19. A Dance With Dragons, by George R.R. Martin, pp. 500-523

The Watcher

Ser Balon Swann has brought the chest containing Gregor Clegane's head to Sunspear, where Doran Martell, Arianne, Ellaria and three of the Sand Snakes are all gathered for the opening. Areo Hotah is watching, his longaxe at the ready for potential trouble. The enormous skull is removed and placed on top of a marble column.

The deed done, Doran lets his seneschal propose a toast to King Tommen, and a feast follows. Hotah keeps his eye on Balon Swann and those he had brought with him from King's Landing. He realizes that they know something is wrong, since neither Ser Arys Oakheart nor Princess Myrcella is present at the feast. They don't know yet that Ser Arys is dead and Myrcella seriously disfigured as a result of Arianne's plot to make her queen.

Cersei has sent a letter, suggesting that Myrcella return to King's Landing for a visit and that Doran take a seat on the small council as a representative of Dorne. Doran postpones discussion of these matters until tomorrow, when they will travel to the Water Gardens, where Myrcella is staying. Doran mentions, in talking of the Water Gardens, that they had been built by one of his ancestors "to please his Targaryen bride," whose name was Daenerys. Then he says he is tired and would like to go to bed, and asks Obara Sand to help him.

As Obara pushes his wheeled chair she asks if Doran really means to send Myrcella and her betrothed, Prince Trystane, to King's Landing. "Do that, and we will never see the girl again, and your son will spend his life a hostage to the Iron Throne." He assures her that he has no intention of doing that. Maester Caleotte has followed them, carrying Ser Gregor's skull, and when they reach Doran's solar, Obara takes it ansks, "What did the Mountain look like? How do we know this is him?" Her sister, Nym, points out that Clegane was eight feet tall, and Cersei would be a fool to have faked his death. Doran agrees that the skull is large enough and that Prince Oberyn is known to have wounded Clegane so badly that his slow, agonizing death is likely. Her other sister, Tyene, agrees, saying that she knows which poison Oberyn used, and that if he even broke the skin, Clegane is dead.

Ellaria points out that all of the people who were involved in the death of Elia and her children are now dead. Oberyn's quest for vengeance for their deaths is over, and she doesn't want further vengeance for Oberyn's death. Obara, however, speaks of the chaos in Westeros, and says, "Our enemies are in disarray. The time is ripe." But Ellaria wants it to end, and tells Doran, "I can hear no more of this." He tells her that no harm will come to her children, and sends her to them.

When Ellaria is gone, he tells the Sand Snakes, "there are things that Ellaria does not know and should not know. This war has already begun." Obara agrees, and says that Arianne began it with her failed attempt to crown Myrcella. When Ser Balon sees the girl, and finds that she's missing an ear, and that Hotah killed Arys Oakheart, things will get more violent.

But Arianne has a plan: Ser Balon will be told that Gerold Dayne, Darkstar, was the one who killed Ser Arys, and that he tried to kill Myrcella. And that Myrcella will back up the story herself. But Obara insists, "If Ser Balon is allowed to carry tales back to King's Landing, drums will sound and blood will flow." But Doran is prepared for this, and he tells them he is not as weak as they think. He makes the Sand Snakes swear to serve him, then explains what he knows:

"Dorne still has friends at court. Friends who tell us things we were not meant to know. This invitation Cersei sent us is a ruse. Trystane is never meant to reach King's Landing. On the road back, somewhere in the kingswood, Ser Balon's party will be attacked by outlaws, and my son will die. I am asked to court only so that I may witness this attack with my own eyes and thereby absolve the queen of any blame. Oh, and these outlaws? They will be shouting, 'Halfman, Halfman,' as they attack. Ser Balon may even catch a quick glimpse of the Imp, though no one else will." 

Then he outlines the plan: When Balon hears the story of Darkstar's attack from Myrcella, he'll send word of it to Cersei. Myrcella will ask him to hunt down Darkstar, and Obara will accompany Balon to High Hermitage to confront Darkstar. Nymeria will accompany Myrcella to King's Landing and serve as Dorne's representative on the council. Tyene, whose mother was a septa, will go to King's Landing and cozy up to the High Septon.

The three Sand Snakes eagerly agree to their roles, and when they have left, Arianne refers to them as "Three Oberyns, with teats." She regrets that she doesn't have a role in the plot herself, but Doran tells her that she will, soon enough. He has heard from Lys that a great fleet of Volantene ships has set sail. He doesn't know who is aboard them, whether Daenerys or Quentyn, or both.

Jon

Val is setting off beyond the Wall on a mission to contact Tormund. Jon has misgivings -- six of the men he sent off on a similar mission are still missing, and three are dead -- but she thanks him for letting her try. When she has left, he returns to his chambers and is eating breakfast when Dolorous Edd tells him that Bowen Marsh, Othell Yarwyck, and Septon Cellador want to see him.

