Chapter Text
When Jaime Lannister had gone to kill the last pyromancers, corpses had been strewn through King's Landing's streets. Lannister soldiers, loyalists, northmen, and bystanders alike had festered in spring's wet heat, feeding insects and crows. They hadn't been disposed of properly, and even days later, the stink of death burned Jaime's throat with every inhale.
If the crowd gathered within the throne room noticed the smell, they showed it not. Men and women fidgeted and whispered, several craning their necks as if seeking a better view. Like they attended a bloody joust. Jaime longed to draw his sword and threaten them to stillness. Surely they’d grow properly solemn with an angry Kingslayer in their midst.
Lord Stark at least seemed disapproving, standing to Robert’s left with grim features, his eyes hard as flint. The observation made Jaime hate him less. He hadn’t seen anyone give a damn about right or wrong since poor Chelsted. Thinking of the former Hand worsened the throbbing in his skull, and Jaime dug his nails into his palms.
From Stark's side, Jon Arryn listened to Lord Tywin's platitudes with sharp interest, while Robert himself fidgeted on his throne, eyes scanning the room in a desultory manner. He'd fought the war for his Lyanna and plainly cared naught for the rest of it. Nothing could've been further from solemn Rhaegar, who'd sworn to return and make changes, but Jaime had no right to regret that Rhaegar hadn’t kept his word. He’d failed the prince in far worse a way.
Most aggravating of the lot, Lord Tywin stood before the dais, so arrogant Jaime would’ve thought it’d been he who’d won the throne. Sunlight danced off his hair and his thick golden cloak, but his eyes remained shadowed. As if standing in a dream, Jaime could not focus on his father’s features, nor his voice. I do not know him. The two years they’d been apart contributed to the feeling, but it'd been the day they were reunited that'd made a true stranger of him.
“My assistance in the Sack should be sufficient,” Lord Tywin said, the words coming to Jaime as if from a distance, “but I’ve deigned to offer further proof of my commitment.”
“Go on,” Robert said.
His father gestured to the far end of the room. Two Lannister guards stepped forward. They held wrapped bundles, cradled like living children. Jaime had resolved to go away inside for this part, but that first glimpse arrested him. Rhaenys Targaryen’s bare feet hung over the nearest man’s arms, splatters of blood along her calves and shins. He couldn’t see Aegon until the men placed the bodies at the base of the throne. Then the crimson fabric fell aside to make visible a mess of flesh and bone and brain.
Jaime’s stomach heaved, and his limbs grew so heavy it was all he could do to remain standing. He tried to hide within thoughts of Cersei, but his attention caught on Stark instead. The northman stepped toward the bodies, as if compelled to go to them. He refrained from doing so and retreated to the king’s side, where he whispered fiercely to Robert.
“Is there a problem, Lord Stark?" Tywin said.
It was Robert who answered. “None at all.”
Stark flinched. “No problem? Look at them."
Stark directed the words at Robert, but Jaime refocused on the children. Tiny bodies wrapped in red. Jaime wore a tunic of the same shade. While his fate remained uncertain, his father thought it pretentious of him to wear white, so he’d chosen crimson instead. He wanted to rip the fabric from his shoulders. Anything to distance himself from what his father had done. But it was war. I should’ve known they’d be in danger. It wasn’t for my father to be merciful. It was for me to protect them.
Robert laughed. “Look at them? I have. What’s there to shout about?”
“They’re children.”
“I see only dragonspawn.”
Jaime heard echoes of the patter of Rhaenys’s feet, Aegon’s infant giggling. “Ser,” he said once when he saw Jaime, jabbing a chubby finger toward him, as if he’d identified Jaime by name. “Ser.” Elia laughed and said that was right, Jaime was indeed 'Ser.' The infant was so pleased he’d squealed in self-congratulations.
Robert is no better than Aerys. The thought clawed its way forth and spread through Jaime’s body like ice. Could nothing go as it should? He’d saved a city. Half a million people. Did fate not owe him some small mercy? Pressure built behind his eyes.
