Alex woke to the sound of bells tolling the fifth hour past dawn. It had not been deep sleep—it never was in King's Landing. Dreams chased him; dreams of snow and wolves and heads rolling on stone.
The sun of King's Landing did not rise so much as punish. It crawled through his window like molten copper, heavy and damp, carrying with it the smell of the city: fresh bread from the royal bakeries mingling with the reek of the sewers from Flea Bottom, and the scent of roses from the queen's gardens trying—and failing—to mask it all.
Alex dressed in a light gray linen tunic and leather breeches. He no longer wore the heavy wool of the North; he had learned quickly that wool in the South meant suffocation. He tied his black hair behind his head and checked his sword—a motion that had become a daily ritual, like breathing.
He descended the narrow spiral stairs of the Tower of the Hand. Servants moved in silence, carrying water pitchers and straw brooms, ghosts in gray garments that no one truly saw. He passed a Lannister knight yawning with boredom before Cersei's door, his armor gleaming but his eyes half-closed.
Guards guarding what? Alex thought. Doors no one dares breach?
The training yard boiled with life. Dust rose beneath men's feet like golden smoke, and the sun turned every bead of sweat into a salty pearl on skin. Alex stripped off his tunic and kept only his breeches and belt, gripping a heavy practice sword.
He needed this. He needed the "dance."
He plunged into the chaos. Knights from the Reach in armor so finely wrought it seemed it had never been scratched, and Lannister guards in their garish red breastplates. He began with the basic forms: thrust, parry, pivot. No thought, only movement. Sweat poured down his temples, his muscles burned.
Strike. Parry. Turn.
With each blow, he tried to empty his mind. But thoughts were like flies—you swat them away in one place and they return in another.
Robb. Jon. Theon. Ned.
All of them walking toward their fates, and none of them knowing.
Except me.
And that was heavier than any sword.
"You move fast," said a voice behind him. "But you think too much."
Alex turned. It was Ser Aron Santagar, the Red Keep's master-at-arms, standing with arms folded. An old man with gray hair and a long scar on his cheek.
"Thinking slows the blade, boy," Aron said. "In battle, a mind that thinks is a dead mind."
Alex smiled a wan smile. "What if thinking is the only thing keeping me alive, Ser?"
Aron looked at him with sharp eyes, then shook his head. "Perhaps. But don't let it weigh you down." Then he walked away.
At the edge of the yard, Jory Cassel stood watching in silence. His gray eyes—Northern eyes, wolf's eyes—read every movement, every expression on Alex's face.
He approached quietly.
"You looked like you were trying to kill time itself, Alex," Jory said, placing his heavy hand on Alex's shoulder. It was a warrior's hand, full of old scars.
Alex turned toward him, his black hair plastered to his forehead with sweat.
"Perhaps I am," he answered in a hoarse voice.
Jory smiled a sad smile. "Go. Take your share of the city's air—if that stench can be called air. I'll stay in the shadow of Lady Sansa and Arya. Go before the thinking consumes you."
Alex did not argue. Jory was right. He needed to get away from the swords, from the sounds, from everything.
Alex walked through the corridors of the Red Keep as though wandering inside the corpse of some great dragon. The red walls seemed to pulse with ancient life, dark and full of secrets and blood.
He passed a young maid carrying a basket of washing, her head bowed. He passed an old septa muttering a prayer in a low voice. He passed a drunken knight leaning against the wall, the smell of wine wafting from him.
This is the Red Keep, Alex thought. Not just stones and towers. It's thousands of small souls, each living their story, oblivious to the coming storm.
He found himself in a part of the castle he had not visited before. Narrower corridors, less crowded. Here, the walls were covered with ancient tapestries depicting forgotten battles. Dragons burning, knights falling, kings dying.
History repeats itself, he thought. Always.
As he turned a corner, a serving girl carrying linens nearly collided with him. She gasped, stepped back, and her eyes—brown and wide—lingered on him for a heartbeat longer than necessary. Not with fear, but with that look women sometimes gave handsome men, a flicker of interest quickly suppressed. She blushed, mumbled an apology, and hurried past.
Alex barely noticed. Or perhaps he did but had grown used to it—the glances from kitchen maids and highborn ladies alike. In Winterfell, his Northern features had been common. Here, they were… different. The dark hair, the gray eyes, the lean strength that came from training rather than feasting. He was not golden like a Lannister, nor pretty like a Tyrell knight, but there was something in the way he moved, the way he held himself, that drew the eye.
A pair of noblewomen passed in the opposite direction, their silk gowns rustling. One whispered to the other, and they both glanced back at him. He caught the words "Stark's man" and "Northern wolf" before they disappeared around a corner, giggling like girls half their age.