"You're here about Val," he says. And Marsh says, "The men have concerns, my lord." Jon knows that already, and he turns to Othell, who is chief builder, asking him how work is progressing at the Nightfort, which is being made ready for Queen Selyse. He says it would go faster if he had more builders, so Jon offers him the giant, whose name is Wun Weg Wun Dar Wun, but answers to Wun Wun. But Othell is afraid of giants and declines, which is okay with Jon, who is learning to communicate with the giant and learn stories about his people.

Marsh complains that Jon is sending Iron Emmett to Long Barrow and replacing him with "this savage Leathers as our master-at-arms," a position that he thinks should be filled by a knight or at least a ranger. But Jon speaks well of Leathers's fighting ability and points out that he has taken the vows and is now their brother. "The men don't trust him," Marsh insists, but Jon stifles a desire to find out which ones.

Septon Cellador's objection is to Jon's naming Satin as his steward, replacing Dolorous Edd, who is also going to Long Barrow. Satin is "a painted catamite from the brothels of Oldtown." Jon thinks, "And you are a drunk," but says that brothers who have taken their vows are not supposed to be judged by what they were before, and that Satin is a good fighter and that he has made friends. Marsh, however, insists that "the men do not like it," and asks, "Does my lord believe the men of the Night's Watch would ever follow a whore into battle?" Jon replies by enumerating the sins of other men who are now accepted as their brothers.

Marsh is obviously very angry, but he saves his chief concern for last: the corpses that are being kept in the ice cells under guard, which he cites as "a waste of two good men." But Jon informs him that he hopes they will turn into wights, which shocks the drunken septon. He explains, "My lord father used to tell me that a man must know his enemies. We understand little of the wights and less about the Others. We need to learn." This doesn't please them, especially the septon, who says he intents to "pray to the Crone to lift her shining lamp and lead you down the path of wisdom."

Finally, Jon himself brings up the topic of Val. Septon Cellador reminds him that she is "The king's prize," and that Stannis will be angry if he returns to find her gone. And Marsh asks why he thinks she will return, and is not satisfied with Jon's assurance that he believes her promise that she will. Jon explains that he sent her to offer the same terms to Tormund Giantsbane that he offered the other wildlings: "Food and shelter and peace, if he will join his strength to ours, fight our common enemy, help us hold the Wall."

Marsh is not surprised, but he protests that there may be hundreds, even thousands of them: "Some might call this treason. These are wildlings. Savages, raiders, rapers, more beast than man." But Jon replies, "Tormund is none of those things." They are human beings, he insists. "Winter is coming, my lords, and when it does, we living men will need to stand together against the dead."

He also tells them that the wildlings they found in the grove say that a witch called Mother Mole has led thousands of those who fled from the battle at the Wall to Hardhome, where they "pray and await salvation from across the sea." Hardhome sits on a natural harbor, and there are supposedly plenty of building materials and fish and game there, but six hundred years, when it was becoming a town, its inhabitants had been attacked and the city burned. "Traders reported finding only nightmarish devastation where Hardhome had stood." But now Mother Mole has been preaching "that the free folk would find salvation where once they found damnation." But Cotter Pyke has told Jon that his ships have sailed past it and that Mother Mole and her followers will find only "cold and starvation" there.

Thousands will die there, he says, but Marsh sees them only as "Thousands of enemies." So he asks Marsh what "will happen when all these enemies are dead?" They will become wights, he says, "and they will come for us."

17. A Dance With Dragons, by George R.R. Martin, pp. 448-472

Bran

Bran is sitting on a weirwood throne in the warm depths of the cavern, with ravens walking up and down his arms. He hears the children sing, and the whispers of the old man, "The last greenseer, the singers called him, but in Bran's dreams he was still a three-eyed crow." The name his mother had given him, he told Bran, was Brynden.

One of the singers, whom Meera calls Leaf because the real name is impossible to pronounce, says that most of the last greenseer "has gone into the tree." Jojen, who has recovered from the journey but still displays its effects on him, tell Bran that the trees remember "The secrets of the old gods.... Truths the First Men knew." And Meera tells Bran that he will remain after they are gone. Bran doesn't like that, and says that Meera and Jojen could also become greenseers.

"It is given to a few to drink of that green fountain whilst still in mortal flesh, to hear the whisperings of the leaves and see as the trees see, as the gods see," said Jojen. "Most are not so blessed. The gods gave me only greendreams. My task was to get you here. My part in this is done."

And Bran learns to fly, to enter a raven and take wing. The first time he tries it, however, he is clumsy and flies into a wall, but the raven is unhurt. When he succeeds he realizes that there is someone else in the raven with him, a girl. He tells Lord Brynden this, and the greenseer says that the earliest singers taught the First Men how to send messages by raven, but did so by inhabiting the birds and speaking the message. A shadow of these singers often remains in the birds. Lord Brynden also tells him, "Only one man in a thousand is born a skinchanger, ... and only one skinchanger in a thousand can be a greenseer."

Bran learns more about the children of the forest from Leaf, including the fact that they are more like "Little wise men of the forest." They are smaller than men, but they are older than they appear. They have "nut-brown skin, dappled like a deer's with paler spots, and large ears that could hear things that no man could hear." In addition to cat's eyes, they have only three fingers and a thumb, and instead of nails have sharp black claws.

