The camps of Bitterbridge had been loud with celebration only days before, Renly’s great tourney drawing half the Reach to feast, gossip, and wager. Lady Elenda Oakheart had been grateful that she and her husband had secured a modest room at a nearby inn, far better than sleeping in one of the damp tents crowding the riverbank. For a little while, it had almost felt like a festival instead of a war.

But then King Renly had ridden east to face his brother. The camp waited. And waited. And waited. Rumors moved faster than ravens, and the mood soured like spoiled wine.

When the news finally came, that Renly Baratheon was dead. Elenda saw the camp split in two as if a sword had cleaved it. Her husband’s kin, along with the Florents, muttered loudly in the inn’s common room that very night, insisting Stannis now was the rightful king. Elenda had said nothing, only listening, her hands folded neatly around her cup.

At dawn, the world broke open. Loras Tyrell and Lord Randyll Tarly returned from Storm’s End, and shouting rolled across the fields. Men fought, some dying in the mud outside the very door of the inn. The Reach was tearing itself apart.

Her husband still slept, peacefully, obliviously, while armored men turned on each other for the crowns of brothers.

Elenda stood over him for a long moment, calm as a statue, before she stepped to the door the chamber, closing it shut. She turned the key, locked it fast, and slid the key under the door to her handmaiden. She then heard him begin to awake behind her.

"I hope one day you will forgive me for this... but I cannot let you pick a side in this fight. King Stannis is not worth your life."