She remembered what she'd looked like as a girl, of course. I don't recall looking quite so guileless, however. The girl in the mirror had exactly the sort of face all the fool knights envisioned their brides-to-be having. Except the eyes. Far from innocent and carefree, there was something in the eyes before her that spoke of hidden thorns beneath the rose's new-bloomed petals. All the same, I am the Queen of Thorns no longer. And what are a few thorns to a dead man or a cold monster anyway? It saddened her to see that there was little of her granddaughter to speak of in her face as well. Margaery could never help but look like she was up to something. I could pass for a new-made septa. But then, the years since Cersei had destroyed the sept and with it House Tyrell had been a trial of a different sort. One survived by sheer luck, not any nous or skill at playing the game. At least not a game I ever learned, nor taught Margaery. Redwyne or Tyrell, crone or maid, Olenna could no more hunt game than raise a palisade, no more speak to a giant than one of Daenerys Targaryen's horselords. Time to spare, she mused humorlessly, and aught to do with it. She looked down at her hands. The cold bit at her as it had before she chanced to cross paths with Sansa Stark in the tunnels beneath Winterfell, but at least there was no answering pain from old bones grinding raw against each other in her knuckles. Nor in my back, hips or knees. I went into the earth to die. Instead, it seems I've bloomed anew. How many endless sermons had she endured of the High Sparrow's? On the beneficence, the benevolence, the inviolability of the Seven. Yet the Seven could not stop Cersei sending you straight to them, and your rabble besides. To say nothing of men better, and women too, aye. Meantime, the old gods had put the wine back in the grape on a lark. A shiver ran down her spine. The only gods worth being called gods need no one collect coin and herd fools in their name.
A yawn pulled her from her thoughts, the little Lord of Highgarden sitting up with a stretch. On spotting Olenna up and about despite dawn not having yet come, he predictably pointed.
"HA!"
"None of that, you'll wake your lady mother." Olenna told him, Samwell quickly turning to check if his nonsense had woken his mother. With an almost quizzical look, he gave her a prod. "Oh, hells…" Olenna grumbled, moving over at the sound of Lady Tarly stirring.
"Sam?" she murmured.
"Here as he ought be, my lady." Olenna told her promptly. Of course, the girl had told her such a formal address was hardly necessary in the days after the battle, but Olenna was firm. "If we want my countrymen to treat you as they ought, no one is to call you by your name as if you were a girl selling flowers by the roadside. You are the Dowager Lady of Highgarden, and Lady Tarly is anyone with their wits is going to call you." Olenna had told her, and she had not excluded herself. For all anyone may know, I'm just one more pretty face. The Kingslayer knew who she truly was for one, but he struck Olenna as the sort of man who knew when to keep his head shut. Sadly, a trait rare to be found in men of the sword.
"Has morning come already?"
"Far from, though the guard shift looks to have changed. Why don't you lie in until breakfast, my dear?"
"We've had more than our share of sunrises stolen from us, I'll not miss one if I can help it." She was speaking of the darkness that had come with the Others and gone with them as well, Olenna knew, but she shivered all the same. Even with the sunrises I've lost due to the Others' workings, how many have I gained thanks to Sansa Stark's? "Perhaps we might call on Lady Melessa." Gilly suggested, easing over to the edge of the bed where the new baby's cradle stood. Even her brother's shout had not woken Margaery Tarly, Olenna remembering the days at Highgarden after Margaery Tyrell's birth. Well, those at Winterfell have more to do than pretend a newborn is anything to swoon over. A newborn among men, anyway. Whenever the hatchlings chanced to make an appearance at a meal, those lucky enough to get a glimpse did little else but talk the castle down spreading the word. And they do more than eat, cry and sleep. Olenna had never expected the habits of new-hatched dragons to much play a part in any mischief she might get up to, but with baby dragons came baby dragonriders. That is something to keep two careful eyes on.
"That sounds like a splendid notion. You feel up to moving about, then?" Olenna asked Gilly, who tittered. "After Sam, Margaery's birth was nothing." I don't doubt it, Olenna thought fervently. She'd never asked directly and even waspish as she could be sometimes, she didn't quite feel she had the stones to do so. At the sound of his name Samwell floundered over, giggling as he strained to get over his mother's heavy fur blankets.
"Goin' to see Granma!" he reported, red in the face by the time he reached Gilly's side.
