The Foster Father?

  Even the nights in Volantis were hot and heavy, he had found. The strong stench of fish and boiled milk did not help as he waited for the bedamned cheesemonger to find him, wiping at his brow with a cloth already wet with sweat.

  None of them had expected to hear that Pentos had been sacked by the Dothraki. It had taken another fortnight until they even learned that Illyrio still lived, a missive reaching his hands for them to make for Volantis, and nothing more.

  He looked out across the breadth of Valyria's oldest daughter. Even after the Century of Blood had spent the city, it still remained the most populous of the Free Cities, a different kind of beast than any he had seen in the Seven Kingdoms. Cut in two by the Rhoyne, each half could easily fit the whole of King's Landing with room to spare.

  Griff wiped at his brow again as he thought about it. He should have brought another cloth…

  The Temple of the Lord of Light burned bright in the night, drawing his eyes. It sat on the other, more opulent half of Volantis across the bridge of fused stone, rising many times as high as the Great Sept of Baelor, if not as high as the Black Walls behind it.

  When the wind blew just right, the smoke from a dozen nightfires overpowered the fish for a time. The heat it brought was less welcome.

  Rhaegar he remembered had spoken of the red priests once or twice, though he could barely remember about what. The years had taken much from him. Too much…

  He wiped at his brow again with a sigh. The heat might do what the Usurper could not if this kept up.

  The thought brought with it bitter memories of Stoney Sept and the Battle of the Bells as he heard it called now. If only Rhaegar's bedamned father had taken the rebel threat seriously and given him more men, he could have caught the Usurper before Stark and Tully had arrived. His silver prince would still yet live, and he would still be Jon Connington, not an exile knight with a false name.

  He gave another miserable sigh as he turned away from Volantis to look upon the sea instead. At least until he spied an older man with a balding head and a neat white beard nearing his person, his skin as dark as an old oak.

  "The master is waiting," the slave whispered, though he had none of the markings common to slaves in Volantis.

  Griff followed him through the maze of alleyways, to a door painted a faded turquoise. Already he missed the docks, the brick and mortar prison surrounding him lacking even a breeze. He watched as the slave knocked once, twice, then once again, the door opening soon after the fourth knock.

  The cool cellar he soon found himself in was a welcome reprieve, and it was there he saw Illyrio Mopatis again, though he almost hadn't recognized him without the grotesque forked beard springing from his jowls. The magister seemed worse off than he remembered, even sporting a burn on one of his heavy arms that was only starting to heal now.

  It was the other that surprised him, however, bearing a face he had not seen since he had left Westeros behind. "A queer sight you are, Varys."

  The plump eunuch's naked smile rubbed him the wrong way now as it did then. They resembled beggars more than two of the most powerful men in the narrow sea. "Aren't I? I fear circumstances have conspired to see it so."

  Griff scratched at his scraggly beard. "I am here as you asked."

  "The boy, is he safe?" His eyes turned back on the cheesemonger or whatever he was now.

  "Safe and sound." The question seemed as queer as Varys being here. Rhaegar's son was all he lived for these past years.

  Illyrio nodded, fingers twitching as if wanting to pull on his vanished beard. "You will take a ship to Qarth in the morning. There you will stay until we call upon you again."

  "Qarth?" he repeated in question. He had heard of the great port city near the Red Wastes but had never seen it.

  "The further the better with what has happened, but Leng is too far and too foreign and Yi Ti moreso."

  "I assume Asshai is similarly out of the question then," he snarked. "And what is it that's happened? Are we still to wait until the Usurper chokes on a pigeon bone?"

  "It will only trouble you to know," the Spider tried to soothe.

  He made a dull sound. "I am well used to trouble. Isn't that why you gave the boy to me?"

  "It is as you say. The Princess Daenerys and her brother were spirited away mere days before she could be wed to Khal Drogo."

  "I'd hoped the khal would understand," Illyrio took over from Varys. "He had more ambition than most and seemed to understand the game. Instead he proved himself as savage as the rest of his ilk when met with a momentary stumble." He threw a sour look at the wall. "It was not as if we did not know where she went."

  "And where was that?" Had the Usurper made a move in Pentos?

  "Dorne," Varys answered sweetly, though the answer only confused him.

  He stared at the bedamned eunuch as he tried to understand why would Prince Doran would—

  "You are aware as much as we are that Prince Doran is too cautious a man to have ever made such a move without prompting, promoting from the same source that stole Khal Drogo's bride and her brother away and turned them against Prince Aegon and ourselves."

