Apologies for the delay on this - last weekend I was at a major conference in the South of France. Sounds glamorous but basically consisted of me running up and down a hill all day in high temperatures and horrible humidity. The length of this update should make up for it a bit.

Jonos

He sat on Bess and stared blankly at the horizon. The view was good up here. It wasn't a big hill, 'else it would have been fought over and fortified at some point, but it was a place that commanded a good view. Perhaps one day it would have a name. Truce Hill, or Parley Hill. Bess snorted a bit and he reached down and patted her neck. She was a good horse. Steady. Reliable. Not that clever, but brave. He smiled slightly. A bit like him really.

He looked back the horizon. The Sun was close to noon by the shadow the tree behind him was casting on the ground and he calmed himself a little. There was too much riding on this to remember the past. He had to put that past behind him, to move on – difficult as that was. They needed to meet to make sure that all was well, that the truce held. He sighed, dismounted and then tied Bess up on the tree to one side.

Seeing motion to one side he squinted down the hill. A small knot of riders had arrived, their leader mounted on a black horse. After a moment the leader trotted up the hill towards him, leaving the others behind. He smiled slightly. They were keeping to their agreement. The smile ebbed a little. This damn feud of theirs… well, enough. It was over. There was something far more important at stake.

As the other rider approached he slowed and then dismounted, before leading the horse up and nodding shortly at him. "Bracken."

He nodded back. "Blackwood."

Tytos Blackwood tied up his own horse next to Bess and then stood next to him. There was a long moment of silence. "News came from Kings Landing," Jonos said eventually. "The King will go to Winterfell."

"Aye," Blackwood said eventually with a slow nod. "We heard that too. Long past time."

There was another silence. Blackwood seemed to be struggling to say something, so Jonos let him. But then something occurred to him. "'Tis said that the Faith Militant rise again, in places at least." The words came hard to him, but they had to be said. He followed the Seven, but recently… well, he had doubts of late.

Blackwood nodded again and then seemed to continue to struggle with something. After a long moment he finally succeeded. "There are red buds on the Heart Tree at Raventree Hall," he said in a rush.

He froze. After a moment he looked at the other man. "What did you say?"

"You heard me right. There are red buds on the Heart Tree at Raventree Hall." There was another long silence.

Eventually, his mind whirling, Jonos nodded. "That explains a report I had which I had scorned. 'Tis said that there are red shoots on the stumps of High Heart."

Another long silence. This time Blackwood broke it. "There will be those," he said carefully, "Who will say that this is proof of the Old Gods. I… will just say that things are moving that are beyond our ken. The Call has gone up from Winterfell that the Others come. Who knows what else will happen?"

He opened his mouth for a moment and then closed it again. "I… cannot disagree with that," he said softly. Then he paused, as an unpleasant thought skittered through his mind. "If the weirwood trees stir again at the same time that we hear of the Faith Militant rising again…" Horror kindled in his heart.

From the startled look that Blackwood sent in his direction the other man had had the same thought as he had. "They will move against all those to worship the Old Gods, or who are seen to be sympathetic to them. And against the symbols of the Old Gods. Raventree Hall. High Heart. And the Isle of Faces."

"We must warn Lord Tully. A raven with a joint message?"

"Aye. There is a small keep not too far from here that is loyal to me. That message from us both can be sent from there."

"Agreed." He paused and then he extended his hand. "You have my word on this, that the Faith Militant will not harm any worshipper of the Old Gods on my lands, not if I have anything to say about it."

Blackwood stared at his eyes intently and then slowly reached out his own hand and shook his. "I thank you. Now – we must ride!"

Jonos nodded, strode over to Bess, and then waved to his own party at the other side of the hill. Startled faces stared up at him and then he mounted Bess. "RIDE TO THE OTHER SIDE OF THE HILL!" he bellowed and then waited until Blackwood was also mounted before thundering down the hill towards the Blackwood party. There was not a moment to be wasted.

Robert

When he had been a young man he'd been able to lift a log as thick as his head (Ned had always joked quietly about that part) and as long as he was tall onto his shoulders and then walk ten times around the sparring ground of the Eyrie with it.

