Free A Clash of Kings by George R.R. Martin Page A

sound of your sweet sister’s voice. My lords, please,
let us give them a few moments together. The woes of our troubled realm shall
keep.”
    Janos Slynt rose hesitantly and Grand Maester Pycelle ponderously, yet they
rose. Littlefinger was the last. “Shall I

tell the steward to prepare chambers in Maegor’s Holdfast?”
    “My thanks, Lord Petyr, but I will be taking Lord Stark’s former quarters in
the Tower of the Hand.”
    Littlefinger laughed. “You’re a braver man than me, Lannister. You
do
know the fate of our last two Hands?”
    “Two? If you mean to frighten me, why not say four?”
    “Four?” Littlefinger raised an eyebrow. “Did the Hands before Lord Arryn
meet some dire end in the Tower? I’m afraid I was too young to pay them much
mind.”
    “Aerys Targaryen’s last Hand was killed during the Sack of King’s Landing,
though I doubt he’d had time to settle into the Tower. He was only Hand for a
fortnight. The one before him was burned to death. And before them came two
others who died landless and penniless in exile, and counted themselves lucky.
I believe my lord father was the last Hand to depart King’s Landing with his
name, properties, and parts all intact.”
    “Fascinating,” said Littlefinger. “And all the more reason I’d sooner bed
down in the dungeon.”
    Perhaps you’ll get that wish,
Tyrion thought, but he said,
“Courage and folly are cousins, or so I’ve heard.
Whatever curse may linger over the
Tower of the Hand, I pray I’m small enough to escape its notice.”
    Janos Slynt laughed, Littlefinger smiled, and Grand Maester Pycelle followed
them both out, bowing gravely.
    “I hope Father did not send you all this way to plague us with history
lessons,” his sister said when they were alone.
    “How I have yearned for the sound of your sweet voice,” Tyrion sighed
to her.
    “How I have yearned to have that eunuch’s tongue pulled out with hot
pincers,” Cersei replied. “Has father lost his senses? Or did you forge this
letter?” She read it once more, with mounting annoyance. “Why would he
inflict
you
on me? I wanted him to come himself.” She crushed Lord
Tywin’s letter in her fingers. “I am Joffrey’s regent, and I sent him a royal
command
!”
    “And he ignored you,” Tyrion pointed out. “He has quite a large army, he can
do that. Nor is he the first. Is he?”
    Cersei’s mouth tightened. He could see her color rising. “If I name this
letter a forgery and tell them to throw you in a dungeon, no one will ignore
that,
I promise you.”
    He was walking on rotten ice now, Tyrion knew. One false step and he would
plunge through. “No one,” he agreed amiably, “least of all our father. The
one with the army. But why should you want to throw me into a dungeon, sweet
sister, when I’ve come all this long way to help you?”
    “I do not require
your
help. It was our father’s presence that I
commanded.”
    “Yes,” he said quietly, “but it’s Jaime you want.”
    His sister fancied herself subtle, but he had grown up with her. He could read
her face like one of his favorite books, and what he read now was rage, and
fear, and despair. “Jaime—”
    “—is my brother no less than yours,” Tyrion interrupted. “Give me
your support and I promise you, we will have Jaime freed

and returned to us unharmed.”
    “How?” Cersei demanded. “The Stark boy and his mother are not like to forget
that we beheaded Lord Eddard.”
    “True,” Tyrion agreed, “yet you still hold his daughters, don’t you? I saw
the older girl out in the yard with Joffrey.”
    “Sansa,” the queen said. “I’ve given it out that I have the younger brat as
well, but it’s a lie. I sent Meryn Trant to take her in hand when Robert died,
but her wretched dancing master interfered and the girl fled. No one has seen
her since. Likely she’s dead. A great many people died that day.”
    Tyrion had hoped for both Stark girls, but he