19. A Feast for Crows, by George R.R. Martin, pp. 529-560

Cersei

Sweet Cersei has returned from Dragonstone with the welcome news that Stannis's former citadel has fallen. This means that Cersei can devote the fleet's attention to the Shield Islands and the Mander, where the ironmen have been conducting raids. And word now has it that Euron's forces are preparing to attack Oldtown.

But the attack on Dragonstone has been costly: A thousand men have fallen, and Ser Loras is seriously wounded. Cersei hides her pleasure at this news and listens as Aurane Waters tells the full story. Then she goes to find Margaery and tells her that her brother is a hero, but first he was wounded in the thigh with an arrow and then some ribs were broken by a blow from a mace. But worst of all, "He was doused with boiling oil." The maesters believe he will not survive.

"Dying is not dead," Margaery replies, and won't listen to Cersei's assurances that the burns are too severe. Cersei retreats to her room, where she prides herself on doing something that her father would have approved of. She will raise a statue to Ser Loras, and everyone will be grateful. "As for his lady mother, if the gods are good this news will kill her." Taena arrives in the morning, after a sunrise that "was the prettiest that Cersei had seen in years," to tell her they had grieved all night but that Margaery still refuses to believe that Loras will die.

Ser Osmund comes a little later to tell her that four men have come to her with news about Tyrion, and one of them has brought a head. She sees the one with the head first, but it isn't Tyrion's, and she has the man hauled off for Qyburn to deal with. Another of the men claims that Tyrion is hiding in a brothel in Oldtown, "pleasuring men with his mouth." The second says he is in "a mummer's show in Braavos," and the third claims he's a hermit in the riverlands. Cersei suggests that each of them lead some of her knights to the dwarf and if it proves true they will be rewarded. "If not ... well, my knights have little patience for deception, nor fools who send them chasing after shadows. A man could lose his tongue." The men suddenly decide "that perhaps it might have been some other dwarf they saw."

She then goes to court, where she deals with various pleas, and meets a delegation from the Faith. She is displeased to see Lancel Lannister among the "pious fools," and that the High Septon has not attended in person. She is also annoyed that the Warrior's Sons have taken in on themselves to "battle wickedness" by preaching and praying against the local brothels.

"These sinners feed the royal coffers," the queen said bluntly, "and their pennies help pay the wages of my gold cloaks and build galleys to defend our shores. There is trade to be considered as well. If King's Landing had no brothels, the ships would go to Duskendale or Gulltown. His High Holiness promised me peace in my streets. Whoring helps to keep that peace. Common men deprived of whores are apt to turn to rape. Henceforth let His High Holiness do his praying in the sept where it belongs." 

Pycelle reports that Gyles Rosby is gravely ill, but Cersei scoffs at the report: "Lord Gyles has had that cough for years, and it never killed him before." She suggests that someone is trying to do him in, perhaps the Tyrells, perhaps Pycelle himself. She huffs, "You will return to Lord Gyles and inform him that he does not have my leave to die."

Finally all the tedious business is done, and she goes to have supper with Tommen, who is upset about Ser Loras's condition. He also says that Margaery says he should go to court and listen, which is the last straw for Cersei. Margaery talks too much, Cersei says. "For half a groat I'd gladly have her tongue torn out." To her surprise, Tommen grows angry and says, "Don't you touch her. I'm the king, not you." Furiously, she hauls Tommen by the ear to the door and tells Ser Boros Blount, who is standing guard, to take Tommen to his bedchamber and bring the whipping boy, Pate, to him. "This time I want Tommen to whip the boy himself. He is to continue until the boy is bleeding from both cheeks. If His Grace refuses, or says one word of protest, summon Qyburn and tell him to remove Pate's tongue, so His Grace can learn the cost of insolence."

When she goes to bed, she thinks about Lady Falyse, whom Qyburn has put in the black cells. She has received word of the death of Lady Tanda and of Lollys's ascension to Lady Stokeworth, with Bronn as her lord. And then she dreams of the visit she and Jeyne Farman and Melara Hetherspoon had made to the sorceress, Maggy the Frog. Jeyne had been so frightened she ran away, and Cersei reflects, "She was the wise one, though." Jeyne was still alive, married, and mother of a dozen children.

The old woman had tasted their blood and said they could each ask three questions. Cersei had asked when she would marry Prince Rhaegar, and Maggy had replied, "Never. You will wed the king." And that she would be queen "until there comes another, younger and more beautiful, to cast you down and take all that you hold dear." And when she asked if she and the king will have children, Maggy said, "Oh, aye. Six-and-ten for him, and three for you." Their crowns and their shrouds will be gold, "And when your tears have drowned you, the valonqar shall wrap his hands about your pale white neck and choke the life from you." Cersei didn't know what a valonqar is, and Maggy didn't tell her. But she had heard enough and told Melara to leave with her.

Melara hadn't had her three questions, however, and insisted on asking if she will marry Jaime. But Maggy said she won't marry anyone: "Your death is here tonight, little one." Cersei was eager to get away, so she picked up a potion from a table and threw it in the old woman's eyes. Maggy cursed her, but now in the dream Cersei hears again "The valonqar shall wrap his hands about your throat." And Tyrion's face leers down at her as his fingers dig into her throat. She wakes to find the coverlet wrapped around her neck, and sends her maid, Dorcas, to fetch Pycelle. She asks him for something to help her sleep without dreaming.

She breakfasts with Tommen, and feels better, then sends for Qyburn, whom she asks if Falyse is still alive. "Alive, yes. Perhaps not entirely ... comfortable." She asks if perhaps they should produce her, in an attempt to thwart Bronn, but Qyburn tells her, "I fear that Lady Falyse is no longer capable of ruling Stokeworth. Or, indeed, of feeding herself." He has learned quite a bit from her, however. So Cersei changes the subject. She asks him about her dream and about the sorceress: "The smallfolk used to call her Maggy." Qyburn asks, "Maegi?" and tells her that "Bloodmagic is the darkest kind of sorcery." Melara, whose death the maegi had foretold, "was one-and-ten, healthy as a little horse and safe within the Rock. Yet she soon fell down a well and drowned."

Qyburn asks if she is still grieving for her childhood friend, but Cersei can't even remember what she looked like. What she wants to know is if the prophecy the maegi made about her, about "another queen, who would take from me all I loved," can be prevented. Qyburn says that it can, and when she asks how, says, "I think Your Grace knows how."

And yes, she does. Several ways, in fact. She begins laying her plot by asking Ser Osmund Kettleblack if his brother Osney could defeat Ser Boros Blount in combat. He assures her that Osney could.

Brienne

They are traveling on, and they begin to find corpses hanging from the trees. Ser Hyle Hunt says what they are all thinking: "These are the men who raided Saltpans." But Brienne is more concerned about who had hanged them: "The noose was the preferred method of execution for Beric Dondarrion and his band of outlaws, it was said."

