Below the High Table

[u/Sad_Stick_2834]

They reached the inn shortly before sunset.

It stood where the mountain road widened beneath a low ridge, a broad building of grey stone and dark timber with two wings enclosing a muddy yard. Smoke poured thickly from its chimneys. A faded painted falcon swung above the gate, turning slowly in the evening wind.

By then Alesandar would have happily slept beneath a hedge.

His back ached. His thighs ached. His left shoulder had begun complaining sometime after midday for reasons he could not remember, and the old wounds along his face had tightened beneath the cold mountain air.

His horse, naturally, looked perfectly content.

“You have done considerably less work than I have,” Alesandar informed him as they entered the yard.

The gelding snorted.

“Ungrateful bastard.”

One of the men-at-arms riding beside him laughed.

“Talking about yourself now, Stone?”

Alesandar looked over.

“Only when my horse refuses to listen.”

That earned another laugh.

The column slowed quickly once inside.

Servants came forward from the inn while Redfort men began dismounting almost before the order was given. Wagons creaked to a stop. Horses crowded one another. Somewhere behind Alesandar, a groom cursed as a pack mule attempted to turn itself around beneath twice its own width in baggage.

At the front of the party, Lord Harrold had already been received by the innkeeper.

The man bowed deeply.

Then bowed again to Lady Redfort.

Then to Myria.

Alesandar watched from several horses away as servants hurried to open the carriage and place a little wooden step beneath the door.

Myria descended first.

She had endured the day's travel better than their mother, though perhaps only because she was too stubborn to show otherwise. Her cloak was dusty at the hem, and several strands of hair had escaped whatever careful arrangement her maid had made that morning.

Alesandar noticed those things before anything else.

He always did.

Myria paused beside the carriage and looked across the yard.

For a moment, he thought she had seen him.

Perhaps she had.

Neither of them raised a hand.

A groom appeared beside Alesandar and reached for his reins.

“I’ve got him,” Alesandar said.

The boy hesitated.

“Ser?”

“I’ll take him in.”

There was no real reason for it.

The household had more than enough men to tend his horse.

Still, Alesandar swung himself down and led the gelding toward the stable himself.

Behind him, his father and sister disappeared into the inn.

The stable smelled better than the road, as hay, leather, horses, old wood, sweat mixed their fumes.

Alesandar loosened the girth and began stripping the saddle before one of the stablehands could protest. He was halfway through when a Redfort groom he knew, Benn, appeared carrying two buckets.

“You planning to put me out of work, ser?”

“I considered it.”

“Pay’s poor.”

“So is mine.”

Benn grinned.

“You’re a knight.”

“Exactly.”

Alesandar took one of the buckets from him.

There were three other Redfort horses already in the stalls, and for the next quarter hour he helped as naturally as if he had never been knighted at all.

Nobody thought much of it.

That was perhaps why he liked being among them.

Ser Sumner had never allowed him to treat stablework as beneath him. A man who could not saddle his own horse had no business riding one. A man who could not clean steel had no business carrying it.

His brothers had disagreed. His brothers had disagreed with most things that required dirty hands. Now, they will never disagree anymore.

Alesandar pushed the thought away.

Someone threw him a cloth. He caught it.

“Stone.”

He turned to find Ser Artys, one of his father’s best household knights, standing at the stable entrance.

“You eating with us?”

Alesandar glanced toward the inn.

“With you?”

“With who else?”

Artys looked genuinely confused. Alesandar smiled.

“Then apparently I am.”

The common room was already crowded.

Travelers filled the benches closest to the fire. Merchants occupied a corner beneath the stairs, guarding their purses while pretending not to. A group of men in Bronze Gauntlet colors had taken over half the far wall. Two serving girls navigated the room with impossible skill, carrying trenchers above shoulders and stepping over boots without spilling anything.

The Redfort household had divided itself without anyone having to say how.

Lord Harrold, Lady Redfort and Myria had been given a private chamber upstairs for supper. A handful of the most senior knights had gone with them.

Everyone else remained below.

Alesandar remained below too.

He had not been told to. That made it more noticeable somehow.

Ser Artys shoved a cup into his hand as soon as he sat.

“Drink.”

“What is it?”

“Drink first.”

“That is usually how poisoning works.”

“It’s ale.”

“That is also usually how poisoning works.”

Alesandar drank anyway. It was sour enough to make him pull a face. The table erupted in approval. Someone slapped him across the shoulder. Someone else demanded another pitcher.

Within minutes, the road had begun leaving his bones.

This was easier.

Men talked loudly around him about Harrenhal, about horses, about which knight from the Vale would embarrass himself first in the joust. One of the younger men-at-arms insisted that nobody from the Riverlands understood how to ride properly because their lands were too flat.

“That makes no sense,” Alesandar said.

“It makes perfect sense.”

