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"Oi!" a voice called behind him, but Jaime didn't slow. The beach, he had to get to the beach. It had been so long since he walked the streets outside the keep, was it that lane that led down to the docks, or did he need to cut across the alley? At least he was away from the crowd, now.
"Oi, you," the man said again, and a rock hit Jaime between his shoulder blades.
Jaime half-turned without stopping. "Do you fucking mind?" he demanded, and then his racing heart began to beat yet faster, because it wasn't one ill-mannered peasant following him, it was four, and all of them looked just as desperate and mean as every other so-called innocent in the city.
"You're the kingslayer," the churl said. From the corner of his eye Jaime watched one of his fellows reached down to pick up another chunk of paving-stone.
Under any other circumstances, Jaime would have laughed, perhaps congratulated the man on recognizing one of the most recognizable men in Westeros before cheerfully murdering the ugly prick. Now he only said, "Not today," and kept briskly walking.
The second stone hit him behind his ear, and Jaime slammed into the wall as his head snapped to the side. He blinked stupidly, ears ringing, as he slid to the ground, the rough brick scraping the stubble off his cheek. Ungentle hands turned him so he sat upright and then clutched at his arm, fumbling with the leather cuff that held his gold hand to the stump of his wrist.
"Shouldn't'a been waving this around," one of the men--how many of them were there, really? Jaime couldn't count anymore--muttered.
Didn't Tyrion say the same thing? When would Jaime ever learn to listen? He really was the stupidest Lannister, he'd have to tell Cersei when he--
The city bells began to ring, the damned dragon screeched in the distance, and Jaime passed out.
* * *
Seaworth lifted up the tarpaulin and swore.
"What in the name of--what are you doing in my boat?"
Curled up in the bottom of the boat, Jaime groaned and buried his face in his arms. The cove faced east and the sun was sinking fast, but even that little light was painfully unwelcome to Jaime's concussed eyes. "Thought I was supposed to be in your boat," he slurred, grabbing for the edge of the canvas to restore the blessed darkness.
"You're supposed to be halfway to Pentos, is what you're supposed to be," Seaworth grumbled, as though Jaime's failure to properly escape the burnt wreck of King's Landing personally offended him.
"Apologies," Jaime said. "I ran into some, ah." He stopped and then poked his naked right wrist out from under the tarpaulin, too embarrassed to relay the details.
"Did you make them fight for it, at least?"
"Not really."
"Bad business," Seaworth said with a shake of his head. "You can walk, though?"
"Not really," Jaime said again, and then gave Seaworth an apprehensive look from the shade of the canvas. "Did Cersei...?"
Seaworth shook his head. "Tyrion found her," he said, and grimaced. "She was in the dungeons when the keep collapsed."
So close, Jaime thought. And yet-- "I couldn't save her," he said bleakly. He had vomited on the way down to the cove and didn't have anything left in his stomach, but he felt he might be sick again anyway.
"Probably not, no."
They remained silent for a moment. Seaworth had the decency to look sorry, even though he probably didn't mean it, but it was more than Jaime would likely have got from any of the other Targaryen partisans.
"I don't know what to do now," Jaime finally admitted. He had accepted when he rode out from Winterfell that he was unlikely to be safe again for whatever remained of his life. He had left the last of his honor, but at least he'd had a plan. Now--now he really had lost everything.
"Well," Seaworth said, "do you want to live?"
"I'm not sure what that means anymore," Jaime said honestly.
Seaworth nodded. "It'll take some time. Do you want to go to Pentos?"
"No."
"Then you've got to go to ground."
* * *
"You must be joking," Jaime said. "It's right in the middle of the damned city."
"And yet it seems to have escaped most of the, ah. Well." Seaworth looked down at the dirty plank floor. "Besides, it's not like anyone will think to look for you here."
Jaime gazed at the ash-streaked walls of the abandoned smithy and swallowed. "Are you sure about that?" he asked.
"No, but it's the best I can do until I can have a word with Tyrion." He sighed. "If I can have a word with Tyrion."
"And what was it that he did, exactly?"
"Strongly expressed his disapproval of the sack of King's Landing in front of the entire army, I'm told," Seaworth said. "Jon Snow heard all of it, but I don't expect he'll tell anyone exactly what was said."
"It probably doesn't matter," Jaime said. "If you do manage to see him, would you tell him something for me?"
"If it won't get all three of us killed, aye."
Jaime's lips twisted in a half-smile. "Tell him he was right about the hand."
* * *
"There's a raven," Brienne said, watching from the window as the bird wheeled about towards the dovecote. "Good news or bad, do you think?"
Lady Sansa did not look up from the elaborate embroidery on her lap. "Depends on who sent it," she said. Her reaction to Jon's last message from Dragonstone--two terse coded lines arriving the day before yesterday, informing them that the Targaryen forces were to attack King's Landing on the morrow--had been to thank Maester Wolkan very graciously for bringing her the news, and then to spend half the afternoon in quiet contemplation in the scarred Godswood.
