The morning air was dark with the smoke of burning gods.
They were all afire now, Maid and Mother, Warrior and Smith, the
Crone with her pearl eyes and the Father with his gilded beard;
even the Stranger, carved to look more animal than human. The old
dry wood and countless layers of paint and varnish blazed with a
fierce hungry light. Heat rose shimmering through the chill air;
behind, the gargoyles and stone dragons on the castle walls seemed
blurred, as if Davos were seeing them through a veil of tears. Or
as if the beasts were trembling,
stirring . . .
“An ill thing,” Allard declared, though at least he
had the sense to keep his voice low. Dale muttered agreement.
“Silence,” said Davos. “Remember where you
are.” His sons were good men, but young, and Allard
especially was rash. Had I stayed a smuggler, Allard would have
ended on the Wall. Stannis spared him from that end, something else
I owe him . . .
Hundreds had come to the castle gates to bear witness to the
burning of the Seven. The smell in the air was ugly. Even for
soldiers, it was hard not to feel uneasy at such an affront to the
gods most had worshiped all their lives.
The red woman walked round the fire three times, praying once in
the speech of Asshai, once in High Valyrian, and once in the Common
Tongue. Davos understood only the last. “R’hllor, come
to us in our darkness,” she called. “Lord of Light, we
offer you these false gods, these seven who are one, and him the
enemy. Take them and cast your light upon us, for the night is dark
and full of terrors.” Queen Selyse echoed the words. Beside
her, Stannis watched impassively, his jaw hard as stone under the
blue-black shadow of his tight-cropped beard. He had dressed more
richly than was his wont, as if for the sept.
Dragonstone’s sept had been where Aegon the Conqueror
knelt to pray the night before he sailed. That had not saved it
from the queen’s men. They had overturned the altars, pulled
down the statues, and smashed the stained glass with warhammers.
Septon Barre could only curse them, but Ser Hubard Rambton led his
three sons to the sept to defend their gods. The Rambtons had slain
four of the queen’s men before the others overwhelmed them.
Afterward Guncer Sunglass, mildest and most pious of lords, told
Stannis he could no longer support his claim. Now he shared a
sweltering cell with the septon and Ser Hubard’s two
surviving sons. The other lords had not been slow to take the
lesson.
The gods had never meant much to Davos the smuggler, though like
most men he had been known to make offerings to the Warrior before
battle, to the Smith when he launched a ship, and to the Mother
whenever his wife grew great with child. He felt ill as he watched
them burn, and not only from the smoke. Maester Cressen would have stopped this. The old man had
challenged the Lord of Light and been struck down for his impiety,
or so the gossips told each other. Davos knew the truth. He had
seen the maester slip something into the wine cup. Poison. What
else could it be? He drank a cup of death to free Stannis from
Melisandre, but somehow her god shielded her. He would gladly have
killed the red woman for that, yet what chance would he have where
a maester of the Citadel had failed? He was only a smuggler raised
high, Davos of Flea Bottom, the Onion Knight.
The burning gods cast a pretty light, wreathed in their robes of
shifting flame, red and orange and yellow. Septon Barre had once
told Davos how they’d been carved from the masts of the ships
that had carried the first Targaryens from Valyria. Over the
centuries, they had been painted and repainted, gilded, silvered,
jeweled. “Their beauty will make them more pleasing to
R’hllor,” Melisandre said when she told Stannis to pull
them down and drag them out the castle gates.
The Maiden lay athwart the Warrior, her arms widespread as if to
embrace him. The Mother seemed almost to shudder as the flames came
licking up her face. A longsword had been thrust through her heart,
and its leather grip was alive with flame. The Father was on the
bottom, the first to fall. Davos watched the hand of the Stranger
writhe and curl as the fingers blackened and fell away one by one,
reduced to so much glowing charcoal. Nearby, Lord Celtigar coughed
fitfully and covered his wrinkled face with a square of linen
embroidered in red crabs. The Myrmen swapped jokes as they enjoyed
the warmth of the fire, but young Lord Bar Emmon had turned a
splotchy grey, and Lord Velaryon was watching the king rather than
the conflagration.
Davos would have given much to know what he was thinking, but
one such as Velaryon would never confide in him. The Lord of the
Tides was of the blood of ancient Valyria, and his House had thrice
provided brides for Targaryen princes; Davos Seaworth stank of fish
and onions. It was the same with the other lordlings. He could
trust none of them, nor would they ever include him in their
private councils. They scorned his sons as well. My grandsons will
joust with theirs, though, and one day their blood may wed with
mine. In time my little black ship will fly as high as
Velaryon’s seahorse or Celtigar’s red crabs.
That is, if Stannis won his throne. If he
lost . . . Everything I am, I owe to him. Stannis had raised him to
knighthood. He had given him a place of honor at his table, a war
galley to sail in place of a smuggler’s skiff. Dale and
Allard captained galleys as well, Maric was oarmaster on the Fury,
Matthos served his father on Black Betha, and the king had taken
Devan as a royal squire. One day he would be knighted, and the two
little lads as well. Marya was mistress of a small keep on Cape
Wrath, with servants who called her m’lady, and Davos could
hunt red deer in his own woods. All this he had of Stannis
Baratheon, for the price of a few finger joints. It was just, what
he did to me. I had flouted the king’s laws all my life. He
has earned my loyalty. Davos touched the little pouch that hung
from the leather thong about his neck. His fingers were his luck,
and he needed luck now. As do we all. Lord Stannis most of all.
Pale flames licked at the grey sky. Dark smoke rose, twisting
and curling. When the wind pushed it toward them, men blinked and
wept and rubbed their eyes. Allard turned his head away, coughing
and cursing. A taste of things to come, thought Davos. Many and
more would burn before this war was done.
Melisandre was robed all in scarlet satin and blood velvet, her
eyes as red as the great ruby that glistened at her throat as if it
too were afire. “In ancient books of Asshai it is written
that there will come a day after a long summer when the stars bleed
and the cold breath of darkness falls heavy on the world. In this
dread hour a warrior shall draw from the fire a burning sword. And
that sword shall be Lightbringer, the Red Sword of Heroes, and he
who clasps it shall be Azor Ahai come again, and the darkness shall
flee before him.” She lifted her voice, so it carried out
over the gathered host. “Azor Ahai, beloved of R’hllor!
The Warrior of Light, the Son of Fire! Come forth, your sword
awaits you! Come forth and take it into your hand!”
Stannis Baratheon strode forward like a soldier marching into
battle. His squires stepped up to attend him. Davos watched as his
son Devan pulled a long padded glove over the king’s right
hand. The boy wore a cream-colored doublet with a fiery heart sewn
on the breast. Bryen Farring was similarly garbed as he tied a
stiff leather cape around His Grace’s neck. Behind, Davos
heard a faint clank and clatter of bells. “Under the sea,
smoke rises in bubbles, and flames burn green and blue and
black,” Patchface sang somewhere. “I know, I know, oh,
oh, oh.”
The king plunged into the fire with his teeth clenched, holding
the leather cloak before him to keep off the flames. He went
straight to the Mother, grasped the sword with his gloved hand, and
wrenched it free of the burning wood with a single hard jerk. Then
he was retreating, the sword held high, jade-green flames swirling
around cherry-red steel. Guards rushed to beat out the cinders that
clung to the king’s clothing.
“A sword of fire!” shouted Queen Selyse. Ser Axell
Florent and the other queen’s men took up the cry. “A
sword of fire! It burns! It burns! A sword of fire!”
Melisandre lifted her hands above her head. “Behold! A
sign was promised, and now a sign is seen! Behold Lightbringer!
Azor Ahai has come again! All hail the Warrior of Light! All hail
the Son of Fire!”
A ragged wave of shouts gave answer, just as Stannis’s
glove began to smolder. Cursing, the king thrust the point of the
sword into the damp earth and beat out the flames against his
leg.
“Lord, cast your light upon us!” Melisandre called
out.