Finally they reach the inn that Septon Meribald knew was along the route, and they hear the sound of a forge. There are children in the inn yard, and Brienne introduces herself, Meribald, Podrick, and Ser Hyle. One of the children runs off to the forge and the hammering stops. A girl on the porch says her name is Willow and asks if they want beds. She tells them her sister Jeyne runs the inn, and they don't have many guests. "It's mostly sparrows on the roads these days, or worse." A boy's voice explains, "Thieves.... Robbers."

Brienne turns and sees the boy who had spoken, and gasps, "My lord?" For a moment she has taken the boy for Renly Baratheon. But he is, of course, Gendry, and she realizes that "Lord Renly's eyes had always been warm and welcoming, full of laughter, whereas this boy's eyes brimmed with anger and suspicion." When Septon Meribald asks if they have rooms for them, he says no, but Willow says yes. "They have food, Gendry. The little ones are hungry." The children, she explains, have just turned up there, sometimes having been brought by sparrows.

She and Podrick share a room. Septon Meribald will be going his own way from there on, Brienne plans to rise early and leave before Ser Hyle awakes. But when Podrick asks where they are going, she doesn't have an answer: East would take them to the Vale of Arryn, west to Riverrun, and north to Winterfell. Or, she thinks, she could just give up the quest, go south to King's Landing, confess her failure to Jaime, and take a ship home to Tarth.

The inn is full of children, and while they are waiting for dinner, Ser Hyle sits down by the fire with Brienne and proposes that they get married. She tells him to get lost. When dinner is served, Septon Meribald says grace, but notices that Gendry doesn't join in the prayer. When Meribald asks if Gendry doesn't love the gods, he says, "Not your gods," and leaves without eating. One little boy says that Gendry's god is the Lord of Light, and Willow hits him with her spoon to shut him up.

Brienne wraps some food in a cloth and takes it out to the forge for Gendry, telling Podrick to stay behind. She watches Gendry at the forge and thinks, "He has Renly's eyes and Renly's hair, but not his build. Lord Renly was more lithe than brawny ... not like his brother Robert, whose strength was fabled." He is sullen when she speaks to him, but she persists. She knows from his speech that he was born in King's Landing, and she says, "You have black hair and blue eyes, and you were born in the shadow of the Red Keep. Has no one ever remarked upon your face? ... In King's Landing you must have seen King Robert."

But before she can pursue her questioning, riders arrive. She counts seven of them, and tells Gendry, "you'll want a sword, and armor. These are not your friends. They're no one's friends." Then they see that the lead rider is wearing a helmet with "an iron snout and rows of steel teeth, snarling." Gendry says, "Him." But she says it isn't the Hound, just his helmet. Willow comes to the porch with a crossbow, but the lead rider threatens her obscenely. So Brienne steps forward with Oathkeeper drawn.

She has recognized her old tormentor, Rorge, and provokes him deliberately: "Shagwell said they cut your manhood off when they took your nose." He charges with his battleaxe, but she is the better fighter, and she cuts him down. "'Sapphires, she whispered at him, as she gave her blade a hard twist that made him shudder." But when she steps back to let him fall, she is attacked by Biter and loses her grip on Oathkeeper. He is on top of her, and she gropes for her dagger. He repeated slams her head into the ground, but she is able to slit his belly. Still, he gets the dagger out of her grip and breaks her forearm as he tries to wrench her head off.

Then he bites her cheek and tears off a mouthful of flesh. "He is eating me, she realized, but she had no strength left to fight him any longer. He opens his mouth again, and then his tongue sticks out at her, dripping blood. "His tongue is a foot long, Brienne thought, just before the darkness took her. Why, it looks almost like a sword."

12. A Storm of Swords, by George R.R. Martin, pp. 413-440

Jaime

His sword hand has been cut off and the stump seared with a torch. In excruciating pain and suffering from a fever caused by the infected wound, he hears the Mummers laughing and tries to restrain his tears. "Now I know how Tyrion has felt, all those times they laughed at him," Jaime thinks.

He and Brienne are riding together on a horse, bound face-to-face, with the severed hand hanging from a cord around his neck between them. To add to his humiliation when he asks for something to drink, he swallows it down and then is told that it's horse piss. He drinks it anyway, but throws it up. They make Brienne clean up his vomit "just as they made her clean him up when he soiled himself in the saddle."

Once he manages to pull the sword from the Dornishman's scabbard, but he is unable to use it with his left hand. Vargo Hoat promises that if he tries something like that again he will cut off Jaime's other hand, or perhaps a foot.

At night, when he is lying next to Brienne, he lets her know that he wants to die, and she asks, "Are you so craven?" He is shocked to realize that it was something no one had ever called him. "'Live,' she said, 'live, and fight, and take revenge,'" but Rorge hears her and comes over to give her a kick. But Jaime lies there and thinks about the word "craven":  "Can it be? They took my sword hand. Was that all i was, a sword hand? Gods be good, is it true?" So the next morning he begins to eat again, and to tell himself to "live for Cersei, live for Tyrion. Live for vengeance. A Lannister always pays his debts." And he wants to live to get even with Vargo Hoat. He envies Brienne, who "has built a fortress inside herself. They will rape her soon enough, but behind her walls they cannot touch her." His wall fell when they took his sword hand, he thinks.

He overhears that their destination is Harrenhal, and he laughs at the irony: The castle was where he was named to the Kingsguard. He gets a lash across the face from a whip for laughing, and is kicked and punched when he continues to laugh. Only when the kick is aimed at his stump does the pain stop him from laughing: He faints.

The next night, three of the Mummers, including Rorge, begin to discuss who will rape Brienne first. As they argue, Jaime whispers to her to "go away inside" while they're doing it.

That was what he he'd done, when the Starks had died before him, Lord Rickard cooking in his armor while his son Brandon strangled himself trying to save him. "Think of Renly, if you loved him. Think of Tarth, mountains and seas, pools, waterfalls, whatever you have on your Sapphire Isle, think...."

But Rorge interrupts him to say that if she fights while he's raping her he'll cut off her nose, or gouge out one of her eyes and make her eat it, or pull her teeth out.

Jaime shouts out, "SAPPHIRES," as a reminder of the supposed ransom that her father will pay for Brienne, and passes out when Rorge kicks him in the stump. But when he comes to, Vargo Hoat is telling the others not to rape her because of the sapphires. Two nights later, Brienne asks him in a whisper why he yelled the word out so loud, and he tries to make a joke, saying, "You're hard enough to look at with a nose. Besides, I wanted to make the goat say 'thapphireth." She thanks him anyway, and he says, "A Lannister pays his debts. That was for the river, and those rocks you dropped on Robin Ryger."