"Not quite yet, Sam. Most of our sort is still asleep yet, dawn or no dawn." She told him before kissing the top of his head, prompting another flood of giggles. Our sort, Olenna thought with a smirk. I like the way that sounds coming from her. "If nothing else, it might be good for the dears to learn to rise when the sun does. We won't be cooped up in this wolf den forever, after all." Olenna said. While events in Winterfell had gone apace, the families of the Reach who had survived thus far had begun to rediscover blood ties and the like, following in the wake of the elder Samwell when he'd done his figuring to settle Brightwater Keep. A lad with Baratheon blood on one side and Florent on the other, matched to Talla Tarly. It was as elegant as it was amicable, and Olenna was certain the lords of the Reach wouldn't have stumbled upon it in a lifetime's worth of arguing. And there's other matches to be made besides. For one, Olenna could have been blindfolded and still seen that any house with a son to spare hoped to wed him to her own granddaughter, Desmera Redwyne, Lady of the Arbor. At least, on paper. It's not like any of us are lieges of anything more than our own persons just now. And the Arbor in particular lay off the southwestern coast. I may be a crone again before we bring it back into the fold. She rubbed the bridge of her nose. A claim may still be a claim. Even if it's presented by someone born in the years to come. And there was no shortage of suitors who would have been happy and more to tie themselves to House Redwyne. She looked back to the mirror. Gods, if I must fend off the cockerels myself… She let out a groan. Would that Sansa Stark's wolf had taught me the trick of fading from sight.
"We'll perhaps need to see about getting you some ladies as well, my lady." Olenna said while Gilly shushed Samwell. The girl looked up at her blankly.
"Ladies?"
"In waiting, I mean. To fetch you things and…well, do most whatever you can think to ask them. If I'm honest, I've never in all my years had one of my ladies do something more useful than hand me a cup of Arbor gold on a hot day." Gilly tittered something uncertainly, looking down into Margaery's cradle. "You'll most likely have your pick of the lot. Her Grace seems to prefer her Dothraki widows and that Skagosi broodtender, to say nothing of the fireling, and the princess has Fenns in spades to tend to her." Gilly blushed.
"I'm not certain I'd like a gaggle of highborn girls following me about everywhere I go, waiting for me to tell them what to do. I know well how to do what needs doing when it comes to being a mother and most everything else besides." Olenna pursed her lips. She's not wrong. The days of highborn girls whiling the days away until their fathers marry them off are over.
"Well, then perhaps you might be more amenable to showing them what to do. The gods only know they're not going to learn from their own mothers." The doubt in Gilly's face seemed to soften.
"When we were at Horn Hill, Talla told Sam and I that she didn't know how to hunt."
"Something that will need correcting and quickly. I doubt much farming is getting done with the ground frozen hard as brick. Perhaps you could mention such when we call on Lady Melessa."
"We should get lemons." Samwell opined, looking around as if a bowl of them might readily be found.
"Lemons?" Olenna asked.
"Sam got him one on a visit to the kitchens one morning." Gilly replied, smiling behind her hand.
"They're sour! We should get them." Samwell reiterated, looking over when his sister began to fuss.
"Lemons will have to wait, my lord. Your mother's day just got a deal busier." Olenna told him.
Every time they passed someone Samwell half-recognized in the corridor, he would pay his usual tribute while Olenna held him fast.
"At least he's happy to see people." Gilly said through a blush, holding Margaery herself.
"No less. I'd sooner he take after his father and your good self than Lord Randyll anyway, the man has the sense of humor of a caltrop." Gilly made a face, as if trying to recall. "The little pointed iron bobs they use to thwart horses." Olenna bandied her hand at an imaginary bag of them before waving it off. "Never mind. I declare, men's ignorance regarding the world at large is matched only by their ingenuity in killing one another." A chilly gust of wind from one of Winterfell's windows had Sam murmuring uncertainly while Olenna watched Margaery shrink into her swaddling.
"Cold today." Gilly said.
"Cold every day, milady." A man with a huntsman on his jerkin said, not waiting for them to identify themselves before he pounded on the door behind him with a fur-gloved fist. "I'll be glad when we're on our way back home, and the Stranger kick me square in the short hairs if I lie."
