13. A Storm of Swords, by George R.R. Martin, pp. 441-473

Samwell

They have taken refuge at Craster's, where Sam is trying to feed some broth to Bannen, who is dying. There are other wounded men, and no supplies to treat them. Craster is feeding them, but stingily, and some of the survivors have begun to complain that Craster is holding out what he has stored away. In the loft above, Gilly is giving birth, angering Craster with her screams.

Sam goes outside to escape the sounds of death and birth. Some of the brothers are practicing archery, and when they see him they call him over to demonstrate how he had killed the Other. They do so mockingly, however, calling him by his new nickname, Slayer, which embarrasses him. When he turns around to avoid them, his boot gets stuck in the thick mud of Craster's yard and he extricates himself awkwardly, provoking more mocking laughter.

Grenn is splitting logs when Sam walks over to him, and he, too, addresses Sam as Slayer. Having witnessed what Sam did, Grenn is puzzled at his protest at the nickname. Sam explains, "It's just a different way of calling me a coward." But Grenn, who is a little slow, asks, "Wouldn't you rather be Sam the Slayer than Ser Piggy?" Sam replies, "Why can't I just be Samwell Tarly?"

Anyway, he says, it was the dragonglass that killed the Other, but some of the brothers don't even believe that, and think that he made up the tale. Dywen and Dolorous Edd believe it, however, and have Sam and Grenn tell the story to Lord Commander Mormont, who asks Sam for all the dragonglass he has. There isn't much of it. The cache Jon had found was full of dagger blades and spearheads and arrowheads, but he had taken only enough to make daggers for himself, Sam, and Mormont, plus a handful of arrowheads. Sam's dagger and Mormont's remain, along with nineteen arrows and a spear with a dragonglass head. The sentries passed around the spear, and the arrows have been divided among the best archers.

Sam wonders why the wights haven't attacked Craster's, and Grenn says that they only come when it's cold. Sam asks, "is it the cold that brings the wights, or the wights that bring the cold?" He also knows only that dragonglass works on the Others. It hasn't been shown that it can do the same thing to the wights. As he is reflecting on the miserable situation in which he finds himself, Mormont approaches and calls for him.

Sam is terrified of the Old Bear, but he comes anyway, even though Mormont gruffly chides him for his fear. He asks about the dragonglass and wonders why they haven't known of its power before. He says the Watch must have known at some time of its efficacy against the Others. "The Wall was made to guard the realms of men ... and not against other men, which is all the wildlings are, when you come right down to it." They have "lost sight of the true enemy. And now he's here, but we don't know how to fight him."

Sam stammers that the maesters call it obsidian, and Mormont replies, "They can call it lemon pie for all I care. If it kills as you claim, I want more of it." They are interrupted by the appearance of Craser, who says that Gilly has had a boy, which is what Sam feared, knowing that Craster's male offspring are given to the Others as a means of appeasing them. When Craster calls the baby "another squalling mouth to feed," Sam says the Watch could take him. Mormont turns on him angrily and tells him to go look after Bannen.

But Bannen is dead. Dirk claims that he would have survived if Craster had given him enough food, and an argument breaks out about Craster's stinginess. Bannen's body is burned at sunset, and Sam is surprised that the smell of burning flesh stirs his hunger. Reflecting on this, he grows nauseated and throws up. Dolorous Edd finds him vomiting and jokes about serving up Bannen with applesauce, and then about how if Sam ever died, "There's bound to be more crackling on you than Bannen ever had, and I could never resist a bit of crackling." He adds that Mormont has commanded them to move out at dawn.

The news that they are leaving pleases Craster, who prepares a feast from the horses the Watch has had to slaughter, adding some beer and bread. But the smell of the roasting horsemeat reminds Sam of Bannen, and he can eat only an onion that Craster's wives serve. There are only two loaves of bread, and when one of the men asks for more, the wife who is serving it shakes her head. This draws a loud protest from another man who, when Mormont tells him to be thankful for what he's been given, replies, "I'd sooner eat what Craster's hiding, my lord." Craster says, "I gave you crows enough. I got me women to feed."

The hungry men take this as an admission that Craster has "a secret larder," and others begin speculating that it contains ham and bacon and mutton, and other food they have been deprived of for a long time. Mormont rises to command silence, but Clubfoot Karl, who has become the leader of the dissidents defies him. Mormont stands his ground, and it appears to Sam that Karl is about to back down, but Craster makes the mistake of ordering the protesters out, wielding his axe.

When someone calls Craster "Bloody bastard!" he attacks swiftly with the axe. But Dirk is faster, and he grabs Craster by the hair and slits his throat. There is a commotion as the wives scream, and the Lord Commander, standing over Craster's body, cries out, "The gods will curse us.... There is no crime so foul as for a guest to bring murder into a man's hall. By all the laws of the hearth, we--" But he has lost control, and Dirk grabs one of the wives and puts his dagger to her throat, saying, "There are no laws beyond the Wall, old man. Remember?
 
Mormont orders Dirk to release her and moves toward him, but his way is blocked by Garth of Greenaway, and Mormont is seized by Ollo Lophand. Mormont reaches for his dagger, but Ollo stabs him in the belly. "And then the world went mad."

When the revolt has ended, Sam is cradling Mormont's head in his lap. Some of the men lie dead, and one has broken his neck falling from the ladder to the loft, where he intended to rape one of Craster's wives. Grenn has tried to get Sam to come with him and Dolorous Edd and some others, but Sam was too frightened even to run. Now Mormont tells Sam to go, to head for the Wall and tell the Watch about what happened on the Fist, about the wildlings, and about the dragonglass. He adds, "Tell my son, Jorah. Tell him, take the black. My wish. Dying wish."

Sam tells him, "It's too far.... I'll never reach the Wall, my lord.... I'd sooner stay with you. See, I'm not frightened anymore. Of you, or ... of anything." But a woman behind him says, "You should be." Two of Craster's wives are standing there with Gilly, who is holding her baby. They tell him that the worst of his men are in the cellar, eating Craster's stores, or in the loft, raping the younger women. He should be gone when they finish, they say, and they have two horses waiting for him and Gilly, who reminds him of his promise to help her.

"I said Jon would help you. Jon's brave, and he's a good fighter, but I think he's dead now. I'm a craven. And fat. Look how fat I am. Besides, Lord Mormont's hurt. Can't you see? I couldn't leave the Lord Commander."

One of the women tells him that Mormont is dead, and Sam realizes she's telling the truth. She urges him to take Mormont's sword and cloak and leave. Gilly pleads with him, too. And one of the old woman says that Craster's sons will be there soon: "The white cold's rising out there, crow. I can feel it in my bones. These poor old bones don't lie. They'll be here soon, the sons." 

Arya

She has been blindfolded, and when the hood is lifted from her head, she finds herself in a big room that has been hollowed out inside a hill. It is fed by tunnels, from which people are appearing and gathering around a firepit. Gendry has been hooded too, and when his hood is removed he asks where they are. Lem says, "An old place, deep and secret. A refuge where neither wolves nor lions come prowling." Greenbeard points out Thoros of Myr, "a tall thin man with oddments of old armor buckled on over his ratty pink robes." When Arya saw him last, at the tourney honoring her father, he had was fat, with "a smooth face and a shiny bald head." Now his face is "droopy" and he has "shaggy grey hair."

Now the Mad Huntsman enters with his prisoner, whom he has reluctantly agreed to take to Lord Beric for judgment. The prisoner is hooded too, and when the hood is yanked off Arya recognizes Sandor Clegane. The Hound recognizes Thoros and says he used to shave his head. "I lost my razor in the woods," Thoros says. "A year in the wild will melt the flesh off a man. Would that I could find a tailor to take in my skin." He adds, "I am not the false priest you knew. The Lord of Light has woken in my heart."

On the other side of the firepit, at the top of some steps carved out of the wall, a man has been sitting. He speaks up now, descending the steps:

"When we left King's Landing we were men of Winterfell and men of Darry and men of Blackhaven, Mallery men and Wilde men. We were knights and squires and men-at-arms, lords and commoners bound together only by our purpose.... Six score of us set out to bring the king's justices to your brother.... More than eighty of our company are dead now, but others have taken up the swords that fell from their hands.... With their help, we fight on as best we can, for Robert and the realm."

Clegane points out that Robert is dead, but the man replies, "Robert is slain, but his realm remains. And we defend her." The Hound scoffs, "Is she your mother, Dondarrion? Or your whore?" Arya is startled to realize that the man is Beric Dondarrion, who "had been so handsome, Sansa's friend Jeyne had fallen in love with him." But now he's "A scarecrow of a man" with a thick red-gold beard, "a bald spot above his left ear where his head had been smashed in," a missing eye and "a dark black ring all around his neck."

The Hound continues to defy them. "You took my sword, my horse, and my gold, so take my life and be done with it ... but spare me this pious bleating." Thoros promises that he will die, "but it shan't be murder, only justice." When some of Gregor Clegane's atrocities are cited, he replies, "Do you take me for my brother? Is being born a Clegane a crime? ... Who did I murder?" From all around the room, voices call out names, until the Hound cries, "Enough.... You're making noise. These names mean nothing. Who were they?" Dondarrion replies that they were people "who died on the points of Lannister spears or saw their bellies opened by Lannister swords."

It wasn't his sword who killed them, the Hound replies. Thoros says, "You serve the Lannisters of Casterly Rock." Clegane admits that he once did so, "Me and thousands more. Is each of us guilty of the crimes of the others?" And then he denounces the pretensions of knighthood:

"A knight's a sword with a horse. The rest, the vows and the sacred oils and the lady's favors, they're silk ribbons tied round the sword. Maybe the sword's prettier with ribbons hanging off it, but it will kill you just as dead. Well, bugger your ribbons, and shove your swords up your arses. I'm the same as you. The only difference is, I don't lie about what I am. So kill me, but don't call me a murderer while you stand there telling each other that your shit don't stink. You hear me?"

Then Arya charges forth: "'You are a murderer!' she screamed. 'You killed Mycah, don't say you never did. You murdered him!"

The Hound is puzzled for a moment, and asks, "And who was this Mycah, boy?" Arya protests that she's not a boy, and that Mycah was a butcher's boy. "Jory said you cut him near in half, and henever even had a sword." It dawns on Clegane suddenly: "The little sister. The brat who tossed Joff's pretty sword in the river.... Don't you know you're dead?" Dondarrion asks if he killed the butcher's boy, and Clegane admits it: "I was Joffrey's sworn shield. The butcher's boy attacked a prince of the blood." Arya protests that it was she who attacked Joffrey, and when Dondarrion asks if he saw the boy attack him, the Hound admits, "I heard it from the royal lips. It's not my place to question princes." Besides, he says, Arya's sister confirmed the story that Mycah had attacked Joffrey. Sansa lied, Arya insists, and as Thoros and Lord Beric confer, thinks, "They have to kill him. I prayed for him to die, hundreds and hundreds of times."

