A Feast for Dragons

by George R. R. Martin

  “Aye,” Garin called out cheerfully, “and we sing and play and dance on water, and know much and more of healing. My mother is the best midwife in Westeros, and my father can cure warts.”

  “How can you be orphans if you have mothers and fathers?” the girl asked.

  “They are the Rhoynar,” Arianne explained, “and their Mother was the river Rhoyne.”

  Myrcella did not understand. “I thought you were the Rhoynar. You Dornishmen, I mean.”

  “We are in part, Your Grace. Nymeria’s blood is in me, along with that of Mors Martell, the Dornish lord she married. On the day they wed, Nymeria fired her ships, so her people would understand that there could be no going back. Most were glad to see those flames, for their voyagings had been long and terrible before they came to Dorne, and many and more had been lost to storm, disease, and slavery. There were a few who mourned, however. They did not love this dry red land or its seven-faced god, so they clung to their old ways, hammered boats together from the hulks of the burned ships, and became the orphans of the Greenblood. The Mother in their songs is not our Mother, but Mother Rhoyne, whose waters nourished them from the dawn of days.”

  “I’d heard the Rhoynar had some turtle god,” said Ser Arys.

  “The Old Man of the River is a lesser god,” said Garin. “He was born from Mother River too, and fought the Crab King to win dominion over all who dwell beneath the flowing waters.”

  “Oh,” said Myrcella.

  “I understand you’ve fought some mighty battles too, Your Grace,” said Drey in his most cheerful voice. “It is said you show our brave Prince Trystane no mercy at the cyvasse table.”

  “He always sets his squares up the same way, with all the mountains in the front and his elephants in the passes,” said Myrcella. “So I send my dragon through to eat his elephants.”

  “Does your handmaid play the game as well?” asked Drey.

  “Rosamund?” asked Myrcella. “No. I tried to teach her, but she said the rules were too hard.”

  “She is a Lannister as well?” said Lady Sylva.

  “A Lannister of Lannisport, not a Lannister of Casterly Rock. Her hair is the same color as mine, but straight instead of curly. Rosamund doesn’t truly favor me, but when she dresses up in my clothes people who don’t know us think she’s me.”

  “You have done this before, then?”

  “Oh, yes. We traded places on the Seaswift, on the way to Braavos. Septa Eglantine put brown dye in my hair. She said we were doing it as a game, but it was meant to keep me safe in case the ship was taken by my uncle Stannis.”

  The girl was plainly growing tired, so Arianne called a halt. They watered the horses once again, rested for a bit, and had some cheese and fruit. Myrcella split an orange with Spotted Sylva, whilst Garin ate olives and spit the stones at Drey.

  Arianne had hoped to reach the river before the sun came up, but they had started much later than she’d planned, so they were still in the saddle when the eastern sky turned red. Darkstar cantered up beside her. “Princess,” he said, “I’d set a faster pace, unless you mean to kill the child after all. We have no tents, and by day the sands are cruel.”

  “I know the sands as well as you do, ser,” she told him. All the same, she did as he suggested. It was hard on their mounts, but better she should lose six horses than one princess.

  Soon enough the wind came gusting from the west, hot and dry and full of grit. Arianne drew her veil across her face. It was made of shimmering silk, pale green above and yellow below, the colors blending into one another. Small green pearls gave it weight, and rattled softly against each other as she rode.

  “I know why my princess wears a veil,” Ser Arys said as she was fastening it to the temples of her copper helm. “Elsewise her beauty would outshine the sun above.”

  She had to laugh. “No, your princess wears a veil to keep the glare out of her eyes and the sand out of her mouth. You should do the same, ser.” She wondered how long her white knight had been polishing his ponderous gallantry. Ser Arys was pleasant company abed, but wit and he were strangers.

  Her Dornishmen covered their faces as she did, and Spotted Sylva helped veil the little princess from the sun, but Ser Arys stayed stubborn. Before long the sweat was running down his face, and his cheeks had taken on a rosy blush. Much longer and he will cook in those heavy clothes, she reflected. He would not be the first. In centuries past, many a host had come down from the Prince’s Pass with banners streaming, only to wither and broil on the hot red Dornish sands. “The arms of House Martell display the sun and spear, the Dornishman’s two favored weapons,” the Young Dragon had once written in his boastful Conquest of Dorne, “but of the two, the sun is the more deadly.”

