Fic: A Year from Now (25/?)
Title: A Year from Now (25/?)
Author: MrsTater
Fandom: A Song of Ice and Fire
Characters & Pairings: Daenerys Targaryen/Jorah Mormont, Tyrion Lannister
Ratings & Warnings: R, none in this chapter
Format & Word Count: WIP, 3403 words in chapter 25
Summary: "Save your tears, child. Weep for him tomorrow, or a year from now. We do not have time for grief. We must go, and quickly, before he dies.” Dany takes Ser Jorah's advice, setting her unborn child, her unhatched dragons, her quest for the Iron Throne, and her relationship with her faithful knight on a very different, but no less adventurous path.
Chapter Summary: Jorah's new traveling companion gives his journey a little direction.
Author's Note: My apologies for the punny title. I blame just_a_dram, my beta who shouldn't encourage me. ;)
Previous Chapters |
25. Improvisation
"We rode south all day," said Tyrion Lannister, trundling into the forest clearing, his stubby arms loaded with twigs and dried leaves. "I do believe that due south of Qohor lies…Valyria."
"So does Sothoryos, if you keep going." Jorah dragged his knife a little more deliberately through the limp rabbit he was skinning for their supper and tried not to take heed of the Imp's mismatched eyes gleaming weirdly as he added the kindling to the campfire.
"Oh, it's to the southern continent we go, then? Delightful. I've always yearned to see the Basilisk Isles…and the Isle of Toads…Or perhaps the Isle of Tears better suits your mood, as Queen Daenerys' spurned lover?"
"Husband," Jorah gritted out through clinched teeth. "I'm Queen Daenerys' husband."
The bloody blade in his hand beckoned to him, but he stayed himself from doing anything brash. The Imp would hardly be of use to Dany if he couldn't speak, and, truth be told, Jorah actually found the incessant prattle during the day's ride a blessed distraction from his own thoughts, which had tormented him throughout his solitary ride from Pentos to Qohor. At least, it had been a change to be irked with someone other than himself.
"What's the point of this?" Jorah asked, tearing the rabbit's pelt off the meat. "Apart from showing off that your lord father could afford a competent geography tutor?"
Hands on his knees, Tyrion pushed himself to stand upright, then, approaching Jorah, clasped them together behind his back in a stance that would have been lordly if his body weren't proportioned like that of a toddling child--thought which made Jorah's thoughts turn to the toddler who was dear enough to be his own; he closed his eyes, as if that would make Rhaego's face vanish from his memory.
"No point, ser," Tyrion said, "other than idle curiosity as to where you've made up your mind to take me, and what you intend to do with me when you get there."
He bent again, reaching out as if for one of the knives that lay beside Jorah on the fallen log where he sat cleaning the game. Jorah pinned Tyrion with his stare.
"Are you asking me to bind your hands again, Imp?"
Tyrion withdrew his hand, his mouth curling slowly in a half-grin. "I swear on my honor as a Lannister, I shall give you no reason to regret untying me. I'll fetch more firewood, if you like."
"I hear Lannisters have shit for honor."
"And gold for shit." Tyrion's bulging brow furrowed. "No, wait, that was only my lord father, and as it happened, he only shat shit. Bugger."
Jorah couldn't help snorting at that as he set to work on the other rabbit. He didn't actually second-guess his decision to restore Tyrion the use of his hands so he could make himself useful setting up camp. A dwarf as clever as this one had so far indicated himself to be couldn't possibly be foolish enough to attempt an escape into the forest by night, and though the Imp had by all accounts including his own committed patricide, Jorah had spent nights in the forests back home with bears and wasn't worried overmuch for the safety of his person--so long as he took care to avoid Lord Tywin's mistake of lowering his breeches and squatting while the Imp skulked about armed with a crossbow.
"Don't tell me you left the winesinks and brothels of Qohor behind with no destination in view," said Tyrion.
"I haven't told you anything so far." Except for the entire saga of his fleeing the khalasar with Dany up to their recent parting. "What makes you think I'd begin now?"
But the Imp had the way of it: Jorah had struck out from Qohor with no clearer plan than when he'd left Pentos. Tyrion was also correct in that they'd ridden in a more or less southerly direction, though Jorah was tempted to repeat the nonsense Quaithe had talked about going south to go north, just to perplex the Imp. If only he didn't find it so bloody confusing himself.