Finally, Dondarrion presents their decision. Since "no one here knows the truth or falsehood of the charge," it must be decided by trial by battle. Arya protests the decision, knowing the Hound's prowess with a sword. Harwin covers her mouth with his hand, but she thinks, "No, they can't, he'll go free." Clegane mocks the decision, by scoffing at the potential opponents. But Dondarrion steps forth and says that he will fight the Hound. "Arya remembered all the tales. He can't be killed, she thought, hoping against hope."

When Dondarrion is being prepared for the fight, his chest is bared, revealing the scars when a lance that should have killed him pierced his body. "Gendry sucked in his breath. 'Mother have mercy.'" Arya hopes that the Hound is frightened as well. As Dondarrion and Clegane step forth to oppose each other, Thoros offers a prayer to R'hllor: "Show us the truth or falseness of this man. Strike him down if he is guilty, and give strength to his sword if he is true. Lord of Light, give us wisdom." Then Lord Beric draws the edge of his sword across the palm of his left hand, and as the blood from the wound drips on the blade, the sword takes fire. Arya asks Gendry if it is wildfire, but Gendry says, "No. This is different.This is...." "...magic?" Arya finishes.

The battle is fierce, but it turns when the fire spreads to the Hound's shield, and then to his left arm. Cries of "Finish him!" and "Guilty!" begin, and Arya joins in eagerly. But suddenly, "The Hound gave a rasping scream, raised his sword in both hands and brought it crashing down with all his strength." And when Dondarrion blocks the cut, his flaming sword snaps in two and the Hound's blade "plowed into Lord Beric's flesh where his shoulder joined his neck and clove him clean down to the breastbone."

As Dondarrion falls face forward, with the Hound's sword still in him, Clegane rolls in the dirt to put out the flames on his arm. "Arya could only think of Mycah and all the stupid prayers she'd prayed for the Hound to die." Then the Hound, weeping, calls out for help, "Please." Arya is astonished to see his tears. Thoros sends someone to tend to his burns. Others carry Lord Beric into the darkness of one of the tunnels.

Arya is protesting the outcome of the fight, but Harwin tells her "R'hllor has judged him innocent." Furious, "She yanked Greenbeard's dagger from its sheath and spun away before he could catch her." Gendry also tries, but she is too fast. When she gets closer to the Hound, she is shocked at the burned flesh. He looks at her and says, "You want me dead that bad? Then do it, wolf girl. Shove it in. It's cleaner than fire." But then he collapses and Tom Sevenstrings saves him from falling. She hesitates, but once again says, "You killed Mycah.... Tell them. You did. You did."

"I did." His whole face twisted. "I rode him down and cut him in half, and laughed. I watched them beat your sister bloody too, watched them cut your father's head off."

Lem grabs the dagger from her hand, and she screams, helplessly, "You just go to hell!"

Behind her a voice says, "He has." She turns to see Beric Dondarrion standing behind her with his bloody hand on Thoros's shoulder.

7. A Storm of Swords, by George R.R. Martin, pp. 227-272

Arya

On the third day after setting out from the inn with Harwin and their other new companions, Arya realizes that they're not traveling north toward Riverrun: The moss is growing on the wrong side of the trees. Gendry thinks it's just because the road here takes a southward turn, and that they're taking a short cut, but Arya doesn't believe it. After all, he says, Lem and Tom live here, so they should know the way. They have left Hot Pie at the inn, where he is happily baking, so Gendry is the only companion left she can fully trust.

But there is Harwin, of course, whom she tells about finding his father, Hullen, dying when she fled from King's Landing. She also tells him of her subsequent adventures, omitting the stableboy she had stabbed while escaping and the guard at Harrenhal whose throat she cut. She also leaves out Jaqen H'ghar and the men he killed for her. She still sometimes mutters "Valar morghulis" under her breath sometimes, and recites her list of the men she wants dead.

Harwin tells her that of the twenty men her father sent from King's Landing with Beric Dondarrion, only six survived the trap Lord Tywin set for them, expecting that Eddard would be with them and that Gregor Clegane would kill him. Jaime, however, had been unaware of the plan so he attacked her father in King's Landing. That's when Lord Eddard broke his leg and was unable to ride west with the others. Harwin was among the survivors of the ambush, and Lord Beric was wounded but recovered. After hearing of Lord Eddard's execution, everything changed:

"We'd been sent out by the King's Hand to deal with outlaws, you see, but now we were the outlaws, and Lord Tywin was the Hand of the King. There was some wanted to yield, but Lord Beric wouldn't hear of it. We were still king's men, he said, and these were the king's people the lions were savaging. If we could not fight for Robert, we would fight for them, until every man of us was dead. And so we did, but as we fought something queer happened. For every man we lost, two showed up to take his place. A few were knights or squires, of gentle birth, but most were common men -- fieldhands and fiddlers and innkeeps, servants and shoemakers, even two septons."

At one village, Arya hears that Jaime has escaped from Riverrun. That night she dreams of Winterfell, except that she is outside the walls, slogging through mud up to her knees, and when she nears the gates the stone walls dissolve into smoke. She is surrounded by wolves. "Whenever she looked at them, she remembered the taste of blood."

The next day the sun is out, and her suspicion that they are going south is confirmed by its position. She takes out her map and confirms that they are riding away from Riverrun. She protests to the others, and they admit that they're not going to Riverrun, they're taking her to Beric Dondarrion, who will "know what's to be done with you." Anguy tells her, "We bring him all our highborn captives." Until this moment she hadn't know she was a captive and immediately she spurs her horse into running away.

She leads them on a furious chase, but eventually Harwin catches up to her and brings her to a halt. "I thought you were my father's man," she says to him, but he tells her that now her father's dead he belongs to "the lightning lord," Beric Dondarrion, and to his brother outlaws. They aren't in opposition to Robb, but they serve "the smallfolk." He asks if she will come peacefully, and she says she will. "For now."

Samwell

He is exhausted, slogging through the steadily falling snow with the others of the Night's Watch who have escaped from the attack on the hill fort. "They had been fifty when they fled the Fist, maybe more, but some had wandered off in the snow, a few wounded had bled to death ... and sometimes Sam heard shouts behind him, from the rear guard, and once an awful scream.... They are behind us, they are still behind us, they are taking us one by one."

He can see the torches around them, "The Old Bear's ring of fire, he reminded himself, and woe to him who leaves it." He berates himself: "Fat and weak and useless, even my wits are freezing now." His thoughts turn to Maslyn, who had been caught by a wight and lifted into the air by his throat and his head nearly ripped from his body. "The dead have no mercy left in them, and the Others ... no, I mustn't think of that, don't think, don't remember, just walk, just walk, just walk."

And then he falls, and weighed down by the layers of clothing and mail that he's wearing, struggles to get up, then gives in to fatigue and sinks back to the ground. He thinks that the snow will cover him, and it will be warm underneath the snow. He has done his duty, he thinks. The Lord Commander wanted him to tend to the ravens, and he had written out the messages about the initial attack to send to Castle Black and the Shadow Tower. "I got the birds off. I did that right, at least." In the confusion of the attack on the Fist, however, the Lord Commander told him to get off more ravens. Sam had written about how they had held off the attackers with fire arrows, how the wights had kept coming, how they had broken into the camp, how they were cutting their way free and heading for the Wall, and then how they had lost.

Grenn finds him fallen in the snow and tries to get him on his feet. "You'll freeze, or the Others will get you. Sam, get up!" A man with a torch comes up and tells Grenn to leave him and save himself, but Grenn keeps trying to hoist Sam from the ground. Finally the man says, "If you take the torch, I can take the fat boy." And suddenly he is lifted up, and he recognizes the man who is carrying him as Small Paul, who had earlier been one of the conspirators with Chett. He is saving Sam because he wants "the Old Bear's raven, the one that talks," and thinks Sam can get it for him. But Sam tells him the ravens have all flown, and remembers that he had forgotten to send any of the messages he had written before he released them from the cages.

He recalls more of the escape from the Fist, finding himself on a horse and Lord Commander ordering the men to form a wedge to move down the south face of the hill. His horse almost threw him when they were attacked by a bear, "dead, pale and rotting." Thoren Smallwood charged at the bear but was killed by it. They charged down the hill, trampling the wights underfoot, and into the forest. But a man on foot pulled him from the saddle and rode off on his horse. Sam had lain there weeping until he was discovered by Dolorous Edd. Then he found himself walking with the others.

Now he is being carried by Small Paul, who is told by one of the men passing them that they're falling behind. When Small Paul says that Sam had "promised I could have a bird... I want me a bird that talks, and eats corn from my hand," the man calls him a fool and rides on. Grenn realizes that they have fallen behind the rest of the men and are alone, and Small Paul says he can't carry Sam anymore.

Then a horse appears through the woods. But it is dead, and seated on it is "a rider pale as ice." Sam feels "a cold so savage that his bladder felt frozen solid. The Other slid gracefully from the saddle to stand upon the snow. Sword-slim it was, and milky white. Its armor rippled and shifted as it moved, and its feet did not break the crust of the new-fallen snow." Grenn thrusts the torch at it, and the Other cuts it in two. The burning torch falls into a snowdrift and is snuffed out. Small Paul charges at the Other with his axe, but the creature impales him with its sword, and his weight pulls it from the Other's hand.

Sam is weeping and praying, but he hears voices telling him to fight -- his father's, and Alliser Thorne's, and then Jon's.

And then he was stumbling forward, falling more than running, really, closing his eyes and shoving the dagger blindly out before him with both hands. He heard a crack, like the sound ice makes when it breaks beneath a man's foot, and then a screech so shrill and sharp that he went staggering backward with his hands over his muffled ears, and fell hard on his arse. When he opened his eyes the Other's armor was running down its legs in rivulets as pale blue blood hissed and steamed around the black dragonglass dagger in its throat. It reached down with two bone-white hands to pull out the knife, but where its fingers touched the obsidian they smoked.

The Other melts away, leaving only the obsidian dagger, and when Grenn reaches down to pick it up, he drops it immediately because it's too cold to handle. When he is finally able to pick it up, Sam tells him to keep it. "You're not craven like me." Grenn replies, "So craven you killed an Other," and then points out the dawn through the trees. That would be the east, he says, and if they keep walking in that direction they can catch up with Mormont and the remaining men of the Watch.

