the two of them. To Jaime, this meant only one thing: he had been forgiven. She had thought about his devotion, realized his worth, and was finally welcoming him back into her bed.
The overwhelming surge of relief and lust made Jaime want to throw his head back and laugh in pure, unadulterated happiness. He took a step forward, his green eyes dark with hunger. "Cersei..." he breathed, his voice ragged.
Seeing the raw, desperate devotion on his face, Cersei maintained her beautiful, inviting smile. But behind her emerald eyes, a cold, calculating predator was assessing its trapped prey.
So easy, Cersei thought, an internal smirk twisting her mind. He is the greatest swordsman in the Seven Kingdoms, a man who terrifies lords and kings alike, yet all it takes is a locked door and a smile to turn him into a begging dog. So incredibly easy to control.
"You look tired, my sweet brother," Cersei purred, her voice dripping with artificial warmth. She slowly walked toward the center of the room, her hips swaying deliberately, gesturing to a heavy, high-backed wooden chair near the hearth. "Come. Sit down. Let me make you forget this terrible week."
As Jaime eagerly moved toward the chair, entirely blind to the invisible web tightening around him, a very different kind of scene was unfolding just one wall away.