As they near Harrenhal, Hoat has them dismount and approach the castle on foot. Jaime is filled with rage and pain. Brienne observes that the banners flying on the castle are the Bolton flayed man, the Frey twin towers, and the Stark direwolf. When they enter, Hoat announces to the people assembled there, "I give you the Kingthlayer," and a spear jabbed in Jaime's back sends him headlong. Instinctively, he breaks his fall by putting out his hands, sending another shock of pain from the stump through his body. He manages to maintain consciousness, however, and when he sees several of Lord Walder Frey's sons there, he offers his condolences on the death of Ser Cleos.

Brienne steps forth and tells them that she is "sworn to House Stark even as you are." But Ser Aenys Stark spits at her feet and tells her, "That's for your oaths. We trusted the word of Robb Stark, and he repaid our faith with betrayal." Jaime's curiosity is piqued by this news, but Brienne persists, telling them that she vowed to Catelyn that she would deliver Jaime to King's Landing in exchange for her daughters. The Freys begin to argue among themselves about what should be done with Jaime, and Hoat interjects that Jaime is his.

Then Roose Bolton speaks up, quietly, so the others stop arguing to hear him. Jaime, however, can't resist taunting the Lord of the Dreadfort with having lost a battle to his father. Bolton observes that Jaime has "lost a hand," but Jaime says it isn't lost: "I have it here, hanging around my neck." In disgust, Bolton breaks the cord holding the hand and flings it at Hoat, who says he'll send it to Jaime's father. If he doesn't pay the ransom for Jaime, Hoat says, he'll send the rest of Jaime to him piece by piece. And if he sends the ransom, he'll turn Jaime over to Lord Karstark anyway and take Karstark's daughter in marriage as a reward.

Bolton then delivers the latest news: Karstark is dead, beheaded by Robb. And Tywin is at King's Landing until the new year, when Joffrey will marry "a daughter of Highgarden." Brienne corrects him: "You mean Winterfell. King Joffrey is betrothed to Sansa Stark." But Bolton informs her that the Lannisters and the Tyrells are uniting because of the Battle of Blackwater: "The rose and the lion joined there, to shatter Stannis Baratheon's host and burn his fleet to ashes."

Jaime asks about his sister, and Bolton says, "She is well. As is your ... nephew," the pause signifying that he knows about Joffrey's paternity. And Tyrion is recovering from the wound he took in the battle. He orders Jaime taken to Qyburn, the acting maester, and Brienne released from her bonds. When she says that Hoat's men tried to rape her, Bolton says, "I am displeased. By that, and this of Ser Jaime's hand." He has Brienne shown to "suitable rooms."

Qyburn is shocked by Jaime's wound, and says the best thing to do would be to amputate the arm, at least at the elbow, but Jaime is insistent: "Take any part of my arm, and you'd best chop off the other one as well, or I'll strangle you with it afterward." Qyburn agrees to try to cut only the gangrenous flesh and to treat the wound, but warns Jaime that may not succeed. Jaime refuses anything that will put him to sleep, for fear that Qyburn will amputate anyway. During the operation Jaime faints from the pain anyway. When he wakes, Qyburn is sewing up the wrist.

"No man who serves with Vargo Hoat is a stranger to stumps," Qyburn comments. "He makes them wherever he goes." Jaime asks why a maester is with the Brave Companions. Qyburn replies that his chain was taken away by the Citadel, and says he should do something about the cut over Jaime's eye. As he works, he tells Jaime about the battle, which as keeper of the ravens Qyburn was well informed on.

Tyrion

Tyrion and Bronn are outside the walls, where people are returning to their old ways in the area that he had burned out before the battle. Tyrion is forced to take charge of the rebuilding, which would have been his Uncle Kevan's task, but the murder of his son Willem and the fact that his son Martyn is a hostage and his son Lancel is still suffering from a wound that will not heal has taken a toll.

As they pass the three trebuchets still standing in the market square, Tyrion notices children climbing on them and worries that one of them is going to fall off and break his neck. But then manure is thrown at him and his horse rears, so Tyrion changes his mind about protecting them. He also knows that his failure to consummate his marriage has drawn ridicule at the court. Sansa is miserable and shows it. "This was the wife they had given him, for all the rest of his life, and she hated him."

He had wanted to break the news of his impending marriage to Shae, but she had already heard it. It made no difference to her, however. "Some part of him had hoped for less indifference. Had hoped, he jeered bitterly, but now you know better, dwarf. Shae is all the love you're ever like to have."

Today he has another matter to deal with, and Bronn accompanies him as he goes into one of the poorer parts of the city. Leaving Bronn on guard, he goes into a dismal little bar where the woman in the front room directs him to the back. There he meets the singer Symon Silver Tongue, who says, "My sweet lady Shae tells me you are newly wed. Would that you had sent for me earlier. I would have been honored to sing at your feast." Tyrion rebuffs the courtesy and tells him never to speak of Shae again.

He tells Symon that he hears he is "a very gifted singer," and suggests that "it is time you brought your music to the Free Cities. They are great lovers of song in Braavos and Pentos and Lys, and generous with those who please them." He tells him that he will be glad to pay his passage. Symon cheekily responds by giving him a sample of his songs, one that refers to Tyrion's clandestine dalliance with Shae. When Tyrion tells him not to sing it again, Symon suggests that others, such as Cersei or his father, might like it better. Tyrion replies, "A wise man could earn more from silence than from song."

But Symon is not deterred, and suggests that he be invited to join the tournament of singers at Joffrey's wedding feast. Tyrion points out that seven singers have already been invited, and that everything at the feast is in multiples of seven: "seven vows, seven challenges, seventy-seven dishes ... but eight singers?" Symon suggests that something might happen to one of the seven already invited, making a place available for him. So Tyrion says, "I will inquire after the health of Cersei's seven. If any of them should be indisposed, my man Bronn will find you."

Symon still taunts him with the prospect that he might sing his song about Tyrion and Shae if the invitation doesn't come through, but Tyrion replies, "You have my word as a Lannister," and leaves. Outside, he tells Bronn,

"Give him three days, then inform him that Hamish the Harper has broken his arm. Tell him that his clothes will never serve for court, so he must be fitted for new garb at once. He'll come with you quick enough." He grimaced. "You may want his tongue, I understand it's made of silver. The rest of him should never be found."

Bronn says he knows of a pot shop that makes a stew from all kinds of meat. Tyrion replies, "Make certain I never eat there."

When he returns to the castle he is summoned to his father, whom he finds talking with an armorer about the sword being made as a wedding gift for Joffrey. It is made of Valyrian steel, and Tywin has always wanted a Valyrian blade to belong to House Lannister. "Thrice at least Lord Tywin had offered to buy Valyrian longswords from impoverished lesser houses, but his advances had always been firmly rebuffed." Tyrion comments on the color of the blade. Tywin had wanted crimson, but the armorer says that despite his efforts the blade continued to turn a darker shade. Tyrion says he likes these colors. "They have an ominous beauty ... and they make this blade unique. There is no other sword like it in all the world, I should think." But there is, the armorer says, and unfolds the cloth covering a second blade, which is similar.