  He remembered something of Prince Viserys, the gentle boy that Her Grace Rhaella Targaryen tried her best to shield from his father's excesses, though he knew nothing of Princess Daenerys.

  He truthfully had never much liked the scheme to sell her to one of the horselords, for his silver prince would have never agreed with it. Rhaegar had loved his family with a strength few could match.

  Varys's queer smile remained as Illyrio made to speak again. "Pentos is no longer safe to us. We had hoped to rebuild some of our strength there, but it was not to be." There was something frustrated lurking behind those beady eyes. "You will not stay long in Qarth either. Take the boy to visit the Lhazareen. No one is likely to look there."

  "What are we running from?" Griff finally asked.

  "Sorcery," Varys answered with a softer sigh. "It is not only Pentos that is no longer safe to us. A scion of the Old Blood of Volantis has involved himself, and we assume there are others."

  He put all the pieces together and he was none too happy with what stared back at him. "How was it that you made an enemy of a sorcerer?"

  They were a more common sight in Essos than Westeros, though he had not had the misfortune to have run into one yet.

  The bedamned eunuch tittered at that. "I am afraid it was greed alone that had seen it done. The blood of the dragon has become a rarity as you well know."

  For a moment he saw the throat of his… Rhaegar's son slit with him helpless to stop it, leaving a sick feeling in his stomach. It was hard enough to keep him safe from the Usurper, but now he was to worry about sorcerers and warlocks?

  "There are ways to safeguard ourselves," Varys continued. "We would not be here to speak with you otherwise. Indeed, every soul that perished in Pentos we found in places known to my little birds."

  "I promised to put the boy on the throne his father should have ruled, not spend the rest of the years I have left running from knives I cannot even see."

  "The plan has not changed," the Spider made to soothe again. "The kingdoms will still be at one another's throat as soon as Robert Baratheon breathes his last. As it stands, the Vale is already bereaved with troubles. Nor will the Faith accept a sorcerer or Stannis Baratheon's red priestess ruling in all but name, but Prince Aegon they will accept with open arms."

  Griff sighed, his thoughts wanting to take him far away to sweeter times.

  "I am not bereft of friends either," Illyrio continued. "One of them in Qarth will see to it that you are given safe passage to the Lhazareen." The magister's sausage-like fingers were still bedecked in jewels. "There is still opportunity to be had in the Free Cities as well. As Braavos moves to take advantage of Pentos's weakness, Volantis will move in kind. As will the others."

  "You need only do as you have and keep the boy safe," Varys finished.

  "I would do so even had you not asked," he grumbled.

  It was not long after that that he left them to their schemes. He did not trust either of them, but what choice did he have?

  The heavy heat of Volantis met him outside again as he hurried through the streets and alleyways. Haldon would be annoyed enough as it was that he would be expected to move his many books and supplies in the span of a night without him taking his time.

  Griff slipped his key into the lock, entering to find the Halfmaester with his nose in one of those books while his charge and Duck traded jokes between a game of cyvasse. Septa Lemore was the only one missing, likely having already retired for the night.

  The boy rose swiftly at seeing him, a smile crinkling the handsome features that reminded him so much of his father. A strong boy, but still a boy.

  "We will set sail on the morrow to Qarth. A ship by name of Sea Star will take us there." He turned to Haldon, the man's shaven cheeks not hiding his frown. "Duck can help you move our belongings aboard."

  "I can?" the man he had knighted asked guilelessly. At least he was loyal to a fault. "I suppose I can."

  "Why Qarth?" the prince asked, his Valyrian eyes confused. "It would take us even further from the Seven Kingdoms."

  He would not trouble his charge with worries of sorcerers and warlocks, so he spoke what Varys bid him to. "The recent trouble in Pentos has turned the Usurper's eye upon the Free Cities. It is best we make ourselves scarce for a year or two until he returns to his wine and his whores."

  "And they thought it necessary to go as far as Qarth?" Haldon questioned. "Slaver's Bay is closer, and Tolos and Elyria are even closer."

  "Qarth is safer, and we will travel to the Lhazareen soon after."

  "We are to become sheep then," Duck jested poorly.

  "You'll always be a duck to me," the prince teased, though his smile hardly reached his eyes. He did not want to flee to some far-flung corner of the world any more than Griff did.

  The morning saw them set sail, even a city as mighty as Volantis vanishing quickly under the horizon.

