20 All Dwarves Are Not Created Equal (III)

"-. 274 AC .-"

"Lord Rickard of House Stark cut a dashing figure. He was tall of stature, solemn of countenance, mindful in every action, and bedecked in the singularly most unique apparel. His head was bare. His shoulder-length dark hair fluttered in the winter winds, tamed only by two plaits that sprung from his temples and merged together at the back into one braid. His strong hands bore no glove or gauntlet, but the rest of him was adorned in a mighty suit of plate, castle-forged steel over mail protecting him from chin to heel. The cuirass shone. The plackart gleamed. The faulds flowed into a split kilt of studded leather all the way down to the knees. And over it all, overlayed only by the man's brassarts and mighty pauldrons, was a great coat of sable leather lined with wool and suede. Its sleeves were long, the lower flaps fluttered around the angles of his greaves, its seams were stitched in double chains, and all along the front were buttons made of polished silver. They hung free and undone despite the freezing cold. Yet even in the dusk-like dimness of the winter dawn they twinkled like-"

"Like your whole face will twinkle if you don't. Stop. Narrating!"

"What!?" Boar turned on his heel with a gasp, outraged. "Is this a heathen I see before me? For shame, Whoresbane! I am describing, not narrating! Do thine virgin ears fail you even now? Do thine eyes account for nothing? Look at the man! Look at his face, his clothes, hells, look at his hands!"

"You'll get a close look at my hands if you don't stop ogling my lord right now."

"My word! The nerve! To think you'd be so disrespectful as to imply your noble liege needs you to protect his virtue! The nerve! The scandal! When I mean but to convey upon you the deepest insight into your fatherland!"

"Oh this better be good."

"His nails, you boor! They're perfect. No knife or shear can yield such firm softness. Either he's got someone around to file them down for hours, or someone's had the leisure and coin to spend on inventing some all-knew, unknown contraption to cut them down to size. Either means the North has changed enough to afford diverting time and resources, during a realm-shaking event, in winter, purely towards the pursuit of convenience. The North is turning vain."

"Vain, vain, vain!" Cried a white raven from the eaves above them, scaring ten years off Luwin's life.

He wasn't the only one. "Well that wasn't terrifying at all-oh my!"

Surprised to hear Boar's breath, of all people, being taken away, Luwin looked away from his examination of the sledhouses to see Lord Stark having finally turned his head in their direction.

Boar gave a long, low whistle under his breath that sounded nothing else but admiring. "You know what, Whoresbane, I take it all back. With a face like that I understand perfectly why savages like you would flock to protect the man. There's natural order and then there's that. Maybe I should grow a beard of my own if that's what I can look forward too. Mmm-Mmm!"

Hother gaped at the young man, completely lost for words.

Luwin carefully did not broadcast his own feelings lest anyone realise he agreed with Boar here. There was gold and silver in that there beard or he's a Dornish Prince. He was grateful Ryben was still inside the inn changing to travel wear. He didn't want to risk anyone else remarking on Hother's ruddy cheeks somehow going even deeper scarlet than they were already. That all wasn't just anger, even he could tell that much.

Which was just as well, because Hother didn't get the chance to act on it.

Rickard Stark had finally approached them.

"Six and ten arrivals," said the Warden of the North. Luwin pretended not to notice Boar's overdramatic swoon. "That's two more than I reckoned. Who intrudes on matters of the North?"

"That would be me, your lordship!" Boar said grandly, stepping out of their huddle and giving the most perfect, most grandiose bow Luwin had ever seen. "Boeryn Sand, at your service. Healer, alchemist, interpreter and orator extraordinaire! Forgive my boldness, my lord, but on hearing that all of my cellmates were being spirited away, I simply had to assess their patron for myself! Of course, I didn't expect I'd find you – your cause! I didn't expect I'd find your cause so compelling, but fate makes fools of us all these days. I offer you my services for a year and a day, if you'll have me."

"Do you now?" Lord Stark asked, giving nothing away as he beheld the Dornishman. The young Dornishman, Luwin couldn't help but note when compared to the nobleman. Boar was barely older than Luwin himself, and he'd only just turned five and te- "Hother, how do you spell his name?"

"B-o-e-r-y-n, my lord."

"Hmm." Lord Stark… did not sound appeased. "Let me see if I understand correctly. We stand here in the aftermath of the worst purge in the Citadel's recorded history. Said purge occurred from fear of what I might do worse when I got here. My journey took place because my supposedly loyal maester attempted to murder my wife and heir as part of some conspiracy. He did this using a skill in poisons he'd kept hidden. And now you come here. One among many who saw their lives ended or ruined over the past few days for being involved with all that, however remotely. You intrude on my business unasked and unlooked for. You play an exaggerated caricature of yourself in the same breath as you all but gloat over possessing the same set of skills as my wife and son's would-be murderer. And in doing all of that, you waste the precious time I could be using to instead make haste back home where my wife is dying as we speak. Considering all this and the fact that anagrams are not subtle, should we skip the theatrics all the way to the part where I take you hostage?" At a sign from the man, the half of the two hundred Stark guards loitering about came to attention, drew their swords and surrounded them. "Or would you like to recant on any of the claims you just made?"

