35. A Dance With Dragons, by George R.R. Martin, pp. 914-959

The Queen's Hand

It takes Quentyn three days to die, and in the meantime the dragons wreak fiery havoc on Meereen. Only the rain prevents the city from being completely destroyed. Barristan now ponders the best way of getting the prince's remains back to Dorne.

He still holds faith that Daenerys is alive somewhere. Meanwhile, he has reluctantly assumed the role of the queen's Hand. Skahaz tells him that they have expelled all the Yunkai'i and sellswords from the city, and that the Unsullied are manning the watch. Meanwhile, the city nobles are demanding that Hizdahr be reinstated, and the Sons of the Harpy have resumed their attacks, with a death toll of twenty-nine in just two days. Skahaz presses Barristan to kill the hostages in retaliation, but he refuses.

Barristan goes to meet with the queen's council, and is pleased that Strong Belwas -- not so strong as he was before the poisoning -- makes an appearance. Barristan reports the death of Quentyn Martell and the imprisonment of Archibald Yronwood and Gerris Drinkwater. Various council members call for their deaths. Barristan sets that aside to discuss the mission of the Green Grace to the Yunkishmen to arrange for the return of their hostages. The plan is to offer gold for the three -- Daario, Hero, and Jhogo -- with the thought that the Yunkai'i will refuse whereas the leaders of the sellswords will accept, thereby driving a wedge between them. The idea had been Missandei's, Barristan recalls: "Eleven years of age, yet Missandei is as clever as half the men at this table and wiser than all of them."

And what will happen if the Green Grace returns with a refusal? "Fire and blood," Barristan replies very softly. He has had a beacon fire prepared on top of the pyramid, and if it is lighted that is the signal to attack the besiegers. He has maps of the enemy camps brought in, and they spend much of the rest of the day arguing over the best plan of attack. Finally someone asks what the dragons will do. Barristan believes the noise of the battle will attract the dragons, but he doubts that they will take sides: "The dragons will do what the dragons will do. If they do come, it may be that just the shadow of their wings will be enough to dishearten the slavers and send them fleeing."

After the others leave, Grey Worm remains behind to point out that if they attack, the Yunkai'i will kill the hostages. Barristan says he has considered that, as well as a way to prevent it. But he tells Grey Worm that he needs to visit the Dornishmen to tell them of Quentyn's death. Yronwood, whose hands were badly burned trying to extinguish the fire, takes the news stoically. But Drinkwater angrily denounces Daenerys: "He offered her his heart, and she threw it back at him and went off to fuck her sellsword."

Barristan will not allow any slanders of Daenerys. Privately, he thinks that she should have accepted Quentyn, but he tells Drinkwater that what they did was "folly ... buying sellswords, loosing two dragons on the city ... that was madness and worse than madness. That was treason." Drinkwater claims that Quentyn did it to prove his worthiness for Daenerys's hand, but Barristan knows better:

"I have spent my life around kings and queens and princes. Sunspear means to take up arms against the Iron Throne. No, do not trouble to deny it. Doran Martell is not a man to call his spears without hope of victory. Duty brought Prince Quentyn here. Duty, honor, thirst for glory ... never love. Quentyn was here for dragons, not Daenerys." 

Yronwood speaks up and agrees with Barristan, telling Drinkwater to shut up. He asks what is going to happen to them. Barristan tells them that the Shavepate wants them executed, but he would prefer their support. If they serve him, he will send them back to Dorne with Quentyn's bones. He asks what arrangement Quentyn had made with the Tattered Prince for the support of the Windblown in capturing the dragons. Yronwood admits that Quentyn was going to give him Pentos. So Barristan tells them that he wants to send them back to the Tattered Prince, along with some Windblown who are in the dungeons, and to tell him that he'll pay the price if he delivers their hostages unharmed. They agree to the plan.

Barristan returns to the queen's rooms and from the terrace sees Viserion's pale wings in the distance. Galazza Galare returns from her mission to the Wise Masters of Yunkai to say that they demand the reinstatement of Hizdahr. Barristan replies, "He shall be, if it can be proved that he did not try to kill our queen." He offers the Green Grace a seat on the council that will rule the city in the meantime. She declines, insisting that only the restoration of Hizdahr can bring about the peace the city needs.

As for the hostages, the Yunkai'i refused: "No amount of gold will buy your people back, I was told. Only the blood of dragons may set them free again." Barristan is disappointed but not surprised. Galazza Galare continues. Daenerys is dead, she says. "Let her dragons die as well." Their conversation is interrupted by the entrance of Skahaz, who announces that the Yunkai'i are preparing the trebuchets. Barristan says he's not concerned about them throwing stones.

But the Green Grace tells him they won't be throwing stones. "Corpses."

Daenerys

Drogon has taken her to the hill where he has made a home. She has been there a while as her burns begin to heal, but from it she has sighted a small stream. If she follows it, she reasons, it will take her to the river Skahazdhan, which she could follow to Slaver's Bay. "She would sooner have returned to Meereen on dragon's wings, to be sure. But that was a desire Drogon did not seem to share." Her efforts to steer the dragon had ended in frustration.

So she climbs down the hill, determined to return to her husband and the people they rule. Her clothes are rags, and having lost a sandal in the pit, she is barefoot. She finds wild onions and a cabbage-like plant to eat. "As she walked, she tapped her thigh with the pitmaster's whip. That, and the rags on her back, were all she had taken from Meereen." Her hair had burned off, and she feels the need of a hat in the midday sun, but her attempts to craft one have failed.

She turns and looks back at the dragon's hill, which she has come to call Dragonstone, and briefly thinks of going back there. She could eat whatever the dragon kills and ride out on him every day. But she decides against it, feeling that her duty lies elsewhere. During the first day she sees Drogon flying overhead and thinks that he has come for her, but he flies on.

She finds the ruins of a village that provide shelter from the elements at night. The next day she continues following her stream. She comes across a bush filled with green berries, but an hour after eating them she vomits them up. Diarrhea follows, and when she falls asleep she wonders if she will be strong enough to wake up again. She dreams of her brother Viserys, his head smoking beneath the molten gold. When she wakes, there is blood on her thighs, and she is frightened until she realizes that she is menstruating.

Weak and feverish, she commands herself to walk. About midday she sees the grass moving as if the wind were blowing it, but there is no wind. She hears the tinkling of bells and recalls the ones Khal Drogo used to braid in his hair. She picks up a stone from the river to defend herself, but then thinks of her bloodriders. Perhaps they have come to rescue her.

Then she sees a lone rider, a scout riding ahead of the khalasar, and knows she must hide from him. But he doesn't see her, and suddenly the dragon appears in the sky. The horse is frightened, and the rider turns and races away. She calls for Drogon, and he comes to her. She climbs on his back, and though she has lost her whip she is able to make the dragon turn and fly in the direction the rider had taken.

They fly over a herd of horses, which begin to stampede in terror. One horse falls behind, and Drogon breathes flame on it, then seizes it in his claws. The kill is too large to take back to the lair, so Drogon eats it there, and Daenerys shares in the meal. Then, as the sun begins to set, riders approach. She goes and stands by the dragon as Khal Jhogo and his riders appear through the smoke.

Epilogue

Ronnet Connington has arrived in King's Landing with news of the return of his uncle Jon Connington with Aegon Targaryen. Mace Tyrell, as Hand, presides over the council assembled to discuss this development. He is inclined to dismiss the threat to Storm's End, which is currently held by Stannis. "Let the castle pass from one pretender to another, why should that trouble us? I shall recapture it after my daughter's innocence is proved."

Kevan Lannister is less sanguine, either about Jon Connington's strength or about Margaery's innocence. Tyrell wants Tommen to declare Margaery innocent "and put an end to the foolishness here and now," but Kevan cautions that if they overrule the High Septon "it will only drive the pious into the arms of one or the other of these would-be usurpers." As for Prince Aegon, Randyll Tarly calls him "A feigned boy," but Kevan recalls that the body of the infant said to be Aegon had been mutilated so badly that proper identification was impossible. Only Tywin Lannister's testimony asserted that the murdered child was Aegon. And then, Kevan says, "We have these tales coming from the east as well. A second Targaryen, and one whose blood no man can question. Daenerys Stormborn."

Grand Maester Pycelle notes that there have been too many stories about "A silver-haired queen with three dragons" to fully discount them. But Tyrell says she is "Queen of Slaver's Bay," which is "At the far end of the world." Still, Kevan insists that they should act now to quell Connington's attacks, before Daenerys decides to move on Westeros. Tyrell simply reiterates, "After the trial." Pycelle suggests trying to buy off the Golden Company from its support of Connington, but the treasurer, Harys Swyft, says "our vaults contain only rats and roaches."

Kevan changes the subject to Cersei's trial, with Ser Robert Strong as her champion. Tyrell wants to know exactly who this champion is: "He does not speak, he will not show his face, he is never seen without his armor. Do we know for a certainty that he is even a knight?" Kevan wonders if this Ser Robert is even living. Meryn Trant says he doesn't eat or drink and Boros Blount says he has never been seen to use the privy. He has his suspicions about the man, but he doesn't share them. All he can say is that Tommen named him to the Kingsguard "and Qyburn vouches for the man as well." The important thing is for him to win, so Cersei's innocence will be confirmed. If she is found guilty, this means that her children are illegitimate: "If Tommen ceases to be a king, Margaery will cease to be a queen." This is a potent argument to use on Mace Tyrell. Anyway, he tells the council, he will see to it that Cersei behaves, sending her back to Casterly Rock after the trial.

Kevan leaves the council with Pycelle and Harys Swyft, who complains about the cold: Snow has been falling on King's Landing. In his chambers, Kevan prepares himself to dine with Cersei and Tommen. Boros Blount is guarding them, but all of the attendants are novices chosen by the High Septon, who "had insisted that no girl spend more than seven days in the queen's service, lest Cersei corrupt her." His meal with them is interrupted by one of the novices who says that Grand Maester Pycell urgently requests to see Kevan.

The message was brought by a boy of eight or nine. Kevan gives him a penny and sends him to warm himself by a fire, saying that he knows the way to Pycelle's quarters. A girl shows him into Pycelle's chambers, where Kevan sees a giant white raven sitting in the open window. "The white ravens of the Citadel did not carry messages, as their dark cousins did. When they went forth from Oldtown, it was for one purpose only: to herald a change of seasons."

Kevan says, "Winter," but he has hardly spoken the word when something slams into his chest. He looks down and sees an arrow protruding from between his ribs. It is the way his brother died, he thinks. Then he sees Pycelle slumped over his desk, a bloody gash in his head. Kevan draws an obvious conclusion: "Tyrion." But a voice says that the dwarf is "Far away."

Varys is standing there, holding a crossbow.

