The Sworn Sword

he was a year younger, maybe two. No one knew for certain, least of all him. He must have had a mother and a father like everybody else, but he’d never known them, not even their names, and no one in Flea Bottom had ever cared much when he’d been born, or to whom.

“Are you as strong as you appear?”

“How strong do I appear, m’lady?”

“Oh, strong enough to annoy Ser Lucas. He is my castellan, though not by choice. Like Coldmoat, he is a legacy of my father. Did you come to knighthood on some battlefield, Ser Duncan? Your speech suggests that you were not born of noble blood, if you will forgive my saying so.”

I was born of gutter blood. “A hedge knight named Ser Arlan of Pennytree took me on to squire for him when I was just a boy. He taught me chivalry and the arts of war.”

“And this same Ser Arlan knighted you?”

Dunk shuffled his feet. One of his boots was half unlaced, he saw. “No one else was like to do it.”

“Where is Ser Arlan now?”

“He died.” He raised his eyes. He could lace his boot up later. “I buried him on a hillside.”

“Did he fall valiantly in battle?”

“There were rains. He caught a chill.”

“Old men are frail, I know. I learned that from my second husband. I was thirteen when we wed. He would have been five-and-fifty on his next name day, had he lived long enough to see it. When he was half a year in the ground, I gave him a little son, but the Stranger came for him as well. The septons said his father wanted him beside him. What do you think, ser?”

“Well,” Dunk said hesitantly, “that might be, m’lady.”

“Nonsense,” she said, “the boy was born too weak. Such a tiny thing. He scarce had strength enough to nurse. Still. The gods gave his father five-and-fifty years. You would think they might have granted more than three days to the son.”

“You would.” Dunk knew little and less about the gods. He went to sept sometimes, and prayed to the Warrior to lend strength to his arms, but elsewise he let the Seven be.

“I am sorry your Ser Arlan died,” she said, “and sorrier still that you took service with Ser Eustace. All old men are not the same, Ser Duncan. You would do well to go home to Pennytree.”

“I have no home but where I swear my sword.” Dunk had never seen Pennytree; he couldn’t even say if it was in the Reach.

“Swear it here, then. The times are uncertain. I have need of knights. You look as though you have a healthy appetite, Ser Duncan. How many chickens can you eat? At Coldmoat you would have your fill of warm pink meat and sweet fruit tarts. Your squire looks in need of sustenance as well. He is so scrawny that all his hair has fallen out. We’ll have him share a cell with other boys of his own age. He’ll like that. My master-at-arms can train him in all the arts of war.”

“I train him,” said Dunk defensively.

“And who else? Bennis? Old Osgrey? The chickens?”

There had been days when Dunk had set Egg to chasing chickens. It helps make him quicker, he thought, but he knew that if he said it she would laugh. She was distracting him, with her snub nose and her freckles. Dunk had to remind himself of why Ser Eustace had sent him here. “My sword is sworn to my lord of Osgrey, m’lady,” he said, “and that’s the way it is.”

“So be it, ser. Let us speak of less pleasant matters.” Lady Rohanne gave her braid a tug. “We do not suffer attacks on Coldmoat or its people. So tell me why I should not have you sewn in a sack.”

“I came to parlay,” he reminded her, “and I have drunk your wine.” The taste still lingered in his mouth, rich and sweet. So far it had not poisoned him. Perhaps it was the wine that made him bold. “And you don’t have a sack big enough for me.”

To his relief, Egg’s jape made her smile. “I have several that are big enough for Bennis, though. Maester Cerrick says Wolmer’s face was sliced open almost to the bone.”

“Ser Bennis lost his temper with the man, m’lady. Ser Eustace sent me here to pay the blood price.”

“The blood price?” She laughed. “He is an old man, I know, but I had not realized that he was so old as that. Does he think we are living in the Age of Heroes, when a man’s life was reckoned to be worth no more than a sack of silver?”

“The digger was not killed, m’lady,” Dunk reminded her. “No one was killed that I saw. His face was cut, is all.”

Her fingers danced idly along her braid. “How much does Ser Eustace reckon Wolmer’s cheek to be worth, pray?”

“One silver stag. And three for you, m’lady.”

“Ser Eustace sets a niggard’s price upon my honor, though three silvers are better than three chickens, I grant you. He would do better to deliver Bennis up to me for chastisement.”

“Would this involve that sack you mentioned?”

“It might.” She coiled her braid around one hand. “Osgrey can keep his silver. Only blood can pay for blood.”

“Well,” said Dunk, “it may be as you say, m’lady, but why not send for that man that Bennis cut, and ask him if he’d sooner have a silver stag or Bennis in a sack?”

“Oh, he’d pick the silver, if he couldn’t have both. I don’t doubt that, ser. It is not his choice to make. This is about the lion and the spider now, not some peasant’s cheek. It is Bennis I want, and Bennis I shall have. No one rides onto my lands, does harm to one of mine, and escapes to laugh about it.”

“Your ladyship rode onto Standfast land, and did harm of one of Ser Eustace’s,” Dunk said, before he stopped to think about it.

“Did I?” She tugged her braid again. “If you mean the sheep-stealer, the man was notorious. I had twice complained to Osgrey, yet he did nothing. I do not ask thrice. The king’s law grants me the power of pit and gallows.”

It was Egg who answered her. “On your own lands,” the boy insisted. “The king’s law gives lords the power of pit and gallows on their own lands.”

“Clever boy,” she said. “If you know that much, you will also know that landed knights have no right to punish without their liege lord’s leave. Ser Eustace holds Standfast of Lord Rowan. Bennis broke the king’s peace when he drew blood, and must answer for it.” She looked to Dunk. “If Ser Eustace will deliver Bennis to me, I’ll slit his nose, and that will be the end of it. If I must come and take him, I make no such promise.”

Dunk had a sudden sick feeling in the pit of his stomach. “I will tell him, but he won’t give up Ser Bennis.” He hesitated. “The dam was the cause of all the trouble. If your ladyship would consent to take it down—”

“Impossible,” declared the young maester by Lady Rohanne’s side. “Coldmoat supports twenty times as many smallfolk as does Standfast. Her ladyship has fields of wheat and corn and barley, all dying from the drought. She has half a dozen orchards, apples and apricots and three kinds of pears. She has cows about to calf, five hundred head of black-nosed sheep, and she breeds the finest horses in the Reach. We have a dozen mares about to foal.”

“Ser Eustace has sheep, too,” Dunk said. “He has melons in the fields, beans and barleycorn, and…”

“You were taking water for the moat!” Egg said loudly.

I was getting to the moat, Dunk thought.

“The moat is essential to Coldmoat’s defenses,” the maester insisted. “Do you suggest that Lady Rohanne leave herself open to attack, in such uncertain times as these?”

“Well,” Dunk said slowly, “a dry moat is still a moat. And m’lady has strong walls, with ample men to defend them.”

“Ser Duncan,” Lady Rohanne said, “I was ten years old when the black dragon rose. I begged my father not to put himself at risk, or at least to leave my husband. Who would protect me, if both my men were gone? So he took me up onto the ramparts, and pointed out Coldmoat’s strong points. ‘Keep them strong,’ he said, ‘and they will keep you safe. If you see to your defenses, no man may do you harm,’ The first thing he pointed at was the moat.” She stroked her cheek with the tail of her braid. “My first husband perished on the Redgrass Field. My father found me others, but the Stranger took them, too. I no longer trust in men, no matter how ample they may seem. I trust in stone and steel and water. I trust in moats, ser, and