Chapter 61: The Banquet
By the time the last of the day's jousting was done, the sun had dropped behind the city walls and painted the Blackwater Rush in bands of copper and red. Knights and lords rode back through the gates in loose procession, their horses tired and their spirits high or low depending on how the day had treated them, and the tourney grounds began the slow work of settling into evening.
Robert had ordered the banquet weeks ago. It was the kind of order Robert gave with obvious personal investment — a feast to mark the first day of his tourney, in his hall, with his wine and his noise. The Red Keep's kitchens had been at work since before dawn.
Torches lined the steps from the outer yard to the Great Hall, close enough together that the corridor between them was bright as midday. The hall itself was fully lit, every sconce and chandelier burning, the long tables arranged along the walls laden with enough food to make the effort of counting the dishes feel pointless. The crowned stag of House Baratheon hung from the vaulted ceiling on black velvet, the gold thread catching the firelight, and the banners of a dozen houses ran along the walls between the windows — the Tyrells' golden rose prominent among them, given that House Tyrell was footing a considerable portion of the evening's expense, a fact that had visibly improved Eddard Stark's mood when he learned of it.
Robert sat at the center of the main table, Myrcella and Tommen flanking him, and he was already well into his second flagon. He had set aside the physician's instructions somewhere between the tourney grounds and the hall and apparently had no intention of retrieving them. Ale ran down his chin and soaked the embroidered front of his doublet. His laugh hit the ceiling and came back down. The candles nearest him flickered with it.
Eddard sat at the main table and looked at the roasted boar and stuffed goose and honeyed figs and the rest of it, and permitted himself to feel relieved that none of this was coming out of the royal treasury.
Henry sat several seats down, with Margaery Tyrell to his right. Arya Stark was across the table, poking at her food with her knife in the manner of someone who has been told to sit still and is complying only technically.
"You unhorsed the man with the pebbles on his surcoat today," Arya said, without looking up from her plate. "Who are you going to beat tomorrow?"
"Arya." Sansa's voice carried the particular patience of someone who has had this conversation many times. "You can't just ask people things like that."
"Why not? It's a fair question."
"It depends on the draw," Henry said, which made Arya look up. He smiled at her. "I'll find out in the morning."
"But you'll win, right?"
"I'll do my best."
"Of course he'll win." Joffrey, seated beside Sansa, had been half-listening. "Don't be dense, Arya."
The apple left Arya's hand before anyone at the table had quite processed that it was going to. It caught Joffrey on the shoulder, which was not where she'd aimed, but close enough to make the point.
"You're the dense one," she said.
Joffrey opened his mouth. Sansa put a hand on his arm. The moment passed, though not entirely — the two of them had managed barely a civil exchange since Arya's arrival at court, and nothing suggested that trend was going to reverse itself.
Henry noticed the man moving through the crowd about halfway through the first course — tall, broad through the shoulders, with the particular upright bearing of someone who had spent decades in armor and carried the habit in his spine even without it. His hair had gone grey at the temples and threaded through the rest of it, and the lines in his face ran deep. His surcoat bore the device of House Royce — the ancient bronze-colored field with the runic inscriptions along the border that marked their bloodline's age.
Lord Yohn Royce of Runestone. Bronze Yohn, as men called him — an old name that meant something in the Vale, where the blood of the First Men still ran in a few houses and the Royces were the oldest of them. Their ancestors had been kings once, before the Andals came and before House Arryn ended that, and the family had served the Eyrie ever since with the particular fidelity of people who had been defeated with honor and decided to make something of the arrangement.
He worked his way toward the main table, offering a toast to Robert, a nod to Joffrey, and then a warm embrace for Eddard — the embrace of men who have known each other through enough hard seasons that formal greetings have become unnecessary.
Then he turned and found Henry.
"So you're the one who put me in the dirt today." He put a hand on Henry's shoulder and shook his head, though he was smiling. "First time seeing your face without the helmet. Makes me feel my age, I'll tell you that. I shouldn't have entered."
"Lord Yohn." Arya's mouth had opened, but Sansa's hand was already moving.
Henry raised his cup. "You gave me a harder run than I expected, my lord. In your youth you must have been formidable."
"My brothers still talk about Harrenhal," Margaery said, from Henry's right. Her fingers rested lightly on his arm. "They say you wore your ancestral bronze armor and defeated every challenger you faced that day."
