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Chapter 64: Chapter 44: Iron FistChapter Text

"The best rulers are those whom are as feared as they are loved."

-King Aegon III, the Stern

111 AC, Great Sept of Aemma,

"To be a Kingsguard is not just about being a fine warrior." I solemnly declared to the assembled crowd. "It is about loyalty. Determination. Sacrifice."

The last word reverberated through the Great Sept, all eyes moving to the three coffins laid down before the obsidian statue of the Stranger.

"These three knights sacrificed everything for the crown. They sacrificed lands and titles. Wealth and worldly fortune. They forswore themselves to neither take lovers nor have children for as long as they bore the White Cloak. And now, they have sacrificed their lives for their duty.

"There was great honour in the act. Ser Arrek Cargyll and Ser Errek Cargyll died valiantly in battle, fighting not for the petty squabbles of men but for something greater than that. They fought for justice. To defend the weak and to slay evil. These two brothers in both blood and arms stayed true to their sworn duty. They met the end unflinchingly. Facing the Stranger's blade with backs straight and knees unbent. They feast in the Seven Heavens now, heroes worthy of song and legend."

Their mother, Lady Cargyll wept noisily at that, dabbing at her eyes with a handkerchief of lace, held up solely by her son Lord Aenys Cargyll.

"Ser Alys Royce too, served with valour and distinction until the end. While she may not have worn the White Cloak for long, and lacked the many years of leal service the Twins gave my family, she was no less a hero. It was her sacrifice that saved my life. She willingly bore my armour and sword onto the battlefield, facing down Ser Borros Baratheon, one of this realm's most fearsome warriors. And yet Ser Alys never flinched not shied away from her duty. Even when it cost her her life."

Ser Alys' father Ser Gunthor Royce bent his head down, looking forlornly at the ground. Tears dripped onto the marble floor.

"Ser Alys gave her life so that I may live, saving me from the oathbreaker's dishonourable blow. For me, she fearlessly took the warhammer in my stead." I let a tear trickle down my cheek, sniffing once before speaking once more. "I will never forget her sacrifice for as long as I live. In this world and the next. May she find herself in a better place."

I paused.

"May they all find themselves in a better place. For they were Kingsguard, cloaked and sworn. And though their watch has ended, freed from their duty and mantle, let all remember them as among the greatest and bravest of the White Knights. Let the minstrels sing songs praising their valour. Let elders tell children tales of their honourable duty. Let a hundred thousand children dream of one day becoming knights just as stalwart and intrepid as them. Let their names and legend be carved into the annals of history, such that one day, a thousand years from now, people will still remember them as heroes!"

———

111 AC, Streets of King's Landing

"I liked your speech." Laena praised as we rode back to the Red Keep. "It was very heartening, I must say."

"I meant every word of it." I sincerely said. "I reward loyalty and good service, and those three have given me that and much more."

"About that, I apologise once again for my cousin." Laena sheepishly said. "Borros was always… belligerent, but this went beyond even my worst nightmares."

"There is no need to apologise." I smoothly replied. "Lord Boremund has already done so. As has your mother, and even Laenor. But in the end, it's none of your faults. The only person in the wrong was Borros. And he's dead."

"I know, but still… Dishonouring himself in such a manner!" Laena huffed indignantly. "I'm ashamed that we even share blood!"

"You and me both." I scoffed. "But still, there were silver linings to this tragedy. His dishonourable actions made my own seem far more acceptable in retrospective."

Strictly speaking, sending a decoy to a Trial by Combat was illegal, but there was a loophole in the scripture. So long as the decoy technically never outright claimed to be the accused, and both the accused and decoy stood on the same side of a Trial of Seven, it wasn't exactly a violation of the rules. But it was still considered rather dishonourable, and broke quite a few of the unwritten rules.

The same unwritten rules that saw the Baratheons strongarm me into a Trial by Combat, never mind that Borros was indisputably guilty.

