5. A Dance with Dragons by George R. R. Martin

Author:George R. R. Martin [Martin, George R. R.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Fiction, Fantasy, Action, Adventure, Science Fiction
ISBN: 9780553801477
Publisher: Bantam Books
Published: 2011-08-01T04:00:00+00:00

THE WATCHER

Let us look upon this head,” his prince commanded.

Areo Hotah ran his hand along the smooth shaft of his longaxe,

his ash-and-iron wife, all the while watching. He watched the white

knight, Ser Balon Swann, and the others who had come with him.

He watched the Sand Snakes, each at a different table. He watched

the lords and ladies, the serving men, the old blind seneschal, and

the young maester Myles, with his silky beard and servile smile.

Standing half in light and half in shadow, he saw all of them. Serve.

Protect. Obey. That was his task.

All the rest had eyes only for the chest. It was carved of ebony,

with silver clasps and hinges. A fine-looking box, no doubt, but

many of those assembled here in the Old Palace of Sunspear might soon be dead, depending on what was in that chest.

His slippers whispering against the floor, Maester Caleotte

crossed the hall to Ser Balon Swann. The round little man looked

splendid in his new robes, with their broad bands of dun and

butternut and narrow stripes of red. Bowing, he took the chest from

the hands of the white knight and carried it to the dais, where Doran

Martell sat in his rolling chair between his daughter Arianne and his

dead brother’s beloved paramour, Ellaria. A hundred scented

candles perfumed the air. Gemstones glittered on the fingers of the

lords and the girdles and hairnets of the ladies. Areo Hotah had

polished his shirt of copper scales mirror-bright so he would blaze

in the candlelight as well.

A hush had fallen across the hall. Dorne holds its breath. Maester

Caleotte set the box on the floor beside Prince Doran’s chair. The

maester’s fingers, normally so sure and deft, turned clumsy as he

worked the latch and opened the lid, to reveal the skull within.

Hotah heard someone clear his throat. One of the Fowler twins whispered something to the other. Ellaria Sand had closed her eyes

and was murmuring a prayer.

Ser Balon Swann was taut as a drawn bow, the captain of guards

observed. This new white knight was not so tall nor comely as the

old one, but he was bigger across the chest, burlier, his arms thick with muscle. His snowy cloak was clasped at the throat by two

swans on a silver brooch. One was ivory, the other onyx, and it

seemed to Areo Hotah as if the two of them were fighting. The man

who wore them looked a fighter too. This one will not die so easy as

the other. He will not charge into my axe the way Ser Arys did. He

will stand behind his shield and make me come at him. If it came to

that, Hotah would be ready. His longaxe was sharp enough to shave

with.

He allowed himself a brief glance at the chest. The skull rested on

a bed of black felt, grinning. All skulls grinned, but this one seemed

happier than most. And bigger. The captain of guards had never

seen a larger skull. Its brow shelf was thick and heavy, its jaw massive. The bone shone in the candlelight, white as Ser Balon’s

cloak. “Place it on the pedestal,” the prince commanded. He had

tears glistening in his eyes.

The pedestal was a column of black marble three feet taller than

Maester Caleotte. The fat little maester hopped up on his toes but

still could not quite reach. Areo Hotah was about to go and help

him, but Obara Sand moved first. Even without her whip and shield,

she had an angry mannish look to her. In place of a gown, she wore

men’s breeches and a calf-length linen tunic, cinched at the waist

with a belt of copper suns. Her brown hair was tied back in a knot.

Snatching the skull from the maester’s soft pink hands, she placed it

up atop the marble column.

“The Mountain rides no more,” the prince said, gravely. “Was his

dying long and hard, Ser Balon?” asked Tyene Sand, in the tone a

maiden might use to ask if her gown was pretty.

“He screamed for days, my lady,” the white knight replied, though

it was plain that it pleased him little to say so. “We could hear him all over the Red Keep.”

“Does that trouble you, ser?” asked the Lady Nym. She wore a

gown of yellow silk so sheer and fine that the candles shone right

through it to reveal the spun gold and jewels beneath. So immodest

was her garb that the white knight seemed uncomfortable looking at

her, but Hotah approved. Nymeria was least dangerous when nearly

naked. Elsewise she was sure to have a dozen blades concealed

about her person. “Ser Gregor was a bloody brute, all men agree. If

ever a man deserved to suffer, it was him.”

“That is as it may be, my lady,” said Balon Swann, “but Ser

Gregor was a knight, and a knight should die with sword in hand.

Poison is a foul and filthy way to kill.”

Lady Tyene smiled at that. Her gown was cream and green, with

long lace sleeves, so modest and so innocent that any man who

looked at her might think her the most chaste of maids. Areo Hotah

knew better. Her soft, pale hands were as deadly as Obara’s callused

ones, if not more so. He watched her carefully, alert to every little flutter of her fingers.

Prince Doran frowned. “That is so, Ser Balon, but the Lady Nym

is right. If ever a man deserved to die screaming, it was Gregor

Clegane. He butchered my good sister, smashed her babe’s head

against a wall. I only pray that now he is burning in some hell, and

that Elia and her children are at peace. This is the justice that Dorne

has hungered for. I am glad that I lived long enough to taste it. At

long last the Lannisters have proved the truth of their boast and paid

this old blood debt.”

The prince left it to Ricasso, his blind seneschal, to rise and

propose the toast. “Lords and ladies, let us all now drink to

Tommen, the First of His Name, King of the Andals, the Rhoynar,

and the First Men, and Lord of the Seven Kingdoms.”

Serving men had begun to move amongst the guests as the

seneschal was speaking, filling cups from the flagons that they bore.

The wine was Dornish strongwine, dark as blood and sweet as

vengeance. The captain did not drink of it. He never drank at feasts.

Nor did the prince himself partake. He had his own wine, prepared

by Maester Myles and well laced with poppy juice to ease the agony

in his swollen joints.

The white knight did drink, as was only courteous. His

companions likewise. So did the Princess Arianne, Lady Jordayne,

the Lord of Gods-grace, the Knight of Lemonwood, the Lady of

Ghost Hill … even Ellaria Sand, Prince Oberyn’s beloved

paramour, who had been with him in King’s Landing when he died.

Hotah paid more note to those who did not drink: Ser Daemon

Sand, Lord Tremond Gargalen, the Fowler twins, Dagos

Manwoody, the Ullers of the Hellholt, the Wyls of the Boneway. If

there is trouble, it could start with one of them.

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