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The poisoning had left everyone shaken, a single incident that rattled hearts and unsettled nerves.
Even before the investigation began, Clay already sensed how it would end. He knew there would be no harvest, no tidy answers waiting at the end of the trail.
The merchants who had brought the shipment were gone the instant their wagons were emptied. They left the Twins without so much as a backward glance, vanishing like mist before sunrise.
By the time the furious commander of the White Sea Guard, the warden of White Harbor, the guardian of the Twins, and even the master of the Bite sent their men to scour the land, the quarry was already long gone. Not a shadow remained to pursue.
Hoping for some clever method of tracking in this age was little more than wishful thinking. Clay trusted his own witcher-honed senses more than he did the crude skills of the best soldiers.
The real problem, he decided, did not lie in the bottle of wine but in the method behind it.
He had studied the residue carefully. The poison itself was nothing elaborate, merely grey cap mushroom, one of the most common toxins in the Seven Kingdoms.
Ordinary grey cap never worked this fast. A dose should take six hours, sometimes longer, before it brought down even a goat or a hound.
Yet the poison he encountered struck in less than half an hour, its strength tenfold that of any normal grey cap.
No ordinary hand could have brewed such a thing.
Could it have come from across the Narrow Sea? Clay doubted it.
First of all, the only people across the Narrow Sea who might hold a grudge against him were the slavers, and even they barely knew his name. Anyone else on that coast probably had no idea he even existed, let alone enough reason to strike at the old man.
Besides, the grey cap mushroom was found only in Westeros. Essos held nothing like it, not a single grove or patch.
That left only one conclusion: whoever had done this had to be Westerosi.
If the culprit could not be found, then the source of the poison would have to be traced instead.
A dose of grey cap this potent might fetch a price higher than the famed Tears of Lys, for it was no mere commodity but proof of a master's craft.
Refining such a poison was no simple matter of tossing ingredients into a pot and letting them boil. True purification demanded skill and patience, the kind of careful artistry that turned common death into something rare and devastating.
Clay knew from his own struggles that without the system's guidance he could never hope to brew even the simplest witcher's draught. To reach that level without aid required genius and years of hidden practice.
Following this thought, he saw that the list of suspects narrowed to almost nothing.
Two places seemed possible, though in truth they were one.
The first was King's Landing, and to be precise the man who might still live there if rumor had not already buried him: Grand Maester Pycelle.
The other lay far away on the Honeywine, the Citadel itself, a place that pretended to be gentle and harmless, a sanctuary of quiet scholars.
But Pycelle had walked out of those halls, and in that sense the Citadel and the old Grand Maester were a single trail.
Once this connection became clear, Clay did not hesitate. He sent an order straight to Riverrun:
[Edmure Tully, wherever you are and whatever you are doing, bring the maester of your house to me at once.]
Clay believed that someone halfway inside the Citadel, someone bound by oaths yet not entirely theirs, might provide the first crack in the wall.
He could not simply saddle Gaelithox and fly to Oldtown to question the archmaesters one by one.
A place like the Citadel, one that played both sides while cloaking itself in virtue and wielding such deep influence, could only be handled with care. To bring it under control he would need a reason so sound that none could deny it, and he would have to strike all at once.
If he failed to act with foresight, the trouble they could cause later would be endless.
And Edmure Tully… Clay had no doubt about the man's nature. Timid to the bone, he would never dare to defy a dragonlord.
If Clay wished to end him, it would be as easy as crushing a dry twig beneath his heel.
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After Clay returned to the Twin, Westeros itself seemed to fall into a strange and uneasy silence.
Tywin in the Westerlands, the twin stags of the South, Dorn in the far south, and even the trembling folk of the Vale, all seemed frozen in place, making no move at all.
Each of them was trying to digest a single staggering fact: that the world now held two dragonlords.
Every noble's gaze turned toward the Riverlands, toward Riverrun, toward Twin.
These lords needed to see for themselves how this male dragonlord, the suddenly ascendant Clay Manderly, intended to treat the old nobility.
In other words, would he lean into his identity as Clay Manderly, a man among men, or would he assert himself fully as a dragonlord, raining down fire and blood on all who dared resist, in the manner of Aegon Targaryen the First?
Countless spies were sent out, doing everything in their power to approach the Twins and Riverrun.
Some did indeed catch sight of the massive dragon Gaelithox nesting in the nearby forest, confirming Clay Manderly's status as a true dragonlord beyond doubt.
Yet no amount of scheming or intelligence could answer the question that haunted the nobility: how could a family that had never allied with the Targaryens suddenly control a dragon?