“For the night is dark and full of terrors,” Selyse
and her queen’s men replied. Should I speak the words as
well? Davos wondered. Do I owe Stannis that much? Is this fiery god
truly his own? His shortened fingers twitched.
Stannis peeled off the glove and let it fall to the ground. The
gods in the pyre were scarcely recognizable anymore. The head fell
off the Smith with a puff of ash and embers. Melisandre sang in the
tongue of Asshai, her voice rising and falling like the tides of
the sea. Stannis untied his singed leather cape and listened in
silence. Thrust in the ground, Lightbringer still glowed ruddy hot,
but the flames that clung to the sword were dwindling and
dying.
By the time the song was done, only charwood remained of the
gods, and the king’s patience had run its course. He took the
queen by the elbow and escorted her back into Dragonstone, leaving
Lightbringer where it stood. The red woman remained a moment to
watch as Devan knelt with Byren Farring and rolled up the burnt and
blackened sword in the king’s leather cloak. The Red Sword of
Heroes looks a proper mess, thought Davos.
A few of the lords lingered to speak in quiet voices upwind of
the fire. They fell silent when they saw Davos looking at them.
Should Stannis fall, they will pull me down in an instant. Neither
was he counted one of the queen’s men, that group of
ambitious knights and minor lordlings who had given themselves to
this Lord of Light and so won the favor and patronage of Lady—no,
Queen, remember?—Selyse.
The fire had started to dwindle by the time Melisandre and the
squires departed with the precious sword. Davos and his sons joined
the crowd making its way down to the shore and the waiting ships.
“Devan acquitted himself well,” he said as they
went.
“He fetched the glove without dropping it, yes,”
said Dale.
Allard nodded. “That badge on Devan’s doublet, the
fiery heart, what was that? The Baratheon sigil is a crowned
stag.”
“A lord can choose more than one badge,” Davos
said.
Dale smiled. “A black ship and an onion,
Father?”
Allard kicked at a stone. “The Others take our
onion . . . and that flaming heart. It was an
ill thing to burn the Seven.”
“When did you grow so devout?” Davos said.
“What does a smuggler’s son know of the doings of
gods?”
“I’m a knight’s son, Father. If you
won’t remember, why should they? “
“A knight’s son, but not a knight,” said
Davos. “Nor will you ever be, if you meddle in affairs that
do not concern you. Stannis is our rightful king, it is not for us
to question him. We sail his ships and do his bidding. That is
all.”
“As to that, Father,” Dale said, “I mislike
these water casks they’ve given me for Wraith. Green pine.
The water will spoil on a voyage of any length.”
“I got the same for Lady Marya,” said Allard.
“The queen’s men have laid claim to all the seasoned
wood.”
“I will speak to the king about it,” Davos promised.
Better it come from him than from Allard. His sons were good
fighters and better sailors, but they did not know how to talk to
lords. They were lowborn, even as I was, but they do not like to
recall that. When they look at our banner, all they see is a tall
black ship flying on the wind. They close their eyes to the
onion.
The port was as crowded as Davos had ever known it. Every dock
teemed with sailors loading provisions, and every inn was packed
with soldiers dicing or drinking or looking for a
whore . . . a vain search, since Stannis
permitted none on his island. Ships lined the strand; war galleys
and fishing vessels, stout carracks and fat-bottomed cogs. The best
berths had been taken by the largest vessels: Stannis’s
flagship Fury rocking between Lord Steffon and Stag of the Sea,
Lord Velaryon’s silver-hulled Pride of Driftmark and her three
sisters, Lord Celtigar’s ornate Red Claw, the ponderous
Swordfish with her long iron prow. Out to sea at anchor rode
Salladhor Saan’s great Valyrian amongst the striped hulls of
two dozen smaller Lysene galleys.
A weathered little inn sat on the end of the stone pier where
Black Betha, Wraith, and Lady Marya shared mooring space with a
half-dozen other galleys of one hundred oars or less. Davos had a
thirst. He took his leave of his sons and turned his steps toward
the inn. Out front squatted a waist-high gargoyle, so eroded by
rain and salt that his features were all but obliterated. He and
Davos were old friends, though. He gave a pat to the stone head as
he went in. “Luck,” he murmured.
Across the noisy common room, Salladhor Saan sat eating grapes
from a wooden bowl. When he spied Davos, he beckoned him closer.
“Ser knight, come sit with me. Eat a grape. Eat two. They are
marvelously sweet.” The Lyseni was a sleek, smiling man whose
flamboyance was a byword on both sides of the narrow sea. Today he
wore flashing cloth-of-silver, with dagged sleeves so long the ends
of them pooled on the floor. His buttons were carved jade monkeys,
and atop his wispy white curls perched a jaunty green cap decorated
with a fan of peacock feathers.
Davos threaded his way through the tables to a chair. In the
days before his knighthood, he had often bought cargoes from
Salladhor Saan. The Lyseni was a smuggler himself, as well as a
trader, a banker, a notorious pirate, and the self-styled Prince of
the Narrow Sea. When a pirate grows rich enough, they make him a
prince. It had been Davos who had made the journey to Lys to
recruit the old rogue to Lord Stannis’s cause.
“You did not see the gods burn, my lord?” he
asked.
“The red priests have a great temple on Lys. Always they
are burning this and burning that, crying out to their
R’hllor. They bore me with their fires. Soon they will bore
King Stannis too, it is to be hoped.” He seemed utterly
unconcerned that someone might overhear him, eating his grapes and
dribbling the seeds out onto his lip, flicking them off with a
finger. “My Bird of a Thousand Colors came in yesterday, good
ser. She is not a warship, no, but a trader, and she paid a call on
King’s Landing. Are you sure you will not have a grape?
Children go hungry in the city, it is said.” He dangled the
grapes before Davos and smiled.
“It’s ale I need, and news.”
“The men of Westeros are ever rushing,” complained
Salladhor Saan. “What good is this, I ask you? He who hurries
through life hurries to his grave.” He belched. “The
Lord of Casterly Rock has sent his dwarf to see to King’s
Landing. Perhaps he hopes that his ugly face will frighten off
attackers, eh? Or that we will laugh ourselves dead when the Imp
capers on the battlements, who can say? The dwarf has chased off
the lout who ruled the gold cloaks and put in his place a knight
with an iron hand.” He plucked a grape, and squeezed it
between thumb and forefinger until the skin burst. juice ran down
between his fingers.
A serving girl pushed her way through, swatting at the hands
that groped her as she passed. Davos ordered a tankard of ale,
turned back to Saan, and said, “How well is the city
defended?”
The other shrugged. “The walls are high and strong, but
who will man them? They are building scorpions and spitfires, oh,
yes, but the men in the golden cloaks are too few and too green,
and there are no others. A swift strike, like a hawk plummeting at
a hare, and the great city will be ours. Grant us wind to fill our
sails, and your king could sit upon his Iron Throne by evenfall on
the morrow. We could dress the dwarf in motley and prick his little
cheeks with the points of our spears to make him dance for us, and
mayhaps your goodly king would make me a gift of the beautiful
Queen Cersei to warm my bed for a night. I have been too long away
from my wives, and all in his service.”
“Pirate,” said Davos. “You have no wives, only
concubines, and you have been well paid for every day and every
ship.”
“Only in promises,” said Salladhor Saan mournfully.
“Good ser, it is gold I crave, not words on papers.” He
popped a grape into his mouth.
“You’ll have your gold when we take the treasury in
King’s Landing. No man in the Seven Kingdoms is more
honorable than Stannis Baratheon. He will keep his word.”
Even as Davos spoke, he thought, This world is twisted beyond hope,
when lowborn smugglers must vouch for the honor of kings.
“So he has said and said. And so I say, let us do this
thing. Even these grapes could be no more ripe than that city, my
old friend.”
The serving girl returned with his ale. Davos gave her a copper.
“Might be we could take King’s Landing, as you
say,” he said as he lifted the tankard, “but how long
would we hold it? Tywin Lannister is known to be at Harrenhal with
a great host, and Lord Renly . . . ”
“Ah, yes, the young brother,” said Salladhor Saan.