"This pains me, my lord. You do not deserve to die alone on such a cold dark night. There are many like you, good men in service to bad causes ... but you were threatening to undo all the queen's good work, to reconcile Highgarden and Casterly Rock, bind the Faith to your little king, unite the Seven Kingdoms under Tommen's rule.... Your niece will think the Tyrells had you murdered, mayhaps with the connivance of the Imp. The Tyrells will suspect her. Someone somewhere will find a way to blame the Dornishmen. Doubt, division, and mistrust will eat the very ground beneath your boy king, whilst Aegon raises his banner above Storm's End and the lords of the realm gather round him."

Kevan still believes that Aegon is dead, but Varys assures him that he is alive and that he has been educated to rule. "Tommen has been taught that kingship is his right. Aegon knows that kingship is his duty, that a king must put his people first, and live and rule for them."

Then Varys apologizes for going on with his speech, prolonging Kevan's suffering. He whistles, and half a dozen children enter, "white-faced children with dark eyes, boys and girls together." In their hands are daggers.

33. A Dance With Dragons, by George R.R. Martin, pp. 860-886

Tyrion

Tyrion is signing a stack of promissory notes, promising the bearer a hundred golden dragons, as the price of joining the Second Sons. He knows the notes will be good only if he ever goes back to Westeros and claims the fortune of Casterly Rock. The notes at the bottom of the stack are for a thousand golden dragons, then ten thousand each for Kasporio the Cunning and Tybero Istarion. As a Second Son, his duties will be to work for Tybero, who is known as Inkpots, "Keeping books, counting coin, writing contracts and letters."

The final note is for "One hundred thousand golden dragons, fifty hides of fertile land, a castle, and a lordship." This one is for Brown Ben Plumm. Tyrion signs it, then adds his name to the roll book of the Second Sons, signing just below Jorah Mormont. He then returns to the tent he shares with Penny, who is grieving over the loss of the dog and the pig. He tells her that they need to find some armor to fit her -- she is to pose as a boy.

They are led to the armorer's by a boy named Kem, whose accent reveals to Tyrion that he is from King's Landing. When they reach the wagons full of odds and ends of armor, Jorah Mormont is there, dressed in mismatched pieces scavenged from the heaps in the wagons. He has recovered from his beatings, but his face is disfigured by a branded demon's mask on his right cheek, the sign of "a dangerous and disobedient slave." Tyrion and Penny sort through the pieces looking for something that will fit, and Tyrion finds a dirk that he likes.

Mormont observes that they will be fighting for the wrong side: "The Yunkai'i have lost this war, though it may take them some time to know it." Meereen has the Unsullied, as well as dragons: "Three of them, once the queen returns. She will. She must." Tyrion agrees:

"The Second Sons are on the losing side. They need to turn their cloaks again and do it now." He grinned. "Leave that to me."

The Kingbreaker

Barristan and Skahaz are meeting to discuss their next move. The Shavepate is convinced that Hizdahr planned to kill not only Daenerys but also her dragons, as a way of leaving the city defenseless when the Volantene fleet arrives. Skahaz wants to attack the Yunkai'i and end things, but Selmy argues that Daenerys signed the peace treaty, so they must not be the ones to break it. They must overthrow Hizdahr, he says, then form a council to present terms to the Yunkai'i, demanding the return of the remaining hostages and the withdrawal of their armies. "Should they refuse, then and only then will we inform them that the peace is broken, and go forth to give them battle."

Selmy says that Skahaz's way is "dishonorable." Skahaz replies that Barristan's way is "stupid." Their men are ready to fight, he says. Barristan admits that this is true, but they had agreed at the outset to do it his way. The Shavepate gives in, very reluctantly. They will overpower the two guards Hizdahr keeps at his bedchamber, both of them pit fighters who have been pressed into service as guards and were already bored at the routine of their duties. Skahaz will see to it that the Brazen Beasts support him.

Barristan wants to free their hostages, the Unsullied known as Hero, Daenerys's bloodrider Jhogo, and Daario Naharis, all of whom are deeply loyal to their queen. Skahaz argues that they are all expendable, particularly Daario. Barristan agrees that things would be simpler if Daario were out of the way, eliminating an impediment to Daenerys's marriage to someone who might aid in the conquest of Westeros, but he still argues for Hero and Jhogo. The Shavepate counters that if their hostages are killed, they can kill the ones they hold, the children of noble families. Barristan has come to know them, however, and balks at killing children, remembering the murder of Prince Rhaegar's children.

Despite their differences, the two agree to make their move that night at the hour of the wolf. He finds Missandei in the queen's chambers, reading, and warns her not to leave them that night, no matter what she sees or hears. The rest of the day he spends remembering events in his past that might have changed the course of his life one way or another. As the time draws near, he bathes and dresses all in white, then puts on the gilded armor and the long white cloak that Daenerys had given him. He decides not to wear his helmet, which impedes his vision.

He meets the Shavepate, who is accompanied by six Brazen Beasts wearing identical masks: locusts. The men in masks follow him as he goes to the king's chamber, guarded outside by the pit fighter known as Steelskin. Barristan says he needs to speak to Hizdahr and is told that he may enter but the Brazen Beasts must remain behind. In the chambers one of the cupbearers goes to wake the king, who appears, yawning.

Hizdahr asks if there has been news of Daenerys, but Barristan tells him no. Is there trouble in the city, then? Again, the answer is no. Finally, Barristan says he has come "To ask a question. Magnificence, are you the Harpy?" Hizdahr is startled, and seems to realize for the first time that Barristan is wearing armor. Barristan then asks, "Was the poison your work, Magnificence?" Hizdahr accuses Quentyn of poisoning the locusts: "They're all poisoners, these Dornish. Reznak says they worship snakes."

As Barristan persists, Hizdahr grows more agitated and confused in his denials, and tries to shift the blame to Daario Naharis: "Perhaps it was her precious captain who tried to poison her, for putting him aside." Barristan says, "If you are not the Harpy, give me his name," and draws his sword. Hizdahr calls out for the other guard, Khrazz, who emerges from his chamber sleepily, but with his weapon, a Dothraki arakh, drawn. Barristan observes that the weapon is not made for close combat, and tells Khrazz to throw it down. He is there for Hizdahr, and not to harm him.

Khrazz attacks. He is forty years younger than Barristan, and much heavier, but Barristan is wearing armor. The pit fighter is unprepared to do battle with an armored man, and when Barristan sees the opportunity, he kills Khrazz. He finds Hizdahr cowering behind a tapestry in the bedchamber and takes him into custody.

The king's cupbearers are standing there terrified, but one of them speaks up to tell Hizdahr that Reznak needs to see him, urgently. Skahaz was supposed to take the seneschal into custody, Barristan thinks, and wonders if something has gone wrong. He asks the cupbearer, "Where does the seneschal want His Grace to go?" The boy stammers that they should go outside to the terrace:

"The dragons have been loosed, ser."

29. A Dance With Dragons, by George R.R. Martin, pp. 769-792

Jon

Jon has a nightmare in which he is fighting not only wildlings but also dead men of the Night's Watch such as Donal Noye and Qhorin Halfhand. He wakes to find Mormont's raven pecking at him and screeching "Snow," and is soon full of misgivings about the treaty he has made with Tormund. As he dresses, he notices something odd: The raven is muttering his full name, "Snow, Jon Snow, Jon Snow." He can't remember its ever doing that before.

At breakfast Bowen Marsh assures him they are ready to receive the wildlings, and Jon reiterates his concern that all go well: "If blood should be shed today, it had best not be one of us who strikes the first blow, or I swear by the old gods and the new that I will have the head of the man who strikes it." He prepares his men to receive Tormund's hordes and gives the order to open the gate.

He goes to meet Tormund, who tells Jon he wants his people to see him: "a long-faced lad in an old black cloak. They need to learn that the Night's Watch is naught t'be feared." In reply, Jon whistles for Ghost, who bounds out of the gate and causes Tormund's horse to shy. Calling Jon "a black-hearted bastard," Tormund sounds the horn for his people to begin their journey through the Wall.

It lasts all day, beginning with the hostages, a hundred boys aged eight to sixteen. Tormund identifies some of them, including the son of Varamyr Sixskins, the skinchanger, whom Tormund believes to be dead. Two of them turn out to be girls, and Jon asks for replacements. Tormund gives Jon his own son, Dryn, and Jon says he'll make him his page. Next come the warriors, including some spearwives who remind Jon of Ygritte. Some pause to pledge themselves to Jon, and they all discard their treasures into the carts that have been prepared for them.

About midday a cart becomes wedged in the tunnel through the Wall, and a fight nearly starts over the best way to move it. Tormund says he wishes he had the Horn of Joramun to take down the Wall, and Jon tells him Melisandre burned it. Tormund claims that it wasn't really Joramun's, but just a big horn they found in a giant's grave. Jon wonders if Mance had lied to him about the horn, or if Tormund is lying now: "If Mance's horn was just a feint, where is the true horn?"

The skies begin to cloud in the afternoon, threatening snow, and the crowd moving through the Wall begins to hurry. As they wait, Jon asks Tormund to tell him about the Others. Tormund is reluctant: "They're never far, you know." They had never attacked his people in force, but he lost many outriders to them. He had lost his own son, Torwynd, to them. John murmurs, "I know," but Tormund replies,

"You know nothing. You killed a dead man, aye, I heard. Mance killed a hundred. A man can fight the dead, but when their masters come, when the white mists rise up ... how do you fight a mist, crow? Shadows with teeth ... air so cold it hurts to breathe, like a knife inside your chest ... you do not know, you cannot know ... can your sword cut cold?"

Jon remembers what Sam had found in the books about dragonsteel, and tells Tormund, "I do not know. And if the gods are good, I never will."

As night comes on, the crowd grows more impatient to make it through the Wall, and Jon recognizes the fear driving them: "Warriors, spearwives, raiders, they are frightened of those woods, of shadows moving through the trees. They want to put the Wall between them before the night descends." Smoke begins to rise from where Tormund's son, Toregg, has been burning the corpses of the wildlings who were found dead in the camp.

Finally, Tormund's rear guard of a dozen warriors appears. In its midst is an enormous boar, twice as big as Ghost. With it is a man Tormund calls Borroq, then spits. Jon realizes instantly that Borroq is a skinchanger. Ghost takes the scent of the boar and bristles and bares his teeth. Jon tells the wolf to stay, but Tormund advises him to keep Ghost locked up that night, and he will tell Borroq to do the same with the boar.

Tormund goes ahead through the Wall, leaving Jon and his guard. Jon tells Borroq to go through because they are about to close the gate. Borroq replies, "You close it good and tight. They're coming, crow." And he and the boar enter the tunnel. When Jon reaches the other side of the wall, Bowen Marsh is waiting with a tally: "Three thousand one hundred and nineteen wildlings passed through the gate today."

Clydas brings Jon a message from Cotter Pyke, who has reached Hardhome with six ships, the others having been lost to storms. "Very bad here. Wildlings eating their own dead. Dead things in the woods." Jon readies himself for the worst.

