Celestial Dwarf: Chapter 27 - Acceptance

Mid 289 AC

Tysha lay on her back in the dark, staring up at the low ceiling beams as her father’s voice echoed in her head.

You've got your mother's stubborn chin, girl. Seven help the man who marries you.

He used to say it while she snapped beans on the porch, always half a joke, always with that crooked smile that meant he was proud of her even when he pretended to complain. She hadn't heard that voice in a moon and a half, yet some nights it returned so clearly she could have sworn he was standing right in the doorway. Her throat went tight. She pressed the heel of her hand against her eyes, holding it there until the ache in her chest passed.

She would not cry tonight. She had cried enough for a lifetime, and tears had never once put coin in her pocket or a roof over her head that wasn't borrowed off someone else's charity.

Sitting up, she reached beneath the pallet to pull out her satchel. She had packed it two nights before, hiding it under a loose floorboard behind the washstand, stowing a little at a time so nothing would be missed. A spare tunic, her mother’s wooden comb, a heel of bread quietly snitched from supper, and a bit of cheese wrapped in a rag.

The medallion sat at the very bottom, wrapped in wool. It had stayed untouched for a moon because she simply hadn't dared allow herself to think about it. Not until three days ago, when her aunt had looked her over at the washbasin and said, not unkindly, "You're a pretty enough girl, Tysha. Might be time we asked around the fish market. Boren's boy is looking, I hear."

Tysha hadn't answered. She'd just scrubbed the pot in her hands until her knuckles ached.

In her first week in Lannisport, she'd walked the streets with her mouth half open, gawking at the opulence around her. There was no reek of a hundred years' refuse baked into the cobblestones here, no open gutters running down the roads the way there'd been in every town she'd passed through on the journey from Sarsfield. She'd asked her uncle about it once, and he'd shrugged and said it was the dwarf lord's doing, some new system of pipes and channels under the streets that carried the filth out to sea instead of leaving it to rot where it

Everyone in Lannisport seemed to have an opinion on Lord Tyrion, and most of them were fiercely fond. The smith two alleys over from her uncle’s workshop swore the young lord had personally demonstrated a trick for tempering iron that cut his fuel costs by a third. She’d even caught sight of him once from a distance, crouched over a heavy drainage grate, arguing fiercely with a foreman about grade and pitch with his sleeves rolled to the elbows like a common laborer. Later, at the harvest fair, she noticed a boy no older than Bella racing around with a beautifully carved wooden horse; when asked, his mother revealed it was the young lord’s design, handed out free by the cartload. A generous lord. A useful one. A loved Lord.

But reality in the Street of Looms was closing in. Her uncle had no coin to spare for an apprenticeship, nor the standing to sway a guild master on her behalf. Though he never voiced it outright, Tysha quickly realized he had no desire to feed a mouth that wasn't his own for a day longer than politeness demanded. A pretty face and a tragic story only bought so much patience in a household already stretched to its limits.

She pulled her shawl tight around her shoulders and slung the canvas satchel across her body, her foot already angling toward the door when a small voice piped up from the corner pallet.

"Tysha?"

She froze. Nine-year-old Bella was sitting up, rubbing her eyes in the gloom, her hair tangled every which way.

"Go back to sleep, Bella," Tysha whispered urgently.

"You've got your bag." Bella's tone was curious. "Where are you going?"

Tysha crossed the room and knelt by the pallet, taking the girl's small hand in both of hers before she could get any louder. "I have to go away for a while," she murmured. "Somewhere better. I need you to promise not to wake your mother or your father until morning. Can you do that for me?"

Bella's face crumpled. "You're not coming back."

"I don't know," Tysha admitted. "Maybe. Maybe not for a long while."

Bella's chin wobbled. Tysha felt her own throat close up all over again, worse this time. She dug into the satchel and pulled out her mother's comb and pressed it into the girl's hands.

"I want you to have this," she said. "It was my mother's. You take care of it for me."

"I don't want your comb." Bella's eyes swelled with unshed tears. "I want you to stay."

"I know." Tysha pressed a quick kiss to the crown of her head before her resolve could shatter. "Go back to sleep. Please."

Bella didn't answer, but she didn't call out either. She just clutched the comb to her chest and watched, wet-eyed, as Tysha slipped out through the front room.

Outside, the biting harbor air hit her face like a slap. She lingered with her back pressed against the wood of the door, breathing heavily, her heart hammering against her ribs as though she had already been running for miles.

