116: Chapter 116 The Dragon Outside the Back Door

King's Landing. After midnight. The back door of the Red Keep. The iron gate was covered in dead ivy, the vines scraping against the iron bars in the night wind, making a faint sound like fingernails scratching metal.

Moonlight slanted over from the direction of the Blackwater River, casting the shadow of the eastern tower long and thin, like a fallen spear.

The alley outside the back door was empty.

Thirty paces away, behind the broken wall of an abandoned stable, Drogon crouched in the shadows.

In full human form. His deep brown, round pupils did not blink in the darkness.

A short sword was strapped to his back, and in the leather pouch at his waist were two small bottles of water infused with dragon glass shards for refreshment—the water was cool, and the dragon glass shards at the bottom of the bottles glowed with a very faint, ghostly blue, like two lamps dimmed down to the size of needlepoints.

System pop-up.

"The current time is ten minutes away from the back door shift change vacuum—two o'clock sharp.

The Gold Cloaks patrol will pass the alley entrance outside the back door at one fifty-five—this is the only patrol that will approach the back door tonight.

After that, the shift change begins, with a two-minute vacuum. Host's outer perimeter range: a thirty-pace radius outside the back door."

"Received. Is Tyrion already under the rose bushes?"

"Yes. He circled into the eastern courtyard from the cold cellar secret passage five minutes ago. He is currently crouching behind the rose bushes under the eastern window of Maegors Holdfast.

There are no extra guards in the courtyard tonight—Jaime adjusted the patrol route of the Gold Cloaks in the courtyard, designating the eastern courtyard as a 'maintenance area,' citing the need for winter pruning of the rose bushes.

His golden hand wrote the maintenance report even more neatly than a real hand."

Drogon unscrewed the small bottle of water infused with dragon glass shards and took a sip.

The water was cool, and the dragon glass shards left a very subtle mineral taste on his tongue—like licking a piece of flint that had been soaked in ice water.

He tucked the bottle back into his waist. Through the crack in the broken wall, he stared in the direction of the back door. The iron gate remained motionless.

There was only the sound of wind in the alley. The sea breeze blew in from the direction of the Blackwater River, making the dead ivy rustle.

The moonlight sliced the shadow of the iron gate into strips, laying them across the deserted stone path.

The third floor of Maegors Holdfast. The easternmost room.

On the wall hung a complex tapestry in the southern style that House Stark disliked, with hunting scenes embroidered in gold thread—a hunter riding a horse, a spear piercing the throat of a wild boar, and the blood flowing from the boar's mouth embroidered with deep red silk thread.

On the vanity sat a Lannister red-gold jewelry box she had never touched, a thin layer of dust accumulated on its lid.

The bedding on the bed was folded neatly—that wasn't the handiwork of a maid; she had folded it herself.

Over the past five years, under the eyes of her enemies, she had learned to use the folding of bedding to prove she was still alive.

The corners of the quilt were folded into standard right angles, the pillow was fluffed and returned to its original position, and the corners of the pillowcase were aligned.

Sansa sat on the edge of the bed. She had changed into a very simple gray wool dress—no crinoline, no lace, the same style she had worn five years ago when she escaped from King's Landing.

She had sewn it stitch by stitch from memory in the cellars of King's Landing, with the stitches hidden on the inside of the skirt hem, where no one could see.

She was not wearing shoes. Shoes would only get in the way when climbing out the window—five years ago, she had climbed out wearing shoes, and the heel had gotten stuck in a crack in the windowsill, nearly breaking her neck.

She flipped over the pillowcase and took out the tiny slip of paper.

Tyrion had had Ella slip it in yesterday. There were only five words on the note, written in a scrawled hand, but she recognized every stroke— "Prepare. Midnight. Old place."

She crumpled the note into a ball, put it in her mouth, and swallowed it.

The paper ball had the musty taste of aged parchment and the bitterness of ink on her tongue, but she chewed slowly, as if chewing on the meaning of every stroke of those five words.

Then she walked to the window and pushed it open.

The cold wind of the winter night rushed in, blowing her gray dress against her legs.

The rose bushes shimmered with dark green leaf shadows in the moonlight, and a few lingering flowers that hadn't withered in winter still hung on the branches—the edges of the petals frozen a deep purple.

She saw a short figure crouching behind the rose bushes, holding a short staff in his hand and waving it gently at her.

The short staff was made of black oak, with the head worn smooth and shiny.

The tip of the staff drew a tiny circle in the air—that was the gesture he had agreed upon with the workers when he was an engineer in the sewers, meaning "Safe, come over."

Tyrion. He was still just as short. His cloak was still deep red. He used to wear deep red when he was repairing pipes in the sewers of King's Landing. He said you couldn't see the mud on that color.

It was truly him. It wasn't a trap. All the wariness in her heart let go at that moment—the release was so intense that she had to hold onto the window frame to steady her breathing.

Sansa lifted her skirt and climbed onto the windowsill.

Her movements were extremely practiced—five years ago she had climbed out of this same window to escape King's Landing, and five years later, she was climbing out again.

Pressing her palms against the edge of the windowsill, she leaned her body weight forward, stepping out with her right foot first to land on the stone ledge outside.

That ledge was left by a stonemason who had accidentally chiseled an extra inch when building Maegors Holdfast; she had felt it the first time she escaped and remembered its location. Her left foot followed. The whole process took less than three seconds.

The rose bushes under the window were the same ones. Jaime had mentioned in a letter that they had torn her dress during her first wedding escape.

