varys the spider

the Crown's Shadow

The walls of Duskendale still stank of iron and ash when Tywin Lannister arrived. His crimson pavilion had been pitched outside the city gates, its banners snapping like whipcracks in the salt-laced wind. Barristan Selmy stood beside him, white cloak dusted with road grit, his face a mask of stoic dread. They had come to parley with a madman's captors. Instead, they found a charnel house.

Lord Denys Darklyn's corpse greeted them in the Dun Fort's courtyard, his throat a ragged maw. Beside him lay a dozen guards, their bodies carved with a precision that spoke of Valyrian steel and cold intent.

"Brynden Rivers," Barristan muttered, crouching to examine a severed hand still clutching a spear. "Only Dark Sister cuts so clean."

Tywin said nothing. His gaze swept the slaughter, emerald eyes sharp as a banker's quill. The Conclave's puppet show had unraveled—no king to rescue, no righteous siege to wage. Only butchery, and the stench of wasted opportunity.

A rider clattered into the yard, mud-spattered and wild-eyed. "My lords! A letter—from the Wall!"

---

**The Letter**

The parchment bore the broken seal of House Targaryen, its edges singed. Aerys's script sprawled like spider legs, ink blotted with fury:

*Tywin,

You left me to rot in a hole while Grey Rats nibbled at my mind. But the gods are just—I am free, cleansed by fire and blood. My uncle Aemon, wiser than all your scheming maesters, shelters me now. Come. Kneel. Beg forgiveness. Or shall I tell the realm how the Hand's ambition outstripped his loyalty?

The King Who Remembers*

Barristan's jaw tightened. "The Wall? Aemon Targaryen is a maester, sworn to serve. He would not harbor…"

"Aemon Targaryen is a *dragon*," Tywin interrupted, crumpling the letter. "And dragons lie as easily as they breathe."

---

**The Council of Wolves**

That night, Tywin's war council seethed with muted rage. Lord Reyne's son proposed burning Duskendale to ash. Ser Kevan urged caution. Barristan stood apart, staring at the fire.

"The king commands your presence," he said finally. "We are sworn to obey."

"Obey a lunatic?" Tywin's voice could have frozen hell. "Aerys flees to the edge of the world, drags our honor through the mud, and you would have me grovel?"

Barristan turned, his shadow a giant on the tent walls. "I would have you save the realm. From him. From whatever game the Spider spins."

The name hung like poison. *Varys.* The Myrman's couriers already buzzed between cities, peddling secrets with spectacles. His hand was in this—Tywin knew it.

---

**Northward**

They rode at first light, a column of Lannister crimson and Kingsguard white. Tywin brooded in his litter, parchments spread before him—reports of Arachne's Weave satchels appearing in Lannisport, of whispers that the "Instant Courier" had smuggled Dornish vipers into the West.

Barristan rode ahead, his thoughts a storm. *Aerys, alive. Aemon, complicit. And Brynden Rivers—kinslayer, sorcerer, shadow.* What pact had they forged in the frozen dark?

At a crossroads inn, a Myrish merchant pressed a package into Barristan's hand. "For the Lord Hand," he grinned, teeth stained with betel nut. Inside: a pair of sunglasses, lenses tinted blood-red, and a note.

*The sun is brighter at the Wall, they say.

– V.*

Barristan crushed the glasses beneath his boot.

---

**Castle Black, The Edge of the World**

Aemon Targaryen met them at the gate, youth restored by sorcery or spite, his violet eyes gleaming. Behind him loomed Brynden Rivers, Dark Sister unsheathed, and Aerys—gaunt, grinning, a dragonbone crown perched askew on silver hair.

"Tywin!" Aerys spread his arms, the gesture half-welcome, half-mockery. "Come to kiss my ring or cut my throat?"

Barristan stepped forward, white cloak billowing. "Your Grace, the realm begs your return."

"The *realm*," Aerys spat, "can lick my arse. But you, Barristan… you'll stay. Guard me from the rats."

Tywin's hand drifted toward his sword. Brynden's laugh echoed off the ice.

"Careful, Lion. The North remembers—and the Spider watches."