The Discarded Knight

Hizdahr is holding court, and Barristan is present, still wearing his sword though he has been dismissed as one of the king's guards. He notes to himself how many of Daenerys's followers are missing: Missandei, Strong Belwas, Grey Worm, Aggo, Jhogo, Rakharo, Irri, Jhiqui, and Daario Naharis. Skahaz the Shavepate has been replaced as commander of the Brazen Beasts by the king's cousin, Marghaz, though Barristan wonders if Skahaz is there behind the mask of one of the Brazen Beasts.

The court begins in disorder, with people complaining loudly about the damage done to their person and property and kin by the dragon. There are cries demanding to know what has happened to Daenerys. Reznak mo Reznak struggles to keep order. Barristan tunes out of what is being said and scans the crowd, discovering Quentyn Martell and his companions at the back of the hall. He thinks, "They should not have come. Martell does not realize his danger. Daenerys was his only friend at this court, and she is gone." He feels sorry for the Dornish prince, who is certainly not the romantic figure of Daenerys's dreams: "She wants fire, and Dorne sent her mud."

And then a thought occurs to Barristan: Quentyn Martell grew up in the courts of Dorne, well known for intrigue and poisonings, and is a relative of the Red Viper. Is it possible that the poisoned locusts were meant for Hizdahr, and not Daenerys? Could Quentyn had arranged for them to be delivered to eliminate his rival for Daenerys's hand? If Hizdahr had died, the peace would have ended, and Daenerys might have found it advisable to accept Quentyn as her consort and return to Westeros with him.

A delegation of Yunkishmen arrives, accompanied by the sellsword Bloodbeard, who carries a leather satchel. He pulls a severed head from it and tosses it at Reznak, who squeals and dodges. The head is that of Daenerys's admiral, Groleo. Barristan is dismayed: "Groleo was a good man. He did not deserve this end. All he ever wanted was to go home." One of the Yunkish delegation explains: There had been seven signatories to the peace treaty, and seven hostages tendered for their safety. Yurkhaz zo Yunzak had died, so Groleo's head had been taken in response.

Barristan speaks up to remind Hizdahr that Yurkhaz had been trampled to death by his own slaves fleeing from the dragon. Hizdahr seems to agree, calling Groleo's death a "breach of our peace." The Yunkish agree in turn to release three of the Meereenese hostages and to deliver Groleo's body for a proper sea burial. But the other three hostages, he says, will remain until the dragons are destroyed. "No peace is possible whilst they live." Reznak replies that the dragons are Daenerys's and cannot be destroyed without her authority, but Bloodbeard asserts that she is dead, which causes a roar of protest from the Meereenese crowd. Hizdahr says he needs to speak with his council, putting an end to the court and the uproar.

As the hall clears, Barristan approaches Quentyn and suggests that it would be wise if he didn't return to his chambers but left the city as quickly as possible. He had seen Hizdahr frown when he noticed the Dornishmen in the hall. Gerris Drinkwater laughs and asks why they should be frightened of Hizdahr, who had "quailed before the Yunkishmen." Quentyn is inclined to agree, admitting that Daenerys had also warned him, but insisting that the documented marriage pact still gives him some claim to her hand. Barristan mocks the pact as having been "made by two dead men." It envisioned Quentyn's sister marrying Daenerys's brother Viserys and has no relevance in this case. "I have no wish to salt your wounds," Barristan says to him, "but Her Grace has a new husband and an old paramour, and seems to prefer the both of them to you."

Quentyn shows his anger, but Barristan continues, telling him about the poisoned locusts. Quentyn is shocked by the news. Barristan then points out that if Hizdahr had planned the poison for Daenerys then "he will need a scapegoat" to explain it away: "Who better than a rival from a distant land who has no friends at this court? Who better than a suitor the queen spurned?" He points out that Quentyn's uncle was the Red Viper and that Quentyn has a reason to want Hizdahr dead.

Gerris Drinkwater suggests that Daario Naharis might also be considered a suspect, but Barristan points out that Daario wasn't there, having been sent as a hostage. Besides, Hizdahr needs Daario's Stormcrows, whom he would lose if he seized their captain as a poisoner. So he advises Quentyn to lie low, or even better to take the first ship to Volantis.

27. A Dance With Dragons, by George R.R. Martin, pp. 717-740

Cersei

Imprisoned and watched over by three stern and pious septas, Cersei has lost touch with the outside world. She spends her time longing for Jaime to come rescue her and brooding over the treachery of her onetime followers, who have either yielded to torture and testified against her, or fled. "She stood accused of adultery, fornication, high treason, even murder, for Osney Kettleblack had confessed to smothering the last High Septon at her command."

Whenever she dozes off, a septa wakes her to demand that she confess to her crimes. And finally, worried about what will happen to Tommen and the realm, she does. As she is being taken to see the High Septon, she asks about Tommen and is told he is "well protected, day and night. The queen is with him, always." This angers and surprises her -- "I am the queen!" she thinks, and then she wonders if Margaery has somehow been exonerated of the crimes she was accused of -- but when she asks for more information, another of the septas admonishes the one who had told her that much.

She kneels before the High Septon to confess, and he tells Septa Unella, the sternest of the three, to stay and record what Cersei says. She confesses to adultery, and when he insists on the names, she lists Lancel Lannister, Osney Kettleblack, and his brothers Osfryd and Osmund, but claims she had sex with the Kettleblacks only to ensure protection for Tommen. As for Lancel, she blames her female frailty in the aftermath of her husband's death. But she swears that she was never unfaithful to Robert Baratheon while he was alive.

The High Septon then says that Osney claims she ordered the death of his predecessor and that she told him to lie about Queen Margaery and her cousins. She denies having engineered the accusations against Margaery and the others, and says she only complained about the High Septon: "He was Tyrion's creature, weak and corrupt, a stain upon our Holy Faith." Osney, she says, must have taken her complaints more seriously than she intended. Then the High Septon says she has been accused of conspiracy to murder her husband, Robert. She realizes that the source of this must be Lancel, and insists that Robert was killed by a boar. "Do they say I am a skinchanger now? A warg?" She denies it.

Finally, he tells her, "there are some who say your children were not fathered by King Robert, that they are bastards born of incest and adultery." She blames Stannis for spreading this story, which she calls "a palpable lie." The High Septon seems to be ready to accept this accusation as the product of Stannis's ambition for the throne: "Lord Stannis has turned from the truth of the Seven to worship a red demon, and his false faith has no place in these Seven Kingdoms." Cersei now sees a glimmer of hope.

But, the High Septon tells her, she will still have to stand trial. And when she asks to see Tommen, he tells her it wouldn't be right to let her near the king until after the trial has demonstrated her innocence. He will allow her other visitors, one a day. As they accompany her back to her cell, one of the septas says Cersei "must feel so much lighter now, clean and innocent as a maid on the morning of her wedding." Cersei thinks, "I fucked Jaime on the morning of my wedding," but tells them she feels "reborn." She asks about visitors, and tells them she would like to see her uncle, Ser Kevan.

He arrives the next morning, but sternly resists her blandishments, reminding her that their last meeting didn't end well, and that she corrupted his son Lancel. He has "hard tidings" for her, he says. She asks immediately about Tommen, but is told he is well, and then about Jaime. He tells her that Jaime has gone off somewhere with a woman, who may be Brienne of Tarth. Cersei can't imagine the clumsy, homely Brienne as a rival, so she is puzzled and dismayed.

Kevan goes on to inform her that companies of sellswords have been landing in the south. He assumes that they have been hired by Stannis, but Mace Tyrell refuses to deal with them until the matter with Margaery has been settled. Cersei would be happy to settle the matter by chopping off Margaery's head, but she holds her tongue. She pleads with her uncle to get her out of the prison, but he says the High Septon refuses to release her until she has atoned for her sins.

She protests that she has confessed, but he replies, "Atoned, I said. Before the city. A walk--". Cersei knows what that involves and refuses, "I am a queen, not some dockside whore." She would "sooner die," she tells him. It may come to that, he tells her: "His High Holiness is resolved that you be tried for regicide, deicide, incest, and high treason." The only one of the charges that surprises her is "deicide":  "When did I kill a god?" He explains that the murder of the High Septon is a form of deicide.

She will be tried by the Faith, he tells her, unless she chooses trial by combat, with a champion drawn from the Kingsguard.

"Whatever the outcome, your rule is at an end. I will serve as Tommen's regent until he comes of age. Mace Tyrell has been named King's Hand. Grand Maester Pycelle and Ser Harys Swift will continue as before, but Paxter Redwyne is now lord admiral and Randall Tarly has assumed the duties of justiciar." 

Redwyne and Tarly are bannermen of the Tyrells, she realizes. She asks why Margaery and her cousins have been freed and she hasn't, and is told that Randall Tarly brought his army with him and persuaded the High Septon to put them in his custody and swore to deliver them for trial. But the case against them has grown weaker: "All of the men named as the queen's lovers have denied the accusation or recanted, save for your maimed singer, who appears to be quite mad." Qyburn is in charge of them in the dungeons at the Red Keep, which makes her feel better.

Then Kevan breaks the news about Myrcella's mutilation. Cersei immediately jumps to the conclusion that Tyrion is behind it, but Kevan assures her the culprit is "a Dornish knight named Gerold Dayne." Ser Arys Oakheart was killed defending her. She realizes that this means there is an opening on the Kingsguard, so she urges her uncle to consult with Qyburn: He'll be able to name someone for the Kingsguard who can defend her in a trial by combat.

The Queensguard

Daenerys's disappearance has thrown her court into turmoil. Already, Barristan has been informed that he has no place at court in her absence -- she is presumed to be dead, which he refuses to believe. Strong Belwas is being cared for by the Graces, after his collapse from eating the honeyed locusts. Skahaz has been relieved of his command, and the Unsullied remain in their barracks. The hostages remain in the hands of the Yunkai'i, including Jhogo, while the other members of Daenerys's khalasar have gone off to search for her. Hizdahr has also dismissed Missandei from service.

Reznak mo Reznak remains, acting as a liaison between Hizdahr and Daenerys's people, and he tells Barristan that Hizdahr has chosen pit fighters as his personal guard. Barristan knows that this is because Hizdahr doesn't trust either the Unsullied or Skahaz's Brazen Beasts. But Barristan is to be kept around to command forces against external enemies, Reznak says. Barristan knows this is nonsense, but he hides his real feelings: "I am His Grace's to command," he says, only to be corrected by Reznak: The proper address is "His Magnificence, His Radiance, His Worship." He takes his leave of the perfumed seneschal, hiding his contempt.

Hizdahr has not occupied Daenerys's chambers, however, preferring a more secure location. Barristan goes there and finds only Missandei -- Irri and Jhiqui have joined the other Dothraki in the search. He is full of regret: "I came to bring Daenerys home. Yet he had lost her, just as he had lost her father and her brother. Even Robert. I failed him too." He had seen Drogon fly off with Daenerys on his back, and had learned later that the dragon had turned his fire on the people who had shot arrows at him, killing more than two hundred and burning or wounding three times that number.

