Interesting, Renly decided, was a considerable understatement.
The artisans' street, as the locals called it, occupied a long, curving avenue that followed the contour of the hillside like a necklace draped across the throat of the town. On either side, workshops and galleries opened onto the pavement, their doors standing wide to admit the light and display their wares to passing custom. Sculptors worked in the open air, their chisels ringing against marble with the patient, rhythmic music of their trade. Painters sat before easels, capturing the harbour light on canvas with a skill that would not have been out of place in Lannisport or King's Landing. Glassblowers tended their furnaces, producing vessels and ornaments in colours that caught the sun and scattered it into rainbows.
And everywhere, customers. Merchants from the ships in the harbour, examining goods with the calculating eyes of men who knew value when they saw it. Ladies in fine gowns, attended by servants carrying purchases already made. Even a few Essosi faces, which surprised Renly more than anything else. The Free Cities were not known for their appreciation of Westerosi craftsmanship, yet here they were, spending their coin in the workshops of a Stormlands island that most maps barely bothered to name.
"The sculptors came from everywhere," Alexander said, pausing before a workshop where a young woman was putting finishing touches on a bust that Renly recognised, with a start, as his own brother Robert. The likeness was extraordinary, capturing not merely Robert's features but something of his essence: the strength, the appetite, the dangerous charm that had made him a king. "We recruited them from across the Seven Kingdoms, and a few from across the Narrow Sea. The same with the painters, the ceramic workers, the jewellers. We offered them commissions, workshops, housing, and the freedom to pursue their craft without the interference of guilds or patrons who could not tell quality from competence."
"That is Robert," Renly said, nodding at the bust. "An excellent likeness."
"The sculptor's name is Elena. She works primarily from descriptions and smaller portraits. She has never met His Grace, but as you say, the likeness is remarkable." Alexander paused, a calculated beat that Renly recognised as the pause of someone about to deliver a line they had prepared in advance. "We intend to send the finished piece to King's Landing as a gift, if His Grace would accept it. Along with several companion works depicting scenes from the Rebellion. The Battle of the Trident, the siege of Storm's End. Moments that should be remembered."
Renly looked at the boy, at his careful expression and his violet eyes and the way he stood with one hand clasped in the other behind his back, like a scholar delivering a lecture. "You want Robert to think well of Tarth."
"I want His Grace to know that Tarth exists, and that it is loyal, and that it produces things of value. Whether he thinks well of us is a consequence, not a goal." Alexander met Renly's gaze without flinching. "A man does not earn a king's favour by seeking it. He earns it by being useful. We intend to be useful."
"You are eleven years old," Renly said. It came out more accusatory than he had intended, but the boy took it in stride.
"So I have been told. Repeatedly. And yet the workshops exist, and the craftsmen work in them, and the goods they produce are purchased by men who care about quality rather than the age of whoever organised the commerce." The faintest hint of a smile crossed Alexander's face. "Truth does not require credibility, Lord Renly. It merely requires evidence. I have learned to let the evidence speak."
They continued up the artisans' street, past more workshops and more wonders. Renly found his scepticism eroding with each step, replaced by something that was not quite belief but was certainly in the same vicinity. The boy was strange, undeniably, unsettlingly strange. But strange was not the same as false, and the evidence, as Alexander had promised, was speaking very loudly indeed.
* * *
The Sept of the Seven Stars, as it had been renamed, occupied the crown of the hill above the artisans' district.
Renly remembered it as a modest structure, unremarkable for a town of Evenfall's original size, the kind of sept that served its community competently without aspiring to anything beyond competence. The building that greeted him now was recognisably the same structure, but transformed so thoroughly that the transformation bordered on the miraculous. The exterior walls had been refaced with the blue-veined marble that Alexander had mentioned, the pale stone catching the morning light and seeming, in certain angles, to glow with an inner luminescence. New windows of coloured glass had been installed in the nave, depicting the Seven in poses and compositions that Renly had never seen in any sept anywhere, and the entrance was flanked by life-sized statues of the Father and the Mother that were, by any objective assessment, masterworks.
But it was the interior that stole his breath.