Robert was not finished. “You’d have me punish the Lannisters for giving us an easy victory? Sentence the boy for killing the Mad King? Raise a fuss about these ‘children?’ Is that what you’d like, Ned?”
Arryn stepped forward. “This isn't the place.”
“There is no place,” Stark said. “I cannot reason with a man who rewards betrayal and smiles at the murder of children. It is best I leave King’s Landing.”
“Lord Tywin broke no oaths you and I didn’t ourselves. It was war.”
A beat of silence.
Stark turned and looked pointedly at Jaime.
Jaime was so fixated on the events playing out in front of him, he didn’t immediately realize he‘d been drawn into them. He stared stupidly, as if he still watched something happening to someone else.
“Right,” Robert said. “The Kingslayer.”
A beat late, Jaime grasped he’d become the focus of this farce. Everyone in the room stared at him. Ignore it, he ordered himself. They’d be dead but for me. Their judgment means nothing.
He smiled to prove it to them, to himself. The urge to weep threatened to become overpowering, and he swallowed hard. He hadn’t cried in years. He couldn’t here, not now. Not with all these eyes on him. He’d sooner die.
Robert looked Jaime over for a long time, while Jaime’s breath roared in his ears. Finally, the king said, “Maybe you’ve a point with this one. It wouldn’t do to set a precedent, letting a Kingsguard get away with killing the king. Fine. I’ll indulge your honor.”
Lord Tywin spluttered. “Your grace—”
“He’ll take the black," Robert announced.
Jaime’s smile curdled.
Lord Tywin launched into frantic speech, genuine fear lacing his voice. His words came to Jaime as meaningless noise. Robert spoke over him. “You’ve another heir. If you’re not satisfied with that one, make more. The Kingslayer will go to the Wall. I need loyal men around me, and this one’s certainly not that.”
Tywin stood so still it seemed movement would break him. The fury writ across his face made even Robert’s smirk fade, but no one spoke. Visibly, Tywin fought with himself. He said, “I have an entire army at my grasp. I could—”
“No." The word was past Jaime‘s lips before he considered what it meant. But everyone heard, and he had no choice but to see the thing through. Jaime took a timid step. You are a knight, he reminded himself. His next step was bigger. As if seized by a spell, the rest of the room froze.
Jaime stopped on the steps before the throne, trembling as he knelt next to the corpses of the children he’d failed to protect. Rhaenys’s dead sunken eyes gaped up at him. Aegon didn’t have eyes. He didn’t have a face, nor much of a head. Probably it’d been mush on Gregor Clegane’s hands, smearing on Elia’s skin when he took her.
He fought the urge to vomit. Pretend it’s a mummer’s farce, he ordered himself with dark amusement. A mummer’s farce, and his was the part of a gallant knight.
“There’s no need for your army,” Jaime told his father. “I accept my punishment. I’ll take the black.”
Robert preened as if this had worked out because of some genius of his, while Stark’s eyes shone with such shock Jaime wished to rip them from their sockets. This is your fault. If he hadn’t judged. If he’d not pushed Robert. If, if, if. But it was over. Jaime saw that in the easing of his father’s deathly stillness, his cool fury replaced with subtler anger, no doubt directed at Jaime.
As if they’d be in this predicament if he’d let the children be.
This close to the corpses of the prince and princess, the smell was too much to bear. The pain in Jaime’s head threatened to split his skull. Or not quite, he thought hysterically, the exaggeration too relevant with the pieces of Prince Aegon two feet away.
“Is this acceptable?” Jaime made himself say. His eyes found Stark’s, whose mouth had come open. He’d taken a step back and appeared as if he’d been smacked in the face with a wooden board. “Why, Lord Stark, what’s that look about?"
Stark shook his head a fraction. “Why would a man like you—”
Jaime's tenuous control frayed. His voice burst out as a snarl. “You know nothing of the man I am. Now get that look off your face, or I'll—" He was doing the right thing, the knightly thing. No need to let Stark muck this up too. Feeling foolish, face flushing, Jaime snapped his mouth shut.