Missandei assures him that Daenerys has not flown to Westeros, that she would not abandon her followers. She also tells him that Skahaz mo Kandaq wants to speak with him. He doesn't trust the Shavepate but agrees to the meeting. Alone, he thinks about his failures:

Jaehaerys, Aerys, Robert. Three dead kings. Rhaegar, who would have been a finer king than any of them. Princess Elia and the children. Aegon just a babe. Rhaenys with her kitten. Dead, every one, yet he still lived, who had sworn to protect them. And now Daenerys, his bright shining child queen. She is not dead. I will not believe it.

That evening he goes out to the meeting Missandei has arranged with Skahaz, uncertain whether he shouldn't arrest him for conspiring against Hizdahr, his queen's consort. He finds the Shavepate wearing the mask of a Brazen Beast: a cat. He tells Barristan that he has discovered who poisoned the honeyed locusts: "The Sons of the Harpy tood his daughter and swore she would be returned once the queen was dead." Belwas's taste for the locust saved Daenerys, as did the dragon. But the poisoner's girl was returned to him "in nine pieces. One for every year she lived."

Moreover, he says, Volantis has launched its fleet and is sailing to Meereen. "The king will open the city gates to the Volantenes when they arrive. All those Daenerys freed will be enslaved again. Even some who were never slaves will be fitted for chains. You may end your days in a fighting pit, old man." He urges an attack on the Yunkai'i, who are fat and complacent, and says Barristan must contact the Unsullied.

Barristan is cautious about getting caught up in a treasonous plot, but Skahaz insists that Hizdahr is behind the attempt to poison Daenerys: He always wanted the crown, and once he gained it had no interest in sharing it. Barristan remembers Hizdahr urging Daenerys to try the locusts, "yet he never touched so much as one himself." He wants to talk to the man who prepared them. Skahaz agrees, and says he won't make a move against Hizdahr until they are certain of his guilt. And Barristan agrees to talk to Grey Worm, the leader of the Unsullied.

26. A Dance With Dragons, by George R.R. Martin, pp. 687-716

Daenerys

Irri, Jhiqui, and Missandei help Daenerys get ready for the reopening of the fighting pits. Ser Barristan waits for them at the palanquin, which will be guarded by Brazen Beasts, the guards who wear bronze masks of various animals. Barristan voices his uneasiness about the guards, wishing that she were attended by Unsullied instead, who are more trustworthy. But Daenerys feels she needs to make an example by placing her trust in these men.

Barristan also tells her that the sellsword army known as the Windblown are willing to come over to her side, but their leader, the Tattered Prince, wants Pentos as his reward. Pentos is not hers to give, she replies, and in any case she owes an obligation to Magister Illyrio whose home is there. He arranged her marriage to Khal Drogo, presented her the dragon eggs, and even sent Barristan, Belwas, and her admiral, Groleo, to her. "I will not repay that debt by giving his city to some sellsword."

She takes her place on the palanquin beside Hizdahr and they are borne to Daznak's Pit as the crowds cheer their procession. Strong Belwas walks ahead of the palanquin and Barristan rides beside it. Behind them, farther back, are Quentyn Martell and his companions. Suddenly the procession halts: One of the bearers of a palanquin has collapsed and is blocking the way. Daenerys orders him revived and given food and water, but Barristan suspects a trap. Hizdahr assures him that their enemies, the Sons of the Harpy, have been quieted.

They reach the pit and descend to their ringside seats. Peddlers are everywhere, selling food, but Hizdahr has taken charge of their refreshments, which include a bowl of honeyed locusts. These are a particular favorite of Strong Belwas, who begins eating them by the handful. Hizdahr urges her to try some: "They are rolled in spice before the honey, so they are sweet and hot at once," but Daenerys decides to have some figs and dates instead.

Hizdahr rises and addresses the crowd, urging them to show their love for Daenerys. They respond with a chant of "Mhysa, Mhysa, Mhysa," the word for "Mother." She is embarrassed by the adulation, but acknowledges it, then takes her seat. They are in the shade, but the day is very hot, and she calls on Jhiqui to bring her some water.

The first fight ends with one man cutting out the heart of his victim and taking a bite out of it, reminding Daenerys of how she once ate a stallion's heart when she was pregnant. It had not prevented her losing the child to Mirri Maz Duur's treachery. She remembers the prophecy of three treasons: "She was the first, Jorah the second, Brown Ben Plumm the third. Was she done with betrayals?"

When the crowd screams its approval of another kill, Strong Belwas proclaims it "Bad fighting, good dying." He has finished off the honeyed locusts. Daenerys has forbidden contests between children, but she is upset when a sixteen-year-old boy is killed. She wishes she had forbidden contests of women, too, but the women fighters had insisted on showing that they could fight as well as men. She also wanted to ban the "comic combats where cripples, dwarfs, and crones had at one another with cleavers, torches, and hammers," but Hizdahr had persuaded her that people enjoy these too much and "that without such frolics, the cripples, dwarfs, and crones would starve." There are battles between animals as well, and Hizdahr assures her that the meat is used to make a stew for the poor.

The first comic battle of the day features a pair of dwarfs, one riding a dog, the other a pig. Daenerys tries to look amused at their combat, but then Hizdahr assures her it will get better when they loose the lions on the dwarfs. Startled, she asks how they are supposed to fight lions with wooden swords. Hizdahr replies, "Badly," and explains that the dwarfs aren't expecting it. "I forbid it," Daenerys says.

"You swore to me that the fighters would be grown men who had freely consented to risk their lives for gold and honor. These dwarfs did not consent to battle lions with wooden swords. You will stop it. Now."

Reluctantly, Hizdahr calls the pitmaster over and says, "No lions." The crowd is not pleased when the dwarfs are allowed to leave, so Hizdahr has Barsena Blackhair, a woman fighter, brought on, which brings cheers from the crowd. She fights a boar, but loses, and the smell as the boar rips into Barsena's entrails nauseates Daenerys. She asks Barristan to take her home. Hizdahr pleads with her to stay, and suddenly Strong Belwas is looking ill, too. He says he ate too many locusts, and calls for milk.

Then a shadow passes across the scene, and everyone looks at the sky. It is Drogon, who descends on the pit and roasts the boar with a blast of flame. Then he lands and begins to eat both the boar and Barsena. The crowd begins to panic and leave, climbing out of the arena, though many others remain seated. Then a man with a spear runs into the arena and jumps onto Drogon's back, driving the spear into the dragon's neck. "Dany and Drogon screamed as one." The dragon shakes off the man and tears his arm from the shoulder, as Hizdahr calls out for the other spearmen to attack.


Barristan grabs Daenerys and urges her to look away from what is happening. Instead, she twists away from him, leaps into the pit, and runs toward Drogon. The dragon is making short work of the spearmen as Daenerys calls out his name. He snaps at her, barely missing her, and she falls over the body of the pitmaster. Drogon roars at her and she feels the intense heat of his breath. She hears Ser Barristan nearby, calling out, trying to distract the dragon.


She grasps the pitmaster's whip, and telling herself not to show fear, lashes out at Drogon, screaming "No!" He hisses fire at her again, but she ducks. Then he folds his wings and stretches out on his belly. She jumps onto the dragon's back and wrenches out the spear that is still stuck in him. Then he unfolds his wings and starts to fly, as she urges him to go higher.


Jon


Tormund Giantsbane and Jon Snow negotiate, with a lot of cursing and bellowing on Tormund's part, and a lot of quiet persistence on Jon's. In the end, quiet persistence wins out and Tormund says, "Done then, and may the gods forgive me," then sticks out his hand for a bone-crushing handshake. In three days' time Tormund and his followers are to join the other wildlings on the south side of the Wall.


When they go outside, Jon whistles for Ghost, who appears with Val beside him. Jon tells her that he has prepared a room for her in Hardin's Tower, since Queen Selyse has taken over her old rooms in the King's Tower. She will have the giant Wun Wun as a protector, since he sleeps in the entry hall. As they pass among Tormund's people, he notices signs of illness and starvation, which only arouses his concern about what has happened to the people who went to Hardhome with Mother Mole.


He tells Val that he now has to sell the terms of his agreement with Tormund to his own people, starting with Selyse. She suggests that she come with him, and he agrees, warning her that she will have to kneel and show seriousness when they go before the queen. She says she will behave, and when they are shown into Selyse's chamber, she kneels alongside Jon. He informs the queen that they have come to terms with Tormund and that his people, about four thousand of them, plus two hundred giants and eighty mammoths, will be relocating south of the Wall.


Selyse says that they "must first acknowledge Stannis as their king and R'hllor as their god," but Jon tells her that those terms were not included in the agreement, which the queen responds to frostily. When she says they must be made to do so, Val informs her that not only do the free folk not kneel, but that they will rebel if forced to do so. Selyse replies, "You are insolent. I suppose that is only to be expected of a wildling. We must find you a husband who can teach you courtesy." Jon says he is sorry that his negotiations displease her, and asks her leave to go, which she grants.


Outside, Val observes that Princess Shireen, who had been in the room when they first arrived is afflicted with what the wildlings call the "grey death." Jon replies that greyscale is not fatal when contracted in childhood, but Val insists, "The grey death sleeps, only to wake again. The child is not clean!" She wants Dalla's child, whom she refers to as "the monster," removed from the tower. Jon says he'll try to arrange it and she persists, "Do. You owe me a debt, Jon Snow."


When she has gone, Jon rides in the winch cage to the top of the Wall. He is joined there by Flint, Norrey, Bowen Marsh, Othell Yarwyck, and Septon Cellador, who is drunk as usual. He tells them of the agreement and gets the usual objections, many of them centering on the Weeper, the wildling who had killed many of the men of the Watch. Jon reminds them that if the Weeper takes the black, his crimes must be forgiven, and that he is well acquainted with their common enemy, the Others. He tells them that they will be housed in the Watch's abandoned castles along the Wall. He doesn't tell them about the arrangement he has made with the Iron Bank for funds, but says that the agreement includes the surrendering of all wealth possessed by the wildlings.


Still, they are unconvinced that the words of "godless savages," as Cellador puts it, can be trusted. Jon tells them that he has insisted on hostages, a hundred boys ages eight through sixteen, including the sons of chiefs and captains. And he reminds him that he is Eddard Stark's son, who knows the ways of northmen and wildlings. But Bowen Marsh speaks up:

"The lord commander must pardon my bluntness, but I have no softer way to say this. What you propose is nothing less than treason. For eight thousand years the men of the Night's Watch have stood upon the Wall and fought these wildlings. Now you mean to let them pass, to shelter them in our castles, to feed them and clothe them and teach them how to fight. Lord Snow, must I remind you?  You swore an oath." 