“They have horses.”

“Flat horses.”

Alesandar stared at him.

“What in seven hells is a flat horse?”

Nobody had an answer, but that only made the argument last longer.

He laughed until his side hurt.

For perhaps half an hour, Alesandar Stone was merely another young knight on the road.

A serving girl passed behind him and accidentally caught her sleeve against the back of his chair.

“Sorry, ser.”

Alesandar caught the pitcher before it tipped.

“No harm done.”

“You saved the ale.”

“Then I expect songs written about it.”

She laughed. Gods, she is pretty.

Across the table, Ser Artys pointed at him.

“That is why nobody takes you seriously.”

Alesandar lifted his cup.

“I have been trying very hard.”

Later, he went upstairs to fetch another cloak.

The temperature had fallen quickly after dark, and someone had suggested dice in the yard before the rain came.

The upper corridors were quieter. Carpet replaced rushes. Candles replaced smoky lamps.

His room was at the far end of the corridor, shared with two young household knights.

He had expected that.

He always expected that.

His father and Lady Redfort had the largest chamber overlooking the road.

Myria had one beside theirs.

Alesandar passed her door on the way to his own.

It opened.

He stopped.

Myria stood there.

For a second neither said anything.

She had changed from her traveling clothes into a simple dark gown, though her hair remained partially loose. Without servants around her, she looked younger.

Closer to the sister he remembered.

Almost.

“Alesandar.”

“Myria.”

Silence followed.

He smiled faintly.

Neither of them seemed to know what came after names anymore.

Years ago, there would have been nothing to decide.

He would have walked into her room without asking. She would have complained that he smelled of horses. He would have stolen something from her table. She would have threatened to tell their mother.

Now there was a doorway between them.

Myria glanced toward the stairs.

“You ate downstairs?”

“Yes.”

“With the knights?”

Her mouth moved.

Almost a smile.

Alesandar saw it.

So did she.

It disappeared quickly.

“Father asked where you were.”

The warmth left him by a degree.

“What did you tell him?”

“That I didn’t know.”

Alesandar nodded.

Another silence.

Myria folded her hands before herself.

“You could have eaten with us.”

He looked at her.

Could I?

Perhaps.

Nobody had forbidden it.

That was the strange part.

“I was already downstairs.”

“With them.”

“They’re good company.”

“I didn’t say they weren’t.”

Alesandar leaned one shoulder against the wall.

Somewhere below, laughter burst through the floorboards.

He could almost identify Artys among it.

“You looked tired earlier,” he said.

Myria’s expression changed slightly.

“So did you.”

“I am devastatingly handsome when exhausted.”

“That horrible scar on your face goes purple in the cold.”

Alesandar went still.

He had forgotten she knew that.

She used to tell him.

After Sisterton, during those first months when the scars were still healing and neither of them quite knew what they were allowed to say to the other.

He touched the side of his face without meaning to.

“It does?”

“Yes.”

Their eyes met.

Something sat between them.

Too large to name.

Too old to ignore.

He wanted to ask whether she was afraid of Harrenhal. He wanted to ask whether she remembered their races through the eastern fields. He wanted to ask whether she still blamed him.

He asked none of those things.

Instead:

“Are you riding tomorrow?”

Myria looked toward her chamber.

“Mother wants me in the carriage.”

“Ah.”

“I might ride in the afternoon.”

“If Father allows it?”

Her eyes sharpened.

Alesandar regretted the words immediately.

He had not meant them cruelly.

“I only meant—”

“I know what you meant.”

Another pause.

He nodded.

“Right.”

Myria looked at him for another moment.

“You should move.”

“Yes.”

Neither moved.

Then someone called from downstairs.

“Stone!”

Alesandar closed his eyes.

Myria actually smiled this time.

Small. Brief. But real.

“They seem to be waiting for you.”

“They usually regret it.”

He pushed himself away from the wall.

“Good night, Myria.”

“Good night, Alesandar.”

He took three steps before she spoke again.

“Alesandar?”

He turned.

Myria stood with one hand still on her door.

For a heartbeat, she looked as though she might say something important.

Instead she glanced at the scar crossing his cheek.

“Take your heavier cloak.”

Alesandar smiled.

“I will.”

He didn't have a heavier cloak.

Her door closed.

When he returned downstairs, the common room had grown louder still. Somebody had started singing badly near the hearth. The servants were eating at a side table now that most of the guests had been fed. The beginning of a music pushed some people to dance.

Alesandar descended into the noise.

Ser Artys saw him first.

“There he is!”

A cup was raised. Then another. Alesandar grinned.

He belonged easily among men who asked very little of him beyond good company and perhaps a competent sword arm.

He crossed the room and joined them.

Above, somewhere beyond timber and candlelight, his family remained behind closed doors.

Alesandar did not look toward the stairs again.