Soon, he would have to make the decision to veer eastward to Vaes Dothrak, or to continue on south to Dany. If they rode hard--which Jorah was not at all sure Tyrion could do, though he was not above trussing the little man up on the back of his own mount like so much baggage--they had a chance of arriving in Valyria at nearly the same time as The Bear and the Maiden Fair completed her meandering voyage around the Stepstones in the Narrow Sea. Assuming, of course, that the ship was not delayed by autumn storms. Or, worse, fallen upon by the pirates or slavers that plagued the western shores of Essos. Though Jorah never had been a praying man, he silently beseeched any gods old or new, on this continent or any other, that her sailing would be as smooth as theirs had been from Qarth.
"From my view--" Tyrion began, and Jorah, relieved to be drawn away from that disturbing line of thought, interrupted him.
"Can't be a very good view, considering your height."
"I was going to follow that with it stands to reason, but anticipating your inevitable jest that a dwarf's reason can't stand very high, I'll skip straight to the part where I tell you that the obvious solution to your little problem is to determine the best way to win back your lady wife, and then go on from there."
Jorah stood, skinned rabbits in hand, and towered over the dwarf. While he welcomed the distraction provided by conversation, he little appreciated being condescended to by the likes of Tywin Lannister's accursed wretch of a son.
"And what do you consider the solution that's so obvious I cannot see it, Imp?"
Undaunted, Tyrion rose; before Jorah could realize what he intended, the Imp took the rabbits from him and had tossed them into a pan over the cookfire, along with a few wild onions and carrots he produced from his pockets.
"The first is to get Daenerys an army," he said as the meat and blood sizzled in the heated pan. "The problem being, of course, that you ran off with a khaleesi rather than let her be taken to the sacred city of the horselords. The Dothraki will most likely be as pleased to see you as my sweet sister Cersei would be to see me."
"But Cersei will happily pay to see your head," said Jorah, taking his wineskin out from one of the packs and resuming his seat on the log to nurse it while the Imp prepared their meal.
"My point exactly," said Tyrion. "Also, Targaryens aren't historically known for riding horses into conquest, which brings us to your second option: go to Qarth and buy back Daenerys' dragon's eggs."
Jorah's face prickled warmly with the realization that he had not considered this course. He ground his teeth together and said, "The problem with that being that I'm traveling with the only Lannister in the world who doesn't have any bloody money. Unless you do what Lord Tywin could not?"
Tyrion turned away from the cook fire to make a mocking bow, though his grotesque face leered upward. "I'll give you all my shit, Ser Jorah."
"I believe you would."
Straightening up, Tyrion gave the frying meat a stir in the pan. "But you make a valid point. Not to mention that a young girl's arrival in Westeros with three dragon's eggs in hand hardly inspires surrender like a queen's arrival astride one dragon and flanked by two others. Still, if Daenerys truly does regard them as children, as you say, it might win you back her affections, if not her a kingdom. On the other hand, if she truly does regard them as children, as you say, you might be better off without her, my friend."
The Imp waggled his eyebrows in a way that left Jorah in no doubt as to his meaning. Despite his own occasional thoughts that Dany was rather too precious about the eggs, Jorah misliked the idea of anyone else implying that her father King Aerys' madness lurked in her--especially not a brother of the Kingslayer. Jorah felt he ought to knock out another of the Imp's teeth for the honor of his lady wife, but he found he lacked the ire that had possessed him in the tavern in Qohor. The day's ride, and the wine, had wearied and mellowed him; he took another swig from the skin.
"I am not your friend," Jorah muttered, but, curiosity getting the better of him, he asked, "You said there were three things I might do to earn Daenerys' forgiveness?"
"Beg for it. On bended knee. Tell her you're sorry."
The wine burned Jorah's throat as he gave a sharp laugh that made him swallow too quickly. "I'm sorry, Daenerys, for selling you and your unborn child to the man who rebelled against your father? I have no doubt that would prove as effective as you crawling before your sister, Imp, and saying, I'm sorry, sweet Cersei, for shooting our lord father in the bowels, and for poisoning your son at his own wedding feast."
