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Chapter Text

Though Tywin Lannister was not a man given to public display, it is said that his love for his lady wife was deep and long-abiding.

--- The World of Ice and Fire

The scurrilous rumor that Joanna Lannister gave up her maidenhead to Prince Aerys the night of his father's coronation and enjoyed a brief reign as his paramour after he ascended the Iron Throne can safely be discounted. As Pycelle insists in his letters, Tywin Lannister would scarce have taken his cousin to wife if that had been true, "for he was ever a proud man and not one accustomed to feasting upon another man's leavings."

--- The World of Ice and Fire

“You should not believe everything you hear. Especially where House Lannister is concerned.”

--- Tyrion, A Dance with Dragons

The skies were gray, and the air smelled of fresh snow. She spent most of her days in thick layers of clothes and wrapped in blankets on the balcony adjoining her outer chambers. This part of her quarters afforded her a good view of Lannisport and the Sunset Sea. For the better part of the day, her eyes searched the horizon for ships. Despite the rough seas, vessels came and went aplenty, but none flew the right banners.

Before, she had made the journey from her quarters all the way up to the Ringfort once a day, more to keep herself distracted than for the view, but now, her belly was so round and heavy she could no longer climb the stairwell to the lifts. Her feet and ankles were swollen beyond recognition and her back ached constantly. All she could do now was sit and watch and ruminate. Where are you, my friend?

She was running out of time. The child inside her belly was growing restless. I should have fled when I still had the chance. But she could not leave her children. Not after what they did. To dye her hair, hide her face and pay off her guards to slip away under the cover of darkness might have been an option at some point. To take her lord husband's well-guarded heir and his golden daughter with her was not. If I had fled, they would have done it again before long, and sooner or later, he would have caught them and known them for the little dragons they are.

She had often dreamed of being a dragon lady herself as a young child. When she learned of her betrothal, it had filled her with happiness and excitement. To wed her own kin almost made her a dragon: a cousin, not a brother, but her blood all the same. “To keep the line pure, like the dragons of old did,” she had overheard someone at the Rock say, and she had repeated the words proudly to anyone who would listen. Her lady mother had laughed at that. “To seal a bond that would not have needed sealing if my lord husband were a less hotheaded man. It was your grandsire's idea, long before you were born. Lord Gerold knew his youngest son well. And he was ever so afraid of a dance of lions.”

Gerold the kinslayer, she thought with bitterness. Unbeknownst to you, you may yet slay me and my youngest child from the grave. She knew that was unjust toward her grandfather, but she could not find it in herself to forgive him. Her lord husband had arrived a fortnight ago from King's Landing. He has come; where are you, my Princess? I need you now more than ever.

She had met the Princess of Dorne when she joined Rhaella's court. I was fearless back then, she thought, not without sadness. I impressed her, and she took me under her wing. It had been the beginning of a deep and long friendship.

She would never forget the day she had arrived in King's Landing, a maid of three-and-ten. All the world was mine on that day. Casterly Rock was majestic, the largest castle in the Seven Kingdoms, towering high above the clouds more oft than not. No other seat in the realm could compare, yet to her, it had never been more than a vast prison meant to keep her small and teach her her place. King's Landing excited her in a way she had never known before: the splendor of the royal court, the lords and ladies hailing from all over the realm and far beyond to see the new king crowned, the colors, the noise, the smells – even the bad ones – she relished everything about her new-found freedom away from the disapproving gaze of her stern lord father and the watchful eyes of her lady mother.

Rhaella was of an age with her, but her eyes belonged to a much older woman. She had given birth to a son on the night of the Tragedy at Summerhall that had killed King Aegon. Those who knew the princess told Joanna that on that fateful day, she had lost whatever was left of the carefree child she had once been.

The Dornish noblewoman, heir to the Prince of Dorne, was older than her and Rhaella. She had a son who was almost Joanna's age and squired for a Dornish lord at Salt Shore, as well as two small children who had accompanied her to court. As her father's firstborn, it was her, not her brothers, who would one day rule in Dorne. Joanna had never thought it possible that a sister could inherit before a brother, but it seemed many things were done differently in the far south. Everybody knew that Doreane kept more than one paramour in King's Landing, yet no-one dared confront her about it.

Then, there was Aerys. Whenever he saw her, his deep purple eyes had lit up. Aerys would invite her over to dine with him and his friends, refill her cup with wine and laugh at her jokes. He embodied everything her parents had denied her at Casterly Rock. She would flirt with him and tease him and once in her cups, she even dared him to put a little dragon in her belly. “Would you have me dishonor you?” He asked, half mocking, but she was a lioness of Casterly Rock and not easily cowed. “If you think my honor lies between my legs, you are a fool, Your Grace.” “Hear, hear!” The Dornish princess said, a wicked smile on her olive-skinned face, “finally a lady at court with some sense in her.” The woman's praise had made her beam.

With Prince Aerys's help, it was easy to slip away from the guards her father had sent to accompany her. He took her maidenhead on the night his father was crowned king. He was two years older than her and had sired a child, yet he was just as nervous as her and not half as good at hiding it. She and Aerys made love in secret whenever and wherever they could after that, even in the throne room underneath Vhagar's skull once. The excitement of doing something so brazen had made up for the discomfort of the hard floor. The Kingsguard who were never far away disapproved of their relationship, she could tell, but they were sworn to secrecy. Doreane made sure she drank her moon tea regularly.

They started calling Joanna the Dornish lioness soon after, and she took it as a compliment. The more she learned of the southernmost kingdom, the more she wished she could have been born Dornish. To the Dornish, women seemed to be people, not brood mares. In Dorne, a woman was a man's equal. King's Landing wasn't Dorne, but surrounded by her new friends, it almost felt like it.

These were her happy years; she flourished, young and beautiful, with Aerys by her side. She knew she could never be his wife; she was no dragon lady, but she would have happily remained with him as his mistress. When she visited Casterly Rock after the Blackfyre pretenders had been defeated, she even asked her mother to convince Lord Tytos to break her betrothal. “My lord father is dead,” she argued, quite convincingly, as she thought at the time. “He will remain loyal to Lord Tytos in his grave. Brother will not fight brother. The betrothal can be put aside.” I was a child, young, headstrong, foolish, and in love. Lady Marla had been appalled, but if she ever realized the reason for her daughter's bold demand, she did not act on it. Joanna was sent back to King's Landing a fortnight later.

