The Lone Wolf Returns(RECONTINUED)

Chapter 10:A Dance of Wolves and Dragons

"Gods," Tyrion complained, flexing his gloved hand and wincing at its numbness. "Is winter always so foul?"

"Quiet, dwarf," Jon Connington snapped. "You're a mute squire, remember? I'll not have the smallfolk telling stories about a chatty little man in my company."

Not when so many people want me dead, no. Tyrion had been genuinely surprised to be asked along at all, but Aegon had insisted on his coming. The boy valued his counsel dearly, in spite of Connington's feelings for him. What was it he said? I am a 'unique perspective.'

Tyrion was also the only one to have ever known the Stark girl, briefly though he had. He'd known her older sister more than well, too, and had befriended her half-brother Jon, with whom she had apparently been close. It was a great deal more than anyone else in the prince's company could offer in terms of background knowledge. More like than not, though, she won't be happy to see me. If the stories of her nature are to be believed, she'll probably have me roasted on a spit and fed to a pack of wolves.

The towns of the Riverlands had been badly stricken by the war, moreso than in the Stormlands. Winter was bitterer up there, and all around him Tyrion saw hunger and frozen waste. When Aegon's men rode through the towns, the people peered fearfully at them through the cracks in boarded windows. The bolder ones came out to stare, and the desperate ones asked for handouts. Aegon tried to please them by tossing them silver stags when they asked, and he had given two golden dragons to a heavily pregnant girl when she stumbled to the side of the road, weeping and begging for the 'Dragon King' to help her.

"It's terrible," Aegon said when they made camp one evening, his violet eyes seeming dull and faraway. "It's worse than I thought it would be. There are corpses in the street, and starvation all around."

"It's a war," Tyrion told him. "When it is over and spring comes, they will thrive again. And if the crown's debts are settled and the country prospers, they will be able to save food for the next winter so that this does not happen again."

Aegon looked at him wearily and nodded. "Yes. I must be a king, and a good one. For my people."

X

Acorn Hall was a tiny, dismal little castle, a dwarf in comparison to Storm's End. Riding through the nearby town, Tyrion saw many Essosi faces, some even donning tattoos. 'Freedmen?',he thought, before realising, 'No. Queen's men.'

The bulk of their two hundred men were left behind in the village with enough money to pay for rooms and food, though the inns were already quite cramped. Tyrion got to accompany the prince and his favourite counsellors and guards into the castle. He was pleased; the stories about the little queen had made him curious, and in spite of himself, Tyrion wondered if she had grown to look anything like her sister, his sweet Sansa.

The Lord and Lady Smallwood greeted them stiffly, and Tyrion realised they were afraid. They seemed especially stunned by him, though; Tyrion remembered again that he was not only presumed a murderer, but also presumed dead. He ignored the stares, and grinned his ugly grin at them.

Aegon was as charming as ever, flashing dazzling smiles and making jokes and compliments, but they did not warm to him. And they never will, until he sits the Iron Throne. Only then will it be safe to truly treat him like a king.

They had been treating Arya Stark quite royally, however; the best rooms had already been given to her, so Aegon was allowed the second-best, the chambers that once belonged to Lord Smallwood's uncle. When Aegon eagerly asked to see the queen, Lady Smallwood informed him that she was in the castle's tiny godswood, praying.

In the meanwhile, Tyrion wandered the castle, observing her men. He counted swaggering bravos and pale Lyseni, a huge, hulking Dothraki, and a few men that looked like Westerosi peasants. While perusing the castle's little library, Tyrion happened upon a young man whose cloak bore a familiar sigil.