A Clash of Kings — Tyrion IV
The Dorne plot comes back out of Cersei's mouth: Pycelle is the leak, and the Grand Maester's beard and freedom both come off in a black cell.
The chapter retold
The Dorne plot Tyrion seeded comes back out through Cersei’s own mouth, proving the leak runs through Grand Maester Pycelle — the realm’s supposedly neutral healer and counselor has been Cersei’s man, and before him Tywin’s, for longer than Tyrion realized. The unmasking is quick and unglamorous: Pycelle is taken to a black cell, his beard and freedom stripped off together, his careful performance of doddering neutrality finally punctured.
It’s a small scene with outsized consequences — Tyrion has just removed his sister’s eyes and ears from the council table and replaced Pycelle’s whispers with silence, at least for now. The chapter also confirms something about how this council has always worked: nobody at that table has ever been as harmless as they perform, and Tyrion’s willingness to act on that insight, rather than merely suspect it, is what starts making him dangerous to people who underestimated him.
This movement: Wolves and Krakens
- Theon comes home to Pyke and finds his father plotting war on the North — and his sister Asha commanding the ships he wanted.
- Renly weds Margaery Tyrell and parades a hundred thousand swords through the Reach at tourney pace.
- Dany leads her khalasar out of the red waste to the gates of Qarth, three dragons her only argument.
- Yoren's column is broken at a lakeside holdfast; Arya frees Jaqen H'ghar from a burning barn.