She had tried her best not to think of the prospect of wedding a stranger, kin or not. She had known her cousin as a young child, but he had always been too old to play with her and had been sent to court when she was no older than six. He was knighted soon after she had arrived in King's Landing and hardly ever spent time at court after that. First, there was the War of the Ninepenny Kings, which claimed her lord father's life. After that, he traveled to the Westerlands to reclaim the debt owed to House Lannister against Lord Tytos's better judgment. The tall, austere man who returned to take his place as Hand of the King was a stranger to her. All I knew of him were the stories. “The Tarbecks got what they deserved,” her cousin Genna told her once, “but there was no honor in what Ty did at Castamere.” “That one is calm on the surface and ruled by raging pride on the inside,” Doreane had said with a frighteningly troubled look on her face, “you will need to be careful not to cross him.”

The stories filled her with dread, but the prospect of being caged again by a man named Lannister had terrified her just as much. “I do not wish to be wed,” she told Aerys. “You are the King. You can order my cousin to marry another lady. If I absolutely must be wed, I can take Doreane's brother as my husband.” She did not know Prince Lewyn well, but the princess always spoke fondly of her younger brother, so he couldn't be half bad.

“Ser Tywin is a good man,” Aerys had said sincerely. “He is my friend and my Hand. He will be the Lord of Casterly Rock one day. He will protect you and your House. He is a good match.” Those were unusually solemn words coming from her dragon. The tenderness in his voice when he spoke of her cousin took her by surprise. “I do not love him,” she insisted. Aerys smiled his disarming smile. “And I do not love my sister, yet we are wed all the same. You can marry Tywin and give him heirs while we remain lovers.” How I wanted to believe him at the time. “What if Ser Tywin feels differently about that?” He sneered at that. “I am his King!”

She remembered her wedding day well. She had sat next to her cousin for hours during the gifting ceremony doing her best to act like a lady while greeting the guests and accepting lavish presents. He comported himself with cool gracefulness, making small talk with the lords and ladies, paying them compliments and praising their gifts, but he never so much as looked at her once. Separated from her friends, she was bored out of her wits.

Gentle Lord Tytos took the place of her deceased father and led her into the sept to be wed to his son and heir. Like a dragon lady. Only the colors were different, red and gold instead of red on black. Ser Tywin stood almost a head taller than her. It was then and there that she noticed him truly for the first time. He looked a king in his cloak of crimson and gold. The light that shone through the colored windows of the Great Sept of Baelor fell on his golden hair and lent him an unearthly glow.

She felt her stomach flutter when he wrapped his cloak around her, resting his hands on her shoulders for just a heartbeat longer than was needed. She had lain with no other man than Aerys, and she found the thought of bedding him oddly intriguing. After they had both said their vows, he placed a chaste kiss on her lips. A kiss to seal a pact, ever so proper. Somehow, the brief cool touch of his lips only excited her more. Cool lion and fiery dragon, on my wedding day, I was convinced I could have them both. She had smiled, and when her eyes met his, he smiled back at her, his gold-flecked green eyes smiling with him.

A few hours into the wedding feast, Joanna was deep enough in her cups that she felt lightheaded, though she was not half as drunk as Aerys, who had guzzled down more wine than she knew a man could. She glanced over at her lord husband who was still sitting on the dais, talking to Ser Barristan and Lord Redwyne, taking small sips from his cup every so often, looking quite at ease in the company of the two older men. That was, until Aerys started clamoring for the bedding.

“Pity the lord's right to the first night has been abolished,” the King had proclaimed loudly, and the hall erupted in laughter. “If the Lady Joanna gives her permission, I'm sure it can be reinstated,” Doreane japed, “but only if I may join you. I would not have my Dornish lioness go anywhere without me!” Joanna laughed at her friend's jest. The Dornishwoman leaned over and placed a gentle kiss on her cheeks. “Pretend to be a shy maid when you bed him,” she whispered in her ear, “Let him be your knight in shining armor. He will like that.” And then, before she knew it, someone grabbed her and she was carried off.

Aerys had been drunk and rowdy. The King was taking her wedding a lot harder than she – or he himself, most like – had expected. At first, she smiled when he grabbed her between her legs and pinched her breast while unlacing her dress and laughed at his bawdy comments, but then she noticed he did not even look at her. This was not her lover, this was an angry stranger. She pushed his hand away the next time he tried to touch her, and he kept a safe distance afterwards, mumbling angrily to himself. She was glad when the ordeal was over and she was tucked under the blanket next to her newly-wed husband. He, too, seemed tense, though that did not surprise her. He's not the type of man to enjoy being carried off, undressed and taunted by a horde of hooting women. She had been in the front and so distracted that she had never even looked at him. Somehow, she regretted that now. It must have been a sight to behold.

Behind the door, people were still jeering and shouting, though she could no longer make out Aerys. She turned to him, smiling. “My lord, we must consummate the marriage.” There was a look of irritation on his face for a heartbeat, but then he nodded in agreement. “Lie on your back, my lady” he told her politely, “and spread your legs apart. You can bend them slightly, if it pleases you.” She found his formality strangely arousing. She wanted nothing more than to flip him onto his back and ride and tease him to see how long he could control himself. And then she would fuck all the correctness out of him until they would both be moaning in pleasure. But she remembered Doreane's words and the look in his eyes when she had been the one to speak up and tell him to get on with it.

“This might hurt a little, but I will be as gentle as possible.” She was soaking wet by then. The last thing she wanted him to be was gentle. Does he truly think I still have my maidenhead? She had thought with bewilderment. I am a woman of seven-and-ten! He seemed startled by the lack of resistance as he entered her, and more so when she pulled her legs up and wrapped them around him to guide him and pull him closer with each thrust, but oddly enough, he went along with it willingly. It was the most control she was like to get on that first night. She watched his face as his breathing grew labored and he began to moan softly as they were rocking back and forth. And then, before she knew it, he had spent himself inside of her and it was all over.

If this had happened with Aerys, she would have asked him to use his mouth or his hands to see the deed finished on her end as well, but she did not want to confront him with something she knew would make him uncomfortable just yet. “You did not bleed,” he noted. That killed whatever lust she had still felt for his touch a moment ago. “I've taken up riding. A saddle took my maidenhead, I'm afraid.” He looked unsure what to make of that. “You... you seem... experienced.” “Doreane taught me so I could please you on our wedding night, my lord,” she said calmly. He seemed appalled by that. “A woman should not bed another woman!” Joanna sighed. “I did not bed her. She explained to me what to do.” It was only half a lie; Doreane always liked to talk and banter when we shared a bed.