Tyrion

Lord Tywin has called his council together and takes his seat at the head of the table with Cersei on one side and his brother Ser Kevan on the other. Tyrion is at the foot of the table. Grand Maester Pycelle is there, sitting as far from Tyrion as possible. In addition to Varys and Littlefinger, the others present include Mace Tyrell, Paxter Redwyne of the Arbor, Mathis Rowan of Gardengrove, and the High Septon. Tyrell and Redwyne congratulate Tyrion on the success of his chain. And Kevan says his son Lancel has told him how brave Tyrion was. Tyrion thinks that Lancel has better be saying nice things about him, considering what he knows about his relationship with Cersei.

Cersei wants to begin by talking about the plans for the wedding, but Tywin wants a report from Varys on the war. He reports on a victory at Duskendale, which Littlefinger observes is a "terrible defeat for the north," although one in which "Robb Stark played no part. The Young Wolf remains unbeaten in the field." Tywin says that Robb has returned to Riverrun, "abandoning the castles he took in the west," and that preparations are being made to attack Riverrun when he moves north.

Ser Kevan says that Balon Greyjoy, calling himself King of the Isles and the North, has offered to join them in alliance. Tywin observes that Greyjoy now controls the Neck and that Winterfell has fallen, and that Greyjoy's ships could be turned against Lannisport and Highgarden. Greyjoy wants only to be recognized as king of "everything north of the Neck." Redwyne scoffs at the idea that there's anything in the north worth having, and Tyrell says, "Let King Balon finish the northmen whilst we finish Stannis."

Tywin observes that they still have to deal with Lysa Arryn, "whose husband was conspiring with Stannis Baratheon at the time of his death." Tyrell thinks there's nothing to worry about from her because she's only a woman, and Redwyne says she hasn't "committed any over acts of treason." But Tyrion reminds them that Lysa threw him into a sky-cell and put him on trial for his life, and that she hasn't sworn fealty to Joffrey as she was ordered to do. He offers to take an army and "sort out Lysa Arryn."

But Tywin has another solution to the problem: marry Lysa to Littlefinger, who proposes to woo her and "deliver you the Vale of Arryn without a drop of blood being spilled." When Lord Rowan questions whether she will have him, Littlefinger replies, "She's had me a few times before." And now that he's Lord of Harrenhal, there is no problem about her marrying someone beneath her. Tyrion raises one objection: Littlefinger "is our wizard of coin, and we have no one to replace him." But he finds that the matter is already settled: Lord Tywin tells Tyrion, "You are admirably suited to the task, I believe."

That settled, Lord Redwyne wants to return to the matter of the alliance with Balon Greyjoy, but Tywin is content to let the matter rest for the time being: "Granted enough time, a better option may well present itself." Tyrion wonders what his father is up to, and recalls him saying, "Some battles are won with swords and spears, others with quills and ravens."

Then they talk about the wedding preparations, and when Mace Tyrell hears that a contingent from Dorne is expected, blusters about not having given them permission to cross his lands. Tywin reminds him that Prince Doran is coming at his son's invitation, "not only to join in our celebration, but to claim his seat on this council, and the justice Robert denied him for the murder of his sister Elia and her children." And Kevan points out that when Joffrey marries Margaery and Myrcella marries Prince Trystane, they'll "all be one great House."

Then there's a dividing-up of "the fruits of victory," in which Tyrell gets the lion's share. And Varys gives a report on various international news, including an item that "Sailors back from the Jade Sea report that a three-headed dragon has hatched in Qarth." And when Cersei proposes executing the gold cloaks who deserted during the battle, Varys suggests that they be sent to the Night's Watch because there have been reports of "wildlings astir." Tywin dismisses that idea and wants their knees broken, so that "any man who sees them begging in the streets" will learn the lesson. Tyrion argues that they break only a few knees and send the rest to the Watch, which "is grievously under strength." But Tywin thinks that the wildlings are a problem for the Starks and the Greyjoys. "King Robb and King Balon both claim the north. Let them defend it, if they can. And if not, this Mance Rayder might even prove a useful ally."

There being no more business, Tywin dismisses everyone except his immediate family: Kevan, Cersei, and Tyrion. When they're alone, Tyrion proclaims his distrust for Littlefinger and his suggestion that he be made master of coin, and he and Cersei fall to insulting each other until Tywin puts an end to their "unseemly squabbling." And Kevan says that Littlefinger demonstrated his loyalty by reporting the Tyrell plan to marry Sansa to Willas Tyrell. Tyrion is surprised that the news came from Littlefinger and not from Varys, and Cersei is furious that anyone should be trying to do something to her hostage without her permission.

Tywin says the marriage won't take place. "I will not have the rose and the direwolf in bed together." He will prevent it by marriage. He tells Cersei "So long as you remain unwed, you allow Stannis to spread his disgusting slander.... You must have a new husband in your bed, to father children on you." Cersei protests furiously: "Three children is quite sufficient. I am Queen of the Seven Kingdoms, not a brood mare! The Queen Regent!" But Tywin is adamant: "You will marry and you will breed." And after going through a number of possibilities, as Cersei says, "No, no, no," he decides that solidifying the alliance with Highgarden is the best option, and that she will marry Willas Tyrell, unless she can come up with a better idea. Seething, Cersei says she will need a few days to think it over, and asks her father's leave.

Tyrion is delighted by Cersei's plight, but not for long. His father then turns to him and tells him, "It is past time you were wed." Tyrion knows what he has in mind: "You mean to wed me to Sansa Stark. But won't the Tyrells take the match as an affront, if they have designs on the girl?" Not if Tyrion marries her before the wedding of Joffrey and Margaery, his father says. They had given them no hint that they were thinking of Sansa for Willas. And Kevan adds that "any lingering resentments should be soothed by the offer of Cersei for ... Willas."

Tyrion rubbed at the raw stub of his nose. The scar tissue itched abominably sometimes. "His Grace the royal pustule has made Sansa's life a misery since the day her father died, and now that she is finally rid of Joffrey you propose to marry her to me. That seems singularly cruel. Even for you, Father." 

But Tywin says he's not interested in Sansa's happiness. "Our alliances in the south may be as solid as Casterly Rock, but there remains the north to win, and the key to the north is Sansa Stark." He tells Tyrion that he has proposed marrying him to other houses, but has always been rejected on the grounds that the proposal was an insult. If he doesn't marry Sansa, he will find "some little lordling who'd gladly part with a daughter to win the friendship of Casterly Rock. Lady Tanda has offered Lollys..." Tyrion shudders at the thought.

When Tyrion protests that he had always hoped to marry someone who wanted him in her bed, Tywin cruelly says, "If you think your whores want you in their bed, you are an even greater fool than I suspected." The reminder that he might become Lord of Winterfell through the marriage does appeal to him, but he points out that it's more likely that Robb Stark will produce an heir with "one of those fertile Freys" he has sworn to marry. And here Tywin reveals something that he didn't tell the council: "The Young Wolf has taken Gawen Westerling's eldest daughter to wife."

Tyrion is stunned at the news, not least because of Robb's breaking "his sworn word." It is Ser Kevan who reveals more about the family Robb has married into:

"Gawen is a good man, but his wife is Sybell Spicer. He should never have wed her. The Westerlings always did have more honor than sense. Lady Sybell's grandfather was a trader in saffron and pepper, almost as lowborn as that smuggler Stannis keeps. And the grandmother was some woman he'd brought back from the east. A frightening old crone, supposed to be a priestess. Maegi, they called her."

Tyrion is not bothered by the lineage, but he is still amazed at Robb's behavior: "He forswore himself, shamed an ally, betrayed a solemn promise. Where is the honor in that?" Ser Kevan observes, "He chose the girl's honor over his own. Once he had deflowered her, he had no other course." Tyrion is still pondering the enigma of this strange marriage when his father reminds him, "You will marry Sansa Stark, Tyrion. And soon."

1. A Storm of Swords, by George R.R. Martin, pp. 1-42

Prologue

Chett -- remember Chett? the one whose job as steward to Maester Aemon was taken over by Samwell back at Castle Black in book before last? -- is plotting to murder Lord Commander Mormont and a bunch of others (including, naturally, Samwell) at the camp on the First of the First Men. Okay, the Prologues to these books are usually sort of thick with backstory and a little hard to get into. But suffice it to say that after Jon Snow went off with Halfhand on the scouting mission, things have not gone so well back at the camp. This one is seen from Chett's point of view: He and several of his co-conspirators have been sent out foraging for food, without much success. The co-conspirators include Lark the Sisterman (which means he comes from the islands known as the Three Sisters) and Small Paul, neither of them much more appealing characters than the boil-plagued Chett. Back at the camp, there are ten more in on the conspiracy, which they plan to have accomplished by daybreak.

Medieval iron caltrop

The news has arrived that the wildlings led by Mance Rayder are on the move down the Milkwater. They vastly outnumber the men of the Watch stationed at the Fist. "Any man with a thimble of sense could see that it was time to pull up stakes and fall back on the Wall. The Old Bear had strengthened the First with spikes and pits and caltrops, but against such a host all that was pointless. If they stayed here they would be engulfed and overwhelmed." Or so Chett thinks, so he's appalled at the idea that not only would they stay at the First but they might even attack the oncoming wildlings.

So tonight the plan is to murder Mormont and his chief officers (plus Sam) while they sleep, then cut the tethers to the horses and release the dogs, which Chett has intentionally starved, among them. "They'll have snarling hounds and panicked horses all over the Fist, running through fires, jumping the ringwall, and trampling down tents. With all the confusion, it might be hours before anyone noticed that fourteen brothers were missing." The conspirators will be on their own after that, and Chett knows exactly what he wants to do: He'll go back to Craster's Keep and kill Craster and take over his harem of wives and daughters.

As they return to the Fist, Chett sees Samwell practicing archery, and doing poorly at it, along with Edd Tollett, known as Dolorous Edd for his steady pessimism. Sam is cheered when he actually sends an arrow into a tree, but then he sees Chett and "his smile curled up and died squeaking." Chett says Sam will have to do better when facing the wildlings or "One o' them will plant his axe right between those little pig eyes." But Dolorous Edd comes to Sam's aid and says that an axe must have split Chett's skull: "Is it true that half your wits leaked out on the ground and your dogs ate them?"

Chett growls and kicks his dogs and hopes he has time to kill Tollett too. Then he bullies his dogs back to the place where they are tied up, refuses to feed them, and goes to report to Mormont on their lack of success in finding meat. He thinks with pleasure that he won't have to speak to Mormont anymore once their plot is accomplished, then goes to listen in on what people are saying.

