Dunk had suspected that Ser Arlan’s age had more to do with it than the Prince of Dragonstone did, but he never dared say as much. The old man had his pride, even at the last. I am quick and strong, he always said so, what was true for him need not be true for me, he told himself stubbornly.
He was moving through a patch of weed, chewing over his chances in his head, when he saw the flicker of firelight through the bushes. What is this? Dunk did not stop to think. Suddenly his sword was in his hand and he was crashing through the grass.
He burst out roaring and cursing, only to jerk to a sudden halt at the sight of the boy beside the campfire. “You!” He lowered the sword. “What are you doing here?”
“Cooking a fish,” said the bald boy. “Do you want some?”
“I meant, how did you get here? Did you steal a horse?”
“I rode in the back of a cart, with a man who was bringing some lambs to the castle for my lord of Ashford’s table.”
“Well, you’d best see if he’s gone yet, or find another cart. I won’t have you here.”
“You can’t make me go,” the boy said, impertinent. “I’d had enough of that inn.”
“I’ll have no more insolence from you,” Dunk warned. “I should throw you over my horse right now and take you home.”
“You’d need to ride all the way to King’s Landing,” said the boy. “You’d miss the tourney.”
King’s Landing. For a moment Dunk wondered if he was being mocked, but the boy had no way of knowing that he had been born in King’s Landing as well. Another wretch from Flea Bottom, like as not, and who can blame him for wanting out of that place?
He felt foolish standing there with sword in hand over an eight-year-old orphan. He sheathed it, glowering so the boy would see that he would suffer no nonsense. I ought to give him a good beating at the least, he thought, but the child looked so pitiful he could not bring himself to hit him. He glanced around the camp. The fire was burning merrily within a neat circle of rocks. The horses had been brushed, and clothes were hanging from the elm, drying above the flames. “What are those doing there?”
“I washed them,” the boy said. “And I groomed the horses, made the fire, and caught this fish. I would have raised your pavilion, but I couldn’t find one.”
“There’s my pavilion.” Dunk swept a hand above his head, at the branches of the tall elm that loomed above them.
“That’s a tree,” the boy said, unimpressed.
“It’s all the pavilion a true knight needs. I would sooner sleep under the stars than in some smoky tent.”
“What if it rains?”
“The tree will shelter me.”
“Trees leak.”
Dunk laughed. “So they do. Well, if truth be told, I lack the coin for a pavilion. And you’d best turn that fish, or it will be burned on the bottom and raw on the top. You’d never make a kitchen boy.”
“I would if I wanted,” the boy said, but he turned the fish.
“What happened to your hair?” Dunk asked of him.
“The maesters shaved it off.” Suddenly self-conscious, the boy pulled up the hood of his dark brown cloak, covering his head.
Dunk had heard that they did that sometimes, to treat lice or root-worms or certain sicknesses. “Are you ill?”
“No,” said the boy. “What’s your name?”
“Dunk,” he said.
The wretched boy laughed aloud, as if that was the funniest thing he’d ever heard. “Dunk?” he said. “Ser Dunk? That’s no name for a knight. Is it short for Duncan?”
Was it? The old man had called him just Dunk for as long as he could recall, and he did not remember much of his life before. “Duncan, yes,” he said. “Ser Duncan of …” Dunk had no other name, nor any house; Ser Arlan had found him living wild in the stews and alleys of Flea Bottom. He had never known his father or mother. What was he to say? “Ser Duncan of Flea Bottom” did not sound very knightly. He could take Pennytree, but what if they asked him where it was? Dunk had never been to Pennytree, nor had the old man talked much about it. He frowned for a moment, and then blurted out, “Ser Duncan the Tall.” He was tall, no one could dispute that, and it sounded puissant.
Though the little sneak did not seem to think so. “I have never heard of any Ser Duncan the Tall.”
“Do you know every knight in the Seven Kingdoms, then?”
The boy looked at him boldly. “The good ones.”
“I’m as good as any. After the tourney, they’ll all know that. Do you have a name, thief?”
The boy hesitated. “Egg,” he said.