Tyrion wields it, and pronounces it "Magnificent." Tywin says, "It is meant for my son." Tyrion thinks, "No need to ask which son," and lays it next to Joffrey's. The armorer, who is Gendry's former master, Tobho Mott, promises to have both swords ready the day before the wedding. When he leaves, Tyrion says, "So ... a sword for Joff, a sword for Jaime, and not even a dagger for the dwarf. Is that the way of it, Father?" Tywin says if he needs a dagger to get one from the armory and asks for his report on the riverfront.

Tyrion details what needs to be done, and comments on the enormous expense, especially considering the extravagance of the wedding. Tywin dismisses his concerns: "I will have the wedding and the waterfront. If you cannot pay for them, say so, and I shall find a master of coin who can." Tyrion doesn't want to be disgraced by losing a post he has held so briefly, so he agrees to find the money.

Then Tywin turns to the topic of the unconsummated marriage of Tyrion and Sansa. "You seem to have no difficulty bedding whores. Is the Stark girl made differently?" When Tyrion protests that she is so young, Tywin points out that she's old enough to inherit Winterfell. "Claim her maidenhood and you will be one step closer to claiming the north. Get her with child, and the prize is all but won." Otherwise, he points out, the marriage can be annulled.

Tyrion changes the subject by asking about Cersei's marriage to Willas, and Tywin tells him that Mace Tyrell has refused the offer. Tyrion is pleased by anything that embarrasses Cersei, and especially so when Tywin tells him that the refusal seems to have been the work of the Queen of Thorns: "Varys claims she told [Mace Tyrell] that your sister was too old and too used for this precious one-legged grandson of hers." When Tyrion laughs, his father says that Cersei must never know about this, and that the official position is, "The offer was never made."

Tywin has some thoughts about other marriages that might be arranged for Cersei, but before he can voice them they are interrupted by Grand Maester Pycelle, who reports that another raven has arrived from Castle Black. The news is that vast numbers of wildlings are moving south, and that the acting commander of Castle Black, Bowen Marsh, fears that Jeor Mormont and his men have been wiped out. He has sent a plea for more men "to all five kings." Tywin bristles at the idea that there might be more than "one king in Westeros."

Tywin has nothing but scorn for the Night's Watch -- "a pack of thieves, killers, and baseborn churls" -- but if Mormont is dead, they need a new Lord Commander. Pycelle has the very man for the job: Janos Slynt. He also knows that Tyrion hates Slynt, whom he sent to the Wall to get rid of. But when Tyrion says that the Night's Watch chooses their own commander, Tywin says that if they don't choose whom he wants, they will never get the reinforcements they need. Tyrion tries to argue his father out of bullying them into choosing Slynt, but loses.

8. A Storm of Swords, by George R.R. Martin, pp. 273-310

Catelyn

Two boys, Tion Frey and Willem Lannister, squires captured and held as hostage, have been murdered by a group led by Lord Rickard Karstark, seeking retribution for the death of his own sons. The bodies of the murdered boys make Catelyn think of Bran and Rickon, and she wonders if Robb does too. Karstark, brought in as prisoner by Greatjon Umber, is defiant, and blames the deaths on the boys on Catelyn, for releasing Jaime Lannister.

Robb, who is furious, orders Karstark's men hanged, but says he will deal with Karstark himself. But before he can do so, Brendyn Tully arrives, and Robb goes to speak with him privately, bringing his mother with him. The Blackfish reports that all of Karstark's men have left. "Near three hundred riders and twice as many mounts," Robb comments, "melted away in the night." Catelyn silently blames herself for the situation, which leaves Robb "surrounded by enemies to every side but east, where Lysa sat aloof on her mountaintop." Moreover, Willem Lannister was Ser Kevan's son, which could be taken as a pretext to do harm to Sansa, as Catelyn knows to her agony.

Edmure suggests that Lord Karstark not be executed but be kept prisoner, a hostage that will ensure the loyalty of his son. But Robb is not willing to do this. He asks Catelyn if her sister is going to answer her calls for help, and she admits that she has no doubt that her messages have reached Lysa and been ignored: "Lysa was never brave." The Blackfish agrees: No help should be expected from that quarter. Robb now knows how uneasy lies the head that wears the crown:

"Gods be good, why would any man ever want to be king? When everyone was shouting King in the North, King in the North, I told myself ... swore to myself ... that I would be a good king, as honorable as Father, strong, just, loyal to my friends and brave when I faced my enemies ... now I can't even tell one from the other. How did it all get so confused? Lord Rickard's fought at my side in half a dozen battles. His sons died for me in the Whispering Wood. Tion Frey and Willem Lannister were my enemies. Yet now I have to kill my dead friends' father for their sakes." 

He puts on his crown and says, "Lord Rickard dies." Edmure protests, but Robb says he has no choice. "Rickard Karstark killed more than a Frey and a Lannister. He killed my honor. I shall deal with him at dawn."

The executioner is waiting at dawn, but Robb takes the axe from him. "He dies at my word. He must die by my hand." Lord Rickard reminds Robb of their kinship. "The Karstarks traced their descent to Karlon Stark, a younger son of Winterfell who had put down a rebel lord a thousand years ago, and been granted lands for his valor. The castle he built had been named Karl's Hold, but that soon became Karhold, and over the centuries the Karhold Starks had become Karstarks." But Rickard's last words are, "Kill me, and be cursed. You are no king of mine." The blow Robb delivers kills him, but it takes three blows to sever the head.

Later, Jeyne comes to see Catelyn, wondering what she can do to console Robb, but all she can do is counsel patience. She also takes the opportunity to remind her daughter-in-law that she needs to produce an heir. Jeyne tells her that her mother "makes a posset for me, herbs and milk and ale, to help make me fertile. I drink it every morning." When she leaves, Catelyn remarks once again that she has good hips for child-bearing.

Jaime

They are riding through a desolate landscape, with destruction on all sides. Jaime's mind is on Cersei, and he thinks that maybe the stories about them have opened a new possibility: "there was nothing left to hid. Why shouldn't I marry Cersei openly and share her bed every night? The dragons always married their sisters. Septons, lords, and smallfolk had turned a blind eye to the Targaryens for hundreds of years, let them do the same for House Lannister." They could even marry Joffrey to Myrcella and send Sansa home. He had already decided that they should send Sansa back to her family: "the notion of keeping faith when they all expected betrayal amused him more than he could say."

Suddenly they are under attack. An arrow hits Jaime's gelding and he has to cling to its neck to keep from being thrown. Ser Cleos is less skillful; he is thrown from his horse but his foot is caught in the stirrup and he is dragged along the ground. Brienne is still mounted on her horse, but she has an arrow lodged in her back and another in her leg. Jaime calls out to her that the archers are behind a wall, and he charges them, hoping that Brienne will follow. She does, and the archers flee.

