Chapter 138: Ned and Arty
The Hand's solar smelled faintly of ink and old parchment, a stack of unread petitions leaning precariously on one corner of the desk where Artos sat. His quill moved in slow, deliberate strokes across a letter meant for some lordling in the Riverlands who had written three times already about a boundary dispute nobody outside his own holdfast cared about.
The door opened without a knock, which told Artos exactly who it was before he even looked up.
"Ned." He set the quill down, leaning back in his chair. "Come to check if I am all right? You finally stopped acting so cold toward me. Finally coming to check on the injuries of your youngest brother?"
Artos said it very cheekily, getting back at Ned for being so cold toward him.
"Fuck you, Arty and Hold that tongue of yours," Ned said in annoyance at his brother japes and teasing.
Artos laughed. "So harsh, brother. Is this how a Warden of the North is supposed to behave?" he asked sarcastically.
Eddard closed the door behind him and took the chair across from the desk with the unhurried ease of a man who had spent decades learning to sit comfortably in rooms full of tension.
He ignored Artos's last comment.
"Why would I care about you? Few days back You killed a man in one of the most painful ways imaginable. If I need to worry about someone, I should worry about Tywin Lannister, not you. There is a possibility he is in more pain than you. Losing two trials in one day—he must be grinding his teeth right now. His family's reputation is at an all-time low, I reckon."
Ned said it with a smile.
"Fair point, I suppose," Artos said, smiling lightly. "But you worrying about Tywin Lannister? Aye, the North will have green fields and farmlands before that happens. But putting that aside, what brings you down here instead of drinking with Stig?"
"I wanted to talk," Eddard said simply. "About you. About the trial. About the Hour of the Demon, as you have coined the term. Feeling like Cregan Stark now, are you? Looks like you are enjoying your time as Hand."
Artos's mouth curved slightly.
"Aye. It seemed like a good term. Too many similarities not to use it. And history has its own twisted way of repeating itself."
Ned smiled, then scoffed. "You truly love playing around now. Where is my brother who used to hate this stuff?"
Artos laughed. "Maybe he is buried somewhere in Essos. Braavos is not a place to survive without politics. If I wanted Valens to rule that place, I needed to dirty myself with politics. So aye, I took some lessons there. Though most of them came from Father teaching Brandon."
Eddard studied him for a long moment, something quiet and searching in his expression. Then he nodded.
"Aye. I remember Father writing quite a bit about you and your antics. He seemed annoyed, but proud of you."
Artos smiled at that. "Thank you for saying that."
Ned shook his head as if it were nothing.
"You seem happier than I have seen you in years, Arty. Since before Essos, maybe. I did not expect that, given everything happening here and in the realm."
Artos considered the observation, turning it over the way he turned over most things—slowly, without rushing toward an answer he did not fully have yet.
"I don't know," he admitted. "Maybe. Something is different, though I cannot say what exactly."
"I think I know the answer, Arty," Ned said with a smile and confidence.
Artos looked at him in surprise. "Really?" he asked genuinely.
"Maybe you are seeing yourself in Bjorn," Eddard offered.
Artos went quiet at that, something flickering behind his eyes—old memory, perhaps, or a recognition he had not fully allowed himself yet.
"Maybe," he said at last. "Though he is wilder than I ever was. Must be his mother's blood. I am calm as anyone, you know."
The last part came out dry as old bone, and Ned's mouth twitched despite himself.
"Calm as anyone," Eddard repeated, deadpan. "Sure. Could anyone possibly be wilder than a boy who once commanded an army of Northmen? We Northmen are harsher than any in the realm. They need someone with spine and character to follow. Though I will grant you, he is wild in a different way than you."
He paused.
"Drinking human blood. I remember the Skagosi doing that in war, years back. But in a trial by combat, in front of the entire realm?"
"It took guts," Artos said, something almost like pride threading through the words. "Guts, wildness, and more than a bit of arrogance."
"That last part sounds familiar," Eddard said.
Artos huffed something close to a laugh. "Aye. I wonder where he got it from. Must be from you, brother."
Both of them laughed at the jape.
"Yeah, sure," Ned said.
They sat in comfortable silence for a moment, the kind only brothers who truly cared for one another could share—men with enough scars between them to no longer need constant conversation to fill the space.
"Robert," Eddard said eventually. "Word is already spreading that he has agreed to let Sansa and the others return north. Is that true?"
"Aye," Artos said, a smile on his face. "He and I made a deal. So aye, take everyone out of this smelly, filthy city. Take them back North, where a Stark should be."
"What deal?" Eddard asked, brow furrowing slightly. Robert did not simply hand out favors without wanting something substantial in return, and both of them knew it.
Artos leaned back and folded his arms.
Something almost sheepish crept into his expression for the first time since Eddard had walked in.
"He was impressed. With how I raised Bjorn. Loras too, I suppose."
"And?"
"And he wants me to mentor Joffrey."
The solar went silent.
Eddard stared at him for a long, unblinking moment, as though waiting for the rest of the sentence—some crucial detail that would make the words he had just heard make sense.
None came.
Then, slowly and inevitably, Eddard Stark began to laugh—loud, genuine, helpless laughter that startled the guard stationed outside the solar door and left Artos scowling across the desk with the particular, wounded dignity of a man who had not intended his announcement to be quite this funny.
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