Morning.
Dennis Prester still had honey wine at his mouth when the doors of the Golden Tooth hall went in.
Lyonel came through clean.
The clay was gone.
The merchant leather was gone.
Lannister crimson, dark, belted.
The gold lion on his chest took the early light.
The cup stopped.
“You—”
Lyonel walked to the middle of the floor.
Boots on stone.
Sharp.
“Dennis Prester.”
“Observer for the Heir.
Lyonel Lannister.”
Thirty-odd men turned.
Bannermen.
Stewards.
The air went out of the room.
Dennis’s color left him in two seconds.
“Ob—Observer.
You—”
Lyonel pulled the black book from his coat and put it on the table.
The slap jumped three times off the oak.
“This.
You know it?”
Dennis stared at the cover.
His throat moved twice.
“No.”
“I’ll read it for you.”
First leaf.
“Last year.
Sixth month.
Under-road haul: four hundred seventy gold dragons.
Dock berth: one hundred twenty.
Escort: two hundred thirty.
In: two silk runs at eight hundred.
One spice run at five hundred.”
Second leaf.
“Ninth month.
Under-road out: nine hundred ten gold dragons.
In from across the Narrow Sea: sixteen hundred.”
Third.
“Twelfth month—”
Dennis came off the high seat.
“Enough.”
“Enough of what.” Lyonel looked up.
“Three leaves.
The rest of the year is still in here.
You want it all out loud?”
Dennis looked at that fifteen-year-old face.
Nothing moving on it.
The hall started to talk under its breath.
The accounts man stood in the left corner.
Blue ink still on the cuff.
He had gone small behind a pillar.
Lyonel shut the book.
“Dennis Prester.
You took Lannister tax silver.
Two thousand gold dragons on the page I can prove.
Add the quiet take off the under-road and it sits over three thousand, easy.”
“What do you think my father says to that number?”
Dennis’s mouth shook.
His knees hit the stone.
“Observer—I’ll make it good—”
“Make it good.”
Lyonel walked to him and stood over him.
A fifteen-year-old dwarf in front of a kneeling lord.
No one in the hall measured him short.
“You swallowed three thousand dragons and you think one word closes it?”
[System]
Task: Golden Tooth Reckoning
Evidence complete (3/3)
Settling…
Reward: Green trait draw in progress—
The card turned low right.
Green light, one flash.
[System]
Green trait acquired: Lordly Presence
Presence while standing +30%.
Weight of speech +20%.
Those present read the host’s rank more cleanly.
Passive.
Heat ran the spine.
His stance found another inch without asking.
Thirty pairs of eyes changed.
Not fear exactly.
Weight.
Dennis’s brow was on the floor.
“Observer… how do I put this right?”
Lyonel crouched.
One hand on Dennis’s shoulder.
“Your books are good.”
Dennis’s head came up.
“Haul on the under-road.
Berth cost.
What you shaved off the escort.
You cut closer than the men who sit the Rock’s desk.”
“You don’t lack the head.
You lack the line you work.”
Dennis stayed still.
“Two choices.” Lyonel put up a finger.
“One.
I send the book to Casterly Rock.
Tywin decides.
Tax theft in the West is the Wall or a rope.
You know which he’d pick.”
Dennis went white.
Second finger.
“Two.
You hand me the under-road.
From today you run the accounts for the Golden Tooth and every holding that touches it.
I need a man who can count.”
“The three thousand already in your pocket counts as your share.”
Dennis stared at the open hand.
Palm up.
Waiting.
“Share.” His voice shook.
“What does that mean.”
“It means I don’t chase the three thousand.”
“Every clean line you keep for me, you take a cut.
Every dirty line you bring me, you take double the bounty.”
Lyonel tipped his head.
“Well?”
Dennis looked at the hand.
Then at the eyes.
Green and black.
The count in them was not fifteen.
He reached with both hands and took it.
“I, Dennis Prester, Lord of the Golden Tooth, give my loyalty to Lyonel Lannister.”
“Yours while I live.
Yours when I don’t.”
“Stay alive.
Keep the books.”
Bloom was already putting it down in a fair hand.
Bronn leaned in the doorway with the butcher’s knife and a straw in his teeth.
The corner of his mouth jumped.
“Three thousand written off… collecting the man instead of the coin.
That’s meaner.”
[System]
Man acquired: Dennis Prester — accounts, coin.
Westerlands economic index +4%.
Men under host: 4
Lyonel turned for the doors.
Three steps.
Looked back at the man still on the floor.
“Your accounts man.
Blue ink on the cuff.
Turn him out.
One of mine takes the desk.”
Dennis nodded too fast.
“Yes.
Now.
Yes.”
Sun on the face when he cleared the gate.
[System]
Next: Silverhill.
Fiscal Mastery × Trade Sense charging.
Recommend: vein work on the Silverhill rim.
He got up on the horse.
“Bloom.”
“My lord.”
“Which way is the next hall.”
Bloom opened the map and drew west.
“Silverhill.
Three days on this road.”
“Then we ride.”
He turned the horse.
Dust off the gate flags.
Bronn swapped the knife for the longsword and came up on the flank.
“My lord.
That under-road.
What do you want it for.”
Lyonel looked at him.
“Smuggle.”
“Smuggle.”
“Every run leaving the West goes that way.
Tax: half on the page.
Half off it.”
“And your father—”
Lyonel checked the horse.
“My father cares that the page is fat.”
“I send him a tax number twice the old one.
You think he asks about a hole in the ground?”
Bronn gave that two seconds.
“…Fuck.
You’re a devil.”
Lyonel showed the teeth and put his heels in.
Sun pulled a long shadow off the Tooth’s wall.
Under it Dennis was still on the hall floor, mouth working, walking Bloom through the handoff list.
Far out, the pane ticked.
[System]
Opening the West — Stage One
Progress: Golden Tooth held (1/5)
Next mark: Silverhill vein survey
Lyonel put a hand up against the light.
Three days of road.
Whether the road had anything waiting, he did not know.
Low right, Trade Sense still burned gold.
He let the horse run.