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  They were in the gods' hands now.

  Bran?

  It was another dream he found himself in. Every night a dream, and rarely was it only one.

  This time he saw King's Landing smothered in green that spread and spread. He saw his father there, his eyes haunted as he commanded men to stop the hungry flames. Wildfire, he knew.

  He had been in King's Landing no longer than a few days, so why this dream?

  He saw more. There was a woman all in red trying to soothe the flames, and a man all in yellow watching with eyes as hungry as the wildfire threatening to devour the city, but he did not know them.

  You do know them. Or you would, if you would but look deeper.

  He turned away instead, having come to dislike the three-eyed crow that visited his dreams, for that is when he knew the worst nightmares would soon follow.

  For every true knight, there are a dozen more monsters with ser before their name. You aspire to a brotherhood most callow.

  Bran did not listen to the stupid crow. He would be a knight. Uncle Brynden said as much, and so did Bronze Yohn and so many other lords.

  The dream changed at those thoughts. He saw the Vale set alight by an army whose banners he did not recognize. He saw his cousin ignored by the lords who grasped ever more and left ever less for him.

  He saw a mockingbird kiss his aunt, turning her into a corpse that shambled blindly.

  He saw Uncle Brynden's blue eyes close, his throat a red ruin with an arrow sticking out of it.

  This is what awaits you in the Vale. No great songs. Only death and sorrow.

  They were only dreams, he insisted, and the caw of a crow was his only response. He woke covered in sweat in spite of how cold he felt. He hated it.

  His eyes found the watchful golden eyes of the direwolf pup he still had not found the right name for. He reminded Bran of Father sometimes with how solemn he was.

  "Did I wake you?"

  The pup licked his nose, causing Bran to laugh and forget his awful dreams. He had been less surprised than the others when men of House Stark entered the Eyrie, a direwolf pup with fur like silver and smoke in their hands, for he had seen a wolf just like him in his dreams, though so much bigger.

  For all he had grown fond of his uncle, he missed Winterfell with a strength that grew with every day. He missed watching Robb and Jon in the training yard and he missed exploring every nook and cranny of Winterfell with Arya. He even missed Sansa's prim-and-proper smiles and kisses to his cheek.

  Bran laughed again, feeling the pup's wet snout tickling his cheek, distracting him again, and the sunlight from the windows soon tickled his eyes as well.

  Throwing the covers off, he couldn't help a shiver as he stood, the stones beneath him cold as ice. The Eyrie had only grown colder in the time since he arrived, as if he had brought winter with him.

  The chill quickly abated as he dressed himself, and he soon made his way to the great hall where he was quickly accosted by Royces and Redforts and others, the sons and daughters of the lords of the Vale sent to keep Robert Arryn and himself company, though he rarely found them speaking to his cousin.

  Bran still tried to bring his cousin into their games, and slowly the sickly boy was starting to smile again.

  The Lady Helene Royce batted her eyelashes at him as he sat next to her, bringing a flush to his cheeks. For all she was Bronze Yohn's youngest daughter, she was still two years his elder. She offered him something to drink as Mayvor Redfort and Peryn Hunter tried to talk his ear off about the knights that had recently arrived at the Eyrie.

  Mayvor's younger sister meanwhile was already playing with his direwolf pup, rubbing her cheek into his fur happily.

  There was no sign of his cousin yet, though Uncle Brynden soon approached. "Cat will arrive at the Eyrie by noon, nephew. You're spared the maester until tomorrow."

  He felt a fuzzy warmth in his heart at the words. He would never admit it, but he missed his mother most of all. Even more than Father.

  The hours after seemed to pass quickly until the herald announced Lady Catelyn Stark had arrived. But they had already caught sight of one another.

  He could not even get a word out before she knelt and hugged him fiercely, his nose buried in her thick auburn hair as he hugged her back just as tight. "A certain someone has said you have been doing well," she whispered in his ear.

  "He's your son, Cat," he heard Uncle Brynden say. "Is that such a surprise?"

  His mother soon kissed both his cheeks, his cheeks feeling as red as beets. Her warm blue eyes went to the direwolf pup at his knees, but she must have heard already as she only sighed.

  Bran was quickly sat with her and bid to tell her everything that's happened as she played with his hair. It made him sleepy, but he persevered, not wanting to fall into any dreams right now. Soon she glanced at Uncle Brynden.

  "How has Lysa been?"

  "Not much better," he admitted. "Some days she does not even eat."

