The scent of hot bread drifting from the shops along the Street of Flour was sweeter than anyperfume Arya had ever smelled. She took a deep breath and stepped closer to the pigeon. It was aplump one, speckled brown, busily pecking at a crust that had fallen between two cobblestones, butwhen Arya’s shadow touched it, it took to the air.
Her stick sword whistled out and caught it two feet off the ground, and it went down in a flurry ofbrown feathers. She was on it in the blink of an eye, grabbing a wing as the pigeon flapped andfluttered. It pecked at her hand. She grabbed its neck and twisted until she felt the bone snap.
Compared with catching cats, pigeons were easy.
A passing septon was looking at her askance. “Here’s the best place to find pigeon,” Arya told himas she brushed herself off and picked up her fallen stick sword. “They come for the crumbs.” Hehurried away.
She tied the pigeon to her belt and started down the street. A man was pushing a load of tarts by ona two-wheeled cart; the smells sang of blueberries and lemons and apricots. Her stomach made ahollow rumbly noise. “Could I have one?” she heard herself say. “A lemon, or … or any kind.”
The pushcart man looked her up and down. Plainly he did not like what he saw. “Three coppers.”
Arya tapped her wooden sword against the side of her boot. “I’ll trade you a fat pigeon,” she said.
“The Others take your pigeon,” the pushcart man said.
The tarts were still warm from the oven. The smells were making her mouth water, but she did nothave three coppers … or one. She gave the pushcart man a look, remembering what Syrio had told herabout seeing. He was short, with a little round belly, and when he moved he seemed to favor his leftleg a little. She was just thinking that if she snatched a tart and ran he would never be able to catch herwhen he said, “You be keepin’ your filthy hands off. The gold cloaks know how to deal with thievinglittle gutter rats, that they do.”
Arya glanced warily behind her. Two of the City Watch were standing at the mouth of an alley.
Their cloaks hung almost to the ground, the heavy wool dyed a rich gold; their mail and boots andgloves were black. One wore a longsword at his hip, the other an iron cudgel. With a last wistfulglance at the tarts, Arya edged back from the cart and hurried off. The gold cloaks had not beenpaying her any special attention, but the sight of them tied her stomach in knots. Arya had beenstaying as far from the castle as she could get, yet even from a distance she could see the heads rottingatop the high red walls. Flocks of crows squabbled noisily over each head, thick as flies. The talk inFlea Bottom was that the gold cloaks had thrown in with the Lannisters, their commander raised to alord, with lands on the Trident and a seat on the king’s council.
She had also heard other things, scary things, things that made no sense to her. Some said her fatherhad murdered King Robert and been slain in turn by Lord Renly. Others insisted that Renly had killedthe king in a drunken quarrel between brothers. Why else should he have fled in the night like acommon thief? One story said the king had been killed by a boar while hunting, another that he’d diedeating a boar, stuffing himself so full that he’d ruptured at the table. No, the king had died at table,others said, but only because Varys the Spider poisoned him. No, it had been the queen who poisonedhim. No, he had died of a pox. No, he had choked on a fish bone.
One thing all the stories agreed on: King Robert was dead. The bells in the seven towers of theGreat Sept of Baelor had tolled for a day and a night, the thunder of their grief rolling across the city in a bronze tide. They only rang the bells like that for the death of a king, a tanner’s boy told Arya. r’s boy told Arya.
All she wanted was to go home, but leaving King’s Landing was not so easy as she had hoped. Talkof war was on every lip, and gold cloaks were as thick on the city walls as fleas on … well, her, forone. She had been sleeping in Flea Bottom, on rooftops and in stables, wherever she could find aplace to lie down, and it hadn’t taken her long to learn that the district was well named.
Every day since her escape from the Red Keep, Arya had visited each of the seven city gates inturn. The Dragon Gate, the Lion Gate, and the Old Gate were closed and barred. The Mud Gate andthe Gate of the Gods were open, but only to those who wanted to enter the city; the guards let no oneout. Those who were allowed to leave left by the King’s Gate or the Iron Gate, but Lannister men-atarmsin crimson cloaks and lion-crested helms manned the guard posts there. Spying down from theroof of an inn by the King’s Gate, Arya saw them searching wagons and carriages, forcing riders toopen their saddlebags, and questioning everyone who tried to pass on foot.
Sometimes she thought about swimming the river, but the Blackwater Rush was wide and deep,and everyone agreed that its currents were wicked and treacherous. She had no coin to pay a ferrymanor take passage on a ship.
Her lord father had taught her never to steal, but it was growing harder to remember why. If she didnot get out soon, she would have to take her chances with the gold cloaks. She hadn’t gone hungrymuch since she learned to knock down birds with her stick sword, but she feared so much pigeon wasmaking her sick. A couple she’d eaten raw, before she found Flea Bottom.
In the Bottom there were pot-shops along the alleys where huge tubs of stew had been simmeringfor years, and you could trade half your bird for a heel of yesterday’s bread and a “bowl o’ brown,”
and they’d even stick the other half in the fire and crisp it up for you, so long as you plucked thefeathers yourself. Arya would have given anything for a cup of milk and a lemon cake, but the brownwasn’t so bad. It usually had barley in it, and chunks of carrot and onion and turnip, and sometimeseven apple, with a film of grease swimming on top. Mostly she tried not to think about the meat. Onceshe had gotten a piece of fish.
The only thing was, the pot-shops were never empty, and even as she bolted down her food, Aryacould feel them watching. Some of them stared at her boots or her cloak, and she knew what theywere thinking. With others, she could almost feel their eyes crawling under her leathers; she didn’tknow what they were thinking, and that scared her even more. A couple times, she was followed outinto the alleys and chased, but so far no one had been able to catch her.