Jojen and Meera decide to explore the underground river, which is six hundred feet below the part of the cavern where they dwell, but the climb is too steep for Hodor to carry Bran on his back. So without telling the others, Bran slips into Hodor's body and makes the journey with them. (Hodor now acquiesces, though a little reluctantly, when Bran enters him.) Meera catches a blind white fish with her frog spear, but Jojen grows so weak on the return journey that Hodor has to haul him up with a rope tied around his waist.

Bran sometimes goes out with Summer and the wolf pack, or flies around as a raven, inspecting the icy world outside the cave, or explores the cave in Hodor's body. He finds a cavern full of singers entwined with weirwood roots like Lord Brynden. Bran is still frightened of Lord Brynden, a ghastly sight with the roots sprouting from his body, and it bothers him that one day he will be like the greenseer, remembering that he used to want to be a knight and that he "used to run and climb and fight. It seemed a thousand years ago."

Jojen is declining, growing "more sullen and solitary, to his sister's distress," and Meera says her brother wants to go home. The greendreams have shown him his fate, and he is distressed by the fact that he can't do anything about it. She begins to cry, regretting that they had made the journey that his greendreams had compelled him to make.

The weeks pass and finally Lord Brynden tells Bran that it is time for him "to go beyond skinchanging and learn what it means to be a greenseer." Leaf brings him a weirwood bowl with a paste in it made of weirwood seeds. Lord Brynden tells him it "will help awaken your gifts and wed you to the trees." Bran isn't so sure about this, but he eats the paste. Then Lord Brynden tells him to enter the weirwood roots the way he enters Summer. He does so, and suddenly he is back at Winterfell, watching his father cleaning the greatsword Ice. Bran whispers, "Winterfell," and his father hears him and asks who's there. It startles Bran so much that he quickly returns to the cavern.

He tells Leaf and Lord Brynden what he saw, but Leaf says, "You saw what you wished to see. Your heart yearns for your father and your home, so that is what you saw." Lord Brynden says that he was "looking through the eyes of the heart tree in your godswood," and that time is different for a tree. When Bran insists that his father heard him, Lord Brynden says that he may have heard something but that Bran can't speak to him. "The past remains the past. We can learn from it, but we cannot change it." Once his skills have developed, Bran can see what the trees have seen at any time in the past, and "in time you will see well beyond the trees themselves."

Hodor takes Bran back to his chamber, where he tries to stay awake so he can tell Meera and Jojen what happened, but suddenly he is back at Winterfell watching his father when he was much younger. He hears Ned say, "...let them grow up close as brothers, with only love between them, ... and let my lady wife find it in her heart to forgive...." Bran speaks to him again, and his father stops his prayer and looks at the weirwood for a moment before resuming his prayer. Then suddenly his father disappears and two children were dueling with broken branches. One is a girl, who is taller than the boy she is dueling with, so he assumes that it's Arya and himself, though he had never worn his hair as long as the boy.

Then other visions follow. One is of a naked woman, pregnant, who prays for a son to avenge her. Then a brown-haired girl who kisses a tall young knight, followed by a youth who trims branches from the tree to make arrows. The tree itself grows smaller, as do the other trees around it, and the men he sees have faces that he knows from the statues in the crypt. And finally he witnesses a man and woman with a captive. The woman cuts the captive's throat, and as the blood flows out of him, Bran can taste it.

Jon

Jon is looking down at the haunted forest from the top of the wall. It has snowed for several days, but now the sun has come out, and he tells Dolorous Edd to have Emmett prepare his recruits and an escort of rangers armed with dragonglass. He intends to command the party which will take the recruits to the weirwoods to say their vows.

When he reaches the ground to prepare for departure, Bowen Marsh comes to protest that the Weeper may be out there ready to attack, but Jon says the grove is only two hours away and that they will be back by midnight. Marsh continues to protest that it's unwise, but Jon insists that the vows are important. Besides, he tells Marsh, he has Ghost to protect them.

However, when they exit the tunnels under the Wall, Ghost bounds away, having sensed something. So they proceed without him. As they ride, Iron Emmett tells Jon there is talk of trouble at "Harlot's Tower." Jon corrects him: "Hardin's Tower," which he has designated as a residence for the spearwives and younger girls who had come from Mole's Town. He doesn't want the place getting a bad reputation. Emmett says he "should put guards around the women," but Jon replies, "And who will guard the guards?" He had broken his own vows with Ygritte, so he knows how easy it can be. But he tells Emmett he plans to open three more of the castles, and that the Long Barrow will be staffed by women except for the commander and the chief steward. When Emmett asks "what poor fool will get that choice command?" Jon says that Emmett will, and Dolorous Edd will be his steward.

Jon reflects on the trouble he has had integrating the wildlings with the Watch. "There were nights when Jon Snow wondered if he had not made a grievous mistake by preventing Stannis from  marching all the wildlings off to be slaughtered. I know nothing, Ygritte, he thought, and perhaps I never will."