“Silence, Kingslayer,” Robert said. “No need to fight. I accept your offer."
“This is preposterous,” Tywin cried, and Jaime swallowed the urge to yell at him too.
Robert, still injured from the Trident, had to shove himself off the throne with effort. When he did, he dwarfed those around him, towering even over Tywin. “I’ll hear no more from you. The boy has agreed. It is what it is. Get him out of here, and remove those as well." He jabbed a dismissive hand at the bodies. “They're upsetting Ned."
Jaime was led to a tower cell. It was to be guarded and locked from the outside. The slight to his honor grated, but was so low on his list of worries he spared it only a passing thought.
For hours, he lay atop the bed and debated whether to come clean about the wildfire. That might fix things. But he could not forget the look on Robert’s face when he took in those bodies. Like Aerys, watching men burn.
He also couldn’t forget how sad Stark appeared as guards came forth to lead Jaime away. The man had assumed Jaime solely self-serving, caught up in a bid for Lannister power. Now here Jaime was, throwing his life away to prevent a war his father might well win. That look on Stark’s face held the slightest hint of doubt. A trace of, maybe I was wrong. It tasted too sweet to throw away by saying, “I didn’t mean it,” and proving to Stark that Jaime wasn’t a proper knight after all.
He’d see this through if only because he hoped that trace of doubt in Stark’s eyes would grow into outright regret, which would linger long as Jaime wasted away at the Wall. He wanted this to be a mark on Stark’s precious honor, something he’d feel conflicted about for the rest of his life. Cersei would never accept that reasoning. Even Tyrion would not like it. Probably they'd be right to doubt. But the prospect of troubling Stark in that way was too sweet, and the notion of staying in King's Landing too sour, to make him reconsider.
He’d not slept properly for weeks, not since Rhaegar left and took the last of Jaime’s brothers with him. This night too, his troubles kept him awake, thoughts of his future a new horror to chase him from rest. When he did sleep, he dreamed of wildfire and woke sweat-soaked and trembling.
Lord Tywin visited the next morning. Upon his arrival, he stood before Jaime, frowning in silence for several long moments.
“You’re a fool,” Tywin said finally.
He felt less like a stranger here, just the two of them speaking, but Jaime could not chase from his head how cold his father seemed to him the day before. He likewise could not banish the sight of the children, who were dead by his father’s orders. Deference, patience were gone, only weariness left. He could not even summon irritation.
“Did you come to insult me?” Jaime said.
“I’ve come to make clear the consequences of your actions.” Tywin then launched into a tirade he’d clearly spent the previous night preparing. Family name, family honor, House Lannister... On, and on, and on. I am leaving forever, and this is what you give me?
Will you miss me, father? Are you proud of me for surviving Aerys? Do you love me, your son, or only regret you’ll lose an heir? He recalled his father once telling him one could not buy a horse with love, nor eat it, nor warm his halls. The memory made him wish to punch Lord Tywin, or strangle him until he begged. But he lacked the energy, so let his father’s words wash meaninglessly over him.
Eventually Lord Tywin crouched before Jaime and put a dry hand on his cheek. “This is no excuse for mediocrity. Even wasted at the Wall, you are a Lannister. Your future behavior reflects on the rest of us as much as your past actions. Do you understand?”
Jaime nodded mutely, though he was not sure he had the strength nor inclination to succeed in the Night’s Watch. I want only a quiet place alone with Cersei, away from the rest of the world.
Lord Tywin shook him. "I'd think Aerys took your tongue like Payne's. Speak, Jaime.”
“I’m tired.”
"Tired?" His father gripped his face so hard Jaime thought he might leave marks. “What are our house words?”
“Hear me roar,” Jaime said, his voice hoarse.
“Do not forget," Tywin warned, then strode from the room, leaving Jaime to stew in his misery alone.