A Game of Thrones 4-Book Bundle

Harren.
I will find out soon enough, no doubt. This should be awkward.
She had not seen Tris Botley since . . . no, she ought not dwell on it. “And my lady mother?”
    â€œAbed,” said Three-Tooth, “in the Widow’s Tower.”
    Aye, where else?
The widow the tower was named after was her aunt. Lady Gwynesse had come home to mourn after her husband had died off Fair Isle during Balon Greyjoy’s first rebellion. “I will only stay until my grief has passed,” she had told her brother, famously, “though by rights Ten Towers should be mine, for I am seven years your elder.” Long years had passed since then, but still the widow lingered, grieving, and muttering from time to time that the castle should be hers.
And now Lord Rodrik has a second half-mad widowed sister beneath his roof,
Asha reflected.
Small wonder if he seeks solace in his books.
    Even now, it was hard to credit that frail, sickly Lady Alannys had outlived her husband Lord Balon, who had seemed so hard and strong. When Asha had sailed away to war, she had done so with a heavy heart, fearing that her mother might well die before she could return. Not once had she thought that her father might perish instead.
The Drowned God plays savage japes upon us all, but men are crueler still.
A sudden storm and a broken rope had sent Balon Greyjoy to his death.
Or so they claim.
    Asha had last seen her mother when she stopped at Ten Towers to take on fresh water, on her way north to strike at Deepwood Motte. Alannys Harlaw never had the sort of beauty the singers cherished, but her daughter had loved her fierce strong face and the laughter in her eyes. On that last visit, though, she had found Lady Alannys in a window seat huddled beneath a pile of furs, staring out across the sea.
Is this my mother, or her ghost?
she remembered thinking as she’d kissed her cheek.
    Her mother’s skin had been parchment thin, her long hair white. Some pride remained in the way she held her head, but her eyes were dim and cloudy, and her mouth had trembled when she asked after Theon. “Did you bring my baby boy?” she had asked. Theon had been ten years old when he was carried off to Winterfell a hostage, and so far as Lady Alannys was concerned he would always be ten years old, it seemed. “Theon could not come,” Asha had to tell her. “Father sent him reaving along the Stony Shore.” Lady Alannys had naught to say to that. She only nodded slowly, yet it was plain to see how deep her daughter’s words had cut her.
    And now I must tell her that Theon is dead, and drive yet another dagger through her heart.
There were two knives buried there already. On the blades were writ the words
Rodrik
and
Maron,
and many a time they twisted cruelly in the night.
I will see her on the morrow,
Asha vowed to herself. Her journey had been long and wearisome, she could not face her mother now.
    â€œI must speak with Lord Rodrik,” she told Three-Tooth. “See to my crew, once they’re done unloading
Black Wind.
They’ll bring captives. I want them to have warm beds and a hot meal.”
    â€œThere’s cold beef in the kitchens. And mustard in a big stone jar, from Oldtown.” The thought of that mustard made the old woman smile. A single long brown tooth poked from her gums.
    â€œThat will not serve. We had a rough crossing. I want something hot in their bellies.” Asha hooked a thumb through the studded belt about her hips. “Lady Glover and the children should not want for wood nor warmth. Put them in some tower, not the dungeons. The babe is sick.”
    â€œBabes are often sick. Most die, and folks are sorry. I shall ask my lord where to put these wolf folk.”
    She caught the woman’s nose between thumb and forefinger and pinched. “You will do as I say. And if
this
babe dies, no one will be sorrier than you.” Three-Tooth squealed and promised to obey, till Asha let her loose and went to find her uncle.
    It was good to walk these halls again. Ten Towers had always felt like home to Asha, more so than Pyke.
Not one castle, ten castles squashed together,
she had thought, the first time she had seen it. She remembered breathless races up and down the steps and along wallwalks and covered bridges, fishing off the Long Stone Quay, days and nights lost amongst her uncle’s wealth of books. His grandfather’s grandfather had raised the castle, the newest on the