Viserys turned to the silent Duke Arthur and asked, "Arthur, how do you think we should handle the Citadel?"
The question left Arthur speechless. He had never expected Viserys to discuss this subject with him.
Although he had learned and improved a little under Viserys's constant pressure since choosing to follow him, he still preferred solving problems with force rather than thought.
He was already barely managing his duties as duke of Free Bay Province, a position Viserys had given him, and even that was only possible with the help of the people Viserys had assigned to him.
Still, after thinking for a while, he hesitantly said, "Your Majesty, the Citadel is, after all, the oldest center of learning in the Seven Kingdoms. It holds all the knowledge of Westeros. At the same time, the maesters it assigns are closely involved in the daily lives of every noble family. If we act rashly, we will certainly face a great deal of opposition."
"You're right."
Viserys nodded and said, "But we can't do nothing, either. We can secretly spread word among the great noble houses that the Citadel has been controlling all their livelihoods from the shadows. Once those nobles realize what's happening, the Citadel will lose their trust and become a tree without roots."
He paused, then continued, "Once I have fully united the Seven Kingdoms, I will go to Oldtown myself and root out this cancer on Westeros for good."
Duke Arthur merely nodded at those words and said nothing more, but a complicated look still flickered in his eyes. It held both approval of Viserys's foresight and concern over the continent's future.
After all, the Citadel had spent thousands of years building its tangled web of influence. Shaking its foundations would be no easy task, even if dragons