  Thankfully, they did not need to cross the deep sands but only a sliver of the drylands. When Arianne spied a hawk wheeling high above them against a cloudless sky, she knew the worst was behind them. Soon they came upon a tree. It was a gnarled and twisted thing with as many thorns as leaves, of the sort called sandbeggars, but it meant that they were not far from water.

  “We’re almost there, Your Grace,” Garin told Myrcella cheerfully when they spied more sandbeggars up ahead, a thicket of them growing all around the dry bed of a stream. The sun was beating down like a fiery hammer, but it did not matter with their journey at its end. They stopped to water the horses again, drank deep from their skins and wet their veils, then mounted for the last push. Within half a league they were riding over devilgrass and past olive groves. Beyond a line of stony hills the grass grew greener and more lush, and there were lemon orchards watered by a spider’s web of old canals. Garin was the first to spy the river glimmering green. He gave a shout and raced ahead.

  Arianne Martell had crossed the Mander once, when she had gone with three of the Sand Snakes to visit Tyene’s mother. Compared to that mighty waterway, the Greenblood was scarce worthy of the name of river, yet it remained the life of Dorne. It took its name from the murky green of its sluggish waters; but as they approached, the sunlight seemed to turn those waters gold. She had seldom seen a sweeter sight. The next part should be slow and simple, she thought, up the Greenblood and onto the Vaith, as far as a poleboat can go. That would give her time enough to prepare Myrcella for all that was to come. Beyond Vaith the deep sands waited. They would need help from Sandstone and the Hellholt to make that crossing, but she did not doubt that it would be forthcoming. The Red Viper had been fostered at Sandstone, and Prince Oberyn’s paramour Ellaria Sand was Lord Uller’s natural daughter; four of the Sand Snakes were his granddaughters. I will crown Myrcella at the Hellholt and raise my banners there.

  They found the boat half a league downstream, hidden beneath the drooping branches of a great green willow. Low of roof and wide abeam, the poleboats had hardly any draft to speak of; the Young Dragon had disparaged them as “hovels built on rafts,” but that was hardly fair. All but the poorest orphan boats were wonderfully carved and painted. This one was done in shades of green, with a curved wooden tiller shaped like a mermaid, and fish faces peering through her rails. Poles and ropes and jars of olive oil cluttered her decks, and iron lanterns swung fore and aft. Arianne saw no orphans. Where is her crew? she wondered.

  Garin reined up beneath the willow. “Wake up, you fish-eyed lagabeds,” he called as he leapt down from the saddle. “Your queen is here, and wants her royal welcome. Come up, come out, we’ll have some songs and sweetwine. My mouth is set for—”

  The door on the poleboat slammed open. Out into the sunlight stepped Areo Hotah, longaxe in hand.

  Garin jerked to a halt. Arianne felt as though an axe had caught her in the belly. It was not supposed to end this way. This was not supposed to happen. When she heard Drey say, “There’s the last face I’d hoped to see,” she knew she had to act. “Away!” she cried, vaulting back into the saddle. “Arys, protect the princess—”

  Hotah thumped the butt of his longaxe upon the deck. Behind the ornate rails of the poleboat, a doze
n guardsmen rose, armed with throwing spears or crossbows. Still more appeared atop the cabin. “Yield, my princess,” the captain called, “else we must slay all but the child and yourself, by your father’s word.”

  Princess Myrcella sat motionless upon her mount. Garin backed slowly from the poleboat, his hands in the air. Drey unbuckled his swordbelt. “Yielding seems the wisest course,” he called to Arianne, as his sword thumped to the ground.

  “No!” Ser Arys Oakheart put his horse between Arianne and the crossbows, his blade shining silver in his hand. He had unslung his shield and slipped his left arm through the straps. “You will not take her whilst I still draw breath.”

  You reckless fool, was all that Arianne had time to think, what do you think you’re doing?

  Darkstar’s laughter rang out. “Are you blind or stupid, Oakheart? There are too many. Put up your sword.”

  “Do as he says, Ser Arys,” Drey urged.

  We are taken, ser, Arianne might have called out. Your death will not free us. If you love your princess, yield. But when she tried to speak, the words caught in her throat.