It took her all her strength not to lose patience. You will need to be careful not to cross him, she had reminded herself of Doreane's words. She lowered her eyes. “You intimidate me, my lord. I feared I would disappoint you. I did not think I would be- ...I beg your pardon if I angered you. All I want is to please you, my lord.” He cupped her face with his hands and looked her in the eye. Let him be the knight in shining armor. “You could never disappoint me, my lady. You are the best that has happened to me in a long time.” The sincerity in his voice startled her. He drew her closer and kissed her. It was a slow and gentle kiss, but it had nothing of the innocence of the brief touch of lips that had sealed their marriage for all the realm to see. As he caressed her bare breasts and tenderly parted her lips, Joanna let herself go and went along with it. Perhaps, she had thought, I can work with this after all.

It had taken her several days before Aerys would even speak to her. “The way you looked at him,” he said, his voice shaking, “it was love.” “It was lust,” Joanna corrected him, angered by his petulance. Lust and curiosity and the strange allure of solemn correctness. “Lust or love, I am your King, you are mine!” Aerys bristled with anger. That offended Joanna more than she could say. “I am a woman of my own. I belong to nobody. If this really bothers you so much, you should have done as I told you and annulled the betrothal.” She was no longer sure she would have wanted that, she realized with surprise as she spoke the words. They fought, their first fight in a long time, and both left vexed and angry.

He did not come to her until a full fortnight later, but he apologized for his outburst. They asked the Kingsguard to keep the doors to Aerys's bedchambers locked. She did not dare take any moon tea for fear that her husband had already got her with child, so she had pleasured Aerys with her mouth and he had done her the same favor. It felt good to be with someone again who not only understood that she, too, had needs, but who enjoyed fulfilling them. She had tried to gently guide her husband to do the same, but despite slow progress, it always seemed like one step forward two steps back to her. With Aerys, by contrast, it was as if the gods had made him for the sole purpose of pleasuring her.

When her moon blood came, the first thing she did was to look for Aerys. Her flow was strong, and they made a terrible mess, but she did not regret it. “I've missed riding you,” she whispered in his ear. She made him last for almost half the morning, an unusual feat even for her dragon. By the time they were done, the bed looked as if she had given birth. Aerys laughed at that and left the cleaning to his chamber servants while they took a bath together. With the benefit of hindsight, she had realized the carelessness of that decision.

Most like it was one of the servants who had betrayed them, though Joanna would never find out for sure. Queen Rhaella had spoken the words, but the thought had been her husband's, she was certain. Rhaella had never begrudged her the love she shared with her brother-husband. She had born him an heir to please their father, but everyone at court knew she preferred the company of others over that of her brother in bed and harbored no ill feelings when he chose to do the same. Joanna had protested her dismissal from King's Landing with Rhaella, who had only given her a sad smile, and with her lord husband, who had rebuffed her brusquely: “I will not suffer disobedience in my wife, neither toward myself nor toward our Queen.” In the end, she had left the royal court for Casterly Rock, seething.

If all goes well, if their ship makes it in time, if the child does not rush, I can spare Cersei my fate, she thought, watching the gray water of the Sunset Sea down below her, the powerful waves crashing into the Rock looking like little more than thin white lines from up above. She will be a woman of her own in Dorne, respected by her husband as an equal. But all the ifs and buts made her anxious, and with each day that passed, she felt less certain that her plans would work out. A sudden gust of wind made her shiver. She pushed herself up from her chair and slowly limped back inside.

Chapter Text

For close to a week, Casterly Rock was pummeled by a snow storm of a magnitude that was rare even for a cruel, unending winter such as this one. The snow and ice raining down from the sky brought everything at the castle and neighboring Lannisport to a halt. Joanna was forced to stay in her inner chambers, spending the better part of the day by the fireplace. She was tired of winter and tired of her prison. Being confined inside made her feel the full weight of the Rock towering above her.

Conceived in winter; born in winter, she thought, stroking her belly. And killed in just the same winter, a cruel voice at the back of her head whispered, along with his mother. She wanted to push the thought aside, but she knew that if she and the unborn did not survive, she had to provide for the safety of her twins. I'll discuss the matter with Genna and make sure she sees the two separated for good. She called for her handmaid to send word to her cousin that she must needs speak with her. Genna would have the right words to comfort her and ease her anxiety. She had been there for her when Joanna had returned from King's Landing after her wedding, still livid with anger about being returned to her childhood prison.

In a way, life at Casterly Rock had turned out to be less dreadful than she had feared. During the day, Joanna often sat with Lord Tytos or his steward when they held court and listened to petitions. Her uncle had taken a liking to his ambitious niece and made it a point to consult with her before passing judgment. Occasionally, he let her decide disputes on her own. On other days, she accompanied the steward's men to Lannisport to collect the port taxes or to pay a visit to the granaries to check if they were being filled properly to prepare for winter. “You will be the Lady of Casterly Rock,” Lord Tytos had told her, “and my son serves as Hand to the King. You must gain an understanding of these things.” Joanna could not have agreed more.

The nights she spent with Genna and her friends. The fact that her cousin had never left the Rock meant that she had built up an impressive circle of friends and lovers alike, and she was more than happy to share. “You should drink your moon tea,” Joanna always told her, but Genna only scoffed at that. “I make sure to bed Emmon every once in a while, though truth be told, if I didn't, it probably wouldn't make a difference. The man is too craven and too fearful of House Lannister to accuse me of cuckolding him. You, though, your situation is different.” Joanna had not needed reminding of that. As soon as she knew she was not with child after returning from King's Landing, she had resumed drinking her tea.

The only time she ever fought with Genna was when her younger brother paid a visit to Casterly Rock. Ser Tygett was four-and-ten, but he was a knight - one of the youngest in all of the Seven Kingdoms - and looked a man grown. “You take after your brother,” Joanna told him politely, thinking that might please him, but the youth scowled at that. “I am nothing like my brother. I fight with honor.” He came out of his shell later and spent a full evening talking to her, quizzing her about life at court and relating his own stories of the War of the Ninepenny Kings. He could be quite smooth, not unlike his elder brother, and had a sense for choosing the right words at the right time, but unlike Tywin, he did not seem to hide a darker side behind his fairspoken facade.

