Chapter 12: Whispers and Weapons
King's Landing was a city that festered under the guise of celebration. The Tourney of the Hand, decreed by King Robert to honor his friend, became the focal point for all the capital's simmering tensions. It was a grand spectacle of violence and vanity, a pageant where knights in shining armor jousted for glory while the real, bloodier games were played in the shadows of the court. For Eddard Stark, it was an obscene waste of gold the kingdom did not have. For the court, it was a magnificent distraction. For Thor, sitting in the stands beside a grim-faced Ned, it was the most pathetic display of martial prowess he had ever witnessed.
He watched as knights with names like "The Knight of Flowers" and "The Storm Lord" charged at each other with blunted lances, their goal not to kill, but to unseat. They were peacocks in plate armor, their skill undeniable but their purpose hollow. It was sport, not war. On Asgard, training was a brutal, often bloody affair designed to prepare a warrior for the visceral reality of combat. Here, it was a game for the amusement of lords and ladies, a pantomime of the violence that underpinned their entire society.
"They fight for glory," he rumbled to Ned, his voice low enough that only the Hand could hear over the roar of the crowd. "A warrior who fights for his own glory is a danger to everyone, including himself."
Ned nodded, his gaze fixed on the field where a knight had just been thrown from his horse with a sickening crunch. "It is the way of the south. They value appearances above all else."
Thor's gaze swept the royal box. He saw Queen Cersei, looking bored and beautiful, her attention fixed on her golden twin, Ser Jaime, who was preparing to joust. He saw King Robert, already roaring drunk, his face flushed, placing massive bets with a cackling Littlefinger. And he saw Sansa Stark, her eyes wide with a star-struck adoration for the handsome knights, completely captivated by the pageantry. She was living in a song, deaf to the grim music playing underneath.
His attention was drawn to a new contestant entering the lists. He was a man of unnatural size, even by the standards of this world, encased in heavy, ill-fitting steel plate. His helm was fashioned in the shape of a snarling dog's head. This was Ser Gregor Clegane, the Mountain That Rides, a man whose reputation for brutality was as vast as his stature.
The Mountain's first opponent was a young, eager knight from the Vale. The joust was short and brutal. Ser Gregor's lance struck the young knight square in the chest, the blunted tip splintering the wood of his shield and denting his breastplate. The knight was hurled from his saddle and lay unmoving on the field. It was a clean, if brutal, victory. But it was not enough for the Mountain.
As his horse trotted past his fallen opponent, Ser Gregor leaned down from his saddle and, with a vicious backhand swing of his mailed fist, struck the unconscious knight on the helmet. The sound of metal on metal was sickening, followed by a wet, cracking noise that made the crowd gasp. The young knight's head snapped to one side at an unnatural angle. Grand Maester Pycelle rushed onto the field, but it was a pointless gesture. The boy was dead.
A cold silence fell over the tourney grounds. King Robert, for once, was not laughing. But he did nothing. Ser Gregor was a Lannister bannerman, a fearsome weapon, and his brutality was, if not sanctioned, then tolerated. The Mountain simply wheeled his horse around and waited for his next opponent, his monstrous helm revealing nothing of the man within.
Thor felt a cold, familiar rage build in his chest. It was the rage he felt when he saw bullies and tyrants, those who used their strength to crush the weak for sport. He had seen this kind of casual cruelty on a thousand worlds. He looked at Ser Gregor, and he did not see a knight. He saw a monster, a rabid dog that needed to be put down.
He made to stand, a low growl rumbling in his throat, but Ned's hand on his arm stopped him. "No," the Hand commanded, his voice a firm, quiet order. "This is not your fight. This is not our way."
"Your way is to allow a man to be murdered for the amusement of a crowd?" Thor countered, his voice dangerously low.
"My way is to choose my battles," Ned replied, his face grim. "And that is a battle I cannot win. Not here. Not now."
Thor reluctantly settled back into his seat, but his eyes never left the Mountain. He watched him joust again, this time against Ser Loras Tyrell, the Knight of Flowers. Ser Loras, handsome and skilled, won by a trick, riding a mare in heat that distracted the Mountain's stallion. Enraged at being unseated by what he saw as trickery, Ser Gregor flew into a berserk fury. He drew his massive greatsword and, in a shocking breach of all tourney etiquette, stalked towards Ser Loras, intending to kill him. He cut the head from his own horse with a single, savage blow before advancing on the Knight of Flowers.
