A Game of Thrones 4-Book Bundle

all know he threw my offer in my teeth.
He would need to storm the castle.
Well, what’s one more broken vow to the Kingslayer? Just more shit in the bucket.
Jaime resolved to be the first man on the battlements.
And with this golden hand of mine, most like the first to fall.
    Back at camp, Little Lew held his bridle whilst Peck gave him a hand down from the saddle.
Do they think I’m such a cripple that I cannot dismount by myself?
“How did you fare, my lord?” asked his cousin Ser Daven.
    â€œNo one put an arrow in my horse’s rump. Elsewise, there was little to distinguish me from Ser Ryman.” He grimaced. “So now he must needs turn the Red Fork redder.”
Blame yourself for that, Blackfish. You left me little choice.
“Assemble a war council. Ser Addam, Strongboar, Forley Prester, those river lords of ours . . . and our friends of Frey. Ser Ryman, Lord Emmon, whoever else they care to bring.”
    They gathered quickly. Lord Piper and both Lords Vance came to speak for the repentant lords of the Trident, whose loyalties would shortly be put to the test. The west was represented by Ser Daven, Strongboar, Addam Marbrand, and Forley Prester. Lord Emmon Frey joined them, with his wife. Lady Genna claimed her stool with a look that dared any man there to question her presence. None did. The Freys sent Ser Walder Rivers, called “Bastard Walder,” and Ser Ryman’s firstborn Edwyn, a pallid, slender man with a pinched nose and lank dark hair. Under a blue lambswool cloak, Edwyn wore a jerkin of finely tooled grey calfskin with ornate scrollwork worked into the leather. “I speak for House Frey,” he announced. “My father is indisposed this morning.”
    Ser Daven gave a snort. “Is he drunk, or just greensick from last night’s wine?”
    Edwyn had the hard mean mouth of a miser. “Lord Jaime,” he said, “must I suffer such discourtesy?”
    â€œIs it true?” Jaime asked him. “Is your father drunk?”
    Frey pressed his lips together and eyed Ser Ilyn Payne, who was standing beside by the tent flap in his rusted mail, his sword poking up above one bony shoulder. “He . . . my father has a bad belly, my lord. Red wine helps with his digestion.”
    â€œHe must be digesting a bloody mammoth,” said Ser Daven. Strongboar laughed, and Lady Genna chuckled.
    â€œEnough,” said Jaime. “We have a castle to win.” When his father sat in council, he let his captains speak first. He was resolved to do the same. “How shall we proceed?”
    â€œ
Hang
Edmure Tully, for a start,” urged Lord Emmon Frey. “That will teach Ser Brynden that we mean what we say. If we send Ser Edmure’s head to his uncle, it may move him to yield.”
    â€œBrynden Blackfish is not moved so easily.” Karyl Vance, the Lord of Wayfarer’s Rest, had a melancholy look. A winestain birthmark covered half his neck and one side of his face. “His own brother could not move him to a marriage bed.”
    Ser Daven shook his shaggy head. “We have to storm the walls, as I’ve been saying all along. Siege towers, scaling ladders, a ram to break the gate, that’s what’s needed here.”
    â€œI will lead the assault,” said Strongboar. “Give the fish a taste of steel and fire, that’s what I say.”
    â€œThey are
my
walls,” protested Lord Emmon, “and that is my gate you would break.” He drew his parchment out of his sleeve again. “King Tommen himself has granted me—”
    â€œWe’ve all seen your paper, nuncle,” snapped Edwyn Frey. “Why don’t you go wave it at the Blackfish for a change?”
    â€œStorming the walls will be a bloody business,” said Addam Marbrand. “I propose we wait for a moonless night and send a dozen picked men across the river in a boat with muffled oars. They can scale the walls with ropes and grapnels, and open the gates from the inside. I will lead them, if the council wishes.”
    â€œFolly,” declared the bastard, Walder Rivers. “Ser Brynden is no man to be cozened by such tricks.”
    â€œThe Blackfish is the obstacle,” agreed Edwyn Frey. “His helm bears a black trout on its crest that makes him easy to pick out from afar. I propose that we move our siege towers close, fill them full of bowmen, and feign an attack upon the gates. That will bring Ser