The Waterlily had reached the coast of Mossflower now and was sailing up the River Moss. They were going to head for the Eastern Coast, then sail north until they reached Marshank. There, Tyrion and Varys would meet Daenerys and offer their services to her.

Varys had explained it all to Tyrion. The whole time Robert had been king, Varys had been secretly supporting the Targaryens. "In a short time, Daenerys has already made quite a name for herself. She managed to hatch three dragon eggs, and now she has three dragons that follow her around who she calls her children. A stoat named Badrang was holding many animals as slaves in Marshank Fortress, but Daenerys and her dragons killed Badrang and freed the slaves. Now, she's gathering an animal army to march on Westeros so she can seize the Iron Throne. And we're going to help her."

"How do you know all this?" Tyrion asked.

"It's my business to know things," Varys replied cryptically.

Tyrion had another question. "So, was Quagmire secretly helping her too? Is that the reason for all his shenanigans?"

Varys shook his head. "Quagmire is a whole different kettle of fish. He only wants three things, money, power, and sex. All this chaos in the realm delights him. He's gotten everybody fighting everybody else, so when they're all exhausted, he can make his own bid for the throne. He would let the realm burn to the ground if he could be king of the ashes."

Captain Starwort's wife, Marigold, was in the crow's nest. She spied another ship up ahead. It was Clogg's ship Seascarab, but she didn't know it. The pirates had swapped their skull and crossbone flag for a plain white one. "Sailin' vessel lyin' to," she shouted, "flyin' distress signals."

In an instant guests and crew had hurried to points of vantage where they might obtain unobstructed view of the stranger, and take advantage of this break in the monotony of a long voyage. Tyrion and Varys joined Starwort on the ship's bridge. "Can you make her out?" Varys asked.

"She's a brigantine," replied Starwort, "and all that I can make out from her would indicate that everything was shipshape about her. Her canvas is neatly furled, and she's well manned- I can see a number of figures on the deck, but they're too far away for me to tell what kind of animals they are. I'll alter our course and speak to them- we'll see what's wrong, and give 'em a paw if we can."

"That's right," said Tyrion. "Do anything you can for them."

Marigold had climbed down from the mast. She joined her husband and the two passengers on the bridge. "How exciting!" she exclaimed. "O' course it's not a real shipwreck, but maybe it's the next thing to it. The poor souls may have been drifting about here on the river without food or water for goodness knows how many weeks, and now just think how they must be raising their voices in thanks to the fates for their infinite mercy in guiding us to them."

"If they've been drifting for any number of weeks without food or water," Tyrion hazarded, "the only things they'll need are an undertaker and a priest. Regrettably, we didn't bring either of those with us."

Starwort was inspecting the other ship through his spyglass. Suddenly he gave an exclamation of dismay. "By George!" he cried. "It is serious after all! That ship's afire!"

And sure enough, Tyrion and Varys could see a thin column of black smoke rising from the other ship, but they did not see the ferret on the deck who was causing the fire by burning some old rags on a stove.

"Ho-ho, yer a canny one, Cap'n, an' no mistake!" chortled the steersrat, Growch.

"Quiet, you fool," said Clogg. "You'll give the game away." He crouched behind the mast so the people on the Waterlily couldn't see his face. "I'm Captain Jones," he shouted, "of the brigantine Clarinda. We were sailing from Essos to Westeros with a cargo of dynamite. We disabled our rudder yesterday, an' this afternoon fire started in the hold. It's makin' headway fast now, an'll reach the dynamite most any time. You'd better take us aboard, an' get away from here as quick as you can. Taint safe nowhere within five hun'erd fathom of her."

Tyrion whispered to Starwort, "I think he's lying. It's not fire that detonates dynamite, it's concussion." He had read this in a book. "And ships carrying dynamite have to fly a special flag, which I don't see anywhere."

"Even if there's no dynamite, the fire is real," said Starwort. "That's plain as the nose on your face… well, maybe that wasn't the best analogy. But I'm afraid there's nothing else for it in the name of common decency than to take them aboard."

The Waterlily sailed closer to the Seascarab until the ships were right next to each other. That was when Clogg and his pirates jumped onto the deck of the Waterlily, taking the otters by surprise.

Even Varys was surprised, for once in his life. "Captain Clogg?" he said. "What are you doing?"

"Stow the gab, dickless wonder," Clogg snarled. "We're not taking orders off you no more." He issued orders to his crew. "Kill all the otters, but leave the humans alive. We can take them to Queen Tsarmina along with our other prisoner."

A ferret named Boggs rushed at Tyrion. Tyrion had a dagger in his belt, and he tried to fight back, but Boggs kicked him in the balls and Tyrion fell over. Boggs pounced on Tyrion and tied his hands behind his back.

The otters fought bravely, but in the end the pirates slaughtered them all. Varys received the same treatment as Tyrion, having his hands bound behind him, and he was pushed down onto the deck next to Tyrion. But they didn't kick him in the balls, because he didn't have any. "Don't panic," Varys whispered. "We'll get out of this. I've been in worse situations before."

A rat named Dedjaw and a weasel named Floater went back to the Seascarab and emerged from the hold with Jorah Mormont. Jorah's hands were bound too. He was shocked to see Varys. "What are you doing here?"

"We were looking for Daenerys Targaryen, but we got sidetracked," Varys said dryly.

Clogg overheard this. "Looking for Daenerys Targaryen, eh? That's all I needed to hear. I think Queen Tsarmina will want to have a few words with you when we get to Kotir."

The pirates made the three men disembark from the ship and step onto the land. Then they started marching them through Mossflower Woods.