As they approach the grove, Ghost appears, and then Tom Barleycorn, whom Jon had sent ahead to scout. Barleycorn tells him that there are wildlings in the grove. He counted nine, mostly women, but one child and a giant as well. Some may be dead or just sleeping. Jon decides to proceed on foot. It is coming on night. The wildlings are huddled around a small fire. The child is the first to see them, and his cry wakes the giant, who picks up a maul when he sees Iron Emmett's sword.

Ghost bares his teeth, but Jon pulls the wolf back, saying that they don't want a battle here. "This is a holy place," he says, and asks them to yield. The giant bellows and slams his maul against the ground, but the ranger known as Leathers speaks the Old Tongue and persuades the giant to yield. When Jon asks what he told the giant, Leathers says, "That they were our gods too. That we came to pray."

Of the nine wildlings, two are dead already. The rest are weak or wounded. They had come together after Stannis's attack and decided to die in the weirwood grove. Jon asks why they didn't yield, and they tell him that they had heard those who yielded were burned. "Melisandre, Jon thought, you and your red god have much and more to answer for." He assures them that if they return with him, they will be safe and fed and sheltered.

The recruits take their vows, and the group returns with the wildlings, carrying the corpses as well. It takes much longer returning than it did going out, and it is almost dawn when they reach the Wall. The Giant has to crawl through the tunnels on hands and knees.

Jon finds a letter from Stannis waiting for him, telling him that Deepwood Motte had been taken with the help of the mountain clans, and that Alysane Mormont had burned Greyjoy's longships and captured their crews. The victory has caused other northmen to join with him, and they now have five thousand men. Word has come that Bolton is going to marry Arya at Winterfell, so they are going to march against him.

Jon has mixed feelings about this news: "Battles had been fought at Winterfell before, but never one without a Stark on one side or the other." He has his doubts about whether Stannis should attack Winterfell, which even in ruins was a strong castle. And he wonders about the reference to Arya, given Melisandre's vision of the girl who had escaped. Perhaps the wedding is only a ruse, and Bolton doesn't really have Arya. "A grey girl on a dying horse, fleeing from her marriage. On the strength of those words he had loosed Mance Rayder and six spearwives on the north." He is full of doubts.

10. A Dance With Dragons, by George R.R. Martin, pp. 253-275

Reek

Still clinging for dear life to the persona of Reek, Theon sets off for Moat Cailin. He no longer reeks and is dressed warmly for the first time in many months, but he still suspects that he is going to be the butt of some horrible trick played by Ramsay Bolton. Lord Ramsay had reminded him, even as Theon was being bathed, "You'll always be Reek, no matter how sweet you smell."

Moat Cailin had been taken by the ironmen, but it is in ruins. Its strategic value remains: "The only dry road through the Neck was the causeway, and the towers of Moat Cailin plugged its northern end like a cork in a bottle." As Theon draws nearer to it, the number of rotting corpses he encounters increases.

"The garrison will never know me," he thinks. Even if some of them knew him as a boy before he went to Winterfell as Lord Eddard's ward and hostage, he is unrecognizable: His hair has turned white and he has lost much of it. He is feeble and thin from his ordeal in the dungeons. And although he is wearing gloves, a close observer can see that he has lost three of his fingers.

A voice calls out from the castle, challenging him. Theon raises the peace banner and signals that he is unarmed. Even if the men in the castle fill him with arrows, he thinks, it would be a swift death compared to what Ramsay would deal out to him if he returned a failure. And an arrow does fly, but it pierces the banner, which he drops as he falls from the saddle. The voice tells him to get inside, quickly. Another arrow flies as he scrambles through the gate.

The man grabs him and puts a knife to his throat. Tyrion quickly says he is ironborn, and Lord Balon's son, which the man doubts. He continues, "Lord Ramsay took me captive after Winterfell. He's sent me here to treat with you. Do you command here?" The man tells him he only guards the door, and that Ralf Kenning is in charge.

On the floor next to the guard is a corpse, and Theon learns that he died of drinking the water. So many have died that they no longer take the trouble to cart them off but just leave them where they are. When Theon asks how many of the garrison are left, the man doesn't know. He says that in one tower there were only two men left alive, and they were eating the dead. The man sent to find out about them killed them, too.

"Moat Cailin has fallen, Reek realized then, only no on has seen fit to tell them." He asks to see Kenning, but the man says he hasn't seen him in a while. He was dying, and may be dead. But he agrees to take Theon to him. Kenning is feverish and covered with oozing sores and his own vomit. The guard tells him that Kenning was shot with a poisoned arrow by one of the people who live in the swamps. Theon decides that the only thing to do is put Kenning out of his misery, so he takes the captain's sword and cuts his throat. Then Theon and the guard fleet the awful stench that issues from the body.

He asks where the rest of the men are and is taken to the great hall. He remembers being there once with Robb and the Greatjon and Roose Bolton. There are about two dozen men in the hall. He tells them that Kenning is dead, and asks who was second in command. They just stare at him, so he tells them that he is there on Ramsay Bolton's orders, and that they are caught between his forces and that of his father. "Lord Ramsay is prepared to be merciful if you yield Moat Cailin to him before the sun goes down." He has letters to that effect that he shows them, but no one seems interested.

