A Storm of Swords

TYRION

Nothing remained beyond the King’s Gate but mud and ashes and bits of burned bone, yet already there were people living in the shadow of the city walls, and others selling fish from barrows and barrels. Tyrion felt their eyes on him as he rode past; chilly eyes, angry and unsympathetic. No one dared speak to him, or try to bar his way; not with Bronn beside him in oiled black mail. If I were alone, though, they would pull me down and smash my face in with a cobblestone, as they did for Preston Greenfield.

“They come back quicker than the rats,” he complained. “We burned them out once, you’d think they’d take that as a lesson.”

“Give me a few dozen gold cloaks and I’ll kill them all,” said Bronn. “Once they’re dead they don’t come back.”

“No, but others come in their places. Leave them be… but if they start throwing up hovels against the wall again, pull them down at once. The war’s not done yet, no matter what these fools may think.” He spied the Mud Gate up ahead. “I have seen enough for now. We’ll return on the morrow with the guild masters to go over their plans.” He sighed. Well, I burned most of this, I suppose it’s only just that I rebuild it.

That task was to have been his uncle’s, but solid, steady, tireless Ser Kevan Lannister had not been himself since the raven had come from Riverrun with word of his son’s murder. Willem’s twin Martyn had been taken captive by Robb Stark as well, and their elder brother Lancel was still abed, beset by an ulcerating wound that would not heal. With one son dead and two more in mortal danger, Ser Kevan was consumed by grief and fear. Lord Tywin had always relied on his brother, but now he had no choice but to turn again to his dwarf son.

The cost of rebuilding was going to be ruinous, but there was no help for that. King’s Landing was the realm’s principal harbor, rivaled only by Oldtown. The river had to be reopened, and the sooner the better. And where am I going to find the bloody coin? It was almost enough to make him miss Littlefinger, who had sailed north a fortnight past. While he beds Lysa Arryn and rules the Vale beside her, I get to clean up the mess he left behind him. Though at least his father was giving him significant work to do. He won’t name me heir to Casterly Rock, but he’ll make use of me wherever he can, Tyrion thought, as a captain of gold cloaks waved them through the Mud Gate.

The Three Whores still dominated the market square inside the gate, but they stood idle now, and the boulders and barrels of pitch had all been trundled away. There were children climbing the towering wooden structures, swarming up like monkeys in roughspun to perch on the throwing arms and hoot at each other.

“Remind me to tell Ser Addam to post some gold cloaks here,” Tyrion told Bronn as they rode between two of the trebuchets. “Some fool boy’s like to fall off and break his back.” There was a shout from above, and a clod of manure exploded on the ground a foot in front of them. Tyrion’s mare reared and almost threw him. “On second thoughts,” he said when he had the horse in hand, “let the poxy brats splatter on the cobbles like overripe melons.”

He was in a black mood, and not just because a few street urchins wanted to pelt him with dung. His marriage was a daily agony. Sansa Stark remained a maiden, and half the castle seemed to know it. When they had saddled up this morning, he’d heard two of the stableboys sniggering behind his back. He could almost imagine that the horses were sniggering as well. He’d risked his skin to avoid the bedding ritual, hoping to preserve the privacy of his bedchamber, but that hope had been dashed quick enough. Either Sansa had been stupid enough to confide in one of her bedmaids, every one of whom was a spy for Cersei, or Varys and his little birds were to blame.

What difference did it make? They were laughing at him all the same. The only person in the Red Keep who didn’t seem to find his marriage a source of amusement was his lady wife.

Sansa’s misery was deepening every day. Tyrion would gladly have broken through her courtesy to give her what solace he might, but it was no good. No words would ever make him fair in her eyes. Or any less a Lannister. This was the wife they had given him, for all the rest of his life, and she hated him.