"I wouldn't compare your queen to Cersei," replied Tyrion, "though now I think of it, there is that one thing they share in common: brothers who love them a little too well. Did Illyrio tell you Viserys tried to bed Daenerys before he gave her to Khal Drogo? I expect the girl grew up thinking she'd marry her brother. Jaime wishes he could marry Cersei. Lucky for her--Daenerys, I mean--if the Dothraki didn't kill Aegon, she'll find she has a long-lost nephew to wed and bed. While my sweet sister fucks our little cousin Lancel. And pretty soon everyone in Westeros will be kin, so there will be no need for war, or the gods will smite everyone for the abomination of incest. But do you know what I find strange in all of this?" he asked, abruptly, bending to take the pan off the fire and divide its steaming contents into two bowls.
"You mean stranger than talking to a man of marrying his wife off to other people?"
The Imp's glittering eyes were almost of a level with Jorah's as he approached to give him his portion of their supper, then seated himself on the log opposite, stretching out his legs to their full and unimpressive length.
He shoved a bite into his mouth, the juices of the rabbit running down his golden stubbled chin, and said, "If Varys and Illyrio were plotting all along to put Aegon on the throne, why go to all the trouble of marrying Daenerys off to Khal Drogo?"
Jorah's ire lessened as he chewed slowly, both on the tender rabbit and the thought the Imp had planted in his mind.
At length, he replied, "Dothraki don't believe in money, so they're a cheaper army than sellswords or slaves. And a nigh unconquerable one, if they could be persuaded to cross the Narrow Sea." All this he had explained to Dany, when she was but a blushing child bride, but he had not voiced the thought which next he spoke to the Imp. "I never was clear what benefit Khal Drogo stood to receive from an alliance with Viserys."
"Apart from his bride, of course."
Jorah heard the taunt, but his mind had already moved beyond it. "Do you think Varys would have eliminated Khal Drogo after he conquered the Seven Kingdoms, to free Daenerys for Aegon?"
"That very thought that crossed my mind."
"A risky move. Too risky, in my view. Even if they killed Drogo, they'd have a vengeful khalasar to contend with."
"But the horde tore itself apart as it was. You saw this yourself."
"First I saw the kos rape to death the witch who murdered Khal Drogo."
"Still." Tyrion set his empty bowl on the ground and sucked the juices off each of his stunted fingers in turn. "It's quite an elegant little plan. A delicate and intricately woven web. As one would expect of the Spider. And to think, Ser Jorah," he said, sliding off the front of the log to lean back against it on his elbows, "you are the man who unraveled it."
Jorah stared hard at the darkening logs amid the glowing embers of the fire. "Or the fly who got caught in it."
~*~
Next morning they were up with the sun and, after they broke their fast on the cold remains of the rabbits and a few berries the Imp foraged, they mounted their horses again and were on their way again.
"It's to Vaes Dothrak, then?" said Tyrion, squinting into the glare ahead of them. "Decided to try your luck with the horse lords?"
"No," said Jorah. "We won't have to ride nearly so far. The horse lords are coming to us. Don't you smell them?"
The wind had shifted in the night, and Jorah, wakeful despite having bound the kinslaying dwarf in his blanket like a swaddled babe, had caught the familiar stench that could only herald the approach of a khalasar. And the decision of his destination had been made for him. He would try his luck with the Dothraki, though it was a hefty wager that anyone the horde knew him at all, much less as a friend of a beloved khal.
"I suddenly find myself thanking the gods I'm short a nose," said Tyrion.
"You're short everything."
"I'd stick with being surly and gruff, if I were you. It obviously wasn't your sense of humor that won the heart of the maiden fair."
"It was my pretty face."
"It is, a very pretty face--if we're comparing it to mine. Or all the other males on Bear Island? I once heard your aunt took a bear for a husband."
It was only a joke--and the most good-humored the Imp had made--and one in which Jorah had frequently participated himself. But Jorah could manage only a faint smile as the icy fingers of fear closed around his heart at the reminder of yet another dear one who he might well never see again. Another dear one who, if she did live, was even more likely to have no wish to see him.
"Maege is something of a bear herself," he said, quietly. "Was she...?"
"A guest at the Red Wedding?" A tone of genuine sympathy belied Tyrion's flippant turn of phrase. "I'm sorry, my friend. I wish I could tell you more of where your House stands in this war, truly."
"Where we stand," murmured Jorah.
This time, when Tyrion called him friend, he did not correct him.
~*~
"I suppose since the Dothraki don't believe in money," said Tyrion that night as they bedded down for in the outskirts of the Forest of Qohor, Jorah tying him up again, his growing like of the little Lannister ironically making him all the more wary, "that a khalasar isn't where whores go."