“That part is not so good, my friend. King Renly bestirs
himself. No, here he is Lord Renly, my pardons. So many kings, my
tongue grows weary of the word. The brother Renly has left
Highgarden with his fair young queen, his flowered lords and
shining knights, and a mighty host of foot. He marches up your road
of roses toward the very same great city we were speaking
of.”
“He takes his bride?”
The other shrugged. “He did not tell me why. Perhaps he is
loath to part with the warm burrow between her thighs, even for a
night. Or perhaps he is that certain of his victory.”
“The king must be told.”
“I have attended to it, good ser. Though His Grace frowns
so whenever he does see me that I tremble to come before him. Do
you think he would like me better if I wore a hair shirt and never
smiled? Well, I will not do it. I am an honest man, he must suffer
me in silk and samite. Or else I shall take my ships where I am
better loved. That sword was not Lightbringer, my
friend.”
The sudden shift in subject left Davos uneasy.
“Sword?”
“A sword plucked from fire, yes. Men tell me things, it is
my pleasant smile. How shall a burnt sword serve
Stannis?”
“A burning sword,” corrected Davos.
“Burnt,” said Salladhor Saan, “and be glad of
that, my friend. Do you know the tale of the forging of
Lightbringer? I shall tell it to you. It was a time when darkness
lay heavy on the world. To oppose it, the hero must have a
hero’s blade, oh, like none that had ever been. And so for
thirty days and thirty nights Azor Ahai labored sleepless in the
temple, forging a blade in the sacred fires. Heat and hammer and
fold, heat and hammer and fold, oh, yes, until the sword was done.
Yet when he plunged it into water to temper the steel it burst
asunder.
“Being a hero, it was not for him to shrug and go in
search of excellent grapes such as these, so again he began. The
second time it took him fifty days and fifty nights, and this sword
seemed even finer than the first. Azor Ahai captured a lion, to
temper the blade by plunging it through the beast’s red
heart, but once more the steel shattered and split. Great was his
woe and great was his sorrow then, for he knew what he must do.
“A hundred days and a hundred nights he labored on the
third blade, and as it glowed white-hot in the sacred fires, he
summoned his wife. ‘Nissa Nissa’ he said to her, for
that was her name, ‘bare your breast, and know that I love
you best of all that is in this world.’ She did this thing,
why I cannot say, and Azor Ahai thrust the smoking sword through
her living heart. It is said that her cry of anguish and ecstasy
left a crack across the face of the moon, but her blood and her
soul and her strength and her courage all went into the steel. Such
is the tale of the forging of Lightbringer, the Red Sword of
Heroes.
“Now do you see my meaning? Be glad that it is just a
burnt sword that His Grace pulled from that fire. Too much light
can hurt the eyes, my friend, and fire burns.” Salladhor Saan
finished the last grape and smacked his lips. “When do you
think the king will bid us sail, good ser? “
“Soon, I think,” said Davos, “if his god wills
it.”
“His god, ser friend? Not yours? Where is the god of Ser
Davos Seaworth, knight of the onion ship?”
Davos sipped his ale to give himself a moment. The inn is
crowded, and you are not Salladhor Saan, he reminded himself. Be
careful how you answer. “King Stannis is my god. He made me
and blessed me with his trust.”
“I will remember.” Salladhor Saan got to his feet.
“My pardons. These grapes have given me a hunger, and dinner
awaits on my Valyrian. Minced lamb with pepper and roasted gull
stuffed with mushrooms and fennel and onion. Soon we shall eat
together in King’s Landing, yes? In the Red Keep we shall
feast, while the dwarf sings us a jolly tune. When you speak to
King Stannis, mention if you would that he will owe me another
thirty thousand dragons come the black of the moon. He ought to
have given those gods to me. They were too beautiful to burn, and
might have brought a noble price in Pentos or Myr. Well, if he
grants me Queen Cersei for a night I shall forgive him.” The
Lyseni clapped Davos on the back, and swaggered from the inn as if
he owned it.
Ser Davos Seaworth lingered over his tankard for a good while,
thinking. A year ago, he had been with Stannis in King’s
Landing when King Robert staged a tourney for Prince
Joffrey’s name day. He remembered the red priest Thoros of
Myr, and the flaming sword he had wielded in the melee. The man had
made for a colorful spectacle, his red robes flapping while his
blade writhed with pale green flames, but everyone knew there was
no true magic to it, and in the end his fire had guttered out and
Bronze Yohn Royce had brained him with a common mace. A true sword of fire, now, that would be a wonder to behold. Yet
at such a cost . . . When he thought of Nissa
Nissa, it was his own Marya he pictured, a good-natured plump woman
with sagging breasts and a kindly smile, the best woman in the
world. He tried to picture himself driving a sword through her, and
shuddered. I am not made of the stuff of heroes, he decided. If
that was the price of a magic sword, it was more than he cared to
pay.
Davos finished his ale, pushed away the tankard, and left the
inn. On the way out he patted the gargoyle on the head and
muttered, “Luck.” They would all need it.
It was well after dark when Devan came down to Black Betha,
leading a snow-white palfrey. “My lord father,” he
announced, “His Grace commands you to attend him in the
Chamber of the Painted Table. You are to ride the horse and come at
once.”
It was good to see Devan looking so splendid in his
squire’s raiment, but the summons made Davos uneasy. Will he
bid us sail? he wondered. Salladhor Saan was not the only captain
who felt that King’s Landing was ripe for an attack, but a
smuggler must learn patience. We have no hope of victory. I said as
much to Maester Cressen, the day I returned to Dragonstone, and nothing has changed. We are too few, the foes
too many. ff we dip our oars, we die. Nonetheless, he climbed onto
the horse.
When Davos arrived at the Stone Drum, a dozen highborn knights
and great bannermen were just leaving. Lords Celtigar and Velaryon
each gave him a curt nod and walked on while the others ignored him
utterly, but Ser Axell Florent stopped for a word.
Queen Selyse’s uncle was a keg of a man with thick arms
and bandy legs. He had the prominent ears of a Florent, even larger
than his niece’s. The coarse hair that sprouted from his did
not stop him hearing most of what went on in the castle. For ten
years Ser Axell had served as castellan of Dragonstone while
Stannis sat on Robert’s council in King’s Landing, but
of late he had emerged as the foremost of the queen’s men.
“Ser Davos, it is good to see you, as ever,” he
said.
“And you, my lord.”
“I made note of you this morning as well. The false gods
burned with a merry light, did they not?”
“They burned brightly.” Davos did not trust this
man, for all his courtesy. House Florent had declared for
Renly.
“The Lady Melisandre tells us that sometimes R’hllor
permits his faithful servants to glimpse the future in flames. It
seemed to me as I watched the fire this morning that I was looking
at a dozen beautiful dancers, maidens garbed in yellow silk
spinning and swirling before a great king. I think it was a true
vision, ser. A glimpse of the glory that awaits His Grace after we
take King’s Landing and the throne that is his by
rights.” Stannis has no taste for such dancing, Davos thought, but he
dared not offend the queen’s uncle. “I saw only
fire,” he said, “but the smoke was making my eyes
water. You must pardon me, ser, the king awaits.” He pushed
past, wondering why Ser Axell had troubled himself. He is a
queen’s man and I am the king’s.
Stannis sat at his Painted Table with Maester Pylos at his
shoulder, an untidy pile of papers before them. “Ser,”
the king said when Davos entered, “come have a look at this
letter.”
Obediently, he selected a paper at random. “It looks
handsome enough, Your Grace, but I fear I cannot read the
words.” Davos could decipher maps and charts as well as any,
but letters and other writings were beyond his powers. But my Devan
has learned his letters, and young Steffon and Stannis as well.
“I’d forgotten.” A furrow of irritation showed
between the king’s brows. “Pylos, read it to
him.”