Lark reports that the officers are in Mormont's tent talking about things, and when Chett goes to get some food, the forester Dywen remarks, "The wood's too silent.... I never heard no deader wood than this." Chett notices some other conspirators sitting around the fire, including Dirk, who is called that after his weapon, which he is sharpening, and Sweet Donnel Hill, who "had white teeth and fat red lips and yellow locks that he wore in an artful tumble about his shoulders, and ... claimed to be the bastard of some Lannister."

But then a cry of "Assemble!" goes up, and everyone goes to the central fire, where Mormont tells them that the van of the wildlings, led by Harma Dogshead, will probably be there in ten days. Thoren Smallwood, the scout who sighted the wildlings, says, "Mance Rayder means to break the Wall and bring red war to the Seven Kingdoms. Well, that's a game two can play. On the morrow we'll bring the war to him." Mormont says they will ride at dawn and set up an ambush for them that will "make them swear we were three thousand, not three hundred." And Thoren outlines a plan for a guerrilla assault on the column. "If they break and return to their hovels, we've won. If not, we'll harry them all the way to the Wall, and see to it that they leave a trail of corpses to mark their progress."

Someone calls out, "We'll die." "Many of us," Mormont responds. "Mayhaps even all of us. But as another Lord Commander said a thousand years ago, that is why they dress us in black." And he reminds them of the oath they took when they joined the Watch. Chett joins in the recitation of the oath, and notices that several of his fellow conspirators do, too. "That was good. No sense to draw attention, when their hour was so close." But as he beds down for the night, he worries, "What if that bloody oath gave one of his a change of heart?"

He lies there thinking of how quiet it is, and he remembers the prostitute he killed when she spurned him because of his boils. He finds it hard to breathe and wonders if he had fallen asleep. And then he realizes that it's snowing. "It isn't fair, he wanted to scream. Snow would ruin everything he'd worked for, all his careful plans." It would make it easy to track the conspirators after they fled. But he can still murder Samwell, he thinks.

He has just reached the sleeping Sam when "the sound of the horn shuddered through the camp, faint and far, yet unmistakable." If it was a single blast of the horn, it would be one of the lookouts posted in the trees that ringed the camp, telling of the return of one of the scouting parties. Sam wakes and sits up, the ravens caw and the dogs bark, and Chett knows that the camp is waking up. He clutches the dagger and waits for the sound to die down, but then it comes again.

Sam gets to his feet and pulls on a chainmail hauberk. He sees Chett standing there and asks if it was two blasts on the horn. Chett replies, "Two blasts to call the Watch to arms. Two blasts for foes approaching. There's an axe out there with Piggy writ on it, fat boy. Two blasts means wildlings." He enjoys seeing the fear on Sam's face.

But then there's a third blast, and Sam says, "I heard three. They never blow three. Not for hundreds and thousands of years. Three means--"

"--Others." Chett made a sound that was half a laugh and half a sob, and suddenly his smallclothes were wet, and he could feel the piss running down his leg, see steam rising off the front of his breeches.

Jaime

The last time we saw Jaime Lannister he was lying in filth in his cell at Riverrun, and Catelyn Stark had just called to Brienne to bring her sword. And now he is in a boat going downriver with Brienne and his cousin Ser Cleos Frey. He is still in chains, on both his wrists and his ankles. Catelyn has had him smuggled out of the castle and is sending him to King's Landing with new terms for the exchange of Jaime for Sansa and, or so Catelyn expects, Arya.

Jaime has nothing but contempt for his captors, the mannish Brienne and the timorous Cleos, and he doesn't mind expressing it. Catelyn has made Jaime swear that he "will never again take up arms against Stark nor Tully," that he will force Tyrion to send Sansa and Arya to her unharmed, and to swear it on his honor and on the lives of his family, and on the old gods and the new ones. "A strange woman, to trust her girls to a man with shit for honor," he thinks, but he knows that she's putting her trust in Tyrion and not in him.

He insults and bickers with Brienne as they make their way, and Ser Cleos tries to keep the peace: "We have far to go, we should not quarrel amongst ourselves." Jaime wonders if Cleos is "an honest muttonhead or a lickspittle." And then Cleos observes, regarding the charge that Jaime tried to murder Bran Stark, "Any man who'd believe that a Sworn Brother of the Kingsguard would harm a child does not know the meaning of honor." So Jaime concludes, "Lickspittle." He recalls that even Cersei was annoyed at his attempt to kill Bran, after the boy didn't die. They should have tried to frighten the boy into not telling what he had seen, instead of sending an assassin. Jaime wonders if Cersei had sent the assassin herself, but decides that if she had wanted Bran dead, she would have had Jaime kill him, because "it is not like her to chose [sic] a catspaw who would make such a royal botch of the killing."

When the wind changes, they raise the red-and-blue sail, in Tully colors. Jaime says they should be going to his father at Casterly Rock instead of to King's Landing, but Brienne reminds him that the girls are at King's Landing. Then he asks Ser Cleos for a knife, which Brienne denies him. He says he wants to shave, and asks Cleos to do it for him: "Leave the beard, but take the hair off my head." When Cleos asks why, Jaime says, "The realm knows Jaime Lannister as a beardless knight with long golden hair. A bald man with a filthy yellow beard may pass unnoticed. I'd sooner not be recognized when I'm in irons." When Ser Cleos is done, Jaime thinks, "I don't look as much like Cersei this way. She'll hate that."

As they continue downstream they see signs of the war: a floating corpse in Lannister crimson, deserted villages, occasional peasants who either run away or stare at them dully. They come upon the smoking remains of a large building and a tree with the hanged corpses of women. Brienne is shocked by "such wanton butchery," and steers for shore to bury the bodies. A sign on one of the women says, "They Lay With Lions," the lion being the Lannister sigil, which gives Jaime the opportunity to observe that what Brienne regards as an "unchivalrous" act was done by the side she is supporting. Ser Cleos remembers that this was an inn and that the women must be "Tavern wenches."

As they are trying to decide how to dig graves for the women, Brienne, who has climbed a tree to cut them down, spots a sail on the river. They hurry back to the boat. Jaime reports that the sail is "Mud red and watery blue," which means that it is a Tully boat in pursuit of them. Catelyn's unauthorized release of Jaime and Ser Cleos has been discovered. It is "a river galley," Jaime concludes, which means it has eighteen rowers, so there's little chance they can outrun it. As it gets closer, he can see that there are archers on board and that its captain is Ser Robin Ryger. Jaime is able to hail him, and Cleos urges Jaime to tell them that they were freed by Catelyn. But the reply is, "Catelyn Stark does not rule in Riverrun," which is what Jaime expected.

A volley of arrows is shot at them, hitting the mast, piercing the sail, and narrowly missing Jaime. As they reach a bend in the river, Brienne heads for a large island in the stream. Brienne tells Cleos to take the tiller and Jaime to row. She dives into the river and swims to a large cliff, which she begins to climb. Jaime tries to distract Ryger by calling out that they should settle this by single combat, which Ryger denies, then orders his bowmen to fire. But as he does, rocks begin to fall from the cliff, which Brienne has scaled, and then "a boulder the size of a cow detached itself from the top of the bluff."

The galley begins to sink, and the archers are thrown into the water. Jaime is delighted, thinking that he has been saved from the pursuers and has escaped from Brienne as well. But she has kept up with them and dives from the cliff and swims to the boat. Jaime thinks of braining her with the oar, but instead he uses it to help her climb aboard.

Catelyn

Ser Desmond Grell, whom Catelyn has known since childhood, is castellan of Riverrun, and it's his job to punish her for releasing Jaime. She knows the nature of her crime, and tells him, "If you fail to punish me, men will believe that we connived together to free Jaime Lannister. It was mine own act and mine alone, and I alone must answer for it." She suggests that she be put in the same cell and the same chains as Jaime. But Ser Desmond and the steward, Utherydes Wayn, realize that that's unthinkable, so they propose that she be confined to her quarters until her brother Edmure returns. Catelyn says instead that she would like to be confined with her dying father. They agree.

The steward tells her that Ser Robin Ryger has been sent to recapture Jaime, which Catelyn expected, but she hopes that Brienne can outrun them somehow. From her father's quarters, she has a view of the river, and she knows that she will be able to see Ser Robin's galley when it returns, but so far there's no sign of it. She is left with her unconscious father to think about Bran and Rickon, whom she believes to be dead.

Her father wakes and says the name, "Tansy," which Catelyn doesn't recognize. She has grown used to his thinking she is her mother or her sister, Lysa, and tries to tell him that she's Catelyn. But he continues, "Forgive me ... the blood ... oh, please ... Tansy...." She wonders if this was another woman in his life, and asks him, "Who is Tansy, my lord? Do you want me to send for her, Father? Where would I find the woman? Does she still live?" He groans, "Dead," and takes her hand and says, "You'll have others ... sweet babes, and trueborn." More clues to who Tansy might be. He coughs blood, and says, "... be a good wife and the gods will bless you ... sons ... trueborn sons..." Then he gives a cry of pain and tightens his hold on her hand. Maester Vyman comes with an opiate and Lord Hoster goes back to sleep.

She questions the maester about Tansy, but he has no clue other than that "The smallfolk often name their daughters after flowers and herbs." He leaves, telling her that his instructions are to keep conversation with her to a minimum. She spends the rest of the day looking out at the river, and in late afternoon sees a raven arriving. When Maester Vyman returns he tells her he had asked the steward about Tansy, but he had never heard of anyone by that name at Riverrun. She asks about the raven, and he tells her he shouldn't talk to her about it. But he gives in and tells her that Robb was wounded storming the Crag, but that it is "No cause for concern, he writes." Once again, he hurries away.

When she wipes her father's mouth, he moans, "Forgive me" and then "Tansy ... blood ... the blood ... gods be kind." She is disturbed again by this mystery, and sleeps poorly that night. She wakes up early, thinking about Tansy and wondering if her father had had a bastard with this woman. She wonders if Tansy could have been a name he called Lysa, who had had five miscarriages. But none of them had been at Riverrun where her father would have comforted her. "Never, unless ... unless she was with child, that first time...."

She and Lysa had married on the same day and had stayed at Riverrun when Ned and Jon Arryn went off to fight in Robert Baratheon's rebellion. Both of them had missed their periods too, and Lysa had been happy that Catelyn's son would inherit Winterfell and hers the Eyrie. But then Lysa had menstruated after all, and was miserable. "Catelyn had always thought that Lysa had simply been a little late, but if she had been with child...." She remembers that when Robb was born, she had given him to Lysa to hold, but Lysa had burst into tears and given him back, which she might have done if she had lost a child. Jon Arryn had been older than their father, and was childless. "He needed a young wife if House Arryn was to continue ... a young wife known to be fertile."