"In the Western Market of Vaes Dothrak there are whores," Jorah replied, though he had an idea that wasn't at all what the Imp meant with this repetition about whores, "but the khalasars have bed slaves."
"Ah, yes," said Tyrion with a half-hearted smirk. "I had almost forgotten that I traveled in the company of Ser Jorah Mormont, Westeros' authority on slaves."
"Once Daenerys asked me if I'd repented of that sin, or if I'd commit it again for the right price. Careful, my little lordling of Lannister--if I meet a slaver who places a higher value on your head than Cersei, I'll sell you and be on my way to Qarth."
Looking unimpressed with this threat, Tyrion replied, "If I thought my life was worth one dragon's egg, much less two, I'd sell myself."
It was an idle threat, but Jorah drifted off to sleep mulling over the price of a dwarf.
He dreamed he carried the Imp all the way to Qarth and handed him over to Xaro Xhoan Daxos himself, only instead of being paid a dragon's egg, Jorah was the one clapped in irons while the jewels winked in the nose of the merchant prince whose form shifted into that of Tregar Ormallen of Lys. At his side stood Lynesse, or Dany, Jorah couldn't be sure which, because he was falling down, down into a pit as jeering faces looked down on him from above, placing bets on who would win, the dragon or the bear, and he looked around to find himself trapped between the two snarling and slavering beasts while overhead the crows circled, their wings blackening the sky like mounting storm clouds.
The thunder roused Jorah from the nightmare, though as his eyes opened he saw that there was no storm, only the grey predawn, and the rumble was more rhythmic than thunder, his racing heart matching its tempo. Instantly, the chains of the nightmare released him and he was on his feet, cutting the ropes that bound Tyrion wrist and ankle.
"Quickly," he said, hefting the confused dwarf, blanket and all, onto his mount. "The khalasar approaches."
Ignoring the Imp's sleepy requests to break their fast first, or to at least have a drink, Jorah spurred his horse through the thinning forest, and the thickening grass, until there were no trees at all, only a vast browning prairie before them, stretching into a hazy horizon.
"See the cloud of dust ahead?" Jorah threw back to Tyrion, slowing his horse as the dwarf bounced along on his smaller animal, struggling to catch up. "That'll be the Dothraki. And quite a lot of them."
At least as many horse as Khal Drogo's horde, by his reckoning. Which was not at all what he would have expected, none of the kos having matched their former lord's prowess. Who had united the warring factions? The crones had prophesied that Rhaego would be the stallion who mounts the world, but he was but a babe at the breast, and rode a wooden horse through the poison waters.
"Hopefully quite a lot of your friends," said Tyrion.
"We'll find out soon enough," Jorah said, flicking his reins again.
They met the outriders within the hour, and when Jorah was close enough to the young man leading the way, he thought he was seeing a ghost, so like he was to Rakharo.
"I think it prudent to find out this one's khal before I declare myself," said Jorah to Tyrion in the Common Tongue.
"Do you know him?"
"One of his close kin. Brother, most likely. I took off his head as Daenerys and I made our escape."
"You have such a way with people," muttered Tyrion as Jorah greeted the youth in the Dothraki tongue and asked under what khal he rode."
"Khal Jhogo."
"Khal Jhogo?" Jorah repeated. He could not have heard that correctly. He could not have had such good fortune, after his lifetime of bad luck.
"Are you dumbfounded in a good way?" asked Tyrion. "Or do we need to try to outride the horselords?"
"He let us go. He cut off his braid, in submission to Daenerys." Recovering his senses, Jorah spoke again to the rider. "Send word to your khal that Jorah the Andal has come--" When the lad drew in a sharp breath and his hand went for the arakh at his side, Jorah continued quickly, "--on behalf of Daenerys, Khaleesi of the Great Grass Sea."
The look of baleful recognition did not leave the young man's dark eyes, but he put away his arakh and bid them follow him, the other two outriders flanking them behind as they rode back to the horde. Jhogo and his bloodriders, of course, headed the khalasar; more surprising was that Dany's handmaid, Irri, rode alongside the khal, her belly swollen with a child beneath her painted vest. Jorah noted that Jhogo's braid, while not long by Dothraki standards, jangled noisily with a dozen or more bells, and the dark eyes knew him at once.
"It is good you have come, Jorah the Andal," said Khal Jhogo. "We ride to find the khaleesi and the Stallion Who Mounts the World. We ride to make war on Westeros."
