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The King stared at him. Duncan stared back. He wondered if it grief or the weight of his station that had aged him?
“When I said even a farmer would struggle with such a disposition, I did not mean that as challenge,” was the first thing King Baelor said.
A snort filled the air. Duncan had not mean to make such a noise though.
The King glared up at him. His lips did not so much as twitch upward. “Though considering the circumstances, I see you have not fully committed yourself to such a life.”
He wanted to shift on his weight. Duncan did not though. To do such a thing would plainly declare how uncomfortable he was. The truth of the matter was, yes, he was uncomfortable with this topic but better this topic than Great Spring Sickness. It had been many fortnights since Duncan had woken up in Ashford Meadow. He still did not have the words to explain just what-
“I believe the Seven Kingdoms are safer because of that.” King Baelor acknowledged and such words made Duncan’s stomach twist.
Abruptly, it was difficult to look at the King. Duncan’s eyes darted elsewhere.
“You exaggerate,” Duncan muttered only to then wince. It was the truth but King Baelor was not the king Duncan had once served for many years. The leeway afforded to him by Egg was not inherently-
“Most would not tell a king he embellishes.”
Duncan finally looked back at the man. “Would you prefer I lie?”
A head cocked. The crown that graced the King’s head did not move at such a motion. “Tell me then, Ser Duncan. If I asked you to explain the warning you gave me before I left Ashford Meadow would you be honest in your reply?”
“You would think me mad,” his words came out quiet.
“I think in a world full of injustice many people think you mad but still you carry on. Why should this be any different?”
“Not just mad,” Duncan said. “Dishonorable as well.”
The King’s lips thinned. “You killed a man who sought harm to my nephew.”
“Murdered,” Duncan corrected instead of admitting the noble had harmed Egg. It wasn’t his place to confess such things.
King Baelor’s gaze sharpened. “In what world would I find you dishonorable when you killed a man who kidnapped Aegon?”
He said it again; killed. He said it like he had the right to wipe away anyway not only the blood on Duncan’s hands but any guilt he might be carrying. Perhaps in King Baelor’s mind, he did have such a power. Duncan would not waste time arguing over it - best to leave such subjects to measters and scholars for they were far more knowledgeable than Duncan could ever be - especially when the truth of matter was Duncan did not feel any guilt. Not then. Not now.
“I lied,” Duncan confessed.
The King blinked. The surprise on King Baelor’s face did not last long. It was gone after Duncan himself blinked. The King began to fiddle with one of his rings. He wore more now, Duncan observed after glancing down at the man’s fingers. They were long fingers. Likely calloused fingers considering all the battles and tourneys the man had taken part in.
“You lied?” King Baelor repeated, words pronounced slowly as though to give Duncan a chance to interject and correct him. There would be no such interjection. It was truth of matter: Ser Duncan the Tall was liar. He was no knight. He was just a liar in his old life and in this new one the gods had either decided to bestow to him as a blessing or a curse.
“I am no knight.”
There was silence. King Baelor was staring at him with expression Duncan could not begin to try and describe. He was no poet after all.
“I aware you lost your title at Ashford Meadow, Ser Duncan.”
And yet the King still referred to him as such.
Duncan’s lips thinned. “I was never a knight.”
There were no words that came out of King Baelor’s mouth. Not for the first time during this conversation, Duncan felt the urge to shift his weight. He did not give into such an urge. He stood as solid and unyielding as tree. If he had blood on his face perhaps he might be mistaken as man mimicking a Weirwood tree.
When King Baelor finally spoke up, it was not what Duncan had expected. “Did I so poorly explain a trial by combat the first time I discussed it with you?”
Duncan’s eyebrows drew together.
“What?” He asked, feeling stupid.
“A man need not be a knight to pertain in trial by combat,” King Baelor explained. He did not raise his voice but Duncan could see the agitation in his face.
Duncan blinked. He still felt disoriented, as if he had fallen off his horse and the world was spinning while he struggled to get up. He had known that. Why was King explaining this? “I knew that.”
The words did not bring any comfort to the King of the Seven Kingdoms. “Yet you did not challenge Aerion to one.”
Duncan looked up. He could not see the sky but he wished the Seven - or any god truly - would grant him temperance. Even after a season had passed, King Baelor had not let this matter be dropped.
Like a hound he was, Duncan thought only to then twist his mouth. It was inappropriate thought. One he would never say out loud least he wanted trouble. For all that King Baelor was a kind man, even he had to have a snapping point in regard to the leniency he bestowed Duncan.
“You do not deny my words.”
Duncan raised a hand. He rubbed his face, feeling more worn out from this than the injuries he had sustained from rescuing Egg and the other boys.
“I was never a knight, Your Majesty.”
