Chapter 283

CATELYN STARK POV

She woke up to a blinding headache and realized that she was not in her room in Red Keep.

She looked around at the unknown room she was in and then it all came back to her.

She had come to meet Petyr in secret.

She remembered talking to him about the Prince and her daughter but she couldn't remember anything after that.

Then she thought of something and her eyes widened.

They hadn't… oh gods…

She quickly looked down and her dress was where it had been last night.

She put her hand under her breeches and found no difference.

She thanked the gods and looked around the room.

She was all alone. Petyr must have left last night when she got drunk. Gods, how could she even think that he would take advantage of her. He was her childhood friend. Who could she trust if not him.

Still, she had not returned to her own room last night. If the queen found out about this.

She shuddered at the thought.

The queen already had a hatred for her and her daughter. She had already killed Sansa's pet direwolf for the crime of protecting her from the Prince.

And the King had been too deep in his cups and whores to listen to their case and had forcefully closed the matter and dismissed them.

She did not even want to think how the queen would act if the woman found out that she was sleeping in someone else's room.

Because as much as she hated this, she knew that the Starks have no power in the South. Nor allies who could help them.

Coming here, this whole betrothal was a huge mistake but the betrothal couldn't be broken now. And she couldn't leave Sansa alone to these monsters. They would tear her naive daughter apart.

The door of the room opened and Petyr entered the room.

There eyes met and for a reason she could feel a faint memory from last night. His face was close to her own.

She shook the thought as Petyr smiled and came to her with a glass of some kind of juice.

"You're awake." He said and handed the glass to her "Orange juice. It'll help with the hangover. You were too stressed about the whole situation with the Queen and drunk more than you should have. Are your alright now?"

She drank the sweet and sour juice and nodded to him "Thank you Petyr."

He took the glass from her and gave her a smile. It looked different for some reason. Less warm.

"Don't mention it." He said "I couldn't have sent you to the Red Keep in your drunk state. So I allowed you to rest in my office. I hoped you're not as stressed anymore."

She nodded. The stress had not gone down but she didn't want to show weakness to others. Even her own friend.

"The Tourney will start in a few hours." Petyr said "You should go or the queen will notice your absence. I'll save a seat for you and your daughter there."

"Thank you Petyr" she said, wondering who was hosting this tourney.

The king himself was always too drunk for such matters and there was no hand of the king.

She looked at her childhood friend and suddenly realized that with the absence of the absence of the Hand and the King, it would fall upon the Master of Coins to look over such matters.

She smiled at that.

Petyr had come a long way from being the heir of a small keep in the Fingers to being the Master of Coins for the Crown.

After donning the makeup, she left his brothel from the hidden tunnel that led to a corridor some distance from her room in the Red Keep.

With some luck, no one would even realize that she had left the Red Keep at all.

Though once she left the Brothel, she remembered Petyr's smile and wondered why they seemed so fake…