Joey Brown’s Reviews > Fire & Blood > Status Update

Next (and last) to die was Lord Larys Strong. When asked if he wished to take the black, he said, "No, my lord. I'll be going to a warmer hell, if it please you... but I do have one last request. When I am dead, hack off my clubfoot with that great sword of yours. I have dragged it with me all through life, let me be free of it in death at least." This boon Lord Stark granted him.

"Yield, ser," called the Lord of Riverrun to the Lord of Storm's End, "the day is ours." Lord Baratheon answered with a curse, saying, "I'd sooner dance in hell than wear your
chains! Then he charged ... straight into the spiked iron ball at the end of Lord Kermit's morningstar, which took him full in the face in a grisly spray of blood and bone and brain.

“Who can know the heart of a dragon? Was it simple bloodlust that drove the Blue Queen to attack? Did the she-dragon come to help one of the combatants? If so, which?
Some will claim that the bond between a dragon and dragon-rider runs so deep that the beast shares his master's loves and hates. But who was the ally here, and who the enemy? Does a riderless dragon know friend from foe?”

"her lord husband Prince Daemon escorted her, cuts were seen upon Her Grace's legs and the palm of her left hand," wrote Eustace. "Drops of blood fell to the floor as she went past, and wise men looked at one another, though none dared speak the truth aloud: the Iron Throne had spurned her, and her days upon it would be few."

Even at ten, Aemond Targaryen did not lack for boldness. The king's gibe stung, and he resolved not to wait for Dragonstone. What did he want with some puny hatchling, or some stupid egg? Right there at High Tide was a dragon worthy of him: Vhagar, the oldest, largest, most terrible dragon in the world.

"Must it come to that? Find her someone. Someone gentle, as she is. A kind man, who will never raise his voice or his hand to her, who will speak to her sweetly and tell her she is precious and protect her ... against dragons and horses and bees and kittens and boys with boils and whatever else she fears."

It was a time for warm embraces, for smiles, for toasts and reconciliations, for renewing old friendships and making new ones, for laughter and kisses. It was a good time, a golden autumn, a time of peace and plenty.
But winter was coming.

"I fed my last husband to my dragon. If you make me take another, I may eat him myself."

"The things... Mother have mercy, I do not know how to speak of them... they were... worms with faces..snakes with hands.. twisting, slimy, unspeakable things that seemed to writhe and pulse and squirm as they came bursting from her flesh. Some were no bigger than my little finger, but one at least was as long as my arm... oh, Warrior protect me, the sounds they made...”

"Her blood is on your hands," she raged at him. "Her blood is on your cock. May you die screaming."