The prayer hall was dominated by a mural that covered the entire rear wall, floor to ceiling, spanning a width that must have been forty feet or more. It depicted the Seven at supper with mortal men and women, a scene so vivid and so detailed that Renly found himself looking for the seams where the painted figures met the real air and finding none. The Father sat at the head of the table, his face stern but kind, his eyes seeming to follow the viewer wherever they moved. The Mother sat at his right hand, her expression gentle, her hands extended in blessing over the food before them. The Warrior and the Smith occupied the left side of the composition, deep in conversation, while the Maiden and the Crone attended to the mortal guests who filled the remaining seats.
And the Stranger, veiled and mysterious, stood in the background, a shadow among shadows, his presence implied rather than depicted, his attention focused on something beyond the frame that no mortal eye could see.
"The artist's name is Michael," Alexander said quietly, as though raising his voice in this space would be inappropriate. "He came to us from Oldtown, where he had been dismissed from the Citadel for heresy. His crime, apparently, was the belief that art should be beautiful."
"This is heresy?"
"The Citadel takes a dim view of maesters who believe in divine inspiration. Michael chose to believe anyway, and we were fortunate enough to be the beneficiaries of that choice." Alexander gestured at the mural. "It took him eighteen months to complete. He worked alone, mostly, mixing his own paints from pigments that he sourced from the mountains above the southern quarries. The composition is his own design, though we discussed the theological implications at some length before he began."
"You discussed theology," Renly said. "With a painter. About a mural for a sept."
"Religious art serves a function beyond decoration, Lord Renly. It shapes how people understand their relationship with the divine. A mural that depicts the Seven as distant and terrifying produces a different kind of faith than a mural that depicts them sharing a meal with ordinary men and women." Alexander turned to face him, his violet eyes steady. "We wanted something that would make people feel that the gods were accessible. That prayer was a conversation rather than a supplication. That faith could be a source of strength rather than merely a source of obligation."
Ser Cortnay had been standing beside one of the new windows, examining the glasswork with the expression of a man who was rapidly recalibrating his assumptions. Now he turned and looked at Alexander with something approaching respect.
"You speak of religion as though it were a tool," he said.
"Everything is a tool, Ser Cortnay. The question is always what you intend to build with it." Alexander's expression softened slightly. "I believe in the Seven. I pray to them, as my mother taught me before she died. But I also believe that the faith serves people best when it helps them live better lives rather than merely promising them better deaths. This sept is an expression of that belief, rendered in stone and paint and glass."
The silence that followed was not uncomfortable, merely thoughtful. Renly found himself looking at the mural again, at the mortal figures seated at the divine table, and wondering whether any of them were meant to represent specific people. The composition was allegorical, certainly, but there was something in the faces, in the way they held themselves, that suggested portraiture rather than pure invention.
"The figure second from the left," Renly said, pointing at a woman with pale hair and delicate features who sat beside the Maiden with an expression of profound serenity. "Who is she?"
For the first time since Renly had met him, Alexander hesitated. It was only a moment, barely perceptible, but Renly was trained to notice such things, and he noticed.
"My mother," Alexander said quietly. "The Lady Alysanne. She died when I was four. Michael painted her from descriptions and the single portrait that my father keeps in his solar. He said that the composition needed a figure who embodied the connection between the divine and the mortal, and I... suggested her."
Renly looked at the painted face, at the violet eyes that were, he now realised, very like the eyes of the boy standing beside him. He thought about what it must mean to lose a mother at four years old, to carry that loss through the years that followed, to commission a mural that would place her image in a position of honour for as long as the sept stood.
"A fitting tribute," he said, and meant it.
Alexander inclined his head, accepting the words with a gravity that suggested he understood exactly what they cost and exactly what they were worth. "Thank you, Lord Renly. Shall we continue? The Sapphire Palace awaits, and I believe you will find it even more illuminating than what we have seen so far."
* * *
The Sapphire Palace Resort occupied a promontory south of Evenfall Hall, commanding views of the harbour to the north and the open sea to the west and south. It was, by a considerable margin, the most extraordinary building Renly had ever seen in his life, and he had spent the better part of his adulthood in the Red Keep.