She goes to her father and says to him that she knows what he did, that he made Lysa marry Jon Arryn. "Lysa was the price Jon Arryn had to pay for the swords and spears of House Tully." The next day she wrote to Lysa, telling her about Bran and Rickon, but also writing about her father: "His thoughts are all of the wrong he did you, now that his time grows short." She tells Lysa that their father needs her forgiveness, and that if she can't come, to write to him, "A few words of love, so he might die in peace!" She gives the letter to Maester Vyman and then goes to the sept to pray.

Later that day, Edmure returns and tells her of Stannis's defeat at King's Landing and that "Highgarden has declared for Joffrey. Dorne as well. All the south." And then he berates her for releasing Jaime. Cersei will never release Sansa and Arya, he tells her, but she says she trusts Tyrion to do so. Then he tells her that Tyrion was wounded in the battle. "He'll be dead before your Brienne reaches King's Landing, if she ever does." He tells her that he has sent ravens to Roose Bolton. "By river or road, the way from Riverrun to King's Landing must needs take them close to Harrenhal." She is horrified. "Brienne might have gotten him to King's Landing safely ... so long as no one was hunting for them. But now...." She sends him away, convinced that she will never see her daughters again.                                                         

12. A Clash of Kings, by George R.R. Martin, pp. 469-497

Jon

A horn is heard in the night, and it signals the arrival of some brothers from the Shadow Tower, some of whom are wounded. Jon recognizes their leader, Qhorin Halfhand, even though he has never seen him before. He earned his name when he lost all but the thumb and forefinger of one hand fending off a wildling with an axe. He had then thrust the hand into the face of the wildling, using the spurting blood to blind him and then killing him. Halfhand recognizes Jon, too, because he looks so much like his father.

Halfhand tells Mormont that they had an encounter with a wildling named Alfyn Crowkiller, who was leading a scouting party at the Wall. They lost four men and a dozen were wounded, but the casualties on the enemy side were heavier and included Crowkiller. Even so, Jon wonders, "why does Qhorin sound so grave, after such a victory?"

Outside, Jon hears some grumbling from the men, who think the mission is useless and are even considering mutiny. He examines the new dagger he has fashioned from the dragonglass he found buried in the ranger's cloak. He made a hilt from wood and bound it with twine to improve the grip. The blade was brittle, but sharper than steel. He had also made daggers for Grenn and Mormont, and had given the horn to Sam along with a spearhead and some arrowheads. Mormont has no idea who buried the cloak, though he admits it's possible that Benjen Stark did so for some reason.

When he returns to Mormont's tent, he hears Halfhand talking about what they have learned from prisoners they captured about Mance Rayder and his plans, and Mormont saying that the Wall must be alerted, as well as the king -- or rather the kings, "The true and false alike. If they would claim the realm, let them defend it." Halfhand also says that Rayder's forces plan to break through the wall, possibly using sorcery: "He is seeking something in the high cold places. He is searching for something he needs."  He advocates sending out scouts:

"I would send fifteen men, in three parties of five. One to probe the Milkwater, one the Skirling Pass, one to climb the Giant's Stair. Jarman Buckwell, Thoren Smallwood, and myself to command. To learn what waits in these mountains." 

Mormont tells Halfhand to choose his men, and he chooses Jon.

Tyrion

Lancel tells Tyrion that Cersei is planning to send Tommen, disguised as a page, to the castle at Rosby to protect him from not only the mob but also Tyrion. That night, Tyrion sends a message to Jacelyn Bywater, telling him to intercept the detail moving Tommen and convey the boy to the castle himself, effectively transferring him from Cersei's hands to his own. Bronn, who is to carry the message to Bywater, suggests that he could do the job himself, but Tyrion doesn't really trust him: "Ser Jacelyn's gold cloaks would defend the boy; Bronn's sellswords were more apt to sell him to his enemies."

Then he asks Bronn to accompany him to the secret passage at Chataya's, but on the way he decides to skip the passage and go directly to Shae's. The streets are deserted because of the curfew that has been imposed. He finds Shae being serenaded by a singer known as Simon Silver Tongue, who greets him as "My lord Hand." Tyrion is angry that this stranger knows where Shae lives and that Tyrion visits her at night.

After making love to Shae he goes down to the garden, but she interrupts the moment of peace he has there by bringing Varys to him, disguised as "one of the begging brothers, ... in filthy patched robes, his bare feet crusty with dirt.... The smell of him would have gagged a rat." Tyrion doesn't recognize Varys at first, but Shae has seen right through his disguise. "A whore learns to see the man, not his garb, or she turns up dead in an alley," she tells him.

Varys has brought news that Cortnay Penrose is dead and Stannis has taken Storm's End. Realizing that Stannis will turn his attention to King's Landing now, he fears for Shae's safety. He tells her he might be able to move her into the castle, but she'd have to pose as a scullery maid in the kitchens. Shae is not happy about the plan and asks why he can't just take her into his own quarters. He tells her, "I was expressly forbidden to take you to court.  When she mocks him for his fear of his father, he slaps her: "Damn you. Never mock me. Not you." She apologizes, but half-heartedly. He thinks, "I never meant to strike you. Gods be good, am I turning into Cersei."

And then he tells her the story of his marriage, at thirteen, to a girl who turned out to be a whore Jaime had hired for him. And he promises, "Once we're done with Stannis, you'll have another manse, and silks as soft as your hands." She says her hands won't be soft after scouring pots, but he assures her that he'll love them still: "they'll remind me how brave you were." So she accepts the plan.

Varys is waiting for him in the stables, and he tells the eunuch about his plan for Shae. Varys warns him that the kitchen is full of gossips and spies, and she will be catnip for the boys and men who work there. He suggests another plan: The maid to Lady Tanda's daughter, Lollys, has been stealing from her, and if he tells Lady Tanda the girl will be sacked so she'll need a new maid. Moreover, Lollys never leaves her room since she was raped, "so Shae will be out of sight ... but conveniently close, should you have need of comfort." Moreover, Varys knows a secret passage that leads to Tyrion's chambers, which surprises Tyrion.

As they ride, he asks how Cortnay Penrose died. Varys says the story is that Penrose "threw himself from a tower." Tyrion doesn't believe it, and Varys admits that there is no evidence that anyone broke into Penrose's chamber. Finally Varys asks if Tyrion believes "in the old powers." "Magic, you mean?" Tyrion scoffs at the idea "that Ser Cortnay was magicked to his death." Varys then decides to tell Tyrion about how he became a eunuch.

He "was an orphan boy apprenticed to a traveling folly" that performed "in all the Free Cities and from time to time in Oldtown and King's Landing." One day in Myr, a man came to the show and afterward bought Varys from his master. Varys was afraid he had been sold to the man for sex, but instead the man drugged Varys with something "that made me powerless to move or speak, yet did nothing to dull my senses." He then sliced off Varys's genitals while chanting. "I watched him burn my manly parts on a brazier. The flames turned blue, and I heard a voice answer his call, though I did not understand the words they spoke." Varys was then cast out on the streets where he learned to live as a thief, and discovered when he was older "that often the contents of a man's letters are more valuable than the contents of his purse."

"Yet I still dream of that night, my lord. Not of the sorcerer, nor his blade, nor even the way my manhood shriveled as it burned. I dream of the voice. The voice from the flames. Was it a god, a demon, some conjurer's trick? I could not tell you, and I know all the tricks. All I can say for a certainty is that he called it, and it answered, and since that day I have hated magic and all those who practice it. If Lord Stannis is one such, I mean to see him dead."

Tyrion is silent for a while after Varys ends his story, and then says, "I'm sorry." Varys says he knows Tyrion still doesn't believe him, that he thinks Varys imagined the voice because of the drugs and the pain. Tyrion admits that he remains a skeptic, though he believes "there once were dragons. I've seen their skulls, after all."

They talk of other things: There has been no news from Lord Tywin or from Littlefinger. And then Tyrion begins to laugh, puzzling Varys. Tyrion has been overcome by the irony of the situation:

"Storm's End is fallen and Stannis is coming with fire and steel and the gods alone know what dark powers, and the good folk don't have Jaime to protect them, nor Robert nor Renly nor Rhaegar nor their precious Knight of Flowers. Only me, the one they hate." He laughed again. "The dwarf, the evil counselor, the twisted little monkey demon. I'm all that stands between them and chaos."

Catelyn

Edmure rides off to defend Riverrun against the Lannister forces. Brienne is miserable at not being allowed to go and fight, but the castle needs someone to defend it, and the garrison is weak and untrained. The castle is also full of women and children who have taken refuge within the walls. When Brienne asks Catelyn what they should do, Catelyn replies, "Our duty." And then she thinks bitterly of how she has always done her duty, agreeing to marry Brandon Stark and then his brother Ned after Brandon was killed. "I did so gladly, though I never saw Ned's face until our wedding day. I gave my maidenhood to this solemn stranger and sent him off to his war and his king and the woman who bore him his bastard because I always did my duty." But now she isn't really sure what her duty consists of.

Outside, someone is singing of the glory of battle, and Brienne complains, "Fighting is better than this waiting.... You don't feel so helpless when you fight." And when Catelyn points out that you can die in battle, Brienne remarks, "As ladies die in childbed. No one sings songs about them." Catelyn responds that "Children are a battle of a different sort." You want to keep all of them safe. "And who would keep you safe, my lady?" Brienne asks. The men would, Catelyn replies, but now they are all gone off, so "I suppose you must fill their place, Brienne." Brienne vows that she will try.

Later that day, word comes of Penrose's death and Storm's End falling into Stannis's hands. Catelyn wishes that news of this could be sent to Robb, and Maester Vyman suggests that a raven be sent to Ashemark with orders to send a rider to Robb. Catelyn observes that there is no news about what happened to Robert's bastard, who was being guarded by Penrose, and she wonders why Stannis wanted him so much. She asks what the boy looked like, and Brienne tells her, "He is seven or eight, comely, with black hair and bright blue eyes. Visitors oft thought him Lord Renly's own son." Catelyn realizes that Stannis plans "to parade his brother's bastard before the realm, so men might see Robert in his face and wonder why there is no such likeness in Joffrey." She thinks about her own children, who resembled the Tullys more than they did the Starks. Only Arya and Jon Snow resembled their father, and she wonders again who Jon's mother was.