"Alright, that's enough out of you." Olenna said irritably. Thankfully the door opened and a most welcome wave of warmth washed over them, followed by a chorus of discomfited voices at the cold air without. They hurried in without another word, Olenna unsurprised that the lords of the Reach had quit their separate chambers for a larger one. After all, we haven't a need for quite so much space as before. And it was easier to keep warm in a room with a hearth and what looked like two other fires going besides. Gilly was met with greetings from all about her as well as congratulations on her babe, but nobody gave Olenna a second look. Who could reasonably expect an old crone to survive what's come? Perhaps they think I'm one of her wildling friends, now isn't that a lark? As the Tarlys wove their way through the crowd Gilly was sat before the hearth, a gaggle of maidservants coming forward to assist her with son and daughter both.
"Where has Lord Franklyn got to?" she asked one of the red-apple Fossoway girls, who looked to have taken the measure of dangling a wolf's tooth from her ear to hide that she'd lost part of it to frostbite.
"He doesn't spend much time in our company, my lady. Mostly he's with the Golden Company." Gilly frowned.
"Sam put him in charge of the red apples."
"He did, but Lord Franklyn's got mixed feelings as to us nobly born." Her frown deepened.
"My Sam didn't raise him high so he could hurl himself back to ground. Someone go get him, by the ear if need be." Now, that sounds like just the job for a busybody like me!
Though the cold was abominable, Olenna persevered. Where else would the sellswords see fit to reconnoiter than the other side of Winterfell? Freed from the yoke of old age as she was, though, getting there was nothing compared to what it might have been. Nobody hailed her, nobody snapped to attention when she drew near. It occurred to her that if Olenna Redwyne was thought dead, she would need a new name. I'd best give that a deal of thought. When she found the Golden Company they looked rather less like the most renowned sellsword company in the world and more like the men they might have been had they not been scattered across the Narrow Sea.
"Lord Franklyn." she called loudly, ignoring the note of harmlessness in her voice. I sound a kitten trying to roar, save me. The man turned away from Connington's paper prince, the Martell girl evidently elsewhere. Hopefully tucked up nice and warm. He looked around dubiously, as if he thought he might have been hearing things. "Here, my lord." Olenna called again.
"Who are you?" he asked. He looks as if a chair had decided to address him.
"Lady Tarly requests both your presence and to know why you're not wrangling red-apple Fossoways."
"Battle's over, isn't it? And so happens I've no love for Fossoways, red or green."
"You weren't told to love them, you were told to keep them disciplined. Drilled even, if it comes to that." There was the briefest flash of glee in the knight's eyes, remarkably similar to when Olenna had seen Luthor give Mace his first pony.
"Ah, why not, Franklyn? Go shout at some people, it will serve you better than sitting here on your bastard's arse." Aegon told him.
"I could do with a bit of shouting." Franklyn replied, sounding honestly wistful. Men, Olenna thought shortly.
Lord Franklyn seemed slow to act a man of his repute at first, but upon their return to the corridors of the Reachmen his reticent air vanished.
"What, did you spend the morning buggering yourself with that spear? You couldn't stick a pile of hay with that, give it a proper point before I serve you with duty a deal less sweet." he snapped at one of the guardsmen, evidently given to laxness in his coveted position of warmth outside the noble lords' quarters. At once the man rushed off to the smithy, mumbling an apology. No perfumed fop a lifelong soldier might resent, Olenna thought. This golden apple is an officer though to his marrow. Upon their entry to the room proper, his squinting, scarred face soon had more than a few backs straightening along the walls, no guard nor footman eager to seem undisciplined in Lord Franklyn's eyes.
"You're late." Gilly said, in a tone quite unlike her customary meekness. He coughed, bit a splutter off his tongue and comported himself.
"Didn't know I was expected, did I, my lady?"
"How couldn't you, when my lord charged you with minding the many branches of House Fossoway?" His nose wrinkled.
"Brown apples don't mix well with other sorts-"
"Are you as hard of hearing as you are headed? I recall dubbing you a golden apple, and you're just as much a Fossoway as any of these, if your needing to be told something half a hundred times is any hint."
"No officer of the Golden Company needs telling something twice." Lord Franklyn replied, voice colored with pride.
"And glad I am to hear of it. I'll be gladder still to hear of golden apples instilling discipline learned across the sea in the lads born to the houses of the Reach, highborn and low. I'll hear no more of brown apples, Lord Franklyn. You claim to be a man of the Golden Company, well and good. You'll wear that distinction on your own terms, though, and not under another's banner. 'Golden to the Core', if you like." That did it, Olenna saw delightedly as the man puffed up like a peacock. "Cider Hall might be a haunt for your red cousins, but the Reach and all its castles are out of our reach just now and are like to be for a good while. We can sort those out on our return, if the gods will as such. Better we should fit ourselves to be able to live in the grip of winter. To hold what we might retake in the Reach and keep it clear of dead men and monsters and all else we might find has moved in in our absence. Our lives will be cold and our lot will be cold, castles or no castles. Winter may be milder miles to the south, but it will not be gentle." Gilly let that sink into the lords and ladies around her. "A man of your proven luster will help a deal in forming those of us that remain into something fit to achieve such a task."
