A Game of Thrones 4-Book Bundle

Rymund threw back his
head and howled, and by the end, half of the hall was howling along with him,
even Desmond Grell, who was well in his cups. Their voices rang off the
rafters.
    Let them have their songs, if it makes them brave,
Catelyn thought,
toying with her silver goblet.
    â€œThere was always a singer at Evenfall Hall when I was a girl,” Brienne said
quietly. “I learned all the songs by heart.”
    â€œSansa did the same, though few singers ever cared to make the long journey
north to Winterfell.”
I told her there would be singers at the king’s
court, though. I told her she would hear music of all sorts, that her father
could find some master to help her learn the high harp. Oh, gods forgive
me . . .
    Brienne said, “I remember a woman . . . she came from some
place across the narrow sea. I could not even say what language she sang in,
but her voice was as lovely as she was. She had eyes the color of plums and her
waist was so tiny my father could put his hands around it. His hands were
almost as big as mine.” She closed her long, thick fingers, as if to hide
them.
    â€œDid you sing for your father?” Catelyn asked.
    Brienne shook her head, staring down at her trencher as if to find some answer
in the gravy.
    â€œFor Lord Renly?”
    The girl reddened. “Never, I . . . his fool, he made cruel
japes sometimes, and I . . .”
    â€œSomeday you must sing for me.”
    â€œI . . . please, I have no gift.” Brienne pushed back
from the table. “Forgive me, my lady. Do I have your leave to go?”
    Catelyn nodded. The tall, ungainly girl left the hall with long strides, almost
unnoticed amidst the revelry.
May the gods go with her,
she thought
as she returned listlessly to her supper.
    It was three days later when the hammer blow that Brienne had foretold fell,
and five days before they heard of it. Catelyn was sitting with her father when
Edmure’s messenger arrived. The man’s armor was dinted, his boots dusty, and he
had a ragged hole in his surcoat, but the look on his face as he knelt was
enough to tell her that the news was good. “Victory, my lady.” He handed her
Edmure’s letter. Her hand trembled as she broke the seal.
    Lord Tywin had tried to force a crossing at a dozen different fords, her
brother wrote, but every thrust had been thrown back. Lord Lefford had been
drowned, the Crakehall knight called Strongboar taken captive, Ser Addam
Marbrand thrice forced to retreat . . . but the fiercest battle
had been fought at Stone Mill, where Ser Gregor Clegane had led the assault. So
many of his men had fallen that their dead horses threatened to dam the flow.
In the end the Mountain and a handful of his best had gained the west bank, but
Edmure had thrown his reserve at them, and they had shattered and reeled away
bloody and beaten. Ser Gregor himself had lost his horse and staggered back
across the Red Fork bleeding from a dozen wounds while a rain of arrows and
stones fell all around him. “They shall not cross, Cat,” Edmure scrawled,
“Lord Tywin is marching to the southeast. A feint

perhaps, or full retreat, it matters not.
They shall not
cross.
”
    Ser Desmond Grell had been elated. “Oh, if only I might have been with him,”
the old knight said when she read him the letter. “Where is that fool Rymund?
There’s a song in this, by the gods, and one that even Edmure will want to
hear. The mill that ground the Mountain down, I could almost make the words
myself, had I the singer’s gift.”
    â€œI’ll hear no songs until the fighting’s done,” Catelyn said, perhaps too
sharply. Yet she allowed Ser Desmond to spread the word, and agreed when he
suggested breaking open some casks in honor of Stone Mill. The mood within
Riverrun had been strained and somber; they would all be better for a little
drink and hope.
    That night the castle rang to the sounds of celebration.
“Riverrun!”
the smallfolk shouted, and “Tully! Tully!” They’d
come frightened and helpless, and her brother had taken them in when most lords
would have closed their gates. Their voices floated in through the high
windows, and seeped under the heavy redwood doors. Rymund played his harp,
accompanied by a pair of drummers and a youth with a set of reed pipes. Catelyn
listened to girlish