They go in search of Cleos and find him dead, his foot still caught in the stirrup and his head bashed in from being dragged across the rocky ground. Jaime lays claim to his horse and his clothes, shocking Brienne with his callous attitude toward his own cousin. He pulls Cleos's sword from its scabbard and pivots to find Brienne ready to parry his blow. Even though his hands are still chained, he is able to meet her blows, and they fight for some time until he realizes that he is tiring. "She is stronger than I am."

Finally, as they are fighting in a stream, he slips but manages to cut her thigh before he strikes a rock with his knee. Finally she gets the better of him and cries, "Yield, or I'll drown you!" Suddenly laughter rings out around them. There are armed men on both sides of the brook. "The scum of the earth surrounded them: swarthy Dornishmen and blond Lyseni, Dothraki with bells in their braids, hairy Ibbenese, coal-black Summer Islanders in feathered cloaks. He knew them. The Brave Companions."

Immediately there is talk from Rorge of raping Brienne, and Jaime feels compelled to defend her against that. He asks who is in charge, and a cadaverous man identifies himself as Urswyck the Faithful. He also addresses Jaime by name: "It takes more than a beard and a shaved head to deceive the Brave Companions," he says. Jaime knows them as the Bloody Mummers, and he asks, "Where's the goat?" Urswyck says that he'd better not call Lord Vargo Hoat that to his name, and Jaime is surprised to hear that Harrenhal has supposedly been promised to Lord Vargo: "Has my father taken leave of his senses?" he wonders.

Then Urswyck informs him that they no longer serve the Lannisters. "We now serve Lord Bolton, and the King in the North." When Jaime expresses his contempt for that, two of the Mummers grab him and Rorge punches him in the stomach with a mailed fist. Brienne calls out that he's under her protection, and dives into the brook to retrieve her sword. It takes four of the men to restrain her and to beat her into submission.

They are dragged back to the plow horse and bound back to back on it. Jaime calls Urswyck over and tries to bargain with him: Take him to King's Landing and collect a ransom. "Hers as well, if you like. Tarth is called the Sapphire Isle, a maiden told me once." (He knows that it's really called that because of the blueness of its lake.) But Urswyck isn't fooled by the offer of ransom, or even of a knighthood, when Jaime brings it up. "I have heard enough, Kingslayer. I would have to be a great fool indeed to believe the promises of an oath-breaker like you."

As they ride toward Harrenhal, Brienne asks him why he lied about the Sapphire Isle, and Jaime says, "The sooner they know how little you're worth in ransom, the sooner the rapes begin." She is silent for a while after that. Late in the day they find Vargo Hoat and more of the Brave Companions sacking a sept and using the corpse of the septon for target practice. "Kingthlayer," Hoat greets Jaime, "You are my captifth." Brienne introduces herself, and Rorge drags her off the horse and begins kicking her. Urswyck tells him not to break any bones: "The horse-faced bitch is worth her weight in sapphires."

Jaime again tries to bargain with Hoat, promising ransom money. Hoat says, "But firth I mutht thend him a methage." Jaime is knocked to the ground and his arms are pulled out in front of him by the chain. A fat Dothraki raises "a huge curved arakh, the wickedly sharp scythe-sword the horselords loved." Jaime refuses to show fear. But when the blade comes "shivering down, almost too fast to see," he screams.

Arya

They are searching for Beric Dondarrion, but so far have only been told to ask the Lady of the Leaves. They reach a forest and in the middle of it a member of the group who is called Jack-Be-Lucky blows a signal on his horn. Rope ladders unfurl from the trees, and Arya climbs with the others into a hidden village in the treetops, presided over by "a stick-thin white-haired woman," the Lady of the Leaves. She tells them that Lord Beric is dead: He was caught by the Mountain, Gregor Clegane, who "drove a dagger through his eye." But Lem tells her it's an old story, and that the lightning lord didn't die of having an eye put out. The woman is pleased to hear that Dondarrion isn't dead, but otherwise has no clue to his whereabouts.

The next village they come to has been destroyed, but in the ruins of its sept an old septon remains. He tells them the village was burned by "Northmen ... Savages who worship trees." Arya is both "angry and ashamed" at the characterization. There are a dozen men living in the vault under the sept, but they have no news of Dondarrion either, even though one of them has a lightning bolt on his cloak.

When they rest for the night, Anguy lets Arya try his bow, but she's unable to draw it. He promises to make her a lighter one when they reach Riverrun. But Tom Sevenstrings says they'll only stay at Riverrun long enough to collect ransom for Arya's return. Lord Hoster hangs outlaws and his son hates music. Lem says it's Tom that the son, presumably Edmure, hates, and Tom retorts, "Well, he has no cause. The wench was willing to make a man of him, is it my fault he drank too much to do the deed?" So presumably Edmure has several weaknesses. And this particular one became the basis for a song Tom wrote.

Arya is more interested in the idea that she will be ransomed, and Harwin says, "You will not be the first highborn captive we've ransomed. Nor the last, I'd hope." Arya then worries what will happen if if Robb doesn't pay the price they want for her. The next day they reach a hill called High Heart, which is encircled by the "huge pale stumps" of what was once a circle of weirwoods, and had been a sacred place for the children of the forest. "No harm can ever come to those as sleep here," Tom tells her.

That night, a storm comes up and blows the coverlet off of Arya. She runs after it, and then hears voices around the fading coals of the campfire. Tom, Lem, and Greenbeard are talking to a tiny, wrinkled old woman.

"The old gods stir and will not let me sleep," she heard the woman say. "I dreamt I saw a shadow with a burning heart butchering a golden stag, aye. I dreamt of a man without a face, waiting on a bridge that swayed and swung. On his shoulder perched a drowned crow with seaweed hanging from his wings. I dreamt of a roaring river and a woman that was a fish. Dead she drifted, with red tears on her cheeks, but when her eyes did open, oh, I woke from terror. All this I dreamt, and more. Do you have gifts for me, to pay me for my dreams?"

The symbols in her dreams are more suggestive for the reader than they are for Lem, who scoffs at them, but Tom Sevenstrings agrees to sing a song for her. Arya doesn't recognize it, but thinks that Sansa would. Singing is not one of Arya's skills. The next morning she asks Tom if the children of the forest still live on High Heart, and he knows that she saw the old woman. He tells her "she's only an old dwarf woman," but that "she knows things she has no business knowing, and sometimes she'll tell you if she likes the look of you." He also says that they now have a lead on Dondarrion.

Arya asks why, if he's their leader, he's so hard to find. Harwin says that he doesn't tell people his plans so no one can betray him. He doesn't want people following him around, either, because that way he keeps his followers scattered so they "can strike in a dozen places at once, and be off somewhere else before they know." If someone captures them, they can't torture them and find out where Lord Beric is. Arya is reminded of the way the Tickler had tortured the people around the Gods Eye to try to find him.

