Solomon's words fell.
The inner keep went absolutely silent.
The air seemed to congeal. Even the torches seemed to slow their flickering.
Brynden Tully spun toward Roger Lege, his voice dropping low and hard.
"No!!"
"Neither of you is to die!!"
"Each of you may appoint a champion to fight in your stead — that is the recognized noble tradition!! It is consistent with the laws of the Seven Kingdoms!!"
He tried, futilely, to salvage the situation.
Roger Lege let out a sound like a wounded animal, his blood-red eyes locked onto Solomon.
"He has already accepted!!!"
"Just him and me!! Until death parts us!!!"
Brin turned to Solomon, his voice dropping almost to a plea.
"You are a lord. You shouldn't be risking yourself personally, My Lord."
"Let me go in your place!!"
Lushen stood to one side and said nothing. He simply showed his teeth in a wide grin. He had seen Lord Solomon's swordsmanship with his own eyes.
Olivier's face was a picture of pure anxiety. He nearly seized Solomon's arm.
"My Lord, there is absolutely no need for this — why take such a risk?!"
Solomon looked at him, his expression calm and unhurried.
"Haven't you always wanted me to behave like a proper noble?"
He posed the question lightly.
"Can a lord of the Seven Kingdoms refuse a trial by combat once it has been demanded?"
Olivier's face settled into a bitter smile.
"I simply don't want you to come to any harm, My Lord."
Solomon only smiled and said nothing further.
Who exactly do they think they're worried about?
He thought of the days of sparring with Bronn during the campaigns — starting from an even match, until by the time Bronn departed, Solomon had quietly begun to hold the upper hand. His command of his own body far exceeded the ordinary. His swordwork had reached a level that could only be called fluid to the point of supernatural. A man who could test Bronn could be counted among the finest blades in the Seven Kingdoms.
And the man before him — this fat lord, whose son was dead, whose spirit was dead, who was nothing more than a husk held upright by rage alone, a body already running on empty.
On the other side of the room, the Blackfish and Robin Lege had drawn together and were speaking in rapid, urgent undertones, trying to find some way to reverse what was happening. In their judgment, Solomon bore no resemblance to a warrior. They were certain he would lose.
Robin Lege felt something complicated move through him. He served Riverrun, and would serve Riverrun for the rest of his life. If forced to choose between his family and House Tully, he would choose House Tully. And the young man before him had given him very little to condemn.
Robin leaned close to the Blackfish and murmured, "He's too young. He's never even had a formal squire's training."
"Roger is old, but he went from page to squire to knight by the sword. We cannot let this trial happen."
Brynden nodded, his eye moving over Solomon's lean frame. Not powerfully built. Not especially tall. Never served as a squire. By any standard of measurement, not a fighter.
Then one of the Riverrun knights seemed to remember something. He stepped close and whispered into Brynden and Robin's ears.
"My Lord Blackfish — when I was at Seagard, I heard from soldiers of Deddings that..."
Both Brynden and Robin's eyes went wide. They turned to look at Solomon again, trying to reassess what they were seeing.
Solomon drew his sword, looked around at the soldiers encircling him, and gave his orders with complete composure.
"Prepare the finest armour and weapons available for Lord Roger Lege."
"Let him rest through the night. See that he has a proper meal."
Both Brynden and Robin Lege went silent.
Such grace.
The soldiers throughout the inner keep had broken into murmurs of their own.
"Is My Lord truly going to fight himself?"
"It's too dangerous!"
"He doesn't look like a fighter no matter how you look at him."
"No one has ever seen My Lord practice with a sword."
"Can My Lord even move in full armour?"
The veterans — the men who had followed Solomon from the very first battle and marched all the way here — simply cleaned their weapons in quiet, put them away, and wore expressions of private amusement.
They said nothing. Let My Lord give these newcomers a little of what My Lord is.
The morning mist had not yet lifted. The training yard of Willowbrook was already packed to its edges.
Brynden Tully stood at the center of the yard, serving as the reluctant herald of the trial, though he had learned from the Riverrun knight what Solomon had done to a certain knight at Deddings. Even so — the young man looked nothing like a powerful swordsman.
His face was grave. His voice carried through the cold air, and beneath it ran a current of suppressed frustration. Both parties had refused his mediation. Both had declared that blood must be drawn.
"In the name of the Seven — the trial begins."
"Only swords may be used. Each man bears responsibility for his own life and death. No one may intervene."
Roger Lege walked slowly into the yard. He wore a suit of full plate armour, polished to a cold gleam, every step accompanied by the deep groan and grind of heavy metal. In his hands he held his family's longsword, the weeping willow crest worked into the guard. His eyes burned with the fire of a man who had nothing left to lose except the act of vengeance itself.