Jon needs no reminding, and he repeats the oath verbatim. The wildlings are men, he says, and they swore to guard "the realms of men." Marsh starts to reply, but remains silent as Jon turns away. Then Jon reminds them that winter is coming and with it the white walkers. They must be stopped at the Wall, and he has done what he can do to try to stop them. He gives them orders for handling the influx of wildlings and they agree, but he remembers Melisandre's words: "'Ice,' she said, 'and daggers in the dark. Blood frozen red and hard, and naked steel.'"

25. A Dance With Dragons, by George R.R. Martin, pp. 661-686

Daenerys

The peace treaty between Meereen and the Yunkai'i is being signed, and the fighting pits have been reopened as part of the celebration. Daenerys is not happy: Though she married Hizdahr to bring about peace, she feels defeated. Hizdahr assures her that it's only temporary: When the Yunkai'i leave, they will "have all we desired. Peace, food, trade. Our port is open once again, and ships are being permitted to come and go."

But she objects that the Yunkai are trading in slaves outside her own walls, mocking her as powerless. She tries to console herself that by agreeing to the peace terms she has saved thousands of lives: "This is the price of peace, I pay it willingly. If I look back, I am lost."

At the feast, she notes how unimpressive the Yunkish commanders are, and how the sellswords they had hired are swaggering bravos. Brown Ben Plumm has appeared, but only after an exchange of hostages to keep Daenerys's men from killing him. Among the hostages sent to the Yunkish camp are her bloodrider Jhogo, her admiral Groleo, and Daario Naharis. The last was furious at the wedding and at the peace terms, so it was just as well he wasn't present at the feast.

When the party goes out to the terrace to look at the city, she encounters Brown Ben Plumm, who is insouciant about his deserting her, arguing that he didn't want to be on the losing side and advising her, "Never trust a sellsword." Ser Barristan, who has overheard their conversation, tells Daenerys, after Plumm has left, that it's good advice. She talks with him about ways of getting rid of Brown Ben, and wonders if there is a way to use the Dornishmen who include Prince Quentyn. "The three Dornishmen had been at the feast, as befit Prince Quentyn's rank, though Reznak had taken care to seat them as far as possible from her husband," who might see Quentyn as a rival suitor.

Barristan reminds her that House Martell had been a loyal ally to the Targaryens, and that Quentyn had been stubbornly insistent about his plans to marry her. So she tells him to bring Quentyn to her: "It is time he met my children." She and Quentyn descend to the place where the dragons are caged.

One of the elephants trumpeted at them from his stall. An answering roar from below made her flush with sudden heat. Prince Quentyn looked up in alarm. "The dragons know when she is near," Ser Barristan told him.

Viserion has broken and melted his chains and clings "to the roof of the pit like some huge white bat." Rhaegal is still chained, and is eating the carcass of a bull. When Quentyn asks about the third, she tells him just, "Drogon is hunting." Quentyn is terrified, but she assures him that they frighten her too. Still, she tells him, she intends to learn to ride one of them.

Then she advises him to return to Dorne. "My court is no safe place for you, I fear. You have more enemies than you know. You made Daario look a fool, and he is not a man to forget such a slight." He stubbornly insists that he is a prince of Dorne and "will not run from slaves and sellswords." She reflects that he is a fool.

That night, Hizdahr makes drunken love to her, after which he whispers, "Gods grant that we have made a son tonight." But she can only remember Mirri Maz Duur's prophecy of her barrenness. When he falls asleep, her thoughts turn to Daario. Then Missandei enters to say she thought she heard Daenerys crying. Daenerys denies it, but asks Missandei to stay and talk to her about happy things until she falls asleep, "to dream queer, half-formed dreams of smoke and fire."

Theon

The horns and drum of Stannis's troops are still heard, but the attack hasn't yet materialized. Theon waits for it in the Great Hall and keeps an eye on Abel, Rowan, and another of the washerwomen who is known as Squirrel.  Seeing Ramsay Bolton enter the hall, Theon is filled with fear and whispers to Abel that his escape plan won't work. But Abel insists that Stannis is just outside the walls of Winterfell, and that Theon needn't worry.

Just then the doors of the hall burst open and Ser Hosteen Frey enters, carrying the body of Little Walder Frey. Theon instantly assumes that the washerwomen are responsible for the murder, but Rowan assures him that they weren't. In any case, Ramsay Bolton is enraged at the loss of his favorite, and Hosteen accuses Wyman Manderly of ordering the killing. Wyman asks how old the boy was, and when he is told Little Walder was nine, says, "So young.... Though mayhaps this was  a blessing. Had he lived, he would have grown up to be a Frey."

Hosteen attacks Wyman with his longsword: "The blade slashed through three of his four chins in a spray of bright red blood." The room erupts in turmoil as Manderly slumps to the floor and his men come to his defense. By the time Roose Bolton is able to restore order, six of Manderly's men and two of the Freys are dead. A maester arrives with a raven, and Bolton reads the message it has brought: Stannis's company, "snowbound and starving," is three days' away. He orders Hosteen to gather his troops and leave by the main gate, and Manderly to dispatch his by the east gate. Hosteen vows that when he returns with Stannis's head, he will finish cutting off that of Manderly, who is being treated by a maester. Ramsay Bolton orders them all to prepare to fight Stannis, and Roose echoes his son: "There will be time enough to fight one another once we are done with Stannis."

Abel is called on for a song as the Freys begin to lead their horses out of the hall, and Rowan grasps Theon's arm to tell him it is time to put the plan they have discussed in effect: "Bolton is sending forth his swords. We have to reach King Stannis before they do." Theon thinks what they have planned is madness, but he gives in and goes with Rowan to the godswood. They are joined there by Squirrel, Holly, and three more of the washerwomen.

The plan is to engineer an escape for Jeyne Poole by disguising her as Squirrel, who is almost the same size. Squirrel will exit by a window and scale down the tower wall while Jeyne exits with the other maids. Theon's task is one he does regularly: to fetch the water for Jeyne's bath. The washerwomen, pretending to be Jeyne's maids, will carry it to her chambers.

Jeyne is huddled in terror in her room when they make it past the guards with the bathwater. Rowan addresses her as "Lady Arya" -- Theon hasn't revealed her true identity to his co-conspirators. They tell her that they are going to take her to her brother, which confuses Jeyne, who says she has no brothers. Theon realizes that the horribly abused girl isn't entirely sure who she is anymore, but Rowan explains that they are going to get her to Jon Snow at the Wall.

Jeyne resists, terrorized as she has been by Ramsay, and the women tell Theon to handle her. He gently persuades her to go along with the plan. They quickly dress her in Squirrel's clothing, and to Theon's surprise and relief they make it past the guards outside the door. His fear returns as they go down the stairs, but even the guards outside the doors barely look at them. Theon feels sorry for them: "Ramsay would flay them all when he learned his bride was gone, and what he would do to Grunt and Sour Alyn" -- the guards outside the bedchamber door -- "did not bear thinking about."

The snowstorm continues to conceal them as they make their way through the paths through the snow, which in places is higher than their heads. At an intersection, Rowan sends Theon and Jeyne on with Holly and Frenya, while she and the others go to fetch Abel. When they reach another pair of guards, Holly and Frenya kill them both, but Jeyne screams when she sees what is happening. Theon puts his hand over her mouth and pulls her along with him as they run.

They reach the steps to the battlements, and Theon slings Jeyne over his shoulder as he begins to climb. Halfway up, he slips on the ice and hurts his knee, but Holly helps him back to his feet and together they get Jeyne to the top of the battlements. Frenya remains behind to attack any pursuers. But when they reach the top, Holly realizes that Frenya has the rope they need to climb down. Then she is pierced by arrows and falls.

Realizing that they have been discovered, and that there are crossbowmen on the inner wall and men racing toward them with drawn swords, Theon does the only thing he can do: He grabs Jeyne and jumps.

21. A Dance With Dragons, by George R.R. Martin, pp. 549-578

The King's Prize

Stannis and his army set out from Deepwood Motte bound for Winterfell, with Asha Greyjoy a prisoner in the baggage train. The snow has not yet begun to fall, and the march is expected to take perhaps fifteen days. Only nine of her people from Deepwood remain, including Qarl and Tris.  She had yielded, and is his hostage, having gotten Stannis's vow to spare the others, who are imprisoned at Deepwood. But she knows she is worth little as a hostage. Euron couldn't care less about her.

Ser Justin Massey, who is in charge of the baggage train, has told her that the only woman Stannis respects is Melisandre. He wishes she were with them now, as he is opposed to the attack on Winterfell. The northmen were insistent, however: "Ned's girl must be rescued from the clutches of [Roose Bolton's] bastard."

Asha finds Ser Justin attractive, and it becomes obvious that he feels the same about her. Alysane Mormont, known as the She-Bear, tells her, "He wants you." Asha replies that he wants her lands, since he had lost his own in the south of the kingdom. "Stannis had frustrated Ser Justin's hopes of marrying the wildling princess that Asha had heard so much of, so now he had set his sights on her."

On the third day she begins to recognize landmarks from her earlier journey to try to persuade Theon to abandon Winterfell and come with her to Deepwood Motte, and thinks, "I failed in that as well." That night, Stannis sends for her, and she finds him staring into the fire outside his pavilion. She kneels and asks him to remove her manacles, and vows to join forces with him -- knowing that she has little in the way of forces to offer. But she makes the mistake of referring to his brother Robert, who "was renowned for turning fallen foes into friends." Ser Justin tells her later that was an error: Stannis never likes to be compared to his brother.

The snow begins to fall on the fourth day. By the third day of snow, the army begins to fall apart. The southerners are unaccustomed to it, and their big warhorses are unprepared for it, needing more food than the small horses of the men of the northern hills. The northern men also have snowshoes, and bear paws that they attach to the feet of their horses. But the warhorses shy away from attempts to attach them to their hooves. The baggage train also begins to sink into the snow.

On the fifth day, they lose five men and four horses when the baggage train tries to cross a frozen pond concealed by the snow. Asha hears the "queen's men" accompanying Stannis, the worshipers of R'hllor, talking about a sacrifice to end the storm. The wind and cold worsens, and provisions begin to run low. Any horse that collapses is slaughtered for food. The southerners begin to plead with Stannis to make camp until the storm ends, and the queen's men continue to urge a sacrifice, but Stannis ignores them both. They make less and less progress, sometimes as little as two miles a day.

By the fifteenth day of the march, they were less than half of the distance to Winterfell. Ser Justin comes to release Asha from her ankle chains, telling her that she must walk from now on. She had broken an ankle during the fight at Deepwood, but the cold numbs the pain. But by the end of the day she is so exhausted that she falls asleep at the supper table. But then there is little to eat anyway: They run out of vegetables on the twenty-sixth day, and eat the last of the grain and fodder on the thirty-second. "Asha wondered how long a man could live on raw, half-frozen horse meat."

Finally they reach an abandoned village between two frozen lakes, where fish can be taken through holes cut in the ice. Stannis agrees to the fishing, but orders them to march at first light. But Asha wakes in the morning to silence: Snow has fallen so heavily during the night that "Stannis Baratheon's host sat snowbound and unmoving, walled in by ice and snow, starving."