  His mother sighed as her hand left his hair. Then she stood. "Waiting would not help."

  Bran watched them leave the great hall with a stubborn curiosity. He soon thought of some excuse to leave as well, something about a cloak from his quarters.

  When he reached a ledge, he warned the pup trailing after him not to follow. The Eyrie stood much higher than Winterfell, but he trusted himself not to fall.

  There was another ledge that led to his aunt's room, but he made it handily, and soon he was peeking inside.

  "If it isn't my precious sister. Come to mock me as well?"

  His aunt had lost much of her weight in recent months, only slightly plumper than his lady mother now, although her eyes seemed dull and dead.

  "You know that is not why I am here, Lysa. You were always closest to Petyr, I know, but…"

  "Petyr almost died for you, but what did you care?" Her voice was thick with scorn and jealousy to his ears. "You just couldn't wait for a wolf to spend his seed in your cunt!"

  His mother's eyes grew stormy at her words. "I did my duty. Have you forgotten the words of our House?"

  "Damn our House, damn our father and damn you. I was forced to take moon tea against my will and then given to an old man to do as he likes. That is duty, and I have had my fill of it."

  His mother was quiet for a time.

  "And what good has it done you, Lysa? You have threatened your own son's succession. You cannot bear to even see him."

  Each word only drove his aunt to further madness as she scratched at her arms. "Petyr will come back for us, you'll see. You think the lesser brother you took for a husband will keep the peace?" she mocked. "You know nothing about what has been going on in King's Landing, just as blind as Father. Return to your precious Winterfell and your precious children and leave me be!"

  "Then tell me, Lysa. It is not too late to make amends and be the mother Robert needs you to be. Already there is news that Lord Grafton has summoned his levies. Tell me where Petyr has—"

  "Never!" she screeched, throwing a brush and more. "I said leave me be!"

  Bran felt the wind kick up at his back with some annoyance. Why now?

  He returned the way he came, but this time he stumbled, leaving him clutching at the ledge for dear life as the wind made his legs sway to-and-fro. His heart beat madly, but the wind soon died down again, allowing him to climb again and hurry back to solid ground.

  He felt a tongue lap at his cheeks once he did, his breathing heavy. His laugh after sounded shaky.

  The next day his mother told him they would be traveling to Ironoaks and then Gulltown to speak to Lady Anya Waynwood and Lord Grafton on his cousin's behalf, and the day after that their procession set out, choked with knights and lords of every stripe. His cousin had been deemed too sick to travel by Maester Coleman.

  It was a few days after that, not far from Ironoaks, that they heard a commotion up ahead of them where Uncle Brynden and his lady mother had gone ahead with some of the lords.

  "Surely Lady Waynwood would not try and bar our entry," Lady Helene complained.

  Mayvor Redfort picked up after her. "With how many men Grandfather and the other lords brought? It would be folly!"

  Bran was not sure what to think, but he felt a pit where his stomach would be. There was a thick fog today, and it seemed to be worsening at a speed he had never seen.

  His heart caught in his throat when he next saw men and women in furs and skins coming down from the hills all around them like ghosts.

  Lady Helene screamed as knights formed a circle around them, but there were so many. He saw a man that must have stood at least seven feet tall smash a stone maul into a knight's helm, crushing it completely.

  Lady Helene screamed even louder when she saw, and Peryn Hunter emptied his stomach on the dirt.

  Bran raised his sword awkwardly. What could he do if they made it through the knights? The direwolf pup at his legs also grew agitated, barking and snarling at the mountain clansmen, but he was too small to fight still.

  He heard those words again as he could only stare in horror. This is what awaits you in the Vale. No great songs. Only death and sorrow.

  Soon the knights were all cut down or broken, and they stood amidst a circle of savage men who stared at them with hard eyes. Until they parted for a woman, slight and quick on her feet.

  A mane of orange curls adorned her not unlike a cloak and the black face paint around her eyes and lips made her smile seem wider. He knew her. He had seen her in— "Hello, little greenseer. You'll be coming with us."

  Bran brandished his sword at her, but she only cackled.

  "Take the rest for ransom. Harm them and I will gut you myself and stick your entrails on a heart tree for the next would-be fool to see."

  He took a swipe at a man that came at him, but he was quickly disarmed, and then he felt the woman blow some powder in his face that smelled too sweet.

  Bran quickly felt his eyes grow heavy, and as the world turned black, all he could hear was the caw of a stupid crow.