"Who are you?"
Lancel's hair was yanked brutally upward, forcing his head back so he could look at the man seated on the bench. Arms folded across his chest, the fellow was covered head to toe in coarse black hair and built like a bear.
The man facing him was none other than the current underground overlord of Flea Bottom—Rorge.
Rorge did not answer. He simply twisted Lancel's head toward the other side of the room.
There, two men were noisily slurping meat soup and tearing into bread with obvious relish, completely unbothered by the stench that would have made any normal person faint.
These two were none other than the true puppet-masters behind Flea Bottom: the Fourth Scourge players Iron-Pumping Superman and Moon-Fang.
Of course they couldn't smell anything—they had turned their olfactory settings all the way down. They could have gone swimming in a cesspit and still smelled nothing but fresh air.
"Who are you?" Lancel asked again, voice trembling.
"I am the king's squire—Lancel Lannister of House Lannister! Let me go and I'll give you gold, heaps of gold! A Lannister always pays his debts!"
Lancel's words came out in broken gasps, as though he were already half-dead.
"Hmph. Save that speech for them," Iron-Pumping set his bowl down and flashed what he clearly thought was a gentle smile. He pointed at the backs of the thugs who had just left the room. "We two aren't interested in gold."
Lancel realized no one was pinning him anymore and tried to scramble to his feet.
A shadow-cat-quick youth suddenly shot out of the darkness, dagger already gleaming at Lancel's throat.
The meaning was obvious: move and you die.
"Hmm, the king's squire, let's take a look…" Iron-Pumping rose with a grin, palming a small black stone no one else noticed. "Hold him, Anguy."
"Yes, boss."
The youth named Anguy clamped down on the struggling Lancel. He looked skinny, yet his grip was iron—Lancel might as well have been a chick in a hawk's talons.
Iron-Pumping slapped the black stone squarely against Lancel's forehead.
"What are you doing?!" Lancel yelped.
What was he doing? That unremarkable little black stone was a treasure from a Silver Loot Box—the Memory Viewing Stone. Press it to someone's forehead and the user could browse their memories from the past week.
A perfect interrogation tool. Iron-Pumping had been saving it for the right moment.
Lancel had been wandering Flea Bottom like a sleepwalker for days. The moment Iron-Pumping realized the golden-haired youth had come from the Red Keep, he decided the stone's time had come.
The extraction was quick. After only a few heartbeats, Iron-Pumping found exactly what he wanted.
He pocketed the now-dulled stone and gave the terrified boy a meaningful look.
"Yo… never would've guessed. The king's own squire has been… 'serving' the queen in his spare time?"
Lancel's whole body jerked. His pupils shrank to pinpricks. He clenched his teeth, trying to look like he had no idea what the man was talking about.
But the guilty flicker in his eyes was plain as day—even a fool could see it.
Of course he was guilty!
For days he had been sleepwalking into Flea Bottom, not just because Robert kept slapping him silly, but because of Cersei!
The queen had given him a task—a plot to murder the king.
The "advance payment" for that task had been one night in the queen's bed.
At first Lancel had savored it. Now the terror was catching up. He was trapped on the conspirators' ship with no way to jump off!
The accumulated fear finally cracked him.
"Damn fat bastard! Fat bastard! Who do you think you are!"
"Come on then! I'm Lancel of House Lannister! You think I'm afraid of you?!"
Lancel jerked his head up, roared at Iron-Pumping, then panted like a bellows.
Seeing the boy sticking his neck out, daring them to do their worst, Iron-Pumping actually laughed.
"Hmm, got some spine. A young hero. I've always liked heroes—especially heroes brave enough to murder a king!"
Lancel, who had just been acting tough, immediately wilted again at the words "murder a king."
"You… you're talking nonsense…"
Rorge burst out laughing from the side.
Iron-Pumping leaned in close, voice dropping to a devil's whisper.
"In my homeland there's a saying: stretch your neck—one chop. Shrink your neck—still one chop. You know what you've done. Either you kill him first, or one day he kills you."
Lancel shuddered violently.
Why does bad luck always find me?!
He was already despairing. Murdering the king wasn't some casual game. If the plot leaked, if anyone found out… Lancel didn't even dare imagine how he would die.
"Know who we work for?" Iron-Pumping patted the boy's shoulder, still smiling.
"…I don't…"
"Across the Narrow Sea… Targaryen!"
Gulp.
When Lancel finally stumbled out of the fighting pit, the sky was already completely dark.
Two burly thugs and the red-haired youth stood behind him—they would escort "Lord Lancel" safely home.
"Let's go, Lord Lancel!"
Anguy was a commoner from the Dornish Marches—tall and thin, freckled, with a head of bright red hair. Still very young.
Moon-Fang always called him "Red Hair," though Anguy hated the nickname.
He had come to King's Landing for Lord Eddard's tourney, confident his archery would win him the ten thousand gold dragons the king had promised.
Bad luck: the Hand was assassinated, the tourney canceled, and the ten thousand dragons vanished with it.
By the time he reached the city, Anguy had already spent every copper he owned. He was about to sell his bow skills to whoever would feed him when he ran into Iron-Pumping.
One bag of gold coins. A quiet mention of the Targaryens across the sea. A desperate man with nowhere else to turn—Anguy joined on the spot.