24. A Dance With Dragons, by George R.R. Martin, pp. 632-660

Jaime

Jaime is making his way to Raventree, the besieged castle that is one of the last holdouts of Robb Stark's short-lived kingdom. If he can end this siege he can make his way back to King's Landing and deal with Cersei, whose call for help he has ignored. He goes to meet with Lord Jonos Bracken, who has been attempting to starve the castle into submission, but walks in on him in flagrante with a camp follower.

Once she is sent on her way and Bracken has dressed himself, Jaime talks with him about proposing terms of surrender to Lord Blackwood. Bracken wants to make sure that he takes a share of the lands now belonging to Blackwood. Bracken had been loyal to Robb Stark until the Red Wedding, when he switched allegiance to Tommen, so Jaime is not inclined to be terribly generous. Still he promises Bracken some of the lands he wants.

Under a flag of truce, Jaime goes to meet Lord Tytos Blackwood and arranges the terms of surrender. Blackwood agrees to all of them, but when it comes to naming a hostage he resists parting with his daughter, Bethany. Jaime finally agrees to take his "bookish" son Hoster, "a gangling, gawky boy" about sixteen. When he returns to Bracken with Hoster, the lord calls the boy a "weakling" and says "any one of my girls could snap him like a rotten twig." So Jaime takes the opportunity to order Bracken to send one of his daughters to King's Landing to serve the queen.

He summons Hoster to ride alongside him, and hears a good deal of the local history from the boy, whose interest in books reminds him of Tyrion until he remembers what his brother had done. The Brackens and Blackwoods have been fighting and intermarrying for centuries, and Jaime tells Hoster of his father's advice: "Never wound a foe when you can kill him. Dead men don't claim vengeance." But when Hoster asks if that's why the Lannisters killed all the Starks, Jaime has to admit that not all of the Starks are dead, including the one, Sansa, whom he had sent Brienne to find.

They camp at Pennytree, where the villagers have all taken refuge in the holdfast. Rather than force them out, Jaime tells his men to take shelter in the houses but not to steal anything. He is contemplating the tree that gives the town its name -- an ancient oak with hundreds of copper pennies nailed to it -- when  a scout arrives with none other than Brienne, who had asked to see him.

Jaime is startled by her face, and the fact that she looks ten years older. She tells him that she has found Sansa and that she's a day's ride away. "I can take you to her, ser ... but you will need to come alone. Elsewise, the Hound will kill her."

Jon

Melisandre is praying to R'hllor, with Queen Selyse and the queen's men in attendance, though Jon notices that many of the men are obviously not devout followers of the Lord of Light. He suspects that Stannis had a hand in selecting them. Alys Karstark is being married to Sigorn, the Magnar of Thenn. Alys's uncle, Cregan, had pursued her with four men, one of whom died in the fight they started. The living ones are now imprisoned in ice cells in the Wall.

Jon offers to have Satin show the queen the way to the wedding feast, but Ser Malegorn, one of the queen's men, steps up to say he will escort Selyse, intimating his contempt for the former male prostitute. As the royal party makes its way, the fool Patchface chants nonsense. Melisandre tells Jon that she has seen Patchface in her flames and considers him dangerous. Jon asks if she has seen Stannis, but she says whenever she tries, all she sees is snow. But she also tells Jon, "I see your face every time I look into the flames. The danger that I warned you of grows very close now."

Jon continues to doubt Melisandre's visions, and he reminds her that she was mistaken about the "grey girl on a dying horse, fleeing from a marriage" -- she turned out to be Alys, not Arya. But Melisandre insists, "The vision was a true one. It was my reading that was false. I am as mortal as you, Jon Snow. All mortals err." She urges him to keep Ghost close beside him.

Jon goes to the ice cell where Cregan Karstark is imprisoned and tells him that Alys is married. Cregan protests that she was promised to him by his father, Arnolf, but Jon insists that Arnolf is not the rightful Lord of Karhold. If Alys's brother, Harrion, is dead, then she is the heir, and she has married Sigorn. "A wildling. A filthy, murdering wildling," Cregan protests. Nevertheless, Jon says, Sigorn commands two hundred Thenns, and two of Cregan's men have admitted that Arnolf Karstark had conspired with Ramsay Bolton. "Yield the castle. Lady Alys will pardon the women who betrayed her and allow the men to take the black." Cregan says he will never do that.

Jon goes to the wedding feast, but it only reminds him of how low the supplies at Castle Black are becoming. He talks with Alys about the situation at Karhold, where supplies are also running low, and suggests that she send the old men and the boys to the Wall rather than have them die alone in the snow. Clydas arrives with a letter brought by a raven from Eastwatch to say that the rescue mission has set off for Hardhome and that Ser Glendon Hewett is in charge at Eastwatch. Jon worries about this: Hewett was friends with Alliser Thorne and had been "a crony of sorts with Janos Slynt."

When Alys gets up to dance with Sigorn, Ser Axell Florent sits down beside Jon to press once again the idea of marrying Val. His coarseness angers Jon and they exchange words. But then the sound of a horn is heard. It is followed by a second, and Jon realizes that Val has completed her mission to Tormund Giantsbane.

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.