The Mystery Knight

with Bittersteel on the right, and almost died of his wounds.”

“Old dead history. They’re here now, aren’t they? So they bent the knee, and King Daeron gave them pardon.”

“Yes, but—”

Dunk pinched the boy’s lips shut. “Hold your tongue.”

Egg held his tongue.

No sooner had the last boatload of Shawney men pushed off than Lord and Lady Smallwood turned up at the landing with their own tail, so they must needs wait again.

The fellowship of the hedge had not survived the night, it was plain to see. Ser Glendon kept his own company, prickly and sullen. Kyle the Cat judged that it would be midday before they were allowed to board the ferry, so he detached himself from the others to try to ingratiate himself with Lord Smallwood, with whom he had some slight acquaintance. Ser Maynard spent his time gossiping with the innkeep.

“Stay well away from that one,” Dunk warned Egg. There was something about Plumm that troubled him. “He could be a robber knight, for all we know.”

The warning only seemed to make Ser Maynard more interesting to Egg. “I never knew a robber knight. Do you think he means to rob the dragon’s egg?”

“Lord Butterwell will have the egg well guarded, I’m sure.” Dunk scratched the midge bites on his neck. “Do you think he might display it at the feast? I’d like to get a look at one.”

“I’d show you mine, ser, but it’s at Summerhall.”

“Yours? Your dragon’s egg?” Dunk frowned down at the boy, wondering if this was some jape. “Where did it come from?”

“From a dragon, ser. They put it in my cradle.”

“Do you want a clout in the ear? There are no dragons.”

“No, but there are eggs. The last dragon left a clutch of five, and they have more on Dragonstone, old ones from before the Dance. My brothers all have them too. Aerion’s looks as though it’s made of gold and silver, with veins of fire running through it. Mine is white and green, all swirly.”

“Your dragon’s egg.” They put it in his cradle. Dunk was so used to Egg that sometimes he forgot Aegon was a prince. Of course they’d put a dragon egg inside his cradle. “Well, see that you don’t go mentioning this egg where anyone is like to hear.”

“I’m not stupid, ser.” Egg lowered his voice. “Someday the dragons will return. My brother Daeron’s dreamed of it, and King Aerys read it in a prophecy. Maybe it will be my egg that hatches. That would be splendid.”

“Would it?” Dunk had his doubts.

Not Egg. “Aemon and I used to pretend that our eggs would be the ones to hatch. If they did, we could fly through the sky on dragonback, like the first Aegon and his sisters.” “Aye, and if all the other knights in the realm should die, I’d be the Lord Commander of the Kingsguard. If these eggs are so bloody precious, why is Lord Butterwell giving his away?”

“To show the realm how rich he is?”

“I suppose.” Dunk scratched his neck again and glanced over at Ser Glendon Ball, who was tightening the cinches on his saddle as he waited for the ferry. That horse will never serve. Ser Glendon’s mount was a sway-backed stot, undersized and old. “What do you know about his sire? Why did they call him Fireball?”

“For his hot head and red hair. Ser Quentyn Ball was the master-at-arms at the Red Keep. He taught my father and my uncles how to fight. The Great Bastards too. King Aegon promised to raise him to the Kingsguard, so Fireball made his wife join the silent sisters, only by the time a place came open, King Aegon was dead and King Daeron named Ser Willam Wylde instead. My father says that it was Fireball as much as Bittersteel who convinced Daemon Blackfyre to claim the crown, and rescued him when Daeron sent the Kingsguard to arrest him. Later on, Fireball killed Lord Lefford at the gates of Lannisport and sent the Grey Lion running back to hide inside the Rock. At the crossing of the Mandel, he cut down the sons of Lady Penrose one by one. They say he spared the life of the youngest one as a kindness to his mother.”

“That was chivalrous of him,” Dunk had to admit. “Did Ser Quentyn die upon the Redgrass Field?”

“Before, ser,” Egg replied. “An archer put an arrow through his throat as he dismounted by a stream to have a drink. Just some common man, no one knows who.”

“Those common men can be dangerous when they get it in their heads to start slaying lords and heroes.” Dunk saw the ferry creeping slowly across the lake. “Here it comes.”

“It’s slow. Are we going to go to Whitewalls, ser?”

“Why not? I want to see this dragon’s egg.” Dunk smiled. “If I win the tourney, we’d both have dragon’s eggs.”

Egg gave him a doubtful look.

“What? Why are you looking at me that way?”

“I could tell you, ser,” the boy said solemnly, “but I need to learn to hold my tongue.”

* * *

They seated the hedge knights well below the salt, closer to the doors than to the dais.

Whitewalls was almost new as castles went, having been raised a mere forty years ago by the grandsire of its present lord. The smallfolk hereabouts called it the Milk house, for its walls and keeps and towers were made of finely dressed white stone, quarried in the Vale and brought over the mountains at great expense. Inside were floors and pillars of milky white marble veined with gold; the rafters overhead were carved from the bone-pale trunks of weirwoods. Dunk could not begin to imagine what all of that had cost.

The hall was not so large as some others he had known, though. At least we were allowed beneath the roof, Dunk thought as he took his place on the bench between Ser Maynard Plumm and Kyle the Cat. Though uninvited, the three of them had been welcomed to the feast quick enough; it was ill luck to refuse a knight hospitality on your wedding day.

Young Ser Glendon had a harder time, however. “Fireball never had a son,” Dunk heard Lord Butterwell’s steward tell him, loudly. The stripling answered heatedly, and the name of Ser Morgan Dunstable was mentioned several times, but the steward had remained adamant. When Ser Glendon touched his sword hilt, a dozen men-at- arms appeared with spears in hand, but for a moment it looked as though there might be bloodshed. It was only the intervention of a big blond knight named Kirby Pimm that saved the situation. Dunk was too far away to hear, but he saw Pimm clasp an arm around the steward’s shoulders and murmur in his ear, laughing. The steward frowned, and said something to Ser Glendon that turned the boy’s face dark red. He looks as if he’s about to cry, Dunk thought, watching. That, or kill someone. After all of that, the young knight was finally admitted to the castle hall.

Poor Egg was not so fortunate. “The great hall is for the lords and knights,” an understeward had informed them haughtily when Dunk tried to bring the boy inside. “We have set up tables in the inner yard for squires, grooms, and men-at-arms.”

If you had an inkling who he was, you would seat him on the dais on a cushioned throne. Dunk had not much liked the look of the other squires. A few were lads of Egg’s own age, but most were older, seasoned fighters who long ago had made the choice to serve a knight rather than become one. Or did they have a choice? Knighthood required more than chivalry and skill at arms; it required horse and sword and armor too, and all of that was costly. “Watch your tongue,” he told Egg before he left him in that company. “These are grown men; they won’t take kindly to your insolence. Sit and eat and listen, might be you’ll learn some things.”

For his own part, Dunk was just glad to be out of the hot sun, with a wine cup before him and a chance to fill his belly. Even a hedge knight grows weary of chewing every bite of food for half an hour. Down here below the salt, the fare would be more plain than fancy, but there would be no lack of it. Below the salt was good enough for Dunk.

But peasant’s pride is lordling’s shame, the old man used to say. “This cannot be my proper place,” Ser Glendon Ball told the understeward hotly. He had donned a clean doublet for the feast, a handsome old garment with gold lace at the cuffs and collar and the red chevron and white plates of House Ball sewn across the chest. “Do you know who my father was?”