The palace rose from its foundation in seven distinct wings, each one oriented toward a different point of the compass, each one decorated in a style that was immediately, unmistakably evocative of a different region of the Seven Kingdoms. The Stormlands wing, facing west toward the mainland, was severe and proud, all dark stone and narrow windows and banners snapping in the perpetual wind. The Reach wing, by contrast, was green and golden, its walls festooned with flowering vines and its balconies hung with awnings in the colours of House Tyrell. The North wing was grey and solemn, the Westerlands red and gold, the Riverlands blue and silver. The Vale stood proud and white, and the Dorne wing, facing south-west toward the sun, was a riot of colour and tile-work that would not have been out of place in the shadow city of Sunspear itself.
And in the centre, where the seven wings converged, rose a great dome of glass and iron that caught the sunlight and scattered it into rainbows that danced across the courtyard below.
"The concept," Alexander explained, as they approached the main entrance along a path lined with flowering shrubs, "was to create a space where visitors could experience all of Westeros without ever leaving Tarth. Each wing contains guest chambers decorated in the style of its region, a gallery depicting the history and culture of that kingdom, and a dining hall serving cuisine appropriate to the theme. A guest from the Reach can stay in the Reach wing and feel at home, or stay in the North wing and feel transported. The choice is theirs."
"A museum," Renly said. "And a resort. Combined."
"Exactly. The galleries are open to all visitors, regardless of whether they are staying as guests. The history of the Seven Kingdoms, depicted in art and artifact, available for education and contemplation. The chambers, of course, are reserved for those who have made arrangements in advance." A slight smile crossed Alexander's face. "The waiting list for reservations currently extends past the turn of the year. We have had enquiries from as far as Volantis."
They entered through the main doors, which were bronze and depicted a map of Westeros in relief, each kingdom distinct and detailed. The central dome loomed overhead, its glass panels filtering the light into something softer and more diffuse than the harsh sun outside. The space beneath the dome was a great hall, furnished with comfortable seating and decorated with plants that Renly did not recognise, their leaves broad and green and somehow tropical in a way that felt utterly foreign to the Stormlands.
"The plants are from Essos," Alexander said, following Renly's gaze. "The dome creates a microclimate that allows us to grow species that would not otherwise survive this far north. We have citrus trees in the southern courtyard, and a small collection of spice plants that we are attempting to cultivate for eventual commercial production."
"You are growing oranges. On Tarth."
"In small quantities, yes. It is an experiment. Not everything we attempt succeeds, Lord Renly. But the attempts that do succeed tend to be worth the failures that precede them."
They toured the galleries next, moving through wings that each told a different story. The Stormlands wing depicted the history of Renly's own kingdom, from the Storm Kings of old through the Conquest and the Rebellion, with particular attention paid to the siege of Storm's End. Renly found himself standing before a painting that showed his brother Stannis on the walls, gaunt and grim, holding the castle against impossible odds while the Redwyne fleet blockaded the harbour. It was not a flattering portrait, exactly, but it was honest, and Renly respected honesty even when it was uncomfortable.
"You included Stannis," he said.
"The siege of Storm's End is part of the history of the Stormlands. Lord Stannis was the man who held it. To omit him would be to falsify the record." Alexander paused. "I understand that the relationship between your family is... complicated. But history does not care about complication. It cares about what happened, and what happened is that Lord Stannis held Storm's End when lesser men would have surrendered."
Renly looked at the boy, at his serious face and his careful words, and felt a sudden, unexpected stab of something that was not quite guilt but was certainly related to it. He had never thought particularly well of Stannis. The man was humourless, rigid, and constitutionally incapable of enjoying anything that other people found pleasurable. But he had held Storm's End, and Renly had been inside those walls during the holding, young enough that he barely remembered it but old enough that the memory of hunger had never quite faded.
"You are very careful," Renly said. "For a boy your age. Very considered in what you say and how you say it."
"I have learned that words, once spoken, cannot be unspoken. It encourages a certain caution." Alexander gestured toward the next gallery. "Shall we continue? There is more to see, and I believe you will find the zoo and aquarium particularly interesting."
* * *
The zoo, as Alexander called it, occupied a sprawling complex of enclosures and gardens to the west of the Sapphire Palace. It was, Renly was forced to admit, unlike anything he had ever seen or heard of in his life.