A moment later, Solomon walked into the yard.
He wore only a light black leather jerkin. At his hip hung the narrow Myrish blade.
No shield. Not even a helm.
Nothing but the sword and the smile.
The entire yard stared.
No one had ever seen anyone enter a trial by combat in light leather. It was indistinguishable from suicide.
Brin, Olivier, and every soldier who cared for him swallowed hard, their stomachs in knots. Only Lushen stood with his chest out and his chin up, wearing an expression of uncomplicated pride. And the veterans — the old hands — wore the same quiet smile Solomon wore.
The Blackfish's hand swept down.
The trial began.
Roger Lege launched himself from the far end of the yard instantly. The fury driving him made his heavy armour no obstacle to his explosive start. He charged like an enraged bull, longsword howling through the air as he brought it crashing down toward Solomon's head.
Solomon did not meet the blow.
His footwork shifted — light, fast, minimal. His body tilted a fraction. The longsword missed by a hair, catching the very edge of his coat, and buried itself in the dirt, throwing up a spray of dust.
Roger wrenched his blade free and reversed it in the same motion, sweeping horizontally.
Solomon stepped back. The sword tip passed in front of him, exactly far enough. No wasted movement. Nothing extra. Nothing at all that didn't need to be there.
The Blackfish's eyes went wide. Robin Lege's jaw tightened in shock.
The moments passed one by one. The only sounds in the yard were Roger's breathing — growing heavier and more ragged with each exchange — and the shriek of steel through empty air.
Solomon moved among the swinging blade like a cat playing with a snake. He held the distance between them at a precise and somehow infuriating constant — always just out of reach, never retreating too far, never coming close enough to be touched.
As he watched Roger's exhaustion mount, his voice came through pleasantly, warm with amusement.
"Is your sword perhaps a little slow, My Lord Roger?"
"I suspect the armour may be rather heavy, My Lord."
"Shall we pause for a rest? We can start fresh."
The words were a whip across Roger Lege's nerves. In his ears, Solomon's tone was mockery, was contempt, was everything he had left to hate.
He roared, "SHUT YOUR MOUTH!!!"
His attacks became wilder. More frenzied. Less and less any recognizable fighting pattern. Chop after chop, hack after hack, every blow falling on empty air, every miss bleeding off a little more of his dwindling strength. Beneath the armour, his body was drenched. His breathing had become a bellows with a hole in it.
Solomon's soldiers, who had watched the opening moments in tight-throated anxiety, had long since let the tension out of their shoulders. They had read what was happening. Their lord was playing with Roger Lege.
Solomon moved like an elegant dancer performing a lethal dance along the very edge of death — feline, economical, unhurried. Roger Lege was the mouse. He simply hadn't worked it out yet.
Voices calling Solomon's name began to rise here and there, then ran together into a wave.
"Long live Lord Solomon!!"
"Long live Lord Solomon!!"
Roger's movements slowed further and further. The armour that had gleamed so impressively was now the heaviest thing in the world. The shapes before his eyes began to blur. The rage had burned through everything else, and what was left underneath was exhaustion, and beneath the exhaustion, despair.
He knew. He would not have his revenge. This trial was over.
At last, after one more lunging chop that found nothing, Roger Lege's foot slid on the churned dirt. What was left of his strength gave out at once. He sank to both knees, chest heaving in great, desperate gulps of air, a broken bellows.
The yard went completely still.
Every eye moved from Roger collapsed on the ground to Solomon, without a scratch.
The Blackfish was silent. Robin let out a long breath. The two dozen Riverrun knights looked at one another in stunned disbelief. Whatever kind of trial this had been — it was over. And Solomon had not struck a single blow throughout, which in their reading meant one thing: he did not intend to kill Roger Lege.
In their minds, what would come next was clear.
He would extend a hand. Announce the trial concluded. Pardon his defeated enemy and give him the dignified ending the whole war had been pointing toward — the way he had deferred to Riverrun, respected the nobility, and offered Roger the chance to negotiate with honor at every single turn.
Solomon walked slowly toward Roger Lege.
He looked down at the man struggling to breathe inside his armour. Those eyes staring back up at him were filled with an implacable, bone-deep hatred.
Solomon's gaze swept the yard without hurry. Across Brynden Tully. Across Robin Lege. Across the Riverrun knights. Across his own soldiers.
Every breath in the yard went quiet.
They waited for Solomon's next move.
Solomon stepped back once. Without a moment's hesitation, the sword found the gap between neck-guard and gorget and passed clean through.
A spray of blood misted through the seams of the helmet.
Absolute silence.
Solomon drew the sword without expression.
One stroke.
The head fell.