"Aye, as my lady says." Franklyn finally blurted out.
"I do say. Now go shout at somebody taking too long to complete his rounds, my lord." Gilly said, the little Lord of Highgarden still and stern perched upon her knee. At once, Lord Franklyn Fossoway nodded and turned on his heel, heading off looking ready to turn some poor lad's world upside down.
The girl is nobly born as the average dandelion, Olenna reflected as Gilly murmured something to her son, yet all these noble descendants of Garth Greenhand hang on her every word as if she were Daenerys Targaryen.
"The rest of you might think of something useful to do, before I think of something for you." she said without looking up as she checked on Margaery, the room going from silent to a riotous bustle in the blink of an eye. When Olenna drew nearer she could see the blush rising in the girl's cheeks.
"Pray tell, where did that quite come from?" she asked quietly, making as if to adjust the heavy fur blanket that had gone 'round Gilly's shoulders.
"I only talked the way you used to when you were still an old raisin. It didn't matter who crossed your path or how, they got a piece of your mind and more if they didn't busy themselves with getting out of your way." she replied, sounding much more the girl Olenna had met at Sunspear. "But seeing as you're not a raisin anymore, what ought I call you when all the rest are about?" Olenna chewed on that.
"Perhaps Viola. Or Mina, Minnie, something pretty and common sounding. Better yet, call me each in turn when in the presence of different lordlings, just to confound those about us." she said with a smile.
"I doubt much of anything you say will much ring common, if I may say so, my lady."
"You are the Dowager Lady of Highgarden," Olenna replied, "and I, just another girl in the throng. You may say most anything you like, my lady." The gods have seen fit to switch our places on their great board. At some point we'll need to tell some bard or other, she reasoned. All this would make too good a song to take to the grave.
Only when Samwell chanced to spot Lady Melessa did his unamused demeanor fold, breaking into a wide grin as he pointed. ("HA!") Olenna could only try to hide a smirk as she listened to the little lord squeal at his grandmother holding him aloft, Lady Talla appearing from behind her.
"Granma, I want lemons!" Lady Melessa took his request in stride, holding him close.
"Not to worry, sweetling. Horn Hill stands on the Dornish Marches just south of Highgarden, we'll send you as many as we can get our hands on." So many big words had Samwell's eyes going wide.
"Where's Lord Randyll?" Gilly asked.
"With our soldiers as most always he is, Dickon at his side no doubt." Lady Melessa's face fell a bit. She knows it will do no good, Olenna observed. The elder Samwell has left a gap in our ranks no sword arm can fill.
"Ser Edric as well. He's not quite the fighter Father would like, perhaps, but he's not afraid to get back up after being knocked down." Talla added.
"Steel in a spine is what counts, not in a hand or on a back." Gilly said, taking Margaery from the maidservant. "The sort of steel razor ice isn't so good at parting." I wonder if mist is better suited to the trick, Olenna thought. The stories that had come up with the westermen were not encouraging. She busied herself with trying to spot Lady Desmera, finding the girl seated in a cozy corner of the room and waited on by Redwyne footmen…as well as several most vigilant-looking knights. Lord Randyll's men, Olenna knew at once. So he is fishing to wed his heir to the Lady of the Arbor. With a quick glance at Gilly, content to gently rock Margaery as Talla introduced Samwell to the rest of the room, Olenna made for Desmera.
"Your pardon, my lady." she said, nearly forgetting to curtsy. I can hardly be blamed, she reasoned. Until very recently I couldn't have pulled off a curtsy if a cask of my lord father's wine was waiting between my feet. "The queen requests that you attend her in the hall a moment, I think she might have an inquiry or two about vintages." There were a number of men from the Arbor who remained Olenna might have asked, she knew, vintners and the like, but it would serve her ends best if Desmera spent a bit of time in the company of people uninterested in her claim. Among them Her Grace, whom I pray will be bright enough to play along. Or at least be awake when we reach the hall.
