A Game of Thrones 4-Book Bundle

Quentyn should be the one conspiring against me. I sent him away when he was just a child, too young to understand the needs of Dorne. Anders Yronwood has been more a father to him than I have, yet your brother remains faithful and obedient.”
    â€œWhy not? You favor him and always have. He looks like you, he thinks like you, and you mean to give him Dorne, don’t trouble to deny it. I read your letter.” The words still burned as bright as fire in her memory. “‘
One day you will sit where I sit and rule all Dorne,
’ you wrote him. Tell me, Father, when did you decide to disinherit me? Was it the day that Quentyn was born, or the day that
I
was born? What did I ever do to make you hate me so?” To her fury, there were tears in her eyes.
    â€œI never hated you.” Prince Doran’s voice was parchment-thin, and full of grief. “Arianne, you do not understand.”
    â€œDo you deny you wrote those words?”
    â€œNo. That was when Quentyn first went to Yronwood. I did intend for him to follow me, yes. I had other plans for you.”
    â€œOh, yes,” she said scornfully, “such plans. Gyles Rosby. Blind Ben Beesbury. Greybeard Grandison. They were your
plans.
”
    She gave him no chance to reply. “I know it is my duty to provide an heir for Dorne, I have
never
been forgetful of that. I would have wed, and gladly, but the matches that you brought to me were insults. With every one you spit on me. If you ever felt any love for me at all, why offer me to
Walder Frey
?”
    â€œBecause I knew that you would spurn him. I had to be seen to
try
to find a consort for you once you’d reached a certain age, else it would have raised suspicions, but I dared not bring you any man you might accept. You were promised, Arianne.”
    Promised?
Arianne stared at him incredulously. “What are you saying? Is this another lie? You never said . . .”
    â€œThe pact was sealed in secret. I meant to tell you when you were old enough . . . when you came of age, I thought, but . . .”
    â€œI am three-and-twenty, for seven years a woman grown.”
    â€œI know. If I kept you ignorant too long, it was only to protect you. Arianne, your nature . . . to you, a secret was only a choice tale to whisper to Garin and Tyene in your bed of a night. Garin gossips as only the orphans can, and Tyene keeps nothing from Obara and the Lady Nym. And if they knew . . . Obara is too fond of wine, and Nym is too close to the Fowler twins. And who might the Fowler twins confide in?
I could not take the risk.
”
    She was lost, confounded.
Promised. I was promised.
“Who is it? Who have I been betrothed to, all these years?”
    â€œIt makes no matter. He is dead.”
    That left her more baffled than ever. “The old ones are so frail. Was it a broken hip, a chill, the gout?”
    â€œIt was a pot of molten gold. We princes make our careful plans and the gods smash them all awry.” Prince Doran made a weary gesture with a chafed red hand. “Dorne will be yours. You have my word on that, if my word still has any meaning for you. Your brother Quentyn has a harder road to walk.”
    â€œWhat road?” Arianne regarded him suspiciously. “What are you holding back? Seven save me, but I am sick of secrets. Tell me the rest, Father . . . or else name Quentyn your heir and send for Hotah and his axe, and let me die beside my cousins.”
    â€œDo you truly believe I would harm my brother’s children?” Her father grimaced. “Obara, Nym, and Tyene lack for nothing but their freedom, and Ellaria and her daughters are happily ensconced at the Water Gardens. Dorea stalks about knocking oranges off the trees with her morningstar, and Elia and Obella have become the terror of the pools.” He sighed. “It has not been so long since you were playing in those pools. You used to ride the shoulders of an older girl . . . a tall girl with wispy yellow hair . . .”
    â€œJeyne Fowler, or her sister Jennelyn.” It had been years since Arianne had thought of that. “Oh, and Frynne, her father was a smith. Her hair was brown. Garin was my favorite, though. When I rode Garin no one could defeat us, not even Nym and that green-haired Tyroshi girl.”
    â€œThat green-haired girl was the Archon’s daughter. I was to have sent you to Tyrosh in her place. You would have served the Archon as a cupbearer and met with