She found herself oddly impressed, something which did not escape Genna. “No doubt Tyg desires you,” her cousin told her sharply, “but for all the wrong reasons. If I find you in bed with my baby brother, I will never forgive you.” Joanna raised her hands in defense. “He is too young.” “Yes, but you want him all the same, if only to spite Ty. You have that in common, the two of you.” Joanna denied that vigorously, and somehow, their spat got out of hand. They did not speak for over a fortnight until Tygett had left and both could finally swallow their pride and apologized to each other.

Two years into her exile in the West, the King finally reached out and requested her presence in King's Landing for his name day celebration. She gladly obliged him and traveled to the capital. But if Casterly Rock no longer was the prison Joanna had known as a child, King's Landing no longer held its magic. Her lord husband visited her in her bedchambers every night, so she rarely had a chance to sneak away. It would not have made a difference either way: Doreane had returned to Sunspear as the rightful Princess of Dorne after her lord father had passed away, and with her departure, her circle of friends had dissolved. Joanna barely knew any of Rhaella's new ladies-in-waiting, and the Queen herself was courteous, but distant.

Aerys was excited to see her, but something about his demeanor unnerved her. He talked of his grand plans for King's Landing and barely seemed to sleep at all. Sometimes, he would wander into her bedchambers in the midst of night and request her lord husband's presence for some matter or another that he urgently wanted to discuss. “I will build a new city,” he told her in the privacy of his own bedchamber on one occasion. “It will be made of white marble. I have seen it in my dreams.” In hindsight, she realized it was during those days that she noticed the first spark of madness in his eyes. “That's the worst idea I've ever heard, Your Grace,” she told him. “Honestly, Aerys, you could feed the realm for ten winters to come with the gold it would take to build that city of yours.”

She unlaced his breeches and started to pleasure him with her mouth in the hopes of taking his mind off his grandiose fantasies, but Aerys had pulled away from her. “I want to be inside of you! Promise me you will ride me later!” He insisted, pouting. She hated when he did that. “Ser Tywin wants an heir, and I am under much pressure to prove I can give him one. I cannot drink moon tea while I am at court.”

“The books have recorded many brown- or black-haired Targaryen bastards,” Aerys said slyly, suddenly resembling his former self again. “We have good reason to wed in the family. It protects our blood just as much as our Valyrian looks. Yet House Lannister seems to have retained its golden curls throughout the ages.” She had thought on that. It was true. Lannister lords had wed red-haired and black-haired ladies, but the children of their union always seemed to have a head of fine spun gold. The Lannister seed may not be the strongest in the realm, she had pondered, but it is stronger than the Targaryen. “Please?” Aerys had begged. “Fine, but only this once.” Had I known what he would do, where this would send him, I would have refused him.

She returned to the Rock a fortnight later. To her great relief, her body started changing soon after. She hated her morning sickness, but knowing that she was fertile made up for her discomfort. Yet, as her belly grew, so did her anxiousness. Let the child look Lannister, she prayed to the Mother. Let the child be Lannister. To her surprise, her lord husband returned from the royal court for the birth. She was even more baffled when Doreane arrived from Sunspear. “To see that my lioness of Dorne survives her first battle on the bed of blood,” she said. Joanna laughed at that. “You think you can cow the Stranger?” “The Stranger is not who I worry about,” the Princess told her, and the unusual seriousness in her voice had made her spine tingle.

No matter the reason for her friend's visit, Joanna was glad to have Doreane by her side. The birth of not one but two children, a girl and a boy, left her exhausted, and the Princess saw to it that she got enough rest amidst all the commotion that the birth of the heir to the heir of Casterly Rock had caused. Ser Tywin tried and failed to hide his excitement. She had never seen him so happy before.

That was until Aerys claimed the children as his own, not with sword, but with gold. They looked Lannister enough, but Aerys had the right of it; his House's seed was weak. There was no way of knowing for sure. Joanna was appalled all the same that her lover would openly spite her. Doreane was beside herself with anger and cursed the King that he would dare risk her life over some obscure spat with his childhood friend. Joanna had never seen her so furious.

The gift of gold to mark the children as his bastards incensed her lord husband, yet he accepted it with impeccable correctness when the envoy from King's Landing presented it to him. Nor did his face betray any emotions when the King accompanied him to the Rock a year later for Lord Tytos's funeral. It was only over the following days that she realized how far the relationship between the King and his Hand had deteriorated.

The King kept referring to the twins as his Great Bastards and openly mused about his plans to take them back to King's Landing and legitimize them. She pleaded with Aerys to leave it be, to stop enraging her husband unduly, but the stranger he had become just laughed at her. When a Targaryen is born, the gods always flip a coin, she thought. And sometimes, when they grow bored of a sane dragon, they'll toss it again. Yet Joanna could not help but feel guilty for the part she had played. Whatever she had seen in him two years earlier had only got worse with the birth of the twins.

It wasn't only her friendship with Aerys that was put to the test; her lord husband grew increasingly distant with every passing day they had to spend together. It was the morning after she had seen the Princess Doreane off to return to Dorne with her ships after a year in residence at Casterly Rock that their relationship finally reached a breaking point. She had been on her way to see the steward when she noted the noise and clamoring in the Great Hall. As she approached, she saw her husband's guards strip a woman before half the court of Casterly Rock - her late uncle's mistress, she realized. The woman was wailing, desperately trying to hold on to her clothes while covering her voluminous breasts to the sneering and laughter of the men and women surrounding her. Her lord husband stood by the side, quietly observing the scene.

She watched the spectacle in shock and disgust, unable to believe her eyes, before finally speaking up: “Enough, my lord! Put an end to this mindless cruelty!” “She thinks she is the ruling Lady of Casterly Rock,” Lord Tywin told her, eyeing her with cold rage. “She took advantage of my father's weakness to elevate herself above his men.” Joanna knew that wasn't true. His mistress had sat in attendance occasionally, but far less frequently than she herself. It was not her but Joanna who had taken over the reins after Tytos's passing until her lord husband's arrival. He's talking about me, she realized in horror, this is as much about me as it is about her.

“Stop it! This is savagery!” She screamed. To hear stories of her husband's vengeful rage was one thing; to witness it firsthand was a different matter entirely. He only glared at her and ordered his men to remove her from the Great Hall and take her back to her chambers. She reached her solar just in time before she started retching up her breakfast.

The next day, her servants told her that Lord Tywin had ordered his men to take the woman to Lannisport to parade her through the streets naked and proclaim to every man, woman, and child she met that she was a whore. Joanna appealed to the steward and to half her husband's bannermen, but they refused to intercede. Finally, she overcame the resentment she harbored toward Aerys and appealed to the King directly. “He punished her for crimes he thinks I committed,” she told him, “and now he is prolonging the punishment, having her dragged through the streets, because I dared to speak out.” But the King seemed indifferent. If anything, he looked pleased, she noted with horror. “Pity the poor woman, but good for you to finally recognize him for who he truly is. The monster that is Tywin Lannister must be seen to be believed.” She left him, disgusted.