Today he had made five circuits of the Red Keep's training ground with the same kind of log, before finally rolling it off his shoulders and standing there and panting. Well. Yesterday he'd gotten four and a half times around. He was improving. Still wasn't good enough, but better than yesterday.

There was a bucket of water to one side and he poured it over his head. Gods, but he ached. It was a good ache though. It meant that he was doing things right. The fat was going. The muscle was coming back. It was slow, but it was there. He made a mental note to talk to Selmy about how they were going to train him onboard the ship to White Harbour. The last thing he needed to do was to fall behind in his plan to get fighting fit again. A sea voyage was a poor excuse.

He wiped the water that had dribbled into his eyes off and strode over to Stormbreaker, which was leaning against a wall to one side. The sword felt like a part of him these days, as if he had always wielded it. It was enough to make him wonder about it, wonder about it a lot. Selmy had been told so many stories about it when he was a child. Robert had not. Why? Was it because Argella Durrandon had been unable to trust her husband? What had Orys Baratheon been like? Had he been capable of listening?

Hearing the pad of soft feet approach he looked up and was unsurprised to see Varys approach and bow. "Your Grace."

"Varys." He stretched and then winced a little as something popped somewhere in his back. "What news?"

"Preparations for your departure to White Harbour go on apace, your Grace. I regret to say that Lord Arryn has not yet awoken. And it has been confirmed that the Company of the Rose has sailed from Pentos, bound for the North."

He eyed the eunuch carefully. The man had put some odd emphasis on the last four words. "And?"

"Ser Jorah Mormont has joined them."

Mormont. Oh yes, he remembered the man now. He'd had it all on a plate. He'd been Lord of Bear Island, he'd been the first man through the breach at Pyke, Robert had knighted the man himself. And then idiot had thrown it all away. Marriage to Lynesse Hightower, someone who was used to the comforts of Oldtown, had broken him financially, so he'd tried to make ends meet by selling poachers into slavery. Ned had found out of course. He'd wanted to execute the man himself, but he'd escaped into exile.

He eyed Varys again. "Then Ned will execute him when he sees him."

"Your Grace, Ser Jorah has been working for the Crown during his time in Essos," Varys admitted in a quiet voice. "He has given us valuable intelligence on a number of matters."

"Such as?"

"The affair of the White Stoat in Lys." Oh bugger. That had been him? "And many other things. He has reported from the Free Cities many times on what they were up to and as a sellsword he has reported on what the various sellsword companies were up to – and who was paying them. He has given us valuable insights into the movements of the Dothraki – including their mysterious disappearance – and also the movements of the Targaryens."

He sighed. "Has he been promised a pardon?"

"He has been working towards one, your Grace. He is aware of the scale of his crime and knows that a pardon would take time."

"And now he's coming back anyway, before getting a pardon? Man's got balls."

Varys hesitated for a heartbeat before clearing his throat for a moment. "Word reached me that he has heard this 'Call' that so many of the descendants of the First Men have heard."

Robert stared at him and then closed his eyes and pinched the bridge of his nose with a finger and thumb. "Bugger."

"Indeed, your Grace."

He placed a hand on Stormbreaker and thought long and hard for a moment. Then he made a decision. "Issue the pardon. Send word of it to White Harbour and also to Ned at Winterfell. Tell Ned I'll talk to him about it when we reach Winterfell. Make it clear though that the pardon does not make Ser Jorah Lord of Bear Island again. I think that Ned said that Mormont's aunt is in charge of the place now and is doing a damn sight better job of running the place. Ser Jorah Mormont must know that we forgive for expediency but we do not forget."

"A merciful decision, your Grace."

He thought about it. "Merciful? Not really. There's a war coming Varys. All I'm probably doing is delaying the moment of his death."

The eunuch peered at him carefully. "Who will we be fighting your Grace?"

This was a surprisingly hard question to answer. "I think that Ned Stark knows better than I do at the moment," he muttered. "And perhaps not who, but more what." He looked over at the log. He had a lot to do and he strode over to it and hoisted it back onto his shoulders. Looking back at Varys he could see that the eunuch had gone quite pale. "What?"

"You said… that we'd be fighting a what, your Grace?"

