A stir began near the side doors. Two servants hurried through with a folded screen, and behind it a maester in gray moved like a shadow. Lysa's septa followed with a tight mouth and a basin.
Hoster half rose, then sat, forcing calm into his face the way a man eases a restless horse. Jon Arryn's glance flicked once toward the screen and then away. He did not move from the dais.
Catelyn rose at once. "I will go to my sister," she said to Hoster. He nodded and let her pass.
Ned watched the screen vanish into a side passage. A few ladies whispered and then pretended they had not. As Lord Yohn Royce walked past, Ned pulled him aside.
"Lord Royce, what's happening?" Ned asked.
"Your warden Lord Arryn is about to wed again, but there are a few hiccups to resolve." Yohn responded, before heading back to his seat.
Ned's jaw worked. "Lysa is with child."
"For the moment," Howland said. "Maesters have bitter herbs, and fathers have ambition. This river runs the same way it always has."
Ned kept his eyes on the flagstones. He had no kindness to spare for Petyr Baelish, who had made a show of bleeding for Catelyn and then crept to Lysa's bed. He had some pity for Lysa, who would now marry a man 50 years senior, noble as he was. He had little left for the maester.
Tom shifted the melody and the hall steadied. He leaned into a fresh rhythm that drew chuckles from the lower tables before the first verse was done.
Down by Harren's leaky halls,
Where bats make love on broken walls,
Three Frey-fed squires squealed and rolled—
Weasels digging after gold.
Then came a helm with a laughing tree,
Said, "Stand up straight, show courtesy.
Crack went pride, crack went knee—
Bridge boys squeaked like they'd sat on a bee.
The Troll and the Toll and the Tree,
Three times they tumbled for free,
He scratched his warts and counted his coins,
But still the troll had floppy fish loins,
Toll-troll, bridge-soul,
Stuff your purse and stuff your hole!
A murmur ran the benches. Northmen laughed. Edmure Tully's ears reddened before the chorus even landed. Tom grinned as if he had been born under a gallows and found it a friendly tree.
Off they scurried, warts aglow,
To crouch beneath the bridge below.
"A silver stag to cross," they cry—
"And two if you don't like our eye."
Troll Jahaerys, lord of mud,
Crowned himself with chicken blood;
"Kiss my pole or pay my fee—
That's Frey law, by Uncle's decree!"
Along rode Tree, all grin and nerve:
"Your toll's as crooked as you serve.
Roads are free, you weasel men—
Wash your bridge and count to ten."
Trolls called "subjects" from their pens—
Six damp cousins, none true men;
One swung wide and lost his shoe,
One bent down to puke his brew.
Coins went flying, bridge went bright,
Peasants crossed by moonlit light;
Troll Jahaerys begged for mum—
"Count your teeth," said Tree, "you scum."
Frey boys fished their pride from muck—
Found a turnip, not their luck.
Laughter burst from the hall. Blackwood men clapped time on the board. A Mallister scowled but could not help the quirk at his mouth. Tom bowed to the laugh like a man drinking rain.
The Troll and the Toll and the Tree,
A bridge made free by painted envy
Roads run free where justice grows—
Trolls get kicked in wart and nose!
"Stop," Edmure Tully ordered, standing. He tried for a lord's authority but found a boy's temper. "You mock our bannermen in my father's hall."
Tom's eyes widened in innocence that fooled no one. "I only share what others speak first, my lord. The Riverlands hears the same. Your bannermen could not keep a bridge against one knight and a painted smile."
"Mind your tongue," Edmure snapped. "You will not spit on House Frey while they are absent."
Tom cocked his head. "Absent is the word, my lord. Absent from this feast. Absent from this muster. Absent from any place where spears rise for something besides a purse. A riverlord should see what swims with him and what swims away. Else the trout looks limp and the river laughs."
Hoster's voice came mild as milk. "Enough."
"Send him to the cells," Edmure said quickly, seizing the chance to look lordly. "Let him sing to the rats. He can keep Lord Petyr company and practice being clever at a wall."
Tom swept a deep bow that mocked no one and everyone. "As my lord commands. I shall compose a new verse. Rats have a keen ear for scandal."
Two guards took him by the arms. As he passed Ned and Howland, Tom winked. There was no fear in him, only the look of a man who trusted his feet. "I will see you by morning, my lords," he said under his breath. "Or you will hear me through stone."
When the door closed behind the little procession, the hall tried to find its old merriment and could not. Edmure sat, triumphant and ill at ease. Hoster's smile stayed fixed. Jon Arryn went back to quiet talk with his captains.
Ned leaned toward Howland. "You said Lyanna can be reached."
Howland's mouth thinned. "She can also reach. You are used to carrying her in your mind as a little girl with a wooden sword and a temper. She is not less than that now. She is more."
Ned looked down the length of the table at the lantern's colored panes. "You speak in riddles."
"I do not mean to," Howland said. "She is the one men call the laughing tree. She put Freys in the mud and made lords look at their sons twice. She learned to ride as if the horse were her own skin. She learned to see a move before it is made. She went to the Isle of Faces and the trees did not turn her away."
Ned's hand closed until the knuckles whitened. Shame moved through him like cold water. Pride followed, sharp enough to sting. "And I married in the sept," he said. The truth sat between his teeth like iron.
"You cannot unmake yesterday," Howland said. "You can choose tomorrow. The gods will judge all of us. I tell you this so you do not march as if she were a cup to be fetched. She is a storm you join, or a rock you stand with, or a banner you follow. She is not a prize."
Ned let out a breath he had held ever since the king called for his head. "When this feast ends, come to the godswood with me."
Howland inclined his head. "Of course."
At the dais, Hoster rose again for the final toasts. Men stood and drank because that was what men did. Ned raised his cup and tasted nothing.
When the hall emptied to the sound of benches scraping and armor buckling, Ned slipped away to the cold behind the keep. He wandered through the forest, its winter breath slowly washing over him. He stood beneath branches that had seen him vowed as a boy in the North and as a man in the south, and he set his jaw around the shape of a promise he meant to keep.
No more broken oaths. No more borrowed lies. He would meet the dawn with a course and hold to it, whatever banners shook in the wind.