The King of Winters

Chapter 47

Tyrion

They reached King's Landing by the morning and the first things to do in Tyrion's mind was to get a feather bed and a nice hot meal and a whore to warm his bed. He has been riding for so long that his legs ached and cramped so badly. He could seldom walk with his legs. Tyrion was very much fed up with the swaying of the horse beneath him that he came to believe that his time in Casterly Rock spend with his father was much more entertaining than this. He missed the softness of his feather bed beneath him and the nice hot meal to fill his belly and the ache between his legs of staying so far away from a woman. He missed all of it so much that he meant to have all three at once. His father and the other tidings can wait. Woe to anyone who would keep him away from his bed. 

Tyrion rode through the gate of gods with Bronn beside him. His escort of twenty redcloaks following behind him under the command Tregar. The paintings on the gate seemed to follow him as he passed through the portcullis. He did not like it one bit.

He could smell the stench of the city the moment he entered it. The stench of piss and shit and people. The moment he entered the city he found that it was well crowded. 

The inn beneath the sign of the broken anvil stood within sight of those walls, near the Gate of the Gods where they had entered. As they rode into its courtyard, a boy ran out to help Tyrion down from his horse.

"What are you going to do here?" Bronn asked as Tyrion dismounted from his horse.

"Quite easy, if you think," Tyrion said. "A room with a featherbed, a meal and a flagon of wine and a good wench to warm me up completely."

"Innkeep," Tyrion called out as he entered the inn, "we have horses that want stabling, and me and my men require refreshments and room and a hot bath."

The innkeep bowed and smiled a hideous smile when she saw the Lannister lion upon his jerkin and his men coming up behind him. "I'm glad to host you my lord of Lannister. We'll find enough rooms and care for your men and horses."

Tyrion pulled a coin from his purse and flicked it up over his head, caught it, tossed it again. The wink of gold was unmistakable even in the candlelight.

He sent the coin spinning across the room to Bronn and the sellsword snatched it from the air. "Pay them for their services, will you Bronn?" He turned back to the innkeep. "You will be able to manage food, I trust?"

"Anything you like, m'lord, anything at all," the innkeep promised.

Tyrion glanced at the nearest tables and found that most of them were have a good gracious meal. He might very well have the taste of foods he's been wanting to taste for many days. "My men will have whatever you're serving these people. Double portions, we've had a long hard ride. I'll take a roast fowl—chicken, duck, pigeon, it makes no matter. And send up a flagon of your best wine."

"Aye, m'lord, It will be done," the innkeep said.

The bed and food were arranged. Now it is time for the whore. Tyrion faced Bronn. "Eat or drink whatever you want, Bronn," he said. "By the time I come back from my meal, I mean to see a pretty sight in my bed. Make it happen, will you?"

"I would prefer one who is reasonably young, with as pretty a face as you can find," he said. "If she has washed sometime this year, I shall be glad. If she hasn't, wash her. Be certain that you tell her who I am, and warn her of what I am. " Jyck had not always troubled to do that. There was a look the girls got in their eyes sometimes when they first beheld the lordling they'd been hired to pleasure . . . a look that Tyrion Lannister did not ever care to see again.

Tyrion waddled up the stairs to his room, saddlesore, and sour, all too vividly aware of how amusing he must look as he climbed up the stairs. He might get quite drunk tonight. Nothing made the day better than wine or a whore.