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GOT Chapter 99: A Council of Doubts
🕑 Added 2025-08-26 06:40:29 +0000 UTCKal’s mind kept turning in circles, even more than a week later, unable to make sense of Tywin’s actions.
So when the king put the question to him, Kal could only frown in confusion, his face a picture of helplessness.
“Forgive me, Your Grace. I cannot make sense of what Tywin Lannister is trying to do.”
Unlike the War of the Five Kings in the original tale, this siege of Riverrun under Tywin’s direct command looked like nothing more than a farce—two children playing at make-believe.
If not for the constant raids and battles of the past month, and the Lannister blood already staining his hands, Kal himself might have thought the same.
Hearing this expected answer, Robert pinched the bridge of his nose, then turned with exasperation to the man beside him—the Hand of the King, Lord Eddard Stark.
“Ned, what do you think? Is there no one who can offer me the least bit of useful counsel?”
Sitting there, Eddard almost wanted to snap back at the damned fat man: I’m sitting here, aren’t I?
After all, the price he had paid for this war was no small thing. Not only had he entrusted half of Bran’s future into another’s hands, but he had also taken the grave risk of summoning the banners to war on the very eve of winter’s coming.
Of all those present, none was more troubled—or more angered—by Tywin Lannister than Eddard Stark himself.
But clearly, he could not speak such words aloud.
So, rubbing at his temples, voice heavy with weariness, he could only reply: “Forgive me, Your Grace. For now, no one can fathom what scheme Tywin Lannister has in mind.”
At those words, Robert’s face darkened at once.
Noticing it, Eddard let out a helpless sigh. Looking around the chamber at the others, all with heads bowed in silence, he finally offered the only counsel he could—half a measure at best.
“Whatever Tywin intends, all we need do is to thwart his designs. He has no way out.”
Eddard Stark lowered his hand from his brow, his eyes heavy with exhaustion as he looked back at Robert.
“But that bastard is playing hide-and-seek!” Robert cursed harshly, slamming his broad hand again and again on the long table before him. “Damn it, I should have hired the Faceless Men to kill him—with his own gold!”
At those words, every man present twitched at the mouth, struck dumb with disbelief.
But just as the lords were exchanging uneasy glances, Kal, who had been frowning in thought, fixed his gaze on the map Robert’s hand had been pounding.
He studied the sheepskin spread across the table, his eyes lingering on the place where the Blackwater Rush met Blackwater Bay, then upon the surrounding lands of the Crownlands.
“Your Grace, could it be that Tywin Lannister actually has designs on King’s Landing?”
At Kal’s words, silence fell at once upon the chamber. All eyes turned to that spot on the map where King’s Landing was marked.
The reminder left both King Robert and Eddard momentarily stunned, before they too lowered their eyes to study it closely.
“I cannot say with certainty that he has no such designs,” came the low, shadowed voice of Lord Roose Bolton. “But even if he did strike at King’s Landing, what would he gain by it?”
His question sparked grim reflection around the table.
“There’s no profit in it. Tywin Lannister isn’t fool enough to attempt such madness,” Rickard Karstark added.
And now Eddard Stark joined the exchange. “Nor could King’s Landing be taken so easily. If he were reckless enough to try, all we’d need do is seize the chance—press him hard from behind, surround the Lannister host, and then let the great armies of Storm’s End and Dragonstone come swarming in.”
“What would greet Tywin Lannister then would be nothing but utter ruin.”
Hearing Ned’s words, the others found themselves in agreement, and their brows furrowed all the deeper.
Robert pounded the table once more, roaring in anger. “If that wretch dares such a thing, I’ll see his head hacked from his shoulders and set upon a spear above King’s Landing’s gates!”
“Seven hells, has the old fool lost his wits?”
As King upon the Iron Throne, Robert might leave governance to others, but he wasn’t so ignorant of King’s Landing as to be wholly blind to its defenses.
And as one man after another weighed the matter aloud, turning over the possibility that Tywin Lannister might indeed harbor such thoughts, the same conclusion became plain.