Read Chapter 26
Author: MrsTater
Fandom: A Song of Ice and Fire
Characters & Pairings: Daenerys Targaryen/Jorah Mormont, Tyrion Lannister
Ratings & Warnings: R, none in this chapter
Format & Word Count: WIP, 3403 words in chapter 25
Summary: "Save your tears, child. Weep for him tomorrow, or a year from now. We do not have time for grief. We must go, and quickly, before he dies.” Dany takes Ser Jorah's advice, setting her unborn child, her unhatched dragons, her quest for the Iron Throne, and her relationship with her faithful knight on a very different, but no less adventurous path.
Chapter Summary: Jorah's new traveling companion gives his journey a little direction.
Author's Note: My apologies for the punny title. I blame just_a_dram, my beta who shouldn't encourage me. ;)
Previous Chapters |
25. Improvisation
"We rode south all day," said Tyrion Lannister, trundling into the forest clearing, his stubby arms loaded with twigs and dried leaves. "I do believe that due south of Qohor lies…Valyria."
"So does Sothoryos, if you keep going." Jorah dragged his knife a little more deliberately through the limp rabbit he was skinning for their supper and tried not to take heed of the Imp's mismatched eyes gleaming weirdly as he added the kindling to the campfire.
"Oh, it's to the southern continent we go, then? Delightful. I've always yearned to see the Basilisk Isles…and the Isle of Toads…Or perhaps the Isle of Tears better suits your mood, as Queen Daenerys' spurned lover?"
"Husband," Jorah gritted out through clinched teeth. "I'm Queen Daenerys' husband."
The bloody blade in his hand beckoned to him, but he stayed himself from doing anything brash. The Imp would hardly be of use to Dany if he couldn't speak, and, truth be told, Jorah actually found the incessant prattle during the day's ride a blessed distraction from his own thoughts, which had tormented him throughout his solitary ride from Pentos to Qohor. At least, it had been a change to be irked with someone other than himself.
"What's the point of this?" Jorah asked, tearing the rabbit's pelt off the meat. "Apart from showing off that your lord father could afford a competent geography tutor?"
Hands on his knees, Tyrion pushed himself to stand upright, then, approaching Jorah, clasped them together behind his back in a stance that would have been lordly if his body weren't proportioned like that of a toddling child--thought which made Jorah's thoughts turn to the toddler who was dear enough to be his own; he closed his eyes, as if that would make Rhaego's face vanish from his memory.
"No point, ser," Tyrion said, "other than idle curiosity as to where you've made up your mind to take me, and what you intend to do with me when you get there."
He bent again, reaching out as if for one of the knives that lay beside Jorah on the fallen log where he sat cleaning the game. Jorah pinned Tyrion with his stare.
"Are you asking me to bind your hands again, Imp?"
Tyrion withdrew his hand, his mouth curling slowly in a half-grin. "I swear on my honor as a Lannister, I shall give you no reason to regret untying me. I'll fetch more firewood, if you like."
"I hear Lannisters have shit for honor."
"And gold for shit." Tyrion's bulging brow furrowed. "No, wait, that was only my lord father, and as it happened, he only shat shit. Bugger."
Jorah couldn't help snorting at that as he set to work on the other rabbit. He didn't actually second-guess his decision to restore Tyrion the use of his hands so he could make himself useful setting up camp. A dwarf as clever as this one had so far indicated himself to be couldn't possibly be foolish enough to attempt an escape into the forest by night, and though the Imp had by all accounts including his own committed patricide, Jorah had spent nights in the forests back home with bears and wasn't worried overmuch for the safety of his person--so long as he took care to avoid Lord Tywin's mistake of lowering his breeches and squatting while the Imp skulked about armed with a crossbow.
"Don't tell me you left the winesinks and brothels of Qohor behind with no destination in view," said Tyrion.
"I haven't told you anything so far." Except for the entire saga of his fleeing the khalasar with Dany up to their recent parting. "What makes you think I'd begin now?"
But the Imp had the way of it: Jorah had struck out from Qohor with no clearer plan than when he'd left Pentos. Tyrion was also correct in that they'd ridden in a more or less southerly direction, though Jorah was tempted to repeat the nonsense Quaithe had talked about going south to go north, just to perplex the Imp. If only he didn't find it so bloody confusing himself.