Daenerys

Each day brings her closer to her wedding to Hizdahr, and she is so anxious to postpone that eventually that she can't sleep. Daario shares her bed, and urges her to marry him, but they both know that's impossible. On the morning of the day before her wedding, he asks her if she is going to hold court. He has new recruits, former members of the Windblown, who want to see her, he says. "Bred and born in Westeros, most of them, full of tales about Targaryens." One of them, known as the Frog, has a gift for her. He is "Some Dornish boy. He squires for the big knight they call Greenguts." So she tells him to bring the Westerosi to court.

After he leaves, she goes out on her terrace and sees the ships of the Yunkai'i in the harbor. They are bringing wood for catapults, scorpions, and trebuchets. "Hizdahr will bring me peace," she thinks. "He must." The next day, she holds court, as Daario had wanted, but it is almost sunset before he arrives with his Westerosi, who are, she thinks, "a scruffy bunch." "Pretty Meris" is presented to her, and a series of others, equally unprepossessing, then finally the Dornishmen, Greenguts, Gerrold, and Frog. The last "was the youngest of the three, and the least impressive, a solemn, stocky lad, brown of hair and eye."

Then they reveal that they are all three knights, traveling under assumed names. They would prefer not to reveal them in such a public forum, however, so Daenerys tells Skahaz to clear the court. Then they reveal themselves as Ser Gerris Drinkwater and Ser Archibald Yronwood, but "Frog" asks if he may present his gift first. He unlaces his boot and pulls out a parchment concealed in it. Daenerys unrolls it and studies it until Ser Barristan asks if they might know what it is.

"It is a secret pact," Dany said, "made in Braavos when I was just a little girl. Ser Willem Darry signed for us, the man who spirited my brother and myself away from Dragonstone before the Usurper's men could take us. Prince Oberyn Martell signed for Dorne, with the Sealord of Braavos as witness." She handed the parchment to Ser Barristan, so he might read it for himself. "The alliance is to be sealed by a marriage, it says. In return for Dorne's help overthrowing the Usurper, my brother Viserys is to take Prince Doran's daughter Arianne for his queen." 

Ser Barristan says Robert Baratheon would have attacked Dorne if he had known, and Daenerys observes that Viserys would have sailed for Sunspear as soon as he was old enough to marry. It was wise of Doran to keep this pact a secret, she observes, and Barristan agrees.

So does Quentyn, who reveals himself now: "My father was content to wait for the day that Prince Viserys found his army," he says. Daenerys laughs, then explains she remembers a children's story about "frogs who turn into enchanged princes when kissed by their true love." But she thinks of Quentyn, "Neither enchanted nor enchanting, alas. A pity he's the prince, and not the one with the wide shoulders and the sandy hair" -- i.e., Gerris Drinkwater.

She tells Quentyn that he has come too late, that she is about to marry Hizdahr, but she orders Reznak to provide accommodations for him and his companions suitable to their station. As Barristan accompanies her to her quarters, he says, "This changes everything." But she disagrees; nothing has changed. Then she asks him what the arms of House Martell are. "A sun in splendor, transfixed by a spear," he tells her. And she remembers Quaithe's prophecies, "The pale mare and the sun's son." And "Beware the perfumed seneschal." She wishes prophecies weren't always in riddles.

That night, she and Daario have sex in every possible way. Then she gets ready for her wedding. As she is going to the sedan chair that will carry her through the streets, Quentyn appears and makes a final plea. She tells him, "One day I shall return to Westeros to claim my father's throne, and look to Dorne for help. But on this day the Yunkai'i have my city ringed in steel. I may die before I see my Seven Kingdoms. Hizdahr may die. Westeros may be swallowed by the waves."

As they are going to the Temple of the Graces, she asks Barristan, who is riding beside her, whom her father and mother would have married if their marriages had not been arranged. Barristan is embarrassed by the question, and says that her mother was "smitten" with a knight who won a tournament "and named her queen of love and beauty," but was too lowly born to marry her. As for her father, he tries to get out of telling the story by saying it's only gossip, but she insists. Prince Aerys was taken with the lady who married Tywin Lannister. Aerys drank too much at their wedding feast "and was heard to say that it was a great pity that the lord's right to the first night had been abolished. A drunken jape, no more, but Tywin Lannister was not a man to forget such words, or the ... the liberties your father took during the bedding."

Fortunately, Barristan is relieved of his embarrassment by the appearance of Hizdahr zo Loraq in his sedan chair. At the temple they are welcomed by Galazza Galare, and four hours later they are married.

18. A Dance With Dragons, by George R.R. Martin, pp. 473-499

Daenerys

Daenerys has come out to see the Astapori refugee camp, and is nauseated by the filth and disease. Ser Barristan urges her to turn back, but is, as usual, resolute. The refugees, many of them calling her "Mother," cry out for her help, but she has done all she can, sending out healers and even attempting a quarantine of the sick, but to no avail. Over the protests of Barristan and others in her retinue, she decides to nurse as many as she can, and they grudgingly join her. She also sends for the Unsullied, who have no fear of illness or death, to aid in the task.

Eventually, she returns, weary and depressed, to her pyramid, where Missandei helps her bathe before Reznak mo Reznak and the Green Grace arrive to discuss the wedding plans. She balks at some of the traditional rituals, including an inspection of her "female parts" by the women of Hizdahr's family, but agrees to be married in the Temple of the Graces instead of in a Westerosi ritual. At first she refuses to wash Hizdahr's feet, but agrees to do so if he will wash hers. But as it turns out, Hizdahr claims no more allegiance to tradition than she does.

However, he tells her that to establish peace, Yunkai will have to resume the slave trade. She observes that this is already a fait accompli: "The Yunkai'i resumed their slaving before I was two leagues from their city," and she didn't turn back. But he says the people of New Ghis don't trust her: "They would see us wed, and they would see me crowned as king, to rule beside you."

She is pondering how to reply when Barristan brings the news that the Stormcrows have returned and that the Yunkai'i are marching toward Meereen. Hizdahr protests that she is dining, but Daenerys tells him that she must speak with Daario and has Barristan show Hizdahr out. Then she changes into something more attractive to greet Daario.

He describes for her the strength of the forces moving toward Meereen by land and sea, but mentions that they have also gained some supporters: "Some Westerosi too, a score or more. Deserters from the Windblown, unhappy with the Yunkai'i." On the other hand, Brown Ben Plumm and the Second Sons have turned their cloaks and now support the Yunkai'i. Daenerys wonders if Plumm is one of the three treasons she was to experience, and if marrying Hizdahr will put an end to all of these attacks.

The news of Plumm's desertion causes an uproar, but Daenerys silences it. Then she orders the gates of the city closed, which means leaving the Astapori refugees to fend for themselves. She dismisses everyone but Daario, using the pretext that he has a wound that needs to be seen to.

Her handmaids tend to his wound, and then she sends them away, leaving her alone with Daario.

The Prince of Winterfell

Theon is helping Jeyne Poole prepare for her marriage to Ramsay Bolton. When she tells him that she "will be a better wife than the real Arya could have been," he recognizes the danger that she faces if she doesn't think of herself as Arya, just as he forces himself to think that he is Reek. He tells her that she is "Arya Underfoot. Your sister used to call you Arya Horseface." But Jeyne tells him that she is the one who made up that nickname. "Her face was long and horsey. Mine isn't. I was pretty."

She asks if Ramsay thinks she is pretty, and Theon lies, saying, "He's told me so." But she knows whom she's marrying: "They say he likes to hurt people," she says, and that he hurt Theon. But Theon claims he made him angry and that "Lord Ramsay is a ... a sweet man, and kindly." Then she begs him to help her: They could run away together, she says desperately, "I could be your wife, or your ... your whore ... whatever you wanted. You could be my man." But Theon begs her to try to please Ramsay and not to talk "about being someone else." He thinks, "Jeyne, her name is Jeyne, it rhymes with pain." He notices that her eyes are brown whereas Arya's were gray, and worries that someone will notice.

He has been chosen to give the bride away because, as Lady Dustin tells him, "You were her father's ward, the nearest thing she has to living kin." He realizes that if he is seen to accept her as Arya, the northmen gathered for the wedding "would have no grounds to question her legitimacy." And even those who suspected that she wasn't really Arya "would be wise enough to keep those misgivings to themselves." He is part of the deception, which is why he has been dressed as a lord instead of in his usual rags. When it's over, he will become Reek again, he realizes. "Unless the gods were good, and Stannis Baratheon descended on Winterfell and put all of them to the sword, himself included. That was the best he could hope for." 

The ceremony is taking place in the godswood, which Theon remembers from childhood. The hot springs make it a warm oasis in the midst of the snow, and it shrouds the faces of the guests in mist. The trees are full of ravens, and Theon thinks, "Maester Luwin's birds. Luwin was dead, and his maester's tower had been put to the torch, yet the ravens lingered." Ramsay Bolton is standing by the heart tree as he delivers Jeyne/Arya to him. She gives him a final look, pleading for him to do something, before she gives herself to Bolton.

Theon lingers as the wedding party leaves, and he hears a voice whisper, "Theon."

His head snapped up. "Who said that?" All he could see were the trees and the fog that covered them. The voice had been as faint as rustling leaves, as cold as hate. A god's voice, or a ghost's. How many died the day that he took Winterfell? How many more the day he lost it? The day that Theon Greyjoy died, to be reborn as Reek. Reek, Reek, it rhymes with shriek.

He hurries away from the godswood to the Great Hall.

In the yard, among the ruins of Winterfell, dead men were hanging from ropes. The castle had been full of squatters when Bolton and his company arrived, and those who resisted had been hanged. Those who agreed to help repair the gates and put a new roof on the Great Hall were told they would be spared. But after the work was finished, Bolton hanged them anyway. "True to his word, he showed them mercy and did not flay a one."

He makes his way into the warmth of the hall, where a bard named Abel is singing. As he passes through the crowd, he hears someone call him, "Theon Turncloak," and someone spits. "He was the traitor who had taken Winterfell by treachery, slain his foster brothers, delivered his own people to be flayed at Moat Cailin, and given his foster sister to Lord Ramsay's bed. Roose Bolton might make use of him, but true northmen must despise him."

Nevertheless, he has a seat on the dais at the high table, next to Lady Dustin. He looks at Jeyne and sees the fear in her eyes, and thinks, "I could beg her for the honor of a dance and cut her throat. That would be a kindness, wouldn't it?" And then, if the gods are kind, Ramsay would kill him. "Theon was not afraid to die. Underneath the Dreadfort, he had learned there were far worse things than death. Ramsay had taught him that lesson, finger by finger and toe by toe, and it was not one that he was ever like to forget."