Luwin heard and witnessed everything as if in a fog. Dimly, he noticed that Hother had all but leapt away from their cellmate and drawn a short sword from… somewhere. He didn't look like he'd expected the upset, though, any more than Luwin had. Or anyone else. The three youngest acolytes were literally clinging to Mullin in sheer fright.

Boar carefully looked around at the men and weapons surrounding them, ten of whom were within leaping distance. "I can see how my actions would invite suspicion, especially given the tumultuous circumstances of your presence here, my lord. Perhaps a beneficial compromise that would make my day and assuage all of your misgivings is not as simple to strike as I thought."

"Not even close," Rickard Stark said flatly.

"My lord," Umber said roughly. "Is it a faceless man, you think?"

"No," the lord replied. "Just a boy with more nerve than sense."

"By the Rhoyne, my lord!" Boar balked, aghast. "You needn't subject me to your cutting wit so harshly. I know when to back down."

"No you do not, or you'd have dropped the mummery well before this. Someday you will overstretch and it will kill you. It won't be a very easy death either, if you antagonise whoever it is half as much as you did a Lord Warden of the Realm. You overstep and overreach. Much like my son in that way, except he has the excuse of being but one and ten name days."

Boar almost seemed to react to that, but instead gave a put upon sigh. "Never fear, my lord, I know when I'm not welcome."

Luwin stared at Boar incredulously. How could he still make light of… whatever this was?

Rickard Stark was even less impressed. "I don't believe you. Nor would I trust your ability to live up to your claim if I did. That being said, while I can afford calling both your competence and honour into question somewhat more than you can mine, that would just be an even bigger waste of my time. Which is why I'll be writing the relevant parties about this as soon as I depart."

Boar's composure finally cracked. Not that Luwin could blame him. He'd do more than crack if someone told him he'd be contacting his parents over… whatever this was.

Wait, Boar was a bastard. Did he even know his own parents? Did he have both parents?

The matter of anagrams and spelling and hostage-taking finally stumbled into their proper pattern and Luwin could but stare at his acquaintance of two years, jaw dropped.

"… Alright then," said the Dornishman. "I'll get out of your admittedly exquisite hair, by your leave my lord?"

"Go."

Oberyn Martell bowed shortly and turned to address one last time his four 'friends.' "Alas, dear fellows, this is it for us. I enjoyed our time together! Do write to me sometime, hmm? And close that mouth, Luwin. It's unseemly."

The Prince of Dorne then promptly sauntered off.

Luwin stared after him, barely noticing the white raven following him from the rooftops while struggling to make sense of what had just unfolded. Was this why the Princess of Dorne just 'happened' to come across Boar earlier that year? Just 'happened' to hire him along for their journey to and back from that trip to the Westerlands? The triumphant satisfaction that usually accompanied the completion of a puzzle didn't emerge this time. Luwin had not expected to be deceived from that quarter. He hadn't though betrayal would feel like this. Hadn't expected to be made to feel like such a fool. A bigger fool than any maester or archmaester had managed to make him feel like. Ever.

He exchanged disturbed looks with the rest of his friends. If they really were that. Luwin suddenly felt resentment bubble inside him as well. With this one act, 'Boar' had made him question every last one of his other friendships as well.

Fucking Dornish.

He couldn't go back home to the North fast enough.

"Right then," Rickard Stark said once 'Boar' finally passed beyond the island inn's grounds and out of sight. "Whoever else is here without vouchsafing or invitation, speak now."

It was at that point that Luwin realized no one had actually told him precisely where he fell in all thi-

"That would be my companion here," Marwyn interjected, stepping up from the lean-to next to the kennels. The squat man had been playing with the sleigh dogs. Two of the wolf-like hounds jumped playfully around him even now. He pat them fondly on the head as he gestured to his tall, slightly stooped companion. "This is Qyburn."

"Which tells me precisely nothing," Lord Stark said.

"Figured you could do with the prestige of a 'real' maester to start you off, however long that lasts." When that didn't appease the taller man, the Archmaester grunted. "He's got one silver link more than I do."

What? No... That's impossible!

Lord Stark suddenly focused his entire attention on the willowy man.

The man – Qyburn – faltered at the sudden attention, but reached up to push back the hood of his grey robe, revealing a man older than everyone else present. His clothes were somewhat frayed and sewn unevenly, but that stopped mattering the moment the complete maester's chain around his neck was revealed. Luwin wished he was close enough to count the silver links in it. The man didn't seem to know what to actually say though. Instead, he reached into his worn satchel and pulled out a familiar stack of papers. "I've identified almost all of the substances here." He dithered awkwardly, then shuffled forward to hold them out to the lord. "… Most on the list probably won't be useful for what you need them, but I can see potential uses for some of the matches."

