Disclaimer:
Harry Potter and all of its characters belong to J.K. Rowling.
ASOIAF and all of its characters belong to GRRM
I own nothing but the original characters I make.
"Dialogue"
'Thoughts'
-Author notes-
Chapter 14: Nightly Healing
The Great Hall was cavernous and mostly empty, its high rafters lost in shadow. The only life was at the head table, where King Robert sat like a mountain in a fur-lined robe, flanked by two white shadows of the Kingsguard. The table before him was a graveyard of gnawed bones and empty cups.
The doors thudded open. Robert looked up, his face ruddy in the firelight.
"Boy!" he bellowed, his voice echoing. "Where in the Seven Hells have you been?"
Joffrey walked forward, flanked by a grim Lord Stark and a seething Sandor Clegane. He kept his pace steady, his face calm.
"I went for a walk. Explored the castle. I didn't mean to cause a stir."
Robert glowered at him, a heavy silence falling. He lifted his cup, drained it in one long, noisy gulp, slammed it down… and then erupted into a great, wheezing laugh that shook his belly.
"Ha! I thought you'd be more upset. Like this great, grim hound of yours." He jabbed a thick finger towards Sandor, who stood rigid, his jaw a hard line.
"If you want mad, wait till your mother gets her claws in you. She's been in a froth all day. Had the whole castle turned upside down."
Joffrey shrugged. "I needed some air. Didn't think it would cause such a fuss."
"Prince Joffrey," Lord Eddard's voice was quiet, but it cut through the King's mirth. "If you don't mind me asking… where did you go? My daughter Sansa said she saw you in the Godswood this morning. After that, you vanished."
Joffrey strolled to the table, picked up a cold chicken leg from a platter, and took a bite. "The crypts."
Ned Stark's face changed. It was as if a shutter had slammed shut behind his eyes. "We searched the crypts."
"I was on the lower levels," Joffrey said around a mouthful of chicken.
"You went that deep?" Ned's shock was plain. The thought of anyone, let alone a southern prince, wandering the deepest, oldest tombs alone was unsettling.
"I did. Don't worry, Lord Stark. I didn't damage anything." Joffrey decided then and there not to mention the pale, screaming woman made of ice, or the shattered obsidian bars. He wasn't sure Ned even knew what was entombed in the dark below his feet. Best not to find out.
"What did y—"
The hall doors crashed open again.
Cersei Lannister swept in, a storm of gold silk and cold fury. Her guards flanked her like a moving wall.
Joffrey leaned close to the King, dropping his voice to a murmur. "Get me out of this one, and I owe you."
Robert chuckled into his new cup of wine. "Sorry, lad. You dug this pit. You lie in it."
"Joffrey!" The Queen's voice was a whip-crack.
He sighed, took another bite of chicken, and sat down to face the music.
<><><><><><><><><><><><>
An hour later, he was back in his chambers in the guest house, a gilded cage.
"Don't you think this is a bit ridiculous?" Joffrey asked the empty air. He got no answer.
He looked instead at the young servant girl laying out a small feast on his table. She flinched at his voice, her eyes wide and frightened. "I… I don't know, Your Grace."
He moved from the window. "No need to be afraid. Despite the tales, I don't bite."
The girl managed a shaky smile. "Actually… I've heard only good things of the Prince."
"Really?" Joffrey raised an eyebrow. His reputation in King's Landing was a thing of nightmares. Here, it seemed, was a fresh slate. "What do they say?"
She blushed, looking at her hands. "They say the Prince is always polite. That he speaks kindly to the servants. That he reads books. And… that he is very skilled with a sword."
"Hear that, Sandor?" Joffrey called to the Hound, a dark statue by the door. "I am 'very skilled'. Not what you said after you took that kick to the stones."
"Don't get cocky," Sandor grunted, arms folded across his broad chest.
"Anyway," Joffrey turned back to the girl, who was nearly finished. "Don't you think it's silly? A prince, locked in his room, missing a feast like a misbehaving child?"
The girl kept her eyes lowered. "I wouldn't know, Your Grace."
Joffrey smiled. He didn't need Legilimency to see the fear of saying the wrong thing about the Queen. "Of course. I shouldn't put you in that spot. My apologies."
"Is there… anything else you require, Your Grace?" Her voice held a hopeful, nervous tremble.
"No, that's all. Thank you." He gave her a kind nod.
She curtseyed, a flicker of disappointment in her eyes before she slipped out.
The Hound let out a low, rasping chuckle. "That one wanted a royal tumble."
"No need to be crude, Sandor." Joffrey sat and poured a cup of wine. "Sadly for her, I have more restraint than my father."
"Hmph."
"Come on, Sandor." Joffrey gestured to the laden table. "There's enough here for two. More than enough."
The Hound eyed the spread—roasted fowl, a meat pie, bread, cheese, flagons of wine and ale. "I'm your guard. I know my place."
"Tonight, your place is there." Joffrey pointed at the chair opposite. "If it troubles you, say I commanded it. A prince's order to eat chicken and drink wine."
A long pause. Then, "Fine." Sandor stalked over, pulled out the chair with a screech, and sat, filling a cup to the brim.
Joffrey glanced out the window. The moon was full, washing the world in a pale, cold light. Good. He hadn't forgotten his promise.
I'll wait until the castle sleeps. He thought. Then I'll pay the broken boy a visit.
They might not be his family, not truly. But the stain of their sin was on the house he now wore. He would have to clean it.