Her lord husband took his time before he came to see her. When he did, the cold fury on his face was gone. “Why do you have to do this?” He asked quietly. “Why do you have to elevate yourself above your lord husband? Why do you have to defy me and give me commands in front of my men?” I must make amends with this man, she had thought. Doreane would want me to, for my own safety and the safety of my children. And for my sanity. But instead, all she could say was: “Because what you did was sheer madness.” “It was my right, and it was my duty.”

She knew the lecture he was about to give her; he had been preaching it since he was a young boy at the Rock. “There is an order to things,” he said, as she knew he would. “It has served the realm well. Men like to cast it aside when it benefits them, but I will do everything in my power to uphold it. If we lose it, we will break apart. The lowborn serves the highborn; the highborn provides for the lowborn. The vassal is loyal to his liege; the liege offers his vassal protection...” “And a lady always heeds her lord husband's commands in return for his shield, yes, yes, that is all very well,” Joanna finished for him, “but what of the son? Must he not obey his lord father? If the father chooses to forgive his vassals, must the son not respect that decision? If the father loves a lowborn woman, what right does the son have to humiliate her?”

Lord Tywin fell silent. “If the father does not understand-” he finally began, but Joanna would have none of it. “No! Either you take it all or you take none of it. If the father does not understand his place in this invisible order you want to believe in so firmly, then all the son can do is try to make him understand behind closed doors and work within the boundaries set by his sire to better the standing of his House. Sometimes, it would seem you agree, that simply does not serve. And therein lies the flaw in your logic. You pick and choose as benefits you.”

“The Hand of the King cannot be ruled by a woman. No man who needs to command respect can.” “And isn't that a silly thing, that the world would think so little of my sex,” Joanna said acidly. More silence followed. “Please, Joanna.” He rarely ever called her by her given name. “You and I may disagree on many things, but even you must see that this is the way of the realm. If you love and accept me as your lord husband, please do me this favor. You are the Lady of Casterly Rock. I would never dare to cage you or deny you anything that you wished to do behind closed doors. All I ask is that you heed my wishes where others can see. If you disagree with me, come and see me in my chambers, but do not defy me openly. If you bear me any love, please do this for me.”

His plea caught her off guard. She had not expected him to bare himself in front of her and make himself so vulnerable. Her anger melted, though a sense of suspicion remained. Her lord husband was a cat of the sly kind, and he knew her well enough. “Very well,” she said. “You want a deal. I'll give you one. Men like to seek pleasure outside their wife's bedchambers. So do I." She watched his reaction, but he did not so much as flinch. "I will keep it discrete, but I will not have this taken away from me. If the stewards or your men seek my advice on matters concerning the Rock or the Westerlands, as they should, I will give it to them. I will do so quietly, but I will not forsake this right. Nor will I ever be commanded around by you without being consulted first. For any decision that affects me or my children, you will seek my permission first. Do this, and you will have a submissive wife to parade before the realm, kind, innocent, loving, and ever so supportive of her lord husband's every decision. Break this deal, and I will rain hell down on you like you once rained hell on the Tarbecks.”

She had thrown down her gauntlet, and Lord Tywin gladly obliged her and picked it up. “Whatever it is you do, no word of it will ever leave your bedchambers. If people start talking, you will regret it. You will never defy me openly again, not at the Rock and most certainly not at court in King's Landing. I will not find you talking or scheming behind my back. Make a fool of me, and I will destroy you. For the realm to see, you will love me, respect me, and obey me. Our marriage is a happy one.”

“Our marriage is a happy one,” she agreed, as if saying the words made them true. “So long as you keep my terms, I will keep yours.” She paused briefly. “There's one more condition, Lord Tywin. As long as we are under the same roof, you will make yourself available and please me in the bedchambers when I have need of you.” To her surprise, he smiled, an almost mischievous smile of the kind she had never expected to see on his face in her lifetime. “With pleasure, my lady.”

They made love that night, “to seal our new pact,” as Joanna liked to put it. True to his word, he licked her like a little kitten. Then he let her tie him to the bed, and she teased him for hours on end until he was completely pliable under her hands and begged her to give him relief. It was hard to believe that this was the same man who had threatened to destroy her should she ever defy him again. A part of her had hoped he would resent having to submit to her to stay true to their pact, but another side in her was thrilled to see how much he seemed to enjoy their play. I should hate him, she thought to herself afterwards, but I don't.

She never told Aerys of her mutual understanding with her husband, but he sensed the new accord between them almost instantly and had insisted on returning to the royal court with his Hand as soon as possible. “The realm needs me,” he declared in front of the bannermen and knights that had accompanied him to Casterly Rock, “and it needs my humble servant Tywin, no matter how much he would prefer spending his days in bed with his sweet lady-wife's mouth around his cock.” Her husband fumed at the public debasement, but he immediately began preparations to move the court back to King's Landing.

“Stay,” she pleaded with him, “leave King's Landing behind. You are the Lord of Casterly Rock. Your place is here with me. Your King does not love you. No good will come of it if you go with him.” “My King does not love me,” he had admitted, “but I have no choice but to serve him. The vassal is loyal to his liege lord, and the lord obeys his King. How could I ever demand the fealty of my bannermen if I were not willing to pay the same to my King?” He, too, was young once, Joanna realized. He truly believed it back then.

“You will have green eyes and golden hair,” she told the child in her belly. “You will be strong and handsome and make your lord father proud. You will be a Lannister.” But whatever temporary peace that gave her was destroyed when her handmaid brought her the news later that night. “Lord Tywin bids me tell you the Lady Genna has left Casterly Rock,” the girl said softly, "she will not return for a full moon's turn." With the storm, Doreane's ship will never make it in time. Genna was the last shield between my lord husband and my unborn child. She looked at the serving girl and noticed the fear in her eyes. She does not understand what this is all about, Joanna thought, but even she can sense the danger we are in. She tried to look reassuring, thanked the girl and dismissed her. Not for the first time she asked herself where she and her lord husband had gone wrong. He tried to cage me again, she remembered. But she knew she could not lay the blame solely at his feet. He was the first to break our pact, but I smashed it to pieces.

