Chapter 24: A Wedding of Lions and Roses

Chapter 24: A Wedding of Lions and Roses

299 AC

The waters of Blackwater Bay, once a churning cauldron of green fire and black death, now lay placid under a weak autumn sun. The carrion crows had feasted, the funeral pyres had burned out, and the city of King's Landing had awoken to a new reality. The war for the capital was over. The war for its carcass had just begun.

From his silent, sun-drenched study in Braavos, Damon orchestrated the city's recovery with the detached precision of a master puppeteer. The first ships to breach the broken chain and arrive at the city's docks were not flying the banners of any great house. They flew the simple, unassuming sigil of the True Tide Development Group. They were Damon's ships, laden with Damon's grain, and their arrival was a masterstroke of public relations.

His agent, Kael, oversaw the distribution. There were no handouts. The Bank of Westeros, in a gesture of civic responsibility, issued food credits to the starving populace. Every citizen was registered, their details noted, their gratitude recorded. Damon was not just feeding the city; he was conducting a census, building a database of the city's most desperate souls, and indebting them to him with every loaf of bread.

In the bank's boardroom, which Damon attended as a silent, invisible phantom, Silas proposed the next phase to the Small Council.

"My lords," Silas announced, his voice resonating with a confidence Damon projected directly into his mind. "The city is saved, but the treasury is empty. The infrastructure is shattered. To rebuild, to truly secure the King's Peace, requires capital. Therefore, the Bank of Westeros proposes the issuance of 'Royal Reconstruction Bonds'."

He laid out the terms. The bonds would be sold to lords and merchants across the realm, a patriotic investment in the new era. The bank would administer the entire program, and the bonds would be secured by liens on the future tax revenues from King's Landing, Lannisport, and Oldtown. It was a financial coup dressed in the noble robes of civic duty. Jon Arryn would have agonized over such terms. The new Hand, Lord Tywin Lannister, a man who understood debt as a weapon, simply saw it as a necessity. The proposal was approved.

Tywin Lannister was now the undisputed master of the Seven Kingdoms, the Hand of the King, the Savior of the City, the father of the Queen-to-be. He was at the absolute apex of his power. And it was at this precise moment that Damon chose to remind him who held the leash.

He arranged a meeting, a summons from the Hand to the board of the Bank of Westeros. Damon 'attended' the meeting in the Tower of the Hand, the air in the room still thick with his predecessor's austere presence. Tywin Lannister sat behind his massive desk, a golden lion in his natural habitat.

"Lord Elyas," Tywin began, his voice the low growl of a predator who believes himself secure. His eyes, however, were fixed on Silas, the bank's chairman. He was dismissing Damon's public persona, a deliberate slight. "The bank has performed its duty to the Crown admirably. Now, as we enter this new era of peace, the Crown will require a more… formal relationship with its financial institutions. We will be restructuring the terms of the royal loans, lowering the interest rates to a more sustainable level."

He was dictating, not negotiating. He saw the bank as another tool, another vassal to be brought to heel.

Damon focused, feeding Silas his lines, bolstering the man's spirit with a telepathic wave of cold, unassailable confidence.

"My Lord Hand," Silas said, his voice shockingly firm. "The Bank of Westeros is a private institution, chartered by the Iron Throne, not a servant of it. Our terms were agreed upon in a time of crisis, a crisis the bank's stability helped to resolve. To alter those terms now would be to default on the Crown's own sacred word. It would send a message to our international partners that the new regime is no more reliable than the last."

Tywin's eyes narrowed. The puppet was speaking with its master's voice. "Are you refusing the command of the Hand of the King?"

"I am reminding the Hand of the King that the security of his reign rests upon the security of his credit," Silas countered, the words flowing from him with a fluency he did not possess. "And the bank's security rests upon its contracts."

It was a stalemate. A battle of wills. Damon decided it was time to deploy his ultimate weapon.

Present the geological report, he commanded Silas.

Silas, his hand trembling slightly, pushed a heavy, leather-bound folder across the desk. "My Lord Hand, there is another matter. A confidential report from our joint venture, the Golden Lion Mining Corporation."

Tywin opened the folder. His face remained a mask of stone, but Damon, with his senses extended, felt the catastrophic psychic impact as the Lord of Casterly Rock read the meticulously fabricated report from Maester Arlan. He felt the cold shock, the volcanic, suppressed rage, and the sudden, horrifying understanding of his own vulnerability. The report was a death sentence for the myth of Lannister wealth, declaring the ancient mines unstable, worthless, and a threat to the land itself.