---

Whispers in the Jungle

Sothoryos hungered. Its jungles steamed with the breath of a thousand unseen things—things that slithered, things that stalked, things that sang in clicks and hisses. Varys leaned against the rail of the *Black Widow*, his Myrish galleon, as it cut through the Zamoyos' murky waters. He wore linen instead of silk, a wide-brimmed hat shading his Valyrian pallor, and a smirk. Vacation, he'd told his lieutenants. *Rest.* But rest, for a spider, was merely the stillness between vibrations in the web.

Behind him, the holds groaned with crates stamped with Arachne's sigil: glass lenses, cocaine vials, and the first prototypes of the Myrish Instant Courier satchels—leather packs enchanted with minor glamours to "*borrow speed from the wind*." Next-day delivery. A revolution wrapped in rawhide.

"The Summer Islanders say there's a city upriver," murmured Captain Qhallo, his gold nose ring glinting. "*Yeen.* Cursed, they say."

"Curses are just prayers to the wrong gods," Varys said, adjusting his sunglasses. "Drop anchor. I'll take the skiff."

---

**The Green Hell**

The jungle swallowed him. Vines clutched like skeletal hands. Parrots screamed warnings. Varys trekked lightly, his drow senses parsing the chorus of threats—a quicksand pit here, a venomous frog there. He'd come for the rumors: a beast, black as sin, that stalked even the Brindled Men. A creature out of song.

He found it at dusk.

The panther crouched atop a moss-crusted ziggurat, its eyes twin embers in the gloom. Seven hundred pounds of muscle and malice, fur glistening like oil under moonlight. Varys met its gaze, unblinking.

"*K'thyss,*" he murmured, a word from Valas's memory. *Hunter.*

The beast snarled, fangs bared—then *shuddered*. Bones cracked. Fur rippled. In a breath, it was housecat-sized, leaping into his arms with a purr like a dagger dragged over stone.

"Clever," Varys said, scratching behind its ears. The panther's collar bore glyphs even his ancient drow tongue couldn't parse. "Shall we name you… *Invoice*? Every courier needs bureaucracy."

The cat hissed.

"*Shadow* it is."

---

**Aboard the *Black Widow***

Varys drafted letters by lamplight, Shadow coiled at his feet.

*To Aemon at the Wall:

The courier network will place a rookery in every tavern from Lannisport to Qarth. Your letters will fly swifter than ravens. Burn the Citadel's lies with truth—and dragonfire.

– V.*

*To Brynden Rivers:

Attached, a dossier on the Conclave's alchemists in Lys. They're attempting to replicate wildfire. Perhaps you'd enjoy a visit?

– The Spider*

*To the Summer Islanders:

50% discount on Myrish glass for every cocoa bean shipped to Arachne's Weave. Let the Grey Rats choke on sugar.

– Your New Trade Overlord*

Shadow batted a cockroach across the desk. Varys sighed. "You're fired."

---

**Sothoryos, One Week Later**

The Brindled Men attacked at dawn. Naked, painted in ochre and blood, they swung from vines with bone knives. Varys sipped his coffee—Sothoryos dark blend, brewed over a portable Myrish stove—as Shadow expanded to full size.

Chaos ensued.

By the time the last warrior fled, Varys had parsed their tattoos. *Slavers.* The Brindled Men had been selling prisoners to Yeen's ruins. *How curious.*

He left them trussed in their own nets, a coupon for Arachne's spectacles tucked into their chieftain's loincloth. *20% off corrective lenses. You'll need them.*

---

**Myr, The Grand Courier's Debut**

Varys returned to a city abuzz. Couriers in spider-emblazoned tunics darted through streets, satchels shimmering with stolen haste. At the docks, a Braavosi merchant wept over a crate of fresh Winterfell apples delivered in a day. "*Magic!*" he cried.

"Commerce," Varys corrected, stropping Shadow now housecat-sized on his shoulder. "The deadliest magic of all."

That night, he dined in his manse, the panther gnawing a haunch of venison as he read a raven from Dorne:

*Spider,

Oberyn Martell requests a pair of "sunglasses." Also, your cocaine. He says to write "the Red Viper bites sweeter with both."

– Selwyn*

Varys snorted. *Let the Citadel tremble. Let kings plot. The future is delivered by dawn.*

---