That day they ride to Acorn Hall, where Lady Smallwood welcomes them, but also scolds them for "dragging a young girl through the war," and is even more scandalized when she finds out that Arya is highborn. She has Arya scrubbed and scented and dressed "in girl's things," none of which Arya takes well to. When Lady Smallwood talks about her own daughter and her love of dancing, she asks Arya what she likes to do. Arya finally comes up with "Needlework," and when Lady Smallwood says that it's "restful," Arya says, "not the way I do it." And when she's asked if she works at it every day, Arya says, "I did till I lost Needle. My new one's not as good." When Arya goes down to supper in her feminine finery, "Gendry took one look and laughed so hard that wine came out his nose, until Harwin gave him a thwack alongside his ear."

Lady Smallwood tells them that the lightning lord passed by a fortnight ago, and that they were driving sheep. "Thoros gave me three as thanks. You've eaten one tonight." She says that she's heard of famine near Stoney Sept and the Threepenny Wood, and that she would look for Lord Beric there. She also says that some of Robb's followers came by looking for Jaime. Arya asks who they were, which surprises Lady Smallwood, but she describes the sigil, which Arya identifies as the Karstarks.  She thinks that if she could find them and slip away from the outlaws, they might take her to Riverrun.

Lem asks how Jaime escaped, and Lady Smallwood says, "They claimed that Lady Catelyn set him free." Tom says, "That's madness," and Arya refuses to believe it, though she holds her tongue. Harwin, however, says to Arya that she shouldn't be hearing such talk, and the others agree. Greenbeard tells her, "Be a good little lady and go play in the yard while we talk, now." Arya leaves, angrily, but Gendry follows her and they go to the smithy. He asks if the Thoros being talked about is the same one who was at King's Landing, "A red priest, fat, with a shaved head?" When Arya tells him she thinks so, he remembers that Thoros used to come to the forge where he apprenticed. His master disapproved of Thoros's flaming swords because they ruined the steel, but Thoros only used cheap swords that he dipped in wildfire.

Gendry compliments her on looking like "A proper little girl," and says, "You even smell nice for a change." She tells him he stinks, and they begin to wrestle until they are dirty and her dress is torn. When they return to the hall, Harwin bursts out laughing and says, "She was much the same at Winterfell." Lady Smallwood makes her take another bath and dresses her in something even more feminine. But it's too delicate to ride in, so when they set out the next day Lady Smallwood gives her some riding clothes that her son wore before he died at the age of seven.

Arya apologizes for tearing the acorn dress and says it was pretty. Lady Smallwood replies, "Yes, child. And so are you. Be brave."

13. A Clash of Kings, by George R.R. Martin, pp. 498-532

Bran

Bran/Summer (in his dream they are one) hears a faint sound of steel scraping on stone, and he howls. Shaggydog joins him, his fur bristling at the hint of danger. He throws himself against the chained gate that keeps him in the godswood, but to no avail. He hears a shout in the night, and looks for a way over the wall. There is a tall tree, and the boy part of him remembers how to climb it, but the wolf part is unable. Then he hears the dogs in the kennels begin to bark: "They smelled it too; the scent of foes and fear." He hurls himself up the tree and gets a foothold so he can climb, but "suddenly he was sliding, stumbling. He yowled in fear and fury, falling, falling, and twisted around while the ground rushed up to break him...."

The falling wakes Bran, who realizes what is happening: "The sea has come. It's flowing over the walls, just as Jojen saw." He calls for help, but no one comes because Ser Rodrik has taken the guard off his door, needing every able-bodied man he could find to go to the defense of Torrhen's Square, which "was under attack by some monstrous war chief named Dagmer Cleftjaw." Bran calls for Hodor, but suddenly the door crashes open and a strange man carrying a dirk and with an axe strapped to his back enters, followed by Theon Greyjoy.

The sight of Theon is a welcome one, until Theon tells him, "I've taken your castle, my prince." Bran is confused: "But you're Father's ward." Theon replies that Bran and Rickon are his wards now, and that his men are gathering all the residents of the castle into the Great Hall. "You and I are going to speak to them. You'll tell them how you've yielded Winterfell to me, and command them to serve and obey their new lord as they did the old."

Bran refuses, but Theon insists that he will. He leaves, saying that he will send someone to dress Bran and bring him to the Great Hall. Bran waits, expecting to see Hodor or one of the servants, but it is Maester Luwin who comes to him. He explained that Theon's men swam the moat and climbed the walls. They killed Alebelly at the gate. Luwin sent off two ravens, but one was shot down.

Luwin helps Bran dress and tells him there is no shame in yielding the castle. One of Theon's men comes to carry Bran, and Luwin gathers Rickon on the way. They meet Meera and Jojen and the Freys as well. When they reach the Great Hall, Rickon says, "Theon's sitting in Robb's chair," and Bran tells him to hush.

Maester Luwin explains to Theon that the Freys are Catelyn's wards, and that Jojen and Meera had come to Winterfell to renew the oath of fealty the Reeds had sworn.  The last of the staff are driven into the hall, followed by the prisoner called Reek, who explains to Theon why he is there, and says that his real name is Heke.

Bran notices that there are only twenty of Theon's men there, and assumes that if he left guards on the gates and the armory there were only thirty of them in all. He tells the group that he has yielded Winterfell to Theon and that they should do what he asks. But the smith, Mikken, shouts out, "Damned if I will!" One of Theon's men silences him with a blow from the butt of his spear. When Theon speaks again, however, Mikken shouts something, then is silenced forever when he is stabbed through the throat. Hodor begins to shout "Hodor hodor hodor hodor," and is beaten by two of the men when Theon orders them to "shut that halfwit up." Theon continues to address the crowd.

"Torrhen's Square and Deepwood Motte will soon be ours as well, and my uncle is sailing up the Saltspear to seize Moat Cailin. If Robb Stark can stave off the Lannisters, he may reign as King of the Trident hereafter, but House Greyjoy holds the north now."

Reek speaks up and volunteers his services in support of Theon (and promises to "wash some" if needed), so Theon has one of his men give Reek a spear and has him swear "obedience to House Greyjoy and King Balon." Then Osha surprises Bran by stepping forward and saying she will fight for Theon too if he'll give her a spear. The man who killed Mikken grabs his crotch and says, "I've got a spear for you right here." But when Osha knees him in the groin and grabs the spear away from him, then knocks the man down with it, Theon tells her to keep the spear and swear her loyalty.

Hodor, bleeding and weeping, carries Bran back to his room.

Arya

Arya is in the kitchens, trying to persuade Hot Pie to give her a tart, when she hears the sound of a warhorn and the portcullis being raised. She swipes a tart and runs off to see what is happening. The mercenaries known as the Bloody Mummers are entering with cartloads of looted goods and a train of prisoners. There are at least a hundred of them, and she recognizes from their sigils that they're all men allied to Robb. Ser Amory Lorch appears and asks the leader of the Mummers, Vargo Hoat, what's going on. Hoat explains that his group attacked the forces commanded by Roose Bolton, and captured their commander, Robett Glover and Ser Aenys Frey. Lorch orders them sent to the dungeons.