Brienne overheard the smallfolk speaking in hushed tones about the Lady of Winterfell's piety, after; they of course did not know that the Godswood was the only place that Sansa could be alone to think.
There was a small commotion in the corridor, and Podrick pushed Bran into Sansa's solar.
"Hello," Bran said. "There's been a raven from King's Landing."
"We know," Sansa replied, and then sighed and put aside her sewing. "Is there anything I ought to prepare?"
"Soon," Bran said, and then he smiled a dismissal at Pod and settled back to wait for the maester with a look of vacant contentment.
Brienne still wasn't sure she believed in the Three-Eyed Raven, but she definitely hated that look--she found it unsettling. More importantly, she strongly disapproved of the way that Bran had appropriated her squire.
In due time Wolkan bustled into the solar with a slip of parchment and a serious expression. "My lady," he said, and offered the message to Sansa. "It's from Jon."
Sansa read the message twice, eyes moving over the parchment, and then fixed her gaze on the far wall. "Daenerys has taken King's Landing," she announced in a toneless voice. "And burned half the city to the ground."
"Seven hells," Brienne said, her voice sounding faint even to her own ears. Podrick, still standing by the door, made a choked noise and then covered his mouth.
"Two hundred thousand, give or take," Bran said, answering the question that the rest of them were too shocked to ask. "Plus the soldiers and the sailors. Arya is there."
Sansa immediately abandoned her composed expression. "Is she alright?"
"Yes," Bran said. "She's with Jon. They're not happy."
"Are they safe?" Sansa pressed.
"For now," Bran said.
Sansa closed her eyes and breathed out slowly through her nose. "Ser Brienne," she said.
"Yes, my lady?" Brienne said.
"Ready what men can be spared."
"Ready for what, my lady?"
Sansa slanted an unreadable look at Bran. "I'm not sure yet," she said. "But I suspect we'll have to go to whatever's left of King's Landing."
* * *
"How could you not have told us?" Sansa demanded of Bran after Arya's raven arrived the next day.
"If I were meant to have told you, I would have done," Bran said.
Podrick and Brienne shared a panicked look, and Brienne put out a hand but stopped just short of taking hold of Sansa's arm.
"And I'm going with you to King's Landing," he added.
"Like hell you are!"
"Sansa--" Brienne started, and then gave in and laid a restraining hand on Sansa's shoulder. Surely Catelyn would forgive her for laying hands on her daughter if it was necessary to keep her from strangling her brother?
* * *
"All right, Podrick?" Brienne asked, bringing up her horse next to her squire's.
He glanced back over his shoulder at Bran. "I'm surprised how well he rides," he said. "Did you know Lord Tyrion designed that saddle?"
"I did not." The last thing Brienne wanted to do was talk about Lannisters, but she couldn't mistake the wistful worry in Pod's voice. "He was still alive when Arya sent her last. I'm sure he's managed to talk a at least a dozen Unsullied out of killing him."
"If they gave him the chance," Pod said gloomily. "They didn't seem to me like they were too fond of talking."
"I'm sure he's fine," Brienne said with more confidence than she felt. "Honestly."
Podrick sighed. "We'll know soon, I suppose."
-
When they had first ridden from Winterfell to rescue Jon Snow, Brienne had not expected to become a guest at the first Grand Council in decades. She had not expected Bran Stark to be acclaimed king, and still was not sure that Tyrion Lannister's impassioned speech really had anything to do with whom among the assembled lords was best suited to rule the Seven Kingdoms. She probably ought to have foreseen Sansa's declaration of the North's independence, but she had not really expected that, either.
But she was absolutely certain that no one expected Bran's first act as King-Elect to be to turn to Ser Davos and say, "I'd like to see Jaime Lannister now."
"What?" Brienne and Tyrion said together, both of them staring at Ser Davos.
"Ah," Davos said. "Yes, well. I was hoping to have a word about that."
* * *
"Jaime!" Seaworth yelled up to the apartment from the smithy below. "I hope you're dressed, you've got an appointment."
Jaime was not, in fact, properly dressed. He also hadn't bathed in several days or shaved in several months. "Hope it's not an important appointment," he called back, and reached for the cleanest shirt left in the chamber.
Seaworth climbed up the creaking stairs. "Oh, the King of Westeros only asked for you by name."
"We have a king again? Charming." Jaime struggled with the ties on the shirt and was uncomfortably reminded that he really, really didn't like having to get dressed when other people were around. He had attempted to replace his gold hand with an improvised hook, just using bits and pieces that the departed smith had left around the place, but as he was neither a girdler nor a smith and only had half the usual number of hands, he made very little progress.
