Chapter 24 – The Thread Between Spiders
The candlelight in Aden's chamber hadn't moved since dawn.
It flickered against the folded parchment on his desk — the one sealed in red and black wax. Two sigils. Two masters. Two traps.
He hadn't slept since returning from the vaults. Every attempt to close his eyes brought him back to that room — Baelish's calm voice, the smell of damp stone, the faint echo of "next time" in his ear.
He read the message again.
"He believes he still holds your leash.
Let him.
But remember, clerk — even the cleverest spiders die in their own webs."
Varys's phrasing always carried weight, like silk hiding a blade. But the wax beside it — that half-finished seal of Baelish's mark — made it something else entirely.
A warning.
A test.
Or an invitation.
Aden turned the letter over, studying the texture of the parchment. Two sets of fibers. Two inks. The same quill. Whoever had written it knew how to blur authorship — how to make truth indistinguishable from manipulation.
That meant only one thing: he was being studied.
He rose from the desk and walked to the window. The streets below were just beginning to fill — merchants, servants, beggars. The hum of King's Landing waking. From up here, they looked like veins of a single living body. The body he was learning to control — or thought he was.
A knock came at the door.
He froze.
Then, quietly: "Enter."
The door opened, and Ser Mandon of the Kingsguard stepped in — pale armor gleaming even in the half light. His presence was always unsettling; his voice even more so.
"A summons, clerk Holt," Mandon said. "From the Master of Coin."
Aden inclined his head. "I expected as much."
Mandon said nothing else. He handed over a small iron key instead of a parchment. Its teeth were oddly shaped — old, hand-filed. There was no note, no instruction.
"When?" Aden asked.
"Now," Mandon said. Then turned and left.
Aden stared at the key for a long moment before slipping it into his sleeve.
Baelish was moving again — and this time, there would be no written record.
The counting house was quiet when he arrived. Too quiet. The clerks were gone, the ledgers closed. Only the sound of water dripping from the eaves filled the air.
He found the door easily — an unmarked iron lock behind a row of empty cabinets. The key fit perfectly.
Inside was a narrow passage lit by a single lantern. At its end: a small, circular room lined with sealed chests and scroll racks. The air was colder here, tinged with the metallic scent of coin and secrecy.
Baelish wasn't present.
Instead, a single note lay atop a crate.
"You wish to know the Game?
Then learn the rules others forget to count."
Beneath it sat a ledger bound in black leather. No title, no crest. Only one thing stood out — a mark pressed into the lower corner: a spider's web drawn over a coin.
Aden opened it.
Inside were names — not of merchants or debts, but informants. Servants of the Red Keep. Dockhands. Couriers. Even a few clerks. The entire network of whispers that Baelish supposedly didn't own.
Half the pages were written in cipher. The other half — in his own handwriting.
His throat tightened.
They had copied his style perfectly, even his small pressure marks. Someone had forged him forging others.
And at the bottom of the last page, written in small, deliberate strokes:
"How well do you know yourself, clerk?"
He closed the book. Slowly. Carefully.
That night, Aden didn't return to his quarters. He rented a narrow room in Flea Bottom, beneath a wine seller's shop, where the walls smelled of vinegar and ash. He sat alone with the ledger and the spider-coin mark, his mind working like clockwork gears.
If Baelish wanted to test him, he'd done so perfectly.
If Varys wanted to manipulate him, he'd given him exactly what Baelish feared.
And if both wanted to use him, they'd soon find the same truth — he could serve both and neither.
But first, he needed proof.
Proof of who had written the letter. Proof of who wanted him to break.
A sound broke his thoughts — a faint creak from the corridor outside.
Aden reached for the knife beneath the table.
Another creak. Slow. Closer.
He stood.
The door handle turned once — then stopped. Silence followed. Only the hiss of the wind through the gaps in the shutters.
Then, a voice, low and sharp, from the other side of the door.
"Clerk Holt," it whispered. "You're being counted."
The handle released. The footsteps faded. When Aden opened the door, the hall was empty — except for a single silver coin lying on the floor.
A coin with a spider engraved on one side…
and Baelish's mocking sigil scratched faintly into the other.
Aden shut the door, locked it, and leaned against the wall.
The Game wasn't between them anymore.
It had begun around him.
And somewhere in King's Landing, two men smiled in different rooms — each believing the same thing:
They had the clerk exactly where they wanted him.
But Aden Holt had already begun counting them, too.
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