The silver bracelet she’d hoped to sell had been stolen her first night out of the castle, along withher bundle of good clothes, snatched while she slept in a burnt-out house off Pig Alley. All they lefther was the cloak she had been huddled in, the leathers on her back, her wooden practicesword … and Needle. She’d been lying on top of Needle, or else it would have been gone too; it wasworth more than all the rest together. Since then Arya had taken to walking around with her cloakdraped over her right arm, to conceal the blade at her hip. The wooden sword she carried in her lefthand, out where everybody could see it, to scare off robbers, but there were men in the pot-shops whowouldn’t have been scared off if she’d had a battle-axe. It was enough to make her lose her taste forpigeon and stale bread. Often as not, she went to bed hungry rather than risk the stares.
Once she was outside the city, she would find berries to pick, or orchards she might raid for applesand cherries. Arya remembered seeing some from the kingsroad on the journey south. And she coulddig for roots in the forest, even run down some rabbits. In the city, the only things to run down wererats and cats and scrawny dogs. The pot-shops would give you a fistful of coppers for a litter of pups,she’d heard, but she didn’t like to think about that.
Down below the Street of Flour was a maze of twisting alleys and cross streets. Arya scrambledthrough the crowds, trying to put distance between her and the gold cloaks. She had learned to keep tothe center of the street. Sometimes she had to dodge wagons and horses, but at least you could seethem coming. If you walked near the buildings, people grabbed you. In some alleys you couldn’t helpbut brush against the walls; the buildings leaned in so close they almost met.
A whooping gang of small children went running past, chasing a rolling hoop. Arya stared at themwith resentment, remembering the times she’d played at hoops with Bran and Jon and their babybrother Rickon. She wondered how big Rickon had grown, and whether Bran was sad. She wouldhave given anything if Jon had been here to call her “little sister” and muss her hair. Not that it neededmussing. She’d seen her reflection in puddles, and she didn’t think hair got any more mussed than hers.
She had tried talking to the children she saw in the street, hoping to make a friend who would giveher a place to sleep, but she must have talked wrong or something. The little ones only looked at herwith quick, wary eyes and ran away if she came too close. Their big brothers and sisters askedquestions Arya couldn’t answer, called her names, and tried to steal from her. Only yesterday, ascrawny barefoot girl twice her age had knocked her down and tried to pull the boots off her feet, butArya gave her a crack on her ear with her stick sword that sent her off sobbing and bleeding.
A gull wheeled overhead as she made her way down the hill toward Flea Bottom. Arya glanced at itthoughtfully, but it was well beyond the reach of her stick. It made her think of the sea. Maybe thatwas the way out. Old Nan used to tell stories of boys who stowed away on trading galleys and sailedoff into all kinds of adventures. Maybe Arya could do that too. She decided to visit the riverfront. Itwas on the way to the Mud Gate anyway, and she hadn’t checked that one today.
The wharfs were oddly quiet when Arya got there. She spied another pair of gold cloaks, walkingside by side through the fish market, but they never so much as looked at her. Half the stalls wereempty, and it seemed to her that there were fewer ships at dock than she remembered. Out on theBlackwater, three of the king’s war galleys moved in formation, gold-painted hulls splitting the wateras their oars rose and fell. Arya watched them for a bit, then began to make her way along the river.
When she saw the guardsmen on the third pier, in grey woolen cloaks trimmed with white satin, herheart almost stopped in her chest. The sight of Winterfell's colors brought tears to her eyes. Behindthem, a sleek three-banked trading galley rocked at her moorings. Arya could not read the namepainted on the hull; the words were strange, Myrish, Braavosi, perhaps even High Valyrian. Shegrabbed a passing longshoreman by the sleeve. “Please,” she said, “what ship is this?”
“She’s the Wind Witch, out of Myr,” the man said.
“She’s still here,” Arya blurted. The longshoreman gave her a queer look, shrugged, and walkedaway. Arya ran toward the pier. The Wind Witch was the ship Father had hired to take herhome … still waiting! She’d imagined it had sailed ages ago.
Two of the guardsmen were dicing together while the third walked rounds, his hand on the pommelof his sword. Ashamed to let them see her crying like a baby, she stopped to rub at her eyes. Her eyesher eyes her eyes, why did …Look with your eyes, she heard Syrio whisper.
Arya looked. She knew all of her father’s men. The three in the grey cloaks were strangers. “You,”
the one walking rounds called out. “What do you want here, boy?” The other two looked up fromtheir dice.
It was all Arya could do not to bolt and run, but she knew that if she did, they would be after her atonce. She made herself walk closer. They were looking for a girl, but he thought she was a boy. She’dbe a boy, then. “Want to buy a pigeon?” She showed him the dead bird.
“Get out of here,” the guardsman said.
Arya did as he told her. She did not have to pretend to be frightened. Behind her, the men wentback to their dice.
She could not have said how she got back to Flea Bottom, but she was breathing hard by the timeshe reached the narrow crooked unpaved streets between the hills. The Bottom had a stench to it, astink of pigsties and stables and tanner’s sheds, mixed in with the sour smell of winesinks and cheapwhorehouses. Arya wound her way through the maze dully. It was not until she caught a whiff ofbubbling brown coming through a pot-shop door that she realized her pigeon was gone. It must haveslipped from her belt as she ran, or someone had stolen it and she’d never noticed. For a moment shewanted to cry again. She’d have to walk all the way back to the Street of Flour to find another onethat plump.
Far across the city, bells began to ring.
Arya glanced up, listening, wondering what the ringing meant this time.
“What’s this now?” a fat man called from the pot-shop.
“The bells again, gods ha’mercy,” wailed an old woman.
A red-haired whore in a wisp of painted silk pushed open a second-story window. “Is it the boyking that’s died now?” she shouted down, leaning out over the street. “Ah, that’s a boy for you, theynever last long.” As she laughed, a naked man slid his arms around her from behind, biting her neckand rubbing the heavy white breasts that hung loose beneath her shift.