Dunk did not laugh. His head does look like an egg. Small boys can be cruel, and grown men as well. “Egg,” he said, “I should beat you bloody and send you on your way, but the truth is, I have no pavilion and I have no squire either. If you’ll swear to do as you’re told, I’ll let you serve me for the tourney. After that, well, we’ll see. If I decide you’re worth your keep, you’ll have clothes on your back and food in your belly. The clothes might be roughspun and the food salt beef and salt fish, and maybe some venison from time to time where there are no foresters about, but you won’t go hungry. And I promise not to beat you except when you deserve it.”
Egg smiled. “Yes, my lord.”
“Ser,” Dunk corrected. “I am only a hedge knight.” He wondered if the old man was looking down on him. I will teach him the arts of battle, the same as you taught me, ser. He seems a likely lad, might be one day he’ll make a knight.
The fish was still a little raw on the inside when they ate it, and the boy had not removed all the bones, but it still tasted a world better than hard salt beef.
Egg soon fell asleep beside the dying fire. Dunk lay on his back nearby, his big hands behind his head, gazing up at the night sky. He could hear distant music from the tourney grounds, half a mile away. The stars were everywhere, thousands and thousands of them. One fell as he was watching, a bright green streak that flashed across the black and then was gone.
A falling star brings luck to him who sees it, Dunk thought. But the rest of them are all in their pavilions by now, staring up at silk instead of sky. So the luck is mine alone.
In the morning, he woke to the sound of a cock crowing. Egg was still there, curled up beneath the old man’s second-best cloak. Well, the boy did not run off during the night, that’s a start. He prodded him awake with his foot. “Up. There’s work to do.” The boy rose quick enough, rubbing his eyes. “Help me saddle Sweetfoot,” Dunk told him.
“What about breakfast?”
“There’s salt beef. After we’re done.”
“I’d sooner eat the horse,” Egg said. “Ser.”
“You’ll eat my fist if you don’t do as you’re told. Get the brushes. They’re in the saddle sack. Yes, that one.”
Together they brushed out the palfrey’s sorrel coat, hefted Ser Arlan’s best saddle over her back, and cinched it tight. Egg was a good worker once he put his mind to it, Dunk saw.
“I expect I’ll be gone most of the day,” he told the boy as he mounted. “You’re to stay here and put the camp in order. Make sure no other thieves come nosing about.”
“Can I have a sword to run them off with?” Egg asked. He had blue eyes, Dunk saw, very dark, almost purple. His bald head made them seem huge, somehow.
“No,” said Dunk. “A knife’s enough. And you had best be here when I come back, do you hear me? Rob me and run off and I’ll hunt you down, I swear I will. With dogs.”
“You don’t have any dogs,” Egg pointed out.
“I’ll get some,” said Dunk. “Just for you.” He turned Sweetfoot’s head toward the meadow and moved off at a brisk trot, hoping the threat would be enough to keep the boy honest. Save for the clothes on his back, the armor in his sack, and the horse beneath him, everything Dunk owned in the world was back at that camp. I am a great fool to trust the boy so far, but it is no more than the old man did for me, he reflected. The Mother must have sent him to me so that I c
ould pay my debt.
As he crossed the field, he heard the ring of hammers from the riverside, where carpenters were nailing together jousting barriers and raising a lofty viewing stand. A few new pavilions were going up as well, while the knights who had come earlier slept off last night’s revels or sat to break their fasts. Dunk could smell woodsmoke, and bacon as well.
To the north of the meadow flowed the river Cockleswent, a vassal stream to the mighty Mander. Beyond the shallow ford lay town and castle. Dunk had seen many a market town during his journeys with the old man. This was prettier than most; the whitewashed houses with their thatched roofs had an inviting aspect to them. When he was smaller, he used to wonder what it would be like to live in such a place; to sleep every night with a roof over your head, and wake every morning with the same walls wrapped around you. It may be that soon I’ll know. Aye, and Egg too. It could happen. Stranger things happened every day.