“Do not,” King Baelor swiftly commanded. He was still fiddling with one his rings.
The King did not elaborate on just what he was wanting Duncan to refrain from and so Duncan asked, “Do not what?”
“You have not referred to me as such this entire conversation. I see not point in you starting now.”
It was good thing Maeker was not in this room. The prince would not take well to Duncan discarding titles - disgraced hedge knight or not - much less King Baelor giving Duncan his blessing to.
Instead of acknowledging the decorum King Baelor was giving him permission to neglect, Duncan simply got upon his knees, like a man before a sept or a Northern before their Weirwood tree. “I was never a knight.”
After he spoke, King Baelor’s expression became an admonishing state. Such an expression had reminded Duncan of the child Egg had named after him. Perhaps it should not shock him that King Baelor favored his great nephew. The Prince of Fireflies had inherited his mother’s dark hair instead of his father’s hair coloring.
“And?” King Baelor asked. He was fiddling with his rings. He had rings on more than one finger. Not for the first time, Duncan wondered how truthful common folk’s conversations were about the King taking on a new wife.
Duncan tried to shallow. His mouth was too dry. “I lied.”
“My ears are not deaf, Ser Duncan,” the King chided. Despite such a comment, there was no anger in King Baelor’s voice.
Duncan’s eyes darted elsewhere as though looking away from the dark haired Targaryen might lead to him understanding just what was going on.
Dunk the luck, thick as castle wall even after all these years.
Why Egg had thought him an appropriate contender for Lord Commander - much less giving the position to him - was lost on him.
“Yet you do not say anything.” The words rushed out of his mouth. Duncan bit his tongue afterwards, pain flaring up as his top row of teeth dug into his tongue. His temper had not always been this quick especially as the years he lived grew in number.
Coming back had changed him in more ways than Duncan liked to dwell on.
There was a cruelty in that - not only was he was robed of his life but Duncan did not think any gods - whether it be the Seven, the Old Gods, or some other god - cared about being accused of cruelty.
“I see before me a man who defended a puppeteer even if meant striking a prince.”
Tanselle, Duncan thought but didn’t interject. His stomach twisted though. How could a man with such good memory have forgotten Tanselle’s name when he not only remembered Ser Arlan but the amount of lances that had been broken duri-
King Baelor continued to speak, “I see before me man who was offered money to return back a boy to his mother but rejected such an offer. An offer rejected not from thinking himself incapable of such a mission after having he lost his dominant hand earlier this year but, rather, at receiving money for such an endeavor.”
Duncan’s eyebrows drew together. How did the King know he had turned down the money Anne had offered him.
King Baelor abruptly titled his head. “Though perhaps you motivated from interest in courting his mother?”
“No.” Duncan quickly said, bitting his tongue forgotten about in face of such a question.
“No,” the King repeated. His tone conveyed it was a question.
“No,” Duncan said again. He then added, “I do not see Anne in such a manner.”
“And yet you wonder why I do not care that you lied.”
There it was; finally his mummer’s farce acknowledged by Pri- no, Dunk thought, correcting himself. King Baelor. He was the King in this lifetime.
“It was dishonorabl-“
King Baelor cut him off. “You once told me you saw me as the soul of chivalry. Let me inform you that I think you are very thing you describe me to be, Ser Duncan.”
“Is that why you keep referring to me as Ser?” Duncan’s face grew hot after speaking. Likely that was exactly why King Baelor was calling him Ser.
King Bealor smiled then. He got up from where he was sitting. “Give me your sword, Ser Duncan.”
When they had taken his hand, Aerion had wanted to take possession of the long sword. What use was it to a man who was not a knight after all? Duncan had protested though. He was not to easily depart from Ser Arlan’s sword. If Prince Baelor had not been there, likely, his pleas would have fallen on deaf ears.
His heart was pounding. “What do you intend?”
King Baelor looked down at him because Duncan was still kneeling on the floor. “Do not play the fool. It does not suit you.”
Duncan shut his eyes. Abruptly, everything was overwhelming.
“How can you not resent me?” He found himself asking.
“Have I not established that you are chivalry itself if it wore flesh?” King Baelor asked. His voice was quiet as though he was unsure. Despite this, the man did not stop in his approach to close the distance between them. He continued to walk toward Duncan.
Duncan opened his eyes. “Your sons, Your Highness.”
Pain spread across the King’s face, like a blood stain that only grew larger as seconds went by.
“Will you explain how you knew about that sickness before it came to pass?”
“You would think me mad.” It, somehow, seemed like feeble excuse to voice to the King.
King Baelor came to a halt. He was standing right in front of Duncan. Like this, he looked more like a god than a man. “Let me be the judge of that.”