Yohn looked at her with the pleased surprise of a man who has not expected a young woman at a banquet to know his tournament history. "It's kind of them to remember. That was a long time ago." Something shifted in his expression — not quite nostalgia, something with more weight in it. "I was narrowly beaten in the end. Rhaegar Targaryen was the last man standing." He raised his cup. "In any case — I wish you both well for the marriage."
"Thank you, my lord," Henry said.
"We hope you'll stay in King's Landing after the tourney," Margaery said, her hand moving from Henry's arm to take his hand instead. "You and your sons. We'd be honored to have you witness the ceremony in person."
"I wouldn't miss it." Yohn's smile was genuine, and then something behind it dimmed, the way a fire dims when a draft finds it. He looked down at the table. When he raised his eyes again, the smile had come back, but it was the kind a man assembles deliberately. "Forgive me. I was thinking of Waymar. He died not long ago, and old men are poor at keeping their thoughts where they belong."
The table went quiet in the way it does when grief enters a conversation uninvited.
Henry set his cup down. "I was sorry to hear it. When I rode north with the King, I had occasion to visit Castle Black." He kept his voice even and direct. "Lord Commander Mormont spoke well of him. Waymar Royce volunteered for the Watch knowing exactly what the posting meant, and he served his oath fully. That's a thing worth saying plainly."
Yohn's hand tightened on his cup. The grief in his face moved openly for a moment, undisguised. "Truly?" His voice was not quite steady. "The Watch sent only a raven — one raven, nothing more. No detail, no word of how. Just that he was gone."
"He died in the line of duty," Henry said. "Beyond the Wall, on ranging. It was the kind of death that only comes to men who go where the danger is. That was his choice, and he made it knowingly, and it was a Royce's choice."
Every word of this was a kindness Henry was choosing to give rather than a fact he could confirm. The truth was that Waymar's body had never come back, that Benjen Stark had gone looking and not returned either, and that Jeor Mormont had told Henry privately, in the blunt way Mormont told most things, that sending an untested boy to command a ranging party had been his mistake and one he wouldn't make again. None of that was what Yohn Royce needed to hear tonight.
"To Waymar Royce," Margaery said quietly, raising her cup.
Yohn raised his. "To Waymar. A man of the Night's Watch."
They drank.
After a moment, Henry let the silence settle and then moved on the way you move on after grief — not rushing it, but not dwelling either. "I watched your sons in the lists today, my lord. Andar rode well, and Robar was exceptional. That straight-backed charge — you can see where they learned it."
Yohn straightened slightly, the way fathers do when their children are spoken of well. "I trained them myself. Never trusted the work to a master-at-arms."
"It shows." Henry turned his cup slowly. "Andar is your heir — Runestone will be his, and your name with it. That's settled by blood and right." He paused. "But Robar's skill is equal to his brother's. A knight of that quality deserves more than a supporting role at his brother's table."
Yohn's expression shifted — the small frown of a man who has considered this and arrived at an answer he's not entirely satisfied with. "He'll serve Andar. Be his knight. That's the way of it for second sons."
"It doesn't have to be." Henry glanced down the table toward Joffrey, who was laughing at something a fool was doing three seats away. "When the City Watch expansion is complete, a portion of the new force will be designated as the Crown Prince's personal guard. Good men, properly trained — the kind of posting that builds a reputation and a career, not just a wage." He looked back at Yohn. "Joffrey is going to be king. The men around him in those early years will matter. And he is" — he chose the words with some care — "not entirely satisfied with certain current members of the Kingsguard."
Yohn's eyes moved briefly to the white cloak visible further down the hall. Jaime Lannister, talking to someone, apparently unconcerned with the rest of the room. "The Kingslayer," Yohn said quietly. The distaste was old and had not softened with time. "He has no business in those white robes."
"I won't disagree," Henry said.
Yohn was quiet for a moment, looking at his cup. Then he nodded, the decision settling in him visibly. "I'll speak with Robar tonight. I expect he'll be willing to swear to the Crown Prince. He's always wanted something of his own to build toward."
Henry touched his cup to Yohn's. "I'll look forward to it. House Royce's name will mean something to Joffrey's guard — and to Joffrey himself, when he's old enough to understand what old names are worth."
Yohn drank with the satisfied air of a man who has arrived at a banquet expecting an evening and found something more useful.
Across the table, Arya had acquired a second apple and was eyeing Joffrey with the focused assessment of someone who felt the first throw had been wasted on a shoulder.
Sansa put her hand over the apple without looking away from her own conversation.
Arya set it down.
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