“Your Grace.” The maester took up one of the
parchments and cleared his throat. “All men know me for the
trueborn son of Steffon Baratheon, Lord of Storm’s End, by his lady wife Cassana of House
Estermont. I declare upon the honor of my House that my beloved
brother Robert, our late king, left no trueborn issue of his body,
the boy Joffrey, the boy Tommen, and the girl Myrcella being
abominations born of incest between Cersei Lannister and her
brother Jaime the Kingslayer. By right of birth and blood, I do
this day lay claim to the Iron Throne of the Seven Kingdoms of
Westeros. Let all true men declare their loyalty. Done in the Light
of the Lord, under the sign and seal of Stannis of House Baratheon,
the First of His Name, King of the Andals, the Rhoynar, and the
First Men, and Lord of the Seven Kingdoms.” The parchment
rustled softly as Pylos laid it down.
“Make it Ser Jaime the Kingslayer henceforth,”
Stannis said, frowning. “Whatever else the man may be, he
remains a knight. I don’t know that we ought to call Robert
my beloved brother either. He loved me no more than he had to, nor
I him.”
“A harmless courtesy, Your Grace,” Pylos said.
“A lie. Take it out.” Stannis turned to Davos.
“The maester tells me that we have one hundred seventeen
ravens on hand. I mean to use them all. One hundred seventeen
ravens will carry one hundred seventeen copies of my letter to
every corner of the realm, from the Arbor to the Wall. Perhaps a
hundred will win through against storm and hawk and arrow. If so, a
hundred maesters will read my words to as many lords in as many
solars and bedchambers . . . and then the
letters will like as not be consigned to the fire, and lips pledged
to silence. These great lords love Joffrey, or Renly, or Robb
Stark. I am their rightful king, but they will deny me if they can.
So I have need of you.”
“I am yours to command, my king. As ever.”
Stannis nodded. “I mean for you to sail Black Betha north,
to Gulltown, the Fingers, the Three Sisters, even White Harbor.
Your son Dale will go south in Wraith, past Cape Wrath and the
Broken Arm, all along the coast of Dorne as far as the Arbor. Each
of you will carry a chest of letters, and you will deliver one to
every port and holdfast and fishing village. Nail them to the doors
of septs and inns for every man to read who can.”
Davos said, “That will be few enough.”
“Ser Davos speaks truly, Your Grace,” said Maester
Pylos. “It would be better to have the letters read
aloud.”
“Better, but more dangerous,” said Stannis.
“These words will not be kindly received.”
“Give me knights to do the reading,” Davos said.
“That will carry more weight than anything I might
say.”
Stannis seemed well satisfied with that. “I can give you
such men, yes. I have a hundred knights who would sooner read than
fight. Be open where you can and stealthy where you must. Use every
smuggler’s trick you know, the black sails, the hidden coves,
whatever it requires. If you run short of letters, capture a few
septons and set them to copying out more. I mean to use your second
son as well. He will take Lady Marya across the narrow sea, to
Braavos and the other Free Cities, to deliver other letters to the
men who rule there. The world will know of my claim, and of
Cersei’s infamy.” You can tell them, Davos thought, but will they believe? He
glanced thoughtfully at Maester Pylos. The king caught the look.
“Maester, perhaps you ought get to your writing. We will need
a great many letters, and soon.”
“As you will.” Pylos bowed, and took his leave.
The king waited until he was gone before he said, “What is
it you would not say in the presence of my maester,
Davos?”
“My liege, Pylos is pleasant enough, but I cannot see the
chain about his neck without mourning for Maester
Cressen.”
“Is it his fault the old man died?” Stannis glanced
into the fire. “I never wanted Cressen at that feast.
He’d angered me, yes, he’d given me bad counsel, but I
did not want him dead. I’d hoped he might be granted a few
years of ease and comfort. He had earned that much, at least,
but”—he ground his teeth together—“but he died.
And Pylos serves me ably.”
“Pylos is the least of it. The
letter . . . What did your lords make of it, I
wonder?”
Stannis snorted. “Celtigar pronounced it admirable. If I
showed him the contents of my privy, he would declare that
admirable as well. The others bobbed their heads up and down like a
flock of geese, all but Velaryon, who said that steel would decide
the matter, not words on parchment. As if I had never suspected.
The Others take my lords, I’ll hear your views.”
“Your words were blunt and strong.”
“And true.”
“And true. Yet you have no proof. Of this incest. No more
than you did a year ago.”
“There’s proof of a sort at Storm’s End.
Robert’s bastard. The one he fathered on my wedding night, in
the very bed they’d made up for me and my bride. Delena was a
Florent, and a maiden when he took her, so Robert acknowledged the
babe. Edric Storm, they call him. He is said to be the very image
of my brother. If men were to see him, and then look again at
Joffrey and Tommen, they could not help but wonder, I would
think.”
“Yet how are men to see him, if he is at Storm’s
End?”
Stannis drummed his fingers on the Painted Table. “It is a
difficulty. One of many.” He raised his eyes. “You have
more to say about the letter. Well, get on with it. I did not make
you a knight so you could learn to mouth empty courtesies. I have
my lords for that. Say what you would say, Davos.”
Davos bowed his head. “There was a phrase at the end. How
did it go? Done in the Light of the
Lord . . . ”
“Yes.” The king’s jaw was clenched.
“Your people will mislike those words.”
“As you did?” said Stannis sharply.
“If you were to say instead, Done in the sight of gods and
men, or By the grace of the gods old and
new . . . ”
“Have you gone devout on me, smuggler?”
“That was to be my question for you, my liege.”
“Was it now? It sounds as though you love my new god no
more than you love my new maester.”
“I do not know this Lord of Light,” Davos admitted,
“but I knew the gods we burned this morning. The Smith has
kept my ships safe, while the Mother has given me seven strong
sons.”
“Your wife has given you seven strong sons. Do you pray to
her? It was wood we burned this morning.”
“That may be so,” Davos said, “but when I was
a boy in Flea Bottom begging for a copper, sometimes the septons
would feed me.”
“I feed you now.”
“You have given me an honored place at your table. And in
return I give you truth. Your people will not love you if you take
from them the gods they have always worshiped, and give them one
whose very name sounds queer on their tongues.”
Stannis stood abruptly. “R’hllor. Why is that so
hard? They will not love me, you say? When have they ever loved me?
How can I lose something I have never owned?” He moved to the
south window to gaze out at the moonlit sea. “I stopped
believing in gods the day I saw the Windproud break up across the
bay. Any gods so monstrous as to drown my mother and father would
never have my worship, I vowed. In King’s Landing, the High
Septon would prattle at me of how all justice and goodness flowed
from the Seven, but all I ever saw of either was made by
men.”
“If you do not believe in gods—”
“—why trouble with this new one?” Stannis broke in.
“I have asked myself as well. I know little and care less of
gods, but the red priestess has power.” Yes, but what sort of power? “Cressen had
wisdom.”
“I trusted in his wisdom and your wiles, and what did they
avail me, smuggler? The storm lords sent you packing. I went to
them a beggar and they laughed at me. Well, there will be no more
begging, and no more laughing either. The Iron Throne is mine by
rights, but how am I to take it? There are four kings in the realm,
and three of them have more men and more gold than I do. I have
ships . . . and I have her. The red woman. Half
my knights are afraid even to say her name, did you know? If she
can do nothing else, a sorceress who can inspire such dread in
grown men is not to be despised. A frightened man is a beaten man.
And perhaps she can do more. I mean to find out.
“When I was a lad I found an injured goshawk and nursed
her back to health. Proudwing, I named her. She would perch on my
shoulder and flutter from room to room after me and take food from
my hand, but she would not soar. Time and again I would take her
hawking, but she never flew higher than the treetops. Robert called
her Weakwing. He owned a gyrfalcon named Thunderclap who never
missed her strike. One day our great-uncle Ser Harbert told me to
try a different bird. I was making a fool of myself with Proudwing,
he said, and he was right.” Stannis Baratheon turned away
from the window, and the ghosts who moved upon the southern sea.
“The Seven have never brought me so much as a sparrow. It is
time I tried another hawk, Davos. A red hawk.”
