George Martin: The Mystery Knight

“As it should.” Ser Glendon Ball gave his sword another stroke with the whetstone. “The Warrior hates cravens.”

The scorn in his voice made Dunk give the youth a closer look. Ser Glendon’s clothes were of good cloth, but well-worn and ill-matched, with the look of hand-me-downs. Tufts of dark brown hair stuck out from beneath his iron halfhelm. The lad himself was short and chunky, with small close-set eyes, thick shoulders, and muscular arms. His eyebrows were shaggy as two caterpillars after a wet spring, his nose bulbous, his chin pugnacious. And he was young. Sixteen, might be. No more than eighteen. Dunk might have taken him for a squire if Ser Kyle had not named him with a ser. The lad had pimples on his cheeks in place of whiskers.

“How long have you been a knight?” Dunk asked him.

“Long enough. Half a year when the moon turns. I was knighted by Ser Morgan Dunstable of Tumbler’s Falls, two dozen people saw it, but I have been training for knighthood since I was born. I rode before I walked, and knocked a grown man’s tooth out of his head before I lost any of my own. I mean to make my name at Whitewalls, and claim the dragon’s egg.”

“The dragon’s egg? Is that the champion’s prize? Truly?” The last dragon had perished half a century ago. Ser Arlan had once seen a clutch of her eggs, though. They were hard as stone, he said, but beautiful to look upon, the old man had told Dunk. “How could Lord Butterwell come by a dragon’s egg?” “King Aegon presented the egg to his father’s father after guesting for a night at his old castle,” said Ser Maynard Plumm.

“Was it a reward for some act of valor?” asked Dunk.

Ser Kyle chuckled. “Some might call it that. Supposedly old Lord Butterwell had three young maiden daughters when His Grace came calling. By morning, all three had royal bastards in their little bellies. A hot night’s work, that was.”

Dunk had heard such talk before. Aegon the Unworthy had bedded half the maidens in the realm and fathered bastards on the lot of them, supposedly. Worse, the old king had legitimized them all upon his deathbed; the baseborn ones born of tavern wenches, whores, and shepherd girls, and the Great Bastards whose mothers had been highborn. “We’d all be bastard sons of old King Aegon if half these tales were true.”

“And who’s to say we’re not?” Ser Maynard quipped.

“You ought to come with us to Whitewalls, Ser Duncan,” urged Ser Kyle. “Your size is sure to catch some lordling’s eye. You might find good service there. I know I shall. Joffrey Caswell will be at this wedding, the Lord of Bitterbridge. When he was three, I made him his first sword. I carved it out of pine, to fit his hand. In my greener days my sword was sworn to his father.”

“Was that one carved from pine as well?” Ser Maynard asked.

Kyle the Cat had the grace to laugh. “That sword was good steel, I assure you. I should be glad to ply it once again in the service of the centaur. Ser Duncan, even if you do not choose to tilt, do join us for the wedding feast. There will be singers and musicians, jugglers and tumblers, and a troupe of comic dwarfs.”

Dunk frowned. “Egg and I have a long journey before us. We’re headed north to Winterfell. Lord Beron Stark is gathering swords to drive the krakens from his shores for good.”

“Too cold up there for me,” said Ser Maynard. “If you want to kill krakens, go west. The Lannisters are building ships to strike back at the iron-men on their home islands. That’s how you put an end to Dagon Greyjoy. Fighting him on land is fruitless, he just slips back to sea. You have to beat him on the water.”

That had the ring of truth, but the prospect of fighting ironmen at sea was not one that Dunk relished. He’d had a taste of that on the White Lady, sailing from Dorne to Oldtown, when he’d donned his armor to help the crew repel some raiders. The battle had been desperate and bloody, and once he’d almost fallen in the water. That would have been the end of him.

“The throne should take a lesson from Stark and Lannister,” declared Ser Kyle the Cat. “At least they fight. What do the Targaryens do? King Aerys hides amongst his books, Prince Rhaegel prances naked through the Red Keep’s halls, and Prince Maekar broods at Summerhall.”

Egg was prodding at the fire with a stick, to send sparks floating up into the night. Dunk was pleased to see him ignoring the mention of his father’s name. Perhaps he’s finally learned to hold that tongue of his.

“Myself, I blame Bloodraven,” Ser Kyle went on. “He is the King’s Hand, yet he does nothing, whilst the krakens spread flame and terror up and down the sunset sea.”

Ser Maynard gave a shrug. “His eye is fixed on Tyrosh, where Bittersteel sits in exile, plotting with the sons of Daemon Blackfyre. So he keeps the king’s ships close at hand, lest they attempt to cross.”

“Aye, that may well be,” Ser Kyle said, “but many would welcome the return of Bittersteel. Bloodraven is the root of all our woes, the white worm gnawing at the heart of the realm.”

Dunk frowned, remembering the hunchbacked septon at Stoney Sept. “Words like that can cost a man his head. Some might say you’re talking treason.”

“How can the truth be treason?” asked Kyle the Cat. “In King Daeron’s day, a man did not have to fear to speak his mind, but now?” He made a rude noise. “Bloodraven put King Aerys on the Iron Throne, but for how long? Aerys is weak, and when he dies, it will be bloody war between Lord Rivers and Prince Maekar for the crown, the Hand against the heir.”

“You have forgotten Prince Rhaegel, my friend,” Ser Maynard objected, in a mild tone. “He comes next in line to Aerys, not Maekar, and his children after him.”

“Rhaegel is feeble-minded. Why, I bear him no ill will, but the man is good as dead, and those twins of his as well, though whether they will die of Maekar’s mace or Bloodraven’s spells…”

Seven save us, Dunk thought as Egg spoke up shrill and loud. “Prince Maekar is Prince Rhaegel’s brother. He loves him well. He’d never do harm to him or his.”

“Be quiet, boy,” Dunk growled at him. “These knights want none of your opinions.”

“I can talk if I want.”

“No,” said Dunk. “You can’t.” That mouth of yours will get you killed someday. And me as well, most like. “That salt beefs soaked long enough, I think. A strip for all our friends, and be quick about it.”

Egg flushed, and for half a heartbeat, Dunk feared the boy might talk back. Instead he settled for a sullen look, seething as only a boy of eleven years can seethe. “Aye, ser,” he said, fishing in the bottom of Dunk’s helm. His shaven head shone redly in the firelight as he passed out the salt beef.

Dunk took his piece and worried at it. The soak had turned the meat from wood to leather, but that was all. He sucked on one corner, tasting the salt and trying not to think about the roast boar at the inn, crackling on its spit and dripping fat.

As dusk deepened, flies and stinging midges came swarming off the lake. The flies preferred to plague their horses, but the midges had a taste for man flesh. The only way to keep from being bitten was to sit close to the fire, breathing smoke. Cook or be devoured, Dunk thought glumly, now there’s a beggar’s choice. He scratched at his arms and edged closer to the fire.

The wineskin soon came round again. The wine was sour and strong. Dunk drank deep, and passed along the skin, whilst the Cat of Misty Moor began to talk of how he had saved the life of the Lord of Bitterbridge during the Backfire Rebellion. “When Lord Armond’s banner-bearer fell, I leapt down from my horse with traitors all around us—”