This time, she had rolled her skirt up to her thighs in advance, securing it with the ties at her waist.

Her feet landed precisely in the gap beside the rose bushes—the safe landing spot she had memorized after falling once five years ago, a patch of gravel less than a foot wide between two rose bushes.

But the rose branches still scratched her lower leg.

A slanted branch grazed her as she landed, its thorns slicing her skin and leaving a very thin trail of blood extending from her ankle to her knee. The beads of blood glimmered dark red in the moonlight.

She didn't make a sound, only drawing a very light breath after landing, and then immediately bent down to untie her skirt.

Tyrion flashed out from behind the rose bushes. His movements were extremely fast, his short figure appearing before her in a flash in the moonlight.

He handed her a thick Highgarden wool cloak. His voice was kept extremely low, but his tone was the same as usual, like he was chatting about architectural history—the same tone he used when he was explaining the drainage systems of the Seven Kingdoms to her in a brothel.

"The last time you came here, I was standing nearby watching you fall into the rose bushes. You cursed at me then—'Why didn't you catch me?' This time I brought a cloak. The boots are inside the cloak. Put them on."

Sansa wrapped herself in the cloak. The wool was soft, lined with fine Highgarden linen, and the cloak indeed contained a pair of old leather boots—not new boots, but Tyrion's own spare boots, the soles already worn thin, the right heel half a point lower than the left because he walked with a slight limp on his right foot.

She bent down and pulled the boots onto her bare feet. Her fingers paused for a very brief moment while tying the laces, then she looked up, her deep blue eyes staring straight at Tyrion's face in the moonlight.

"You've grown taller."

"You have too. Your landing from the rose bushes was much steadier than before. You landed right on your backside last time."

The lock on the iron gate made a very faint "click" at two o'clock in the morning. It wasn't pried open; it was unlocked from the inside with a key.

The key was inserted into the keyhole and turned a full turn and a half—the key Jaime had taken from The Mad King's keychain seventeen years ago, which had always hung on an inconspicuous leather loop inside his golden hand. Then it was withdrawn through the crack in the door.

The iron gate slid open silently just enough for one person to squeeze through sideways. The hinges had been oiled recently—Jaime had done it last month, using the best crossbow lubricant from the Lannister guards' armory, waiting for this day all along.

There was no one outside the door.

The Gold Cloaks captain who owed Jaime a life had adjusted the shift change time for the back door guards on the roster to start at two o'clock sharp and end at two-zero-two.

This two-minute vacuum was something Jaime had traded for with the words "You owe me a life"—two years ago at the Battle of the Blackwater, this captain had his leg burned off by wildfire, and it was Jaime who dragged him out of the green fire.

Tyrion led Sansa across the courtyard.

The hem of her cloak dragged on the stone floor, making a very faint rustling sound that was almost inaudible in the night wind. He pushed her to the back door, then used his short staff to pry open the edge of the iron gate, just enough for her to squeeze through sideways.

The cold rust of the iron gate grazed her shoulder, brushing off a small piece of dried moss. Then he squeezed through himself, his short staff knocking against the door frame with a very faint metallic clinking sound.

Sansa steadied him on the other side of the door. Her hands were shaking—not from the cold, but because she had gone out through this door once before, and that time she thought she would never return. Then she had come back. Now she was going out from here again. She said softly, in a voice only Tyrion could hear.

"Last time it was Jaime. This time it is him too."

"He says it's not treason. It's paying an old debt. A debt he owes, not one I owe. But he said—you owe him a dance. At the wedding. He was probably joking.

Jaime's jokes have always been terrible—last time he said 'The Kingslayer can open back doors too,' I think he was trying to be funny. I didn't laugh."

Drogon flashed out from behind the broken wall.

His senses in full human form were still far beyond those of an ordinary person—a few seconds before Tyrion and Sansa squeezed out of the back door, he had already heard the footsteps of a patrol coming from the direction of the alley entrance.

It wasn't the Gold Cloaks on shift change. It was another three-man patrol, probably having taken the wrong route during the guard change, and they were heading toward the back door.

The rhythm of the boots on the gravel road was casual, not a search gait, just routine business—but if they reached the back door, they would inevitably run into them.

He lowered his breathing, took the dragon glass shards from the leather pouch at his waist, and held them in his palm.

He released a trace of extremely faint dragon aura—the dragon aura, halved by his full human form, was not enough to cause fear, but it was enough to make the alley in that direction look darker, colder, and less inviting to walk into.

The air grew a few degrees heavier under the subtle adjustment of his will, and the moonlight seemed to dim for a beat, as if an invisible cloud had covered the moon, but in reality, there were no clouds in the sky.

Gold Cloaks patrolman A stopped at the alley entrance. He shivered and shoved his torch into his companion's hand.

"There's nothing to see over here. Let's go that way. My torch is about to be blown out by the wind."

"Didn't you just say we needed to check the back door—"

"Check what? Behind that damn iron gate is just a pile of rotten roses. The back door key is with the captain; no one can open it. Let's go, let's go, it's freezing to death over here."

The patrol turned a corner and continued walking in the direction away from the back door. The sound of footsteps gradually faded, and the light of the torch was swallowed by the low wall at the alley entrance.

Drogon put the dragon glass shards back into his leather pouch and nodded at Tyrion—the movement was very slight, but clear in the moonlight. The three of them silently melted into the shadows of the abandoned alley outside the back door.

In the alley, only the moonlight and the sea breeze remained, along with the sound of the dead ivy rustling in the wind.