Arya slips away from the crowd and finds Gendry in the armory. She tells him about the captives, and asks him to help her free them. The castle is poorly defended now, and there are almost as many men among the captives as there are among Ser Amory's men. "We just have to get them out and we can take over the castle and escape." Gendry is uninterested: He's a smith, he says, and it doesn't matter who he works for. "A sword's a sword, a helm's a helm, and if you reach in the fire you get burned, no matter who you're serving. Lucan's a fair enough master. I'll stay here." Arya reminds him that the queen is after him, and there must be some reason why she wants him, but he is unmoved.

Then she thinks about finding Jaqen, who still owes her a death. She remembers Old Nan's stories about people who had been granted wishes, and how "you had to be especially careful with the third wish, because it was the last. Chiswyck and Weese hadn't been very important. The last death has to count." She goes to the godswood and finds the sword she had made herself out of a broomstick and practices the moves Syrio Forel taught her. She climbs a tree and dances out onto the limbs to practice keeping her balance.

When she tires, she climbs down and tries to pray to the old gods, but thoughts of how they have never made her prayers come true anger her. Her father prayed to them often, she recalls. "I don't care if you help me or not. I don't think you could even if you wanted to." A voice behind her says, "Gods are not mocked, girl." It is Jaqen. She begins to ask him questions: How did he know she was there? How did he make Weese's dog kill him? Are Rorge and Biter human or demons? "Is Jaqen H'ghar your true name."

"Some men have many names. Weasel. Arry. Arya," and adds, "My lady of Stark." She is surprised that he has uncovered her identity, but asks him to kill the guards and help the men in the dungeons escape. He reminds her that he owes her only one more death. Killing one guard won't be enough, she says, but he persists: "Three lives were snatched from a god. Three lives must be repaid. The gods are not mocked." She thinks for a moment and asks if he will kill anyone she asks for, and when he says yes, she makes him swear. He replies, placing his hand in the mouth of the face in the weirwood, "By all the gods of sea and air, and even him by fire.... By the seven new gods and the old gods beyond count, I swear it."

They kneel face to face and she whispers in his ear: "It's Jaqen H'ghar."

He is surprised and upset, but suddenly there is a knife in his hand. "A girl will weep," he says. "A girl will lose her only friend." She replies that he's not her friend. "A friend would help me.... I'd never kill a friend." He asks, "A girl might ... name another name then, if a friend did help?" And when she says she might if he helps, he puts the knife away and says, "Come." She is startled that he wants to act so soon, and he replies, "A man hears the whisper of sand in a glass. A man will not sleep until a girl unsays a certain name. Now, evil child."

They leave the godswood and hear a noise of celebration in the castle. Jaqen asks her again to say another name "and cast this mad dream aside," but she refuses, so he orders her to obey his instructions. She is to go to the kitchens and ask Hot Pie to make broth for a hundred men. "A girl will help make broth, and wait in the kitchens until a man comes for her. Go. Run." She does what he tells her, and when the kettles are hot, Jaqen arrives with Rorge and Biter. Jaqen and Arya carry one of the kettles between them, Rorge takes one, and Biter carries two.

They take them to the Widow's Tower, where the men are imprisoned, and the guards let them pass. They descend into the dungeons where there are eight men guarding the prisoners. They gather around the table, and first Rorge and then Jaqen and Biter heave the scalding broth in the guards' faces.

Arya pressed back against the wall as Rorge began to cut throats. Biter preferred to grab the men behind the head and under the chin and crack their necks with a single twist of his huge pale hands. Only one of the guards managed to get a blade out. Jaqen danced away from his slash, drew his own sword, drove the man back into a corner with a flurry of blows, and killed him with a thrust to the heart. The Lorathi brought the blade to Arya with heart's blood and wiped it clean on the front of her shift. "A girl should be bloody too. This is her work." 

The prisoners are freed quickly, and Arya notices that that the wounded ones don't seem as badly wounded as they had when they arrived. And Robett Glover asks if the broth was Hoat's idea. He also asks if they are members of the Brave Companions (i.e., the Bloody Mummers). Jaqen introduces himself as "once of the Free City of Lorath," and his "discourteous companions" Rorge and Biter. Since Biter is currently nibbling on the fingers of one of the dead guards, he doesn't need to say which one he is. When he turns to Arya, she says, "I'm Weasel."

When Rorge and Biter have left with the freed men, Jaqen H'ghar stays behind with Arya. He realizes that she is confused, and he explains, "A goat has no loyalty" -- the Bloody Mummers switched sides on the road, and the imprisonment was only a ruse. Eventually, the prisoners would have been freed to take over the castle without Arya's intervention. Jaqen still wants to "hear a certain name unsaid."

"I take back the name," Arya says, and then asks if she still has a third death coming to her. Jaqen points out the eight bodies: "The debt is paid." She agrees that it has been. And then he says, "A god has his due. And now a man must die." She protests that she has unsaid the name and he doesn't need to die, but he says, "My time is done."

Jaqen passed a hand down his face from forehead to chin, and where it went he changed. His cheeks grew fuller, his eyes closer; his nose hooked, a scar appeared on his right cheek where no scar had been before. And when he shook his head, his long straight hair, half red and half white, dissolved away to reveal a cap of tight black curls.

Arya is "too astonished to be afraid," and asks how he did it, and if she could learn to do it too. She would have to come with him to learn, he says. But she still wants to go home to Winterfell. "Then we must part," he says, and presses a small iron coin in her hand. "If the day comes when you would find me again, give that coin to any man from Braavos, and say these words to him -- valar morghulis." She repeats the words, but begs him, "Please don't go, Jaqen." He replies, "Jaqen is as dead as Arry." He has her repeat valar morghulis once more, and walks off into the darkness.

The castle has been taken by morning, and Arya returns to work, "mopping up dried blood." She sees "people looking at her strangely" and hears jokes about "weasel soup." That evening the new master of Harrenhal, Roose Bolton, arrives. He is an ordinary-looking man except "for his queer pale eyes." The fool Shagwell pulls her over to him and introduces her as "the weasel who made the soup." Bolton asks how old she is, and it takes Arya a moment to remember that she is ten. He asks what her real name is, and she says it's Nymeria, but that her mother called her Nan. He asks if she's afraid of leeches, and she says, "They're only leeches. My lord." He indicates that his squire is afraid of them, but that he believes "Frequent leechings are the secret of a long life. A man must purge himself of bad blood." He makes her his cupbearer for as long as he's at Harrenhal.

The banners of the Lannisters and Ser Amory Lorch are hauled down and the "flayed man of the Dreadfort and the direwolf of Stark" are raised in their place. Ser Amory is paraded naked to the bear pit and kicked in by Shagwell.