  Ser Arys Oakheart gave her one last longing look, then put his golden spurs into his horse and charged.

  He rode headlong for the poleboat, his white cloak streaming behind him. Arianne Martell had never seen anything half so gallant, or half so stupid. “Noooo,” she shrieked, but she had found her tongue too late. A crossbow thrummed, then another. Hotah bellowed a command. At such close range, the white knight’s armor had as well been made of parchment. The first bolt punched right through his heavy oaken shield, pinning it to his shoulder. The second grazed his temple. A thrown spear took Ser Arys’s mount in the flank, yet still the horse came on, staggering as he hit the gangplank. “No,” some girl was shouting, some foolish little girl, “no, please, this was not supposed to happen.” She could hear Myrcella shrieking too, her voice shrill with fear.

  Ser Arys’s longsword slashed right and left, and two spearmen went down. His horse reared, and kicked a crossbowman in the face as he was trying to reload, but the other crossbows were firing, feathering the big courser with their quarrels. The bolts hit home so hard they knocked the horse sideways. His legs went out from under him and sent him crashing down the deck. Somehow Arys Oakheart leapt free. He even managed to keep hold of his sword. He struggled to his knees beside his dying horse . . .

  . . . and found Areo Hotah standing over him.

  The white knight raised his blade, too slowly. Hotah’s longaxe took his right arm off at the shoulder, spun away spraying blood, and came flashing back again in a terrible two-handed slash that removed the head of Arys Oakheart and sent it spinning through the air. It landed amongst the reeds, and the Greenblood swallowed the red with a soft splash.

  Arianne did not remember climbing from her horse. Perhaps she’d fallen. She did not remember that either. Yet she found herself on her hands and feet in the sand, shaking and sobbing and retching up her supper. No, was all that she could think, no, no one was to be hurt, it was all planned, I was so careful. She heard Areo Hotah roar, “After him. He must not escape. After him!” Myrcella was on the ground, wailing, shaking, her pale face in her hands, blood streaming through her fingers. Arianne did not understand. Men were scrambling onto horses whilst others swarmed over her and her companions, but none of it made sense. She had fallen into a dream, some terrible red nightmare. This cannot be real. I will wake soon, and laugh at my night terrors.

  When they sought to bind her hands behind her back, she did not resist. One of the guardsmen jerked her to her feet. He wore her father’s colors. Another bent and seized the throwing knife inside her boot, a gift from her cousin Lady Nym.

  Areo Hotah took it from the man and frowned at it. “The prince said I must bring you back to Sunspear,” he announced. His cheeks and brow were freckled with the blood of Arys Oakheart. “I am sorry, little princess.”

  Arianne raised a tear-streaked face. “How could he know?” she asked the captain. “I was so careful. How could he know?”

  “Someone told.” Hotah shrugged. “Someone always tells.”

  * * *

  Brienne

  The stone wall was old and crumbling, but the sight of it across the field made the hairs on Brienne’s neck stand up.

  That was where the archers hid and slew poor Cleos Frey, she thought . . . but half a mile farther on she passed another wall that looked much like the first and found herself uncertain. The rutted road turned and twisted, and the bare brown trees looked different from the green ones she remembered. Had she ridden past the place where Ser Jaime had snatched his cousin’s sword from its scabbard? Where were the woods they’d fought in? The stream where they’d splashed and slashed at one another until they drew the Brave Companions down upon them?

  “My lady? Ser?” Podrick never seemed certain what to call her. “What are you looking for?”

  Ghosts. “A wall I rode by once. It does not matter.” It was when Ser Jaime still had both his hands. How I loathed him, with all his taunts and smiles. “Stay quiet, Podrick. There may still be outlaws in these woods.”

  The boy looked at the bare brown trees, the wet leaves, the muddy road ahead. “I have a longsword. I can fight.”

  Not well enough. Brienne did not doubt the boy’s courage, only his training. A squire he might be, in name at least, but the men he’d squired for had served him ill.