Even in a city of beautiful monsters, he thought with bitter amusement, a new face draws attention.
But he did not linger on it. Vanity was a luxury he could not afford.
In a side garden, where water flowed from a marble fountain with a monotonous murmur, Alex found the children.
Princess Myrcella and her brother Tommen.
Myrcella sat on the fountain's edge, her golden hair gleaming in the sun, her green eyes—Lannister eyes—watching her brother with tenderness and patience.
Tommen was trying to build a tower from smooth stones. He panted with effort, his plump cheeks red from the heat, his small fingers trembling as he placed one stone atop another.
Then the tower fell.
"Ah!" Tommen cried, his voice carrying pure childish frustration.
Myrcella smiled. "Try again, Tommen. Knights don't give up."
Alex approached quietly. He knelt beside them.
"The secret isn't in the stone, Your Highness," he said in a soft voice. "It's in your hand." He picked up a stone and balanced it between his fingers. "Look. Find the level place. Set it gently, not with force."
Tommen looked at him with wide eyes, full of childish admiration. "You're... you're the Northman. The one who knows how to fight."
"I know many things, my prince," Alex said, and smiled a genuine smile this time. "Among them, how to build towers."
Myrcella laughed—a light, musical laugh. "Joffrey says you're a lucky peasant. But I don't believe that."
Alex looked at her. She was young—could not be more than nine—but there was something in her eyes. Intelligence. Awareness.
She's a Lannister, he reminded himself. Even the children here learn to read people.
"Joffrey says many things," Alex answered carefully. "But truth matters more than words, Princess."
"Is winter very cold in the North?" Tommen asked suddenly, his voice full of innocent curiosity.
Alex nodded. "Cold enough that your breath freezes in the air. Cold enough that tears turn to ice on your cheeks before they fall." He paused, then added quietly: "In the North, we learn that warmth is not a right. It's something we fight for every day."
Myrcella looked at him seriously. "Are you afraid of winter?"
Alex thought for a moment. "Yes. Every wise man is."
She smiled. "At least you're honest.
Tommen's laughter stopped suddenly.
Alex felt a sudden chill run down his spine. A chill that did not come from the wind.
He turned slowly.
And several yards away, beneath the shadows of a dark stone archway, stood a black shape.
Ser Ilyn Payne.
The King's Justice stood as though he were part of the very stonework. Rusty leather armor, his cracked hands resting on the hilt of his great sword. He had no tongue to speak—the Mad King had cut it out years ago—but his sunken eyes were fixed on the children.
Then they moved slowly, terribly slowly, to settle on Alex.
It was a soulless gaze. The smell of death and old iron seemed to emanate from his very presence. Ser Ilyn Payne watched, always watched, as though waiting for the next command.
Little Tommen trembled and hid behind his sister. Myrcella took his hand, but her face had gone pale.
Alex felt his hand move instinctively toward his sword hilt—but he stopped it.
No. Not here. Not now.
He stood slowly, placing himself between the children and the headsman.
Ser Ilyn Payne did not move. Did not nod. But after a long, heavy moment, he turned and walked away, his shadow stretching across the stones like a bloodstain.
Alex remained standing for a long time, even after Ser Ilyn Payne had disappeared.
"Who... who was that?" Tommen whispered, his voice shaking.
"No one important, my prince," Alex lied. "Just... a guard."
But Myrcella was looking at him with eyes older than her years. "You're afraid of him."
It was not a question.
Alex smiled a sad smile. "Every wise man fears death, Princess."
In his chamber, Alex sat in the darkness. He did not blow out the candle this time—he let it burn, its weak light trembling on the walls.
He thought of the children. Of Tommen's innocence. Of Myrcella's intelligence. Of the way Tommen had trembled when he saw Ser Ilyn Payne.
They are children, Alex thought. Lannister children, yes. But children.
And in the original story... they all died.
Tommen, the boy king who jumped from a window.
Myrcella, poisoned in Dorne.
Even Joffrey, poisoned at his own wedding.
All children. All dead.
He felt a weight in his chest. Not pity—he could not pity the Lannisters after all they had done—but... sorrow.
Sorrow for a world where children were killed for the sins of their fathers.
He looked out the window. King's Landing glittered in the darkness, the lights of thousands of candles and torches twinkling like fallen stars.
This city will burn, he thought. Soon.
But not today.
Not yet.
He closed his eyes, but he did not sleep.
Because every time he closed his eyes, he saw Ser Ilyn Payne standing in the shadow.
Waiting.
Always waiting.