Soon, he would have to make the decision to veer eastward to Vaes Dothrak, or to continue on south to Dany. If they rode hard--which Jorah was not at all sure Tyrion could do, though he was not above trussing the little man up on the back of his own mount like so much baggage--they had a chance of arriving in Valyria at nearly the same time as The Bear and the Maiden Fair completed her meandering voyage around the Stepstones in the Narrow Sea. Assuming, of course, that the ship was not delayed by autumn storms. Or, worse, fallen upon by the pirates or slavers that plagued the western shores of Essos. Though Jorah never had been a praying man, he silently beseeched any gods old or new, on this continent or any other, that her sailing would be as smooth as theirs had been from Qarth.
"From my view--" Tyrion began, and Jorah, relieved to be drawn away from that disturbing line of thought, interrupted him.
"Can't be a very good view, considering your height."
"I was going to follow that with it stands to reason, but anticipating your inevitable jest that a dwarf's reason can't stand very high, I'll skip straight to the part where I tell you that the obvious solution to your little problem is to determine the best way to win back your lady wife, and then go on from there."
Jorah stood, skinned rabbits in hand, and towered over the dwarf. While he welcomed the distraction provided by conversation, he little appreciated being condescended to by the likes of Tywin Lannister's accursed wretch of a son.
"And what do you consider the solution that's so obvious I cannot see it, Imp?"
Undaunted, Tyrion rose; before Jorah could realize what he intended, the Imp took the rabbits from him and had tossed them into a pan over the cookfire, along with a few wild onions and carrots he produced from his pockets.
"The first is to get Daenerys an army," he said as the meat and blood sizzled in the heated pan. "The problem being, of course, that you ran off with a khaleesi rather than let her be taken to the sacred city of the horselords. The Dothraki will most likely be as pleased to see you as my sweet sister Cersei would be to see me."
"But Cersei will happily pay to see your head," said Jorah, taking his wineskin out from one of the packs and resuming his seat on the log to nurse it while the Imp prepared their meal.
"My point exactly," said Tyrion. "Also, Targaryens aren't historically known for riding horses into conquest, which brings us to your second option: go to Qarth and buy back Daenerys' dragon's eggs."
Jorah's face prickled warmly with the realization that he had not considered this course. He ground his teeth together and said, "The problem with that being that I'm traveling with the only Lannister in the world who doesn't have any bloody money. Unless you do what Lord Tywin could not?"
Tyrion turned away from the cook fire to make a mocking bow, though his grotesque face leered upward. "I'll give you all my shit, Ser Jorah."
"I believe you would."
Straightening up, Tyrion gave the frying meat a stir in the pan. "But you make a valid point. Not to mention that a young girl's arrival in Westeros with three dragon's eggs in hand hardly inspires surrender like a queen's arrival astride one dragon and flanked by two others. Still, if Daenerys truly does regard them as children, as you say, it might win you back her affections, if not her a kingdom. On the other hand, if she truly does regard them as children, as you say, you might be better off without her, my friend."
The Imp waggled his eyebrows in a way that left Jorah in no doubt as to his meaning. Despite his own occasional thoughts that Dany was rather too precious about the eggs, Jorah misliked the idea of anyone else implying that her father King Aerys' madness lurked in her--especially not a brother of the Kingslayer. Jorah felt he ought to knock out another of the Imp's teeth for the honor of his lady wife, but he found he lacked the ire that had possessed him in the tavern in Qohor. The day's ride, and the wine, had wearied and mellowed him; he took another swig from the skin.
"I am not your friend," Jorah muttered, but, curiosity getting the better of him, he asked, "You said there were three things I might do to earn Daenerys' forgiveness?"
"Beg for it. On bended knee. Tell her you're sorry."
The wine burned Jorah's throat as he gave a sharp laugh that made him swallow too quickly. "I'm sorry, Daenerys, for selling you and your unborn child to the man who rebelled against your father? I have no doubt that would prove as effective as you crawling before your sister, Imp, and saying, I'm sorry, sweet Cersei, for shooting our lord father in the bowels, and for poisoning your son at his own wedding feast."
