"Lord Tywin Lannister, do you even understand what you are doing?!"
Inside the cage, Edmure raised his voice for the first time since his capture, hurling his accusation at the lord of Casterly Rock.
But with his gaunt, wolfish face, his body weakened by hunger and thirst, his righteous outrage carried not the slightest weight.
Tywin sat his warhorse in deep crimson armor, golden lions etched bright upon the steel.
A great cloak woven with golden thread billowed from his shoulders, magnifying his already imposing presence.
He wore no helm, yet as he rode through the host, an aura of icy command seemed always to coil around him, making those nearby shrink back in unbidden fear.
Hearing Edmure's cry, Tywin steered his horse closer, having deliberately made time to see him.
He gazed coolly at the prisoner glaring at him from the cage and spoke in an indifferent tone: "To tell the truth, I don't really understand your way of thinking. But if I were the one in that cage, I would never be foolish enough to ask such a question."
Tywin Lannister despised laughter, and he never laughed.
Even when he insulted others, his tone remained calm, as if he were speaking of something ordinary.
Yet the calmer Tywin sounded, the more enraged Edmure became inside the cage.
He shoved aside one of the lords crammed in with him and pressed himself against the iron bars, bloodshot eyes glaring at the bald man before him.
"You murdered Lord Vance! You slaughtered the armies of the Riverlands!" Edmure shouted in fury.
"If a fresh loaf of bread were placed before your mouth, would you resist taking a bite?" Tywin replied, his tone unchanged, answering accusation with a question.
The shamelessness of Tywin's words only made Edmure's anger burn hotter.
"You are a criminal!"
"The gods will not forgive you!" he roared, his curses rasping his throat, as if he could wound Tywin's spirit with words alone.
But Tywin's patience was wearing thin.
He found Edmure Tully to be truly foolish.
It was not worth wasting more time.
"Ser Edmure Tully, I have no need to debate with you about morality or so-called honor," Tywin said coldly.
"Those things vanished long ago—ever since Robert raised his banners in the Rebellion. They exist now only as hollow illusions, flowery phrases to fill the pages of books."
"So I did not come here to hear your stories. Do you understand?"
Tywin's gaze remained fixed on the man in the cage, his face utterly unchanging, as though those words had not even come from his lips.
Edmure's frail body could no longer support the strain of railing against such shamelessness.
Turning away in defeat, he slumped against the bars, no longer willing to look at Tywin.
"Then why are you here?" His voice dropped, heavy with grief. "Perhaps you mean to kill me? Or maybe you've come to humiliate me?"
"I've come to strike a bargain," Tywin said at last, his voice calm now that Edmure's barbs had fallen away.
"A bargain? What, does the Duke of Casterly Rock plan to ransom me for three hundred gold dragons? Hah." Edmure gave a bitter, mocking laugh. "Or perhaps you'll bleed my father for every coin you can wring from him?"
Tywin merely shook his head, unbothered by the scorn.
"What I mean by a bargain has to do with your ransom—but it has nothing to do with gold dragons."
"After all, the lands of the Lannisters are full of the stuff. To me, it's no different from horse dung."
"So in your eyes, I'm no better than dung?" Edmure gave a bitter laugh at his own expense.
Tywin said nothing.
He simply kept staring.
That look of contempt made Edmure's teeth grind with rage, yet he was powerless against it.
"The armies of the North are already marching south!"
"The King has summoned the lords of the Seven Kingdoms under the banner of defending the realm, to bring war against your Westerlands!"
"Honored Lord Tywin, I don't understand why you persist in resisting under such circumstances!"
Edmure twisted around with all his strength, his bloodshot eyes locking on Tywin Lannister, as if his words might pierce through the old lion's armor of composure.
"We both know what has happened! Why don't you beg for mercy? Plead guilty before King Robert—perhaps in his boundless mercy, he might even grant you the black cloak!"
At that, Tywin's eyes flickered at last, and a hint of mockery touched his face.
"Beg for mercy?"
"Robert would sooner smash every Lannister skull he can get his hands on!"