“Stupid slut,” the fat man shouted up. “The king’s not dead, that’s only summoning bells. Onetower tolling. When the king dies, they ring every bell in the city.”
“Here, quit your biting, or I’ll ring your bells,” the woman in the window said to the man behindher, pushing him off with an elbow. “So who is it died, if not the king?”
“It’s a summoning,” the fat man repeated.
Two boys close to Arya’s age scampered past, splashing through a puddle. The old woman cursedthem, but they kept right on going. Other people were moving too, heading up the hill to see what thenoise was about. Arya ran after the slower boy. “Where you going?” she shouted when she was rightbehind him. “What’s happening?”
He glanced back without slowing. “The gold cloaks is carryin’ him to the sept.”
“Who?” she yelled, running hard.
“The Hand! They’ll be taking his head off, Buu says.”
A passing wagon had left a deep rut in the street. The boy leapt over, but Arya never saw it. Shetripped and fell, face first, scraping her knee open on a stone and smashing her fingers when herhands hit the hard-packed earth. Needle tangled between her legs. She sobbed as she struggled to herknees. The thumb of her left hand was covered with blood. When she sucked on it, she saw that halfthe thumbnail was gone, ripped off in her fall. Her hands throbbed, and her knee was all bloody too.
“Make way!” someone shouted from the cross street. “Make way for my lords of Redwyne!” Itwas all Arya could do to get out of the road before they ran her down, four guardsmen on hugehorses, pounding past at a gallop. They wore checked cloaks, blue-and-burgundy. Behind them, twoyoung lordlings rode side by side on a pair of chestnut mares alike as peas in a pod. Arya had seenthem in the bailey a hundred times; the Redwyne twins, Ser Horas and Ser Hobber, homely youthswith orange hair and square, freckled faces. Sansa and Jeyne Poole used to call them Ser Horror andSer Slobber, and giggle whenever they caught sight of them. They did not look funny now.
Everyone was moving in the same direction, all in a hurry to see what the ringing was all about.
The bells seemed louder now, clanging, calling. Arya joined the stream of people. Her thumb hurt sobad where the nail had broken that it was all she could do not to cry. She bit her lip as she limpedalong, listening to the excited voices around her.
“—the King’s Hand, Lord Stark. They’re carrying him up to Baelor’s Sept.”
“I heard he was dead.”
“Soon enough, soon enough. Here, I got me a silver stag says they lop his head off.”
“Past time, the traitor.” The man spat.
Arya struggled to find a voice. “He never—” she started, but she was only a child and they talkedright over her.
“Fool! They ain’t neither going to lop him. Since when do they knick traitors on the steps of theGreat Sept?”
“Well, they don’t mean to anoint him no knight. I heard it was Stark killed old King Robert. Slithis throat in the woods, and when they found him, he stood there cool as you please and said it wassome old boar did for His Grace.”
“Ah, that’s not true, it was his own brother did him, that Renly, him with his gold antlers.”
“You shut your lying mouth, woman. You don’t know what you’re saying, his lordship’s a finetrue man.”
By the time they reached the Street of the Sisters, they were packed in shoulder to shoulder. Aryalet the human current carry her along, up to the top of Visenya’s Hill. The white marble plaza was asolid mass of people, all yammering excitedly at each other and straining to get closer to the GreatSept of Baelor. The bells were very loud here.
Arya squirmed through the press, ducking between the legs of horses and clutching tight to hersword stick. From the middle of the crowd, all she could see were arms and legs and stomachs, andthe seven slender towers of the sept looming overhead. She spotted a wood wagon and thought toclimb up on the back where she might be able to see, but others had the same idea. The teamstercursed at them and drove them off with a crack of his whip.
Arya grew frantic. Forcing her way to the front of the crowd, she was shoved up against the stoneof a plinth. She looked up at Baelor the Blessed, the septon king. Sliding her stick sword through herbelt, Arya began to climb. Her broken thumbnail left smears of blood on the painted marble, but she made it up, and wedged herself in between the king’s feet.
That was when she saw her father.
Lord Eddard stood on the High Septon’s pulpit outside the doors of the sept, supported betweentwo of the gold cloaks. He was dressed in a rich grey velvet doublet with a white wolf sewn on thefront in beads, and a grey wool cloak trimmed with fur, but he was thinner than Arya had ever seenhim, his long face drawn with pain. He was not standing so much as being held up; the cast over hisbroken leg was grey and rotten.
The High Septon himself stood behind him, a squat man, grey with age and ponderously fat,wearing long white robes and an immense crown of spun gold and crystal that wreathed his head withrainbows whenever he moved.
Clustered around the doors of the sept, in front of the raised marble pulpit, were a knot of knightsand high lords. Joffrey was prominent among them, his raiment all crimson, silk and satin patternedwith prancing stags and roaring lions, a gold crown on his head. His queen mother stood beside himin a black mourning gown slashed with crimson, a veil of black diamonds in her hair. Aryarecognized the Hound, wearing a snowy white cloak over his dark grey armor, with four of theKingsguard around him. She saw Varys the eunuch gliding among the lords in soft slippers and apatterned damask robe, and she thought the short man with the silvery cape and pointed beard mightbe the one who had once fought a duel for Mother.
And there in their midst was Sansa, dressed in sky-blue silk, with her long auburn hair washed andcurled and silver bracelets on her wrists. Arya scowled, wondering what her sister was doing here,why she looked so happy.
A long line of gold-cloaked spearmen held back the crowd, commanded by a stout man in elaboratearmor, all black lacquer and gold filigree. His cloak had the metallic shimmer of true cloth-of-gold.
When the bell ceased to toll, a quiet slowly settled across the great plaza, and her father lifted hishead and began to speak, his voice so thin and weak she could scarcely make him out. People behindher began to shout out, “What?” and “Louder!” The man in the black-and-gold armor stepped upbehind Father and prodded him sharply. You leave him alone! Arya wanted to shout, but she knew noone would listen. She chewed her lip.