Whatever his true aim was, it could not be so foolish as to trap himself in a dead end.
“Indeed,” someone muttered, “Tywin Lannister’s purpose cannot be that…”
“Then what in the gods’ names is it?”
As these doubts circled the chamber, Kal’s eyes remained fixed on the map.
Some faint inkling stirred in his mind—but he could not yet seize upon the crucial piece. That, more than anything, left him troubled.
The council chamber buzzed with chatter, one voice overlapping the next, as lords speculated endlessly over Tywin Lannister’s intentions. Why had he marched such a vast host straight into the eastern Riverlands, pressing up against the royal demesne? And why had he abandoned his true stronghold, the Westerlands, with such sudden, ruthless resolve?
These riddles pressed upon every mind at the table, giving rise to wild conjectures.
But to Robert, the noise was nothing but an irritation that mounted with every word. His head felt ready to split open. He had no patience to untangle the schemes of that cunning, venomous old lion.
So he shoved back his chair, surged to his feet, and slammed his palm down hard on the long table, cutting the babble short.
“Enough! Stop wasting time on pointless guessing!”
“Listen—I don’t give a damn what Tywin Lannister is plotting.”
“All I know is my hammer tells me it wants to smash his skull to pieces!”
His complaint spent, Robert turned toward his Hand.
“Ned, you were right. Whatever Tywin’s schemes or plots, the only thing we need to do—must do—is make sure he accomplishes nothing.”
“If his rat-eaten brain has driven him to crawl into a sack, then I’ll gladly help cinch it shut.”
“When the host is rested, I want you to pursue the bastard without pause, and keep after him until his head lies before me!”
At that order, Eddard Stark—who had been pondering Tywin’s motives all along—lifted his head. His eyes first flicked across the northern lords at the table, then he rose and gave Robert a solemn bow.
“Yes, Your Grace. I will give my utmost.”
“But, Your Grace, since matters have come to this—even if we still do not know what Tywin truly intends—he has yielded his own stronghold. I believe we ought to seize the chance to send forces against Golden Tooth and garrison it.”
“And Riverrun must also be held with sufficient strength, lest Tywin’s move prove nothing but a ruse to deceive us.”
“So long as we keep our defenses in order, even if he is toying with us, we can block his retreat. And if later we continue pressing into the Westerlands, we’ll hold the ground to do so at far less cost.”
Thus, while Eddard Stark accepted Robert’s command to pursue Tywin, he also set forth the sound counsel of occupying the ground Tywin had so strangely abandoned. His thinking was thorough, his strategy cautious—meant to guard against being toyed with yet again by the Lord of Casterly Rock.
Robert listened, then cast his gaze upon him, and after a long breath, looked around at the northern lords, their eyes fixed on him with expectation.
At last he gave a slight nod and rose once more.
“Very well. But only within what we can truly hold. Keep only the numbers needed to secure the ground.”
“If Tywin’s aim is to exploit our greed, to stretch our line thin and bleed us dry, then we must be wary enough not to grant him his wish.”
Robert finished speaking, his eyes lingering on Eddard with a hint of meaning, stressing certain words more heavily than others.
Feeling the weight of the king’s gaze, Eddard Stark tensed inwardly.
If Golden Tooth were taken, and their host pressed west along the River Road to seize Sarsfield, then they would stand before Casterly Rock itself. That had been his plan all along—divide their strength and strike into the Westerlands, for he did not believe Tywin Lannister could ever abandon the seat his house had built and held for centuries.
But with the king’s pointed reminder, that plan would have to be set aside. Robert clearly would not allow his forces to be split at such a critical moment.
And as he realized this, another truth struck him: once the Lannisters were broken, the question of how the Westerlands should be dealt with would arise—and that was not something he, as the king’s Hand, ought to be taking the lead on now.
Catelyn had been right. The North was not like the South. He needed to be more deliberate in all that he did.
With that thought settled, Lord Eddard gave a firm nod.
“Your Grace, House Stark and the North stand ready to serve at your command.”