  She had gotten his story out of him in fits and starts on the road from Duskendale. His was a lesser branch of House Payne, an impoverished offshoot sprouted from the loins of a younger son. His father had spent his life squiring for richer cousins and had sired Podrick upon a chandler’s daughter he’d wed before going off to die in the Greyjoy Rebellion. His mother had abandoned him with one of those cousins when he was four, so she could run after a wandering singer who had put another baby in her belly. Podrick did not remember what she looked like. Ser Cedric Payne had been the nearest thing to a parent the boy had ever known, though from his stammered stories it seemed to Brienne that cousin Cedric had treated Podrick more like a servant than a son. When Casterly Rock called its banners, the knight had taken him along to tend his horse and clean his mail. Then Ser Cedric had been slain in the riverlands whilst fighting in Lord Tywin’s host.

  Far from home, alone, and penniless, the boy had attached himself to a fat hedge knight named Ser Lorimer the Belly, who was part of Lord Lefford’s contingent, charged with protecting the baggage train. “The boys who guard the foodstuffs always eat the best,” Ser Lorimer liked to say, until he was discovered with a salted ham he’d stolen from Lord Tywin’s personal stores. Tywin Lannister chose to hang him as a lesson to other looters. Podrick had shared the ham and might have shared the rope as well, but his name had saved him. Ser Kevan Lannister took charge of him, and sometime later sent the boy to squire for his nephew Tyrion.

  Ser Cedric had taught Podrick how to groom a horse and check his shoes for stones, and Ser Lorimer had taught him how to steal, but neither had given him much training with a sword. The Imp at least had dispatched him to the Red Keep’s master-at-arms when they came to court. But during the bread riots Ser Aron Santagar had been amongst those slain, and that had been the end of Podrick’s training.

  Brienne cut two wooden swords from fallen branches to get a sense of Podrick’s skills. The boy was slow of speech but not of hand, she was pleased to learn. Though fearless and attentive, he was also underfed and skinny, and not near strong enough. If he had survived the Battle of the Blackwater as he claimed, it could only be because no one thought him worth the killing. “You may call yourself a squire,” she told him, “but I’ve seen pages half your age who could have beat you bloody. If you stay with me, you’ll go to sleep with blisters on your hands and bruises on your arms most every night, and you’ll be so stiff and sore you’ll hardly sleep. You don’t want that.”

  “I do,” the boy insisted. “I want that. The bruises and the blisters. I mean, I don’t, but I do.
Ser. My lady.”

  So far he had been true to his word, and Brienne had been true to hers. Podrick had not complained. Every time he raised a new blister on his sword hand, he felt the need to show it to her proudly. He took good care of their horses too. He is still no squire, she reminded herself, but I am no knight, no matter how many times he calls me “ser.” She would have sent him on his way, but he had nowhere to go. Besides, though Podrick said he did not know where Sansa Stark had gone, it might be that he knew more than he realized. Some chance remark, half-remembered, might hold the key to Brienne’s quest.

  “Ser? My lady?” Podrick pointed. “There’s a cart ahead.”

  Brienne saw it: a wooden oxcart, two-wheeled and high-sided. A man and a woman were laboring in the traces, pulling the cart along the ruts toward Maidenpool. Farm folk, by the look of them. “Slowly now,” she told the boy. “They may take us for outlaws. Say no more than you must and be courteous.”

  “I will, ser. Be courteous. My lady.” The boy seemed almost pleased by the prospect of being taken for an outlaw.

  The farm folk watched them warily as they came trotting up, but once Brienne made it plain that she meant them no harm, they let her ride beside them. “We used to have an ox,” the old man told her as they made their way through the weed-choked fields, lakes of soft mud, and burnt and blackened trees, “but the wolves made off with him.” His face was red from the effort of pulling the cart. “They took off our daughter too and had their way with her, but she come wandering back after the battle down at Duskendale. The ox never did. The wolves ate him, I expect.”

  The woman had little to add. She was younger than the man by twenty years, but never spoke a word, only looked at Brienne the same way she might have looked at a two-headed calf. The Maid of Tarth had seen such eyes before. Lady Stark had been kind to her, but most women were just as cruel as men. She could not have said which she found most hurtful, the pretty girls with their waspish tongues and brittle laughter or the cold-eyed ladies who hid their disdain behind a mask of courtesy. And common women could be worse than either. “Maidenpool was all in ruins when last I saw it,” she said. “The gates were broken and half the town was burned.”