Lord Stark took the papers and skimmed them briefly before returning his attention to the man.

"There are some substances that aren't peddled anywhere in Oldtown, at least not openly. There are composites or by-products of other processes as well. I know the process for creating most of them but it should be possible to go without them, if my guess about your intended process is correct."

"And that is?"

"Bread mold medicine."

That jarred Lord Stark out of his self-possession quite thoroughly.

For good reason too, Luwin thought. Mold tea? That only ever made things worse. It was known! Whatever few cases were documented where it helped at all involved entire slurries of other compounds that happened to somehow interact with each other and-

Luwin's thoughts staggered to a halt. Compounds. Interaction.

Catalysts.

Infections.

A spell of clarity descended on Luwin's mind. No one there had fewer than two links of silver in their chain, complete or not. Was this why? Was Lady Stark suffering from an infection or plague of some sort, rather than poison as everyone had assumed off-hand?

Qyburn nodded, much more confident after having seen Lord Stark's reaction. "You mean to create a plague killer."

Rickard Stark peered at Maester Qyburn intently for a time. "And what all do you know about it?"

"I've already done it," Qyburn said.

For a moment, Luwin didn't realize what he'd just heard. The old man sounded like a smarmy lickspittle.

Rickard Stark certainly seemed astounded enough himself.

"It's not perfected," Qyburn amended after. "The results are unstable. The first set of steps of a larger process I've yet to undertake. That, I assume, is what most of the reagents you sent buyers for are meant to fix? Whoever started down this path is a genius. Let me meet them and I'll complete the work, my lord, I promise you."

Lord Stark continued to just stand there and look at the maester until Qyurn started fidgeting, before addressing Archmaester Marwyn again. "You collect interesting strays, Archmaester." The Lord glanced at Qyburn's chain. "Or perhaps not quite a stray in this case."

"He wasn't gonna last much longer at the Citadel anyway," Marwyn grunted. "He's been cutting people open while they're still alive. Oh, and he's also looking into necromancy. Speaking of which," Marwyn started to dig through his pockets as if it meant nothing that everyone from Luwin to Lord Stark were staring at him in disbelief over what he'd just thrown out there. Or, in Qyburn's case, outright horror. "Here it is!"

Qyburn reeled, tried to catch the thrown object, failed and flailed all the way to the ground to pick it up. A link. A chain link made of valyrian steel. It glinted in the pale light of winter. It glinted like a similar link already glinted on the chain around his neck, even so far away.

On noticing everyone's attention on him, Qyburn hunched on himself. "… They were none of them uwilling," he said weakly.

Luwin wondered, perhaps madly, if that even implied sanity when it could just as easily be because Qyburn didn't look like he could force anyone to do anything at all. Of course they weren't unwilling, they were dead! And what's this about cutting the living?

"Qyburn here's about as ingratiating as anyone you'll ever meet," Marwyn supplied 'helpfully.' "Take him on and let him research what he wants on his own time and he'll stick with you until he dies. Put him under someone with actual scruples and it'll all work out."

Luwin stared. So did everyone else.

Marwyn ignored them, spat a glob of phlegm to the side, staining the snow red, then subjected the high lord in their midst to the hardest gaze Luwin had ever seen on him. "Now, my Lord Stark. Let's discuss terms."

"Excuse me?"

Marwyn gave a ghastly smile, his teeth stained with the red juice of the sourleaf he chewed even now. "I helped bring down the grey rats because our interests aligned. I gave what little assistance I could to your book requisition because I wanted Hother and whoever else you won to your side to finish their studies properly. I delivered young Luwin to you because I wanted to rescue my young pupil from overzealous Hightower soldiery. And I endorsed whoever I could from these men and children because I felt them worth the trouble. But I never agreed to endorse you. I never said I'd pledge my service to you either. I like what I've seen of you so far, but first impressions sour quickly. So tell me, Lord Warden. Why should I pledge myself to you when I can have my pick of hundreds of others? Why should I back your grand ambitions when I could just retire and write my books in peace and quiet? Why should I help you break the Citadel's spine instead of leaving on another journey to the east? Why should I entrust these children with you, even? Instead of taking them with me to nurture them myself?"

Luwin had thought for days that he'd gone mad. Then he thought the world had gone mad. Now he knew with total certainty that his mad master had gone even madder than everything else in Luwin's life combined.

But instead of spite or malice or censure or rebuke, the only thing that could be heard in the wake of that brazen challenge was a free, rumbling laughter.

"Aha…" Lord Rickard Stark sighed when he was done, aware but unbothered by Marwyn's way of diverting his attention from Qyburn and the rest. "Tell me, Archmaester. Does the citadel teach anything about tooth drawing?"

Marwyn blinked in obvious surprise. "… I won't talk about that out in the open."

Eh?

"Inside then, while the young ones get ready to leave."