Catelyn raised her eyes again and carefully studied Viserys's handsome face. He was far better-looking than her former love, Brandon, who had been an experienced womanizer himself. Even Rhaegar, whom women all across Westeros had adored, could not compare.
She could see no hollow courtesy in his expression. He was serious. Catelyn suddenly realized that this new Targaryen king might truly be nothing like his father Aerys, who had been notorious for his madness.
She had witnessed the Mad King's paranoia and suspicion. Beneath the calm of the man before her, however, lay a pragmatism that bordered on ruthlessness, yet he still retained a measure of human warmth.
She gently raised her hand and swiftly brushed her fingertips across the corners of her eyes, wiping away the faint moisture. "Whatever the case, thank you for your help," she said gratefully.
She was beginning to feel that her daughters had judged him correctly, but she also knew how captivating Viserys was, just as Rhaegar had been all those years ago. She only hoped things would turn out well for her daughters in the end.
In the pause after Catelyn finished speaking, Robb Stark, the equally young new Warden of the North who had been silently watching all along, seized on the slight shift in the atmosphere her words had created.
He set down the lamb rib he had been holding, gnawed clean of meat. The bone struck his plate with a sharp clink.
He carefully wiped the corners of his mouth with a linen napkin, his movements carrying that deliberate effort to appear dignified peculiar to young nobles. Then he straightened his back and turned the blue eyes he had inherited from his mother toward the head of the table.
What flickered in his eyes was not his mother's worry, but