Chapter 161: The Hand’s Web

Tyrion crossed to the sideboard, poured Dornish red, and drank it off. “I know. Arthur Greyoak. Did I misjudge him, back at the beginning? Perhaps I should have thrown him off a wall at Winterfell when we first met.” He laughed at himself, briefly. “Too late by half. The question is what we do. Tolerate his infiltration, and we are fattening a tiger. Oppose it openly, on what grounds? He is helping the North through a famine, at the invitation of its own regent. And behind him stands an integrated west and Trident and that Battanian army of his. The queen must pacify the Crownlands, rebuild this city, referee the Reach and Dorne, and manage the bankers and magisters across the water. We have neither the strength nor the pretext to fight the Vale and the west at once, while starving the very northerners who are waiting on that grain.”

“Then we answer with something finer than strength, my lord.” Varys turned, smile intact. “We cannot use force, and we cannot sit still. The queen’s justice and the queen’s authority must be seen; and the parties’ own contradictions must be set to checking one another, while the kingdom buys time.”

“Go on.” Tyrion’s eyes narrowed.

“First, the North.” One finger rose. “Her Grace issues a formal decree commending Jon Snow for taking command in crisis and pacifying the region, and appoints him Warden of the North, a proper title from the Iron Throne. It affirms what he has already done; it legalizes his power, and in legalizing, binds it to the crown. The decree defines the office: protect the borders and the people, restore production, guard the royal territory; and authorizes him to manage civil affairs at discretion and raise troops within the North against threats from within or without. It reads as delegation. It functions as the assignment of responsibility, and it stands him in the front line against the Vale’s threat and the wildling question alike. And with the second consignment of aid goes a royal envoy, chosen with care, an old lord of standing who knows northern affairs, to supervise the aid’s use, inspect the North’s condition, evaluate the new warden’s governance, and assess, in detail, the scale, nature, and effect of the western aid. Care, and surveillance, in one appointment.

“Second, the west.” A second finger. “Her Grace replies to Lord Arthur personally, thanking him for the goodwill and efficiency of his humanitarian work, appreciating his public spirit, and hoping such aid may proceed under the crown’s guidance and coordination, to avoid misunderstanding and waste. And she invites him to send a capable deputy versed in agriculture and civil affairs to King’s Landing, to join a newly created Committee for the Kingdom’s Reconstruction and Resettlement, where policies for reclamation, refugee settlement, and post-war rebuilding, for all the realm and the North especially, will be jointly discussed. His private, bilateral charity is thus lifted into public, multilateral kingdom business: honor on the surface, supervision underneath, with the Vale and the Reach watching from the gallery, and a window, besides, into his methods and his people.

“Third, the Vale.” A third finger. “Her Grace replies to Lord Baelish affirming his concern for northern security, and reiterating that Jon Snow now holds the wardenship and may be expected to manage the North’s internal affairs. She requests concrete and conclusive evidence of this wildling threat; suggests the Vale direct its concern and its musters to the security of the Bloody Gate and of the Vale itself, and to real threats from other directions,” the smile sharpened a hair’s breadth, “which the lord may take as Harrenhal if he likes; and encourages the Vale to spend its famous granaries on relief for the North, in generous competition with the west, rather than on soldiers. His concern is thus converted from a pretext for arms into a subscription for charity, with the hint attached that the queen would rather see grain cross the Neck than spears.

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“Fourth, the Reach and Dorne.” The fourth finger, and the tone acquired its edge of mockery. “Here Her Grace may be strong. Reprimand both for making war without leave and breaking the kingdom’s peace; order an immediate ceasefire and plenipotentiaries to King’s Landing, to negotiate the Marches and the Stormlands under the Small Council’s auspices; imply that refusal will be read as provocation of the Iron Throne, obliging the crown to consider further measures; and remind both that the kingdom’s enemies, the ironborn remnant, and whatever watches from across the water, have not vanished while its great houses eat each other. The queen’s authority, plus the specter of the common enemy, to force the south from each other’s throats to the table, at least for a season.”

Tyrion listened, fingers tapping the empty glass, light gathering in his eyes. It was Daenerys’s lofty arbiter’s posture converted into an actionable combination: the wardenship that honored Jon and harnessed him; the committee that crowned Arthur’s charity and caged it; the grain contest that dissolved the Vale’s casus belli and might set two rivals bidding to feed the North; the summons that made the south stand down and bought the crown its season.

“Very delicate, Lord Varys,” he said at last, with complicated admiration. “Decrees, titles, committees, negotiating tables, and encouragement: a net rewoven over the whole realm without moving one soldier. But,” he set the glass down and went to the map, and his finger crossed the North, the Trident, the Vale, the Reach, Dorne, “can the net bear the weights? Can Jon Snow balance a royal wardenship against Stark independence? Will Arthur Greyoak be content as a committee member while his hands shape the North’s new soil? Will Baelish settle for a grain contest, or go looking for a darker seam? Will Olenna and Doran compromise at the table, or recite compromises while they rearm? And,” he turned and looked at the eunuch directly, “our great reliance. Dragons win wars. Drogon and Rhaegal need rest, and no dragon ever solved a dispute over land law or made a single heart loyal. The queen must prove, and soon, that she brings more than conquest: prosperity, justice, hope. Which is the hard part. And the gold to rebuild this city, from where? Reparations from the Reach and Dorne? Voluntary contributions from the Vale and the west? Or the Iron Bank, again?”

Varys’s smile faded by a degree, and he sighed softly. “Then it is a race against time, my lord. The queen must build a working government, restore the realm’s blood, and win its people, before the powers find their new balance or drop their masks entire. Our diplomacy exists to buy that race its yards. As for gold, perhaps something may be raised from the Stormlands, from Dorne’s occupied districts, or from certain insufficiently loyal lords of the Crownlands. New dynasties have always required a certain amount of... dedication.”

Tyrion did not answer at once. He looked out the window, where the sunset was gilding ruin and scaffold alike and stretching his short shadow long across the floor. Varys’s plan was the most realistic road open; and the road was all thorns anyway; and the game of the Dragon Court had only reached its middle, where every decree, every negotiation, every shipment of grain could start a new chain of consequences.

“Then do it as you’ve said, Lord Varys.” His voice carried its weariness and, under the weariness, the old firmness coming back. “Draft the decrees and the letters. I will go to the queen. It is time the Iron Throne’s voice was truly heard in all seven kingdoms. As for how it ends, we will discover whether dragonfire can forge an order, or whether everyone’s ambitions and arithmetic drag this small new hope back down into the dark.”

Night came, and the lamps of the Red Keep lit one by one, and the capital that had just changed hands settled from its brief bustle into a deeper, storm-gathering quiet, while in the Tower of the Hand, by candlelight and murmur, a great game played with decrees, letters, tables, and hearts pushed quietly toward its next crest.