The Bastard of Pyke, or: The Story of How Varamyr Pyke was Almost Killed by Ironborn
Your name is Varamyr Pyke. You are the bastard child of an Iron Islander reaver and a Wildling salt wife - a pretty name for a sex slave. The reaver died shortly after you were born and the wildling woman took the opportunity to escape – if not beyond the Wall, at least to the North, where the Starks of Winterfell made their den. Your mother must have been nobility early in her life, before she ventured beyond the Wall. That is what you assume anyway, for your mother has never told you and there is no other reason you can extrapolate that you know how to read and write. You have the brown hair and green eyes of your mother, with the hard face of your father – that is what you think, for your face does not look like your mother's.
When you were two-and-ten, your mother died of a harsh fever. You buried her behind the farmstead you lived at, took everything of value (including the lone draft-horse), and left that same day, taken by wanderlust. You ventured to Torrhen's Square and sold everything except the horse and the clothes on your back. In return, you received a longsword and two week's worth of food. You considered venturing north to join the Night's Watch or maybe even their enemies, the Wildlings – the Free Folk, as your mother had called them. Ultimately, you decided to head south to Essos – for the disputed lands were always in need of mercenaries, or so you heard from a passing trader.
You only saw the Stark in Winterfell one time. As you left Torrhen's Square on your draft-horse with your food and your meager coin, you saw a train of destriers, coursers, and lesser horses pass you. On the lead horse sat a man with pale skin, hard gray eyes, and black hair.
"Why aren't you in Winterfell?" you asked him, still a naïve, callow youth. His guards gripped their weapons, but the Stark in Winterfell held up a hand and the guards resumed their weaponless guard.
The Stark in Winterfell looked at you then - no, at your soul with his piercing gray eyes. "There was a rebellion. King Robert bade me call my banners, so I marched south with them and we crushed the rebels."
"Why was there a rebellion? Who rebelled?" you asked him then, as if you weren't already pushing your luck.
"Balon Greyjoy felt that there was little support for King Robert and that he could easily break away from the Seven Kingdoms. He was wrong." He and his guards rode north then, each one surveying you and most finding you wanting. At the end of the train rode a sullen boy who looked even younger than you. He glared at you, but it was without heat and you merely spurred your horse south, toward Moat Cailin and the Neck. You rode past the Crannogmen of the Neck with little incident, into the Riverlands and then the Crownlands.
Eventually, you took a ship from King's Landing – an atrocious city, but also the largest you'd been to – that made for Tyrosh, in the disputed lands. You were three-and-ten when you arrived and signed on as a mercenary with the Windblown – it took you a full year to venture from the North to Essos. But you always remembered what the Stark in Winterfell said to you. There was a rebellion. King Robert bade me call my banners, so I marched south with them... You always latched onto those words - words that the Stark in Winterfell probably didn't mean anything by - but you gave them meaning. Obey your lord and oppose those who would cast him down, you took from his words.
For the Stark in Winterfell was an honorable man. You knew this, as did every high lord and bedslave from the Wall to Volantis, and you still believed in honor, chivalry, and heroic knights who rescued fair ladies from towers. What he says has to be the honorable and right thing, you thought more than once.
Occasionally, you thought of abandoning the Windblown and venturing even farther east - to Slaver's Bay and even Asshai-by-the-Shadow, but you always remembered the Stark in Winterfell's words and you stayed faithful to the Tattered Prince, even as he turned his tattered cloak again and again.
In the disputed lands, one learns to fight well or one dies quick. You put your longsword to good use in service of your new masters. You rarely wasted your pay on whores or drink – the long walk from Torrhen's Square to King's Landing had taught you how to save money. You fought sometimes for Tyrosh, sometimes for Myr or Lys, but always in the disputed lands where the fighting was plentiful.
You were six-and-ten when your contract with the Windblown expired and you rode north toward Braavos – on the same draft-horse you rode out of Torrhen's Square. You stopped in Pentos, but never continued on to Braavos; you were approached by a man named Illyrio Mopatis – the Cheese Lord of Pentos. He asked you if you wanted to make more money. You said yes. He bade you carry messages to seemingly-random people throughout the free cities. Each time you returned, he would hand you a sack of gold as payment and a sack of silver for your silence. You did this for five years, even as reports of the death of King Robert and the so-called War of the Five Kings had trickled in to wherever you slept at the time.
In your fourth year in the Cheese Lord's service, three outriders from a Dothraki Khalasar fell upon you. You killed your poor draft-horse – which you hadn't named, despite owning him for eight years (to this day, you don't remember how you got that horse on the ship to Tyrosh) – and yet it wasn't enough. The three riders fell on you as you extricated yourself from your dead mount, arakhs gleaming in the sun, but you didn't survive three years in the disputed lands by being easy to kill.