He shifted the log a little so that a slight knob of wood didn't press so hard into his shoulder. "Buggered if I know. My dreams have been bloody odd of late. I keep dreaming of a white man-like creature with eyes like blue stars." He shrugged, no easy feat with a log on your shoulders and then grinned at Varys. "This Call's gone out, I feel a pull North, Stormbreaker's been found, the Seven are giving warnings and the Company of the Rose is returning. There's a war coming, Varys. Best I get ready for it." And then he strode off around the yard. Six turns around the yard perhaps?

Daenerys

She leant back against the cool stone just behind the bench in the alcove and stared out to sea with almost unseeing eyes. Somewhere out there was the fleet of the ships that had taken the Company of the Rose away. And Ser Jorah Mormont of course. The man who had told such terrible lies about her father.

Lies that were true.

She thought about the book she'd discovered in the Magister's library, the book that she'd read secretly. The book that she'd cried over. The book that had told her, in the mercilessly dry and clinical language of the historian, that her father had been raving mad by the end of his life. That her father had ordered men to be burnt alive, for 'crimes' that existed only within his own head. The book that she had carefully hidden after she had read it. Viserys could not be allowed to see it. He'd scream and shout and probably order it burnt.

She closed her eyes for a moment and then looked back at the sea. There was something else that she had to admit. Her brother was starting to scare her. He'd been increasingly erratic for the past year, but recently he'd gone past that and into obsession. It was that dragon egg. Viserys was obsessed with it.

Her brother was more than obsessed. He'd tell her in endless detail about how he'd fly Balerion the Greater Black Dread to the Red Keep and then hunt the Userper down… and tear him limb from limb… and roast him… and then crack the bones open… and then eat the marrow.

She wasn't entirely sure who was going to eat that marrow. Which worried her. The way he spoke about it…

She sighed and then got to her feet and walked back to the building. All was not well there either. Magister Mopatis was still puzzled as to exactly why the Dothraki had vanished. And he was also angry about the spy that had been uncovered – a trusted servant had vanished, someone that the Magister had trusted. The fact that he had vanished was not good, and security had apparently been stepped up.

From the scraps of conversation that she'd overheard the Magister was also worried about her brother, albeit more in a "the boy is mad" undertone to the man with the gurgling laugh that he occasionally met on the path that led down to the sea.

As she entered her chambers she looked at the three little dragon eggs fondly. They weren't as large as her brother's egg, but she was still fond of them, with their beautiful colours and the ridges and whorls on their surface.

It was then that she heard a footstep to one side. She turned her head to see who was there and had just enough time to register Viserys and the anguished but intense look on his face before something slammed into the side of her head and she knew no more.

When she awoke it was to find that she had a terrible headache and felt as if she was about to be sick. It was then that she realised that there was something in her mouth and her eyes opened as wide as she could when she then also realised that she couldn't move her hands. She looked down, her mind screaming with pain and confusion. Gagged. She was gagged. Her hands were tied together - and then also tied to her waist. Her feet were tied too.

She was quivering with fear as she looked about her. Where was she? A room, somewhere out of the way, the air musty and stale. There was a table to one side and barrels beyond it. There were lit lanterns on the barrels, six of them in a row.

It was then that she saw it. On the other side of the table was a stone slab of some kind. And there was a man spread-eagled on it. His unseeing eyes were staring at the ceiling and his throat was a red ruin. She recognised him. It was the Magister's missing servant.

And Viserys's egg was resting against his throat. Along with her three eggs.

A muffled sob reached her ears and she looked on her other side. Oh Gods. One of the other servants – Tirys was it? – was lying on the stone floor next to her, also gagged and bound. And from her eyes she too was terrified out of her mind.

A door creaked to one side and then booted feet hurried in, before hands pulled her to one side roughly. Viserys. It was Viserys. His hair was disordered, his clothing was untidy and his eyes… his eyes were mad.

"Dany!" Viserys almost crooned the word as he stared down at her. "I'm sorry. I really am. But the Dragon King needs a dragon. I have a destiny." His eyes were lit from within with a terrible light. "I need a dragon. The egg isn't hatching. So I need to give it a boost. Blood boost." He giggled at the last word.

Madness. This was madness. "Whhhghhh?" she tried to scream through the gag and he glared back down at her.

