Jaime strode to the Frey gallows, dismissed the guards with a sharp word, and effectively stripped Ryman Frey of his authority. He personally cut down the shivering, ragged figure of Edmure Tully, Lord of Riverrun, and led him from the camp.
As they rowed south across the Tumblestone, the silence broken only by the rhythmic dip of oars, Edmure finally seized Jaime's arm. "Why?"
Jaime looked at the dark water. "Consider it a wedding gift."
Edmure's eyes narrowed with suspicion. "A... wedding gift?"
"I hear your bride is a beauty," Jaime said dryly. "How else could you have been so lost in her sheets that you didn't notice your sister and your King being butchered in the next room?"
Edmure licked his cracked lips. "I didn't know. There was music... a fiddle outside the door. Roslin... she was in the room."
"She is a Frey," Jaime noted. "The blood was in the hall, not her heart. She's carrying your child, I hear."
And that child is your death warrant, Jaime thought.
Back at the tent, Jaime dismissed Strongboar and Ser Ilyn, keeping only the singer.
"You'll perform shortly," he told the musician. He turned to his squires. "Lew, warm water for our guest. Pia, find clean clothes—nothing with a lion on it. Peck, wine for Lord Tully. Are you hungry, My Lord?"
Edmure nodded, his gaze darting. While Tully bathed, Jaime sat on a stool, watching the steam rise gray with the filth of the gallows.
"After you've eaten, I'm sending you back into Riverrun," Jaime said. "The choice of what happens next will be yours alone."
"What choice?"
"Your uncle is an old man," Jaime said. "Gallant, yes, but his time has passed. He has no bride to mourn, no babe to protect. The Blackfish wants a hero's death. But you, Edmure—you have years left. You are the Head of House Tully, not him. He must obey you. The fate of Riverrun sits in your hands."
"Yield the castle," Jaime continued, "and I promise no blood will be shed. Your people can stay and serve Lord Emmon or leave with their lives. Brynden and any who wish can take the black. You will be a captive at Casterly Rock, but you will live as a Lord. I will bring your wife to you. If the child is a boy, he will be fostered by the Lannisters—a page, a squire, then a knight with his own lands. If a girl, I will find her a dowry and a highborn husband. All for the price of a key."
Edmure lifted an arm from the tub, watching the water drip from his fingers. "And if I do not yield?"
Pia stood at the entrance with a stack of linens. The squires and the singer listened. Jaime didn't care. Let the world hear.
"You've seen my host," Jaime said, his voice dropping into a cold, lethal register. "You've seen the towers, the rams, and the catapults. I will fill your moat with the bodies of the Riverlords first—your own vassals, the men who bled for you at the Whispering Wood. Then I'll send the Freys; they're eager to finish what they started at the Twins. When your arrows are spent, my Westermen will go over the walls. I will put every man, woman, and child to the sword. I'll burn your Sept, chop down your Godswood, and divert the Tumblestone to wash away the ruins. No one will remember a Tully ever stood here."
Jaime stood up. "Your wife may give birth before the walls fall. If you want your child, Edmure... I'll give him to you. Via catapult."
A long silence followed. "I should kill you, Kingslayer," Edmure rasped.
"You could try. But first, eat. Singer, play for our guest. You know the one... about the rain?"
The musician struck the strings. The haunting chords of The Rains of Castamere filled the tent, a cold reminder of Lannister "justice."
The next morning, Edmure was admitted into Riverrun. He spent one night within his walls. When he emerged the following day, the gates were open, and the trout banners were lowered.
Lord Emmon Frey was shaking with fury. "We were cheated!" he shrieked, pointing at Edmure. "The boy lied! I want his head! I am the Lord of Riverrun by the King's decree!"
"Emmon," his wife, Genna, snapped. "The Commander knows the decree. Edmure knows it. Even the stableboys know it. Be silent."
"I am a Lord! I want his head!"
Edmure stood tall, looking more the Lord than Emmon ever would. He wore a padded crimson tunic with the leaping trout. "I did as you asked," he said calmly.