One  of the men stands up and says, "Dagon Codd yields to no man." And the guard says, "Victarion commanded us to hold, he did. I heard him with my own ears." Theon tells them that his uncle isn't returning to Moat Cailin. "The kingsmoot crowned his brother Euron, and the Crow's Eye has other wars to fight." They have been "left behind to die." He can see that they have already realized this fact, and he tells them Ramsay Bolton will treat them honorably, though he thinks: "He has only taken toes and fingers and that other thing, when he might have had my tongue, or peeled the skin off my legs from heel to thigh."

Dagon Codd remains defiant, and draws his longsword. But he is felled by a throwing axe from one of the other men, and Theon has won. In the end there are fifty-eight men who are strong enough to march and to carry five others as they accompany Theon back to Bolton. When they reach the castle Lord Ramsay appears, and he orders them fed and the wounded among them taken to the maesters.

Bolton praises his "old friend Reek," and asks what he wants as a reward. Theon knows enough to be very careful. "Give him the answer that he wants," he tells himself, so he fawningly says, "my place is here, with you. I'm your Reek. I only want to serve you." But he asks for "red wine, the strongest that you have, all the wine a man can drink." Bolton laughs and says, "You're not a man, Reek. You're just my creature. You'll have your wine, though." And he tells him he can sleep with the dogs instead of returning to the dungeon.

Theon drinks himself into a stupor, but when he wakes briefly, "Somewhere in the night, men were screaming." He goes back to sleep. The next morning, Ramsay sends word to his father that Moat Cailin is no threat. Along the road, "wooden stakes were driven deep into the boggy ground; there the corpses festered, red and dripping." Theon knows that there are sixty-three of them, the men he had promised honorable treatment.  

Three days later, Roose Bolton arrives with a huge contingent of Freys and other northmen. "Collared and chained and back in rags again, Reek followed with the other dogs at Lord Ramsay's heels when his lordship strode forth to greet his father." Theon remembers how he used to make fun of Roose Bolton to Robb Stark, mimicking his soft voice and making fun of his use of leeches. Now he looks at Bolton and realizes "that he had more cruelty in his pinky toe than all the Freys combined."

Then Bolton has two women descend from the coach in which they had been riding. One is very fat, Roose's new wife, Walda Frey. The other is Ramsay Bolton's intended bride, the fake Arya Stark. Theon knows immediately that this can't be Arya, and he thinks for a moment and realizes, "That's Sansa's little friend, the steward's girl. Jeyne, that was her name. Jeyne Poole."

She makes a deep obeisance to Ramsay, and Theon thinks, "The real Arya Stark would have spat in his face." But she promises to make him a good wife and give him strong sons. "'That you will,' promised Ramsay, 'and soon.'"

Jon

Stannis has  marched south, and Jon now leads a contingent southward to talk with the wildlings, though not before Bowen Marsh has registered his complaint about such dealings with the former enemy. On the way, Dolorous Edd points out that the wildlings have begun to carve faces into trees: "The wildlings brought their gods with them after all," he thinks, defying Melisandre's attempt to demonstrate the power of her red god.

The faces that the First Men and the children of the forest had carved into the weirwoods in eons past had stern or savage visages more oft than not, but the great oak looked especially angry, as if it wee about to tear its roots from the earth and come roaring after them. Its wounds are as fresh as the wounds of the men who carved it.

They reach Mole's Town, where the buildings above ground were torched by the Magnar of Thenn before his attack on Castle Black. But the underground dwellings and tunnels are more alive than ever, with a new population of free folk. They begin to emerge from the tunnels when Jon's contingent arrives, and he notes that there are three times as many women as men, but very few infants. "The babes in arms died during the march, he realized, and those who survived the battle died in the king's stockade."

There are many men with visible wounds, such as missing legs, arms, and eyes, but Jon recognizes some fighting men among them too. The black brothers in his contingent begin distributing food, but immediately there are scuffles and disputes and complains that it's not enough. He calls on one of his men to sound the horn, which quiets them. Then he addresses the crowd, telling them that they're giving them what they can, and pointing out that the Watch needs its share to defend the Wall. He talks about the wights, and says, "It's us that keeps you safe, the black crows you despise."

If they want more food, he says, they need to join in the defense of the Wall: "The food's for fighters. Help us hold the Wall, and you'll eat as well as any crow." But he thinks, "Or as poorly, when the food runs short." Sigorn, the new  Magnar of Thenn, says they should kill the Watch instead, but Jon reminds him that if they do, there will be no one to defend the Wall. "Winterfell's walls were strong as well, but Winterfell stands in ruins today, burned and broken. A wall is only as good as the men defending it."

A confusion of voices rises, but Jon speaks up again, telling them that they don't have to join the Watch and take the black, or worship any particular god or gods to help defend the Wall. "It's spears we need. Bows. Eyes along the Wall." He'll take any boy over twelve who can hold a spear or use a bow, and he needs help just maintaining the Wall and doing ordinary tasks. "I will take as many spearwives as will come," he adds. A girl who reminds him of Arya asks about girls, and he says he'll take them sixteen or older. When she protests that he's taking boys as young as twelve, he realizes that he's talking to wildlings: "As you will. Boys and girls as young as twelve. But only those who know how to obey an order." And he warns them that he'll have the head of anyone who disobeys an order and that his brothers have seen him do it.