I'm sorry, she thought, though she was no longer entirely certain who the apology was meant for.

Forcefully, she compelled her feet to move.

The streets winding toward the western gate were largely deserted, save for a few lanterns flickering outside the taverns, casting a dull glow over the wet, gleaming cobblestones. As she walked, Tyrion's voice echoed back to her through the dark.

This is not a decision you need to make today. Go to your uncle. See what awaits you there.

Well. She'd gone. She'd scrubbed floors and hauled water, wandered the streets of Lannisport, and had waited a whole moon for something - anything - to make her feel like she belonged her.. Nothing had. Not one thing.

Her hands were trembling with nerves by the time the massive gatehouse loomed into view. Two guardsmen flanked the torchlight, spears held loosely, watching her approach with mild, half-bored indifference. Tysha halted a few paces back and reached into her satchel until her fingers found the heavy medallion.

Unwrapping it from its protective wool, she held it up, letting the metal catch the firelight. Her voice came out far steadier than she actually felt.

"I need passage to Casterly Rock," she declared. "Lord Tyrion gave me this."

The nearer guard’s eyes dropped to the medallion, then snapped back up to her face, instantly sharpening.

"Where'd you get that, girl?" His hand was already falling toward the hilt at his belt when the second guard caught him by the wrist.

"Oye, Ed." The second guard's voice was flat and cold. "That ain't no forgery. You know the rules."

Ed didn't let go of his spear, but he stopped reaching for his sword. He looked from the medallion to Tysha's face and back again, as if trying to force the two puzzle pieces to fit together.

"Lord Tyrion gave me this," Tysha repeated. Her arm was beginning to ache from holding it out, but she refused to lower her hand.

Ed stepped back and clicked his tongue against his teeth in irritation. "Fine." He jerked his chin toward the stone archway. "Wait here."

She waited. The remaining guard offered nothing more, simply resuming his post as though she had dissolved into the dark. He settled his spear back against his shoulder, his eyes drifting past her toward the black road beyond the torchlight. Tysha stood with the medallion resting in her open palm, her heart hammering so violently she could feel the pulse ticking in her throat.

It wasn't long before a man emerged from the gatehouse, older than the guards, unarmored, with a heavy wool cloak thrown over what looked like a night's interrupted sleep. He possessed the sort of face that had grown soft and pleasant with age, and he regarded her with more curiosity than suspicion as he approached.

"Let's see it, then."

He held out a weathered hand. Tysha placed the medallion into it, watching his thumb trace the crisp etching as he tilted the metal toward the torchlight.

"Well." He turned it over once. "It's standard enough."

When he handed it back, his manner had already shifted into something far more relaxed. "Come along, girl."

She followed him past the gatehouse and down the track running parallel to the massive city wall, her canvas satchel bumping against her hip with every step, her fingers tightly clutching the cold medallion. A short way down, where the last of the streetlamps flickered out, a cluster of heavy merchant wagons sat pulled off to the side of the road. Their canvas covers loomed pale in the dark, and a few low fires still smoldered where the teamsters hadn't yet banked the coals for the night.

"Caravans bound for the Rock," the older man noted, without slowing his pace. "Most leave before the first light. This one’s carrying ironwork and tallow for the castle smiths. You'll ride with them."

He led her to the last wagon in the line, a sturdy, open-backed transport stacked with crates and rolled canvas, and rapped his knuckles twice against the wooden frame. A heavyset teamster appeared from the far side, chewing on a piece of dried meat, entirely unbothered by the ungodly hour.

"Got a girl needs passage to Casterly Rock," the gateman called out. "Lord Tyrion's business."

The teamster's eyebrows rose slightly, and he swept Tysha with a quick, searching gaze. "Aye. Room enough." He nodded toward the back of the bed. "Climb up, then. Mind the crates, girl, some of that's fine Myrish glass, and I'll skin the one who cracks it."

Tysha murmured her thanks to the gateman, who had already turned back toward his warm quarters, and hauled herself over the wooden tailboard. The wood was hard and freezing beneath her. She settled herself against a stack of canvas-wrapped crates, pulling her knees tightly to her chest and wrapping her shawl securely around her shoulders.

For a long while, no one spoke to her. The teamster returned to his business, murmuring in low tones to another man by the fire, and the camp drifted back into the restless quiet of people snatching a final hour of sleep before a long haul.