Chapter Text

The babe was kicking and punching her, and she felt a persistent urge to make water. “You truly are my lord husband's,” she told him, half a smile on her face, “the way you torment me and make my life difficult.” Her child's determination was growing stronger by the day; it would not be long now until he would fight his way out of her womb.

She had not spoken to Lord Tywin since he had returned from King's Landing to oversee the birth of her child. She had loved him once for the pact he had made with her, she remembered. She often wondered how their relationship would have been had he stayed with her back then as lord of his own castle instead of returning to the royal court a hundred leagues away. Would he have come to think of me as his equal and I of him as a friend and companion? Or would I have strangled him in his sleep? It made no matter now; the King's Hand had left for King's Landing shortly before her twins had turned two, and Joanna had stayed behind at Casterly Rock.

Her lord husband had appointed Ser Kevan as castellan. Lord Tywin himself sent her a raven once every turn of the moon with missives concerning matters he deemed suitable for a lady. She had heeded some of them and put the rest in a pile. Every so often, he would attempt a stiff show of affection, making her smile. In all the decisions she made regarding the Westerlands, she had stayed true to her word and let Kevan and the steward act as her front. They would take both credit and blame for her ideas. With time, as she rose as the Lady of Casterly Rock in more than just name and even her lord husband's bannermen began to pay her grudging respect, she came to appreciate the advantages of ruling from behind the curtain.

Lord Tywin only visited her once in all this time, the year that her twins celebrated their sixth nameday. Theirs was a fragile peace while he resided at the Rock. They had their happy moments, too, but those were always short-lasting. He would get involved in matters of the castle and the West he did not fully understand, yet their pact compelled her to smile and indulge him at council meetings and then try to fix the damage later. “You undo my work,” she told him testily. “Would I interfere in your work as Hand of the King and presume to know better than you?” “I am the Lord of Casterly Rock,” he replied, unwilling or unable to see her point.

She had taken it out on him in the bedroom, but once the initial excitement of having the most powerful bed slave in Westeros at her mercy had worn off, she found herself soon growing bored of their play. The longer he stayed, the more she felt the need to hurt him in earnest. She wanted him to resent her for what she did to him, yet no matter what she tried, the best he could give her was a pretense of anger and defiance. The fault lies with me, she told herself, not with him. But that recognition only made her desire him less.

She stopped asking him to visit her and turned him away more and more often when he came to her bedchambers. It did not take her long to realize that this gave her just what she craved: power and the ability to hurt him. He wants me to love him, she realized, and he is fascinated by who I truly am. But in the end, he loves an idea of me that simply does not exist. And thus, once she had grown bored of him in bed, all that seemed to remain was a man who wanted a woman to be cherished and protected when she wanted to be a person to be respected.

By the time he made preparations to return to the royal court, little love was left between them, yet she was intent on accompanying him back to King's Landing. It was the tenth anniversary of Aerys's coronation, and all the realm would be there for the tourney her lord husband was to host in honor of the King. The capital would be full of life, and with all her friends at court, she hoped for a glimpse of the old times. “It is only right and proper that the Hand of the King should present his lady wife and children to the court.” Your wealth, your power, and your beautiful devout wife and children: go, my lord, and parade your gifts from the gods for all the realm to see. He could scarcely argue with that and had grudgingly permitted her and the twins to come.

The city she found upon her return truly was the place she had known and loved as a young woman in all its magnificence and splendor. Each day, more lords and ladies of noble houses from all over Westeros poured into the city, bringing with them their entourages of bannermen sworn to their houses, of knights and squires, servants, singers and mummers, and scores of soldiers and guards.

One of the first things she did was visit Doreane, who had arrived before them with her children and taken up residence in Maegor's Holdfast. The Princess had kissed and hugged her and ordered the King's servants to find accommodation close to her own chambers for Joanna and her children. They had given her two spacious rooms facing south, right across from the Princess's. It put a sufficient distance between herself and the Tower of the Hand, she noted with satisfaction.

Her lord husband's two youngest brothers arrived to partake in the tourney, and Tygett had come to visit her. Now a man of two-and-twenty, he was a knight in his prime, tall, and handsome with golden hair and green eyes. To her surprise, Tygett and Doreane knew each other. “We have friends in common, and enemies as well,” was all the Princess would say, and Joanna knew not to ask any further.

Lord Tywin no longer made the effort to visit her in her bedchambers, so she sat with Doreane and Tygett, and they talked and laughed all evening. The King had turned her lord husband's brother down as master-at-arms, she knew, and she had expected him to be bitter about it, but he shrugged it off. “I quite enjoy my freedom,” he told her, clearly relishing in Lord Tywin's failed attempt to bring him to King's Landing to keep a check on him. “And I would have gladly given my sword hand just to see the look on my dear brother's face when Aerys refused him.” She was happy to see him in such a good mood.

Only when she asked him about Castamere did he fall silent, as Doreane's face hardened at the mention of the name. It was something Joanna had always wanted to know. “I was one-and-ten,” Tygett finally said, “but I had killed in battle before. I knew what war could do to men, what I myself had become many times before. Castamere was different. Everybody knows what Tywin did, and everyone can hazard a guess what sort of a man that makes him, but I saw it, and I saw the look on his face. I know him for who he truly is, and that is more than I ever wanted to know.”

You are right, she wanted to say, and you are wrong. He is all this, but he is more. She felt surprised at her sudden need to defend her lord husband. But instead, all she said was: “I know your pain, Tygett Lannister. I have seen it, too.” She cupped his face and leaned over to kiss him. That startled him, but he recovered quickly and kissed her back fiercely. Doreane came up behind them as if she had known all along this would happen, nuzzling Joanna's neck while unlacing her dress and slowly undressing her. The Princess ran her hands over her breasts as Joanna pulled off Tygett's surcoat, unbuttoned his doublet and began to unlace his breeches.

But then, Tygett withdrew abruptly. “I cannot do this,” he said. Doreane laughed. “You've bedded me, and I can see you desire your sister by marriage, don't deny it!” “I cannot do it,” the young knight repeated, looking at them with uncertainty. “To see you two together...” The Princess ignored his remark and turned her attention to the small of Joanna's back, placing sensual kisses all over her bare skin. But Joanna was vexed. A woman must not bed another woman, she heard her lord husband say. In her mind, she saw his face twist in disgust. Suddenly, Tygett's physical semblance to Lord Tywin was more than she could bear. “You are no better than your brother,” she told him sharply. “Go, Ser!” He looked hurt, and she almost regretted her harsh words for an instant, but then he grabbed his surcoat, turned around and left without so much as another word. “Well. There goes Ser Tygett,” Doreane said before returning her attention to Joanna's body.