The morning air was dark with the smoke of burning gods.
They were all afire now, Maid and Mother, Warrior and Smith, the
Crone with her pearl eyes and the Father with his gilded beard;
even the Stranger, carved to look more animal than human. The old
dry wood and countless layers of paint and varnish blazed with a
fierce hungry light. Heat rose shimmering through the chill air;
behind, the gargoyles and stone dragons on the castle walls seemed
blurred, as if Davos were seeing them through a veil of tears. Or
as if the beasts were trembling,
stirring . . .
“An ill thing,” Allard declared, though at least he
had the sense to keep his voice low. Dale muttered agreement.
“Silence,” said Davos. “Remember where you
are.” His sons were good men, but young, and Allard
especially was rash. Had I stayed a smuggler, Allard would have
ended on the Wall. Stannis spared him from that end, something else
I owe him . . .
Hundreds had come to the castle gates to bear witness to the
burning of the Seven. The smell in the air was ugly. Even for
soldiers, it was hard not to feel uneasy at such an affront to the
gods most had worshiped all their lives.
The red woman walked round the fire three times, praying once in
the speech of Asshai, once in High Valyrian, and once in the Common
Tongue. Davos understood only the last. “R’hllor, come
to us in our darkness,” she called. “Lord of Light, we
offer you these false gods, these seven who are one, and him the
enemy. Take them and cast your light upon us, for the night is dark
and full of terrors.” Queen Selyse echoed the words. Beside
her, Stannis watched impassively, his jaw hard as stone under the
blue-black shadow of his tight-cropped beard. He had dressed more
richly than was his wont, as if for the sept.
Dragonstone’s sept had been where Aegon the Conqueror
knelt to pray the night before he sailed. That had not saved it
from the queen’s men. They had overturned the altars, pulled
down the statues, and smashed the stained glass with warhammers.
Septon Barre could only curse them, but Ser Hubard Rambton led his
three sons to the sept to defend their gods. The Rambtons had slain
four of the queen’s men before the others overwhelmed them.
Afterward Guncer Sunglass, mildest and most pious of lords, told
Stannis he could no longer support his claim. Now he shared a
sweltering cell with the septon and Ser Hubard’s two
surviving sons. The other lords had not been slow to take the
lesson.
The gods had never meant much to Davos the smuggler, though like
most men he had been known to make offerings to the Warrior before
battle, to the Smith when he launched a ship, and to the Mother
whenever his wife grew great with child. He felt ill as he watched
them burn, and not only from the smoke. Maester Cressen would have stopped this. The old man had
challenged the Lord of Light and been struck down for his impiety,
or so the gossips told each other. Davos knew the truth. He had
seen the maester slip something into the wine cup. Poison. What
else could it be? He drank a cup of death to free Stannis from
Melisandre, but somehow her god shielded her. He would gladly have
killed the red woman for that, yet what chance would he have where
a maester of the Citadel had failed? He was only a smuggler raised
high, Davos of Flea Bottom, the Onion Knight.
The burning gods cast a pretty light, wreathed in their robes of
shifting flame, red and orange and yellow. Septon Barre had once
told Davos how they’d been carved from the masts of the ships
that had carried the first Targaryens from Valyria. Over the
centuries, they had been painted and repainted, gilded, silvered,
jeweled. “Their beauty will make them more pleasing to
R’hllor,” Melisandre said when she told Stannis to pull
them down and drag them out the castle gates.
The Maiden lay athwart the Warrior, her arms widespread as if to
embrace him. The Mother seemed almost to shudder as the flames came
licking up her face. A longsword had been thrust through her heart,
and its leather grip was alive with flame. The Father was on the
bottom, the first to fall. Davos watched the hand of the Stranger
writhe and curl as the fingers blackened and fell away one by one,
reduced to so much glowing charcoal. Nearby, Lord Celtigar coughed
fitfully and covered his wrinkled face with a square of linen
embroidered in red crabs. The Myrmen swapped jokes as they enjoyed
the warmth of the fire, but young Lord Bar Emmon had turned a
splotchy grey, and Lord Velaryon was watching the king rather than
the conflagration.
Davos would have given much to know what he was thinking, but
one such as Velaryon would never confide in him. The Lord of the
Tides was of the blood of ancient Valyria, and his House had thrice
provided brides for Targaryen princes; Davos Seaworth stank of fish
and onions. It was the same with the other lordlings. He could
trust none of them, nor would they ever include him in their
private councils. They scorned his sons as well. My grandsons will
joust with theirs, though, and one day their blood may wed with
mine. In time my little black ship will fly as high as
Velaryon’s seahorse or Celtigar’s red crabs.
That is, if Stannis won his throne. If he
lost . . . Everything I am, I owe to him. Stannis had raised him to
knighthood. He had given him a place of honor at his table, a war
galley to sail in place of a smuggler’s skiff. Dale and
Allard captained galleys as well, Maric was oarmaster on the Fury,
Matthos served his father on Black Betha, and the king had taken
Devan as a royal squire. One day he would be knighted, and the two
little lads as well. Marya was mistress of a small keep on Cape
Wrath, with servants who called her m’lady, and Davos could
hunt red deer in his own woods. All this he had of Stannis
Baratheon, for the price of a few finger joints. It was just, what
he did to me. I had flouted the king’s laws all my life. He
has earned my loyalty. Davos touched the little pouch that hung
from the leather thong about his neck. His fingers were his luck,
and he needed luck now. As do we all. Lord Stannis most of all.
Pale flames licked at the grey sky. Dark smoke rose, twisting
and curling. When the wind pushed it toward them, men blinked and
wept and rubbed their eyes. Allard turned his head away, coughing
and cursing. A taste of things to come, thought Davos. Many and
more would burn before this war was done.
Melisandre was robed all in scarlet satin and blood velvet, her
eyes as red as the great ruby that glistened at her throat as if it
too were afire. “In ancient books of Asshai it is written
that there will come a day after a long summer when the stars bleed
and the cold breath of darkness falls heavy on the world. In this
dread hour a warrior shall draw from the fire a burning sword. And
that sword shall be Lightbringer, the Red Sword of Heroes, and he
who clasps it shall be Azor Ahai come again, and the darkness shall
flee before him.” She lifted her voice, so it carried out
over the gathered host. “Azor Ahai, beloved of R’hllor!
The Warrior of Light, the Son of Fire! Come forth, your sword
awaits you! Come forth and take it into your hand!”
Stannis Baratheon strode forward like a soldier marching into
battle. His squires stepped up to attend him. Davos watched as his
son Devan pulled a long padded glove over the king’s right
hand. The boy wore a cream-colored doublet with a fiery heart sewn
on the breast. Bryen Farring was similarly garbed as he tied a
stiff leather cape around His Grace’s neck. Behind, Davos
heard a faint clank and clatter of bells. “Under the sea,
smoke rises in bubbles, and flames burn green and blue and
black,” Patchface sang somewhere. “I know, I know, oh,
oh, oh.”
The king plunged into the fire with his teeth clenched, holding
the leather cloak before him to keep off the flames. He went
straight to the Mother, grasped the sword with his gloved hand, and
wrenched it free of the burning wood with a single hard jerk. Then
he was retreating, the sword held high, jade-green flames swirling
around cherry-red steel. Guards rushed to beat out the cinders that
clung to the king’s clothing.
“A sword of fire!” shouted Queen Selyse. Ser Axell
Florent and the other queen’s men took up the cry. “A
sword of fire! It burns! It burns! A sword of fire!”
Melisandre lifted her hands above her head. “Behold! A
sign was promised, and now a sign is seen! Behold Lightbringer!
Azor Ahai has come again! All hail the Warrior of Light! All hail
the Son of Fire!”
A ragged wave of shouts gave answer, just as Stannis’s
glove began to smolder. Cursing, the king thrust the point of the
sword into the damp earth and beat out the flames against his
leg.
“Lord, cast your light upon us!” Melisandre called
out.