The enclosures were designed to replicate the natural habitats of their inhabitants, or at least what Renly assumed were their natural habitats, since many of the creatures on display were species he had only ever read about in books. There were shadowcats from the mountains of the Vale, pacing their artificial cliffs with the fluid grace of predators who had not quite forgotten what freedom felt like. There were striped horses from the Dothraki Sea, their black and white hides gleaming in the afternoon sun. There were enormous birds from the Summer Islands, their plumage so bright it seemed to glow, and small, clever monkeys that watched the visitors with eyes that suggested they found the spectacle as entertaining as the visitors found them.
And then there was the aquarium.
It was housed in a building of its own, a long, low structure with walls of glass that allowed the sunlight to penetrate into a series of enormous tanks filled with seawater. The tanks contained fish of every size and colour, from tiny, darting things no larger than a man's thumb to great, slow-moving creatures that must have weighed as much as a horse. There were crabs and lobsters and eels and octopi, there were sea stars and sea urchins and things with tentacles that Renly could not begin to identify. And in the largest tank of all, visible through a wall of glass that must have been twenty feet high and forty feet wide, and costed a fortune, there were dolphins.
They were performing, Renly realised. Performing for an audience of perhaps fifty people who sat on benches arranged in tiers before the glass, watching as the sleek grey creatures leapt and dived and twisted through the water with an intelligence that was almost, but not quite, human. A trainer stood at the edge of the tank, making gestures that the dolphins seemed to understand, rewarding their performances with fish from a bucket at her feet.
"The dolphins were the most difficult part," Alexander said, standing beside Renly as they watched the show. "They require a great deal of space and constant attention. But they are worth the effort. People will travel a great distance to see something they have never seen before, and no one in the Seven Kingdoms has ever seen anything like this."
"No," Renly agreed. "I do not imagine they have."
"The principle is simple enough. Give people something remarkable, something they cannot find anywhere else, and they will come to you. Once they are here, they spend money. They buy goods from our merchants, meals from our taverns, lodging from our inns. They see our craftsmanship, taste our whiskey, wear our perfumes. And when they go home, they tell their friends, and their friends come too. The cycle feeds itself."
"A virtuous circle."
"Exactly. Prosperity funding prosperity. It requires initial investment, of course, and patience, and a willingness to accept that not every venture will succeed. But the mathematics are sound, and the results..." Alexander gestured at the aquarium, at the delighted faces of the audience, at the whole, impossible complex that surrounded them. "The results speak for themselves."
Renly was quiet for a long moment, watching the dolphins and thinking about everything he had seen since arriving on the island that morning. The harbour, the town, the artisans' street, the sept, the palace, the zoo. Each one remarkable in its own right. Together, they constituted something that went beyond remarkable into territory that Renly did not have a word for.
"This will make you powerful," he said finally. "All of this. The wealth, the reputation, the alliances. You are building something that will change how the realm sees House Tarth."
"Yes," Alexander said simply. "That is the intention."
"And you do not think that such power might attract... attention? The kind of attention that a minor house might prefer to avoid?"
Alexander turned to face him, his violet eyes steady and unafraid. "Power always attracts attention, Lord Renly. The question is whether you are prepared for the attention when it comes. We are a minor house, yes. We have been a minor house for centuries, content to serve our lords and tend our island and attract no notice from anyone who might pose a threat. That strategy has kept us safe. It has also kept us irrelevant." He paused. "I prefer safety that comes from strength to safety that comes from obscurity. Obscurity can be stripped away by a single stroke of bad fortune. Strength, properly built, endures."
"You sound like you are expecting bad fortune."
"I am expecting the world to continue being the world, Lord Renly. The world is not a safe place. It never has been. The strong survive, the weak perish, and the clever find ways to become strong before the world remembers to test them." Something flickered in Alexander's expression, something old and tired and entirely inappropriate for a child of eleven. "I do not know what the future holds. No one does. But I know that I would rather face it with walls and ships and trained soldiers than without them."
Renly looked at the boy for a long moment, weighing what he had heard against what he had seen, trying to reconcile the child's face with the words that came from the child's mouth. It did not quite work, and he suspected it never would. Alexander Tarth was something new, something that the categories Renly had been raised with did not quite contain.
"Well," he said at last. "I suppose I should see these walls you are building. I have heard rumours, but rumours are often unreliable."
Alexander smiled, a genuine expression that made him look, for just a moment, like the child he was supposed to be. "The Wall of Tarth is not a rumour, Lord Renly. It is, in fact, the least rumour-like thing on this island. Come. I think you will find it educational."
* * *