At the end of the meeting, Iger left the room with a brow on his face, rather depressed.

From a personal point of view, there is some truth in the sentence that would rather be the head of a chicken than a queen of the ox: being an official or an important minister in a big country is not necessarily more comfortable in some respects than occupying a piece of poor rural land as an emperor or warlord. Not to mention anything else, at least when he was simply the commander-in-chief of his night watchman and the lord of the land grant, he had a clear goal and a clear idea every day, not only knew what he wanted to do, but could also start implementing it as soon as he had an idea...... And unwaveringly stick to it.

He has been a big brother for many years, how can he immediately adapt to this kind of forced work and have to discuss with several people, full of plans that need to be implemented urgently, but he was actually vetoed by his superiors and beaten back?

A sense of unhappiness arose, and Egger's eyes wandered, squinting and began to think of a solution to the problem in front of him.

"Your Excellency, Commander-in-Chief. The night watchman was in a trance, but a deliberately low but quite clear voice suddenly sounded behind him, "I want to walk with Your Excellency, I wonder if you are free?"

The speaker was Petyr Berish, who had left the conference room first, but he had stood behind a pillar in the hall when he had gone out, and he did not speak until he had passed by.

In the adult world, "walking together" naturally does not mean simply walking and pressing the road, Iger immediately put away his thoughts and replaced it with a shallow smile: "Lord Petyr! ”

......

One of them was the hand of the Queen, who had been assisting Daenerys for many years, and the other was the new commander-in-chief of the Night's Watch, and for the first time they had time to meet as colleagues, and a brief exchange together would not attract special attention or suspicion. After chatting about a lot of things, the two walked side by side from the hall to the outside.

Outside, it was already late and the snow was still drizzling, the howling cold wind blew the flames in the brazier to be extinguished, and the Innocents and Land-Giving soldiers who came and went were much rarer than during the day, Egg waved his hand and motioned for the guards to follow from a distance, and the two walked a few steps towards the sanctum that Eddard Stark had built for his wife in Winterfell. The Commander-in-Chief of the meeting was also present just now, have you ever wondered: why would such a clever person act as if he did not understand even the simple truths that a child could understand, and tricked His Majesty into making such a stupid decision as wasting time in the north?"

Of course, he doubted, and Iger even had a simple guess, but Littlefinger came to ask this sentence mysteriously, of course, not to listen to his own clever answer. He shook his head and answered very cooperatively: "I really don't know, please ask the Prime Minister for advice?"

"To be honest, Commander-in-Chief, since Count Varys defected to the Queen with a large amount of information, there have been disagreements and discords between me and him, and there have been disputes and debates at both ends for three days. At that time, I thought that these 'political differences' were due to different perspectives, but in the bottom of my heart, we were all serving our common masters in our own way, and we were doing our best to advise for the benefit of Her Majesty. Petyr shook his head with a solemn expression: "It is with this idea that I am like you, my lord, when the eunuch suddenly jumped out of the meeting and made random moves under the banner of morality, he was caught off guard and failed to come up with a rebuttal at the first time. ”

Indeed, Iger nodded, not answering.

"It's not accusation or resentment, but the Queen's temper is a bit strange, and the Commander-in-Chief himself must have noticed it: before Your Majesty has made up her mind, as long as others can figure out what she is thinking and what she is thinking, it is easy to influence her train of thought, and let her make decisions according to her own ideas...... But at the same time, once she made a decision, no matter how stupid or ridiculous it was, no one could persuade her to change her mind until it was proven wrong. Littlefinger continued, returning to Westeros after many years of forced exile, and now he no longer showed a lewd smile as before, and his speech and demeanor were much more steady, but worthy of his status as a queen: "Now Varys has taken us by surprise first, and we have lost the first game- At the moment, rather than trying in vain to persuade the queen not to waste too much time in the north, what I am more willing and should think about is: what is the intention of the eunuch to suddenly offer this trick, and how should we counteract?"

How can we open and close our mouths are "we"? Who is "us" with you!

Iger sneered in his heart, but considering that he was indeed on the same front as Littlefinger at the moment, he couldn't bear to debunk the other party's trick of relying on subconscious hints to bring them closer to each other: "Oh? ”

"The first thing that came to my mind was that Varys was using this to suppress Stark and help Burton. Littlefinger didn't sell it at all, but began to make his judgment happy, "You and I are friends with the Starks, and friends from friends are friends...... Since he is his own person, he will not say that cover-up. No one is blind - you, me, and the Queen all know that the Starks were persuaded to pledge allegiance to the Queen by 'truth' after the Night's Watch had conquered Winterfell. Not to mention that Robb's child's submission was indeed not voluntary, and even if it was, it would be difficult for him to command the entire northern border, so that everyone would be convinced to come out and support the restoration of a 'daughter of the mad king'. ”

As the two of them gradually approached the Sanctuary, Petyr looked up at the seven-pointed star, which was rare in the north, and then at the darkening sky, before continuing: "It is conceivable that once the queen finds out that the Duke of Winterfell's public allegiance cannot bring the full support of the northerners, then her attention and recognition of the Stark family will be greatly reduced, and on the contrary, the favor of Bolton, who has elite soldiers and comes first, will be greatly strengthened. And since Count Bolton was introduced to the queen by Varys, he gained the trust and attention of the queen, which indirectly means that Varys's own influence on the queen has also been strengthened, and the eight-clawed spider won a small game in this power competition before the queen, which made me eat a dark deflated. ”

That's exactly what Iger was guessing about, and he nodded convincingly, and wondered even more as to why Littlefinger was still in an unfinished tone - as a rule of thumb, there must be something to be said about "but".