“For the night is dark and full of terrors,” Selyse
and her queen’s men replied. Should I speak the words as
well? Davos wondered. Do I owe Stannis that much? Is this fiery god
truly his own? His shortened fingers twitched.
Stannis peeled off the glove and let it fall to the ground. The
gods in the pyre were scarcely recognizable anymore. The head fell
off the Smith with a puff of ash and embers. Melisandre sang in the
tongue of Asshai, her voice rising and falling like the tides of
the sea. Stannis untied his singed leather cape and listened in
silence. Thrust in the ground, Lightbringer still glowed ruddy hot,
but the flames that clung to the sword were dwindling and
dying.
By the time the song was done, only charwood remained of the
gods, and the king’s patience had run its course. He took the
queen by the elbow and escorted her back into Dragonstone, leaving
Lightbringer where it stood. The red woman remained a moment to
watch as Devan knelt with Byren Farring and rolled up the burnt and
blackened sword in the king’s leather cloak. The Red Sword of
Heroes looks a proper mess, thought Davos.
A few of the lords lingered to speak in quiet voices upwind of
the fire. They fell silent when they saw Davos looking at them.
Should Stannis fall, they will pull me down in an instant. Neither
was he counted one of the queen’s men, that group of
ambitious knights and minor lordlings who had given themselves to
this Lord of Light and so won the favor and patronage of Lady—no,
Queen, remember?—Selyse.
The fire had started to dwindle by the time Melisandre and the
squires departed with the precious sword. Davos and his sons joined
the crowd making its way down to the shore and the waiting ships.
“Devan acquitted himself well,” he said as they
went.
“He fetched the glove without dropping it, yes,”
said Dale.
Allard nodded. “That badge on Devan’s doublet, the
fiery heart, what was that? The Baratheon sigil is a crowned
stag.”
“A lord can choose more than one badge,” Davos
said.
Dale smiled. “A black ship and an onion,
Father?”
Allard kicked at a stone. “The Others take our
onion . . . and that flaming heart. It was an
ill thing to burn the Seven.”
“When did you grow so devout?” Davos said.
“What does a smuggler’s son know of the doings of
gods?”
“I’m a knight’s son, Father. If you
won’t remember, why should they? “
“A knight’s son, but not a knight,” said
Davos. “Nor will you ever be, if you meddle in affairs that
do not concern you. Stannis is our rightful king, it is not for us
to question him. We sail his ships and do his bidding. That is
all.”
“As to that, Father,” Dale said, “I mislike
these water casks they’ve given me for Wraith. Green pine.
The water will spoil on a voyage of any length.”
“I got the same for Lady Marya,” said Allard.
“The queen’s men have laid claim to all the seasoned
wood.”
“I will speak to the king about it,” Davos promised.
Better it come from him than from Allard. His sons were good
fighters and better sailors, but they did not know how to talk to
lords. They were lowborn, even as I was, but they do not like to
recall that. When they look at our banner, all they see is a tall
black ship flying on the wind. They close their eyes to the
onion.
The port was as crowded as Davos had ever known it. Every dock
teemed with sailors loading provisions, and every inn was packed
with soldiers dicing or drinking or looking for a
whore . . . a vain search, since Stannis
permitted none on his island. Ships lined the strand; war galleys
and fishing vessels, stout carracks and fat-bottomed cogs. The best
berths had been taken by the largest vessels: Stannis’s
flagship Fury rocking between Lord Steffon and Stag of the Sea,
Lord Velaryon’s silver-hulled Pride of Driftmark and her three
sisters, Lord Celtigar’s ornate Red Claw, the ponderous
Swordfish with her long iron prow. Out to sea at anchor rode
Salladhor Saan’s great Valyrian amongst the striped hulls of
two dozen smaller Lysene galleys.
A weathered little inn sat on the end of the stone pier where
Black Betha, Wraith, and Lady Marya shared mooring space with a
half-dozen other galleys of one hundred oars or less. Davos had a
thirst. He took his leave of his sons and turned his steps toward
the inn. Out front squatted a waist-high gargoyle, so eroded by
rain and salt that his features were all but obliterated. He and
Davos were old friends, though. He gave a pat to the stone head as
he went in. “Luck,” he murmured.
Across the noisy common room, Salladhor Saan sat eating grapes
from a wooden bowl. When he spied Davos, he beckoned him closer.
“Ser knight, come sit with me. Eat a grape. Eat two. They are
marvelously sweet.” The Lyseni was a sleek, smiling man whose
flamboyance was a byword on both sides of the narrow sea. Today he
wore flashing cloth-of-silver, with dagged sleeves so long the ends
of them pooled on the floor. His buttons were carved jade monkeys,
and atop his wispy white curls perched a jaunty green cap decorated
with a fan of peacock feathers.
Davos threaded his way through the tables to a chair. In the
days before his knighthood, he had often bought cargoes from
Salladhor Saan. The Lyseni was a smuggler himself, as well as a
trader, a banker, a notorious pirate, and the self-styled Prince of
the Narrow Sea. When a pirate grows rich enough, they make him a
prince. It had been Davos who had made the journey to Lys to
recruit the old rogue to Lord Stannis’s cause.
“You did not see the gods burn, my lord?” he
asked.
“The red priests have a great temple on Lys. Always they
are burning this and burning that, crying out to their
R’hllor. They bore me with their fires. Soon they will bore
King Stannis too, it is to be hoped.” He seemed utterly
unconcerned that someone might overhear him, eating his grapes and
dribbling the seeds out onto his lip, flicking them off with a
finger. “My Bird of a Thousand Colors came in yesterday, good
ser. She is not a warship, no, but a trader, and she paid a call on
King’s Landing. Are you sure you will not have a grape?
Children go hungry in the city, it is said.” He dangled the
grapes before Davos and smiled.
“It’s ale I need, and news.”
“The men of Westeros are ever rushing,” complained
Salladhor Saan. “What good is this, I ask you? He who hurries
through life hurries to his grave.” He belched. “The
Lord of Casterly Rock has sent his dwarf to see to King’s
Landing. Perhaps he hopes that his ugly face will frighten off
attackers, eh? Or that we will laugh ourselves dead when the Imp
capers on the battlements, who can say? The dwarf has chased off
the lout who ruled the gold cloaks and put in his place a knight
with an iron hand.” He plucked a grape, and squeezed it
between thumb and forefinger until the skin burst. juice ran down
between his fingers.
A serving girl pushed her way through, swatting at the hands
that groped her as she passed. Davos ordered a tankard of ale,
turned back to Saan, and said, “How well is the city
defended?”
The other shrugged. “The walls are high and strong, but
who will man them? They are building scorpions and spitfires, oh,
yes, but the men in the golden cloaks are too few and too green,
and there are no others. A swift strike, like a hawk plummeting at
a hare, and the great city will be ours. Grant us wind to fill our
sails, and your king could sit upon his Iron Throne by evenfall on
the morrow. We could dress the dwarf in motley and prick his little
cheeks with the points of our spears to make him dance for us, and
mayhaps your goodly king would make me a gift of the beautiful
Queen Cersei to warm my bed for a night. I have been too long away
from my wives, and all in his service.”
“Pirate,” said Davos. “You have no wives, only
concubines, and you have been well paid for every day and every
ship.”
“Only in promises,” said Salladhor Saan mournfully.
“Good ser, it is gold I crave, not words on papers.” He
popped a grape into his mouth.
“You’ll have your gold when we take the treasury in
King’s Landing. No man in the Seven Kingdoms is more
honorable than Stannis Baratheon. He will keep his word.”
Even as Davos spoke, he thought, This world is twisted beyond hope,
when lowborn smugglers must vouch for the honor of kings.
“So he has said and said. And so I say, let us do this
thing. Even these grapes could be no more ripe than that city, my
old friend.”
The serving girl returned with his ale. Davos gave her a copper.
“Might be we could take King’s Landing, as you
say,” he said as he lifted the tankard, “but how long
would we hold it? Tywin Lannister is known to be at Harrenhal with
a great host, and Lord Renly . . . ”
“Ah, yes, the young brother,” said Salladhor Saan.
