Chapter 16: The King's Peace and the Banker's Reign

Chapter 16: The King's Peace and the Banker's Reign

284 AC

The seasons had turned, and a year had passed since the coronation of King Robert I Baratheon. The blood had been washed from the streets of King's Landing, and the realm settled into what the maesters were already calling 'the King's Peace'. It was a peace paid for with rebellion and built upon a mountain of debt, a fact no one understood better than Damon. The war was over, but his conquest had just begun.

In the heart of the capital, on the grand thoroughfare connecting the Red Keep to the Dragonpit, a new structure had risen from the rubble. It was a building of shocking, pristine white Tyroshi marble, its façade a masterpiece of clean lines and imposing columns, utterly alien to the gothic sensibilities of Westerosi architecture. It bore no sigil, only the words 'THE BANK OF WESTEROS' carved above its massive bronze doors. The building was a statement: elegant, formidable, and radiating an aura of unbreachable financial power. It was the new heart of the kingdom, and Damon was its unseen, beating pulse.

He sat not at the head of the great oak table in the bank's primary boardroom, but to the right of the chairman's seat. His public persona, the reclusive and enigmatic 'Lord Elyas', was that of the bank's founding director and largest shareholder, a man whose counsel was sought but whose ultimate authority remained veiled. The board itself was a carefully selected collection of pliable second sons from noble houses and shrewd merchants who owed their prosperity to him.

Today's meeting was to review loan applications for the great reconstruction. It was here, in the quiet, carpeted stillness of this room, that the future of the Seven Kingdoms was truly being decided.

"The petition from Lord Balon Greyjoy of the Iron Islands," began the bank's chairman, a portly former guild master named Tytos. "He requests a substantial loan for the 'rebuilding and expansion' of the Iron Fleet."

A younger director, a Hightower by birth, scoffed. "The Ironborn are pirates and reavers. To give them gold to build more ships is madness."

Damon listened, his senses extended. He felt the board's general consensus: deny the loan. It was the sensible, prudent choice. It was also the wrong one.

"Prudence is a fine quality in a shopkeeper," Damon spoke, his voice quiet but carrying an authority that instantly silenced the room. "But we are not shopkeepers. We are architects of a kingdom. Lord Balon's pride is a known quantity. He believes the old ways were stolen from him. He will rebel against the Iron Throne within the decade. It is not a possibility; it is a certainty."

The board stared at him, confused by his logic.

"Therefore," Damon continued, a cold smile playing on his lips, "we shall grant him the loan. We will fund the construction of the very ships he will use in his foolish rebellion. When he rebels, he will default. His assets will be forfeit. And the Bank of Westeros, as his primary creditor, will take ownership of the Iron Islands' shipyards, their mines, and their ports. We will let him build our future assets for us. Furthermore, the war will create instability, and instability is profitable for those who are prepared. Approve the loan."

There was a stunned silence, then a chorus of assents. The board didn't need to understand his reasoning; they only needed to understand that his reasoning always led to profit. He followed the same logic for a loan to Dorne, framing it as a necessary political gesture to soothe their anger over the deaths of Elia and her children, all while ensuring the bank gained a foothold in the lucrative Dornish trade of wine and spices. He was using the bank's charter to extend his economic tendrils into every corner of the realm, wrapping them in chains of gold.

With the bank's operations running smoothly, Damon turned his attention to his most delicate and satisfying acquisition: the final humbling of House Lannister. As Lord Elyas, he traveled to Casterly Rock. The ancient fortress of the Kings of the Rock was as magnificent and imposing as the stories claimed, a mountain carved into the shape of a lion's roar.

He met Tywin Lannister in the Lord's solar, a vast chamber with a view of the Sunset Sea. The Lord of Casterly Rock was no longer the Hand of the King, and the loss of that power had not softened him. He was harder, colder, and more dangerous than ever. But the power dynamic between them had fundamentally shifted.

"Lord Elyas," Tywin greeted him, his voice flat and devoid of warmth. "I trust your journey was satisfactory."

"It was, Lord Tywin," Damon replied, taking a seat without being invited. A small gesture, but a significant one. "I have come to review the progress of our joint venture."

The 'Golden Lion Mining Corporation' was a resounding success, because Damon had willed it to be. He had poured his own capital into it, using the advanced mining techniques he remembered from his past life—superior tunnel bracings, more efficient ore extraction, geological mapping—to create a series of productive new silver and even some minor gold mines. It was a charade, an expensive puppet show designed for an audience of one.

"Your 'Essosi' techniques are effective," Tywin conceded, the words like stones in his mouth. He despised being dependent on this upstart merchant. Damon could feel the man's cold, suppressed fury, a glacier of rage hidden beneath a frozen surface.