"I wouldn't compare your queen to Cersei," replied Tyrion, "though now I think of it, there is that one thing they share in common: brothers who love them a little too well. Did Illyrio tell you Viserys tried to bed Daenerys before he gave her to Khal Drogo? I expect the girl grew up thinking she'd marry her brother. Jaime wishes he could marry Cersei. Lucky for her--Daenerys, I mean--if the Dothraki didn't kill Aegon, she'll find she has a long-lost nephew to wed and bed. While my sweet sister fucks our little cousin Lancel. And pretty soon everyone in Westeros will be kin, so there will be no need for war, or the gods will smite everyone for the abomination of incest. But do you know what I find strange in all of this?" he asked, abruptly, bending to take the pan off the fire and divide its steaming contents into two bowls.
"You mean stranger than talking to a man of marrying his wife off to other people?"
The Imp's glittering eyes were almost of a level with Jorah's as he approached to give him his portion of their supper, then seated himself on the log opposite, stretching out his legs to their full and unimpressive length.
He shoved a bite into his mouth, the juices of the rabbit running down his golden stubbled chin, and said, "If Varys and Illyrio were plotting all along to put Aegon on the throne, why go to all the trouble of marrying Daenerys off to Khal Drogo?"
Jorah's ire lessened as he chewed slowly, both on the tender rabbit and the thought the Imp had planted in his mind.
At length, he replied, "Dothraki don't believe in money, so they're a cheaper army than sellswords or slaves. And a nigh unconquerable one, if they could be persuaded to cross the Narrow Sea." All this he had explained to Dany, when she was but a blushing child bride, but he had not voiced the thought which next he spoke to the Imp. "I never was clear what benefit Khal Drogo stood to receive from an alliance with Viserys."
"Apart from his bride, of course."
Jorah heard the taunt, but his mind had already moved beyond it. "Do you think Varys would have eliminated Khal Drogo after he conquered the Seven Kingdoms, to free Daenerys for Aegon?"
"That very thought that crossed my mind."
"A risky move. Too risky, in my view. Even if they killed Drogo, they'd have a vengeful khalasar to contend with."
"But the horde tore itself apart as it was. You saw this yourself."
"First I saw the kos rape to death the witch who murdered Khal Drogo."
"Still." Tyrion set his empty bowl on the ground and sucked the juices off each of his stunted fingers in turn. "It's quite an elegant little plan. A delicate and intricately woven web. As one would expect of the Spider. And to think, Ser Jorah," he said, sliding off the front of the log to lean back against it on his elbows, "you are the man who unraveled it."
Jorah stared hard at the darkening logs amid the glowing embers of the fire. "Or the fly who got caught in it."
~*~
Next morning they were up with the sun and, after they broke their fast on the cold remains of the rabbits and a few berries the Imp foraged, they mounted their horses again and were on their way again.
"It's to Vaes Dothrak, then?" said Tyrion, squinting into the glare ahead of them. "Decided to try your luck with the horse lords?"
"No," said Jorah. "We won't have to ride nearly so far. The horse lords are coming to us. Don't you smell them?"
The wind had shifted in the night, and Jorah, wakeful despite having bound the kinslaying dwarf in his blanket like a swaddled babe, had caught the familiar stench that could only herald the approach of a khalasar. And the decision of his destination had been made for him. He would try his luck with the Dothraki, though it was a hefty wager that anyone the horde knew him at all, much less as a friend of a beloved khal.
"I suddenly find myself thanking the gods I'm short a nose," said Tyrion.
"You're short everything."
"I'd stick with being surly and gruff, if I were you. It obviously wasn't your sense of humor that won the heart of the maiden fair."
"It was my pretty face."
"It is, a very pretty face--if we're comparing it to mine. Or all the other males on Bear Island? I once heard your aunt took a bear for a husband."
It was only a joke--and the most good-humored the Imp had made--and one in which Jorah had frequently participated himself. But Jorah could manage only a faint smile as the icy fingers of fear closed around his heart at the reminder of yet another dear one who he might well never see again. Another dear one who, if she did live, was even more likely to have no wish to see him.
"Maege is something of a bear herself," he said, quietly. "Was she...?"
"A guest at the Red Wedding?" A tone of genuine sympathy belied Tyrion's flippant turn of phrase. "I'm sorry, my friend. I wish I could tell you more of where your House stands in this war, truly."
"Where we stand," murmured Jorah.
This time, when Tyrion called him friend, he did not correct him.
~*~
"I suppose since the Dothraki don't believe in money," said Tyrion that night as they bedded down for in the outskirts of the Forest of Qohor, Jorah tying him up again, his growing like of the little Lannister ironically making him all the more wary, "that a khalasar isn't where whores go."