It was the Hound, Sandor Clegane, who intervened, drawing his own sword to protect the young knight from his brother's madness. The two brothers, the two Cleganes, locked in a brutal, screeching sword fight in the middle of the field, a dance of pure hatred that brought the crowd to its feet. It was only King Robert's bellowed command to "STOP THIS MADNESS IN THE NAME OF YOUR KING!" that brought the fight to an end.
Through it all, Thor watched, a silent, grim observer. He saw the brutal, unrestrained violence of the Mountain, the conflicted, bitter duty of the Hound, the panicked fear of the King, and the cold, calculating eyes of Tywin Lannister's bannermen. He saw a kingdom where savagery was barely contained by a thin veneer of ceremony, where brothers would kill each other over a point of pride. It was a lesson more valuable than any whispered secret.
The whispers, however, found him nonetheless. A few days later, a servant brought a message to the Tower of the Hand. A simple note, folded and sealed with no sigil. It read: The spider wishes to inspect a new thread in his web. The old dragon skull, the one with the cracked jaw, at the hour of the wolf.
Thor knew who it was from. The hour of the wolf was the deep of night. He went alone, leaving Stormbreaker in his chambers. He did not need it for a conversation. He found Varys standing in the cavernous throne room, his plump form silhouetted against the moonlight streaming through the high windows. The great dragon skulls that lined the walls seemed to watch them, their empty sockets filled with a palpable history of fire and death.
"Lord Thor," Varys purred, his voice echoing slightly in the vast, empty hall. "Thank you for coming. I find that the most interesting conversations are had when the world is asleep."
"I am not your lord, Spider," Thor said, his voice flat. He stopped a respectful distance away, his arms crossed.
"A pity," Varys sighed. "You have the bearing of a lord. Or a king." His gaze was sharp, probing. "You are a puzzle, you know. My little birds sing me songs of everything that happens in this city, in this kingdom. They sing of plots and passions, of betrayals and desires. But of you… they are silent. It is as if you fell from a silent sky. Tell me, what do you want?"
"I want to be left alone," Thor said. It was the truth.
"A noble aspiration. And an impossible one," Varys replied. "Men of your… significance… are never left alone. You are a piece on the great board now, whether you wish to be or not. And when powerful pieces appear, the other players become… anxious. They wish to know whose side you are on."
"I am on Lord Stark's side," Thor said simply.
"Ah, yes. The noble, honorable Lord Stark," Varys said, a hint of something that might have been pity in his voice. "A great, direwolf in a pit of vipers. Honor is a fine thing, but it is a poor shield in this city. He is investigating the death of his predecessor, Jon Arryn. A dangerous path. He is asking questions that others do not want answered."
Varys glided closer, his soft slippers making no sound on the stone floor. "He believes Lord Arryn was poisoned. He is not wrong. But he is looking for the wrong poison. Jon Arryn was a healthy man. But he and Lord Stannis, the King's other brother, had taken a sudden interest in genealogy. In bloodlines. They spent many hours with a book, a ponderous tome about the lineages of the great houses."
The Spider paused, letting his words hang in the air. "They also paid a visit to a certain armorer's shop in the Street of Steel. A smith who once apprenticed under the very man who forged the King's own war hammer."
This was it. The test. The offering of a secret to gauge his reaction. Thor remained impassive, but his mind was working. Bloodlines. An armorer's shop.
"Why are you telling me this?" Thor asked.
"Because chaos is a ladder," Varys said, quoting a phrase Thor did not understand. "No, that is not right. That is someone else's motto." He gave a soft, fluttery laugh. "I tell you this because I serve the realm. And a man like you, a power that sits outside the game, can either be a force for stability or for utter devastation. I would prefer the former. Lord Stark's honor will get him killed. And I fear what will happen to this city, to this realm, if the Hand of the King is murdered, and his giant, thunder-wielding companion is… displeased."
