"I . . . yes, of course. Your Grace does me great honor."

A greater one than you deserve. "You have served me ably as justiciar, my lord. And will continue to do so through these . . . trying times ahead." When she saw that Merryweather had grasped her meaning, the queen turned to smile at the singer. "And you must be rewarded as well, for all the sweet songs you have played for us whilst we ate. The gods have given you a gift."

The singer bowed. "Your Grace is kind to say so."

"Not kind," said Cersei, "merely truthful. Taena tells me that you are called the Blue Bard."

"I am, Your Grace." The singer's boots were supple blue calfskin, his breeches fine blue wool. The tunic he wore was pale blue silk slashed with shiny blue satin. He had even gone so far as to dye his hair blue, in the Tyroshi fashion. Long and curly, it fell to his shoulders and smelled as if it had been washed in rosewater. From blue roses, no doubt. At least his teeth are white. They were good teeth, not the least bit crooked.

"You have no other name?"

A hint of pink suffused his cheeks. "As a boy, I was called Wat. A fine name for a plowboy, less fitting for a singer."

The Blue Bard's eyes were the same color as Robert's. For that alone, she hated him. "It is easy to see why you are Lady Margaery's favorite."

"Her Grace is kind. She says I give her pleasure."

"Oh, I'm certain of it. Might I see your lute?"

"If it please Your Grace." Beneath the courtesy, there was a faint hint of unease, but he handed her the lute all the same. One does not refuse the queen's request.

Cersei plucked a string and smiled at the sound. "Sweet and sad as love. Tell me, Wat . . . the first time you took Margaery to bed, was that before she wed my son, or after?"

For a moment he did not seem to understand. When he did, his eyes grew large. "Your Grace has been misinformed. I swear to you, I never - "

"Liar!" Cersei smashed the lute across the singer's face so hard the painted wood exploded into shards and splinters. "Lord Orton, summon my guards and take this creature to the dungeons."

Orton Merryweather's face was damp with fear. "This . . . oh, infamy . . . he dared seduce the queen?"

"I fear it was the other way around, but he is a traitor all the same. Let him sing for Lord Qyburn."

The Blue Bard went white. "No." Blood dripped from his lip where the lute had torn it. "I never . . ." When Merryweather seized him by the arm, he screamed, "Mother have mercy, no."

"I am not your mother," Cersei told him.

Even in the black cells, all they got from him were denials, prayers, and pleas for mercy. Before long, blood was streaming down his chin from all his broken teeth, and he wet his dark blue breeches three times over, yet still the man persisted in his lies. "Is it possible we have the wrong singer?" Cersei asked.

"All things are possible, Your Grace. Have no fear. The man will confess before the night is done." Down here in the dungeons, Qyburn wore roughspun wool and a blacksmith's leather apron. To the Blue Bard he said, "I am sorry if the guards were rough with you. Their courtesies are sadly lacking." His voice was kind, solicitous. "All we want from you is the truth."

"I've told you the truth," the singer sobbed. Iron shackles held him hard against the cold stone wall.

"We know better." Qyburn had a razor in his hand, its edge gleaming faintly in the torchlight. He cut away the Blue Bard's clothing, until the man was naked but for his high blue boots. The hair between his legs was brown, Cersei was amused to see. "Tell us how you pleasured the little queen," she commanded.

"I never . . . I sang, was all, I sang and played. Her ladies will tell you. They were always with us. Her cousins."

"How many of them did you have carnal knowledge of?"

"None of them. I'm just a singer. Please."

Qyburn said, "Your Grace, mayhaps this poor man only played for Margaery whilst she entertained other lovers."

"No. Please. She never . . . I sang, I only sang . . ."

Lord Qyburn ran a hand up the Blue Bard's chest. "Does she take your ni**les in her mouth during your love play?" He took one between his thumb and forefinger, and twisted. "Some men enjoy that. Their ni**les are as sensitive as a woman's." The razor flashed, the singer shrieked. On his chest a wet red eye wept blood. Cersei felt ill. Part of her wanted to close her eyes, to turn away, to make it stop. But she was the queen and this was treason. Lord Tywin would not have turned away.

In the end the Blue Bard told them his whole life, back to his first name day. His father had been a chandler and Wat was raised to that trade, but as a boy he found he had more skill at making lutes than barrels. When he was twelve he ran off to join a troupe of musicians he had heard performing at a fair. He had wandered half the Reach before coming to King's Landing in hopes of finding favor at court.

"Favor?" Qyburn chuckled. "Is that what women call it now? I fear you found too much of it, my friend . . . and from the wrong queen. The true one stands before you."

Yes. Cersei blamed Margaery Tyrell for this. If not for her, Wat might have lived a long and fruitful life, singing his little songs and bedding pig girls and crofter's daughters. Her scheming forced this on me. She has soiled me with her treachery.

By dawn the singer's high blue boots were full of blood, and he had told them how Margaery would fondle herself as she watched her cousins pleasuring him with their mouths. At other times he would sing for her whilst she sated her lusts with other lovers. "Who were they?" the queen demanded, and the wretched Wat named Ser Tallad the Tall, Lambert Turnberry, Jalabhar Xho, the Redwyne twins, Osney Kettleblack, Hugh Clifton, and the Knight of Flowers.