Jaime, who hadn't slept since the gates opened, felt a throbbing ache in his temples. "I didn't ask you to let the Blackfish go."
"You asked me to yield the castle. You didn't ask for my uncle. If your guards were too lazy to watch the water, that is not my failing."
"Where is he?" Jaime demanded. The castle had been searched three times.
"He didn't tell me."
"And you didn't ask? How did he go?"
Edmure offered a small, triumphant smile. "Fish swim. The Blackfish swims faster than most."
Jaime leaned in, his eyes cold. "There are oubliettes beneath Casterly Rock, Edmure. Cells so narrow a man cannot turn or sit. Cells where the rats eat your toes and you cannot reach down to stop them. Do you wish to reconsider your answer?"
The smile vanished. "You promised me the treatment of a Lord."
"And I keep my word," Jaime said. "Dukes and Earls have died in those holes. If you like, I can put your wife in the cell next to yours. I would hate to separate a happy couple."
"He swam," Edmure confessed, his voice hollow. "We raised the water gate just three feet—enough for a man to slip under but too low to be seen from the bank. He went through the spikes after dark and slipped past your dams. It was a moonless night, and your sentries were sleeping."
Jaime stood by the window, looking at the bright autumn sun on the river. The Blackfish was gone.
"He must be caught," Emmon Frey insisted.
"He won't be caught," Jaime said, knowing it was true. He had sent Ser Addam and Ser Dermot to search the banks, but he hadn't let the local lords join. They would only help the old man escape.
"He'll stay hidden for a time," Jaime muttered. "But he's a soldier. He'll find a way to strike back."
"This is your home now," Lady Genna told her husband. "Defend it. If you can't, burn it and run back to the Rock."
Emmon wiped his mouth, his fingers stained red from sourleaf. "It is mine. No one takes it."
When the others left, Jaime remained with Edmure. "Any final words?"
"This was my father's study," Edmure said proudly. "He ruled the Trident from this chair. Littlefinger and I used to build castles of wood on this floor. Kingslayer, you cannot imagine the contempt I feel seeing you in this room."
"Better men than you have despised me, Edmure," Jaime said. "Guards! Take the Lord to the tower. Feed him."
In the days that followed, the Riverlords departed. Ser Forley Prester led the escort for Edmure and Jeyne Westerling toward the West. Ser Lyle Crakehall—Strongboar—left to hunt outlaws near Darry.
"I want the Lightning Lord's head," Strongboar barked.
"Bring Beric Dondarrion back alive," Jaime commanded. "I want to execute him in the capital. The realm needs to see him die once and for all."
As the Tully garrison was disarmed and sent away, Jaime watched them go. He allowed them no armor or steel, only three days' food and a vow never to rise against House Frey.
"One in ten will keep that vow," Genna noted.
"Then nine are easier to kill than ten," Jaime replied. "I'd rather die in the field than in my bed." Or on a privy, he thought.
A few days later, Lord Emmon gathered the castle servants for a three-hour speech on his own greatness. Standing in the doorway, out of the rain, was the singer Jaime had taken from Ser Ryman's camp.
"The Lord should have been a bard," the singer noted. "He doesn't breathe between sentences."
Jaime laughed. "Emmon doesn't need air as long as he has sourleaf. You want to write a song for him?"
"A comedy, perhaps. The Lessons of the Trout."
"Don't sing it near my aunt," Jaime warned. He looked at the man properly for the first time. Small, sharp-nosed, with thinning brown hair. "You were with Ryman only a fortnight?"
"Aye. I thought Riverrun would be a good place to spend the winter. White-Smile Wat left with Ser Forley, so I thought I'd take his spot. I don't have his high notes, but I know twice as many bawdy tunes."
"You'll be a favorite of my aunt's," Jaime said. "What is your name?"
"Tom of Sevenstreams, My Lord," the singer said, tipping his cap. "Though the smallfolk call me Tom Seven-Gods."
"Good luck to you, Tom."
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