Ashford Castle was a stone structure built in the shape of a triangle, with round towers rising thirty feet tall at each point and thick crenellated walls running between. Orange banners flew from its battlements, displaying the white sun-and-chevron sigil of its lord. Men-at-arms in orange-and-white livery stood outside the gates with halberds, watching people come and go, seemingly more intent on joking with a pretty milkmaid than in keeping anyone out. Dunk reined up in front of the short, bearded man he took for their captain and asked for the master of the games.
“It’s Plummer you want, he’s steward here. I’ll show you.”
Inside the yard, a stableboy took Sweetfoot for him. Dunk slung Ser Arlan’s battered shield over a shoulder and followed the guards captain back of the stables to a turret built into an angle of the curtain wall. Steep stone steps led up to the wallwalk. “Come to enter your master’s name for the lists?” the captain asked as they climbed.
“It’s my own name I’ll be putting in.”
“Is it now?” Was the man smirking? Dunk was not certain. “That door there. I’ll leave you to it and get back to my post.”
When Dunk pushed open the door, the steward was sitting at a trestle table, scratching on a piece of parchment with a quill. He had thinning grey hair and a narrow pinched face. “Yes?” he said, looking up. “What do you want, man?”
Dunk pulled shut the door. “Are you Plummer the steward? I came for the tourney. To enter the lists.”
Plummer pursed his lips. “My lord’s tourney is a contest for knights. Are you a knight?”
He nodded, wondering if his ears were red.
“A knight with a name, mayhaps?”
“Dunk.” Why had he said that? “Ser Duncan. The Tall.”
“And where might you be from, Ser Duncan the Tall?”
“Everyplace. I was squire to Ser Arlan of Pennytree since I was five or six. This is his shield.” He showed it to the steward. “He was coming to the tourney, but he caught a chill and died, so I came in his stead. He knighted me before he passed, with his own sword.” Dunk drew the longsword and laid it on the scarred wooden table between them.
The master of the lists gave the blade no more than a glance. “A sword it is, for a certainty. I have never heard of this Arlan of Pennytree, however. You were his squire, you say?”
“He always said he meant for me to be a knight, as he was. When he was dying he called for his longsword and bade me kneel. He touched me once on my right shoulder and once on my left, and said some words, and when I got up he said I was a knight.”
“Hmpf.” The man Plummer rubbed his nose. “Any knight can make a knight, it is true, though it is more customary to stand a vigil and be anointed by a septon before taking your vows. Were there any witnesses to your dubbing?”
“Only a robin, up in a thorn tree. I heard it as the old man was saying the words. He charged me to be a good knight and true, to obey the seven gods, defend the weak and innocent, serve my lord faithfully and defend the realm with all my might, and I swore that I would.”
“No doubt.” Plummer did not deign to call him ser, Dunk could not help but notice. “I shall need to consult with Lord Ashford. Will you or your late master be known to any of the good knights here assembled?”
Dunk thought a moment. “There was a pavilion flying the banner of House Dondarrion? The black, with purple lightning?”
“That would be Ser Manfred, of that House.”
“Ser Arlan served his lord father in Dome, three years past. Ser Manfred might remember me.”
“I would advise you to speak to him. If he will vouch for you, bring him here with you on the morrow, at this same time.”
“As you say, m’lord.” He started for the door.
“Ser Duncan,” the steward called after him.
Dunk turned back.
“You are aware,” the man said, “that those vanquished in tourney forfeit their arms, armor, and horse to the victors, and must needs ransom them back?”
“I know.”
“And do you have the coin to pay such ransom?”
Now he knew his ears were red. “I won’t have need of coin,” he said, praying it was true. All I need is one victory. If I win my first tilt, I’ll have the loser’s armor and horse, or his gold, and I can stand a loss myself.
He walked slowly down the steps, reluctant to get on with what he must do next. In the yard, he collared one of the stableboys. “I must speak with Lord Ashford’s master of horse.”
“I’ll find him for you.”