"Well then, I have no time to waste on you. Boy, you know nothing—you're nothing but a breathing fool!"
Tywin's patience snapped.
He urged his horse closer, lifted a finger, and pointed at Edmure and the hollow-eyed Riverlords packed into the cage.
"The bargain I offer is this: you will tell your father that I mean to trade your life—and theirs—for Riverrun."
At Tywin's words, Edmure froze for an instant. Then his lips twisted into a mocking smile.
"Who was it just now calling me a fool?"
With that, he coughed and spat a wad of phlegm through the bars, straight at Tywin.
"Tywin, you will never have what you want!"
"As soon as Lord Eddard Stark brings the host of the North south, the Reach, the Vale, and the King's own brothers will march with their armies to crush you!"
"You'll never get the chance to don the black. Because, as you said yourself, Robert will smash your skull with his hammer!"
"And the more you do now, the angrier Robert will become!"
"The Lannisters may be ambitious, but what of it?"
"In the end, it's nothing but a fool's dream!"
...
The road through the Neck was simply too difficult to travel. Since the Northern host had entered the swamps of the Neck, their initial burst of speed and momentum had inevitably slowed to a crawl.
The causeway here was narrow, flanked on all sides by endless black mire, and the air was damp and clinging.
At night, because the causeway was too narrow, even pitching camp was impossible; the soldiers could only wrap themselves in their cold-weather gear and rest where they stood upon the King's Road.
Fortunately, for this Northern army, the temperature here was tolerable. Hypothermia and freezing were no concern for men of the North.
Even so, invisible quicksands everywhere, venomous snakes lurking in the swampy forests, and brightly colored poisonous flowers and fruits—all these caused steady non-combat losses in their ranks.
Lord Eddard Stark could only feel worry, burning with anxiety.
Yet before the majesty of nature itself he was as helpless as a suckling child, at a loss, praying each day only to be free of this cursed place.
When they neared the far side of the Neck, not far from Greywater Watch, Lord Howland Reed of House Reed joined the Lord of Winterfell's host, bringing with him his two children, Meera Reed and Jojen Reed.
At the start of the liege-lord's summons, Howland Reed had already written to Eddard Stark, declaring that if the Lannisters marched along the causeway through the Neck, the crannogmen would see them pay blood for blood.
Even so, even with the help of the crannogmen, it took Lord Stark a full twenty days to cross that region.
Bound by honor and morality, the Lord of Winterfell, in the latter half of those days, found himself cursing daily like the King himself.
At least only the King could hear his complaints.
Once the host emerged from the Neck, both Eddard Stark and King Robert felt the world open wide. Their marching columns quickened, surging ahead at far greater speed.
But the easier road did not last. In less than two days, the army left the King's Road, galloping hard toward the direction of Riverrun.
For with the reports received after leaving the Neck, the Lannisters' movements had proven exactly as Eddard Stark had foreseen.
What he had not expected was how swiftly the situation had decayed.
All the lords and hosts of the Riverlands, before the might of the Lannister army, were as helpless as stumbling fawns before ravenous leopards.
They collapsed without the slightest resistance.
Even their liege lord's stronghold, Riverrun itself, had already been surrounded on three sides by the Westerlands host, exploiting the terrain, leaving only the castle's walls to hold in defense while waiting for rescue.
"Hoster Tully is nothing but a fool!"
"He couldn't even guard his own men, and even sent thousands straight into their hands!"
Looking at Riverrun looming just ahead, King Robert, heedless of the exhaustion from the forced march, still cursed endlessly from atop his black warhorse at House Tully's failure.
He simply could not fathom how Hoster Tully could bungle so simple a task. He had not even demanded that House Tully resist the Westerlands host.
The only order given had been to keep watch over the passes, and not let the Lannister host gain favorable ground once outside the Westerlands, where the situation would be far harder to control.
Who would have thought, before they even arrived—
Oh, for fuck's sake!
House Tully couldn't even keep watch, and now their own castle was besieged.
How could that not make hot-tempered Robert furious?
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