A Game of Thrones 4-Book Bundle

to where it had been. Her breasts were small, but he liked the
firmness of them.
    â€œYou don’t want to do that, my lord prince.”
    â€œOh, but I do.” Theon gave her a squeeze.
    â€œYour squire is watching you.”
    â€œLet him. He’ll never speak of it, I swear.”
    Esgred pried his fingers off her breast. This time she kept him firmly
prisoned. She had strong hands.
    â€œI like a woman with a good tight grip.”
    She snorted. “I’d not have thought it, by that wench on the
waterfront.”
    â€œYou must not judge me by her. She was the only woman on the ship.”
    â€œTell me of your father. Will he welcome me kindly to his castle?”
    â€œWhy should he? He scarcely welcomed
me,
his own blood, the heir to
Pyke and the Iron Islands.”
    â€œAre you?” she asked mildly. “It’s said that you have uncles, brothers, a
sister.”
    â€œMy brothers are long dead, and my sister . . . well, they say
Asha’s favorite gown is a chainmail hauberk that hangs down past her knees,
with boiled leather smallclothes beneath. Men’s garb won’t make her a man,
though. I’ll make a good marriage alliance with her once we’ve won the war, if
I can find a man to take her. As I recall, she had a nose like a vulture’s
beak, a ripe crop of

pimples, and no more chest than a boy.”
    â€œYou can marry off your sister,” Esgred observed, “but not your
uncles.”
    â€œMy uncles . . .” Theon’s claim took precedence over those of his
father’s three brothers, but the woman had touched on a sore point nonetheless.
In the islands it was scarce unheard of for a strong, ambitious uncle to
dispossess a weak nephew of his rights, and usually murder him in the bargain.
But I am not weak,
Theon told himself,
and I mean to be stronger
yet by the time my father dies.
“My uncles pose no threat to me,” he
declared. “Aeron is drunk on seawater and sanctity. He lives only for his
god—”
    â€œ
His
god? Not yours?”
    â€œMine as well. What is dead can never die.” He smiled thinly. “If I make
pious noises as required, Damphair will give me no trouble. And my uncle
Victarion—”
    â€œLord Captain of the Iron Fleet, and a fearsome warrior. I have heard them
sing of him in the alehouses.”
    â€œDuring my lord father’s rebellion, he sailed into Lannisport with my uncle
Euron and burned the Lannister fleet where it lay at anchor,” Theon recalled.
“The plan was Euron’s, though. Victarion is like some great grey bullock,
strong and tireless and dutiful, but not like to win any races. No doubt, he’ll
serve me as loyally as he has served my lord father. He has neither the wits
nor the ambition to plot betrayal.”
    â€œEuron Croweye has no lack of cunning, though. I’ve heard men say terrible
things of that one.”
    Theon shifted his seat. “My uncle Euron has not been seen in the islands
for close on two years. He may be dead.” If so, it might be for the best. Lord
Balon’s eldest brother had never given up the Old Way, even for a day. His
Silence,
with its black sails and dark red hull, was infamous in
every port from Ibben to Asshai, it was said.
    â€œHe may be dead,” Esgred agreed, “and if he lives, why, he has spent so long
at sea, he’d be half a stranger here. The ironborn would never seat a stranger
in the Seastone Chair.”
    â€œI suppose not,” Theon replied, before it occurred to him that some would
call
him
a stranger as well. The thought made him frown.
Ten
years is a long while, but I am back now, and my father is far from dead. I
have time to prove myself.
    He considered fondling Esgred’s breast again, but she would probably only take
his hand away, and all this talk of his uncles had dampened his ardor somewhat.
Time enough for such play at the castle, in the privacy of his chambers. “I
will speak to Helya when we reach Pyke, and see that you have an honored place
at the feast,” he said. “I must sit on the dais, at my father’s right hand,
but I will come down and join you when he leaves the hall. He seldom lingers
long. He has no belly for drink these days.”
    â€œA grievous thing when a great man grows old.”
    â€œLord Balon is but the
father
of a great man.”
    â€œA modest