Log: Robb & Roose WHO Robb Stark & Roose Bolton WHAT Robb starts to call the bannermen(!) lock in some alliances to fight back against the Lannisters' Ned-related accusations. WHEN Saturday evening, so slightly backdated WHERE The Boltons' house RATING No particular warnings to speak of STATUS Complete
ROOSE BOLTON (~ROOSE_BOLTON)
ROBB STARK (~SHINESBRIGHT)
Roose had been comforting Bethany when he got the call from Robb. He’d told her he needed some privacy, and now he as he stood outside his house watching the car roll up, the soft moans of the piano drifted from the open living room window.
It had been a long day. The entire department was stuck in purgatory, lacking the information needed to choose a side. Some were loyal regardless, like the Umbers. But right now, Roose was a tree in the wind….and the wind was blowing in opposite directions. He could only stand.
“Robb,” greeted Roose, walking up to the car and extending his hand as the young Stark stepped out.
Robb's expression was drawn as he met Roose's eyes and extended hand in turn, grip clasping in a firm shake. The day has been a chaotic crash of unconfirmed assumptions, insinuations, and confusion as Robb tried to find someone who could tell him what was really going on with his father. Ever since Robert Baratheon's death, Ned Stark had been under fire, and at the center of that fight, the Lannisters seemed to be polishing their guns. The very thought made his blood boil, but he could not afford to lose his cool. His father needed him to be a collected advocate, not a loose cannon.
"Thank you for meeting with me. Where would you prefer to talk?" Robb said, posture stiff with the tension of the day. Lieutenant Roose Bolton was never a particularly warm person to talk to, but their families had worked alongside each other for so long, and it was hard to hear some members of the force turn on his dad so quickly. Snippy defensiveness had risen in him a little too quickly, but Robb had hope that Roose could offer respectable and reasonable conversation.
In a time where his father could be thrown in prison without an investigation, they would need to stick together.
Roose tilted his head in the direction of the house. “Come. We’ll take a walk around the garden,” he said. Hands in pockets, he led Robb around the side of the house down a stone pathway, reaching the expansive garden lined with thick but carefully trimmed bushes.
“These charges against your father are nonsense. If they were going to fabricate a crime, it should have at least been a crime he could believably have committed,” said Roose, strolling leisurely next to Robb. “Although I can’t think of such a crime myself.” The sun was sliding down toward the horizon, but it had a way to go yet. The evening was painted a muted grey.
He turned to Robb. “Have you spoken to him yet?”
Shaking his head with a tight frown, Robb crossed his arms solemnly across his chest, eyes falling across the beautiful garden but not truly seeing it. "I was told no one but his lawyers are being allowed in right now. We will discuss it tomorrow, and the day after, until they see fit to tell me why my father was arrested without so much as a formal investigation."
Seeing an errant stone on the path, Robb had the sudden urge to kick it like a petulant child, but he wasn't a child anymore. He was a man, an adult, an officer of the law, and his father was in federal prison for crimes Robb would bet his life were nothing more than false accusations. He had no room for the uncertainties of youth, no luxury to to sit back and let others figure it out while he fretted. Anger and righteous determination would have to be his fuel.
The truth would out, and justice walked hand in hand with the Starks.
"I suspect the reason is that a formal and legitimate investigation would prove him innocent," Robb continued wryly. "I can't say I'm confident in their intention to be fair, but truth is truth."
Roose nodded thoughtfully. There was no doubt in his mind that Eddard Stark was innocent - of these crimes, at least. And the Bolton family had always been tied to the Starks in one way or the other, albeit they never did share the same power. “The Lannisters,” said Roose. “If I were a gambling man, and I’m not, I’d wager that they are responsible for this. Robert would certainly never have allowed this to happen.”
Robert’s death was something else that stuck in Roose’s mind. He wasn’t sure why, but there was a definite aura around the circumstances of the fat mayor’s demise. Roose had been willing to chalk it up to paranoia but with Ned’s arrest….well, soon nobody would be safe. If they ever had been.
“Why arrest a man like Ned? A man so popular and powerful with such strong allies?” wondered Roose aloud. “Unless he posed a greater threat free then imprisoned. These are the questions to ask, Robb. Ask carefully, but persistently. What does Ned know that makes such a risk acceptable?”
Roose's words rang in Robb's mind, putting voice to the niggling feeling in his stomach. Whatever was happening to Eddard Stark was wholly intentional, driven by a purpose they could not yet see, and that hidden motivation made it all the more dangerous. Intrigue, machinations, conspiracies -- his father did not deserve to be caught up in that game, Robb had no doubt, but caught up in it, he was. Soon Robb guessed they might all be.
Nodding slowly, his face was held fast in cold, quiet determination. "I would say it warrants some investigation, yes? The Lannisters might think they can just throw around their weight in gold, but there is a root, and I intend to pull it out." Meeting Roose's eyes, he added, "Carefully."
Like the strategy of a war game.
The execution would be the challenge -- with a family as powerful as the Lannisters, challengers could find themselves in a cell next to his father -- but it couldn't be impossible. Surely there would be people who recognized how absurd and suspicious the arrest had been, those allies of his father who stand strong in the face of unexpected trials.
Roose stopped by his favourite rosebush, reaching up absentmindedly to touch the petals. “The thing to remember about a root is, you can only see the root itself. When you pull it up, you never know what you might drag into the light with it,” he said. “It won’t do to pull by yourself. You’ll need a few extra hands.”
The Bolton patriarch dropped his hand back into his pocket before turning to Robb. “Trust is difficult to come by, but Karstark, Umber, Ryswell….prove yourself capable of seeing this through and they will lend you whatever support they can,” he said. “The Lannisters always pay their debts, and Tywin Lannister shits gold. But the Targaryens had fire and blood on their side: those words did them no good at the end. The same may prove true of the Lannisters.”
The advice was solid, Robb knew. His father had tried to handle the Lannisters' accusatory onslaught primarily by himself, and though a part of Robb thought his father capable of anything, secrecy had not kept him safe. To come out on top, he would need to take full advantage of those who would stand with him. Together, perhaps they could drown out the lies.
"Of course," Robb said with a nod, mentally taking note of those who might support him. That might, maybe, he would work on a list. "This attack on him is a threat to any of us, in a sense. We don't have to do anything wrong to be punished if money and power will it to happen. I'll start putting materials together, and talking to those who haven't immediately assumed the worst." Robb's gaze was turned on Roose again as he added, "Can I count you in too?"
Roose lifted his head a little to fix his icy stare with Robb’s careful gaze. What would happen to his reputation if he failed his long-time allies the Starks? If he refused them? He would be labelled untrustworthy and any allies to the Boltons would gradually slip away beneath the shadow. Tywin Lannister was a bad enemy to have, but he was pragmatic. The fall of the Targaryens had proved that the old lion was surprisingly forgiving when it came to defeating enemies.
“Of course,” said Roose, his tone as smooth and solid as ever. “You have my word.”
Robb's own leveled stare never wavered as he waited for Roose's response, silence thick with expectation, and when the promise of Bolton support rang true, some small amount of weight lifted -- though the press of self-assigned responsibility remained just as heavy. Someone else could reasonably shoulder it, someone older and more experienced, but this was his father, and some part of Robb couldn't leave that up to another person. Not any other person.
He nodded, expression subtly relaxing, knowing the lieutenant's support could only help, and further hoping others would take the leap with them. Though anger still twisted in his chest, the blind fury was icing into something more focused, and while the task ahead would be difficult, should he put together a team of allies, success was not so impossible. Lannister wrongs would be righted, and his father would be absolved of all accusations.