He felt nothing but pity for the girl. She did not deserve the horror visited on her in Volantis, any more than her brother had. The last time he had seen her, just before they left port, her eyes had been raw from crying, two ghastly red holes in a wan, pale face. By the time they raised sail she had locked herself in her cabin with her dog and her pig, but at night they could hear her weeping. Only yesterday he had heard one of the mates say that they ought to throw her overboard before her tears could swamp the ship. Tyrion was not entirely sure he had been japing.
When the evening prayers had ended and the ship’s crew had once again dispersed, some to their watch and others to food and rum and hammocks, Moqorro remained beside his nightfire, as he did every night. The red priest rested by day but kept vigil through the dark hours, to tend his sacred flames so that the sun might return to them at dawn.
Tyrion squatted across from him and warmed his hands against the night’s chill. Moqorro took no notice of him for several moments. He was staring into the flickering flames, lost in some vision.
“Someone told me that the night is dark and full of terrors. What do you see in those flames?”
“Dragons,” Moqorro said in the Common Tongue of Westeros. He spoke it very well, with hardly a trace of accent. No doubt that was one reason the high priest Benerro had chosen him to bring the faith of R’hllor to Daenerys Targaryen. “Dragons old and young, true and false, bright and dark. And you. A small man with a big shadow, snarling in the midst of all.”
“Snarling? An amiable fellow like me?” Tyrion was almost flattered.
“No, my friend.”
“You are eager to behold the world’s deliverer?”
The red priest chuckled. “Neither.
Moqorro touched his nose. “Imbued with a pleasant aroma. Fragrant, would you say? Flowery?”
“So
“
Tyrion gave a crooked grin. “I believe I will stay with
“I am pleased to have enlightened you. Perhaps someday you will let me teach you the truth of R’hllor as well.”
“Someday.”
The quarters he shared with Ser Jorah were a cabin only by courtesy; the dank, dark, foul-smelling closet had barely enough space to hang a pair of sleeping hammocks, one above the other. He found Mormont stretched out in the lower one, swaying slowly with the motion of the ship. “The girl finally poked her nose abovedecks,” Tyrion told him. “One look at me and she scurried right back down below.”
“You’re not a pretty sight.”
“Not all of us can be as comely as you. The girl is lost. It would not surprise me if the poor creature wasn’t sneaking up to jump over the side and drown herself.”
“The poor creature’s name is Penny.”
“I know her name.” He hated her name. Her brother had gone by the name of Groat, though his true name had been Oppo.
Ser Jorah sat up in his hammock. “Befriend her, then. Marry her, for all I care.”
That left a bad taste in his mouth as well. “Like with like, is that your notion? Do you mean to find a she-bear for yourself, ser?”
“You were the one who insisted that we bring her.”
“I said we could not abandon her in Volantis. That does not mean I want to fuck her. She wants me dead, have you forgotten? I’m the last person she’s like to want as a friend.”
“You’re both dwarfs.”
“Yes, and so was her brother, who was killed because some drunken fools took him for me.”
“Feeling guilty, are you?”
“No.” Tyrion bristled. “I have sins enough to answer for; I’ll have no part of this one. I might have nurtured some ill will toward her and her brother for the part they played the night of Joffrey’s wedding, but I never wished them harm.”
“You are a harmless creature, to be sure. Innocent as a lamb.” Ser Jorah got to his feet. “The dwarf girl is your burden. Kiss her, kill her, or avoid her, as you like. It’s naught to me.” He shouldered past Tyrion and out of the cabin.
Could Slaver’s Bay be where whores went? It seemed unlikely. From what he’d read, the slaver cities were the place where whores were made.
On the river Tyrion had to endure Griff, but there had at least been the mystery of the captain’s true identity to divert him and the more congenial companionship of the rest of the poleboat’s little company. On the cog, alas, everyone was just who they appeared to be, no one was particularly congenial, and only the red priest was interesting.
Life aboard the
And the nights were worse. Tyrion slept badly at the best of times, and this was far from that. Sleep meant dreams as like as not, and in his dreams the Sorrows waited, and a stony king with his father’s face. That left him with the beggar’s choice of climbing up into his hammock and listening to Jorah Mormont snore beneath him, or remaining abovedecks to contemplate the sea. On moonless nights the water was as black as maester’s ink, from horizon to horizon. Dark and deep and forbidding, beautiful in a chilly sort of way, but when he looked at it too long