Daenerys

Continuing her quest for ships and sailors, Daenerys visits the palace of the warlocks, which is "a grey and ancient ruin" that Xaro Xhoan Daxos calls the Palace of Dust. Everyone advises her not to enter it, but Daenerys is stubborn, and when Pyat Pree appears, she takes his arm. He warns her to follow his instructions carefully, "The House of the Undying Ones was not made for mortal men."

Inside it, she will find herself in a room with four doors, counting the one she entered through. Always take the door to the right, he says. If she comes to a stairwell, go up. Never go downstairs. Some doors will be open, and inside them she will see things, some horrible, some wonderful; some will be visions of the past, and some of the future, and some of things that will never be. Don't enter them until she comes to the "audience chamber." People may speak to her as she proceeds, and it's up to her whether she answers them or ignores them. "When you come to the chamber of the Undying, be patient. Our little lives are no more than a flicker of a moth's wing to them. Listen well, and write each word on your heart."

At the entrance, which is a door shaped like a mouth in a wall shaped like a face, a dwarf no taller than her knee holds on a tray "a slender crystal glass filled with a thick blue liquid: shade of the evening, the wine of warlocks." Pyat Pree tells her to drink it and it will open her eyes and ears to the truths revealed inside. The first sip tastes like "ink and spoiled meat," but as it comes to life in her when she swallows it becomes "all the tastes she had ever known, and none of them."

She enters, and keeps moving through rooms, always taking the right-hand door, until she reaches a long hallway in which the only doors are on the left; on the right are a row of torches mounted on the wall. Drogon, who has been perched on her shoulder, unfolds his wings and flies "twenty feet before thudding to an undignified crash." The carpet underfoot is moldy but had once been gorgeous, and there are sounds like rats scurrying in the walls, which attract Drogon's notice.

Most of the doors on the left are closed, but strange sounds come from them. Daenerys tries not to look in the ones that are open, but she can't help it. One room contains mutilated corpses. "In a throne above them sat a dead man with the head of a wolf. He wore an iron crown and held a leg of lamb in one hand as a king might hold a scepter, and his eyes followed Dany with mute appeal." The next open door showed her the house where she had lived in Braavos, a house with a red door that was one of the few pleasant memories of her childhood remaining.

Another door shows her a man whom she at first takes for Viserys and a woman nursing a baby they have named Aegon, "What better name for a king?" The woman asks if he will make a song for the baby, and he says, "He is the prince that was promised, and his is the song of ice and fire." His eyes meet Daenerys's and he says, "The dragon has three heads."

She walks on until she reaches a staircase that descends into darkness. She knows she's not supposed to go down them, but all the doors are on the left, and behind her the torches are going out. In the darkness she hears something "shuffling and dragging itself slowly along the faded carpet." Drogon hears it too, she realizes, and she is panicked about what to do when she realizes that the last door on the left is the first door on the right. She plunges through it into another room with four doors, and keeps going through room after room, always to the right, until she starts getting dizzy.

Finally she reaches another room, and the door facing her is open. It's round and shaped like a mouth, and she can see Pyat Pree outside. He says it's too soon for her to have reached there and she must have taken a wrong turn. He reaches out a hand and says he'll show her the way. But then she notices a closed door on the right and opens it. He calls out to her, "Stubborn child. You will be lost, and never found," and when she goes through the door she can hear him screeching, "No, to me, come to me, to meeeeeee."

There is a stairwell inside, climbing upward, though she remembers that from the outside the building had no towers. On the right, a set of beautiful but "somehow frightening" doors made of ebony and weirwood, with "strange interwoven patterns" in the grain, have been thrown open. She goes into a great hall where there is a gathering of wizards, male and female, in a variety of costumes, and the sound of "the most beautiful music she had ever heard." A man rises and welcomes her: "Come and share the food of forever. We are the Undying of Qarth." Others join in the welcome.

She starts to go forward, but Drogon leaps from her shoulder and perches on top of the ebony-and-weirwood door and starts to bite it. She goes to the door, which is very heavy, and finds behind it a hidden door, to the right of the one through which she had entered. The wizards call out to her to come to them, but she goes through the door that had been hidden, which is "old grey wood, splintery and plain," and finds herself in "a chamber awash in gloom."

There is a long stone table in the room, and above it floats "a human heart, swollen and blue with corruption, yet still alive." There are blue shadowy figures around the table, but "no sound but the slow, deep beat of the rotting heart." Then she hears voices saying "mother of dragons ... dragons ... dragons ... dragons." She sits in the empty chair at the foot of the table and introduces herself as "Daenerys Stormborn of House Targaryen, Queen of the Seven Kingdoms of Westeros." She asks them to speak to her "with the wisdom of those who have conquered death."

She begins to make out the figures around the table, old men and women, "wrinkled and hairless," dressed in rotting clothing. Gradually she begins to hear them whisper that they live and know.  She says she saw visions of things in the hall and asks what they meant. She begins to hear their voices: "mother of dragons ... child of three ... three heads has the dragon ... three fires you must light ... one for life and one for death and one to love ... three mounts you must ride ... one to bed and one to dread and one to love ... three treasons will you know ... once for blood and once for gold and once for love ..." She tells them she doesn't understand, and asks them to show her. She sees Viserys screaming as the molten gold kills him. "A tall lord with copper skin and silver-gold hair stood beneath the banner of a fiery stallion, a burning city behind him." A "blue-eyed king who cast no shadow" raises a red sword. There is a cloth dragon carried on poles through a cheering crowd. A stone beast flies from a tower that is smoking. Her horse trots through grass to a stream under a sky full of stars. A corpse stands smiling at the prow of a ship. A sweet-smelling blue flower grows from a chink in a wall of ice.

The visions keep coming faster and faster: The shadows dancing in the tent, a little girl running to a house with a red door, Mirri Maz Duur shrieking in the flames, "a dragon bursting from her brow." A silver horse dragging the corpse of a naked man. A white lion running through tall grass. Naked crones emerging from a lake and bowing to her. Slaves with bloody hands calling out to her, "Mother!" She opens her arms to give herself to them.

Then suddenly Drogon's wings are beating around her and the dragon is screaming as she realizes that the Undying surround her, reaching for her, "licking, sucking, biting." She can't move until there is a sudden glare in the room and she sees Drogon tearing at the heart, shredding its flesh, "and when his head snapped forward, fire flew from his open jaws, bright and hot." Around her the Undying are on fire. She pushes through them to the door and calls for Drogon, who flies to her. She finds herself in a serpentine passageway with no doors but only stone walls until she reaches "a door like an open mouth" and runs through it into the sunlight.

Behind her, smoke is rising from the roof of the Palace of Dust and coming through the cracks in the walls. "Howling curses, Pyat Pree drew a knife and danced toward her, but Drogon flew at his face." Jhogo's whip sends the knife flying, and Rakharo wrestles the warlock to the ground. Jorah Mormont is there and puts his arm around her shoulder.