She did not know whether Tygett had betrayed her or whether her lord husband had had his servants spy on her. But when he summoned her the next morning, Lord Tywin was furious. He insisted on moving her to the Tower of the Hand at once and had guards placed outside her chamber. Nobody was allowed to see her. “The Lady Joanna has taken ill,” he told those who tried to visit. “I was well within my rights,” Joanna protested to him. “You have no cause to imprison me!” But her husband would hear none of it. “Do not speak to me of your rights,” he said coldly. “Whatever rights you have you only have because I grant them to you. This insolence is the Dornish whore speaking out of your mouth. I will not tolerate this kind of talk in my wife.”

Joanna would have missed the tourney had the King not interfered on her behalf. No doubt Doreane made him. Aerys had come to the Tower of the Hand, accompanied by armed guards, and demanded she be let out. For a moment, she feared that the King's men and her lord husband's guards might cross swords, but then Lord Tywin stepped aside. “Your Grace, if you wish for my lady wife to attend the tourney, then she will accompany us.”

They sat on the dais together: she, her lord husband and their children a step below the King, the Queen, and Prince Rhaegar. They were surrounded by the men and women Aerys held in his favor, sycophants most all of them, always vying for the King's attention, as Joanna noted with distaste. Wine was flowing freely, but Lord Tywin had forbidden her to drink any and warned her not to speak to anyone without his leave. She sat in silence, watching the melee below as the knights of the realm tried to unhorse one another. It was all she could do to contain her rage.

“I wonder, has nursing those two sweet children of mine ruined those high and proud breasts of yours?” Aerys bawled, drunkenly patting the twins' heads. Prince Rhaeger turned around and looked at his father in disgust. Under any other circumstance, the lewd comment of the stranger the King had once again become would have annoyed her to no end, but she was still so angry that she raised her empty glass to toast him mockingly instead. “Come visit me in my quarters to find out, Your Grace.” The crowd erupted in laughter, and Lord Tywin turned red with fury. She might as well have slapped him in the face in front of the entire court, but she was not done. He had broken their pact. She had promised him hell and fire, and hell and fire he would get. “My lord husband is too meek in the bedchamber, I'm afraid. I grow tired of him,” she said, just as he got up to leave.

She knew she had taken it too far the moment the words left her mouth. She watched the blood drain from Lord Tywin's face until it was no more than a white mask as he slowly sank back into his seat in shock. At first, there was silence, then suppressed snickers. “Hear, hear! Our good Lord Hand may pretend to rule the Seven Kingdoms,” someone said, “but in truth, we all know we are ruled by his fierce lady-wife.” She regretted playing into the hands of Aerys's lickspittles. Her head turned red with shame, but it was too late; the words could not be unsaid. Eventually, the toadies' excitement died down again, but her husband remained in his seat, motionless and with dead eyes, long after the conversation had moved on to other topics. She fled the dais as soon as she got the chance.

At the banquet after the conclusion of the tourney, Lord Tywin was nowhere to be seen. Joanna had hidden herself away in a corner as far away from the King and those seeking his favor as possible, refusing to return any of the amused grins the lords and ladies at court gave her when they met her eyes. She would try to make polite conversation, but it seemed that everybody already knew what had happened earlier.

When she returned to the Tower of the Hand, she found him sitting by the window of his solar, looking down on the city with dark eyes. He hates this place, she realized. He hates the King and his men who make a mock of him, and he hates King's Landing and all its people who take delight in his debasement. If he could, he would kill them all. She shuddered to think what would become of her beloved city if ever King's Landing were to find itself at her lord husband's mercy. She could not bear to see the look in his eyes and quickly turned her face. It is that same look that Tygett saw; the same look he had when he destroyed that poor woman in front of my eyes for the crime I committed.

Lord Tywin turned around abruptly. “You have made it impossible for me to do my job,” he said, “but alas, the King will not accept my resignation.” Joanna looked him in the eye. “I am sorry for what I did,” she said as firmly as she could. “I am ashamed of what I did. These words should never have been said.” She might as well have been speaking to a wall. His eyes were cold and empty. “Turn around!” He ordered. As she did, he ripped her gown open, yanking it down before tearing off her undergarments. “Too meek!” He said, his voice filled with hatred.

“Please don't do this to me,” she said with as much calmness as she could muster. “I am your lord husband,” he told her, “I will do as I please.” She knew it was futile to put up a struggle; he could easily overpower her. “Don't do this to me, Tywin,” she repeated, surprised by the defiant firmness in her own voice as he pushed her down on all fours.

After he had taken her, he dared not look her in the eye as if he regretted his deed, but he could not find it in himself to beg her forgiveness - not then, not ever. She wasn't sure whether it would have made a difference to her at all. “Thank you for your service, my lord,” she had said with icy courtesy before getting up and walking out of his chamber.

This child is his, conceived in hatred, she thought. She would love him all the same. But in the end, all that mattered was how her lord husband would feel about the babe. And how could he ever love a child that was hers, born of the wife he had learned to hate so much? It was no use lamenting words that could not be unsaid, nor deeds that could not be undone, but that night she was overcome by grief and despair. “Your great-grandsire did not kill you,” she told the kicking babe in her womb. “I killed you, and so did your lord father.” She laughed, half mad. “We made you and we killed you. In the ten years that we were wed, this may be the only thing we ever truly did together.”

Chapter Text

Her fire is quenched, she who used to burn so bright.

--- Kevan, A Dance with Dragons

Lord Tywin had kept her isolated from her friends after the tourney until the very day he had her sent back to Casterly Rock, but Doreane had managed to smuggle a message to her: “Our ship departs in three days. If all goes well, the King will see you safely to the docks. All will be well, my love. Your daughter will find happiness in the south.” Joanna had burned the letter, kept her children close, and waited for Aerys. But the King never came.

Like as not he was caught in a bout of madness again, unable to think of anything but his grandiose visions for the realm, she thought. Doreane had sent her ravens, and with Genna's help, she had been able to respond despite her lord husband's spies watching her every move. Doreane had made preparations to sail for Casterly Rock as soon as she had heard that Joanna was pregnant again, but the winter seas were treacherous and uncertain. It was too late now; the child's birth was imminent.