That displeased her. She dare not besmirch the name of the hero of Dragonstone. Besides, no one who knew Ser Loras would ever believe it. The Redwynes could not be a part of it either. Without the Arbor and its fleet, the realm could never hope to rid itself of this Euron Crow's Eye and his accursed ironmen. "All you are doing is spitting up the names of men you saw about her chambers. We want the truth!"

"The truth." Wat looked at her with the one blue eye that Qyburn had left him. Blood bubbled through the holes where his front teeth had been. "I might have . . . misremembered."

"Horas and Hobber had no part of this, did they?"

"No," he admitted. "Not them."

"As for Ser Loras, I am certain Margaery took pains to hide what she was doing from her brother."

"She did. I remember now. Once I had to hide under the bed when Ser Loras came to see her. He must never know, she said."

"I prefer this song to the other." Leave the great lords out of it, that was for the best. The others, though . . . Ser Tallad had been a hedge knight, Jalabhar Xho was an exile and a beggar, Clifton was the only one of the little queen's guardsman. And Osney is the plum that makes the pudding. "I know you feel better for having told the truth. You will want to remember that when Margaery comes to trial. If you were to start lying again . . ."

"I won't. I'll tell it true. And after . . ."

". . . you will be allowed to take the black. You have my word on that." Cersei turned to Qyburn. "See that his wounds are cleaned and dressed, and give him milk of the poppy for the pain."

"Your Grace is good." Qyburn dropped the bloody razor into a pail of vinegar. "Margaery may wonder where her bard has gone."

"Singers come and go, they are infamous for it."

The climb up the dark stone steps from the black cells left Cersei feeling breathless. I must rest. Getting to the truth was wearisome work, and she dreaded what must follow. I must be strong. What I must do I do for Tommen and the realm. It was a pity that Maggy the Frog was dead. Piss on your prophecy, old woman. The little queen may be younger than I, but she has never been more beautiful, and soon she will be dead.

Lady Merryweather was waiting in her bedchamber. It was the black of night, closer to dawn than to dusk. Jocelyn and Dorcas were both asleep, but not Taena. "Was it terrible?" she asked.

"You cannot know. I need to sleep, but fear to dream."

Taena stroked her hair. "It was all for Tommen."

"It was. I know it was." Cersei shuddered. "My throat is raw. Be a sweet and pour me some wine."

"If it please you. That is all that I desire."

Liar. She knew what Taena desired. So be it. If the woman was besotted with her, that would help ensure that she and her husband remained loyal. In a world so full of treachery, that was worth a few kisses. She is no worse than most men. At least there is no danger of her ever getting me with child.

The wine helped, but not enough. "I feel soiled," the queen complained as she stood beside her window, cup in hand.

"A bath will set you right, my sweet." Lady Merryweather woke Dorcas and Jocelyn and sent them for hot water. As the tub was filled, she helped the queen disrobe, undoing her laces with deft fingers and easing the gown off her shoulders. Then she slipped out of her own dress and let it puddle on the floor.

The two of them shared the bath together, with Cersei lying back in Taena's arms. "Tommen must be spared the worst of this," she told the Myrish woman. "Margaery still takes him to the sept every day, so they can ask the gods to heal her brother." Ser Loras still clung to life, annoyingly. "He is fond of her cousins as well. It will go hard on him, to lose them all."

"All three may not be guilty," suggested Lady Merryweather. "Why, it might well be that one of them took no part. If she was shamed and sickened by the things she saw . . ."

". . . she might be persuaded to bear witness against the others. Yes, very good, but which one is the innocent?"

"Alla."

"The shy one?"

"So she seems, but there is more of sly than shy in her. Leave her to me, my sweet."

"Gladly." Alone, the Blue Bard's confession would never suffice. Singers lied for their living, after all. Alla Tyrell would be of great help, if Taena could deliver her. "Ser Osney shall confess as well. The others must be made to understand that only through confession can they earn the king's forgiveness, and the Wall." Jalabhar Xho would find the truth attractive. About the rest she was less certain, but Qyburn was persuasive . . .

Dawn was breaking over King's Landing when they climbed from the tub. The queen's skin was white and wrinkled from her long immersion. "Stay with me," she told Taena. "I do not want to sleep alone." She even said a prayer before she crawled beneath her coverlet, beseeching the Mother for sweet dreams.

It proved a waste of breath; as ever, the gods were deaf. Cersei dreamt that she was down in the black cells once again, only this time it was her chained to the wall in place of the singer. She was naked, and blood dripped from the tips of her br**sts where the Imp had torn off her ni**les with his teeth. "Please," she begged, "please, not my children, do not harm my children." Tyrion only leered at her. He was naked too, covered with coarse hair that made him look more like a monkey than a man. "You shall see them crowned," he said, "and you shall see them die." Then he took her bleeding breast into his mouth and began to suck, and pain sawed through her like a hot knife.