Roping Gilly in was neither difficult nor an unwelcome development. Quite apart from wanting to stay off her feet as a girl in her position might, Gilly got right up and carrying Margaery at that. More than one pert mouth around her pressed shut, cowed without effort, but Gilly didn't notice.
"Are we late?" she asked Olenna.
"Not as such, but it wouldn't do to have Her Grace wait on us. Her time is precious, and that which can be filled is quickly spoken for." Olenna told her. It was not a lie, though the dragon's share of what went on behind closed doors was no business of a few sweetlings from the Reach, nor their care. They probably think that between the king and the prince she spends her days dozing in one place or another, and never mind the bloody clutch of dragon eggs she's managed to hatch.
"I've not seen the hatchlings up close, might I accompany you, my lady?" Talla asked, going pink-cheeked.
"I don't see why not. I've not bothered about them, myself. Hands full, and all." Gilly replied, brushing Margaery's forehead with her lips. Samwell needed no carrying, content to hold Lady Melessa's hand as they brought up the rear, occasionally stopping to peek out a window or point at some random passerby he happened to recognize.
"HA!" To Olenna's astonishment, the tall Summer Islander who looked to be an archer of the Golden Company laughed aloud.
"Ha yourself, Sam." he said, pulling some dried fruit out of a pouch, tossing it to Samwell as he passed without missing a step. Out in the open air Olenna heard Lady Melessa mutter in a discomfited tone even beneath the fur cape she'd worn over her dress. Lady Talla got more than her share of looks and mutterings in turn, a small wildling girl who looked as though she'd never had a bath in her life almost shyly tucking a strand of smooth, round shells into her hand before dashing off.
"What's all that about?" Gilly asked.
"The Lord of Storm's End made quite a name for himself during the battle. I suppose it's known that he and Edric share a sire, this isn't the first time I've been given the odd token or bauble." Talla replied. "Might be it's seen as a shine-on." Samwell would know, Olenna thought, knowing the same thing had occurred to the other women in turn.
The sight of Daenerys Stormborn was usually more than enough to draw the eye, but Olenna found her gaze sliding off the spotless coat of snow bear fur almost as soon as she laid eyes on it. Daenerys Targaryen (Hasty? Snow? Did it matter?) sat bold as you like upon a log as if she were a fur trapper's wife, murmuring softly to the prince she held as the iron hatchling on her shoulder peered about, showing none of the unsteadiness Olenna had seen in the young of men and beasts alike. He is bigger now as well. The dragon had gone from no bigger than a cat to the size of a large fox, occasionally stopping his constant slow swiveling to take a bit of meat from the queen's hand. Several waited on a flat stone in front of her, the fireling nearby always to keep it crackling and merry. The horselords' crones were about as well, those as could be roused, as well as one woman whom Olenna could not rightly place. She had a wild look about her, there could be no mistaking the hard, hungry look most all of them had, but before Olenna could inquire further the iron head snapped to them so suddenly it took the mother's eyes off the son.
"What now?" she asked, sounding weary. Following the black gaze, the queen smiled at Gilly and muttered something to one of the Dothraki girls, who promptly pushed together a small pile of logs before tossing a horsehide over it.
"I'd sooner you rest on something with a little more give, my lady." Olenna muttered before she could stop herself.
"Meantime I'll be happy to rest on anything what another's freely given." Gilly replied as they neared the queen. Still the girl born beyond the Wall. While Olenna helped Gilly to sit beside Daenerys, she could feel the iron dragon's black eyes on them.
"Have you done with counting the bricks of your bedchamber, Your Grace?" Olenna asked.
"I thought a bit of air would be good for Ned and I both…and Rhaegal gets rather cross when Aemyxes spends too much time beneath a roof." the queen responded as the dragon on her shoulder seemed to loom over them. Olenna looked up with a smart remark nocked only to find herself staring at the top of the beast's head as it peered down into Gilly's arms. "Mind your manners, Aem- oh, hells!" Daenerys muttered tersely as the dragon caught on the fur over Gilly's shoulders, pulling itself up bold as an outlaw for a better look at Margaery. Though she'd stilled, her brown eyes had gone wide and the Tarlys themselves looked rather disquieted.
"Your pardon." Olenna finally forced out, repeating herself but louder when at first she failed to pull the dragon's attention off Margaery.
"But Lady Gilly's no coat rack for you to dangle off of, nor Lady Margaery a bauble for you to snatch."
The dragon's mouth opened and a lively trill came out.