The girl is the first to volunteer, and gradually others come forward, led by Halleck, the brother of Harma Dogshead: "'I don't like you, crow,' he growled, 'but I never liked the Mance neither, no more'n my sister did. Still, we fought for him. Why not fight for you?'" This breaks down the barrier, and a flood of others follows. But not the Thenns. Sigorn turns and leaves, and his contingent follows him.

In the end, there are sixty-three volunteers. Bowen Marsh still grumbles, worrying about feeding them, and whether they can be relied on if the Wall is attacked by Tormund Giantsbane and his followers instead of by the Others. Jon can only say he hopes that won't happen.

4. A Dance With Dragons, by George R.R. Martin, pp. 83-111

The Merchant's Man

Quentyn Martell is on a stinking ship, pretending to be the servant of Gerris Drinkwater, who is playing the role of a wineseller. Gerris fits the role of master better: He is tall and handsome, with an arrogant swagger. Prince Quentyn, on the other hand, is plain and stocky. Gerris is attempting to find passage from Volantis to Meereen, in support of Quentyn's plan to win the hand of Daenerys.

They have been in Volantis for twenty days, trying to persuade the captains of various ships to take them, but no one wants to brave the war being waged in Slaver's Bay. Finally, the captain of the ill-smelling Adventure agrees to take them for thrice his usual fee. Quentyn is suspicious of the captain, and they make no commitment. Their voyage started off badly: They lost three of their company aboard the Meadowlark when it was attacked by pirates.

As they walk through the market square in Volantis, they come upon a pair of dwarfs, putting on a show: They are dressed in wooden armor and jousting, one riding a pig, the other a large dog. Gerris wants to stop and watch this amusement, but Quentyn is in no mood. They go to the Merchant's House, where a quartet of sellswords are trying to recruit men for their army, the Windblown, which has been hired by Yunkai.

At their room, they are admitted by the third surviving member of the party, Ser Archibald Yronwood, an enormous man, who has been urging them to make the journey overland. Quentyn is still considering the possibility of the Adventure, but Gerris has turned against it after considering the prospect of having to "endure that stench for months on end." He says a new idea has just occurred to him.

Jon

Jon has summoned Gilly, to whom he says, "I have something hard to tell you." She asks if it's about Mance Rayder, who is threatened with execution, but he says that it's about Mance's son, whom Gilly is nursing. She pleads with Jon not to let Melisandre burn the child, as she has threatened to do in part of her dragon-summoning ritual. He says that the only way to do that is for her to leave with Mance's child, but she must leave her own behind: "Take both boys and the queen's men will ride after you and drag you back. The boy will still burn ... and you with him." He promises that he will find a wet nurse for her son and raise him at Castle Black.

She leaves, and Samwell Tarly appears a few minutes later, carrying a stack of books. Jon shows him a letter that Maester Aemon has drafted for him to King Tommen. He remembers Tommen, heavily padded, as a little boy fighting Bran with wooden swords: "Yet Bran's dead, and pudgy pink-faced Tommen is sitting on the Iron Throne, with a crown nestled among his golden curls." Sam observes that Jon hasn't signed the letter. Jon admits that he is worried about the implications: "No letter will make the Lannisters love us better. Not once they hear that we've been helping Stannis." But in the end he agrees to sign it.

Sam says that he saw Gilly almost in tears as he was arriving, and Jon says he is sending her and "the boy" away -- not indicating that the boy is Mance's son, not hers. He asks Sam about what he has learned from his reading about the Others. Much of it is what they already know: The Others are vulnerable to obsidian, or dragonglass, and their thralls must be burned. "Some accounts speak of giant ice spiders too. I don't know what those are." But he has also read an account that speak of Others being slain by "dragonsteel." Jon wonders if this means Valyrian steel, and Sam says that was his guess, too. He needs more time to research it.

Jon breaks the news that Sam doesn't have more time: He is going with Gilly, along with Maester Aemon. If Melisandre needs royal blood for her spells, Aemon Targaryen fits the profile. Sam is to take Aemon to Oldtown, and either send Gilly on to his family at Horn Hill or Aemon will find a position as servant at the Citadel, where Sam is to study to become Jon's new maester. Sam's various fears come rushing out, but Jon shuts him up, forcing himself to be stern with his friend and with himself: "Kill the boy, Jon thought. The boy in you, and the one in him. Kill the both of them, you bloody bastard."  Sam leaves in distress, and Jon reflects on how difficult it was to follow the advice Maester Aemon had given him: "Kill the boy, Jon Snow. Winter is almost upon us. Kill the boy and let the man be born." He goes outside, where he hears that Stannis has sent a pair of men, Ser Richard Horpe and Ser Justin Massey, south on the kingsroad. He decides to let Stannis have his secrets.

