The Witch-King of the Vale [GoT x LotR]

King's Landing. The Small Council Chambers. 299 AC.

Tyrion Lannister.

"Enough!" Joffrey had grown tired of being ignored. " Axel Arryn is an ungrateful coward, and only blood can atone for what he's done. We will not be helping him! I've spoken!"

"You speak too hastily, Your Grace," his father began. "Threats and intimidation will never bring him to our side. A joint battle is a fine opportunity, and one we ought to seize fully."

"I will not help a traitor!!!" One more proof, if any were needed, that with every passing month the little shit grew harder to manage.

For a moment a frightening silence settled over the chamber. Only now did it seem to dawn on Joffrey exactly what he had said, and to whom. Every man has his limit of patience, but Tywin Lannister's ran exceptionally short, and the boy king had long since crossed the line with his behavior.

"The king is tired. This session is adjourned for now." His father's gaze settled on a pale Cersei. "See him to his chambers."

"I am NOT tired!!!" Despite his sister's urging, Joffrey stayed rooted where he stood.

"Maester Hobert, perhaps some draught might help His Grace sleep faster?" Tywin made a point of ignoring the tantrum entirely.

"Don't you dare talk over me! I am the king here, and I decide what we do!"

"Any man who shouts that he's king will never truly become one. I wanted you to understand that when half the realm has crowned itself."

"I don't care about usurpers!" Joffrey shouted. "I know better than to give in, or people will think me weak, just like you." "Weakness," a harder insult could scarcely be found for the Old Lion.

"We are finished here!" His patience had finally broken. "Ser Barristan, Ser Preston, take the king to his chambers." The guards began moving toward the king, slowly, without much enthusiasm.

"That's enough, I've held my tongue long enough, and I'm through with it!" Right then Tyrion felt something bad was about to happen. "Lord Tywin, you are relieved of your post. Hand over the Hand's Badge."

And Tyrion's instincts didn't fail him; the little bastard had decided to make his stand. Cersei's bewildered gaze swung back and forth between father and son. Littlefinger watched the whole show with a gleam in his eye, the captain of the Gold Cloaks tried to keep his composure, though the sweat pouring off him spoke louder than words could, and the young maester looked ready to faint outright. The king's move had left everyone present thoroughly shaken.

"You're a fool if you think you can win this war without me."

"And what help are you to me?! Under your watch the westerlands lie in ruins, Lannisport has burned twice, and for the first time in thousands of years, unbreachable Casterly Rock has fallen. A man like that can't be trusted to hold a kingdom together." For the first time, Tyrion saw his father's jaw tighten.

"Take the king to his chambers. I will not say it again." The Old Lion spoke with unmistakable menace.

"Ser Barristan, Ser Preston, are you the Kingsguard, or the Hand's?" Joffrey shot the question out at once.

Only then did Tyrion realize this wasn't going to go smoothly at all. Whether it was luck or careful calculation on the little snake's part, Tyrion couldn't say, but the men guarding the room today happened to be men loyal to the crown itself. Ser Preston Greenfield, though no shining example of knightly virtue, was without question a reliable man who held his oaths dear, and as for Barristan the Bold, there was no need even to ask. The two knights exchanged a glance, and a moment later Selmy turned to face Tywin.

"Hand over your Badge, Lord Tywin." To underline the seriousness of his words, Selmy's hand drifted toward the hilt of his sword.

A standoff had formed. His father had four guards waiting just beyond the door and could call them in, but that would mean bloodshed. Tyrion had never seen Preston fight himself, but Jaime had once called him a decent enough blade, and decent, coming from his brother, meant something closer to pretty good. Tywin's own guards were no weaklings and might well win out through sheer numbers, but Selmy alone threw off every calculation. The old man was sixty two, yet he still wielded a sword like a young knight; cutting down ten men would cost him nothing at all. The upshot: his father had no choice now but to swallow it.

"As you wish, Your Grace." The Hand's Badge was tossed down onto the table.

Of one thing Tyrion felt certain: his father would not let this rest, and would find some way to put his overreaching grandson back in his place. That much was fact. But for now, Joffrey's loyalists found themselves without a leader, with no other figure of real authority left standing. The dullest among them would genuinely believe the Great Tywin Lannister had been cast aside for good and start stirring within their own ranks; the shrewder ones would simply watch and wait to see how things played out in the Red Keep; and the most cunning of all would try to seize the empty seat and strip the lion's house of its influence entirely. The competition to come would be fierce indeed.

For the Giant of Lannister, the situation was, as ever, a double edged thing. Tyrion, to put it mildly, held little love for his father, and the sight of his humiliation was sweet as honey pooling in his stomach. The image of him grinding his teeth was the finest thing he'd witnessed in a decade. But other considerations weighed on the moment too. His father had never loved him, yet of late had come to value his word and ensured he was shown proper respect by others, while Joffrey and Cersei despised him with a burning passion, and what might cross the minds of two fools like that was a question well worth asking, though Tyrion had no wish to learn the answer.

Unfortunately, there was no keeping such a thing quiet. By evening, the whole castle knew what had happened. There would be no quietly, peacefully putting the overreaching boy back in his place now, not with news of the Old Lion's dismissal already spreading like wildfire. It was a delicate question of "power." In private, Tywin could speak to his grandson however he pleased, but in public he was bound to show proper deference. And if any lord, even the Old Lion himself, was seen openly putting the king in his place before others, the crown's authority would sink to the very bottom. Allied lords would simply conclude the Lannisters had begun fancying themselves kings, and rebellion would follow. In the middle of a war, that was as good as a death sentence.

Before long, the Red Keep would become a disturbed anthill. Of that much, Tyrion felt entirely certain.

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