Word comes that Lannister forces have been sighted across the river, and from the battlements they watch the attempts of the Lannisters to cross and the defensive forces to drive them back. Brienne provides a commentary on what is happening over the next day, when the enemy is successfully driven back several times. Catelyn decides to question Ser Cleos Frey, who had brought Cersei's response to Robb's peace terms and the team whose plot to free Jaime had been foiled. She has wine sent to him before they meet to loosen his tongue.

She asks him if he saw her daughters, and he stammers a yes that persuades her he is lying. Then he admits he saw Sansa, but says nothing about Arya. He also tells her that Cersei was not in court when the terms were delivered, and that Tyrion was the one who proclaimed them. She thinks again of how clever Tyrion is, wondering how he survived on the road after Lysa released him. She also observes that he had no part in Ned's execution, and remembers how he came to her defense when they were attacked by the mountain clans. She wishes she could trust him. But then she remembers the dagger that was used in the attack on Bran, and although he persistently denied having any part in the attack, even when he was locked in the sky cells at the Eyrie, she is still convinced that he was lying.

Five days later, word comes that the Lannisters have been repelled at every attempt to cross the river, and that they are marching southeast. That night there is celebration in the castle, but Catelyn is studying maps. "The gods had granted them victory after victory.... But if we are winning, why am I so afraid?"

9. A Clash of Kings, by George R.R. Martin, pp. 372-403

Catelyn

Catelyn has gone to a sept to pray before the battle between Stannis and Renly, and she finds the faces of the gods as portrayed in the charcoal drawing on the walls of this simple place of worship remind her of people.

The Father's face made her think of her own father, dying in his bed at Riverrun. The Warrior was Renly and Stannis, Robb and Robert, Jaime Lannister and Jon Snow. She even glimpse Arya in those lines, for just a moment.... When she looked up at the Mother again, it was her own mother she saw.... She was always so calm, Catelyn thought, remembering her mother's soft hands, her warm smile.... She wondered what Lady Minisa would make of her eldest daughter, kneeling here before her.... I have lost my daughters, Robb does not want me, and Bran and Rickon must surely think me a cold and unnatural mother. I was not even with Ned when he died....

And then she thinks of Cersei, who is also a mother, and wonders if she prays to the Mother as well. If Cersei had killed Ned and Jon Arryn because they learned her secret, Catelyn wonders, "Would I do any less for my own?" And then she remembers Bran's fall and the attack on him and realizes that he must know something too. "Gods be good, he must have seen something, heard something, that was why they tried to kill him in his bed."

She returns to Renly's pavilion, where Brienne is helping him put on his armor, and tells him she needs to talk with him. He is arguing with two of his knights, who urge him to attack before daybreak, but Renly maintains that would be "unchivalrous." Finally he agrees to speak with Catelyn, who tells him of the attack on Bran. There had been a hunt on the day when Bran fell, and most of the men had gone, but Jaime had remained behind at Winterfell, as had Cersei. Renly gets the point: "you believe the boy caught them at their incest." She begs him to let her go tell Stannis as well. She says Robb will set aside his crown if Renly and Stannis will too. Then they can call a Great Council at which "the assembled lords of the Seven Kingdoms choose who shall rule them."

But Renly laughs at the idea. "The time for talk is done. Now we shall see who is stronger." Brienne kneels to buckle the belt that holds Renly's longsword. Suddenly there is a gust of wind that opens the entrance to the tent. When Catelyn turns to look, she sees what she takes to be Renly's shadow on the walls of the tent, lifting his sword. But she realizes that Renly's sword is still sheathed.

"Cold," said Renly in a small puzzled voice, a heartbeat before the steel of his gorget parted like cheesecloth beneath the shadow of a blade that was not there. He had time to make a small thick gasp before the blood came gushing out of his throat.

Brienne cries out when she sees the blood, and screams when he collapses into her arms. Catelyn recognizes that "Something dark and evil had happened here," but all she knows is that "Death came in that door and blew the life out of him as swift as the wind snuffed out his candles." Ser Robar Royce and Ser Emmon Cuy come rushing in, and when they see Brienne covered with Renly's blood they assume that she has killed him. Emmon picks up a battle-axe and starts for Brienne as Catelyn cries out. But Brienne swiftly pulls Renly's sword and parries the attack, then pivots and cuts off the hand of a man who has moved in behind her with a torch. Brienne holds off the attackers, and Catelyn tries to persuade Ser Robar that Stannis had killed Renly.

It was sorcery of some kind, she argues, as Brienne kills another guardsman. Hearing shouts from outside, Catelyn says, "She is innocent, Robar. You have my word, on my husband's grave and my honor as a Stark." Robar believes her, and tells Catelyn to get Brienne away. Emmon is still fighting with Brienne, but Catelyn knocks him down with an iron brazier, and she and Brienne escape into the darkness outside.

They move slowly to avoid attracting notice, but already the word has spread and there is disarray among the troops. Brienne asks Catelyn what had happened, and Catelyn tells her about the shadow that she first thought was Renly's but then recognized as Stannis's. "I felt him. It makes no sense, I know...."

Catelyn's escort is waiting for her, and she persuades Brienne to ride with them. "We were both with the king when he was killed. That will not be forgotten." As they ride away, Catelyn realizes that "Stannis has won all with a single evil stroke. I am the rightful king, he had declared, his jaw clenched hard as iron, and your son no less a traitor than my brother here. His day will come as well."

Jon

They have reached a hill that rises above the forest. It's known as the Fist of the First Men because of its shape. At its top there is a space enclosed by "a chest-high wall of tumbled rocks" that was said to have been "a ringfort of the First Men in the Dawn Age." Lord Mormont thinks it a good site for their encampment, but Jon is concerned because of the lack of water. And when he finds Ghost, the wolf won't enter the circle of stones. "It was not like him to be so unsettled." When the darkness comes on, Jon finds his own "sense of foreboding" increases, but he tells himself to "Stop acting the boy."

Mormont proposes to settle in and fortify the encampment, then wait for the wildlings to pass by. Jon protests that if the rangers don't move from sight of the Fist, then it will be hard for them to find his Uncle Benjen. But Mormont provokes him to think for a moment and Jon realizes, "it might be easier for one man to find two hundred than for two hundred to find one." Mormont concurs: "If Ben Stark is alive and free, he will come to us, I have no doubt." But they also acknowledge the possibility that he might come to them if he's dead, too.

Jon is not the only one feeling uneasy. The forester Dywen says, "I know this wood as well as any man alive, and I tell you, I wouldn't care to ride through it alone tonight. Can't you smell it?" He says it "smells ... well ... cold." The others scoff, but Jon agrees, remembering the night the undead man attacked in the Lord Commander's chambers. "It smells like death." He hears the sound of wolves howling, and then sees Ghost's red eyes glowing -- the wolf has decided to come inside the ringfort, but he is still uneasy. Jon follows him outside and down the hill, wondering why he is doing this.

When he reaches the stream, Ghost is drinking, but then he is off again. Jon calls on him to stay, but Ghost doesn't obey. Jon thinks of returning to the fort, but he follows Ghost into the forest where he finds the wolf digging into what Jon thinks at first is a grave. Two feet beneath the loose earth he finds a bundle. It contains a dozen knives, as well as spearheads and arrowheads, carved from "Dragonglass. What the maesters call obsidian." There is also a warhorn filled with more arrowheads.  When Jon examines the cloth in which all of this was wrapped he finds that it is "the black cloak of a Sworn Brother of the Night's Watch."

Bran

Bran is summoned to Maester Luwin's quarters where Rickon and the Frey cousins are already gathered. A raven has arrived with news of Robb's victory. Though he is pleased by the news, he feels uneasy because Tywin Lannister remains undefeated, and he remembers Osha saying that Robb was "marching the wrong" way when he left. There is also news that the Freys' uncle Stevron Frey was killed in the battle, but the two Walders are unmoved by it and fall to arguing about who will be their grandfather's heir. Luwin scolds them for not grieving for their uncle, but Bran has a sudden revelation: "They like the taste of this dish better than I do."

He returns to his room, where he asks Osha if she has ever seen a three-eyed crow. She laughs and says she hasn't. Then Jojen and Meera come to his room, and Bran admits that he has seen the fulfillment of Jojen's dream about Maester Luwin serving him some delicious meat that he doesn't enjoy, and serving the Freys inferior meat that they relish. Bran's muted response to the news of Robb's victory and the Freys' gossiping after the news of their uncle's death are parallel to what Jojen had dreamed. "The green dreams take strange shapes sometimes," Jojen says. So Bran now wants to hear about the dream of the bad thing coming to Winterfell.

"It is the sea that come," Jojen says. He dreamed that the castle had flooded, and among the drowned men floating in the yard are Alebelly, the septon, and the smith, Mikken. Bran says they must warn them, but Jojen says it won't make any difference, and Meera argues that they won't believe him. As he agreed he would, he now tells Jojen and Meera what he dreams: the wolf dreams, the crow urging him to fly, the tree that calls his name, and the nightmares about falling. Meera asks if that's all, and he lies and says yes, omitting the ones in which Jaime Lannister appears.

Jojen says people will call him a warg, a shapechanger, if they hear about the wolf dreams. "Some will hate you if they know what you are. Some will even try to kill you." Bran insists that he doesn't want to be a warg; he wants to be a knight.

"A knight is what you want. A warg is what you are. You can't change that, Bran, you can't deny it or push it away. You are the winged wolf, but you will never fly." Jojen got up and walked to the window. "Unless you open your eye." He put two fingers together and poked Bran in the forehead, hard.

Bran is left more confused by this, and he keeps poking at his forehead to try to find the third eye. He also tries to warn Mikken and Septon Chayle about Jojen's dream, but as Jojen predicted, they don't believe him. Alebelly does, however, and refuses to bathe until the other guards gang up on him and wash away his stink.

Ser Rodrik returns from his task, which was to rescue Lady Hornwood, who had been kidnapped by Roose Bolton's bastard son. They had killed the bastard, but failed to rescue Lady Hornwood, who had starved to death in the tower the bastard had locked her in after their wedding. He had forced her to sign a document naming him her heir, which means that Roose Bolton has a claim to her lands. This has touched off a battle between other factions claiming the inheritance. Ser Rodrik has taken prisoner the bastard's servant, "a fleshy young man with fat moist lips and long hair who smelled like a privy," and who is consequently known as Reek.

Bran tells Ser Rodrik about Jojen's prophecy that Winterfell is going to be attacked by the sea. Luwin says he has "spoken to Bran about the uncertainty of such prophecies, but if truth be told, there is trouble along the Stony Shore. Raiders in longships, plundering fishing villages. Raping and burning." Since there is a possibility that Ser Rodrik might have to deal with these sea-dwellers, he asks if Jojen saw him drowned, and Bran says no.