Tysha sat with her back against the crates and stared at the night sky glistening with stars.

She thought of Bella's face, the comb pressed into small hands, the wet eyes that had watched her go. She thought of her father's crooked smile, and how she hadn't said goodbye to her aunt or her uncle at all, only left a girl of nine to carry the news for them in the morning.

Guilt sat heavy and cold in her chest. But beneath it, stubborn and quiet, was a deep sense of relief, and perhaps something like purpose. She had no idea what waited for her atop the high cliffs of Casterly Rock. But whatever it was, it was finally hers to find out.

The eastern sky had just begun to turn the color of bruised plums when the teamster finally called out for the camp to rouse. A moment later, the wagon lurched forward, the iron-shod wheels grinding heavily against the packed dirt as the caravan groaned into motion.

Tysha drifted in and out as the wagon rolled on, the crates shifting and settling around her with every rut in the road, and the low, rumbling chatter of the teamsters faded in and out of hearing.. She hadn't meant to sleep, but the exhaustion of the last few hours caught up with her somewhere past dawn. The next thing she knew, a rough hand was shaking her shoulder.

"Up you get, lass. We've reached."

She blinked awake, stiff and cold, and scrambled over the tailboard on legs that had gone half numb from sitting. When she got her bearings, she realized this wasn't the majestic gate to Casterly Rock she remembered.

The last time she'd come this way, it had been through the Lion's Mouth, the great cavern entrance she'd gaped at when she’d come with Lord Tyrion and Lord Jaime. This was smaller, plainer, set into the base of the mountain some distance along the coast road, with none of the carved stonework or banners of the main gate.

It was, she realized as she looked around, a working entrance.

The yard beyond stretched wide and busy at this early hour. Rows of low, stone buildings stood with dark smoke curling from chimney after chimney, while heavy carts rolled in and out loaded with ore, charcoal, and crated goods she couldn't begin to guess at. Men moved between the structures with quiet purpose, shouting to one another over the relentless, never-ending ringing of blacksmith hammers.

It was louder and more crowded than the streets of Lannisport, yet everything about the place remained meticulously ordered. Carts kept strictly to one side of the yard, barrels were stacked in neat, identical rows, and the ground was swept entirely clear of the debris she would normally expect from this much iron and stone changing hands. Ahead, past the last row of buildings, the yard funneled toward a cavern mouth so large she couldn't see where it ended, only the deep orange glow of forge-fire somewhere inside it.

Ahead, past the final row of buildings, the yard funneled toward a cavern mouth so immense she couldn't see where it ended, only the deep, rhythmic orange glow of forge-fires pulsing somewhere deep inside.

"You need something, lass?"

The voice came from behind her, deep and rough. Tysha turned to find a mountain of a man watching her with mild curiosity. He possessed a thick beard the color of rust, and forearms that looked as though they had spent a lifetime pounding metal.

She fumbled with her satchel and drew the medallion out, holding it toward him with both hands. "I was told to show this. If I needed to see Lord Tyrion."

The man's eyes widened. He reached out and plucked it straight from her fingers, turning it over to run a calloused thumb along the precise etching. "That's Lord Tyrion's own work, that is."

He handed it back to her, far more gently than she expected from hands that size. "Aye. Stay here. I'll get word down to him." He glanced back toward the massive cavern mouth. "Word has it he's mining right now."

"Mining?"

The disbelief must have shown plainly on her face, because the giant let out a low rumble of a laugh.

"Aye. A queer lad, the young lord is. Goes down into the deep veins himself, entirely on his own, and finds deposits most men spend months digging for. The men say he’s got a nose for gold." He shook his head, still chuckling. "A genius, though. A smith like no other."

"A smith?" Tysha started, then bit her lip before the rest of the thought could slip out - but he's so small.

She didn't need to finish it. The man's grin told her he'd heard the same unfinished thought from plenty of people before her.

"Short he is," he allowed, "but by the gods, I've never seen a man stronger for his size. The Lannister blood runs thick in that one. Most of the lads here think he’s blessed by Casterly Rock itself. Everything we do here has improved since he took over the works. Stronger steel, new ways of forging that nobody else had ever dreamed of before him.”

He paused, offering a sheepish grin. "I forgot to introduce myself." He tapped his own chest, where a small golden pin shaped like a blacksmith's hammer was fastened to his heavy wool shirt. "I'm Andrus. Foreman of the yard."