It was cool and dim in the stables. An unruly grey stallion snapped at him as he passed, but Sweetfoot only whickered softly and nuzzled his hand when he raised it to her nose. “You’re a good girl, aren’t you?” he murmured. The old man always said that a knight should never love a horse, since more than a few were like to die under him, but he never heeded his own counsel either. Dunk had often seen him spend his last copper on an apple for old Chestnut or some oats for Sweetfoot and Thunder. The palfrey had been Ser Arlan’s riding horse, and she had borne him tirelessly over thousands of miles, all up and down the Seven Kingdoms. Dunk felt as though he were betraying an old friend, but what choice did he have? Chestnut was too old to be worth much of anything, and Thunder must carry him in the lists.
Some time passed before the master of horse deigned to appear. As he waited, Dunk heard a blare of trumpets from the walls, and a voice in the yard. Curious, he led Sweetfoot to the stable door to see what was happening. A large party of knights and mounted archers poured through the gates, a hundred men at least, riding some of the most splendid horses that Dunk had ever seen. Some great lord has come. He grabbed the arm of a stableboy as he ran past. “Who are they?”
The boy looked at him queerly. “Can’t you see the banners?” He wrenched free and hurried off.
The banners … As Dunk turned his head, a gust of wind lifted the black silk pennon atop the tall staff, and the fierce three-headed dragon of House Targaryen seemed to spread its wings, breathing scarlet fire. The banner-bearer was a tall knight in white scale armor chased with gold, a pure white cloak streaming from his shoulders. Two of the other riders were armored in white from head to heel as well. Kingsguard knights with the royal banner. Small wonder Lord Ashford and his sons came hurrying out the doors of the keep, and the fair maid too, a short girl with yellow hair and a round pink face. She does not seem so fair to me, Dunk thought. The puppet girl was prettier.
“Boy, let go of that nag and see to my horse.”
A rider had dismounted in front of the stables. He is talking to me, Dunk realized. “I am not a stableboy, m’lord.”
“Not clever enough?” The speaker wore a black cloak bordered in scarlet satin, but underneath was raiment bright as flame, all reds and yellows and golds. Slim and straight as a dirk, though only of middling height, he was near Dunk’s own age. Curls of silver-gold hair framed a face sculpted and imperious; high brow and sharp cheekbones, straight nose, pale smooth skin without blemish. His eyes were a deep violet color. “If you cannot manage a horse, fetch
me some wine and a pretty wench.”
“I … m’lord, pardons, I’m no serving man either. I have the honor to be a knight.”
“Knighthood has fallen on sad days,” said the princeling, but then one of the stableboys came rushing up, and he turned away to hand him the reins of his palfrey, a splendid blood bay. Dunk was forgotten in an instant. Relieved, he slunk back inside the stables to wait for the master of horse. He felt ill-at-ease enough around the lords in their pavilions, he had no business speaking to princes.
That the beautiful stripling was a prince he had no doubt. The Targaryens were the blood of lost Valyria across the seas, and their silver-gold hair and violet eyes set them apart from common men. Dunk knew Prince Baelor was older, but the youth might well have been one of his sons: Valarr, who was often called “the Young Prince” to set him apart from his father, or Matarys, “the Even Younger Prince,” as old Lord Swann’s fool had named him once. There were other princelings as well, cousins to Valarr and Matarys. Good King Daeron had four grown sons, three with sons of their own. The line of the dragonkings had almost died out during his father’s day, but it was commonly said that Daeron II and his sons had left it secure for all time.
“You. Man. You asked for me.” Lord Ashford’s master of horse had a red face made redder by his orange livery, and a brusque manner of speaking. “What is it? I have no time for—”
“I want to sell this palfrey,” Dunk broke in quickly, before the man could dismiss him. “She’s a good horse, sure of foot—”
“I have no time, I tell you.” The man gave Sweetfoot no more than a glance. “My lord of Ashford has no need of such. Take her to the town, perhaps Henly will give you a silver or three.” That quick, he was turning away.
“Thank you, m’lord,” Dunk said before he could go. “M’lord, has the king come?”
The master of horse laughed at him. “No, thank the gods. This infestation of princes is trial enough. Where am I going to find the stalls for all these animals? And fodder?” He strode off shouting at his stableboys.