Chapter 253 - Joffrey's Bed — The Conversation
In Joffrey's bedroom, the candles had burned more than halfway down, wax pooled thick in the copper tray beneath them.
A curled hair clung to the corner of Drogo's lips. As he leaned in to kiss Margaery, she raised two fingers and pressed them gently against his mouth.
"That's not clean," she said. Her breath hadn't steadied yet. "Rinse first."
Drogo ignored her.
He caught her wrist and pressed it against the wall. His lips covered hers, his tongue pushing inside, carrying something close to savage possession.
They made it to Joffrey's bed still kissing.
It didn't take long. Her whole body went rigid for one sharp moment, then released. She slumped against his chest, breathing hard, each breath short and fast.
When she'd rested, Drogo lifted her and carried her to the window.
King's Landing spread out below them in the dark, the city pricked with firelight. The Tyrell forces were advancing alongside his cavalry, hunting the Lannister remnants down street by street. The sounds of killing drifted up through several stories of stone.
Margaery pulled his hand over and pressed it flat against her chest. Her voice still had that unspent warmth in it. "Why did you reward Cersei Lannister?"
"Reward?"
"You had her comfort the whole army. That's a reward." She tilted her head slightly and smiled.
Drogo smiled back, the kind that meant he understood and wasn't going to explain. He drew his hand free from hers and settled it on the curve of her waist instead.
"Turn around."
Her toes curled against the cold stone floor.
He turned her with a hand at her waist. She braced both palms on the windowsill, leaning slightly forward, watching the distant fires drift and flicker in the dark.
His movements were simple and direct. She bit her lower lip. A few strands of hair stuck to her shoulder blades.
Outside, the noise went on. Someone shouted in the distance, then a short burst of hoofbeats, but those sounds were already beginning to blur at the edges of her awareness.
Neither of them spoke. The clamor outside sank into a low hum behind everything else.
The army was slaughtering. The city was burning. Fire and blood stitched themselves into the fabric of the night, and at the window the two of them were tangled together, neither willing to give first.
Only when the battle cries below finally tapered off, and the distant fires drew themselves down to coals, did they stop.
Margaery leaned into Drogo's chest and tucked her face into the hollow of his shoulder. Her breathing stretched out, slow and even.
Outside, King's Landing's night still smoldered in scattered ashes. But they had gone quiet.
---
The next morning, Drogo woke to silence.
The clamor of the city had stopped. Gray-white light filled the window. The clouds were thin, and the sun showed a narrow edge behind the eastern rooftops.
He lay in Joffrey's bed. Silk sheets. A Baratheon stag stitched into the pillow. Margaery was curled beside him with her back turned, hair fanned across the pillow.
He sat up, set his bare feet on the floor, and went to the window.
Below the Red Keep, the streets had already come back to life. Some people leaned out of doorways, looking. Others crouched along the road, picking through the wreckage for anything worth keeping.
Further out, Tyrell knights in green cloaks and the Free Army from Slaver's Bay were patrolling together, stopping here and there to talk to people along the road.
He watched for a while. Then the mattress shifted behind him.
Margaery was awake, propped up on one arm, watching him. Her hair fell loose over her shoulders. Above her collarbone, several red marks.
"Why not sleep a little longer?" Drogo turned around. "We were up late."
"You wake early." She reached up and tucked her loose hair behind her ear. Easy, unhurried. "Do you want to go see the Iron Throne?"
"Get dressed," he said.
---
When they entered the throne room, morning light slanted down through the high windows in long, narrow bands across the stone floor.
Margaery had put on a dark Tyrell green gown, the collar embroidered with gold roses, the waist drawn very tight. Her steps were unhurried and composed.
The Iron Throne rose at the far end of the hall on its high dais, the crooked blades catching the morning light in dull gleams.
Daenerys sat on it, holding Rhaego in her arms.
She wore a pale blue robe, hair braided back in a single plait. Rhaego was settled in her lap, both hands working at the buttons on her chest.
6 Kingsguard in white cloaks stood below the throne, hands on their hilts, eyes forward.
The hall held a crowd. Grand Maester Pycelle, Qyburn. Tyrell knights. Merchants from King's Landing, commoners, septons in gray robes.
They came forward one by one, knelt, and told her their troubles. Daenerys listened to each of them. A nod here, a quiet word there, her tone gentle but her answers decisive.
She was speaking now.
"...I will arrange for grain to be transferred from the Riverlands and the Stormlands. Within 3 days, the first shipment will come through the city gates."
A short man below the dais bowed low. "Thank you, Your Grace."
Daenerys nodded and moved her gaze to the next person.
Cohollo stood at Drogo's side, watching from a distance. He spoke in Dothraki. "The Khaleesi takes great pleasure in solving her people's problems. This is something she enjoys."
Margaery had her hand through Drogo's arm. "How can a woman sit on the Iron Throne? She's overstepped. The one sitting there should be you."
The bloodriders had been riding with Drogo through Westeros long enough now. They still couldn't speak the Common Tongue, but months of listening had given them most of it.
Qotho said, "The great Khal has no need for an iron chair. The Khal is a man who rides to war across the world. The saddle is his throne."
Haggo nodded and grunted.
Margaery didn't follow it. She frowned and looked at Drogo. "What did he say?"
Drogo gestured toward the throne. "She is my queen. I made a promise to give her father's Iron Throne to my son."
Margaery looked down and touched her own belly. When she looked up, her voice had slipped back into that soft, sweet register. "And our son? What will you give him?"
"My love," Drogo said. "There is only one iron chair. Unless you bring me dragons as a dowry, you have no footing to stand equal with Daenerys."
As he said it, his hand swept around her waist and gripped her hip, lifting her a clean inch off the floor. He kissed her once on the lips and set her down.
It happened fast enough that she had no time to brace for it. Her skirt swayed, her ankles hung in the air for a moment. To anyone watching it looked like the casual play of a man with his woman. Only Margaery knew how much force was in that hand.
She steadied herself and smoothed her skirt. Every emotion went under the mask, pressed flat, not even a twitch at the brow.
"You're standing in the throne room, beneath the Iron Throne. Don't you feel it? Superfluous. Insignificant. You're the one who took this city."
Drogo looked at her. His gaze settled into something heavier. His thumb pressed into her waist, neither hard nor soft, marking a line.
"Try to drive a wedge between Daenerys and me again, and I will punish you for it."
Margaery lowered her eyes and said nothing.
Daenerys had not looked their way once.
She was still speaking, her voice clear and steady. The old woman kneeling on the floor raised her head. Tears still clung to the corners of her eyes, but at the edge of her mouth, slowly, a smile had begun to form — the fragile, disbelieving kind, the kind of a person who had stopped expecting good things and wasn't sure yet if she was allowed to start again.
➤ Next: Crowning the King