Tysha managed something resembling a proper curtsy, though her legs were still stiff and uncooperative from the wagon ride. "Tysha."

Andrus nodded, satisfied, and turned to bark a sharp order at a boy hauling a sloshing bucket past them. He gave a name she didn't quite catch, commanding the youth to run word down to the lower gallery immediately. The boy took off at a dead sprint, and Andrus turned back to her.

"Might be a while yet," he warned. "He doesn't care to be pulled out of the mines - not for anything short of the Rock burning down around his ears. Sit if you like."

He gestured toward a low wooden bench resting near one of the primary smithing sheds. Tysha lowered herself onto it, clutching the satchel tightly in her lap as she watched the yard move around her. Carts rolled past, men hoisted heavy barrels, and the rhythmic, metallic ring of hammers rose and fell through the morning air while a pair of young apprentices argued over a bin of scrap iron.

An hour crept by before the yard's busy din shifted, a ripple of shouting breaking through the rhythmic din of the smiths.

"Lord Tyrion!"

"Lord Tyrion!"

Tysha rose from the bench to get a look at the commotion. Striding out from the cavern mouth was a small figure, no taller than a child but built stockier, a pickaxe slung across his back and his boots caked in pale dust. Men were already crowding toward him, smiths setting down half-finished pieces, boys darting in from between the carts.

""Gerrit, you old thief! Is that armor order still sitting half-finished on your bench, or did you finally remember how to swing a hammer?" Tyrion called out to a nearby smith, never once slowing his pace. "Three moons I've been asking!"

"Working on it, milord!" the man yelled back.

"So you've said since the harvest fair!" Tyrion grinned, flicking a silver stag to a boy who had darted up beside him. "There. Don't spend it all on sweets. And if you do, at least have the decency to lie to me about it afterward."

The boy laughed and scampered off, replaced instantly by two more lads with their hands outstretched. Tyrion obliged them both with the same easy, effortless grin. He paused by a stone workbench where a smith was hovering over a glowing, half-forged blade. Picking it up without asking, Tyrion turned it in the morning light, and made a face of such theatrical disappointment that the smith went pale before Tyrion broke into a laugh and clapped him on the arm.

"I'm teasing, it's good work. Fix the taper on the last inch and it'll be better than good." He set it back down.

The crowd gradually thinned as the daily work pulled everyone back to their respective benches. It was only then, as the space cleared, that curious glances began drifting toward Tysha. Tyrion had stopped directly in front of her, his hands planted firmly on his hips and his head tilted.

"Well, well." His grin widened. "If it isn’t Tysha. Come to admire the scenery, or did Lannisport finally bore you?"

"Milord." Her voice came out much smaller than she intended. "You had... kindly offered me a position in your household before I left."

"Did I?" He pressed a hand to his chest, looking mock-wounded. "I offer a great many things when I'm feeling generous. You'll have to be more specific, my dear, or I'll start to suspect you're taking credit for someone else's fortune."

She understood, after a beat, that he was enjoying himself entirely too much to make this easy for her. Well, she hadn't escaped from her uncle's to lose her nerve.

"Wouldyoupleasehirememilord," she blurted out. The words rushed out in a single, breathless tangle, barely above a whisper.

Tyrion wiggled a finger in his ear with exaggerated distress, his brows climbing toward his hairline. "I'm sorry, I seem to have gone entirely deaf in this ear. The mining does that, you see. Could you be a little louder?"

Heat rushed up her neck. Gathering her courage, she lifted her chin and held his gaze this time, and repeated herself loud enough that a smith two benches over glanced up.

"Would you please hire me, milord."

"There we are." He looked entirely too pleased with himself. "Well, of course, my dear. Now follow me."

Without another word, he simply turned on his heel and began walking away with quick, purposeful strides, heading right back toward the massive cavern mouth he had just emerged from, whistling a low tune under his breath.

Tysha stood there gaping. That was it?

He glanced back over his shoulder, a brow raised in an expression that managed to look both delighted and mildly scandalized by her hesitation. "Well, come on then. Chop chop. You're supposed to be my assistant now, aren't you? And an assistant is generally expected to keep pace. It's practically the whole job description."

She nodded so hard it nearly hurt, grabbed her satchel off the bench, and ran to catch up, half-certain she'd just agreed to something considerably stranger than she'd bargained for.

Well Tyrion's party of three has formed! Let the madness begin