That night, Bran and Jojen and Meera are playing a game, and Bran suggests that if they don't go near the sea, the prophecy might not come true, but Jojen insists, "The things I see in green dreams can't be changed." Meera asks what's the point of a prophecy if you "can't heed it and change what's to come," but Jojen insists that's the way it works. She blurts out that Bran should fight to change things, and then realizes that she's said too much. Bran sees that she's hiding something from him and asks, "Was I drowned?"

"Not drowned." Jojen spoke as if every word pained him. "I dreamed of the man who came today, the one they call Reek. You and your brother lay dead at his feet, and he was skinning off your faces with a long red blade.... I saw you and Rickon in your crypts, down in the dark with all the dead kings and their stone wolves.... The dream was green, Bran, and the green dreams do not lie."

Tyrion

News has arrived of Renly's death, and Varys is sharing it with Cersei, Littlefinger, and Tyrion.  "Most of the lords who rode with Lord Renly to Storm's End have gone over banner-and-blade to Stannis, with all their chivalry." Storm's End hasn't fallen, however, and Loras Tyrell has left for Bitterbridge with his sister, Renly's wife, and other soldiers. Renly's body has disappeared. Tyrion sees an opportunity to gain the Tyrells and their bannermen. They should arrange a marriage between Joffrey and Margaery Tyrell.

When Cersei objects, "Joffrey is betrothed to Sansa Stark," Tyrion says, "What advantage is there in wedding the king to the daughter of a dead traitor?" And Littlefinger adds that the Tyrells are richer than the Starks, and that Margaery is beautiful "and beddable besides" -- Sansa is not yet old enough to marry. Cersei says that Joffrey is not old enough to think about "such things" as sex, but Tyrion knows better. He "had spoken with Varys about how they might arrange for Joffrey to visit Chataya's. A taste of honey might sweeten the boy." Cersei argues that Joffrey would never consent to the marriage, but Tyrion points out that until he comes of age in three years, he has to do what the regent and the Hand tell him to do.

So Cersei gives in. "Make your offer then, but gods save you all if Joff does not like this girl." Then they argue about who should go to Bitterbridge and persuade the Tyrells to the marriage. Littlefinger volunteers to do so, to Tyrion's surprise: "What gain does he see in this?" He doesn't trust Littlefinger and would rather keep him around where he can control him, but the only other option is to go himself, and if he left King's Landing, "all that he had managed to accomplish would be undone." Then Littlefinger argues for a large contingent of guards and a commission in writing signed and sealed by Joffrey and all the members of the council.

After the meeting, Cersei tells Tyrion, "I know we do not always agree on policy, but it seems to me that I was wrong about you. You are not so big a fool as I imagined." And to his astonishment she kisses him on his forehead. He is certain she is up to something. 

6. A Clash of Kings, by George R.R. Martin, pp. 244-298

Bran

Seated on Dancer in his special saddle, Bran rides down the center aisle of the Great Hall, welcoming the visitors to the harvest celebration. After his welcoming speech, Ser Rodrik and Maester Luwin praise him, and the servants begin bringing in an abundance of food -- a sharp contrast to the starvation down in King's Landing.

As the feast goes on, and the crowd gets noisier and more drunken, Bran feels the heat of the room and grows drowsy. He drifts into a "waking dream," in which he is a wolf in the cool of the godswood, until Ser Rodrik brings him back to reality by observing that he isn't eating. He sips some wine and recalls that the cup he is using once belonged to his father. He thinks of the happier time when his father was alive and they were all together at the harvest banquet -- except Jon, who didn't sit at the high table. He recalls all of those who were there and are no longer alive, or else are out fighting the war.

Some late guests arrive from the marshes of the Neck, and Little Walder dismisses them scornfully as "Frogeaters" and "Mudmen." They include the children of Howland Reed, Jojen and Meera. They swear their loyalty to the Starks. The girl, Meera, says that her brother would like to see the direwolves, and Rickon tells them they are in the godswood. Bran assures them that Summer won't harm them if he's there, and that he'll keep Shaggydog under control.

Finally, Bran is ready to go and signals that he wants to be lifted into the basket on Hodor's back. "The folk of Winterfell had seen this sight half a hundred times, but doubtless it looked queer to the guests, some of whom were more curious than polite. Bran felt the stares." In bed, he thinks about the knights among whom he once hoped to be counted, and about his father's story of Ser Arthur Dayne, whose sword, Dawn, was "forged from the heart of a fallen star." His father had said that Howland Reed saved him from being killed by Dayne.

But though he really wants to dream of knights, he dreams once again of the wolves,  who hear the noise of the banquet and are restless. Then in the dream he senses the approach of Jojen and Meera. She carries a knife for protection, but Jojen says, "He won't hurt me. This is not the day I die." When Jojen reaches out and touches the wolf's muzzle, "the wood dissolved and the very ground turned to smoke beneath his feet and swirled away laughing, and then he was spinning and falling, falling, falling...."

Catelyn

She is on her way with twenty of Robb's best men and five noblemen to talk with Renly Baratheon, traveling overland and staying clear of towns. She hadn't wanted to undertake this diplomatic mission, but Robb had persuaded her that it's necessary. It has become clear that they are not going to receive any help from her sister, Lysa, so he needs to know as much as he can about Renly and whether they can make common cause against the Lannisters. She wishes that she were riding north to Winterfell instead of south.

A half-day away from Renly's encampment they are met by a party of his outriders, led by Ser Colen of Greenpools. She tells him, "I come as envoy from my son, Robb Stark, the King in the North, to treat with Renly Baratheon, the King in the South." Ser Colen corrects her: "King Renly is the crowned and anointed lord of all the Seven Kingdoms, my lady." She wonders if she is being escorted to Renly or if she has been captured, but she sees no option but to trust him.

When they get nearer to Renly's camp she is surprised by the great number of men and the weaponry under his command. "Near all the chivalry of the south had come to Renly's call, it seemed." But even more surprising to Catelyn as they get closer is that a tournament is going on. "This is madness, Catelyn thought. Real enemies on every side and half the realm in flames, and Renly sits here playing at war like a boy with his first wooden sword."

Then she sees Renly himself, "a ghost in a golden crown" because of his resemblance to the young Robert Baratheon. Next to him is his queen, Margaery. Their marriage cemented the alliance between the Baratheons and the Tyrells -- Lord Mace Tyrell was her father. She was Robb's age, and Renly was only twenty-one.

The melee is drawing to a close, and only four combatants are left on the field, one of whom is Loras Tyrell, the queen's brother, known as the Knight of Flowers. Finally there are only two: Loras and a knight in cobalt blue armor. They are well-matched, but in the end they collide and fall from their horses.

Loras Tyrell, on the bottom, took the brunt of the impact. The blue knight pulled a long dirk free and flicked open Tyrell's visor. The roar of the crowd was too loud for Catelyn to hear what Ser Loras said, but she saw the word form on his split, bloody lips. Yield. 

King Renly summons the blue knight before him, and the knight kneels. But the crowd is mostly silent, and Catelyn hears a man say, "A vile trick, pulling the lad down." Catelyn asks Ser Colen, "who is this man, and why do they mislike him so?" Colen informs her that the blue knight isn't a man: "That's Brienne of Tarth, daughter to Lord Selwyn the Evenstar." She is also known as Brienne the Beauty, he says, but nobody calls her that to her face.

Renly proclaims Brienne the champion and offers her any reward within his power to give. She asks to be named one of the seven in Renly's Rainbow Guard, and he grants her request. She removes her helmet and Catelyn gets a good look at her:

Beauty they called her ... mocking. The hair beneath the visor was a squirrel's nest of dirty straw, and her face .... Brienne's eyes were large and very blue, a young girl's eyes, trusting and guileless, but the rest ... her features were broad and coarse, her teeth prominent and crooked, her mouth too wide, her lips so plump they seemed swollen. A thousand freckles speckled her cheeks and brow, and her nose had been broken more than once. Pity filled Catelyn's heart. Is there any creature on earth as unfortunate as an ugly woman?

But Brienne doesn't seem to think she's unfortunate. She's delighted at the king's gift, and she smiles as she looks down on him -- she's taller than he is.

Ser Colen takes this opportunity to present Catelyn to the king, though she corrects him when he says she is the envoy of the Lord of Winterfell: "Lord of Winterfell and King in the North, ser." Renly presents her to Margaery, who expresses her condolences on the loss of her husband. Renly promises, "When I take King's Landing, I'll send you Cersei's head." Catelyn replies, "It will be enough to know that justice has been done, my lord." Brienne interrupts here to correct her: "Your Grace.... And you should kneel when you approach the king." Catelyn retorts that there's not much difference between "lord" and "grace," and that anyway her son is a king, too. Though some of Renly's court don't like that, he just laughs, and asks when Robb plans to march on Tywin Lannister at Harrenhal.

Catelyn knows better than to give away Robb's plans, and just says that she isn't on his war councils. When she mentions that Jaime Lannister is being held prisoner at Riverrun, there is some comment on the fact that he is still alive, and Lord Randyll Tarly suggests that it reveals weakness that Robb hasn't killed Jaime and that he doesn't come to pay homage himself, "rather than hiding behind his mother's skirts. Catelyn retorts that Robb is at war, "not playing at tourney." Renly takes this in good humor and suggests that Randyll is "overmatched."

Catelyn is shown to an opulent pavilion. "He does not stint himself, this Renly, she thought as she looked about. Small wonder this host moves so slowly." She changes for the king's feast, which takes place in the castle of Lord Caswell. She sees Brienne again, seated at the high table. "Out of armor, her body seemed ungainly, broad of hip and thick of limb, with hunched muscular shoulders bur no bosom to speak of. And it was clear from her every action that Brienne knew it, and suffered for it." The food is so rich that Catelyn eats sparingly. She observes that "From time to time, King Renly would feed Margaery some choice morsel off the point of his dagger, or lean over to plant the lightest of kisses on her cheek, but it was Ser  Loras who shared most of his jests and confidences."

Most of all, she notices how young the lords of Renly's court are. "It is all a game to them still, a tourney writ large, and all they see is the chance for glory and honor and spoils. They are boys drunk on song and story, and like all boys, they think themselves immortal." Then Renly asks her to walk with him a while. Brienne says she will accompany them for protection, but Renly tells her that he doesn't need protecting as long as they're at Lord Caswell's castle. She appears to be hurt by this.