In the morning he sees off Sam, Aemon, and Gilly before dawn. When they have left, he goes to meet with Bedwyck, a small man facetiously known as Giant, whom he has sent for. He tells Giant that he is garrisoning Icemark, one of the castles on the Wall, and putting him in charge of it, particularly to watch for climbers. When Giant asks if he is garrisoning all the castles he says yes, "but for the moment, it will just be Icemark and Greyguard." He intends to put Janos Slynt in charge of Greyguard.

Slynt, whom Jon had commanded to meet him at first light, doesn't show up until half the morning is gone. And when Jon tells him he is putting him at Greyguard, he is surprised, and then angry:

Slynt's face had turned the color of a prune. His meaty jowls began to quiver. "Do you think I cannot see what you are going? Janos Slynt is not a man to be gulled so easily. I was charged with the defense of King's Landing when you were soiling your swaddling clothes. Keep your ruin, bastard."

Jon tells him, "That was a command, not an offer," but Slynt continues to refuse.

Jon bides his time, and the next morning finds Slynt at breakfast with Ser Alliser Thorne. Jon enters accompanied by his supporters, and tells Slynt that he has had Slynt's horse made read for his ride to Greyguard. When Slynt defies him again, Jon asks if he is refusing the order, and Slynt replies, "You can stick your order up your bastard's arse." Jon orders Slynt taken to the Wall and hanged.

Slynt is dragged out, protesting, as the residents of Castle Black, including Stannis, come out to watch. Then Jon calls out, "Stop." He orders Dolorous Edd to fetch a block, and draws Longclaw. When he chops off Slynt's head, he looks at Stannis. "For an instant their eyes met. Then the king nodded and went back inside his tower."

2. A Dance With Dragons, by George R.R. Martin, pp. 31-59

Daenerys

Despite the insistence of Ser Barristan that she doesn't need to do so, and the fears of her handmaids Irri and Jhiqui that "It is bad luck to touch the dead," Daenerys insists on seeing the body of one of the Unsullied who has been found dead. He is a victim of the assassins known as the Sons of the Harpy, who are waging a guerrilla war against Daenerys's regime. The dead man is known as Stalwart Shield, and although he is a eunuch, his body was found in a brothel. Grey Worm, the captain of her Unsullied, tells her that eunuchs often go to brothels just to be held by the women: "Even those who lack a man's parts may still have a man's heart."

Ser Barristan informed Daenerys that this is a type of warfare for which even the Unsullied are ill-trained, being used to the battlefield rather than to terrorist acts. She realizes that maintaining her hold over Meereen will be more complicated than she had thought. She returns to her quarters in the Great Pyramid and walks restlessly on her terrace, pondering this face. Her dragons Viserion and Rhaegal are there, but they have been growing wilder lately -- and growing in size as well. She thinks, "I have left them too much to themselves, but where am I to find the time for them?"

Irri and Jhiqui help her prepare for an audience with the Meereenese public, which involves donning the Ghiscari tokar, a clumsy fringed garment that is wound around the body and makes walking difficult. "It was not a garment meant for any man who meant to work. The tokar was a master's garment, a sign of wealth and power." It also includes a headdress that looks rather like a pair of floppy rabbit ears. Daenerys wanted to get rid of the tokar, but Galazza Galare, the high priestess known as the Green Grace advised her that it would be a public relations disaster to do so. "These Meereenese were a sly and stubborn people who resisted her at every turn," so Daenerys conceded this point.

She is attended by her seneschal, Reznak mo Reznak, a flattering, perfumed courtier, and by the head of her city watch, Skahaz mo Kandaq, who has shaved his head as a sign of acceptance of Daenerys's new regime. He is known as the Shavepate. Daenerys doesn't fully trust these advisers: "The Undying of Qarth had told her she would be thrice betrayed. Mirri Maz Duur had been the first, Ser Jorah the second. Would Reznak be the third? The Shavepate? Daario? Or will it be someone I would never suspect, Ser Barristan or Grey Worm or Missandei?"

In the meeting hall, she is announced by Missandei, the scribe she had rescued from slavery in Astapor, and the first person to present his request to her is an Astapori, "a former slave who called himself Lord Ghael, though no one seemed to know what he was lord of." He gives her a pair of slippers from the current king at Astapor, Cleon the Great. She puts them on, but they pinch her feet. He urges her to join in an attack on Yunkai, which reverted to slavery after Daenerys left. But Daenerys knows that Astapor is no better, and suggests that Cleon find a way to feed his people before making war.

Reznak next introduces a wealthy merchant named Hizdahr zo Loraq. When she conquered Meereen, she closed the fighting pits where men battled to the death; Hizdahr owns most of them, and want her to reopen them. She has already refused the request five times, and makes it a sixth. She repeats Hizdahr's earlier arguments to him: The pits are historic, they are part of the religious ritual of blood sacrifice to the gods of Ghis, they are a demonstration of athletic skill, reopening them would win her good will, they draw visitors and trade to Meereen, they satisfy people's innate blood lust, and they serve as a venue for trial by combat as part of the system of justice.

