Grover Tully

Ser Elmo Tully froze in place. He admitted he had been careless.

Advising a crown prince on how to choose a White Knight?!

He, too, longed to live as heedlessly as his grandfather, just once.

Fortunately, Prince Baelon did not grow angry. He was as broad-minded as the rumors claimed!

The prince gave a gentle smile. "I will tell my father."

Just then, a small cart rumbled into the Red Keep's inner courtyard.

Ankatu Mork, the smithy owner dressed in bright yellow silk, jumped down from the cart and jogged over to greet him.

White teeth flashed amid his brown beard as he whipped the linen covering off the cart. "Prince Baelon, these are all the helmet designs our shop has!"

Dozens of helmets in different styles gleamed white in the sunlight.

Baelon immediately spotted a bucket-shaped great helm, pitch-black, with a straight spike on top.

Cold and heavy, it radiated a chill.

"No breathing holes?" Grover Tully leaned closer, squinting as he looked it up and down.

"Of course there are!" With a deft push of Ankatu's thick fingers, the visor clicked open upward.

Beneath it was another visor, densely covered in small round holes.

"I specially made this helmet with a double visor!" Ankatu explained proudly.

Baelon examined it from every angle before regretfully setting down the imposing bucket helm with its maximum protection.

It suited neither Vermithor nor him.

Flying high on dragonback while wearing a bucket helm could make breathing difficult.

A dragon needed enough space around its face, both to breathe dragonfire and to protect its eyes.

Vermithor had few options.

At first, Baelon had intended to combine designs similar to an armet and a bucket helm, with the side plates secured by pins so they could open fully.

A dragon did not need a visor, only the front of the helmet covering its eyes, leaving a narrow slit.

Baelon worried that Vermithor's eyes might not adjust to the view through the helmet's narrow slits.

But after discussing it with Ankatu, the two finally settled on a design for an eye guard, constrained by Vermithor's prominent horns.

They would forge the eye guard from steel, with a narrow slit down the middle.

"Don't worry. With me here, Vermithor won't attack anyone."

He reassured Ankatu, whose thick arms had begun trembling involuntarily upon learning that he would have to take Vermithor's measurements.

He looked toward Lord Grover. The old man was picking through the helmets, his face full of disdain.

Grover shook his head and said dismissively, "Plain... far too plain..."

No wings, no gilding, no gems...

Baelon said farewell to the two members of House Tully. Ser Elmo inwardly sighed with relief and hurriedly bowed in farewell.

But the next moment, his grandfather's voice rang out.

"Prince Baelon!" Lord Grover Tully stepped closer. "I hear we're going to war with the Stepstones?"

He smiled. "Fortunately, I brought my armor with me on this trip to King's Landing."

Baelon's eyes widened slightly.

Wait.

What did you bring armor for?!

"Grandfather!" Ser Elmo exclaimed in surprise.

Grover seemed to notice their surprise. "Prince, I am still the strong man I was back then. My knees are still sturdy!"

"I had intended to put on my armor and enter one last tourney. I even thought up an assumed name!"

"Greyfish," he said cheerfully. "The mystery knight Greyfish!"

"Perhaps, with the Warrior's favor, I might even win the tourney!"

Baelon: ...

His gaze swept over the old man's wrists, little more than skin and bone.

The most likely outcome was that Lord Grover's lance would break, some knight would unhorse him, and... he would die.

He gave the pained-looking Ser Elmo a sympathetic glance.

So it was not only House Targaryen that was mad. The other houses of Westeros were no less so.

Lord Grover grew serious. "But I never expected us to go to war with the Stepstones, or that I could have such an honor in my final days."

"Honor?" Baelon repeated.

Grover Tully chuckled. "I already intend to ask the king for the honor of going to the very front."

Let him grip a sword with the last of his strength, fight gloriously alongside countless knights, dance with dragons, and spend his twilight years in service to his king.

Grover Tully narrowed his eyes in contentment. Whatever happened afterward, he would accept it without a single regret.

Baelon looked toward Ser Elmo, who lowered his head and said nothing.

Baelon could only speak up himself, trying to persuade him. "Lord Grover, the Seven have granted you wisdom tempered by the years. You could direct the troops and arrange their formations from the rear."

Rather than wielding a lance in battle like a young man relying on youth and valor.

"That would also be..."

"Prince." Grover's gaze was calm. "I understand."

"I am old now. Things are not as they once were, and I no longer have the strength of my youth."

But the old had their honor, too.

"Before my life ends, I think I can still do something, still accomplish some deeds."

Baelon sighed.

The people of Westeros were always like this.

They treated life and death lightly, insisted on their own way, and refused to listen to reason.

Viserys, for instance, had said he would add seventy-seven Dragonkeepers to watch Vermithor.

There really were seventy-seven, not one fewer.

Baelon led Ankatu into the ring of Dragonkeepers.

Ankatu spotted what looked like an undulating mountain range from afar. The closer he came to the dragon, the weaker his legs grew.

Vermithor slowly raised his head and opened his mouth with a low growl.

Ankatu stumbled back several steps and fell onto his backside.

"Never mind. Stay here and tell me how to take the measurements." Seeing this, Baelon did not insist.

Fear of dragons was only human.

Meanwhile, elsewhere.

The Godswood

To the houses south of the Neck, the Godswood was a bright garden.

As for the Heart Tree at its center, in southern castles that worshipped the Seven, a weirwood was less welcome to the cooks than the mint and rosemary growing on the grass.

Mint could at least add flavor to soup, while a weirwood's blood-red leaves were utterly useless.

In the shade of a tall redwood, Rhaenyra lay with her head in Alicent's lap, quietly listening as she read the ending of Nymeria's story.

Alicent's gentle fingers combed through Rhaenyra's silver hair. "You seem a little unhappy today?"

"Is it because of your brother?"

Alicent looked at Rhaenyra with pity.

Baelon had a seat on his very first day attending the Small Council, while Rhaenyra did not have a chair of her own.

Was it because Rhaenyra wore skirts?

Rhaenyra shook her head.

"No."

She silently twirled her hair, unwilling to say more.

Alicent took Rhaenyra's hand. "We share everything. We swore in the sept never to forsake each other. Tell me."

"Let me share your troubles, just as I have all these years," she said earnestly.

In the Red Keep, in the sept, in bed, there was nothing they did not talk about.

Rhaenyra stared at a mint plant, her voice drifting. "I just feel..."

"In this entire court, I'm the only one who still remembers her."

"My mother."