“That part is not so good, my friend. King Renly bestirs
himself. No, here he is Lord Renly, my pardons. So many kings, my
tongue grows weary of the word. The brother Renly has left
Highgarden with his fair young queen, his flowered lords and
shining knights, and a mighty host of foot. He marches up your road
of roses toward the very same great city we were speaking
of.”
“He takes his bride?”
The other shrugged. “He did not tell me why. Perhaps he is
loath to part with the warm burrow between her thighs, even for a
night. Or perhaps he is that certain of his victory.”
“The king must be told.”
“I have attended to it, good ser. Though His Grace frowns
so whenever he does see me that I tremble to come before him. Do
you think he would like me better if I wore a hair shirt and never
smiled? Well, I will not do it. I am an honest man, he must suffer
me in silk and samite. Or else I shall take my ships where I am
better loved. That sword was not Lightbringer, my
friend.”
The sudden shift in subject left Davos uneasy.
“Sword?”
“A sword plucked from fire, yes. Men tell me things, it is
my pleasant smile. How shall a burnt sword serve
Stannis?”
“A burning sword,” corrected Davos.
“Burnt,” said Salladhor Saan, “and be glad of
that, my friend. Do you know the tale of the forging of
Lightbringer? I shall tell it to you. It was a time when darkness
lay heavy on the world. To oppose it, the hero must have a
hero’s blade, oh, like none that had ever been. And so for
thirty days and thirty nights Azor Ahai labored sleepless in the
temple, forging a blade in the sacred fires. Heat and hammer and
fold, heat and hammer and fold, oh, yes, until the sword was done.
Yet when he plunged it into water to temper the steel it burst
asunder.
“Being a hero, it was not for him to shrug and go in
search of excellent grapes such as these, so again he began. The
second time it took him fifty days and fifty nights, and this sword
seemed even finer than the first. Azor Ahai captured a lion, to
temper the blade by plunging it through the beast’s red
heart, but once more the steel shattered and split. Great was his
woe and great was his sorrow then, for he knew what he must do.
“A hundred days and a hundred nights he labored on the
third blade, and as it glowed white-hot in the sacred fires, he
summoned his wife. ‘Nissa Nissa’ he said to her, for
that was her name, ‘bare your breast, and know that I love
you best of all that is in this world.’ She did this thing,
why I cannot say, and Azor Ahai thrust the smoking sword through
her living heart. It is said that her cry of anguish and ecstasy
left a crack across the face of the moon, but her blood and her
soul and her strength and her courage all went into the steel. Such
is the tale of the forging of Lightbringer, the Red Sword of
Heroes.
“Now do you see my meaning? Be glad that it is just a
burnt sword that His Grace pulled from that fire. Too much light
can hurt the eyes, my friend, and fire burns.” Salladhor Saan
finished the last grape and smacked his lips. “When do you
think the king will bid us sail, good ser? “
“Soon, I think,” said Davos, “if his god wills
it.”
“His god, ser friend? Not yours? Where is the god of Ser
Davos Seaworth, knight of the onion ship?”
Davos sipped his ale to give himself a moment. The inn is
crowded, and you are not Salladhor Saan, he reminded himself. Be
careful how you answer. “King Stannis is my god. He made me
and blessed me with his trust.”
“I will remember.” Salladhor Saan got to his feet.
“My pardons. These grapes have given me a hunger, and dinner
awaits on my Valyrian. Minced lamb with pepper and roasted gull
stuffed with mushrooms and fennel and onion. Soon we shall eat
together in King’s Landing, yes? In the Red Keep we shall
feast, while the dwarf sings us a jolly tune. When you speak to
King Stannis, mention if you would that he will owe me another
thirty thousand dragons come the black of the moon. He ought to
have given those gods to me. They were too beautiful to burn, and
might have brought a noble price in Pentos or Myr. Well, if he
grants me Queen Cersei for a night I shall forgive him.” The
Lyseni clapped Davos on the back, and swaggered from the inn as if
he owned it.
Ser Davos Seaworth lingered over his tankard for a good while,
thinking. A year ago, he had been with Stannis in King’s
Landing when King Robert staged a tourney for Prince
Joffrey’s name day. He remembered the red priest Thoros of
Myr, and the flaming sword he had wielded in the melee. The man had
made for a colorful spectacle, his red robes flapping while his
blade writhed with pale green flames, but everyone knew there was
no true magic to it, and in the end his fire had guttered out and
Bronze Yohn Royce had brained him with a common mace. A true sword of fire, now, that would be a wonder to behold. Yet
at such a cost . . . When he thought of Nissa
Nissa, it was his own Marya he pictured, a good-natured plump woman
with sagging breasts and a kindly smile, the best woman in the
world. He tried to picture himself driving a sword through her, and
shuddered. I am not made of the stuff of heroes, he decided. If
that was the price of a magic sword, it was more than he cared to
pay.
Davos finished his ale, pushed away the tankard, and left the
inn. On the way out he patted the gargoyle on the head and
muttered, “Luck.” They would all need it.
It was well after dark when Devan came down to Black Betha,
leading a snow-white palfrey. “My lord father,” he
announced, “His Grace commands you to attend him in the
Chamber of the Painted Table. You are to ride the horse and come at
once.”
It was good to see Devan looking so splendid in his
squire’s raiment, but the summons made Davos uneasy. Will he
bid us sail? he wondered. Salladhor Saan was not the only captain
who felt that King’s Landing was ripe for an attack, but a
smuggler must learn patience. We have no hope of victory. I said as
much to Maester Cressen, the day I returned to Dragonstone, and nothing has changed. We are too few, the foes
too many. ff we dip our oars, we die. Nonetheless, he climbed onto
the horse.
When Davos arrived at the Stone Drum, a dozen highborn knights
and great bannermen were just leaving. Lords Celtigar and Velaryon
each gave him a curt nod and walked on while the others ignored him
utterly, but Ser Axell Florent stopped for a word.
Queen Selyse’s uncle was a keg of a man with thick arms
and bandy legs. He had the prominent ears of a Florent, even larger
than his niece’s. The coarse hair that sprouted from his did
not stop him hearing most of what went on in the castle. For ten
years Ser Axell had served as castellan of Dragonstone while
Stannis sat on Robert’s council in King’s Landing, but
of late he had emerged as the foremost of the queen’s men.
“Ser Davos, it is good to see you, as ever,” he
said.
“And you, my lord.”
“I made note of you this morning as well. The false gods
burned with a merry light, did they not?”
“They burned brightly.” Davos did not trust this
man, for all his courtesy. House Florent had declared for
Renly.
“The Lady Melisandre tells us that sometimes R’hllor
permits his faithful servants to glimpse the future in flames. It
seemed to me as I watched the fire this morning that I was looking
at a dozen beautiful dancers, maidens garbed in yellow silk
spinning and swirling before a great king. I think it was a true
vision, ser. A glimpse of the glory that awaits His Grace after we
take King’s Landing and the throne that is his by
rights.” Stannis has no taste for such dancing, Davos thought, but he
dared not offend the queen’s uncle. “I saw only
fire,” he said, “but the smoke was making my eyes
water. You must pardon me, ser, the king awaits.” He pushed
past, wondering why Ser Axell had troubled himself. He is a
queen’s man and I am the king’s.
Stannis sat at his Painted Table with Maester Pylos at his
shoulder, an untidy pile of papers before them. “Ser,”
the king said when Davos entered, “come have a look at this
letter.”
Obediently, he selected a paper at random. “It looks
handsome enough, Your Grace, but I fear I cannot read the
words.” Davos could decipher maps and charts as well as any,
but letters and other writings were beyond his powers. But my Devan
has learned his letters, and young Steffon and Stannis as well.
“I’d forgotten.” A furrow of irritation showed
between the king’s brows. “Pylos, read it to
him.”