Her father raised his voice and began again. “I am Eddard Stark, Lord of Winterfell and Hand ofthe King,” he said more loudly, his voice carrying across the plaza, “and I come before you to confessmy treason in the sight of gods and men.”
“NO,” Arya whimpered. Below her, the crowd began to scream and shout. Taunts and obscenitiesfilled the air. Sansa had hidden her face in her hands.
Her father raised his voice still higher, straining to be heard. “I betrayed the faith of my king andthe trust of my friend, Robert,” he shouted. “I swore to defend and protect his children, yet before hisblood was cold, I plotted to depose and murder his son and seize the throne for myself. Let the HighSepton and Baelor the Beloved and the Seven bear witness to the truth of what I say: JoffreyBaratheon is the one true heir to the Iron Throne, and by the grace of all the gods, Lord of the SevenKingdoms and Protector of the Realm.”
A stone came sailing out of the crowd. Arya cried out as she saw her father hit. The gold cloakskept him from falling. Blood ran down his face from a deep gash across his forehead. More stonesfollowed. One struck the guard to Father’s left. Another went clanging off the breastplate of theknight in the black-and-gold armor. Two of the Kingsguard stepped in front of Joffrey and the queen,protecting them with their shields.
Her hand slid beneath her cloak and found Needle in its sheath. She tightened her fingers aroundthe grip, squeezing as hard as she had ever squeezed anything. Please, gods, keep him safe, sheprayed. Don’t let them hurt my father.
The High Septon knelt before Joffrey and his mother. “As we sin, so do we suffer,” he intoned, in adeep swelling voice much louder than Father’s. “This man has confessed his crimes in the sight ofgods and men, here in this holy place.” Rainbows danced around his head as he lifted his hands inentreaty. “The gods are just, yet Blessed Baelor taught us that they are also merciful. What shall bedone with this traitor, Your Grace?”
A thousand voices were screaming, but Arya never heard them. Prince Joffrey … no, KingJoffrey … stepped out from behind the shields of his Kingsguard. “My mother bids me let LordEddard take the black, and Lady Sansa has begged mercy for her father.” He looked straight at Sansa then, and smiled, and for a moment Arya thought that the gods had heard her prayer, until Joffreyturned back to the crowd and said, “But they have the soft hearts of women. So long as I am yourking, treason shall never go unpunished. Ser Ilyn, bring me his head!”
rking, treason shall never go unpunished. Ser Ilyn, bring me his head!”
The crowd roared, and Arya felt the statue of Baelor rock as they surged against it. The HighSepton clutched at the king’s cape, and Varys came rushing over waving his arms, and even the queenwas saying something to him, but Joffrey shook his head. Lords and knights moved aside as hestepped through, tall and fleshless, a skeleton in iron mail, the King’s Justice. Dimly, as if from faroff, Arya heard her sister scream. Sansa had fallen to her knees, sobbing hysterically. Ser Ilyn Payneclimbed the steps of the pulpit.
Arya wriggled between Baelor’s feet and threw herself into the crowd, drawing Needle. She landedon a man in a butcher’s apron, knocking him to the ground. Immediately someone slammed into herback and she almost went down herself. Bodies closed in around her, stumbling and pushing,trampling on the poor butcher. Arya slashed at them with Needle.
High atop the pulpit, Ser Ilyn Payne gestured and the knight in black-and-gold gave a command.
The gold cloaks flung Lord Eddard to the marble, with his head and chest out over the edge.
“Here, you!” an angry voice shouted at Arya, but she bowled past, shoving people aside,squirming between them, slamming into anyone in her way. A hand fumbled at her leg and shehacked at it, kicked at shins. A woman stumbled and Arya ran up her back, cutting to both sides, but itwas no good, no good, there were too many people, no sooner did she make a hole than it closedagain. Someone buffeted her aside. She could still hear Sansa screaming.
Ser Ilyn drew a two-handed greatsword from the scabbard on his back. As he lifted the blade abovehis head, sunlight seemed to ripple and dance down the dark metal, glinting off an edge sharper thanany razor. Ice, she thought, he has Ice! Her tears streamed down her face, blinding her.
And then a hand shot out of the press and closed round her arm like a wolf trap, so hard that Needlewent flying from her hand. Arya was wrenched off her feet. She would have fallen if he hadn’t heldher up, as easy as if she were a doll. A face pressed close to hers, long black hair and tangled beardand rotten teeth. “Don’t look!” a thick voice snarled at her.
“I … I … I …” Arya sobbed.
The old man shook her so hard her teeth rattled. “Shut your mouth and close your eyes, boy.”
Dimly, as if from far away, she heard a … a noise … a soft sighing sound, as if a million people hadlet out their breath at once. The old man’s fingers dug into her arm, stiff as iron. “Look at me. Yes,that’s the way of it, at me.” Sour wine perfumed his breath. “Remember, boy?”
It was the smell that did it. Arya saw the matted greasy hair, the patched, dusty black cloak thatcovered his twisted shoulders, the hard black eyes squinting at her. And she remembered the blackbrother who had come to visit her father.
“Know me now, do you? There’s a bright boy.” He spat. “They’re done here. You’ll be comingwith me, and you’ll be keeping your mouth shut.” When she started to reply, he shook her again, evenharder. “Shut, I said.”
The plaza was beginning to empty. The press dissolved around them as people drifted back to theirlives. But Arya’s life was gone. Numb, she trailed along beside … Yoren, yes, his name is Yoren. Shedid not recall him finding Needle, until he handed the sword back to her. “Hope you can use that,boy.”
“I’m not—” she started.
He shoved her into a doorway, thrust dirty fingers through her hair, and gave it a twist, yanking herhead back. “—not a smart boy, that what you mean to say?”
He had a knife in his other hand.