Many turned their efforts toward investigating the mysterious rise of Clay Manderly.
But disappointment came swiftly.
The trail Clay left was too clean, too perfectly concealed. The deeper, older, and more intricate details were beyond the knowledge of anyone bound by the limitations of this era.
To the nobles, Clay Manderly remained an impenetrable mist, a puzzle without a solution.
One thing, however, was undeniable: this was a man who could, at any moment, mount a dragon and bring its fiery wrath down upon their heads to teach them the meaning of fear.
For this reason, the entire Seven Kingdoms found their attention drawn more to Clay Manderly in the Twins than to Daenerys, the legitimate Targaryen.
Every move of Clay's, every ripple he caused from within the Twins, set the nerves of all the Seven Kingdoms on edge.
What he would do next became the measure by which all the lords of Westeros planned their next steps.
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The maester of the Riverrun arrived obediently at Clay Manderly's summons, moving with visible trepidation.
He had, of course, received the Raven's message from the Citadel, demanding that all maesters publicly oppose Lord Wyman Manderly.
Yet Edmure Tully, his liege, surprisingly clear-headed for once, had acted decisively. Upon learning of the message, he had thrown it directly into the fire in Clay's presence.
He had then warned the maester sternly not to pay heed to a group of scholars whose minds clearly were not quite right.
Others might not understand, but Edmure knew well what kind of temper Clay Manderly possessed. If a Tully maester had stood in open opposition to the Twins, how would Clay, already master of vast armies, have responded? And who could hope to endure such a clash?
This time, however, Clay Manderly was already a dragonlord, and in theory, following Robb Stark's return to the embrace of the gods, he was now the master of the entire North and the Riverlands. A single command from him reached Riverrun, and even Edmure Tully, however unwilling, could not defy it.
Ser Brynden Tully had repeatedly advised him that if the Tully family wished to survive, they must curry favor with Clay Manderly, a man with no historical grudge against their house.
Otherwise, should they incur his wrath, dealing with the Tullys would be simple. All it would take was invoking Daenerys Targaryen's name as pretext, and the family could be undone.
When the maester arrived in the Twins, Clay did not trouble him with interrogation or intimidation. He had no time for such things.
Instead, he placed the poisoned wine directly before the man.
As Clay had anticipated, the result was exactly the same: a high-concentration dose of grey cap.
How it had been crafted, however, was beyond the maester. He looked completely bewildered. Even after Clay used the Axii Sign, the outcome remained unchanged.
There was simply no way to extract more from him.
For now, Clay could only press pause on the matter.
The White Sea Guard, battle-hardened after fighting multiple rounds of wars against several powerful factions and suffering heavy losses, could offer little help here.
If the poison truly originated from the Citadel, the place was far too distant, its defenses and secrecy too complex for anyone to infiltrate.
It would be faster and more effective for Clay to handle it himself.
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"Grandfather, we'll have to swallow this loss for now. If we want answers, I'll have to make the trip to the Citadel myself."
The poisoning was considered a matter of the strictest secrecy within the upper ranks of House Manderly.
Wynafryd, Wylla, and his eldest uncle, Wylis, had all been given the severest orders not to speak of it.
If outsiders learned of the attack, it would undermine the family's authority and control.
Seeing no clear leads at present, Clay decided to put the matter aside temporarily. The fact that someone had been bold enough to send a poisoner already indicated one thing: the opponent could no longer beat him fairly at the table and had resorted to underhanded tricks.
Clay would not allow himself to be manipulated.
They could play their game; he would play his own.
In the meantime, however, his family would have to endure caution and restraint, paying special attention to daily life.
For one, the old man's wine might have to be set aside for now.
"All right, then. Let's leave it at that for the moment."
The old man knew Clay was right. Rather than wasting manpower and resources chasing shadows, it it was far wiser to consolidate their strength and prepare for the next conflict.
The true victory would come only when the Seven Kingdoms were subdued and Clay could sit firmly in the chair of power. Until that day, any win was only temporary.
In the three-hundred-year history of the Targaryen dynasty, there had never been a king known to have been poisoned on his throne.
"Clay, we'll keep an eye on things here. You don't need to worry."
"Now you are no ordinary man. Even though there is nothing physically on your head, anyone who sees you cannot help but recognize the crown that must exist there in essence."
"What are your plans? Do you intend to take the crown? Our Manderly family has never known much about coronations."
The old man smiled, his tone tinged with nostalgia and awe.
He had watched kings be crowned from the sidelines. Now his own grandson might ascend, and it felt strangely unfamiliar.
"Forget it. What would claiming a crown really change for me as king?"
