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Holy Shit, Ruling Westeros as Joffrey Baratheon, King of the Andals, the Rhoynar, and the First Men, Lord of the Seven Kingdoms and Protector of the Realm is a Lot Harder Than It Seemed At First, and By The Way, When Is My Fucking Back Going To Get Better?
Warm… Moist and warm…
This breakfast pastry my chambermaids presented to me must have only left the kitchen oven but ten minutes ago! Flakey, buttered bread satisfyingly crunches beneath every bite, a syrupy filling complementing the tart of the cherries within. I lick my fingertips clean, beaming at Phoebe.
“A wonderful beginning to start my name day. I’ll receive many gifts today, I’m sure, but yours shall have been the first.”
That makes Phoebe melt, her eyes getting red and puffy.
> “I- I’m honored, your grace, truly!”
She stammers out, averting her gaze to hide her tears.
“Why don’t you all take the rest of the day for yourselves? I am sure I shall not see these chambers until the early hours of tomorrow morning.”
Phoebe brightens up, nodding,
> “I’ll tell the ladies, your grace! Thank you!”
She hurries towards a side door out of my bedchamber, leaving me alone. Earlier, when I had arisen, I was greeted by all of my maidservants, who were the first to wish me a happy name day and pray together for my luck and health. A piping hot draught of milk of the poppy awaited me, along with all the helping hands to pull me out of bed and get me dressed that any man with an injured spine could ask for. That last part pricked me somewhat- only yesterday I was able to rise out of bed unassisted, but over the course of the day I had been stomping all over the Red Keep in a fit of indignant rage, incrementally undoing the healing my back had undergone after two weeks of meticulous caution. That and the ill-fated sword exercise with Sandor, I remind myself quickly, trying not to remind myself that the more recent incident in my privy last night was a far likelier culprit for my renewed back pains.
Surely, I did not have a worse day than Ser Meryn Trant on the other hand, who found himself beaten, terrorized, and ousted from the Kingsguard as a result of his impertinent tormenting of Lady Sansa. Had I not the insight to begin to staff a new order of guardsmen loyal only to me, I’m sure my effort to oust him would have been thwarted by my Lady Mother, to whom he owed his station in the first place. Thankfully, my new Stag Guard, carefully recruited from among the dregs of King’s Landing, had the gumption to impose my will, even when I did not have the words to speak it. Trant’s dismissal, and the Stag Guard that enforced it, are but the first of many changes to this world’s fate that I intend to execute, and paltry though they be, I shall remain steadfast in cultivating the authority, loyalty, and gold required to save the poor, misguided people of Westeros from their own short-sighted follies.
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I exit through my antechamber and find Sandor Clegane, the Hound and my Sworn Shield, standing vigil outside of my door. He is accompanied by the rest of the Kingsguard, sans Ser Meryn Trant and my uncle Jaime, who is still incarcerated at Riverrun. Everyone except for Sandor erupts into a greeting, Ser Preston Greenfield thumping my back with his hand while Ser Boros and Ser Arys begin chanting a traditional name day song. When the revelries subside, Ser Mandon steps forward.
> “Your lady mother bids you join her in the Great Hall to break your fast. She asks that I remind you that given the totality of the day’s festivities, there is little time to waste.”
I nod, starting to walk towards the spiral steps at the end of the corridor, saying,
“Well, I shan’t keep her waiting, then!”
The Great Hall of the Red Keep is much bigger than I had imagined it, reading of it in my old life. The first time I set foot in it as King Joffrey, I felt a niggling pit in my gut as I stared up at it’s ceiling, feeling an uncanny dread at the extreme scale of its construction. The unease was quickly inoculated when I held court for the first time, the ennui of administration proving to be even larger than the impossibly high ceiling and breadth of the Throne Room of King’s Landing. Now though, as I enter it, the tables set up and down the hall along with the crowd of visiting lords and ladies, supplicants, and even servants eating from the well-stocked tables seems to diminish the disquieting scale of the Great Hall. The first man to see me stands up from his seat and cheers, quickly followed by those around him, and then their neighbors, until the cheering compounds into a raucous cry that bounces off the stone walls of the hall. I make my way towards the throne, to the single table laid perpendicular to all the rest- my Lady Mother sitting in the middle. Well-wishes and congratulations delay my arrival, but I do eventually arrive at the end table, my Kinsguard in tow- as they are.