As the blade flashed toward her face, Arya threw herself backward, kicking wildly, wrenching herhead from side to side, but he had her by the hair, so strong, she could feel her scalp tearing, and onher lips the salt taste of tears.
Her stick sword whistled out and caught it two feet off the ground, and it went down in a flurry ofbrown feathers. She was on it in the blink of an eye, grabbing a wing as the pigeon flapped andfluttered. It pecked at her hand. She grabbed its neck and twisted until she felt the bone snap.
Compared with catching cats, pigeons were easy.
A passing septon was looking at her askance. “Here’s the best place to find pigeon,” Arya told himas she brushed herself off and picked up her fallen stick sword. “They come for the crumbs.” Hehurried away.
She tied the pigeon to her belt and started down the street. A man was pushing a load of tarts by ona two-wheeled cart; the smells sang of blueberries and lemons and apricots. Her stomach made ahollow rumbly noise. “Could I have one?” she heard herself say. “A lemon, or … or any kind.”
The pushcart man looked her up and down. Plainly he did not like what he saw. “Three coppers.”
Arya tapped her wooden sword against the side of her boot. “I’ll trade you a fat pigeon,” she said.
“The Others take your pigeon,” the pushcart man said.
The tarts were still warm from the oven. The smells were making her mouth water, but she did nothave three coppers … or one. She gave the pushcart man a look, remembering what Syrio had told herabout seeing. He was short, with a little round belly, and when he moved he seemed to favor his leftleg a little. She was just thinking that if she snatched a tart and ran he would never be able to catch herwhen he said, “You be keepin’ your filthy hands off. The gold cloaks know how to deal with thievinglittle gutter rats, that they do.”
Arya glanced warily behind her. Two of the City Watch were standing at the mouth of an alley.
Their cloaks hung almost to the ground, the heavy wool dyed a rich gold; their mail and boots andgloves were black. One wore a longsword at his hip, the other an iron cudgel. With a last wistfulglance at the tarts, Arya edged back from the cart and hurried off. The gold cloaks had not beenpaying her any special attention, but the sight of them tied her stomach in knots. Arya had beenstaying as far from the castle as she could get, yet even from a distance she could see the heads rottingatop the high red walls. Flocks of crows squabbled noisily over each head, thick as flies. The talk inFlea Bottom was that the gold cloaks had thrown in with the Lannisters, their commander raised to alord, with lands on the Trident and a seat on the king’s council.
She had also heard other things, scary things, things that made no sense to her. Some said her fatherhad murdered King Robert and been slain in turn by Lord Renly. Others insisted that Renly had killedthe king in a drunken quarrel between brothers. Why else should he have fled in the night like acommon thief? One story said the king had been killed by a boar while hunting, another that he’d diedeating a boar, stuffing himself so full that he’d ruptured at the table. No, the king had died at table,others said, but only because Varys the Spider poisoned him. No, it had been the queen who poisonedhim. No, he had died of a pox. No, he had choked on a fish bone.
One thing all the stories agreed on: King Robert was dead. The bells in the seven towers of theGreat Sept of Baelor had tolled for a day and a night, the thunder of their grief rolling across the city in a bronze tide. They only rang the bells like that for the death of a king, a tanner’s boy told Arya. r’s boy told Arya.
All she wanted was to go home, but leaving King’s Landing was not so easy as she had hoped. Talkof war was on every lip, and gold cloaks were as thick on the city walls as fleas on … well, her, forone. She had been sleeping in Flea Bottom, on rooftops and in stables, wherever she could find aplace to lie down, and it hadn’t taken her long to learn that the district was well named.
Every day since her escape from the Red Keep, Arya had visited each of the seven city gates inturn. The Dragon Gate, the Lion Gate, and the Old Gate were closed and barred. The Mud Gate andthe Gate of the Gods were open, but only to those who wanted to enter the city; the guards let no oneout. Those who were allowed to leave left by the King’s Gate or the Iron Gate, but Lannister men-atarmsin crimson cloaks and lion-crested helms manned the guard posts there. Spying down from theroof of an inn by the King’s Gate, Arya saw them searching wagons and carriages, forcing riders toopen their saddlebags, and questioning everyone who tried to pass on foot.
Sometimes she thought about swimming the river, but the Blackwater Rush was wide and deep,and everyone agreed that its currents were wicked and treacherous. She had no coin to pay a ferrymanor take passage on a ship.
Her lord father had taught her never to steal, but it was growing harder to remember why. If she didnot get out soon, she would have to take her chances with the gold cloaks. She hadn’t gone hungrymuch since she learned to knock down birds with her stick sword, but she feared so much pigeon wasmaking her sick. A couple she’d eaten raw, before she found Flea Bottom.
In the Bottom there were pot-shops along the alleys where huge tubs of stew had been simmeringfor years, and you could trade half your bird for a heel of yesterday’s bread and a “bowl o’ brown,”
and they’d even stick the other half in the fire and crisp it up for you, so long as you plucked thefeathers yourself. Arya would have given anything for a cup of milk and a lemon cake, but the brownwasn’t so bad. It usually had barley in it, and chunks of carrot and onion and turnip, and sometimeseven apple, with a film of grease swimming on top. Mostly she tried not to think about the meat. Onceshe had gotten a piece of fish.
The only thing was, the pot-shops were never empty, and even as she bolted down her food, Aryacould feel them watching. Some of them stared at her boots or her cloak, and she knew what theywere thinking. With others, she could almost feel their eyes crawling under her leathers; she didn’tknow what they were thinking, and that scared her even more. A couple times, she was followed outinto the alleys and chased, but so far no one had been able to catch her.