Joanna had taken to her chamber several days prior, surrounded by maids and midwives, waiting for labor to set in. But that did not keep her lord husband from summoning her that afternoon. Since he had returned from the royal court, he had paid her no mind, only seen to it that her quarters were guarded around the clock. Not that he would have needed to; she could scarcely walk. The guards half dragged half carried her to Lord Tywin's study. He was standing with his back to her as the guards seated her in a chair. He turned around and dismissed them. “My lord.” Joanna said.

“You know why I am here,” he told her curtly. “I had hoped that Genna would keep your antics at bay, but it seems she is unfit for the task.” She looked at him blankly as he spoke. He had started shaving his head. It made him look just as harsh and cruel as he sounded. “Cersei is to be wed to Rhaegar. I will not see her marry a Dornish bastard, and I certainly will not have you meddling behind my back and make a fool of me.” Ah, yes, ruled at home by your lady wife, she thought bitterly, of all the japes they make about you at court, this one must sting the most. “As for the child in your belly, I will not suffer to be cuckolded again.” Again, his voice echoed in her head. Again.

He saw the look on her face. “Oh, don't take me for a fool, woman. You bedded Aerys, and the Targaryen seed is weak as a maid.” He waved his hands dismissively, as if to push the thought aside. “It makes no matter. It is too late to do anything about the twins, and they look Lannister enough, I grant you that. But this bastard of yours will be examined carefully at birth, and if there is any indication that he is not mine, he will not live.”

His words did not come as a surprise to her; even so, they made her shudder. If ought was amiss with the child, if he looked any less Lannister than her golden twins, he would kill the babe, and her with him, of that she was sure. Nothing was easier than to kill a mother and her child on her birthing bed. Much less for a lord in his own castle. I should have left when I had the chance... To wait for a Dornish ship that might never come was folly. “No doubt the gods will judge you justly,” she said. “But whatever you do, know that it will be with you for the rest of your life.” A wave of pain hit her back and abdomen just as she finished her words. She tried to breathe through it, but the force of the contraction was too strong.

Lord Tywin watched her with cold eyes as she twisted in pain, gasping for air. You held my hand last time, she wanted to tell him, do you remember, my lord? “Will that be all?” She asked instead once the pain had finally subsided. That seemed to anger him: “Is this all you have to say in your defense?” “It makes no matter what I say. You have already decided that you will not believe me,” she said coolly. “Do I have your leave to go?” He hesitated for half a heartbeat, but then thought better of it and dismissed her with a brusque wave of his hand.

She did not make it very far. As she leaned on her guard for support, she felt a pop, then warm fluid running down her thighs. Her legs felt weak as the next contraction hit her. They carried her to the birthing chamber, Lord Tywin and half a dozen guards in tow. As if I could flee in this state, she thought.

All but one of the room's windows were covered, but she could see him from the corner of her eye, sitting in the half-light by her bed, watching her unmovingly as the midwife cradled her in her lap, trying to push out the child. She felt her servants' unease at the presence of a man in the privacy of the birthing chamber, but none would have dared to protest.

After she had won her battle at last, the midwife presented the child to Lord Tywin without a word. Even in the semidarkness, she could see the rage on his face. He got up and strode out of the room. When they finally lay the child on her belly, she knew why. The babe's head was too large, and his legs were too short, but all she noticed was his black eye and the fine black hair covering his head. Mother have mercy! Mother have mercy... She clasped her doomed child and pulled him close. There will be war between Dorne and the Westerlands, she realized. The Princess will come, and all Lord Tywin will see is a black-haired family coming to claim a black-haired babe.

When her lord husband returned the next day, she was half-mad with fear, but she forced herself to smile and offer the child to him nonetheless. “His name is Tyrion,” she said, “a good Lannister name. He is yours, my lord.” He never so much as glanced at the boy, but his face was twisted in disgust all the same. You smiled when you held Jaime and sang him a song. “That creature is no child of mine,” he said icily. “I don't know what vile monster you bedded to produce this demon. The gods know, you bed any man and woman you can wrap your legs around, and any beast as well, it would seem.”

“He is yours,” she repeated. “Your son.” “Do not insult me, woman,” he said. “Anyone can see that this... this thing is not my issue. He will be killed; I'll see to it myself.” He snapped his fingers, gesturing for his guards to take the babe from her. Joanna was still weakened from her battle on the bed of blood, but she fought back with all her might, holding on to her son, kneeing and kicking the men who came for him. She knew it was a lost fight, but when at last they wrestled him from her arms, it hurt more than she could bear. “No-one outside these chambers will ever lay eyes on this creature,” he told her. “My son was stillborn and took his lady mother with him.”

He turned around to leave. “If you ever bore me any love, my lord, I beg of you, please let the child live!” She cried after him. “Kill me, if you do not believe me, but please be merciful and let the babe live!” Tears were rolling down her face. I might as well be pleading with a rock. My lord husband knows no mercy. He left without another word, taking her child with him.

She no longer cared when they came for her, yanking her out of bed and dragging her across the floor to an adjacent room. I am to be killed. The thought gave her an odd sense of relief. An end to this pain. But what she saw and heard as she was pushed into the room sent shudders through her body. The sight was too much for her weakened body. As the guards tried to force her eyes open and prevent her from covering her ears, everything around her went black.

***

When she awoke, every fiber of her body was aching. The ground beneath her was gently rolling back and forth. A ship, she realized. For a brief moment, she wondered if Doreane had come to save her and her children after all, if they were on their way to Dorne. But she was alone, and her cabin was much too small and plain for a royal ship. She tried to get up from her bed, but her thighs and legs were wrapped tightly with rope, and she fell on the floor. She felt a dull ache between her legs as she pulled herself up again.

Someone must have heard her. A man entered, his long robes gliding over the floor, a chain forged of many different metals hanging around his neck. He took her hand, gently easing her back onto the bed. “I am taking you to Oldtown,” he said softly when he saw the questions on her face. “You will be wed to the Stranger.” I hope the Stranger will be a kinder husband to me than Lord Tywin, she wanted to say, but all she could produce was a gurgling sound. Suddenly, the memories came back to her. He couldn't take my wits, so he settled for my tongue. Oh, and the tongues of so many others. She shivered as she remembered her handmaiden's wails and pleas.

“The child lives,” the man continued, stroking her back. “He will be raised a lion of Lannister. You will never see any of your children again, but he will live. All of them will live.” At first, she mistrusted her ears, but as the words settled in, all her pain and tension was replaced by a wave of relief rushing through her body. The maester looked at her, puzzled, as she was shaken by mad laughter and sobs at the same time. This is mercy, she thought.