> “Good *morrow,* Joffrey!”
Cersei exclaims, standing when I arrive,
> “Thirteen years- I can scarcely believe it! Look at you! King of Westeros- man grown!”
A man grown to be sure, but not of age that you do not share in my absolute power, mother.
“Mother! You unduly honor me! Until I am ten and six, I am not a man grown in the laws of Gods and Man!”
She leans over the table to take my arms, which I readily offer, hugging me over the food on the surface in an awkward, but still sweet, embrace.
> “Come, sit!”
She commands, not insolently,
> “We’ve all your favorites, and many more. Bacon, beef, a whole school of fish.”
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I walk around the table, my Kingsguard dispersing as soon as I am in my Lady Mother’s presence- all except Ser Moore and Sandor, who shadow me and stand five feet behind me when I take my seat at my mother’s side. I look across the Great Hall, and though it is well beneath maximum capacity, it’s still stunning to regard the sheer number of men and women who are present, despite the war that’s on. I suspect the servants are only present to aid the impression of a large attendance. I cannot imagine my mother suffering dining in the same room as the help without a sufficiently superficial cause such as that. Not that I care myself. All the better they may enjoy the fine dining.
> “Your maidservant Priscilla tells me,”
My mother begins in a low tone, not even allowing me a first bite of fried bread,
> “That you had given her a fright in your bath, yesterday.”
I groan, biting down on the bread and granting myself the time to chew and swallow before replying,
“It was nothing, mother. I had drunk poppymilk and let my mind wander. She was being hysterical.”
> “To hear her tell it, you did not respond to her until she slapped you in the face.”
I give Cersei a dark look, putting my bread down and saying,
“I sincerely hope you have not reprimanded her for that.”
Cersei’s jaw gapes, as if the thought of her being so petty is completely fantastical, insisting,
> “I did NOTHING of the sort! I know how fond you are of her, and after yesterday’s dramatics with Sansa, I would hope you think me not so witless as to presume to think- talking of Sansa, I have not seen her all morning. Why is she not present at the first feast of her King’s name day?”
I give a dismissive wave and turn to start shoveling meat and cheese and fruits onto my plate.
“I gave her leave to spend my name day in her apartments.”
I hear Cersei scoff beside me, but I focus on cutting my meat and gorging myself on it.
> “Is that wise, sweetling? People should start whispering to each other if they mark your Lady Sansa’s absence,”
Cersei says after I refuse to explain further for several moments.
“Let them whisper,”
I say with a mouthful of pork,
“I would rather they speculate on the happiness of my betrothal than regard Lady Sansa’s sour face beside me and have no room for doubt.”
> “Worry not, my son, we shall find you a more worthy wife,”
Cersei says, tending to her own food. I do not respond.
> “Your back, my son- I hear it is paining you to climb out of the bath, and into bed,”
She says again, and it’s all I can do to suppress a cry of rage.
“I am fine, mother. I strained it yesterday when I found out of the torment Lady Sansa had to endure.”
Cersei scoffs,
> “And yet, you’ve a parade scheduled for right after this feast. You have not been ahorse since your fall, my sweet, do you think it’s wise to flirt with further injury astride your mount?”
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“I want the people of Kings Landing to regard my Stag Guard. It is a parade in their honor as much as my own.”
> “All I am saying, my son, is perhaps you ought to allow them to march IN your honor, without participating yourself.”
I groan inwardly. As much as my gut instinct is to defy my mother in all things at all times, she may have the right of it here. Loathe as I am to admit, I have been dreading this parade since yesterday, imagining how the bouncing stride of even a trot would play havoc on my spine. I gulp down a swig of wine and sigh.
> “Perhaps you’re right, mother, I’ll defer the parade to my stags.”
> “My back may be wounded, but the people of Kings Landing needn’t know! I would march with my stags, mother.”
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> “My back may be wounded, but the people of Kings Landing needn’t know! I would march with my stags, mother.”
I'm sure we can get Pycelle or someone to make some sort of jury-rigged back brace or something for us. Or perhaps there's achariot or open-topped carriage hidden away in the bowels of the Red Keep we could use instead of riding horseback.
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