Lady Dustin notices that Theon isn't eating, which is hard for him since Ramsay had broken so many of his teeth. She points out Wyman Manderly, who is wolfing down his food, "the very picture of the jolly fat man." She calls him "craven," and observes, "His son died at the Red Wedding, yet he's shared his bread and salt with Freys, welcomed them beneath his roof, promised one his granddaughter." But she knows Manderly would betray them all, and so does Roose Bolton, she says. She points out how Roose doesn't eat or drink anything until Manderly has taken some of it first. And she tells Theon, "Roose plays with men. You and me, these Freys, Lord Manderly, his plump new wife, even his bastard, we are but his playthings."

Some maesters enter the hall, and deliver news to Roose Bolton, who rises to tell the assembly that Stannis has left Deepwood Motte and could be at Winterfell in a fortnight, while Crowfood Umber is traveling down the kingsroad and the Karstarks are on the way from the east. He tells the lords to join him in his solar while Ramsay and his bride consummate the marriage.

When Lady Dustin leaves, Theon decides it is time to go, but one of Ramsay's attendants grabs him: "Ramsay says you're to bring his bride to his bed." Theon is terrified, but knows he has to obey. Jeyne is sitting alone, and Theon goes to her, realizing that she has drunk a good deal of wine. "Perhaps she hoped that if she drank enough, the ordeal would pass her by." Accompanied by some of Ramsay's men, he leads Jeyne up the stairs to the bedchamber.

Lord Ramsay is seated there when they enter, and he tells everyone but "Reek" to leave them. Then he tells Theon to undress "Ned Stark's little daughter." Theon starts to unlace her gown, but Ramsay tells him it will take too long: "Cut it off her." With the dagger in his hand, Theon thinks of killing Ramsay, but fears that he will fail and that Ramsay will flay the hand that held the dagger. Jeyne is trembling and he has to hold her still. When the gown falls, Ramsay tells him to take off her underclothes as well. When she is naked, he realizes how young she is. "Sansa's age. Arya would be even younger."

Ramsay asks what he thinks of her. She is pitiful, and there is "a spiderweb of faint thin lines across her back where someone had whipped her." But he says she is beautiful. Ramsay asks if he'd like to fuck her first: "The Prince of Winterfell should have that right, as all lords did in the days of old." He tells her to get on the bed and spread her legs, and then orders Theon, "Get her ready for me." Theon stammers, "I ... do you mean ... m'lord, I have no ... I...." (Although never stated outright, it is evident that Theon has been castrated.) Ramsay tells him to use his mouth. "And be quick about it. If she's not wet by the time I'm done disrobing, I will cut off that tongue of yours and nail it to the wall."

Theon does as he's told.

15. A Dance With Dragons, by George R.R. Martin, pp. 395-419

Daenerys

Daenerys is growing worried about the ships that are blockading Slaver's Bay, but all her admiral, Groleo, can offer her is advice to turn her dragons loose and burn them. Barristan assures her that the city is well-supplied for the time being.


Skahaz, attended by two of the guards known as Brazen Beasts because they wear animal masks of brass, tells her that Hizdahr has been visiting the wealthy of Meereen, and that it has been twenty-six days since the Sons of the Harpy have committed a murder. Skahaz believes that Hizdahr is himself the Harpy and wants to torture the truth out of him. To his displeasure, Daenerys forbids it.


He then presents her a list of all the Meereenese ships participating in the blockade, which represent all the ruling families of the city. He wants to send the Brazen Beasts to all the houses and imprison all the kin as hostages. Again, she forbids it to prevent "open war inside the city. I have to trust in Hizdahr. I have to hope for peace." Skahaz glowers as she burns the list.


Later, Barristan praises her restraint, saying her brother Rhaegar would approve. But she remembers what Jorah Mormont said: "Rhaegar fought valiantly, Rhaegar fought nobly, Rhaegar fought honorably. And Rhaegar died."


At her public hearing of grievances, there are very few attending, and Reznak mo Reznak tells her people are afraid to leave their houses. Then that evening, Galazza Galare arrives, along with Grey Worm. They tell her that a dying man arrived on a pale horse to say that Astapor is burning. He was emaciated and feverish, suffering from bloody dysentery. She realizes that if the Yunkai'i have taken Astapor, they will aim at Meereen next, and tells Barristan to recall her bloodriders and her sellswords.


Brown Ben Plumm and the Second Sons are the first to arrive, eight days later. They bring with them three Astapori with harrowing tales of the fall of the city. Two of them thank Daenerys for giving them refuge in Meereen, but she sees the truth in the eyes of the third: "She knows I cannot keep them safe. Astapor is burning, and Meereen is next." And Brown Ben says there are hundreds, even thousand of refugees still to come. "The Cats and the Windblown are swarming through the hills with lance and lash, driving them north and cutting down the laggards."


Daenerys is troubled by what to do about them: She is the one who disturbed the order in their city. Reznak mo Reznak has an answer for her: Marry Hizdahr. But Daenerys also remembers Quaithe's warning: "Beware the perfumed seneschal." Brown Ben's solution is to unleash the dragons, but she tells him she can't do that. Then they should leave Meereen, he advises, "and start west with wagons full o' gold and gems and such."


She determines, however, that they should stand and fight: "I defeated the Yunkai'i before. I will defeat them again." But her counselors disagree on the answers to her questions: "Where, though? How?" She commissions the Second Sons to scout the enemy, but she says the Astapori refugees must be welcomed. Barristan protests, "Your Grace, I have known the bloody flux to destroy whole armies when left to spread unchecked. The seneschal is right. We cannot have the Astapori in Meereen." So she tells them to set up a refugee camp outside the walls.


Privately, she consults with Barristan, whose assessment of the situation is gloomy. And she recognizes what she needs to do to at least stabilize the city: "I need Hizdahr zo Loraq."


Melisandre


In her chambers, Melisandre gazes into the fire, seeking to be sure of what she has seen there. She looks especially for "the grey girl on the dying horse," who she has told Jon is his sister Arya. She sees "A wooden face, corpse white," and it sees her. "Beside him, a boy with a wolf's face threw back his head and howled." She hears voices out of the past: "'Melony,' she heard a woman cry. A man's voice called, 'Lot Seven.'" She hears Jon Snow's name, and sees his face appear and disappear.

Now he was a man, now a wolf, now a man again. But the skulls were here as well, the skulls were all around him. Melisandre had seen his danger before, had tried to warn the boy of it. Enemies all around him, daggers in the dark. He would not listen.

She thinks, "I pray for a glimpse of Azor Ahai, and R'hllor shows me only Snow." She asks Devan, Stannis's squire, to bring her a drink of water. He was upset when Stannis left him behind to stay with Melisandre, but she had asked for him specifically, knowing that Davos had already lost four sons.


Devan suggests that she eat something, and when she sends him to fetch her breakfast she tells him to find Rattleshirt and send him to her. When he arrives, she notices that he isn't wearing his armor of bones. "He was cloaked in shadows too, in wisps of ragged grey mist, half-seen, sliding across his face and form with every step he took." When she comments on the missing bones, he tells her, "The clacking was like to drive me mad."


In the iron fetter he wears on his wrist, there is a ruby. He says he can feel its warmth, and sometimes it even burns and he's tempted to pry it out. She tells him, "The spell is made of shadow and suggestion. Men see what they expect to see. The bones are part of that," and wonders if she made a mistake by sparing him. She tells him that Lord Snow's rangers will return today, "with their blind and bloody eyes." That, he tells her, is the work of the Weeper -- one of the wildling chieftains who remained north of the Wall.


Then she tells him about the girl on the dying horse, whom she still assumes to be Arya Stark. She wants to send him out to rescue her. He scoffs at the idea: "No one ever trusted Rattleshirt but fools. Snow's not that. If his sister needs saving, he'll send his crows. I would." He asks where she saw the girl, and from her description he recognizes Long Lake. But their conversation is interrupted by the sound of a warhorn. It is the signal for returning rangers, and she tells him to stay there. When the Watch sees what has happened to the rangers, they will be angry at the wildlings.


She goes out and follows the tunnel through the Wall to where Jon and the black brothers are gathered around three spears, each with the head of a ranger impaled on the point, the eyes gouged out of each head. Bowen Marsh identifies the rangers for her, and comments that with the ground so frozen it must have taken half the night for the wildlings to drive the spears so deep. He worries that they are still close by, watching, but Jon says they have gone. "Ghost would have their scent if they were still out there." He orders the heads taken and burned until nothing but bone is left.


When he sees Melisandre, he asks her to walk with him, which pleases her. They walk slowly, according to her plan, because her warmth causes the ice in the tunnel beneath the Wall to melt and drip: "He will not fail to notice that." He asks if she has seen the other six rangers, and she tells him she hasn't. She does tell him that she had a vision of "towers by the sea, submerged beneath a black and bloody tide." He takes that to be Eastwatch, but although she isn't entirely sure that is what the vision signified, she agrees with him. She asks him to come to her chambers, and he agrees.


As they walk, she can sense his mistrust, and she recognizes it as the same mistrust Stannis once had in her. "In truth, the young lord commander and her king had more in common than either one would ever be willing to admit." She notes that he hasn't asked about Arya, and he tells her that his oath to the Watch means that he has no sister, and that there is no way he can help her. When they enter her chambers, he sees Rattleshirt and bristles. The wildling taunts him, but turns his attention to Melisandre, telling her that he'll need half a dozen good horses and some spearwives to accompany him. "The girl's more like to trust them, and they will help me carry off a certain ploy I have in mind."


Melisandre explains to Jon that she is sending Rattleshirt to rescue Arya. Jon objects, furiously, "If he tries to leave Castle Black without my leave, I'll take his head off myself." But Melisandre sends Devan away, then touches the ruby at her neck and speaks a word. "The wildling heard one word, the crow another. Neither was the word that left her lips." Suddenly, Rattleshirt is transformed into Mance Rayder. And Jon learns that it was Rattleshirt who was burned. He calls it "sorcery," but she replies, "Call it what you will. Glamor, seeming, illusion." But to her self she admits it was a difficult spell to bring off. "When the flames had licked at Rattleshirt, the ruby at her throat had grown so hot that she had feared her own flesh might start to smoke and blacken. Thankfully Lord Snow had delivered her from that agony with his arrows."


She points out that Mance won't betray him, because they hold his son and because Jon had pleaded against his execution. "There he stands, Lord Snow. Arya's deliverance. A gift from the Lord of Light ... and me."

11. A Dance With Dragons, by George R.R. Martin, pp. 276-305

Tyrion

Griff fished Tyrion out of the river, and Septa Lemore revived him. He awakes under a blanket smelling of vinegar, which Lemore claims helps prevent greyscale. Haldon gives him a knife and tells him to prick his toes and fingers; if he doesn't feel pain, he may have greyscale. He should also look for patches of grey skin: "If you see such signs," Haldon tells him, "do not hesitate. Better to lose a toe than a foot."

Tyrion passes the test, but Haldon tells him because he swallowed so much water he may be "turning to stone from inside out, starting with your heart and lungs." When they sit down to eat some broth, Tyrion notices that Haldon the table between them. But when Septa Lemore appears, she hugs him.

