(The Glassworks District - Runestone, Summer 126 AC)
The crime was banal. That was what irritated Aeryn the most. It wasn't a grand conspiracy or a political assassination. It was a tantrum.
Ser Godfrey Waynwood, a second cousin to the Lady of Ironoaks and a man known for his heavy drinking and heavier hand, had been riding through the artisan quarter. He was drunk. His horse had shied at the glare of a polished mirror being transported by a master glassblower.
Godfrey had fallen in the mud. His pride was bruised.
So, he had drawn his sword and split the glassblower's skull.
When Aeryn arrived at the scene, the body was still there. The victim was Mylo, a Myrish artisan Aeryn had personally recruited to grind lenses for the lighthouse optics. Mylo was not just a man; he was a twenty-year investment in specialized skill.
Godfrey was sitting on a nearby barrel, wiping his blade with a silk handkerchief, surrounded by four of his household guards. He looked bored.
"A unfortunate accident, my Prince," Godfrey said, standing up as Aeryn approached. He swayed slightly. "The foreign fool spooked my mount. I will pay the widow the usual blood money. Twenty silvers should cover it. And the mirror, of course."
Aeryn looked at the body. He looked at the shattered lenses scattered in the mud—months of work, destroyed in a second of idiocy.
He looked at the crowd. Hundreds of workers had gathered. They were silent, watching. They held hammers, tongs, and shovels. Their knuckles were white. They were waiting to see if the "New Runestone" was real, or if it was just a fresh coat of paint on the old tyranny.
"Twenty silvers," Aeryn repeated. His voice was flat, carrying perfectly in the silence.
"Make it thirty," Godfrey shrugged, misinterpreting the Prince's tone. "I am feeling generous today."
Aeryn turned to Ser Vardis.
"Arrest him."
Godfrey laughed. "Arrest me? Cousin, I am a Waynwood. You cannot arrest a knight for disciplining a peasant. It's a civil matter. I'll send a letter to my aunt..."
"Disarm him," Aeryn ordered, louder.
The Bronze Guard did not hesitate. They were not knights; they were soldiers of the machine. Four halberds dropped, hooking Godfrey's limbs. He was slammed into the mud, his fine armor splattered with the same filth the artisan had died in.
"This is an outrage!" Godfrey screamed, struggling. "I demand a trial by combat! I demand my rights!"
Aeryn looked down at him.
"You will have a trial," Aeryn said. "But not by combat. Combat proves who is stronger, not who is right. And as for your rights... we are going to rewrite them."
...
(The Institute of Public Improvements - The Think Tank)
That night, the lights in the Institute did not go out.
Aeryn stood before a table covered in scrolls. Around him sat the brightest legal minds he could buy: a disgraced Maester who had lost his chain for arguing that the Faith was illogical, a Braavosi lawyer familiar with the Code of the Keyholder, and his own Maester Helaebar.
" The current law is a mess of contradictions," Aeryn said, pacing the room. "The First Men laws, the Andals laws, the King's Peace... it is all interpretative. It depends on the mood of the judge and the birth of the accused."
He slammed his hand on the table.
"I want a new code. From zero. The Bronze Code."
"My Lord," the Braavosi lawyer cautioned, "codifying law takes years. You have a prisoner in the dungeon now."
"Then we write the first statute tonight," Aeryn said. "The Statute of Value."
He grabbed a quill.
"In Westeros, a noble's life is worth gold, and a peasant's life is worth copper. This is economically flawed. The noble consumes resources; the artisan produces them. Mylo created lenses that save ships. Godfrey consumes wine and creates noise."
Aeryn wrote furiously.
"Clause One: The Universal Value of Function. No man is above the utility of the State. Murder is the unauthorized destruction of a state asset. The penalty is not a fine. The penalty is liquidation."
Helaebar turned pale. "Liquidation? My Lord, you mean execution? For a highborn? Lady Waynwood will raise her banners. The Vale will revolt."
"Let them," Aeryn said, his eyes cold. "If I let Godfrey walk with a fine, every worker in my city will know that they are disposable. Morale will collapse. Productivity will drop. I cannot afford a strike in the glassworks."
He looked at his advisors.
"Draft it. Clear language. No poetry. 'If you kill, you die.' Regardless of the name on your cloak."
...
(The Plaza of the Falcon - Three Days Later)
Word had spread. Not just through the city, but through the nearby holdfasts. The Prince is judging a noble.