Outside, he asks if Ser Barristan Selmy is with Robb at Riverrun. This surprises Catelyn, who hasn't heart of his ouster by Joffrey and his replacement by the Hound. Renly says Barristan has disappeared, and that he had hoped he might join his service. "I thought perhaps he had gone to Riverrun instead." He also tells her that he had offered Ned his support if he would depose Joffrey, but Ned told him he had sworn to protect Robert's children. When Renly heard this, he says, he knew that he had to flee. Catelyn reflects that if he had stayed to support Ned, he would be alive.

He takes Catelyn to the top of the castle tower and shows her the campfires in all directions. He has heard that Robb commands forty thousand troops, and boasts that he has twice that here, plus another ten thousand at Highgarden, a garrison at Storm's End, and expects the Dornishmen to join forces with him too. And he tells her not to forget the sailors commanded by his brother Stannis.

She reminds him that Stannis has made a claim to the throne himself, but Renly dismisses this. "Men respect Stannis, even fear him, but precious few have ever loved him." As for Stannis's claim as elder brother, Renly observes that the Baratheon claim to the throne was obtained by Robert through force, not through kinship. And he gestures toward the troops below as evidence of his claim. Then he tells her that if Robb will support him, he'll let him "go on calling himself King in the North if he likes, so long as he bends the knee and does me homage as his overlord." If Robb will join him, the war will be over quickly.

Then they interrupted by a messenger from Storm's End. Stannis is laying siege to the city.

Jon

It has been raining for six days and everyone is miserable and hungry. But they have received good news: Although every village they have seen has been deserted, Craster is still at his keep. "Thoren Smallwood swore that Craster was a friend to the Watch, despite his unsavory reputation." He presides over an all-female household: his wives and daughters, and some of them are both.  So Mormont sends Jon to ride down the line of the expedition and remind all of the officers that Craster's women are off-limits.

Midway down the train he finds Samwell, and tells him that "Craster's Keep is just ahead. If the gods are good, he'll let us sleep by his fire." But Sam has heard sinister things about Craster and his wives, and is not looking forward to the visit. On the way back Jon is joined by Ghost, who has been foraging on his own.

Craster's Keep is "a midden heap, a pigsty, an empty sheepfold, and a windowless daub-and-wattle hall scarce worthy of the name. There isn't enough room in the hall for the two hundred men on the expedition, but Jon estimates that from thirty to fifty of them can sleep inside. The rest will have to pitch tents in the compound yard, which is half "ankle-deep puddles" and half "sucking mud. Another dismal night was in prospect." But even the hall is "squalid" and "foul-smelling."

Craster himself doesn't fit Jon's imagining of what the wildlings are like from "Old Nan's tales of the savage folk who drank blood from human skulls. Craster seemed to be drinking a thin yellow beer from a chipped stone cup. Perhaps he had not heard the stories." He tells Mormont that he hasn't seen Benjen Stark for three years, though he had seen Ser Waymar Royce, for whom Benjen had been searching. Mormont offers to provide Craster and his wives with an escort to the Wall, but Craster is content to stay. What he really wants is some "good southron wine" and a new axe.

Mormont tells him of the undead men who had attacked them, but Craster scoffs and says he doesn't have that kind of trouble. "If wights come walking, I'll know how to send them back to their graves." Jarmen Buckwell asks about Mance Rayder, and Craster says that he's the one behind the empty villages. "Might be that I could tell you where to seek Mance Rayder. If I had a mind." He asks if they have someone who can draw a map, and Jon suggests Sam. Mormont tells Jon to send Sam in after he's eaten and to ask someone else to bring him his axe as a gift for Craster.

Jon delivers the message about the axe, and goes in search of Sam. He hears a cry of "Wolf!" and runs to find Ghost with a rabbit in his mouth and one dead on the ground. He tells the woman not to be afraid as Ghost bolts down the rabbit, which he realizes came from a small wooden hutch that Ghost must have broken into. He asks the woman, who turns out to be a girl about his age, if she is one of Craster's daughters. "Wife now," she says, putting her hand on her pregnant belly. She says she was going to breed the rabbits because they don't have any sheep left. He promises that he'll ask Lord Mormont to make good on the loss.

Two of Jon's enemies appear: Lark the Sisterman (meaning that he comes from the islands known as the Three Sisters) and Chett, whom Sam replaced as steward to Maester Aemon. They scare off the girl, but Lark slips in the mud when he tries to take the remaining rabbit. Ghost brings it to Jon. He finds Sam feeding the ravens, and tells him that he's wanted to draw a map. But first he shares the rabbit with Sam.

In the morning the rain has stopped and everything is covered with ice. As he's reflecting on the beauty of it, he hears a voice call him. It is the girl from last night, wearing Sam's cloak. He said she should see him and gave her his cloak so no one would question her. She tells him that Craster is still passed out from all the wine he drank last night and will probably sleep through the day. He says she should go back; they were forbidden to talk to the women. But she asks him to take her with him. Her name is Gilly, she says, and she fears for her baby. "Nella says it's to be a boy, and she's had six and knows these things. He gives the boys to the gods."

Jon asks what gods. "'The cold gods,' she said. 'The ones in the night. The white shadows.'" He asks what color their eyes are, and she tells him, "Blue. As bright as blue stars, and as cold." She wants to go as far as the Wall, but he tells her that they're going in the other direction. "We ride north, after Mance Rayder and these Others, these white shadows and their wights. We seek them, Gilly. Your babe would not be safe with us." He can't even promise that they will come back this way. Disappointed, she runs off, as Jon curses Sam for sending her to him.

He goes to the hall where Mormont tells him that he means to leave within the hour. Behind the hall he finds Sam with Gilly, who is giving him back his cloak. She runs away when she sees him. Jon tells him what a bad idea it was to send her to him, but when he walks away he feels "as confused as he was angry."

As he rides beside Mormont, Jon brings up the fact that Craster has no sons. "He gives his sons to the wood," he says. After a pause, Mormont says, "Yes." He admits that all the rangers know. "But the wildlings serve crueler gods than you or I. These boys are Craster's offerings. His prayers, if you will." Jon admits that one of Craster's wives told him because she was frightened and thought he could help.

"The wide world is full of people wanting help, Jon. Would that some could find the courage to help themselves. Craster sprawls in his loft even now, stinking of wine and lost to sense. On his board below lies a sharp new axe. Were it me, I'd name it 'Answered Prayer' and make an end."

On the other hand, the rangers had always depended on Craster's Keep for shelter when they needed it. But Jon should take it as a lesson, he says. "We cannot set the world to right. That is not our purpose. The Night's Watch has other wars to fight."

The reason the villages are empty, Craster told him, is that Mance Rayder is gathering his people in the Frostfangs, "a wilderness of stone and ice." And the only reason Mormont can see for that is that he's planning to invade south of the Wall. The Night's Watch, he says, is weaker than it has ever been, and Winterfell has been left vulnerable because of the war to the south. "The wildlings may never again have such a chance as this." They must find him and stop him.

"Three hundred, thought Jon, against the fury of the wild."

Theon

Theon is inspecting his new longboat, but he's also inspecting the beautiful woman who is there admiring it. She is a few years older than he is, he guesses, and he begins to flirt outrageously with her. "My cock's gone hard as a mast for you," he tells her, and she feels him through his breeches to confirm the fact. But she tells him that she's married and expecting a child. That's no impediment to Theon, and evidently not to her, for they continue to exchange bawdy witticisms. She is Esgred, she says, daughter of Ambrode and wife of Sigrin. He recognizes the names as those of shipbuilders. They talk about the ship, and she says, "She's a sea bitch, this one." So he tells her he'll name the ship Sea Bitch.

Even though she has claimed to be newly wed and carrying a child, she grows even bolder, at one point going so far as to undo the lacing of his fly. He asks her to come back to Pyke with him, and she agrees. "Esgred is yours, sweet prince. Take me to your castle." As they walk to the inn where he has left his horse, he notices the respectful bows of people as they pass. "They have finally learned who I am, he thought." She too, seems to be well known and respected, for she exchanges ribald comments with a seafarer about his pregnant wife. She also gives him advice about choosing a crew for his ship.

On the way, they pass the Myraham, and the captain's daughter whom he bedded on the voyage calls out to him plaintively, but he ignores her. At the inn, he calls for his squire, Wex, who is mute, which pleases Theon since the boy can't gossip about him. He orders Wex to saddle the horses, and they mount his stallion, which he has named Smiler: "I knew a man once who told me that I smiled at the wrong things." She rides in front of him, but she keeps removing his hand from her breast.

She asks if his father will welcome her, and he says, "He scarcely welcomed me, his own blood, the heir to Pyke and the Iron Islands." "Are you?" she asks, saying that she has heard he has uncles, brothers, and a sister.

"My brothers are long dead, and my sister ... well, they say Asha's favorite gown is a chainmail hauberk that hangs down past her knees, with boiled leather smallclothes beneath. Men's garb won't make her a man, though. I'll make a good marriage alliance with her once we've won the war, if I can find a man to take her. As I recall, she had a nose like a vulture's beak, a ripe crop of pimples, and no more chest than a boy."

As for his uncles, they're no threat. "Aeron is drunk on seawater and sanctity" and "Victarion is like some great grey bullock, strong and tireless and dutiful, but not like to win any races." And his uncle Euron, he says, may be dead.

When they reach the castle, the hounds come running out and greet her, not Theon. And when the stableman comes out he says, "Lady Asha. You're back." Theon is, of course, floored. "Why didn't you tell me?" he says. She replies, "I wanted to see who you were first. And I did."

Miserably embarrassed, he has to face her at dinner, where she throws back at him everything he said and did. She isn't married to Sigrin, and Esgred was the name of the first ship he built. As for being married and with child, she calls for someone to throw her an axe, which she uses to split the plate he is eating from in two. "'There's my lord husband.' His sister reached down inside her gown and drew a dirk from between her breasts. 'And here's my sweet suckling babe.'" The Great Hall echoes with laughter at his expense, and even his father smiles.

When the meal ends, Lord Balon summons them to discuss plans. When he ventures, "I have some suggestions --" his father cuts him off with "When I require your counsel I shall ask for it." He tells Theon that he is to take eight longships and "harry the Stony Shore, raiding the fishing villages and sinking any ships you chance to meet." He will be accompanied by Aeron and Dagmer Cleftjaw. Theon realizes that he is being assigned a lowly task and that his father doesn't trust him to do that without help. Asha is the one who is to command thirty longships and attack the castle at Deepwood Motte.

After they have done this, Balon says, the main thrust will be up to Victarion. The other attacks will have drawn a response from Winterfell. "Robb the boy will find himself caught like a rat in a bottle."