The veiled threat, the admission of fear, was the most honest thing Varys had said. He was afraid of Thor's reaction if Ned were to fall. He was trying to arm him, to guide his potential wrath.
"Tell your Hand to look for the life that Robert has created, not the death that Jon Arryn found," Varys whispered. "The seeds are strong." He then bowed his head. "The hour grows late. I have taken enough of your time." And with that, the Master of Whisperers melted back into the shadows, leaving Thor alone with the dragon skulls and a new, dangerous piece of the puzzle.
He relayed the conversation to Ned the next day. The Hand listened intently, his face growing grimmer with every word. "The seeds are strong," Ned repeated, his mind clearly working. "Gendry. The armorer's apprentice. He has the look of Robert. The black hair, the blue eyes."
Driven by Varys's cryptic clue, Ned decided he had to see the boy again. But he knew he was being watched. He asked Thor to accompany him, not as a guard, but as a deterrent. They left the Red Keep on foot, dressed in simple, unassuming clothes, two vastly different men on a secret errand. Thor, even in a plain woolen cloak, was anything but inconspicuous, but his presence had a chilling effect. People melted away from them, their eyes downcast. No one, not even Varys's little birds, would dare get too close.
They found the armorer's shop, the air thick with the smell of coal smoke and hot metal. Inside, a broad-shouldered, black-haired youth was hammering a piece of steel into a breastplate. It was Gendry. When he looked up, his eyes a startling, defiant blue, the resemblance to a young Robert Baratheon was undeniable. Ned spoke with him briefly, his questions gentle, his manner kind. Thor said nothing. He simply stood by the door, a silent observer. He looked at the boy, at his strong hands, his proud bearing. He saw a bastard, yes, but he also saw a king's son, his royal bloodline clear for anyone who cared to look.
On Asgard, succession was a simple, brutal affair. The firstborn son inherited, unless he was proven unworthy. There were no bastards, no hidden bloodlines to complicate matters. Here, it was a tangled web of secrets and lies, a truth that could get a man killed. As they left the forge, Thor finally spoke.
"The boy is his," he said. It was not a question.
"Aye," Ned said, his voice heavy. "And Jon Arryn knew it. And for that, he died."
"You are holding a burning coal, Lord Stark," Thor said, his voice a low rumble. "And the Queen's eyes are on you."
"It is the truth," Ned said, his northern honor a stubborn, unyielding thing. "And the truth must be spoken."
"Truth is not a sword," Thor countered. "It is a seed. It needs the right ground to grow. Plant it in poisoned soil, and it will bear only poisoned fruit."
His words, a strange echo of Varys's own, seemed to give Ned pause. They walked back to the Red Keep in silence, the weight of their new knowledge a heavy burden.
That evening, Thor sought out a different kind of quiet. He found Arya in the small garden, stabbing furiously at a practice dummy with Needle. She was crying, silent tears of rage and frustration tracking paths through the grime on her face. Her dancing master, Syrio Forel, had been dismissed, her lessons with him deemed unladucible. She was trapped again, her only escape, her swordplay, taken from her.
Thor watched her for a moment, then walked over to the practice dummy. "You are angry," he said. "Good. Anger is a fire. Use it. But do not let it consume you. An uncontrolled fire burns the house down."
He took a practice sword from the rack. "Your water dancer taught you how to be swift. I will teach you how to be still. How to wait. The deadliest predator is not the one that roars the loudest, but the one that waits for the perfect moment to strike."
He began to train with her again, not the brutal lessons of Winterfell, but something new. He taught her patience, observation. He taught her how to use her opponent's strength against them, how to find the fulcrum point in any attack. He taught her the discipline of the warrior's mind.
As they practiced, their blades a soft whisper of wood on wood, Thor felt a sense of purpose he had not felt in a long time. He was a weapon, yes, but a weapon could also be a shield. He was a prisoner, yes, but even in a cage, a warrior can prepare for war. He looked at Arya, at her fierce, determined face, and he saw a kindred spirit. A fellow survivor.
The whispers in King's Landing were a poison, the weapons were all hidden, and the game was deadly. But Thor was beginning to learn the rules. And he knew, with a certainty that was as cold and hard as Uru, that before the game was over, the vipers in this pit would learn to fear the thunder.