A Feast for Dragons

would have prohibited contests
between women as well, but Barsena Blackhair protested that she had as much
right to risk her life as any man. The queen had also wished to forbid the
follies, comic combats where cripples, dwarfs, and crones had at one another
with cleavers, torches, and hammers (the more inept the fighters, the funnier
the folly, it was thought), but Hizdahr said his people would love her more if
she laughed with them, and argued that without such frolics, the cripples,
dwarfs, and crones would starve. So Dany had relented.
    It had been the custom to sentence criminals to the pits;
that practice she agreed might resume, but only for certain crimes. “Murderers
and rapers may be forced to fight, and all those who persist in slaving, but
not thieves or debtors.”
    Beasts were still allowed, though. Dany watched an elephant
make short work of a pack of six red wolves. Next a bull was set against a bear
in a bloody battle that left both animals torn and dying. “The flesh is not
wasted,” said Hizdahr. “The butchers use the carcasses to make a healthful stew
for the hungry. Any man who presents himself at the Gates of Fate may have a
bowl.”
    “A good law,” Dany said.
You have so few of them
.
“We must make certain that this tradition is continued.”
    After the beast fights came a mock battle, pitting six men
on foot against six horsemen, the former armed with shields and longswords, the
latter with Dothraki
arakh
s. The mock knights were clad in mail
hauberks, whilst the mock Dothraki wore no armor. At first the riders seemed to
have the advantage, riding down two of their foes and slashing the ear from a
third, but then the surviving knights began to attack the horses, and one by
one the riders were unmounted and slain, to Jhiqui’s great disgust. “That was
no true
khalasar,”
she said.
    “These carcasses are not destined for your healthful stew, I
would hope,” Dany said, as the slain were being removed.
    “The horses, yes,” said Hizdahr. “The men, no.”
    “Horsemeat and onions makes you strong,” said Belwas.
    The battle was followed by the day’s first folly, a tilt
between a pair of jousting dwarfs, presented by one of the Yunkish lords that
Hizdahr had invited to the games. One rode a hound, the other a sow. Their
wooden armor had been freshly painted, so one bore the stag of the usurper
Robert Baratheon, the other the golden lion of House Lannister. That was for
her sake, plainly. Their antics soon had Belwas snorting laughter, though
Dany’s smile was faint and forced. When the dwarf in red tumbled from the
saddle and began to chase his sow across the sands, whilst the dwarf on the dog
galloped after him, whapping at his buttocks with a wooden sword, she said,
“This is sweet and silly, but …”
    “Be patient, my sweet,” said Hizdahr. “They are about to
loose the lions.”
    Daenerys gave him a quizzical look. “Lions?”
    “Three of them. The dwarfs will not expect them.”
    She frowned. “The dwarfs have wooden swords. Wooden armor.
How do you expect them to fight lions?”
    “Badly,” said Hizdahr, “though perhaps they will surprise
us. More like they will shriek and run about and try to climb out of the pit. That
is what makes this a folly.”
    Dany was not pleased. “I forbid it.”
    “Gentle queen. You do not want to disappoint your people.”
    “You swore to me that the fighters would be grown men who
had freely consented to risk their lives for gold and honor. These dwarfs did
not consent to battle lions with wooden swords. You will stop it. Now.”
    The king’s mouth tightened. For a heartbeat Dany thought she
saw a flash of anger in those placid eyes. “As you command.” Hizdahr beckoned
to his pitmaster. “No lions,” he said when the man trotted over, whip in hand.
    “Not one, Magnificence? Where is the fun in that?”
    “My queen has spoken. The dwarfs will not be harmed.”
    “The crowd will not like it.”
    “Then bring on Barsena. That should appease them.”
    “Your Worship knows best.” The pitmaster snapped his whip
and shouted out commands. The dwarfs were herded off, pig and dog and all, as
the spectators hissed their disapproval and pelted them with stones and rotten
fruit.
    A roar went up as Barsena Blackhair strode onto the sands,
naked save for breechclout and sandals. A tall, dark woman of some thirty
years, she moved with the feral grace of a panther. “Barsena is much loved,”
Hizdahr said, as the sound