Knights always got a Trial by Combat, even when they were obviously guilty of the crime. Sure you could veto the act, like I did, but not without causing mass discontentment in the court for not 'playing fair'.

Still… at least my emergency backup plan for getting stuck in a hopeless Trial by Combat paid off. But that was like praising the bulletproof vest for stopping the bullet, when the real problem was the fact that you got shot in the first place.

I'd have to dismantle the entire damned judiciary system.

Trial by Combat was little more than religiously glorified murder. There was no justice to be found in it, save the justice of might made right. It would have to go.

"So then what are you going to do about the Kingsguard?" Laena asked, snapping me out of my theological problems and back to reality. "Any knights you're considering?"

"I was considering Ser Harwin Strong, but then…"

"Daena." Laena laughed. "And we thought your temper was bad."

Daemon's firstborn had taken my apparent death… poorly. Her magic had burst out of her, uncontrolled, and had set the Hall of Hundred Hearths afire. Dozens of highborn had been immolated by the uncontrollable flames, and hundreds more wounded fighting the blaze. Among the casualties were most of House Strong, whom were sitting beside Daena at the time. Including Ser Harwin Strong.

Daena and Caraxes were being blamed for the fire, and public sentiment in the Riverlands was swinging against her. I'd immediately recalled her to King's Landing, and had Mysaria begin damage control, but those were only stopgap measures. My very own Master of Laws, Lord Lyonel Strong, was pushing for me to punish Daena under charges of arson and murder, threatening to resign in protest if I intended on allowing her to evade justice. So like it or not, I was going to have to hit the eldest Dragonseed with a few consequences.

"Lies and slander! The manse burned down by itself." I insisted. "It wasn't my fault!"

"Uh huh." My girlfriend dubiously replied. "The same way Harrenhal wasn't Daena's fault."

I muttered a few choice Tamil cusses under my breath before speaking once more.

"Look. I had to use a body double. I didn't expect the fallout of my apparent death to be that bad." I sulked.

"Understatement of the century, love." Laena laughed. "You killed Lord Lannister!"

"Hey!" I protested. "He was old and fat! It's not my fault his heart couldn't take the shock."

The shock of my apparent death had caused Lord Tymond Lannister to suffer a heart attack. One he never recovered from. Sixteen-year-old Jason Lannister was now the Warden of the West. He'd began his rule by issuing a series of progressive edicts, intent on reconsolidating House Lannister's eroded prestige and authority, but his bannermen were unruly and bucking his rule.

"Right. The same way it's not your fault that the Reach is in the verge of war with the Stormlands." My girlfriend drawled as I resisted the urge to groan and slump in my saddle in a most unladylike manner. I was using a muting spell to prevent even our guards from hearing our conversation, but we could still be seen.

My loyalists in the Reach were roiling at Borros' dishonour and seeking Baratheon blood to sate their thirst for justice and vengeance. Shaera had pacified them, but she made it clear that the situation was untenable. The problem was that both they and the Stormlands numbered among my supporters, and I couldn't have them backbiting at each other. Now, the Reach was as a barrel of oil, and all it took was single spark to ignite a war.

God, I swear that every time I put out a fire, three more burst into existence.

"Laena, there is no point in playing the blame game." I said in a tone that brooked no challenge. "What's done is done. All that's left is making the most of the hand we've been dealt."

"If you say so." My girlfriend shrugged. "The Realm is your problem, not mine."

We left it at that, the two of us spending the rest of the ride in silence, waving at the cheering crowds that lined the streets. King's Landing had been flourishing ever since I took over as Hand.

The bureaucracy was running smoother than ever, and all the bureaucrats that had moved into the capital were causing business to boom. More people in town meant more customers for everything from drapers to whores. Coin was circulating through the capital, enriching everyone as it passed from one hand to another.

Master of Engineering Mellos had been hard at work designing expansions for the capital, and the construction endeavours meant that there were no shortage of jobs for the people. Between the new harbour, the dredging of the bay, the Blackwater Bridge and the external districts, labour costs were at an all-time high. Unemployment was nearly nonexistent and the crime rate was the lowest in history.

