Fire & Blood (A Targaryen History #1) - George R.R. Martin Page 0,333

they soon found themselves hemmed in and surrounded in the confused, bloody fighting by the docks. Once taken, Lysaro was sent downriver to Volantis, where the Triarchs offered him to his brother Drako, for a certain price. Drako declined and suggested the Volantenes sell him back to Lys instead. And so Lysaro Rogare was returned to Lys, chained to an oar in the belly of a Volantene slave ship.

During his trial, when asked what he had done with all the gold that he had stolen, Lysaro laughed and began to point to certain magisters in the assembly, saying, “I used it to bribe him, and him, and him, and him,” picking out a dozen men before he could be silenced. It did not save him. The men he had bought voted with the rest to condemn him (and kept the bribes as well, for the magisters of Lys put avarice ahead of honor, as is well-known).

Lysaro was sentenced to be chained naked to a pillar before the Temple of Trade, where all those despoiled by him would be allowed to whip him, the number of lashes accorded to each person to be determined by the extent of their losses. And so it was done. It is written that his sister Lysara and brother Fredo were amongst those who availed themselves of the whip, whilst other Lyseni placed wagers on the hour of his death. Lysaro expired in the seventh hour of the first day of his scourging. His bones would remain chained to the pillar for three years, until his brother Moredo pulled them down and interred them in the family crypt.

In this instance, at the least, Lysene justice proved to be considerably harsher than that of the Seven Kingdoms. Many in Westeros would gladly have seen Lotho and Roggerio Rogare suffer the same dire fate as Lysaro, for the collapse of the Rogare bank had impoverished great lords and humble tradesmen alike…but even those who most despised them could offer no shred of proof that either had known of their brother’s depredations in Lys, or had benefited from his plundering in any way.

In the end, the banker Lotho was adjudged guilty of theft, for taking gold and gems and silver not his own, and failing to restore same on demand. Lord Manderly gave him the choice of taking the black, or having his right hand removed as if he were a common thief. “Then praise Yndros, I am left-handed,” Lotho said, choosing mutilation. Nothing at all could be proved against his brother Roggerio, but Lord Manderly sentenced him to seven lashes all the same. “For what?” Roggerio demanded of him, aghast. “For being a thrice-damned Lyseni,” Torrhen Manderly responded.

After the sentences had been carried out, both of the brothers left King’s Landing. Roggerio closed his brothel, selling off the building, the carpets, drapes, beds, and other furnishings, even the parrots and the monkeys, using the coin thus gained to buy himself a ship, a great cog he named the Mermaid’s Daughter. Thus was his pillow house reborn, this time with sails. For years to come, Roggerio sailed up and down the narrow sea, selling spiced wine, exotic viands, and carnal pleasure to the denizens of great ports and humble fishing villages alike. His brother Lotho, short a hand, was taken up by Lady Samantha, the paramour of Lord Lyonel Hightower, and returned with her to Oldtown. The Hightowers had not entrusted so much as a groat of their gold to the Lyseni, and thus remained one of the wealthiest houses in all Westeros, second mayhaps only to the Lannisters of Casterly Rock, and Lady Sam wished to learn how to put that gold to better use. Thus was born the Bank of Oldtown, which has made House Hightower richer still.

(Moredo Rogare, the eldest of the three brothers who had come with Lady Larra to King’s Landing, was in Braavos during the trials, treating with the keyholders of the Iron Bank. Before the year was out, he would sail for Tyrosh, flush with Braavosi gold, to hire ships and swords for an attack on Lys. That is a tale for another time, however, beyond our current purview.)

King Aegon III did not once appear to sit the Iron Throne during the trials of the brothers, but Prince Viserys came every day to sit beside his wife. What Larra of Lys thought of the Hand’s justice neither Mushroom nor the court chronicles can tell us, save to note that she