And their nights together in the great bed were another source of torment. He could no longer bear to sleep naked, as had been his custom. His wife was too well trained ever to say an unkind word, but the revulsion in her eyes whenever she looked on his body was more than he could bear. Tyrion had commanded Sansa to wear a sleeping shift as well. I want her, he realized. I want Winterfell, yes, but I want her as well, child or woman or whatever she is. I want to comfort her. I want to hear her laugh. I want her to come to me willingly, to bring me her joys and her sorrows and her lust. His mouth twisted in a bitter smile. Yes, and I want to be tall as Jaime and as strong as Ser Gregor the Mountain too, for all the bloody good it does.

Unbidden, his thoughts went to Shae. Tyrion had not wanted her to hear the news from any lips but his own, so he had commanded Varys to bring her to him the night before his wedding. They met again in the eunuch’s chambers, and when Shae began to undo the laces of his jerkin, he’d caught her by the wrist and pushed her away. “Wait,” he said, “there is something you must hear. On the morrow I am to be wed…”

“… to Sansa Stark. I know.”

He was speechless for an instant. Even Sansa did not know, not then. “How could you know? Did Varys tell you?”

“Some page was telling Ser Tallad about it when I took Lollys to the sept. He had it from this serving girl who heard Ser Kevan talking to your father.” She wriggled free of his grasp and pulled her dress up over her head. As ever, she was naked underneath. “I don’t care. She’s only a little girl. You’ll give her a big belly and come back to me.”

Some part of him had hoped for less indifference. Had hoped, he jeered bitterly, but now you know better, dwarf. Shae is all the love you’re ever like to have.

Muddy Way was crowded, but soldiers and townfolk alike made way for the Imp and his escort. Hollow-eyed children swarmed underfoot, some looking up in silent appeal whilst others begged noisily. Tyrion pulled a big fistful of coppers from his purse and tossed them in the air, and the children went running for them, shoving and shouting. The lucky ones might be able to buy a heel of stale bread tonight. He had never seen markets so crowded, and for all the food the Tyrells were bringing in, prices remained shockingly high. Six coppers for a melon, a silver stag for a bushel of corn, a dragon for a side of beef or six skinny piglets. Yet there seemed no lack of buyers. Gaunt men and haggard women crowded around every wagon and stall, while others even more ragged looked on sullenly from the mouths of alleys.

“This way,” Bronn said, when they reached the foot of the Hook. “If you still mean to…?”

“I do.” The riverfront had made a convenient excuse, but Tyrion had another purpose today. It was not a task he relished, but it must be done. They turned away from Aegon’s High Hill, into the maze of smaller streets that clustered around the foot of Visenya’s. Bronn led the way. Once or twice Tyrion glanced back over his shoulder to see if they were being followed, but there was nothing to be seen except the usual rabble: a carter beating his horse, an old woman throwing nightsoil from her window, two little boys fighting with sticks, three gold cloaks escorting a captive… they all looked innocent, but any one of them could be his undoing. Varys had informers everywhere.

They turned at a corner, and again at the next, and rode slowly through a crowd of women at a well. Bronn led him along a curving wynd, through an alley, under a broken archway. They cut through the rubble where a house had burned and walked their horses up a shallow flight of stone steps. The buildings were close and poor. Bronn halted at the mouth of a crooked alley, too narrow for two to ride abreast. “There’s two jags and then a dead end. The sink is in the cellar of the last building.”

Tyrion swung down off his horse. “See that no one enters or leaves till I return. This won’t take long.” His hand went into his cloak, to make certain the gold was still there in the hidden pocket. Thirty dragons. A bloody fortune, for a man like him. He waddled up the alley quickly, anxious to be done with this.

The wine sink was a dismal place, dark and damp, walls pale with niter, the ceiling so low that Bronn would have had to duck to keep from hitting his head on the beams. Tyrion Lannister had no such problem. At this hour, the front room was empty but for a dead-eyed woman who sat on a stool behind a rough plank bar. She handed him a cup of sour wine and said, “In the back.”

The back room was even darker. A flickering candle burned on a low table, beside a flagon of wine. The man