In Chapter 3 of A Clash of Kings, Lord Varys poses a riddle to Tyrion Lannister:

“In a room sit three great men, a king, a priest, and a rich man with his gold. Between them stands a sellsword, a little man of common birth and no great mind. Each of the great ones bids him slay the other two. ‘Do it,’ says the king, ‘for I am your lawful ruler.’ ‘Do it,’ says the priest, ‘for I command you in the name of the gods.’ ‘Do it,’ says the rich man, ‘and all this gold shall be yours.’ So tell me – who lives and who dies?”

I love this riddle. It’s one of my favorite quotes from Varys. It’s essentially a fancy way of asking, “What is power?”

Now, let’s analyze this situation, step by step:

Firstly, the sellsword definitely survives. There are no other swordsmen or weapons in the room. He has the power of life and death - he can choose who to kill, and who to keep alive.

So which of the king, the priest, and the rich man survives? Who will the sellsword choose to kill?

There isn’t actually a specific answer to this riddle - as to who lives and who dies. It’s a question about power - do the king, priest, and rich man have any actual power in this situation? No, because that power lies with the sellsword - whether they live or die depends entirely on the choices of the sellsword.

But if power lies with the lowborn sellsword in this case, what is power? Power usually belongs to kings, priests, and rich men - but the sellsword, as Varys says, “has neither crown nor gold nor favor of the gods, only a piece of pointed steel” - so how did the power come to belong to him?

Varys offers a potential answer: “Power resides where men believe it resides. [It’s] a shadow on the wall, yet shadows can kill. And ofttimes a very small man can cast a very large shadow.”

We believe, or rather, pretend, that kings and priests and rich men have power. Sellswords don’t rule us - they obey kings, even child kings like Joffrey - because they believe that power lies with kings, when in truth, they, sometimes, have the real power. That’s why kings still rule us: power is a trick or a shadow - people believe it’s there, but is it?

However, Varys adds that “shadows can kill” - even if power is a trick, those who command power can still be dangerous. The same goes for Tyrion - even a small man can command power just like a king, and can be just as dangerous.

This reminds me of Littlefinger and Cersei’s conversation in Season 2, Episode 1 of Game of Thrones. When Littlefinger suggests “knowledge is power”, Cersei immediately rejects this by saying “power is power.” Power is such a vague concept - in my opinion, both are correct - they’re just different paths that they took to rise to power.