"In the Western Market of Vaes Dothrak there are whores," Jorah replied, though he had an idea that wasn't at all what the Imp meant with this repetition about whores, "but the khalasars have bed slaves."
"Ah, yes," said Tyrion with a half-hearted smirk. "I had almost forgotten that I traveled in the company of Ser Jorah Mormont, Westeros' authority on slaves."
"Once Daenerys asked me if I'd repented of that sin, or if I'd commit it again for the right price. Careful, my little lordling of Lannister--if I meet a slaver who places a higher value on your head than Cersei, I'll sell you and be on my way to Qarth."
Looking unimpressed with this threat, Tyrion replied, "If I thought my life was worth one dragon's egg, much less two, I'd sell myself."
It was an idle threat, but Jorah drifted off to sleep mulling over the price of a dwarf.
He dreamed he carried the Imp all the way to Qarth and handed him over to Xaro Xhoan Daxos himself, only instead of being paid a dragon's egg, Jorah was the one clapped in irons while the jewels winked in the nose of the merchant prince whose form shifted into that of Tregar Ormallen of Lys. At his side stood Lynesse, or Dany, Jorah couldn't be sure which, because he was falling down, down into a pit as jeering faces looked down on him from above, placing bets on who would win, the dragon or the bear, and he looked around to find himself trapped between the two snarling and slavering beasts while overhead the crows circled, their wings blackening the sky like mounting storm clouds.
The thunder roused Jorah from the nightmare, though as his eyes opened he saw that there was no storm, only the grey predawn, and the rumble was more rhythmic than thunder, his racing heart matching its tempo. Instantly, the chains of the nightmare released him and he was on his feet, cutting the ropes that bound Tyrion wrist and ankle.
"Quickly," he said, hefting the confused dwarf, blanket and all, onto his mount. "The khalasar approaches."
Ignoring the Imp's sleepy requests to break their fast first, or to at least have a drink, Jorah spurred his horse through the thinning forest, and the thickening grass, until there were no trees at all, only a vast browning prairie before them, stretching into a hazy horizon.
"See the cloud of dust ahead?" Jorah threw back to Tyrion, slowing his horse as the dwarf bounced along on his smaller animal, struggling to catch up. "That'll be the Dothraki. And quite a lot of them."
At least as many horse as Khal Drogo's horde, by his reckoning. Which was not at all what he would have expected, none of the kos having matched their former lord's prowess. Who had united the warring factions? The crones had prophesied that Rhaego would be the stallion who mounts the world, but he was but a babe at the breast, and rode a wooden horse through the poison waters.
"Hopefully quite a lot of your friends," said Tyrion.
"We'll find out soon enough," Jorah said, flicking his reins again.
They met the outriders within the hour, and when Jorah was close enough to the young man leading the way, he thought he was seeing a ghost, so like he was to Rakharo.
"I think it prudent to find out this one's khal before I declare myself," said Jorah to Tyrion in the Common Tongue.
"Do you know him?"
"One of his close kin. Brother, most likely. I took off his head as Daenerys and I made our escape."
"You have such a way with people," muttered Tyrion as Jorah greeted the youth in the Dothraki tongue and asked under what khal he rode."
"Khal Jhogo."
"Khal Jhogo?" Jorah repeated. He could not have heard that correctly. He could not have had such good fortune, after his lifetime of bad luck.
"Are you dumbfounded in a good way?" asked Tyrion. "Or do we need to try to outride the horselords?"
"He let us go. He cut off his braid, in submission to Daenerys." Recovering his senses, Jorah spoke again to the rider. "Send word to your khal that Jorah the Andal has come--" When the lad drew in a sharp breath and his hand went for the arakh at his side, Jorah continued quickly, "--on behalf of Daenerys, Khaleesi of the Great Grass Sea."
The look of baleful recognition did not leave the young man's dark eyes, but he put away his arakh and bid them follow him, the other two outriders flanking them behind as they rode back to the horde. Jhogo and his bloodriders, of course, headed the khalasar; more surprising was that Dany's handmaid, Irri, rode alongside the khal, her belly swollen with a child beneath her painted vest. Jorah noted that Jhogo's braid, while not long by Dothraki standards, jangled noisily with a dozen or more bells, and the dark eyes knew him at once.
"It is good you have come, Jorah the Andal," said Khal Jhogo. "We ride to find the khaleesi and the Stallion Who Mounts the World. We ride to make war on Westeros."
Read Chapter 26