Fire & Blood (A Targaryen History #1) - George R.R. Martin Page 0,300

had in effect sold something that he did not own, but this was not unusual in Braavos).

The mission to Braavos proved eventful in other ways as well. Lord Follard became enamored of a Braavosi courtesan and elected to remain close to her rather than return to Westeros, Ser Herman Rollingford was killed in a duel by a bravo who took offense at the color of his doublet, and Ser Denys Harte supposedly engaged the services of the mysterious Faceless Men to kill a rival back in King’s Landing, Mushroom asserts. The fool himself so amused the Sealord that he received a handsome offer to remain in Braavos. “I do confess that I was tempted. In Westeros my wit is wasted capering for a king who never smiles, but in Braavos they would love me…too well, I fear. Every courtesan would want me, and soon or late some bravo would take umbrage at the size of my member and prick me with his little pointy dwarf-skewer. So back to the Red Keep Mushroom scurried, and more fool me.”

So it came to pass that Lord Mooton returned to King’s Landing with peace in hand, but at a grievous cost. The huge indemnity demanded by the Sealord so depleted the royal treasury that Lord Peake soon found it necessary to borrow from the Iron Bank of Braavos just so the Crown might pay its debts, and that in turn required him to reinstate certain of Lord Celtigar’s taxes that Ser Tyland Lannister had abolished, which angered lords and merchants alike and weakened his support amongst the smallfolk.

The last half of the year proved calamitous in other ways as well. The court rejoiced when Lady Rhaena announced that she was with child by Lord Corbray, but joy turned to grief a moon’s turn later when she miscarried. Widespread famine was reported in the North, and the Winter Fever descended on Barrowton, the first time it had ever traveled so far inland. A raider named Sylas the Grim led three thousand wildlings against the Wall, overwhelming the black brothers at Queensgate and spreading out across the Gift until Lord Cregan Stark rode forth from Winterfell, joined with the Glovers of Deepwood Motte, the Flints and Norreys of the hills, and a hundred rangers from the Night’s Watch to hunt them down and put an end to them. A thousand leagues to the south, Ser Steffon Connington was hunting too, pursuing a small band of Dornish raiders across the windswept marches. But he rode too far and too fast, ignorant of what lay ahead until one-armed Wyland Wyl came down on him, and Lady Elenda found herself widowed once again.

In the west, Lady Johanna Lannister hoped to follow her victory at Kayce by striking another blow against the Red Kraken. Assembling a ragtag fleet of fishing boats and cogs beneath the walls of Feastfires, she loaded a hundred knights and three thousand men-at-arms aboard, and sent them out to sea under the cover of darkness to retake Fair Isle from the ironmen. The plan was to land them undetected on the south end of the island, but someone had betrayed them, and the longships were waiting. Lord Prester, Lord Tarbeck, and Ser Erwin Lannister commanded the ill-fated crossing. Dalton Greyjoy sent their heads to Casterly Rock afterward, calling it “payment for my uncle, though in truth he was a glutton and a drunkard, and the islands are well rid of him.”

Yet all these were as naught against the tragedy that descended on the court and king. On the twenty-second day of the ninth moon of 133 AC, Jaehaera of House Targaryen, Queen of the Seven Kingdoms and the last surviving child of King Aegon II, perished at the age of ten. The little queen died just as her mother, Queen Helaena, had, throwing herself from a window in Maegor’s Holdfast onto the iron spikes that lined the dry moat below. Impaled through breast and belly, she twisted in agony for half an hour before she could be lifted free, whereupon she passed from this life at once.

King’s Landing grieved, as only King’s Landing could. Jaehaera had been a frightened child, and from the day she donned her crown she had hidden herself away inside the Red Keep, yet the smallfolk of the city remembered her wedding, and how brave and beautiful the little girl had seemed, and so they wept, and wailed, and tore their clothes, and crowded into septs and taverns and brothels,