A Game of Thrones 4-Book Bundle

found himself looking at Asha in a way he had never looked at her before. He could feel his manhood beginning to stiffen.
She is Balon’s daughter,
he reminded himself. He remembered her as a little girl, throwing axes at a door. He crossed his arms against his chest. “The Seastone Chair seats but one.”
    â€œThen let my nuncle sit,” Asha said. “I will stand behind you, to guard your back and whisper in your ear. No king can rule alone. Even when the dragons sat the Iron Throne, they had men to help them. The King’s Hands. Let me be your Hand, Nuncle.”
    No King of the Isles had ever needed a Hand, much less one who was a woman.
The captains and the kings would mock me in their cups.
“Why would you wish to be my Hand?”
    â€œTo end this war before this war ends us. We have won all that we are like to win . . . and stand to lose all just as quick, unless we make a peace. I have shown Lady Glover every courtesy, and she swears her lord will treat with me. If we hand back Deepwood Motte, Torrhen’s Square, and Moat Cailin, she says, the northmen will cede us Sea Dragon Point and all the Stony Shore. Those lands are thinly peopled, yet ten times larger than all the isles put together. An exchange of hostages will seal the pact, and each side will agree to make common cause with the other should the Iron Throne—”
    Victarion chuckled. “This Lady Glover plays you for a fool, niece. Sea Dragon Point and the Stony Shore are ours. Why hand back anything? Winterfell is burnt and broken, and the Young Wolf rots headless in the earth. We will have
all
the north, as your lord father dreamed.”
    â€œWhen longships learn to row through trees, perhaps. A fisherman may hook a grey leviathan, but it will drag him down to death unless he cuts it loose. The north is too large for us to hold, and too full of northmen.”
    â€œGo back to your dolls, niece. Leave the winning of wars to warriors.” Victarion showed her his fists. “I have two hands. No man needs three.”
    â€œI know a man who needs House Harlaw, though.”
    â€œHotho Humpback has offered me his daughter for my queen. If I take her, I will have the Harlaws.”
    That took the girl aback. “Lord Rodrik rules House Harlaw.”
    â€œRodrik has no daughters, only books. Hotho will be his heir, and I will be the king.” Once he had said the words aloud, they sounded true. “The Crow’s Eye has been too long away.”
    â€œSome men look larger at a distance,” Asha warned. “Walk amongst the cookfires if you dare, and listen. They are not telling tales of your strength, nor of my famous beauty. They talk only of the Crow’s Eye; the far places he has seen, the women he has raped and the men he’s killed, the cities he has sacked, the way he burnt Lord Tywin’s fleet at Lannisport . . .”
    â€œ
I
burnt the lion’s fleet,” Victarion insisted. “With mine own hands I flung the first torch onto his flagship.”
    â€œThe Crow’s Eye hatched the scheme.” Asha put her hand upon his arm. “And killed your wife as well . . . did he not?”
    Balon had commanded them not to speak of it, but Balon was dead. “He put a baby in her belly and made me do the killing. I would have killed him too, but Balon would have no kinslaying in his hall. He sent Euron into exile, never to return . . .”
    â€œ. . . so long as Balon lived?”
    Victarion looked at his fists. “She gave me horns. I had no choice.”
Had it been known, men would have laughed at me, as the Crow’s Eye laughed when I confronted him. “She came to me wet and willing,”
he had boasted.
“It seems Victarion is big everywhere but where it matters.”
But he could not tell her that.
    â€œI am sorry for you,” said Asha, “and sorrier for her . . . but you leave me small choice but to claim the Seastone Chair myself.”
    You cannot.
“Your breath is yours to waste, woman.”
    â€œIt is,” she said, and left him.

THE DROWNED MAN
    O nly when his arms and legs were numb from the cold did Aeron Greyjoy struggle back to shore and don his robes again.
    He had run before the Crow’s Eye as if he were still the weak thing he had been, but when the waves broke over his head they reminded once more that that man was dead.
I was reborn from the sea, a harder man and stronger.
No mortal man could frighten