A Lions Flower |J.Lannister|

• Chapter 23 •

The minutes seemed to go by fast, then the hours went by faster, and the days leading up to the trial by combat went the fastest.

Rose knew there was a slim chance that Tyrion would make it out of this situation alive—there was no part of herself that could be fooled to think otherwise. But, she had given Tyrion the benefit of the doubt. He was smart, considered her a true friend, and her mind went ill thinking she was near to loose a man such as that.

The sounds of the Red Keep the morning of the trial by combat were quiet. There was a somber mood within those who supported their Lord Tyrion. It was as though everyone shared the same thoughts; lingering, whispering in the backs of their mind to say: "Tyrion Lannister is near death, find peace with it now." It ate away at her bones that Tyrion could have lived his life out at the wall in a cloaked shame but Tywin would never see as such.

He would rather see his disappointing son suffer and writhe in the hands of the crown than be a disgrace. Die with dignity of never losing his name, she concluded.

But with that rejection also came the realization that Jaime's wants, and in turn Rose's own, would never manifest into a reality the realm would see. A marriage, a home at Casterly Rock in exchange for Tyrion's disposal to the wall... it was all a dream. It would never be something real because once the grips of power dug their claws into those left in a drought, it fills them with a greed at the behest of the good.

Just as the sun had risen, Rose broke her fast with Margaery in the Queen's quarters that morning. They feasted on fruits and a light wine which Margaery had so graciously requested at the behest of her own nerves about the day.

"Do you think Prince Oberyn will defeat Ser Gregor?" Margaery asked Rose over the silence that had long been established.

Tyrion accepted Oberyn's proposal to be his champion once Jaime told him he could not, or would not, do it. The man tasked with the opportunity instead was hungry for it.

Oberyn Martell was a prisoner of his own past. It was the need that seeped from his bones that sent him to the dungeons and offered himself to Tyrion in the news of Jaime's inability to perform. One hand was not going to serve Tyrion well—even the common folk could see.

But Oberyn feasted on the idea of revenge and Jaime opened the gates for him to seek it.

"I suppose I do." Rose shrugged, distant in her admittance as her sister looked on.

"Is everything alright, Rose?"

The eldest Tyrell nodded bleakly. "I suppose I am just nervous, anxious of the whole affair."

"Is that the fault of Tyrion's fate or someone's absence?"

Rose felt her eyes widen at Margaery, looking around the room to the handmaidens stationed in the corner. Their eyes averted from the table the two of them sat at when Margaery reached a hand across the table and squeezed her sister's hand gently.

"You needn't worry here, sister," Margaery confessed with a smile. "I do not shoulder the burdens you do but I do love you, so dearly, and I wish not to see you suffer."

Rose shook off Margaery's hand. "It is not his absence that irks me, Margaery... I wish to share with you something."

"Oh?" Margaery perked up in her chair. She turned briskly and dismissed the handmaidens that remained with no more than a flick of her hand and the slam of a door.