A Game of Thrones 4-Book Bundle

“Why, she looked a bit like you, Daenerys.” He bowed
low. “Sleep well, my queen.”
    Dany shivered, and pulled the lionskin tight about her.
She looked like
me.
It explained much that she had not truly understood.
He wants
me,
she realized.
He loves me as he loved her, not as a knight loves
his queen but as a man loves a woman.
She tried to imagine herself in Ser
Jorah’s arms, kissing him, pleasuring him, letting him enter her. It was no
good. When she closed her eyes, his face kept changing into Drogo’s.
    Khal Drogo had been her sun-and-stars, her first, and perhaps he must be her
last. The
maegi
Mirri Maz Duur had sworn she should never bear a
living child, and what man would want a barren wife? And what man could hope to
rival Drogo, who had died with his hair uncut and rode now through the night
lands, the stars his
khalasar
?
    She had heard the longing in Ser Jorah’s voice when he spoke of his Bear
Island.
He can never have me, but one day I can give him back his home and
honor. That much I can do for him.
    No ghosts troubled her sleep that night. She dreamed of

Drogo and the first ride they had taken together on the night they were wed. In
the dream it was not horses they rode, but dragons.
    The next morn, she summoned her bloodriders. “Blood of my blood,” she told
the three of them, “I have need of you. Each of you is to choose three horses,
the hardiest and healthiest that remain to us. Load as much water and food as
your mounts can bear, and ride forth for me. Aggo shall strike southwest,
Rakharo due south. Jhogo, you are to follow
shierak qiya
on
southeast.”
    â€œWhat shall we seek,
Khaleesi
?” asked Jhogo.
    â€œWhatever there is,” Dany answered. “Seek for other cities, living and dead.
Seek for caravans and people. Seek for rivers and lakes and the great salt sea.
Find how far this waste extends before us, and what lies on the other side.
When I leave this place, I do not mean to strike out blind again. I will know
where I am bound, and how best to get there.”
    And so they went, the bells in their hair ringing softly, while Dany settled
down with her small band of survivors in the place they named
Vaes
Tolorro,
the city of bones. Day followed night followed day. Women
harvested fruit from the gardens of the dead. Men groomed their mounts and
mended saddles, stirrups, and shoes. Children wandered the twisty alleys and
found old bronze coins and bits of purple glass and stone flagons with handles
carved like snakes. One woman was stung by a red scorpion, but hers was the
only death. The horses began to put on some flesh. Dany tended Ser Jorah’s
wound herself, and it began to heal.
    Rakharo was the first to return. Due south the red waste

stretched on and on, he reported, until it ended on a bleak shore beside the
poison water. Between here and there lay only swirling sand, wind-scoured
rocks, and plants bristly with sharp thorns. He had passed the bones of a
dragon, he swore, so immense that he had ridden his horse through its great
black jaws. Other than that, he had seen nothing.
    Dany gave him charge of a dozen of her strongest men, and set them to pulling
up the plaza to get to the earth beneath. If devilgrass could grow between the
paving stones, other grasses would grow when the stones were gone. They had
wells enough, no lack of water. Given seed, they could make the plaza
bloom.
    Aggo was back next. The southwest was barren and burnt, he swore. He had found
the ruins of two more cities, smaller than Vaes Tolorro but otherwise the same.
One was warded by a ring of skulls mounted on rusted iron spears, so he dared
not enter, but he had explored the second for as long as he could. He showed
Dany an iron bracelet he had found, set with a uncut fire opal the size of her
thumb. There were scrolls as well, but they were dry and crumbling and Aggo had
left them where they lay.
    Dany thanked him and told him to see to the repair of the gates. If enemies had
crossed the waste to destroy these cities in ancient days, they might well come
again. “If so, we must be ready,” she declared.
    Jhogo was gone so long that Dany feared him lost, but finally when they had all
but ceased to look for him, he came riding up from the southeast. One of the
guards that Aggo had

posted saw him first and gave a shout, and Dany rushed to the walls to see for
herself. It was true. Jhogo