The plaza was packed. Five thousand people stood shoulder to shoulder. Merchants, smiths, dockworkers, whores. And in the VIP gallery, the nervous minor lords and knights of the Vale, watching with disbelief.
A wooden dais had been erected. There was no throne on it. Just a table and a block.
Ser Godfrey Waynwood was dragged out. He was clean, but he looked terrified. He had spent three days in the dark, and no letter from his aunt had come to save him.
Aeryn stood behind the table. He wore his black and bronze ceremonial armor. He held a scroll—the freshly dried ink of the Bronze Code.
"Citizens of Runestone," Aeryn's voice was amplified by the acoustics of the plaza design. "We are here to audit a transaction."
He pointed to Godfrey.
"This man destroyed a master artisan. He claims that because his blood is old, his crime is small. He offered thirty pieces of silver for a life that created light."
A rumble of anger went through the crowd.
"I have consulted the laws of the Seven Kingdoms," Aeryn continued. "They say he is right. They say he can pay and leave."
Godfrey straightened up, looking relieved. "See? I told you. The law is the law."
Aeryn picked up the old law book of the Vale—a heavy, leather-bound tome.
"This law is obsolete," Aeryn said.
He threw the book into a brazier burning beside him. The crowd gasped.
"Today, we inaugurate The Bronze Code," Aeryn announced, unfurling the new scroll. "Article One: All citizens are components of the Realm. To destroy a component maliciously is treason against the stability of the whole."
He looked at Godfrey.
"Ser Godfrey Waynwood. You are found guilty of destroying a productive asset of the State. The sentence is death."
The silence was absolute. Even the seagulls seemed to stop screaming.
"You... you can't!" Godfrey stammered. "I am a knight! I demand a headsman! I demand..."
"You are a criminal," Aeryn cut him off. "And in Runestone, we do not waste manpower on headsmen."
Aeryn nodded to Ser Vardis.
Vardis stepped forward. He didn't draw a sword. He pulled a lever on the side of the strange wooden contraption Godfrey had been kneeling in front of.
It wasn't a simple block. It was a machine. A heavy, weighted blade sliding between two oiled vertical rails. A guillotine, primitive but effective.
"Efficiency," Aeryn whispered.
Click. WHOOSH. THUD.
The blade dropped. It was faster than a blinking eye. Godfrey's head fell into the basket. There was no hacking, no missed swings, no messy dignity. Just gravity doing its job.
The crowd didn't cheer immediately. They were stunned. They had just watched a nobleman die like a common thief.
Then, a single voice from the back—a blacksmith—shouted: "Hail the Prince of Justice!"
The roar that followed shook the towers. It wasn't the polite applause of the court; it was the primal, terrifying sound of the masses realizing they had a monster on their side.
In the gallery, the minor lords were pale as milk. They looked at the machine. They looked at the Prince. And they understood. The rules had changed. Their shields, their titles, their ancestors—none of it would protect them from the math.
...
(The Solar - Post-Execution)
Aeryn watched the workers cleaning the plaza from his window.
Lady Jeyne Arryn's raven had arrived an hour ago. It was brief. Be careful, cousin. You are sharpening the blade too fine.
Aeryn fed the letter to the fire.
He turned to his desk, where the draft of the Bronze Code lay. It was just the beginning. Property laws, contract enforcement, sanitation regulations. He would regulate everything.
There was a knock on the door. Casper entered.
"The people are lighting candles for you in the Sept, My Lord," the spymaster said, grinning crookedly. "They call you 'The Equalizer'. But the merchants in the noble quarter... they are packing their bags."
"Let them go," Aeryn said calmly. "Parasites leave when the host becomes healthy. Those who stay will be the ones who understand the value of order."
Aeryn looked at his own hand—the flesh and the metal.
"Today I chose, Casper. I chose the machine over the paint. I chose the gear over the decoration."
"Lady Waynwood will be furious," Casper noted.
"Lady Waynwood is a pragmatist," Aeryn replied. "Send her the blood money. Send her three hundred gold dragons."
"Three hundred? For Godfrey?"
"No," Aeryn corrected. "Twenty silvers for Godfrey. The rest is for the inconvenience of having to clean my plaza. It's an insult, Casper. Make sure she understands that."
He sat down.
"Now, bring me the Master of Works. We need to discuss the expansion of the prison. If we are going to enforce the law, we are going to need more cells."
Aeryn Royce-Targaryen had killed a man today, but he didn't feel the weight of a sin. He felt the satisfaction of a corrected error. The equation was balanced.
And the people loved him for it.