Archsepton Eustace was also no less important, as I'd not been shy about setting up charities before dumping them onto his lap, to run in my name. This had the twofold benefit of keeping him too busy to rock the boat overmuch while I got to steal all of the credit. My PR ratings, already high, had skyrocketed with the charities. Patronising orphanages. Setting up daycares. Soup kitchens. Setting up hospitals and clinics to provide affordable healthcare.

Those two had already made me popular, but it was Mysaria that made me all but worshipped.

The previous Master of Whispers tended to be simply spymasters, keeping the Crown informed about the going-ons in the Realm and beyond and rarely deviating from that mandate. I mean, they dabbled in assassination and incitement of riots on more than one occasion, but by and large, were simply a surveillance apparatus.

Don't get me wrong, as an ex-member of Intelligence, I damn well knew that surveillance was an extremely important part of espionage, but there were more ways to use a spy network than merely that.

Namely, with the single worst and most deadly weapon of the Nazi Party: Propaganda.

Everywhere from Hardhome to the Arbor, the Iron Islands to the Stepstones, Mysaria's spies hired minstrels to quite literally sing my praises. And given my many achievements, even at a young age, we barely had to embellish any of the details. In fact, I'd insisted that we lie as little as possible for our propaganda, as the best deceivers were those that told the truth.

And by the looks of the cheering crowd surrounding me, I think that Mysaria had succeeded.

———

111 AC, Town Hall, King's Landing

The Town Hall of King's Landing was formerly the Guildhall of the Alchemists. A great building thrice the size of the any of the surrounding guildhalls, it was made of polished black marble and towered over King's Landing Square.

As part of my deal with the Wisdoms, I got their old Guildhall in exchange for building them the far larger Alchemist Compound in the Industrial District. I'd honestly bought it mostly because I wanted to make absolutely sure that there'd be no wildfire left in the beating heart of the capital. Sure there hadn't been any accidents, but it wasn't taking any risks. I'd rather lose a district in the outskirts than the heart of the most densely populated city in Westeros.

Of course, it was only after the Alchemists moved out that the question turned as to just what I was going to do with the old guildhall.

A few suggestions were bandied about. Some suggested that we convert the Guildhall into a hostel for the bureaucrats we'd hired, but the place was hardly fit as a dormitory. Mysaria wanted the place as headquarters for her Vice Guilds, but I felt that having a guild house for whores, gambling dens proprietors and barkeepers right there in King's Landing Square sent the wrong message.

In the end, I decided to go with Adanna Celtigar's suggestion that I convert the building into a Town Hall of sorts.

The former Guildhall was smack dab right in the middle of the capital, taking up the entire southeastern corner of King's Landing Square by itself. As such, basing the Magistrate out of it would save the supplicants the hassle of needing to travel all the way to the Red Keep when they wanted to petition the Crown, while having the added benefit of cutting down on traffic to and fro from the Red Keep.

So far, it had proved a roaring success. To the extent that I was considering raising other Town Halls throughout the city, such that the voices of the people could be heard quicker and their problems solved faster.

Unfortunately, even though a crowd of thousands had gathered in King's Landing Square, today was not going to be a day for the voices of the people to be heard.

———

Corporal punishment wasn't about the pain. Not truly. It was about the spectacle. The humiliation and the ruining of a reputation. Making an example of an offender to warn everyone else against doing the same.

In the Singaporean education system, caning was used as a disciplinary measure all the way from Primary School to Junior College, and was as ubiquitous to school life as homework, stationary and examinations.

I still remember the canings performed in my old Secondary School. Every so often, we'd be called to the school hall after school, and made to sit in lines. A desk would be placed on the stage, and we'd all know what would happen next. Public canings were only reserved for students that broke a law. And my school's policy on the matter was always to dole out the hardest possible punishment on any lawbreakers.