The silver bracelet she’d hoped to sell had been stolen her first night out of the castle, along withher bundle of good clothes, snatched while she slept in a burnt-out house off Pig Alley. All they lefther was the cloak she had been huddled in, the leathers on her back, her wooden practicesword … and Needle. She’d been lying on top of Needle, or else it would have been gone too; it wasworth more than all the rest together. Since then Arya had taken to walking around with her cloakdraped over her right arm, to conceal the blade at her hip. The wooden sword she carried in her lefthand, out where everybody could see it, to scare off robbers, but there were men in the pot-shops whowouldn’t have been scared off if she’d had a battle-axe. It was enough to make her lose her taste forpigeon and stale bread. Often as not, she went to bed hungry rather than risk the stares.
Once she was outside the city, she would find berries to pick, or orchards she might raid for applesand cherries. Arya remembered seeing some from the kingsroad on the journey south. And she coulddig for roots in the forest, even run down some rabbits. In the city, the only things to run down wererats and cats and scrawny dogs. The pot-shops would give you a fistful of coppers for a litter of pups,she’d heard, but she didn’t like to think about that.
Down below the Street of Flour was a maze of twisting alleys and cross streets. Arya scrambledthrough the crowds, trying to put distance between her and the gold cloaks. She had learned to keep tothe center of the street. Sometimes she had to dodge wagons and horses, but at least you could seethem coming. If you walked near the buildings, people grabbed you. In some alleys you couldn’t helpbut brush against the walls; the buildings leaned in so close they almost met.
A whooping gang of small children went running past, chasing a rolling hoop. Arya stared at themwith resentment, remembering the times she’d played at hoops with Bran and Jon and their babybrother Rickon. She wondered how big Rickon had grown, and whether Bran was sad. She wouldhave given anything if Jon had been here to call her “little sister” and muss her hair. Not that it neededmussing. She’d seen her reflection in puddles, and she didn’t think hair got any more mussed than hers.
She had tried talking to the children she saw in the street, hoping to make a friend who would giveher a place to sleep, but she must have talked wrong or something. The little ones only looked at herwith quick, wary eyes and ran away if she came too close. Their big brothers and sisters askedquestions Arya couldn’t answer, called her names, and tried to steal from her. Only yesterday, ascrawny barefoot girl twice her age had knocked her down and tried to pull the boots off her feet, butArya gave her a crack on her ear with her stick sword that sent her off sobbing and bleeding.
A gull wheeled overhead as she made her way down the hill toward Flea Bottom. Arya glanced at itthoughtfully, but it was well beyond the reach of her stick. It made her think of the sea. Maybe thatwas the way out. Old Nan used to tell stories of boys who stowed away on trading galleys and sailedoff into all kinds of adventures. Maybe Arya could do that too. She decided to visit the riverfront. Itwas on the way to the Mud Gate anyway, and she hadn’t checked that one today.
The wharfs were oddly quiet when Arya got there. She spied another pair of gold cloaks, walkingside by side through the fish market, but they never so much as looked at her. Half the stalls wereempty, and it seemed to her that there were fewer ships at dock than she remembered. Out on theBlackwater, three of the king’s war galleys moved in formation, gold-painted hulls splitting the wateras their oars rose and fell. Arya watched them for a bit, then began to make her way along the river.
When she saw the guardsmen on the third pier, in grey woolen cloaks trimmed with white satin, herheart almost stopped in her chest. The sight of Winterfell's colors brought tears to her eyes. Behindthem, a sleek three-banked trading galley rocked at her moorings. Arya could not read the namepainted on the hull; the words were strange, Myrish, Braavosi, perhaps even High Valyrian. Shegrabbed a passing longshoreman by the sleeve. “Please,” she said, “what ship is this?”
“She’s the Wind Witch, out of Myr,” the man said.
“She’s still here,” Arya blurted. The longshoreman gave her a queer look, shrugged, and walkedaway. Arya ran toward the pier. The Wind Witch was the ship Father had hired to take herhome … still waiting! She’d imagined it had sailed ages ago.
Two of the guardsmen were dicing together while the third walked rounds, his hand on the pommelof his sword. Ashamed to let them see her crying like a baby, she stopped to rub at her eyes. Her eyesher eyes her eyes, why did …Look with your eyes, she heard Syrio whisper.
Arya looked. She knew all of her father’s men. The three in the grey cloaks were strangers. “You,”
the one walking rounds called out. “What do you want here, boy?” The other two looked up fromtheir dice.
It was all Arya could do not to bolt and run, but she knew that if she did, they would be after her atonce. She made herself walk closer. They were looking for a girl, but he thought she was a boy. She’dbe a boy, then. “Want to buy a pigeon?” She showed him the dead bird.
“Get out of here,” the guardsman said.
Arya did as he told her. She did not have to pretend to be frightened. Behind her, the men wentback to their dice.
She could not have said how she got back to Flea Bottom, but she was breathing hard by the timeshe reached the narrow crooked unpaved streets between the hills. The Bottom had a stench to it, astink of pigsties and stables and tanner’s sheds, mixed in with the sour smell of winesinks and cheapwhorehouses. Arya wound her way through the maze dully. It was not until she caught a whiff ofbubbling brown coming through a pot-shop door that she realized her pigeon was gone. It must haveslipped from her belt as she ran, or someone had stolen it and she’d never noticed. For a moment shewanted to cry again. She’d have to walk all the way back to the Street of Flour to find another onethat plump.
Far across the city, bells began to ring.
Arya glanced up, listening, wondering what the ringing meant this time.
“What’s this now?” a fat man called from the pot-shop.
“The bells again, gods ha’mercy,” wailed an old woman.
A red-haired whore in a wisp of painted silk pushed open a second-story window. “Is it the boyking that’s died now?” she shouted down, leaning out over the street. “Ah, that’s a boy for you, theynever last long.” As she laughed, a naked man slid his arms around her from behind, biting her neckand rubbing the heavy white breasts that hung loose beneath her shift.
“Stupid slut,” the fat man shouted up. “The king’s not dead, that’s only summoning bells. Onetower tolling. When the king dies, they ring every bell in the city.”