"However, on second thought, I realized that things are far from that simple. As expected, the little man's voice became more and more serious after a turn, "With the experience and mind of the octopus, he will never fail to see the possible harm that the consequences of the queen's imprisonment in the north and the delay of the fighter plane and the lack of command may cause her to seize the great cause of the Seven Kingdoms. I know this eunuch, he is an extremely rational power player, good at and focused on maintaining his position and influence, but he will never do stupid things that harm others and himself out of anger. If it was just to bolster the allies he was betting on in the North, and to suppress the Starks, you, and me in the eyes of the Queen, he would have had a thousand options to choose from, and would never have given Dany such a foolish suggestion that jeopardized her entire career and thus her own identity as 'intelligence director'. ”

"Varys will only disrupt other people's affairs if he is sure that he will benefit from it. Petyr retracted his gaze, turned his head, and stared at Egg, who was dressed stupidly, with sharp eyes in the raging winds in Winterfell: "After thinking about it, I suddenly realized: either this eunuch is old and stupid - this is unlikely, or it is ...... He gave higher priority to the interests of people or forces other than the Queen. ”

"The question, then, is: who benefits from the Queen's wasted time in the North?"

Who's going ......to benefit? Pseudo-King Stannis, the Riverdale Stormlords and even Riverbend, and ...... Goosebumps suddenly appeared on the Night's Watchman—awakened by the words of the man next to him, and he realized that he hadn't thought about it just now.

Could it be ......

"Before the Queen flew north on a dragon ride, one of the issues I was fighting with Varys was how to respond to the greetings of the 'little Aegon' and how to deal with the 'other Targaryen'. My view is that the queen should maintain her supremacy, that the other dubious Targaryen should either be unconditionally loyal to His Majesty or be treated as a forger and enemy, and Varys's suggestion is to ally and marry the little Aegon, or at least make him his heir, in order to co-opt his Golden Order. "Petyr continued," continued, "but Varys's proposal is a very common and easy political means to be thought of, and although it is not to my liking or interest, it is indeed a solution to the problem. Therefore, in spite of my opposition, I dare not make any malicious speculation about Varys's loyalty to the Queen. But combined with the eunuch's sudden and unusually unscrupulous trick today, which is completely out of line with his level, after thinking about it, I suddenly dug up a detail that I had overlooked before: this guy seems to be too enthusiastic and attentive to the matter of promoting the alliance and marriage between the queen and Aegon!"

This was almost clear, and Egger knew what Petyr was going to say next, and he suddenly showed a shocked expression that was not fake—first, he was surprised: as a traverser, he had more information, and he was not as quick as a native of this world to straighten out his thoughts, and second, he was frightened: the situation he was facing now seemed to be more dangerous and complicated than he had thought before.

"Could it be that the object of his real allegiance is actually ......?"

"That's right!" Although Egger only said half a sentence, Petyr had already taken a decisive step to approve of his reaction, and was even slightly surprised that a night watchman could keep up with his train of thought so quickly, and subconsciously glanced at him with a mixture of admiration and jealousy, "Thinking back to what has happened in the past year, I suddenly realize that while I was busy dealing with a lot of for the Queen's war to reclaim the Seven Kingdoms, Varys was either trying to persuade the Queen to marry Aegon, or trying to introduce Jon Jon to His Majesty. Clinton's emissary. Before and after the contact, I had a bold guess: this guy's real allegiance was actually to the prince Aegon whose origin was questionable...... He came to join the queen in order to lay pawns next to Daenerys and pave the way for the former's plan to steal the queen's legitimacy and the fruits of victory!"

"The Golden Regiment already has a strong military force and considerable combat power, and it has the capital to be co-opted, and there is such an inner force that should blow the wind in the queen's ears, and the probability of success is really great. Originally, there was no conflict between Aegon and the assistant queen, and Varys was naturally happy to play the role of a loyal minister, but now, with the commander-in-chief, you are halfway through, the balance of power suddenly turns fatally for him: the queen of the Unsullied, the Free People, and the Dragon, and the open allegiance and support of the Night's Watch and the North, His Majesty suddenly has enough capital to unify the Seven Kingdoms - "wooing little Aegon and his golden regiment", which has become a dispensable option overnight. That's what forced him to ...... made a show of today's faint trick to the queen!"

Littlefinger just had a bold guess, but Egg, who knew something about the background of the plot, understood in an instant that this was the truth that was exactly what was being faked. Using the simple model of the Three Kingdoms Killing is enough to summarize what is happening in Winterfell at the moment: Varys, who plays the role of a traitor, suddenly finds that the lord and loyal ministers have drawn a lot of good cards in this round, and the only way to win is naturally to make quick moves, contain and consume the power of the lord's loyal side, and rebalance the situation!

But metaphors are just metaphors after all, and Iger quickly extended his mind to think of something more terrifying: Westeros is not a card game for the Three Kingdoms after all, and in the real Seven Kingdoms, Varys is not bound by the rule of "destroy all the thieves and loyal ministers first and then deal with the lord", and can skip foreplay and directly target anyone!

And that means......

"At best, Varys may just be trying to delay for a moment, so that the Queen's advantage of the Night's Watch and the support of the North weakens over time and the planes fade away, thus reasserting the need to win over Aegon and the Golden Order. Petyr quickly said what he was thinking in a heavy tone, "But I'm afraid, this octopus's means and determination don't stop there, it's very likely that he wants to use the time that has trapped us here to deal with the Stark family, you and me, and even Her Majesty herself, lest she become an obstacle to little Aegon ruling the Seven Kingdoms after her southern expedition and successive victories!"

——