The discipline master would appear with the offending student, and read out a list of charges. Typically smoking. My secondary school had a rampant smoking problem. Every school toilet smelt like tobacco, and for good reason. It was known that some students would peddle cigarettes illicitly, bought by their parents to sell to the rest of the students at a markup.

The offending boy—Girls couldn't be caned—would be made to bend over the desk and present his clothed butt to the school. Occasionally, a few other teachers would hold him down and prevent him from struggling.

Then the discipline master would swing down the rattan cane. Bringing it down on the offender's buttocks. Once, twice, thrice… up to six strokes of the cane could be administered —At least, until 2017– no matter their age. Made an example of to show everyone else the consequences of rule-breaking.

I'd even seen a couple of twelve-year-olds caned for smoking. Which was utterly horrifying in more ways than one.

But what I remembered most wasn't the cries of pain or pleading sobs, but how the audience, everyone else in the school would look at the offender and laugh. The boy being caned would be a joke for the rest of the school. With even the toughest boys being brought down from the pedestals. Reputations utterly ruined. Fair game for even the nerdiest to bully.

That humiliation, more than anything else, was the point of corporal punishment. It was a deterrent to potential offenders. A reminder that not even youth exempted us from the consequences of breaking a law.

Today however, it was not children being caned, but adults. And what little mercy there was for children wasn't present.

The sentence I passed at Borros Baratheon's Trial was clear: One lash of the cane, for every person the offender wronged.

Out of the five hundred and fifty or so mutineers, all but thirty-three holdouts had knelt and accepted plea deals from me. Not counting those the Kingsguard and I killed in the Trial by Seven. Those whom knelt, I had them flogged in the relative privacy of Legion Headquarters. The unrepentant were to be flogged in front of the entire capital. Shamed in front of the mob, their reputations utterly ruined.

I would make many enemies today for this. But that was fine. Borros had shown me that I was handling them too softly. I was no longer feared. Men expecting that because I was female that I had to be nice and forgiving.

Well, time to show Westeros that I could make the hard decisions when push came to shove. Just because I didn't like to be heavy-handed didn't mean that I forgot how to bring down the iron fist of justice.

The flogging was carried out methodically. Gibbets had been set up on a raised stage in front of the Town Hall. A dozen in a row. And the mutineers were led up and placed into them. Stripped utterly bare of both their clothes and dignity, they were a sorry sight, pleading and begging to no avail. The herald would read out the crimes, and the twelve legionaries would bring down the canes on the bare buttocks of the mutineers.

I watched, stone-faced at the sight.

Unlike the audience of jeering smallfolk, I took no pleasure in the act. This flogging was a necessity. I had to demonstrate to the Realm that I would be a just and fair ruler. Willing to punish criminals and wrongdoers, be they born high or low.

I was reminded of a nice turn of phrase I read from somewhere: 'A government cannot run solely on fear, but will most certainly fall without it.'

Like medicine, fear had to be measured out and quantified. Be too soft, like Aenys, and nobody would give a damn about House Targaryen's authority. Be too hard, like Maegor, and accusations of tyranny would be bandied about.

There was a middle ground between them. That perfect balance between tyranny and benevolence, where one could get the best of both worlds without any of the downsides. Aegon the Conqueror found it. As did Jaehaerys the Wise. Viserys… well, that's why he kept me around as his enforcer and right hand woman. My father knew that he needed my iron fist to pair with his velvet glove.

I'd need a replacement for Viserys when he eventually kicked the bucket. Another good cop to my bad cop. Another velvet glove to my iron fist.

Laenor was my fiancé, but he didn't exactly have Viserys' absurd popularity or benevolence. He was respected, yes, but he was neither popular nor particularly liked. And Laena was hardly any better in that aspect. My girlfriend was a blunt instrument and while popular, wasn't loved.

I was currently considering Helaena. My baby sister was just so sweet and kind, and if memory served, she canonically grew up beloved by the population. She was also young enough that I could mould her into a Princess whom was as politically savvy as I was. A second Viserys, she wouldn't grow up into.