"Indeed," Damon said. He slid a report across the polished desk. "The new mines are producing well. However, my chief geologist, Maester Arlan, has finalized his assessment of the older lodes." He let his expression grow somber. "His findings confirm my initial fears. Casterly Rock is a hollowed-out shell. The great veins are gone. Continuing to operate the old mines is not just unprofitable; it is a catastrophic risk."

Tywin's face was a mask of stone, but Damon could feel the psychic flinch, the stab of humiliation at hearing his house's great secret spoken aloud.

"Therefore," Damon continued smoothly, "as the majority partner in our venture and as a gesture of goodwill, I am prepared to make you an offer. I will buy out House Lannister's controlling interest in the old, failing mines. All of them. The Rock, the Golden Tooth, everything. I will assume all the risk, all the cost of the necessary reinforcement and decommissioning. In return, I will provide your house with a generous lump sum and a permanent, ten percent share of the net profits from all new mining ventures we undertake together."

It was the perfect trap. He was offering to take a great burden off Tywin's hands, to pay him for the privilege of saving him from ruin. He was offering to transform a non-performing, dangerous asset into a permanent, risk-free source of income. Tywin Lannister, the proudest man in Westeros, was being offered a golden parachute by the very man who had secretly punctured his wings. The Lord of Casterly Rock had no choice but to accept. The deal was struck. Damon now owned the very source of the Lannister legend.

As a final, masterful touch of psychological dominance, Damon said, "The Bank of Westeros is expanding its board of governors. We need men of vision and experience. I would be honored if you would consider accepting a seat."

He was offering Tywin a cage of gilded prestige, a position that would give him a semblance of power while placing him firmly within Damon's own institutional structure. Tywin, ever the pragmatist, would accept. It was better to be inside the tent than out.

With the lions collared, Damon turned his attention to the secrets of the past. He knew the location of the Tower of Joy was a loaded gun waiting to be fired in a future war. He needed to control it. He dispatched an agent, a man posing as a wandering septon collecting oral histories of the war, to the lands near the Red Mountains of Dorne. The agent's mission was to find Howland Reed.

The report came back months later. Lord Reed lived in seclusion at Greywater Watch, a man haunted by the past. The agent, in his guise as a septon, had spent a week with him, listening to his stories. The report confirmed Reed's unwavering loyalty to Eddard Stark and the depth of the secret he carried. Damon now had a complete psychological profile of the man, his needs, his fears, his loyalties. The secret of Jon Snow's parentage was now, for all intents and purposes, his to deploy or suppress as he saw fit.

The new court of King Robert was a boisterous, drunken affair, a world away from the paranoid whispers of Aerys's reign. And at its center was the new Queen, Cersei Lannister, beautiful, vain, and bored. She was the perfect new customer.

Damon, as the enigmatic Master Damon of The Atelier, granted the Queen a private consultation. He entered her solar and was met with the full force of her personality. His telepathy revealed a mind of breathtaking narcissism, a bottomless contempt for her new husband, and a burning, obsessive love for the twin brother she had been forced to leave behind at court.

"So you are the man who makes old women believe they are young again," Cersei said, her voice a sultry purr, though her eyes were cold and calculating.

"I do not deal in belief, Your Grace," Damon replied with a slight bow. "I deal in chemistry. But beauty is a form of power, and you, of all women, understand power."

He had spoken her language. He spent the next hour presenting her with his creations. Not just perfumes, but a new line of cosmetics he had designed with her in mind. Eyeshadows infused with actual gold dust—"Lion's Light," he called it. A face powder milled finer than any in the world, to give the skin the appearance of flawless porcelain. Lip stains derived from rare berries that provided color without the waxy feel of common paints.

He flattered her, not with clumsy compliments, but with his focused, artistic attention, treating her beauty as a grand canvas upon which he, the master artist, was privileged to work. Cersei, starved for genuine adoration and respect, was utterly captivated. She became his greatest patron, her royal endorsement making his products the absolute standard for every lady in the Seven Kingdoms. And in their subsequent consultations, she became one of his most valuable intelligence assets, her unguarded thoughts providing a running commentary on the schemes of her father, the drunken indiscretions of her husband, and the political machinations of the court.

The King's Peace reigned. Damon stood on the balcony of his manse, which had once belonged to a Targaryen loyalist and now belonged, like so much of the city, to him. He looked out over a kingdom he now controlled in all but name. He owned its bank, its major industries, the secrets of its great houses, and the patronage of its queen.

He had come to this world with nothing but a ruthless mind and a secret power. He had used them to build an empire. The Game of Thrones, as the nobles played it with their swords and their sigils, was over. But the true game, a game of global economics and social engineering, had just begun. The dragons would return, the dead would march, and the world would fall into chaos. And Damon would be there, waiting. Not as a player, but as the house itself, ready to collect on every bet, profit from every disaster, and build a new world order from the ruins of the old. The reign of the Banker King had begun.