video » One Penny

[impathy]

[Open]

It's a fine day for sunshine. I find myself pitying those who choose to live beneath stones and only play at seeing sunlight. The real thing is not so easy to replicate. It seems to be getting warmer as well. Summer Is Coming, as they might say in my own Westerlands. If there is anything to love about this world, it is the peculiarly short seasons. It is a strange thing to have them all wrapped up in one year. I find myself wondering how it is you're able to keep track of them when they each go by so swiftly. It is near spring, but I'm told it will only be a few months long with more certainty than even the wisest maesters can manage - and this from an ill-bred soldier with scant few hairs on his lip.

I will say this for the south, however. It is blessed with very few imps.

[Locked to the Unseelie]

I've spent an uncomfortably long time in Seelie lands these past few weeks, though I am to understand a fairy ring is not so far off ahead of me. Would that we had such things in my own seven kingdoms, I might have done a fair bit more traveling. Though I confess I find it terribly disappoint how utterly small this world is made out to be. Is it truly a void beyond the oceans? I would imagine that it could not have always been that way. Certainly there had to be something far off out there, beyond where ships are able to reach.

In any case, I do have a point beyond the tedium of long riding. My name is Tyrion Lannister, which may not merit much weight here, but I was known as the King's Hand and the Master of Coin where I was from. I excelled in both duties and while I have no mind to butcher my features in further battles, I would see my skills put to proper use still. There is a certain spire that I feel might benefit from my talents and so it is there I mean to go. But I am given to understand there are a number of spires in all and would be only too glad to find other similar minded individuals to begin making certain investments. I do not yet have all my wealth at my disposal, but I promise you I always pay my due. A Lannister always pays his debts.

There is one other matter. Briefly for a time there were two of my kin here. My brother Jaime Lannister and my bastard nephew, Joffrey. Did anyone perchance to meet either of them? I know they are long gone from this world, but I would be interested to know if there was anything they might have left behind.

Comments

[impathy]

Oh, I have. But I was denied it. Just so, if all you say is true, then I've met something rarer than a unicorn. An honorable knight and a woman all at the same time? You might have had the decency to be ugly as well. Do you also sing sweet sonnets and forge your own armor in your spare time?

[So he did not believe her. Not even a little bit.]

[psalmed]

I do not sing well at all and I do not wear armor, either. I have never fought in a war. I am a diplomat. The agent of His Majesty when I visit other countries.

I would offer to demonstrate, monsieur, but how might a lady demonstrate goodness?

[She is, at least, smiling. Turning it into something beyond insult because truly it all probably does seem too fantastical.]

Would you like a list of my failures?

[impathy]

Your failures do not interest me. In truth, the only thing you possess of interest to me is what you keep between your legs.

[It was, he knew, an absolutely vile thing to say. There was a time that he would never say such thing to a lady, especially one that did seem as genuinely good as this one. But Tyrion was not that man anymore. She sickened him with her sweetness and he would be far more comfortable to let her hate him as much as everyone else did. Those who feigned at wishing to aid him would only ever betray him in the end.]

[psalmed]

Does it make you feel powerful to insult a woman in such a way?

[There is hurt in her tone. Anger. She's heard it all before, of course. Vile, nasty, hateful things because of her sex. But it has been quite a while, she has earned her place and had her knights at her defense. Not here. A rude awakening.]

I am sad you think that way, monsieur, and I will pray for you. It must be so very limiting if you view a woman as nothing more than a place to rut.

[impathy]

Would that my thoughts were so simple as that. [No, it did not make him powerful. But spite was all that really fueled him now. It mattered so little to him if she was man or woman in the end. He was not even sure if he had it in him to find pleasure from whores anymore. And he would find none outside of brothels, so it left him little else.]

Pray all you like, my lady. Perhaps if you do it long enough, you might find a god that listens.

[psalmed]

And what might be your thoughts? Do you believe sincerely I have not heard such rumors and insults because a lady with a sword seems to present a threat to one's masculinity?

[She bites her tongue there. Stills herself, prays for patience and a calmness and wit and everything she is so sorely lacking.]

Perhaps I shall amend my offer to you. If ever you should need anything I can provide you that is not between my legs.

[impathy]

[He realizes now with her words what truly grates him. She is everything Cersei wanted to be. It is an association he finds entirely unpleasant. Even so, he does not bother to correct her assumptions. His concern is not with her femininity at odds with her knightdom, but with her godsdamned piety.]

If that is your offer, I would sooner have a sellsword. But as I said before, you are kind to offer.

[psalmed]

If you wish what is between the legs of a sellsword, who might I be to stop you?

[Tranquility. Peace. Understanding. What she prays for over and over.]

I hope God will set you on a path to overcome whatever it is you suffer from, and put you in a place where you are happy, monsieur.

[impathy]

As you please. I hope for very much the same.

[But it would not be prayers that got him there. It would be rebalancing the debts owed him and what he owed in turn. When the balance was stricken clean, then he could be happy.

Won't I? ... won't I?

He closes the locket.]