"King Bran the Broken, or so Tyrion has named him," Seaworth said.
Jaime's fingers stilled. "Tyrion spoke at the council?" he asked. He knew that part of the reason the Grand Council had been convened in the first place was to levy the Sovereign's Justice against both Tyrion and Jon Snow, but Jaime knew what happened the last time Tyrion was allowed to speak for himself at trial. If any of the noble arses who sat on the Grand Council cared at all about Tyrion's, they wouldn't let him make the same mistake twice.
"Tyrion," Seaworth said, with the same excitement of a small child who gets to tell an important secret, "is once again Hand of the King."
Jaime opened and closed his mouth several times. "I refuse to believe you are not joking," he finally said.
Seaworth chuckled. "I wouldn't believe it, either, except that I was there," he said. "Now get moving, the King's flagship is in the harbor and the welcoming party is waiting."
* * *
The welcoming party turned out to consist solely of Ser Brienne of Tarth.
"Ser Davos," she said, clasping his forearm and smiling warmly.
Jaime she ignored. It hurt. He deserved it.
Podrick Payne, who had apparently been knighted that afternoon and was practically bouncing with excitement, opened the door to the great cabin, where the remaining Stark scions had decided to hold court.
"King Bran wishes to speak to Ser Davos," he said, ushering Seaworth into the cabin. Then he shut the door in Jaime's face.
Jaime blinked. "Rude," he said.
Brienne snorted before she could help herself, and Jaime didn't deserve to feel any kind of pleasure in making her laugh, but he felt it all the same.
"Brienne, I--" he started, but she held up a hand.
"I want to make something very clear," she said.
Jaime's mouth went dry. "Yes, of course," he said, and braced himself mentally for whatever she wanted to say.
"I thought I had forgiven you," she said. "But that was when I thought you were dead."
He looked down at his boots. "That's...entirely fair, I suppose."
"I'm not finished." She turned to look at him, then, and waited until he met her eyes to say more. "You must understand, it's not that I don't want to forgive you," she said. "It's just that I don't know why I should."
Jaime swayed on his feet as if struck--but no, a fist to the face would have been much less painful. "Thank you for telling me," he said, when he felt like he could speak again.
She shifted her weight uncomfortably and looked away from him again. "You're welcome," she said, and lapsed back into silence.
Thankfully, they only had to wait a moment more for Podrick to open the door and announce Jaime to the new king.
"Well met, Ser Jaime," Lady Sansa said coolly.
"Hello," King Bran of House Stark, first of his name, said.
Jaime made a proper bow. "Your Grace," he said. He still felt flayed from Brienne's confession, but at least he still remembered his manners.
"You've lost your hand," Bran said, frowning at the knotted cuff of Jaime's shirt.
"Ah, yes," Jaime said. "Losing it probably saved my life, actually."
"I told you," a voice said from behind him, and Jaime completely forgot propriety and whirled to face his brother.
Tyrion looked exactly like a man who had spent a couple of moons in prison--he had dropped weight that he couldn't really afford to lose, and his scars stood out on his pale face. But he had bathed and trimmed his beard and was wearing decent clothes, the Hand's brooch pinned once again to his chest.
"Tyrion," Jaime breathed, and set his hands on his brother's shoulders, too emotional to say anything more.
"We can congratulate one another for not dying later," Tyrion said, and nodded towards Bran. "The King has business to discuss."
"Yes," Bran said tonelessly, and then failed to elaborate.
Sansa rolled her eyes at her brother. "There's presently no lord in the Westerlands," she said.
"Casterly Rock belongs to Tyrion," Jaime said. "I gave up the claim a long time ago. I don't want it back."
"What makes you think I want it?" Tyrion said. "Besides, I'm going to be in King's Landing for the foreseeable future. Hardly good form for the Warden of the West."
"I don't want it," Jaime repeated, and glanced down at Tyrion. "We have cousins, if Tyrion doesn't want the responsibility. Give Casterly Rock to one of them, I'm sure whomever you choose will be extremely eager to prove their loyalty."
"Did you expect to rejoin the Kingsguard?" Sansa said.
"Why does it matter?" Jaime asked.
"Because you can't just go from being the thirdmost powerful person in the kingdom to being a nobody," Tyrion said. "The lords of Westeros would never--"
"I don't want him in the Kingsguard," Bran interrupted.
"Unsurprising," Jaime muttered under his breath. No one else appeared to have heard him.
"What?" Brienne said. "Why not?" And that, at least, was warming; at least he was still good for something in her eyes.
"Ser Brienne," Bran said, as though he had only just remembered she was there.
Brienne stepped forward. "Yes, Your Grace?"
"You vouched for Jaime Lannister before. Would you still speak for him?"
She looked at Jaime for a long moment, then gave him a half-smile before resolutely turning back to the King. "No, Your Grace," she said. "But I would let him speak for himself."