A Game of Thrones(90)

49.EDDARD(1)

“Mother, what does he mean?” Princess Myrcella asked the queen plaintively. “Isn’t Joff the king now?”
   “You condemn yourself with your own mouth, Lord Stark,” said Cersei Lannister. “Ser Barristan, seize this traitor.”
   The Lord Commander of the Kingsguard hesitated. In the blink of an eye he was surrounded by Stark guardsmen, bare steel in their mailed fists.
   “And now the treason moves from words to deeds,” Cersei said. “Do you think Ser Barristan stands alone, my lord?” With an ominous rasp of metal on metal, the Hound drew his longsword. The knights of the Kingsguard and twenty Lannister guardsmen in crimson cloaks moved to support him.
   “Kill him!” the boy king screamed down from the Iron Throne. “Kill all of them, I command it!”
   “You leave me no choice,” Ned told Cersei Lannister. He called out to Janos Slynt. “Commander, take the queen and her children into custody. Do them no harm, but escort them back to the royal apartments and keep them there, under guard.”
   “Men of the Watch!” Janos Slynt shouted, donning his helm. A hundred gold cloaks leveled their spears and closed.
   “I want no bloodshed,” Ned told the queen. “Tell your men to lay down their swords, and no one need…”
   With a single sharp thrust, the nearest gold cloak drove his spear into Tomard’s back. Fat Tom’s blade dropped from nerveless fingers as the wet red point burst out through his ribs, piercing leather and mail. He was dead before his sword hit the floor.
   Ned’s shout came far too late. Janos Slynt himself slashed open Varly’s throat. Cayn whirled, steel flashing, drove back the nearest spearman with a flurry of blows; for an instant it looked as though he might cut his way free. Then the Hound was on him. Sandor Clegane’s first cut took off Cayn’s sword hand at the wrist; his second drove him to his knees and opened him from shoulder to breastbone.
   As his men died around him, Littlefinger slid Ned’s dagger from its sheath and shoved it up under his chin. His smile was apologetic. “I did warn you not to trust me, you know.”