"Aemyxes, come here. Or must I wake Drogon?" Another trill, this one directed at the queen. She made to rise, prince and all, and Olenna thanked all the gods together when the dragon clambered back up her well-protected arm. Her bliss proved brief, however, for when Gilly moved to escape while she thought she had the chance the dragon trilled again and slunk straight back to whence it had come. The game wore on for the better part of an hour, the iron dragon letting neither mother rise.
"What's this now?" The king's approach had the gathering crowd scattering like leaves in an autumn gust…or else it was the white direwolf that trailed behind him. In his wake too came the famous wild winter rose, a frizz of red hair that clashed and danced with the orange dragon clinging to her shoulders. Larger than the iron, and more animated. It was not afraid to hiss loudly at any who came to close, puffing up like a peacock whenever it did. Or a puff fish.
"A miser and a boor. I despair of making anything of them." Daenerys hung her head. To Olenna's astonishment, the king gave a chuckle.
"Wait until they can hold themselves aloft. There'll be none of this louting about then, not with Drogon and Rhaegal for taskmasters."
"I heard there were three- er, are three." Gilly said, now positively pink in the cheeks as the dragon eyed up her Tarly relations, staring at them fixedly.
"Dhaegelle rarely leaves the godswood, and never before nightfall. She has a love of darkness and silence that Aemyxes and Jaehaerion don't share." the queen told her. Samwell wouldn't have noticed if an Other was stood before him though, gaping as he was at the princess. She was occupied with licking some kind of apple glaze off her fingers, but once the orange dragon picked up on his fascination he went stone still.
"None of that now, peacock." The king's humorous tone vanished, replaced by one of stony sternness. When the orange dragon didn't respond he stepped between the pair, blocking both Samwell's view of the wild little rose and the dragon's of Samwell. He picked daughter and hatchling up both, the little girl content to lay her head on her father's shoulder while her hatchling peered over the king's shoulder at Samwell. While he strode off in the direction of the godswood, twin silver pinpricks glowering in the boy's direction, Daenerys apologized profusely.
"They're not the politest concerning what they think is theirs. Unfortunately, when it comes to dragons…"
"What's theirs is what they think is theirs." Gilly finished for her.
What they think is theirs. It stuck in Olenna's mind like a fly to a honeycake. What interest might an infant have for a hatchling dragon with a rider of his own already? It tickled her wits most abominably. And here I am thinking myself canny! Her only supposition that half made sense was that the iron dragon could have no interest in Margaery, none whatever…of his own. And yet, he'll not let Gilly leave the queen's side. Her jaw dropped open loud as a wooden puppet's.
"Still to come, I'm sorry to say." she told the iron hatchling. It looked to her, burbling with what might have been a dragon's tone of interest. "Time's what's needed, and time you have. Time we both have. You do what needs doing, you black-gazed blackguard. Content yourself with Prince Eddard…for the nonce. The morrow will come when it will come, and when it does…you'll see we've more than held up our end." I may not know about working metal or hunting beasts, she mused, but I know much that Gilly cannot teach her daughter, just as she knows much no daughter of the Arbor would ever know. Aemyxes did not grow distracted as she spoke, did not look down even as Margaery began to fuss. Finally, he clambered back to where Daenerys, who promptly stood. "There now. What, pray tell, was quite so intolerable about that? Herding cats, the lot of you. At least Dhaegelle can be counted on not to make trouble!" she scolded him. The queen nodded to Gilly, who nodded in turn, still pink in the cheeks somewhat. While she followed the king, the iron dragon's neck looped to give the beast a last glimpse of Margaery before the ducklings waddled off after Daenerys.
"He didn't nick her with a claw, did he?" Talla asked as soon as the lot of them were out of earshot.
"Not a scratch." Olenna replied, gaze still trailing the queen's party. She did not have to check the babe to know it to be true. "Has anyone got something hot to drink?" A cup of mulled wine was duly poured for her, the castle's civilized servants less able to up and go as the queen's Dothraki maids had. While Olenna emptied her cup Talla helped Gilly stand, Lady Melessa scooping Samwell up when it became apparent they were due to leave as well.
"Has something crossed your mind?" Gilly asked as they began their own return to the chambers of the Reachmen.
"Something and more." Olenna replied, the mulled wine warmer in her chest by the minute.
"That dragon has a thing or two to learn about the ways of men. Or does he think all this a story and Margaery a convenient highborn girl to go stashing in some tower?" Talla muttered. He knows more than you credit, my lady. They were but babes, it was years before time, but what were years to a dragon? He knows queens go with kings.