“Here, quit your biting, or I’ll ring your bells,” the woman in the window said to the man behindher, pushing him off with an elbow. “So who is it died, if not the king?”
“It’s a summoning,” the fat man repeated.
Two boys close to Arya’s age scampered past, splashing through a puddle. The old woman cursedthem, but they kept right on going. Other people were moving too, heading up the hill to see what thenoise was about. Arya ran after the slower boy. “Where you going?” she shouted when she was rightbehind him. “What’s happening?”
He glanced back without slowing. “The gold cloaks is carryin’ him to the sept.”
“Who?” she yelled, running hard.
“The Hand! They’ll be taking his head off, Buu says.”
A passing wagon had left a deep rut in the street. The boy leapt over, but Arya never saw it. Shetripped and fell, face first, scraping her knee open on a stone and smashing her fingers when herhands hit the hard-packed earth. Needle tangled between her legs. She sobbed as she struggled to herknees. The thumb of her left hand was covered with blood. When she sucked on it, she saw that halfthe thumbnail was gone, ripped off in her fall. Her hands throbbed, and her knee was all bloody too.
“Make way!” someone shouted from the cross street. “Make way for my lords of Redwyne!” Itwas all Arya could do to get out of the road before they ran her down, four guardsmen on hugehorses, pounding past at a gallop. They wore checked cloaks, blue-and-burgundy. Behind them, twoyoung lordlings rode side by side on a pair of chestnut mares alike as peas in a pod. Arya had seenthem in the bailey a hundred times; the Redwyne twins, Ser Horas and Ser Hobber, homely youthswith orange hair and square, freckled faces. Sansa and Jeyne Poole used to call them Ser Horror andSer Slobber, and giggle whenever they caught sight of them. They did not look funny now.
Everyone was moving in the same direction, all in a hurry to see what the ringing was all about.
The bells seemed louder now, clanging, calling. Arya joined the stream of people. Her thumb hurt sobad where the nail had broken that it was all she could do not to cry. She bit her lip as she limpedalong, listening to the excited voices around her.
“—the King’s Hand, Lord Stark. They’re carrying him up to Baelor’s Sept.”
“I heard he was dead.”
“Soon enough, soon enough. Here, I got me a silver stag says they lop his head off.”
“Past time, the traitor.” The man spat.
Arya struggled to find a voice. “He never—” she started, but she was only a child and they talkedright over her.
“Fool! They ain’t neither going to lop him. Since when do they knick traitors on the steps of theGreat Sept?”
“Well, they don’t mean to anoint him no knight. I heard it was Stark killed old King Robert. Slithis throat in the woods, and when they found him, he stood there cool as you please and said it wassome old boar did for His Grace.”
“Ah, that’s not true, it was his own brother did him, that Renly, him with his gold antlers.”
“You shut your lying mouth, woman. You don’t know what you’re saying, his lordship’s a finetrue man.”
By the time they reached the Street of the Sisters, they were packed in shoulder to shoulder. Aryalet the human current carry her along, up to the top of Visenya’s Hill. The white marble plaza was asolid mass of people, all yammering excitedly at each other and straining to get closer to the GreatSept of Baelor. The bells were very loud here.
Arya squirmed through the press, ducking between the legs of horses and clutching tight to hersword stick. From the middle of the crowd, all she could see were arms and legs and stomachs, andthe seven slender towers of the sept looming overhead. She spotted a wood wagon and thought toclimb up on the back where she might be able to see, but others had the same idea. The teamstercursed at them and drove them off with a crack of his whip.
Arya grew frantic. Forcing her way to the front of the crowd, she was shoved up against the stoneof a plinth. She looked up at Baelor the Blessed, the septon king. Sliding her stick sword through herbelt, Arya began to climb. Her broken thumbnail left smears of blood on the painted marble, but she made it up, and wedged herself in between the king’s feet.
That was when she saw her father.
Lord Eddard stood on the High Septon’s pulpit outside the doors of the sept, supported betweentwo of the gold cloaks. He was dressed in a rich grey velvet doublet with a white wolf sewn on thefront in beads, and a grey wool cloak trimmed with fur, but he was thinner than Arya had ever seenhim, his long face drawn with pain. He was not standing so much as being held up; the cast over hisbroken leg was grey and rotten.
The High Septon himself stood behind him, a squat man, grey with age and ponderously fat,wearing long white robes and an immense crown of spun gold and crystal that wreathed his head withrainbows whenever he moved.
Clustered around the doors of the sept, in front of the raised marble pulpit, were a knot of knightsand high lords. Joffrey was prominent among them, his raiment all crimson, silk and satin patternedwith prancing stags and roaring lions, a gold crown on his head. His queen mother stood beside himin a black mourning gown slashed with crimson, a veil of black diamonds in her hair. Aryarecognized the Hound, wearing a snowy white cloak over his dark grey armor, with four of theKingsguard around him. She saw Varys the eunuch gliding among the lords in soft slippers and apatterned damask robe, and she thought the short man with the silvery cape and pointed beard mightbe the one who had once fought a duel for Mother.
And there in their midst was Sansa, dressed in sky-blue silk, with her long auburn hair washed andcurled and silver bracelets on her wrists. Arya scowled, wondering what her sister was doing here,why she looked so happy.
A long line of gold-cloaked spearmen held back the crowd, commanded by a stout man in elaboratearmor, all black lacquer and gold filigree. His cloak had the metallic shimmer of true cloth-of-gold.
When the bell ceased to toll, a quiet slowly settled across the great plaza, and her father lifted hishead and began to speak, his voice so thin and weak she could scarcely make him out. People behindher began to shout out, “What?” and “Louder!” The man in the black-and-gold armor stepped upbehind Father and prodded him sharply. You leave him alone! Arya wanted to shout, but she knew noone would listen. She chewed her lip.