A longsword sweeping in a wide arc hamstrung two of the horses, while the third shied away from the blade. The Dothraki screamers were trapped beneath their mounts, so you turned to the still-mounted one. His arakh came slashing at you, but your longsword swung and caught the curved blade from the opposite direction, wrenching it out of his hands. He tried to bolt, but you hauled him off his horse and impaled him, taking his mount as your own.
It was easy to dispatch the second screamer, still trapped beneath his dying mount, but the third screamer had successfully extricated himself from his. You were poised to ride him down when he knelt in supplication and cut his long, flowing braid off in recognition of your victory. You, knowing this much about Dothraki customs, raised your sword in salute and wheeled your new mount away, riding back to Pentos.
When you returned to the Cheese Lord with your tale, he gave you another sack of silver and warned you to not engage Dothraki in combat again. The reason why was obvious – a Khalasar rode beneath the walls three days later, and their khal married a silver-haired scion of Old Valyria inside the city.
In your fifth – and last – year of service to the Cheese Lord, he bade you deliver a letter to the Dornish princess – Arianne Martell, just as reports came trickling in saying that the silver-haired scion of Old Valyria had sacked Astapor and conquered Meereen with three dragons, in Slaver's Bay to the east. Just as reports came in that the Golden Company abandoned a contract.
"Do not worry about returning to me," he said. "Simply deliver this to Doran Martell's daughter and you are free of my service. And remember – this letter is for her eyes only." You took ship to Myr and then to Lys and then Sunspear. It took a three day wait for the gouty Prince of Dorne and his daughter to see you. The Dornish princess read the letter and raised an eyebrow. She showed it to her father, who nodded.
"We will finally have justice," the Prince of Dorne said in his aged voice.
"Justice?" you wondered aloud.
"Justice." He looked you in the eye. "Vengeance. Fire and Blood." Fire and Blood, you think. House Targaryen. The silver-haired queen in Slaver's Bay. His daughter handed you a sack of gold in payment and another sack of gold for your silence and bade you leave.
You took ship to Oldtown, intent on retiring from the business you wandered into so long ago and studying at the Citadel. As bad luck would have it, Ironborn – your father's people – attacked Oldtown the very next day. You found yourself in the Citadel, hiding with a dark-skinned Dornishman – Alleras the Sphinx, he had introduced himself – and a fat Half-maester – Samwell Tarly, he had introduced himself.
"If we survive this, you must tell me all about your travels," the Sphinx said to you, as if the two of you were gossiping maids in a king's court. There was to further time for talk, as a reaver thundered around the corner and into your hallway. He was shot in the neck by the Sphinx, who already had another arrow nocked for his goldenheart bow. The next two reavers faced the same fate. The Half-maester retreated into another hallway, mumbling about something he needed to do, leaving behind his dragonglass dagger.
The next reaver to come up held an axe and a shield, and the Sphinx's arrows embedded uselessly in it. When the reaver was close, you charged out from behind the Sphinx, parrying a blow that was meant for him. You managed to turn the reaver to the side, allowing the Sphinx to shoot him in the neck as you desperately parried his axe and shield. You fell back, leaning against the wall as the Sphinx glances to the stairway the Half-maester disappeared into.
It was two-and-twenty seconds of waiting before Euron Greyjoy, the Crow's Eye, marched around the corner.
"So this is the bitch and the bastard that killed four of my reavers."
You merely nodded once and stood in a low guard in front of the Sphinx. He laughed and charged you, the goldenheart arrows embedding uselessly in his thick armor. You met him, swords and axes clanging throughout the hallway as the Sphinx uselessly fired his arrows. It was the hardest fight you had ever faced, but in the end, you managed to spit him on your blade. You fell back three paces, gasping for breath.
"That's it, then?" you asked. "The raider king is dead?" The Sphinx nodded, backing up slightly.
"Let's go find the Half-maester," you said to the Sphinx— —just as the Crow's Eye stood up again, his lone eye as blue as icy death.
"Other," you whispered as the air grew cold. "My mother used to tell me stories… run. Get to your Half-maester friend. I can grant you two minutes."
The Sphinx shook his head. "We're in this together now, friend," he said as he readied his bow once again. You charged the Crow's Eye again, longsword flashing as it struck the axe. He dropped the axe and wrenched your longsword out of your hands – and yet, his own hands did not bleed. He effortlessly knocked you down and took his axe to kill you while you lay there stunned, only to recoil in surprise as the Sphinx buried the Half-maester's dagger in the back of his neck. Even still, he managed to bite into the Sphinx's side with his axe as he died a second time, screaming and melting to naught.