They have docked at the town of Selhorys, and Yandry and Ysilla have gone ashore for provisions. Young Griff, or rather Prince Aegon, has been told he has to remain on the Shy Maid for his own safety: Dothraki horsemen have been spotted as they sailed downriver from the Sorrows. They have also seen warships. Selhorys is on the eastern bank of the river, and therefore more vulnerable to Dothraki raiders.

Lemore is no longer dressed as a septa, and Tyrion wonders what she really is. She explains that the septa's robes identify her as from Westeros, and she doesn't want to attract too much attention. Tyrion invites the prince to play cyvasse, and gives him pointers on the game, telling him, "Your father knew the dangers of being overbold." Aegon asks if Tyrion knew Rhaegar, and Tyrion says he glimpsed him one or twice, but was only ten when he was killed. He comments that Lord Connington must have been a truly good friend of Rhaegar's to risk his life protecting his son, after Rhaegar's father confiscated Connington's lands and sent him into exile. If he hadn't done so, Connington "might have been on hand when my father sacked King's Landing, to save Prince Rhaegar's precious little son from getting his royal brains dashed out against a wall."

Aegon explains that he had been substituted for "some tanner's son from Pisswater Bend whose mother died birthing him." Varys had bought the baby from the tanner "for a jug of Arbor gold. He had other sons but had never tasted Arbor gold. Varys gave the Pisswater boy to my lady mother and carried me away." Tyrion knows the rest: that Varys smuggled the infant Aegon to Pentos and put him in custody of Illyrio, who then gave him to Connington to raise. He says the singers will love making songs about it if Daenerys agrees to take Aegon as her consort.

Aegon says, "She will. She must." But Tyrion cautions him that "must" isn't "a word queens like to hear." Daenerys, he says, "is the widow of a Dothraki khal, a mother dragons and sacker of cities, Aegon the Conqueror with teats. She may not prove as willing as you wish." Daenerys is strong and fierce, he says.

"Now, how do you suppose this queen will react when you turn up with your begging bowl in hand and say, 'Good morrow to you, Auntie. I am your nephew, Aegon, returned from the dead. I've been hiding on a poleboat all my life, but now I've washed the blue dye from my hair and I'd like a dragon, please ... and oh, did I mention, my claim to the Iron Throne is stronger than your own?'"

Aegon gets angry at Tyrion's words. "I have a gift for angering princes," Tyrion thinks, remembering Joffrey. Aegon says he trusts Lord Connington to help him claim Daenerys as his bride, but Tyrion warns him, "Trust no one, my prince." He suggests a different approach from the one Connington and his other advisers had been planning: "I would go west instead of east. Land in Dorne and raise my banners. The Seven Kingdoms will never be more ripe for conquest than they are right now." Tommen is a boy, the north is full of rival factions, the riverlands are in ruins, and winter is about to bring famine. "Westeros is torn and bleeding, and I do not doubt that even now my sweet sister is binding up the wounds ... with salt." Cersei is busily undoing all the alliances that Tywin had created.

He advises Aegon to land and gather all the disaffected lords to him, but to be quick about it. "Be certain you reach Westeros before my sister falls and someone more competent takes her place." Aegon objects that they need Daenerys and her dragons to win, but Tyrion explains that all he need to do is build up support "until Daenerys arrives to join her strength to yours." And she'll do that, he says, when she hears that he's alive and fighting to "reclaim the Iron Throne for House Targaryen, hard-pressed on every side.... You are the last of her line, and this Mother of Dragons, this Breaker of Chains, is above all a rescuer" who frees slaves. When she arrives in Westeros she will recognize him as her equal.

At this point, Tyrion moves a piece and announces that he has won the game. Aegon says he advised him against making the move that just won for Tyrion. "I lied," Tyrion says. "Trust no one. And keep your dragon close." Angrily, Aegon knocks over the board and commands Tyrion to pick up the pieces. Tyrion complies, thinking, "He may well be a Targaryen after all."

Yandry and Ysilla return to the boat with supplies and news: Daenerys is under siege in Meereen, and Volantis is going to join the war against her. When Griff hears this, he dispatches Haldon to gather more information, and Haldon takes Tyrion with him. As they move through the streets, a man grabs Tyrion around the neck and quickly rubs his head. Haldon, who speaks the language, asks the man why and tells Tyrion it's because rubbing a dwarf's head is good luck.

In the busy market square, a red priest is preaching, and Haldon listens to him. He tells Tyrion that the priest is calling for war, but on the side of Daenerys. The high priest of R'hllor, Benerro, has proclaimed Daenerys "the fulfillment of an ancient prophecy.... She is Azor Ahai returned." Tyrion thinks of Thoros of Myr, the only red priest he has known, and tells Haldon, "Give me priests who are fat and corrupt and cynical, ... the sort who like to sit on soft satin cushions, nibble sweetmeats, and diddle little boys. It's the ones who believe in gods who make the trouble."

Haldon takes Tyrion into an inn, where two men are playing cyvasse. He boasts, "My dwarf plays better cyvasse than both of you combined." Tyrion plays along, pointing out a bad move by one of the players. He's right, and the other player quickly wins. The winner then challenges Tyrion to a game. Haldon knows him as the customs officer in Selhorys, Qavo Nogarys.

As they are setting up their pieces, Haldon asks if there will be a war, and Qavo says that the Yunkai'i who call themselves the Wise Masters are preparing for it. They have gained the support of one of the triarchs in Volantis, Nyessos. Qavo says the stories are that Daenerys is a bloodthirsty monster, a sorceress who feeds babies to her dragons, and that she is sexually insatiable who possesses the souls of her lovers. Of course, her real sin is her attempt to end the slave trade. "The Old Blood cannot suffer that. Poor men hate her too. Even the vilest beggar stands higher than a slave. This dragon queen would rob him of that consolation."

Qavo says that although the priests of R'hllor are preaching against the attack on Daenerys, she will be greatly outnumbered, even with three dragons. Then he wins the game and takes Tyrion's silver. Outside, Tyrion persuades Haldon to let him find a whore, and Haldon agrees to wait for him in a tavern by the gate to the town. In the brothel he finds a woman and gets drunk. As he's coming down the stairs afterward, he loses his balance and falls, but he manages to turn the fall into a cartwheel, attracting attention from the patrons in the bar.

"'Imp,' a deep voice said, behind him." Tyrion sees a burly, hairy man with a whore on his lap at a table in a dark corner. Tyrion introduces himself as Hugor Hill, but the man knows who he is, and says he intends to deliver him to the queen. 

Daenerys

The Green Grace, Galazza Galare, comes to dine with Daenerys, attended by a dozen of the young priestesses, the White Graces. Galazza remarks on how tired Daenerys looks, and she admits that the attacks on the city are weighing on her. They talk about the hostages Daenerys has taken from the wealthy citizens of Meereen, two of whom are waiting on their table. Skahaz has been urging her to kill some of the children to deter the attacks of the Sons of the Harpy, but Daenerys has refused. The priestess approves of her mercy, and says it has earned her gratitude in the city.

Then the priestess gets to the point of her visit: She urges Daenerys to marry Hizdahr zo Loraq. He comes of distinguished ancestors, she says, which carries weight among the Meereenese. Their offspring will dispel her enemies. But Daenerys remembers the prophecy of Mirri Maz Duur, that she will remain barren until "the sun rises in the west and sets in the east, when the seas go dry and mountains blow in the wind like leaves." Still, if a marriage could  stop the killing, it would be worth it.

The priestess has brought Hizdahr with her, so Daenerys summons him. He claims that their marriage would put an end to strife in the city, and when she asks why he would want to help her do that, says, "Is it so strange that I would want to protect my own people, as you protect your freedmen? Meereen cannot endure another war, Your Radiance." She observes that he has said nothing about loving her, and he asks, "What is love? Desire?" Who wouldn't desire a woman as beautiful as she? Besides, she has brought new life to Meereen, which was a crumbling city of desiccated old rulers before she arrived. "Custom and caution had an iron grip upon us till you awakened us with fire and blood. A new time has come, and new things are possible. Marry me."

She tells him to kiss her, but she feels nothing when he does. "I do not love you," she tells him. He says she may learn to do so, but she doubts it, especially when Daario is still around. Finally she proposes that if ninety days and nights pass without a murder, she will consider that he is "worthy of a throne." He accepts the challenge and tells her to have her seneschal prepare for a wedding on the ninety-first day. She remembers the warning: "Beware the perfumed seneschal," and wonders if Reznak is in cahoots with Hizdahr and has set a trap for her.

When he leaves, Barristan appears. She tries to get him to say whether he approves of the marriage, but he is distant and evasive on the subject. She tells him, "Marriage or carnage, those are my choices. A wedding or a war." But he proposes a third choice: Return to Westeros and take the Iron Throne. Marrying Hizdahr would be an obstacle to that.

"She wanted Westeros as much as he did, but first she must heal Meereen." Hizdahr may fail to bring about the peace, but when Barristan asks what she will do if he doesn't fail, she says she will do her duty. She asks if her brother Rhaegar married for love or duty, and he hesitates in his answer, finally saying that "the prince was very fond of" Elia. But he adds that there was no fondness in the marriage of her father and mother, "and the realm paid dearly for that." They married, he tells her, because of the prophecy of a woods witch that a prince "would be born of their line." This is news to Daenerys.

And now Barristan has more news: Daario Naharis has returned while she was meeting with the priestess. She tells him to send Daario to her "at once," dismisses him for the evening, and sends for Irri, Jhiqui, and Missandei to help her get ready for him. "She always felt a little foolish when she was with Daario. Gawky and girlish and slow-witted." They talk of his fighting and of the troubles in the city. He suggests bringing out her dragons, but she doesn't want to talk about them: "Farmers still came to her court with burned bones, complaining of missing sheep, though Drogon had not returned to the city." In their confinement, Viserion and Rhaegal are growing more restless, and one day they heated the iron doors to their pit red hot.

She tells him of the plan to marry Hizdahr, and of the ninety days she has given him to keep the peace. Daario says he'll take care of the problem in nine days by killing her enemies. She tells herself he is "Fickle, faithless, brutal. He will never be more than he is. He will never be the stuff of kings." She is shocked when he proposes staging a wedding and then murdering all the assembled guests from the Meereenese nobility. And when he says, "Most queens have no purpose but to warm some king's bed and pop out sons for him. If that's the sort of queen you mean to be, best marry Hizdahr."

She gets angry at his insolence and dismisses him, then calls for Barristan and says she wants the Stormcrows sent out into the field again. As for Daario, he is to report to Barristan. "Give him every honor that is due him and see that his men are well paid, but on no account admit him to my presence." But she is restless that night, filled with longing for Daario, but tormented by the idea of the "butcher queen" that he would like her to be.

But then she thought of Drogon far away, and the dragons in the pit. There is blood on my hands too, and on my heart. We are not so different, Daario and I. We are both monsters.