"All your titles amount only to the lands we currently hold, and at most, we could add the territories our ancestors lost to House Peake far across the riverlands. But even then, they serve little purpose."
The old man nodded. He acknowledged that his grandson was right. The Manderly family had no history of aggressively asserting claims, which made such ambitions troublesome.
This was not the age of Aegon's conquest.
Aegon had never belonged to the old noble system of Westeros, so he had simply forged the entire realm's claims by his own hand.
Clay was a Manderly, and that meant he had to play by the rules of nobility. His current power had been built entirely within that system.
To start wars recklessly across the land would put him in open conflict with the entire noble structure.
It was not that it could not be done, but it would be far too troublesome.
Suddenly, the old man asked Clay, "The… Mad King's daughter… err… King Aerys' daughter, Daenerys Targaryen. Your relationship with her is… all right, yes?"
Clay knew his grandfather was not asking about romance. He was asking whether Daenerys might demand the Manderly family's submission.
He let out a soft hum and replied with a single, measured sentence:
"Her actions follow mine, no matter the circumstance."
As expected, someone with experience, like the old man, reacted quickly.
He was very pleased with that answer.
"I told her long ago that I would not take her throne. I would help her avenge her losses and rebuild her kingdom. But in exchange, the center of the throne is mine, and the new royal surname will be Manderly-Targaryen."
This had been agreed upon in advance. Without that fundamental premise, everything that had unfolded so far would have been nonsense.
In Clay's memories of the previous life, history had been far simpler. Every change of dynasty had someone like Aegon Targaryen rising to claim the entire realm outright. Kings, princes, and nobles were all swept along without question. A minor ruler could appear, and if the people accepted him, that was enough.
But here, that logic would not work.
"All right, as long as you understand that yourself."
The old man thought that since Clay could speak this way, he must have a certain degree of confidence.
"Then tell me. What exactly are your plans for the next step?"
Even though the entire family had been placed under Clay's control, the old man still had experience on his side. He had lived far longer than Clay and understood the character of these nobles far better. He believed he could still offer guidance and advice from behind the scenes
"The North, the Riverlands, the Westerlands, the Vale, the Stormlands, the Bay, the Iron Islands…"
Clay recited each region one by one, skipping only Dorne. These were all territories that required his attention, some more urgently than others.
"The North… I cannot intervene personally, as you know…"
Clay nodded. The old lord could not help in this matter. As a younger generation, he could boldly ignore decorum and refuse to recognize anyone, relying entirely on the unmistakable extent of his own power. But the old lord intervening directly could backfire, causing more harm than good.
"I'll handle them myself. The Riverlands along with them should be no problem. They are still tucked away in Riverrun without any moves, which only proves that even if they have intentions, they lack the courage or decisiveness to act."
"As for House Stark…"
The thought brought a faint smirk to Clay's lips. The little boy who would become the Three-Eyed Raven likely did not yet have the nerve to stand against him.
Neither Clay nor the old lord had touched their wine. And though Clay's witcher-forged body made the last poison completely harmless, he still refrained from testing it before his grandfather's eyes.
Two cups of water sat untouched between them, serving more as a formality than anything else. Neither showed the slightest interest in such trivialities at the moment.
"The remaining houses will not be so easy to manage," Clay said.
"The Lannisters will certainly pay a price. How many will survive, and whether the entire family should be wiped out… that I will discuss later with Daenerys."
Clay stroked his chin thoughtfully.
"The young queen holds less resentment toward the Baratheons than she does toward the Lannisters. In her eyes, her father's mistakes came first, which is why the Starks and the Baratheons rebelled. Although it is still treason punishable by death, at least it makes sense. But what Tywin Lannister's did… Daenerys cannot accept them, and she has no intention of ever doing so."
Clay pointed toward the western sky and smiled faintly: "When we were in Astapor, she kept asking me why I didn't just ride a dragon straight over King's Landing and burn everything into ashes with a single breath of fire. She only wanted to bring her own fire and blood, to take revenge first and think about ruling later."
The old man listened quietly, then commented with a wry smile, "Hmm… truly an impatient girl. In that sense, she is very much like her father."
He looked earnestly at his grandson. "Thankfully, there is you, Clay. If you couldn't ride a dragon and the Seven Kingdoms welcome another one of those reckless king/queens returning with a dragon of her own, then the entire realm would truly be doomed."
The words hung in the air as if Clay himself had made some grand sacrifice, offering himself to tame the dragon for the stability and prosperity of the Seven Kingdoms.
Clay could only respond with a wry, knowing smile.
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[Chapter End's]
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