<><><><><><><><><><><><>
So far, so good, Joffrey thought.
He stood in plain view of a Stark guard pacing the inner courtyard. The man's eyes swept over him without a flicker of recognition.
Invisibility Charm, holding. Silencing Charm on my boots, perfect.
To the muggles of this world, he was a ghost. A whisper of air. It was almost too easy.
<><><><><><><><><><><><>
"Grrrrrr!"
A low, warning growl rumbled through the closed shutters of Bran Stark's sickroom the moment Joffrey's hand touched the window ledge.
Smell. Of course. He'd forgotten the beast. A direwolf's nose would put any spell to shame.
Inside, a figure stirred in a chair by the bed. "Mmm… what is it, Summer?" Lady Catelyn's voice was thick with sleep.
No time. "Stupefy."
A scarlet spark, precise and silent, shot from his fingertip through the gap in the shutters. It struck Catelyn Stark in the chest. She slumped back into the chair, her worried face going slack.
"GrrrRRR!" The growl intensified. Through the window, he saw the grey direwolf plant itself between the bed and the window, lips peeled back from long white teeth, ready to strike at any second.
Joffrey dropped the Invisibility Charm. "Easy. Shhh. I'm here to help your companion, not harm him."
He'd heard these wolves were clever. Bound to the Stark children by more than leash and loyalty.
"Rrrr…" The growl softened to a wary rumble.
Taking it as a sign, Joffrey perched on the windowsill. "Look, I don't want to stun you too. Can you move?"
The wolf tilted its massive head.
Joffrey pointed at Bran's still form. "I came to help him."
The direwolf padded forward, sniffed Joffrey's outstretched hand thoroughly, then turned, leaped lightly back onto the bed, and settled beside his master, watching.
Permission granted.
Joffrey slipped inside. "Let's see the damage." He placed a hand on Bran's forehead, then his chest, his magic extending in fine, diagnostic threads. "Fever from infection—the maester's draught is working on that. The bones… set poorly. The spine… fractured. If left like this, he'll never walk. He'll live a life of pain."
A soft whine came from the direwolf. It understood.
"Don't worry. I may not be a professional healer, but I can fix this much." He pressed his palm flat over Bran's heart, focusing his will. The healing charm was complex, meant for knitting shattered bone. Wandless, it was a gamble. "Compesce Fractura."
A soft, blue-white radiance enveloped the boy's small body, sinking into the skin. Joffrey held the flow steady, feeling the minute adjustments, the tiny cracks sealing, the vertebrae sliding back into perfect alignment. The light faded.
He scanned again. A slow breath of relief escaped him. It had worked. Perfectly.
"Wandless," he muttered, a flicker of that old wonder returning. "Who'd have thought?"
He tapped Bran's temple gently. "Obliviate." A gentle, careful wash over the last hours of trauma, the memory of the fall, of the tower, of the golden hair he might have seen. "Sorry, lad. But the truth would cause more problems than it's worth just now."
He still needed the prince's life. Its comforts, its power. He wasn't ready to trade it for the truth.
"Caw!"
The sound was sharp, angry. Joffrey turned.
A large raven stood on the windowsill, black as the void between stars. It fixed him with a beady, intelligent eye.
"Caw! Caw!" It flapped its wings aggressively, not in fear, but in clear rebuke.
"If I didn't know better," Joffrey said softly, "I'd say that bird is furious with me."
He peered closer. There was something in its gaze. Not just animal cunning. A presence. A magic he had felt recently, cold and ancient and green.
The godswood. The weirwood tree. The feeling of being watched.
"Who are you?" Joffrey asked, his voice low.
The raven stared a moment longer, then gave one final, scolding "Caw!" and launched itself into the night.
Joffrey watched it go. It appears that he had spoiled someone's game. A slow smile touched his lips. It was confirmation. A thrilling, dangerous confirmation.
<><><><><><><><><><><><>
"We leave today," Cersei announced at breakfast, her voice cutting through the morning quiet.
"What? Already?" Myrcella's face fell. "But I like it here! Sansa and Jeyne are so nice."
Cersei gave her daughter a thin smile. "We've lingered long enough. But you'll see more of Sansa. She is coming south with us."
"Sansa is coming to King's Landing?" Myrcella brightened instantly.
Joffrey looked at his mother, a cold suspicion forming. "Why is she coming?"
The whole point was to bring Ned Stark south as Hand. Why drag a daughter into the viper's nest of the capital?
Cersei's smile turned smug, secretive. "All in good time."
Joffrey frowned. He didn't need to wait. He met her eyes, and with the barest flicker of effort, brushed the surface of her simple thoughts. The plan unfolded in her mind, clear and calculated. A betrothal. Binding the Stark girl to the crown, to him, as a political leash on her father. Not her idea either, but the King's.
She's a child, he thought with a surge of disgust. This world's games were played with live pieces, and no one cared how young they were.
"I suppose this is the moment to mention," Tyrion said, setting down his cup, "that I'll be staying on a while. You see, I'm planning a trip to t—"
The hall doors burst open. Two Lannister guardsmen strode in, their faces tense.
"What is the meaning of this?" Cersei demanded, her composure cracking. "We are at breakfast."
"Your Grace," the lead guard bowed. "You said to bring word at once if there was any change in the Stark boy's condition."
Cersei's mask slipped entirely, a flash of vicious hope in her green eyes. "Oh? Did the boy finally die?"
"No, Your Grace." The guard shook his head. "He woke up."
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