Her father raised his voice and began again. “I am Eddard Stark, Lord of Winterfell and Hand ofthe King,” he said more loudly, his voice carrying across the plaza, “and I come before you to confessmy treason in the sight of gods and men.”
“NO,” Arya whimpered. Below her, the crowd began to scream and shout. Taunts and obscenitiesfilled the air. Sansa had hidden her face in her hands.
Her father raised his voice still higher, straining to be heard. “I betrayed the faith of my king andthe trust of my friend, Robert,” he shouted. “I swore to defend and protect his children, yet before hisblood was cold, I plotted to depose and murder his son and seize the throne for myself. Let the HighSepton and Baelor the Beloved and the Seven bear witness to the truth of what I say: JoffreyBaratheon is the one true heir to the Iron Throne, and by the grace of all the gods, Lord of the SevenKingdoms and Protector of the Realm.”
A stone came sailing out of the crowd. Arya cried out as she saw her father hit. The gold cloakskept him from falling. Blood ran down his face from a deep gash across his forehead. More stonesfollowed. One struck the guard to Father’s left. Another went clanging off the breastplate of theknight in the black-and-gold armor. Two of the Kingsguard stepped in front of Joffrey and the queen,protecting them with their shields.
Her hand slid beneath her cloak and found Needle in its sheath. She tightened her fingers aroundthe grip, squeezing as hard as she had ever squeezed anything. Please, gods, keep him safe, sheprayed. Don’t let them hurt my father.
The High Septon knelt before Joffrey and his mother. “As we sin, so do we suffer,” he intoned, in adeep swelling voice much louder than Father’s. “This man has confessed his crimes in the sight ofgods and men, here in this holy place.” Rainbows danced around his head as he lifted his hands inentreaty. “The gods are just, yet Blessed Baelor taught us that they are also merciful. What shall bedone with this traitor, Your Grace?”
A thousand voices were screaming, but Arya never heard them. Prince Joffrey … no, KingJoffrey … stepped out from behind the shields of his Kingsguard. “My mother bids me let LordEddard take the black, and Lady Sansa has begged mercy for her father.” He looked straight at Sansa then, and smiled, and for a moment Arya thought that the gods had heard her prayer, until Joffreyturned back to the crowd and said, “But they have the soft hearts of women. So long as I am yourking, treason shall never go unpunished. Ser Ilyn, bring me his head!”
rking, treason shall never go unpunished. Ser Ilyn, bring me his head!”
The crowd roared, and Arya felt the statue of Baelor rock as they surged against it. The HighSepton clutched at the king’s cape, and Varys came rushing over waving his arms, and even the queenwas saying something to him, but Joffrey shook his head. Lords and knights moved aside as hestepped through, tall and fleshless, a skeleton in iron mail, the King’s Justice. Dimly, as if from faroff, Arya heard her sister scream. Sansa had fallen to her knees, sobbing hysterically. Ser Ilyn Payneclimbed the steps of the pulpit.
Arya wriggled between Baelor’s feet and threw herself into the crowd, drawing Needle. She landedon a man in a butcher’s apron, knocking him to the ground. Immediately someone slammed into herback and she almost went down herself. Bodies closed in around her, stumbling and pushing,trampling on the poor butcher. Arya slashed at them with Needle.
High atop the pulpit, Ser Ilyn Payne gestured and the knight in black-and-gold gave a command.
The gold cloaks flung Lord Eddard to the marble, with his head and chest out over the edge.
“Here, you!” an angry voice shouted at Arya, but she bowled past, shoving people aside,squirming between them, slamming into anyone in her way. A hand fumbled at her leg and shehacked at it, kicked at shins. A woman stumbled and Arya ran up her back, cutting to both sides, but itwas no good, no good, there were too many people, no sooner did she make a hole than it closedagain. Someone buffeted her aside. She could still hear Sansa screaming.
Ser Ilyn drew a two-handed greatsword from the scabbard on his back. As he lifted the blade abovehis head, sunlight seemed to ripple and dance down the dark metal, glinting off an edge sharper thanany razor. Ice, she thought, he has Ice! Her tears streamed down her face, blinding her.
And then a hand shot out of the press and closed round her arm like a wolf trap, so hard that Needlewent flying from her hand. Arya was wrenched off her feet. She would have fallen if he hadn’t heldher up, as easy as if she were a doll. A face pressed close to hers, long black hair and tangled beardand rotten teeth. “Don’t look!” a thick voice snarled at her.
“I … I … I …” Arya sobbed.
The old man shook her so hard her teeth rattled. “Shut your mouth and close your eyes, boy.”
Dimly, as if from far away, she heard a … a noise … a soft sighing sound, as if a million people hadlet out their breath at once. The old man’s fingers dug into her arm, stiff as iron. “Look at me. Yes,that’s the way of it, at me.” Sour wine perfumed his breath. “Remember, boy?”
It was the smell that did it. Arya saw the matted greasy hair, the patched, dusty black cloak thatcovered his twisted shoulders, the hard black eyes squinting at her. And she remembered the blackbrother who had come to visit her father.
“Know me now, do you? There’s a bright boy.” He spat. “They’re done here. You’ll be comingwith me, and you’ll be keeping your mouth shut.” When she started to reply, he shook her again, evenharder. “Shut, I said.”
The plaza was beginning to empty. The press dissolved around them as people drifted back to theirlives. But Arya’s life was gone. Numb, she trailed along beside … Yoren, yes, his name is Yoren. Shedid not recall him finding Needle, until he handed the sword back to her. “Hope you can use that,boy.”
“I’m not—” she started.
He shoved her into a doorway, thrust dirty fingers through her hair, and gave it a twist, yanking herhead back. “—not a smart boy, that what you mean to say?”
He had a knife in his other hand.
As the blade flashed toward her face, Arya threw herself backward, kicking wildly, wrenching herhead from side to side, but he had her by the hair, so strong, she could feel her scalp tearing, and onher lips the salt taste of tears.