The Sphinx fell and you rushed to him, gathering him in your arms and rushing up the stairs.
"Half-maester," you called. "Half-maester," but it was to no avail. You lay him down and take the mostly-empty quiver off his back and strip off the Sphinx's tunic, intent on tearing it up for bandages— —only to discover that the Dornishman is actually a Dornishwoman. You resolutely ignore the Sphinx's breasts as you tear her tunic to pieces and wrap them around her bloody side in a crude bandage. You keep calling for the Half-maester, but he doesn't come.
"Bring my body back to Dorne-" she started weakly, but you interrupt her with your own words.
"The wound isn't fatal," you said with conviction, having seen wounded and dying men in the disputed lands. "When I tell you about my time in the east, you'll have to tell me about history and medicine and all the things the maesters study in return. Now, I need to find Half-maester. You should be fine until then, just don't move too much." With that, you left the Sphinx and ran up the tower stairs, sans longsword.
"Half-maester," you called and shouted, yet the fat Black Brother would not come. You eventually found him in the tallest tower, gazing into a glass candle, holding a vial of gray liquid.
"They were the ones to unleash… the maesters killed the—"
"Half-maester," you shouted at him, and he turns around, surprise on his pudgy countenance. "We killed the Crow's Eye, but the Sphinx is hurt. Come with me," you ordered. His face looked shocked, slightly panicked, but your new friend was hurt defending you. He puts the vial into one of his pouches and you drag him – actually dragging him at times when he proves too slow for your pace – to where you left the Sphinx.
You found her still lying on the ground, breasts bared and makeshift bandage soaked through with blood, the rest of her tattered tunic laying some distance away from her. At least she's wearing trousers, too, you think.
"H-she's a lady?" The Half-maester half-yelped, blushing furiously.
"Yes, the Sphinx is a woman, now do your… maester thing and heal her," you said lamely, having ran out of words.
He nodded as fast as his fat head allowed him, even as pink-red stained his cheeks and then his ears and neck.
Five-and-ten minutes later, the Sphinx was propped up against the wall, outfitted with better bandages, from the Half-maester's (surprisingly competent) treatment, and the rest of her tattered tunic preserving her modesty.
"The Crow's Eye was an Other," you stated flatly once all was said and done. "The Sphinx killed it with your dragonglass dagger.
"A-an Other? A-are y—"
'Yes, I'm sure. I stabbed the Crow's Eye right in the heart, but he got up and his eye was cold blue and the air started freezing." The Half-maester looked frightened, and even you worried at the implications. "But enough of this. We have time enough to worry about snarks and grumkins. Let us worry about more pressing matters, like our wounded Sphinx."
"S-she'll heal perfectly w-well," the Half-maester stammered out. You nodded, accepting this.
"Sarella," you heard the Sphinx say. You looked back at her and saw her eyes open, if pained. "My name is Sarella Sand."
"One of the Sand Snakes?" you asked her.
"Yes. My father is… was… Oberyn Martell." You detected a hint of sadness there, and only then remembered that the Viper was killed in King's Landing.
"The Viper of Dorne. Well, don't worry, Sand Snake. Half-maester says that you'll live and that you'll be fine, and I trust in his medicinal knowledge." You look from the Sand Snake to the Half-maester and see the Half-maester blushing.
"So, now that that's all out of the way, where do you all plan to go?" You asked them after thirty seconds of silence.
"N-north," the Half-maester replied. "Jon needs me there." And he looked more resolute than you had ever seen him, not stammering or mumbling once.
"I'll go with you, Slayer," the Sand Snake said in the silence. "Archmaester Marwyn told me to look after you, and this all seems like a grand adventure besides."
"I'll join with you then," you said after the Sand Snake fell silent. "I owe you a debt, Sand Snake, and Half-maester is going to need all the protection he can get. It's not like I have much else to do, anyway."
Of course, you heard strange portents throughout the next few days as you prepared to leave Oldtown. Aegon Targaryen, Rhaegar's son, came back from the dead and invaded Westeros with the Golden Company. Wildlings, Black Brothers, and Stannis Baratheon worked together at the Wall. Daenerys Targaryen disappeared from Meereen, not to be seen elsewhere. You took your repaired longsword and your new suit of chainmail from the blacksmith and went to join the Half-maester and the dark-skinned Sand Snake on the Half-maester's quest to find – and aid – his friend Jon. The Stark in Winterfell's bastard, if the rumors are true, you thought. Which makes him the Stark in Winterfell with his brothers dead and his sisters scattered to the wind - not that a bastard's ever inherited anything, especially not in the Watch.