Hizdahr compliments her recital: "I see that you are eloquent as well as beautiful." Reznak also whispers to her that they are a significant source of tax revenue. But Daenerys refuses him again. Still, she observes to herself that Reznak and the Green Grace had been urging her to marry a Meereenese noble to solidify her authority over the city, and she thinks it might be worth taking a good look at Hizdahr.

The next petitioner is Grazdan zo Galare, a cousin of the Green Grace. "The priestess was a voice for peace, acceptance, and obedience to lawful authority," so Daenerys knows she should be careful in listening to and answering him. He wants a share of the profits of some of his former slaves, women who had been trained in weaving at his household and who now have opened a shop of their own. Daenerys asks him the name of the slave who taught the women to weave, and he can't remember it. She orders that he not only have no share in their profits, but that he buy them the finest loom available: "That is for forgetting the name of the old woman."

She tells Reznak to call on a freedman next, and to alternate between former masters and former slaves from now on. The cases she hears are a parade of grievances, and Daenerys thinks, "I am queen over a city built on dust and death." She grows tired, her crown grows heavy, and the bench she sits on grows hard: "I have too many councillors and too few cushions." Finally, there is a throng of claimants for compensation for livestock killed by her dragons.

Some claims were false, she did not doubt, but more were genuine. Her dragons had grown too large to be content with rats and cats and dogs. The more they eat, the larger they will grow, Ser Barristan had warned her, and the larger they grow, the more they'll eat. Drogon especially ranged far afield and could easily devour a sheep a day. "Pay them for the value of their animals," she told Reznak, "but henceforth claimants must present themselves at the Temple of the Graces and swear a holy oath before the gods of Ghis."

The claimants file out, grumbling, but one man, holding a sack, remains behind. Missandei proclaims an end to the hearing, but Daenerys notices the man and asks what he wants. He opens the sack and empties the bones, saying, "It were the black one...." Reznak tells him to get his compensation tomorrow, but Barristan tells him to shut up. Those aren't sheep bones, he says.

"No, Dany thought, those are the bones of a child."

Jon

Jon is dreaming he is Ghost, racing through a moonlit forest. As he races, the moon calls out, "Snow."

Once they had been six, five whimpering blind in the snow beside their dead mother, sucking cool milk from her hard dead nipples whilst he crawled off alone. Four remained ... and one the white wolf could no longer sense.

The moon continues calling out, "Snow, snow, snow!" until finally Lord Commander Mormont's raven wakes Jon. His steward, Dolorous Edd Tollett enters to ask if he wants breakfast. Jon asks him if there has been any trouble with the wildlings penned in the stockade, many of whom were women who were being sneaked out by the guards to sleep with them. Dolorous Edd says no, but there were more wildlings arriving.

Jon remembers his wolf dream, which like others of its kind had been stronger than ever before. Ghost knows of Grey Wind's death, he realizes, but he also knows that Summer and Shaggydog, Bran and Rickon's direwolves, are still alive. It was Summer who saved his life at Queenscrown, and he wonders "if some part of his dead brothers lived on inside their wolves."

On his way to the King's Tower, he meets Samwell Tarly, who has just delivered a letter to Stannis. Jon asks Sam about his longbow practice, and Sam says he's been reading up on it, but he gets blisters when he practices. At the entrance to the king's quarters, he is forced by the guards to surrender his weapons. Inside, Stannis is poring over a map; Melisandre is sitting by the fire. Stannis is angry because he has sent out ravens to all of the Stark bannermen asking for their support, but only the Karstarks have come around to his support. Jon knows this is because Rickard Karstark has no choice, having alienated both the Starks and the Lannisters.

Stannis angrily probes Jon about ways to enlist the support of the bannermen and of the wildlings, but receives no satisfactory answers from him. He is already vexed with Jon for refusing his offer to make Jon legitimate and the lord of Winterfell. Jon now tells him that he is sending Gilly and her baby south from Eastwatch, and he continues to refuse to cede the abandoned castles along the Wall to Stannis. In fact, he asks Stannis for men to garrison them. They don't need to join the Watch, "so long as they obey my officers as they would your own."

Stannis retorts that Jon is "only lord commander by my sufferance. You would do well to remember that." When Jon replies that he was chosen by his brothers, Stannis says that Alliser Thorne and Janos Slynt dispute that. "Your Grace knows that I was fairly chosen," Jon replies. "The Wall is mine." Stannis threatens that if any of the castles on the Wall fall to the enemy, Jon's head will follow, and orders him out.

Melisandre says she will accompany Jon to his chambers, and as they go down the steps says, "His Grace is growing fond of you." Jon replies, "I can tell. He only threatened to behead me twice." She tells him that she has seen Jon in her fires, and that he has enemies:

"It is not the foes who curse you to your face that you must fear, but those who smile when you are looking and sharpen their knives when you turn your back. You would do well to keep your wolf close beside you. Ice, I see, and daggers in the dark. Blood frozen red and hard, and naked steel. It was very cold."

And her final words to him are the same as Ygritte's: "you know nothing, Jon Snow."