I couldn't fix my bumbling buffoon of a father, but I damned well would make sure that none of my siblings or cousins grew up as idiots.

Oh, the screams had stopped.

I looked down and saw that the last of the mutineers were being led down from the stage. Now it was my turn. Stepping forwards, I strode to the front of the balcony atop the front doors of the Town Hall. The crowd falling silent as I placed my hands on the black marble balustrade.

"It is not a right to be born high." I began, voice magnified by sorcery such that everyone in the square could hear me. "It is a duty.

"When a knight is anointed, they swear seven vows. They swear to be just. They swear to defend the young and innocent. They swear to be brave. To be strong. To protect all women. To keep their lord's secrets and to slay the wicked.

"Like the knights we empower and raise, the highborn are empowered and raised above the common folk. They are born with wealth and power. But with this wealth and power, also comes a duty.

"As Prince of Dragonstone and Hand of the King, it is my duty to be just and fair when dealing with my subjects. In times of peace and plenty, I am to be my subjects' patient shepherd, and keep the flock fed and sated. In times of war and conflict, I am to be my subjects' sword and shield, to slay those whom would do them harm and protect those whom cannot protect themselves. And, gods forbid, in times of plague and madness, I am to be my subjects' warden, quarantining them such that the taint may not spread.

"This is not only my duty, but that of every lord and lady in Westeros, from the highest royalty to the lowest landed knight. They whom are raised high, are obliged to protect those beneath them."

I turned a baleful glare at the mutineers, my indigo eyes piercing into them, the naked men flinching under my gaze.

"These men have failed that duty." I denounced, voice like the nail of a coffin. "They were abusive to those they saw as beneath them. Committing acts of insubordination, violence and treason. Thinking that they were above laws and consequence because of their high birth. I will not allow such injustice. I will never allow such injustice.

"Let this be a lesson to all whom live and breath in the Realm, from the highest of the highborn to the lowest of the lowborn. None are exempt from the Laws of the Crown and Realm. If anyone breaks a law, they had better be prepared to face the consequences. 

"Today was but the start of their punishments. On the morrow, these men will depart our shores for the Stepstones, where they will serve out the rest of their sentence. They will toil in the quarries day and night, and stand shoulder-to-shoulder with the scum of society. And by the time they finish their sentences and are allowed to return to their homes, I pray that they would have learnt humility and temperance."

I looked down upon all thirty-three mutineers.

"Because the next time that you step out of the line, it will not the Stepstones but the Seven Hells I send you to." I quietly said, voice little more than a whisper, and yet carrying for blocks.

"Get them out of my sight." I ordered, turning around and swishing my cape in a most dramatic manner as I left.

I'd practised the movement for hours in front of the mirror to get it just right. Occasionally weaving in magic to make the swish even more dramatic. Laena had laughed at me back then, but it was worth it. Oh so worth it, in the way it just lent me that dramatic presence and gravitas.

Now then, I'd successfully disciplined the mutineers, both those that knelt and those that didn't. But they were but the symptom, not the root cause. The real threat to my Legions were the families behind the mutineers. The Houses whom didn't believe in my meritocracy. Whom believed in the rule of the highborn over the low.

Snobs one and all. But unfortunately, they were powerful and influential snobs. Nonetheless, I had no less than three independent plans on how to neuter them. Five, if you counted my plans for destroying the nobility wholesale, but those were both overkill and indiscriminate. Genies best left in the lamps for the same reason as my rather lethargic anti-slavery campaign.

I didn't expect to have to bust them out this early, but it didn't matter. Every plan I made was deliberately designed to be both flexible and adaptable, such that I could modify them for a variety of situations.

Mom had made it clear to me that any plan that wasn't sufficiently adaptable wasn't a plan, it was wishful thinking. It didn't matter if it was the single best plan in the world so long as the conditions required to execute it were far too stringent for practical use.

Well, I'd dealt out the stick.

Now it was time for the carrot.

Those snobs wouldn't know what'd hit them.