"A tragedy," Silas said, his voice dripping with false sympathy. "But the bank is prepared to help its most valued partner. We propose to absorb the now-worthless assets of the old mines. We will take on the immense cost of decommissioning them, a service to protect the Westerlands. In exchange for this service, and to ensure the continued profitability of our new ventures, we will require a majority controlling interest in the Golden Lion Corporation."

The room was silent. Tywin Lannister, the man who had brought a kingdom to its knees, was being checkmated by an accountant. He was being offered a bailout, a secret deal to hide his house's shame, at the cost of surrendering the last vestiges of his economic independence. He was trapped. Damon felt the lion's pride roar in defiance, and then, the cold, pragmatic submission. Tywin would not allow his house to be exposed. He would pay any price to maintain the illusion of gold.

"Draw up the papers," Tywin said, his voice a barely audible rasp. He did not look at Silas. He looked past him, as if seeing the invisible puppeteer who stood behind him.

The new order was cemented with a wedding. The Tyrell-Lannister alliance, the pact Damon had forged in the chaos of Renly's death, was to be sealed by the marriage of King Joffrey to the beautiful Margaery Tyrell. The city, still scarred from the battle, was commanded to celebrate.

Damon, in his guise as the reclusive Master Damon of The Atelier, sent a series of extravagant betrothal gifts. A bolt of shimmering cloth that seemed woven from moonlight for Margaery's wedding gown. A vial of perfume for Joffrey, scented with blood orange and black pepper, a scent both regal and cruel. Publicly, it was a gesture of loyalty. Secretly, it was an invoice. The wedding, Damon knew, would be the most expensive event in the history of the Seven Kingdoms, and the Bank of Westeros would finance every last golden plate and silken banner.

He also arranged a private consultation with the Queen-to-be. Margaery Tyrell arrived at The Atelier, a vision of youthful beauty and charm. But Damon's telepathy looked beneath the surface of the smiling rose and saw the sharp, clever thorns beneath. He felt her ambition, a cool, controlled fire, so different from Cersei's hot, needy narcissism. He felt the guiding hand of her grandmother, the Queen of Thorns, in her every word and gesture.

"Master Damon," Margaery began, her voice like honeyed wine. "Your gifts are as legendary as your skill. All of Highgarden speaks of you."

"A flower as rare as yourself deserves to be set in the proper garden, my lady," Damon replied, playing the part of the fawning artist.

They spoke of fabrics and fragrances, but Damon was conducting a deep, psychological reconnaissance. He sensed Margaery's genuine desire to be loved by the people, not just feared. He also sensed her clear-eyed understanding of the monster she was about to marry. She was a far more sophisticated player than Cersei, and potentially a more dangerous one.

As they spoke, he noticed a vase of perfect golden roses on the table, a gift from her family. One of the flowers was beginning to wilt, its petals curling at the edges.

"Power, like beauty, is a fragile thing, my lady," Damon said softly, his eyes meeting hers. "It requires constant care and… the right environment… to truly bloom."

As he spoke, he focused a tiny, invisible thread of his telekinetic will on the wilting flower. He did not lift it or move it. He simply channeled a faint, vital energy into its stem, encouraging the flow of water, reinforcing the cellular structure of its petals. Before Margaery's astonished eyes, the wilting rose seemed to drink in an unseen light, its petals uncurling, its head lifting, returning to its full, perfect bloom.

Margaery's smile did not falter, but Damon felt a jolt of shock and wonder from her, a sudden, sharp intake of her mental breath. She didn't know what she had just seen, but she knew it was not normal. It was a small, inexplicable miracle. A display of power disguised as a parlour trick. He had just marked himself in her mind, and in the mind of the grandmother she would surely tell, as a man of mysteries, a man far more significant than a simple perfumer.

The city prepared for its wedding, a feast for lions and roses. But Damon was preparing for the inevitable fallout. He knew Joffrey's cruelty and Margaery's ambition could not coexist for long. He knew the Tyrells, led by the shrewd Olenna, would not suffer a monster to sit on the throne next to their beloved rose.

He sat in his Braavosi study, a world away. The game board in Westeros was reset. The alliance he had built now ruled the kingdom. The great Lord Tywin was now, for all intents and purposes, his employee. The future queen was now aware that he was something more than he seemed.

He had won the war. He had won the peace. And now, he would profit from the fatal intrigues of the wedding to come. The lords and ladies of Westeros believed they were celebrating a new beginning, a new dynasty. Damon knew they were merely guests at a feast he was hosting, and the most expensive courses had yet to be served.