“Your Grace.” The maester took up one of the
parchments and cleared his throat. “All men know me for the
trueborn son of Steffon Baratheon, Lord of Storm’s End, by his lady wife Cassana of House
Estermont. I declare upon the honor of my House that my beloved
brother Robert, our late king, left no trueborn issue of his body,
the boy Joffrey, the boy Tommen, and the girl Myrcella being
abominations born of incest between Cersei Lannister and her
brother Jaime the Kingslayer. By right of birth and blood, I do
this day lay claim to the Iron Throne of the Seven Kingdoms of
Westeros. Let all true men declare their loyalty. Done in the Light
of the Lord, under the sign and seal of Stannis of House Baratheon,
the First of His Name, King of the Andals, the Rhoynar, and the
First Men, and Lord of the Seven Kingdoms.” The parchment
rustled softly as Pylos laid it down.
“Make it Ser Jaime the Kingslayer henceforth,”
Stannis said, frowning. “Whatever else the man may be, he
remains a knight. I don’t know that we ought to call Robert
my beloved brother either. He loved me no more than he had to, nor
I him.”
“A harmless courtesy, Your Grace,” Pylos said.
“A lie. Take it out.” Stannis turned to Davos.
“The maester tells me that we have one hundred seventeen
ravens on hand. I mean to use them all. One hundred seventeen
ravens will carry one hundred seventeen copies of my letter to
every corner of the realm, from the Arbor to the Wall. Perhaps a
hundred will win through against storm and hawk and arrow. If so, a
hundred maesters will read my words to as many lords in as many
solars and bedchambers . . . and then the
letters will like as not be consigned to the fire, and lips pledged
to silence. These great lords love Joffrey, or Renly, or Robb
Stark. I am their rightful king, but they will deny me if they can.
So I have need of you.”
“I am yours to command, my king. As ever.”
Stannis nodded. “I mean for you to sail Black Betha north,
to Gulltown, the Fingers, the Three Sisters, even White Harbor.
Your son Dale will go south in Wraith, past Cape Wrath and the
Broken Arm, all along the coast of Dorne as far as the Arbor. Each
of you will carry a chest of letters, and you will deliver one to
every port and holdfast and fishing village. Nail them to the doors
of septs and inns for every man to read who can.”
Davos said, “That will be few enough.”
“Ser Davos speaks truly, Your Grace,” said Maester
Pylos. “It would be better to have the letters read
aloud.”
“Better, but more dangerous,” said Stannis.
“These words will not be kindly received.”
“Give me knights to do the reading,” Davos said.
“That will carry more weight than anything I might
say.”
Stannis seemed well satisfied with that. “I can give you
such men, yes. I have a hundred knights who would sooner read than
fight. Be open where you can and stealthy where you must. Use every
smuggler’s trick you know, the black sails, the hidden coves,
whatever it requires. If you run short of letters, capture a few
septons and set them to copying out more. I mean to use your second
son as well. He will take Lady Marya across the narrow sea, to
Braavos and the other Free Cities, to deliver other letters to the
men who rule there. The world will know of my claim, and of
Cersei’s infamy.” You can tell them, Davos thought, but will they believe? He
glanced thoughtfully at Maester Pylos. The king caught the look.
“Maester, perhaps you ought get to your writing. We will need
a great many letters, and soon.”
“As you will.” Pylos bowed, and took his leave.
The king waited until he was gone before he said, “What is
it you would not say in the presence of my maester,
Davos?”
“My liege, Pylos is pleasant enough, but I cannot see the
chain about his neck without mourning for Maester
Cressen.”
“Is it his fault the old man died?” Stannis glanced
into the fire. “I never wanted Cressen at that feast.
He’d angered me, yes, he’d given me bad counsel, but I
did not want him dead. I’d hoped he might be granted a few
years of ease and comfort. He had earned that much, at least,
but”—he ground his teeth together—“but he died.
And Pylos serves me ably.”
“Pylos is the least of it. The
letter . . . What did your lords make of it, I
wonder?”
Stannis snorted. “Celtigar pronounced it admirable. If I
showed him the contents of my privy, he would declare that
admirable as well. The others bobbed their heads up and down like a
flock of geese, all but Velaryon, who said that steel would decide
the matter, not words on parchment. As if I had never suspected.
The Others take my lords, I’ll hear your views.”
“Your words were blunt and strong.”
“And true.”
“And true. Yet you have no proof. Of this incest. No more
than you did a year ago.”
“There’s proof of a sort at Storm’s End.
Robert’s bastard. The one he fathered on my wedding night, in
the very bed they’d made up for me and my bride. Delena was a
Florent, and a maiden when he took her, so Robert acknowledged the
babe. Edric Storm, they call him. He is said to be the very image
of my brother. If men were to see him, and then look again at
Joffrey and Tommen, they could not help but wonder, I would
think.”
“Yet how are men to see him, if he is at Storm’s
End?”
Stannis drummed his fingers on the Painted Table. “It is a
difficulty. One of many.” He raised his eyes. “You have
more to say about the letter. Well, get on with it. I did not make
you a knight so you could learn to mouth empty courtesies. I have
my lords for that. Say what you would say, Davos.”
Davos bowed his head. “There was a phrase at the end. How
did it go? Done in the Light of the
Lord . . . ”
“Yes.” The king’s jaw was clenched.
“Your people will mislike those words.”
“As you did?” said Stannis sharply.
“If you were to say instead, Done in the sight of gods and
men, or By the grace of the gods old and
new . . . ”
“Have you gone devout on me, smuggler?”
“That was to be my question for you, my liege.”
“Was it now? It sounds as though you love my new god no
more than you love my new maester.”
“I do not know this Lord of Light,” Davos admitted,
“but I knew the gods we burned this morning. The Smith has
kept my ships safe, while the Mother has given me seven strong
sons.”
“Your wife has given you seven strong sons. Do you pray to
her? It was wood we burned this morning.”
“That may be so,” Davos said, “but when I was
a boy in Flea Bottom begging for a copper, sometimes the septons
would feed me.”
“I feed you now.”
“You have given me an honored place at your table. And in
return I give you truth. Your people will not love you if you take
from them the gods they have always worshiped, and give them one
whose very name sounds queer on their tongues.”
Stannis stood abruptly. “R’hllor. Why is that so
hard? They will not love me, you say? When have they ever loved me?
How can I lose something I have never owned?” He moved to the
south window to gaze out at the moonlit sea. “I stopped
believing in gods the day I saw the Windproud break up across the
bay. Any gods so monstrous as to drown my mother and father would
never have my worship, I vowed. In King’s Landing, the High
Septon would prattle at me of how all justice and goodness flowed
from the Seven, but all I ever saw of either was made by
men.”
“If you do not believe in gods—”
“—why trouble with this new one?” Stannis broke in.
“I have asked myself as well. I know little and care less of
gods, but the red priestess has power.” Yes, but what sort of power? “Cressen had
wisdom.”
“I trusted in his wisdom and your wiles, and what did they
avail me, smuggler? The storm lords sent you packing. I went to
them a beggar and they laughed at me. Well, there will be no more
begging, and no more laughing either. The Iron Throne is mine by
rights, but how am I to take it? There are four kings in the realm,
and three of them have more men and more gold than I do. I have
ships . . . and I have her. The red woman. Half
my knights are afraid even to say her name, did you know? If she
can do nothing else, a sorceress who can inspire such dread in
grown men is not to be despised. A frightened man is a beaten man.
And perhaps she can do more. I mean to find out.
“When I was a lad I found an injured goshawk and nursed
her back to health. Proudwing, I named her. She would perch on my
shoulder and flutter from room to room after me and take food from
my hand, but she would not soar. Time and again I would take her
hawking, but she never flew higher than the treetops. Robert called
her Weakwing. He owned a gyrfalcon named Thunderclap who never
missed her strike. One day our great-uncle Ser Harbert told me to
try a different bird. I was making a fool of myself with Proudwing,
he said, and he was right.” Stannis Baratheon turned away
from the window, and the ghosts who moved upon the southern sea.
“The Seven have never brought me so much as a sparrow. It is
time I tried another hawk, Davos. A red hawk.”