"What? Oh – 'what'? His blood wasn't high enough. Wasn't enough. I need more. So I found this slut near your room. And then I had a thought – what about you? You're royal. You aren't as good as me, you're not a king like me, but you'll do." He reached out with a trembling hand and stroked her cheek. "I'm so sorry. But it's for the best. After I hatch my dragon you'll see that it's for the best."

How can I see that it's for the best if I'm going to be dead? She wanted to scream the words in his face.

Viserys stood abruptly and then paused. "A bowl. I need a bowl. For the blood." And then he seemed to shamble off, as if his limbs were only loosely connected to him all of a sudden, through a small door to one side.

She peered down at her hands, almost cross-eyed with effort. The knots were tight, but if she wriggled a bit…. Perhaps she could get loose. She had small hands and thin wrists and she worked frantically to try and free herself. It wasn't working. She tried harder – and then suddenly the door opposite her was thrown open and a man rushed in. She peered up at him, before wanting to suddenly burst into tears. It was the Magister. He looked dishevelled and dirty, with a lantern in one hand and a dagger in the other.

"Princess!" Mopatis cried and then darted over to her, moving surprisingly fast for such a large man. He gently pulled the gag from her mouth and then cut the roped tying her hands together. "What happened?"

She coughed and then reeled as she tried to re-order her jagged thoughts. "Vis… Viserys. It… it was my brother… he killed your servant… Blood magic I… I think."

The Magister stared at her in horror and then looked at the body to one side. "By the Gods…" Then he sighed, suddenly looking years older. "He's mad. Why didn't I listen?"

"To… to who?"

The Magister opened his mouth – and then suddenly a pottery bowl smashed against the side of his head and he staggered – and then collapsed onto his back, his face suddenly bloody.

The Viserys who reappeared by her side was no longer her brother but a howling lunatic. "Mad? Mad am I! Peasant! Merchant! I AM THE DRAGON!" He quivered and then almost seemed to jerk in place for a moment – and then he threw back his head and burst into hysterical laughter.

"More blood!" Viserys said eventually. "More blood! More blood for Balerion the Greater Black Dread! He'll be strong and fast and big and he'll crunch everyone's bones and suck the marrow from them. Crunch, crunch! Won't it be glorious Dany? Yes, very glorious."

She stared at him, terrified out of her mind. She was about to scream for help, when suddenly Viserys was kneeling by her, his knife in a trembling hand by her neck. "Most glorious, yes. I'm sorry Dany. I really am. But it's all for the best. You'll see. I'll hatch your eggs too. They won't be as good – you're just a girl, so your eggs won't be as fine as mine – but I am the Dragon and all dragons belong to me you see."

She was about to take a deep breath and then scream for help when a mighty hand suddenly clamped down on the back of Visery's neck and pulled him away violently, so much so that the knife fell from his hand. Illyrio Mopatis was somehow on his feet, his face covered in blood and his legs trembling, but he had Viserys in what looked like a grip of iron.

"Stupid… little… BOY!" The Magister roared the words. "Mad… boy! To break… guest's rights… Kill my servant… try and kill your sister…"

Viserys yelped with pain. "I am the Dragon!" He wailed the words. "I am the KING!"

"You're a lunatic!" Motapis roared.

"I shall hatch my egg! And have him eat you!"

Mopatis smirked at this. "You can try," he panted. "I… had a mason carve… that egg out of stone. You were too stupid to… tell the difference!"

Viserys went still – and then he went berserk. "NO!" The word was howled and he shuddered out of the other man's grip and turned on him. But fast as he was Motapis was faster, grabbing Viserys around the neck with both hands and squeezing, his knuckles whitening.

Dany watched this with horror – and then her mind seemed to snap back into the here and now. Where was the knife? She looked around desperately and then saw it. Grabbing it she sawed at the rope around her feet desperately.

When she looked up again she saw that her brother was going purple in the face and beating ineffectually at the great hands that were choking the life out of him. And then something seemed to occur to him and he slapped a desperate hand at his side. She watched him – and then she saw his hand find his dagger, draw it and then punch it deep into the side of the Magister.

Mopatis didn't make a sound – but he did reel after a long moment, pulling Viserys with him. They both smashed into the table, jolting it hard enough to send one of the lanterns sliding across the surface and then fall to the ground. Something broke inside it and suddenly flames shot up. The Magister seemed to recover for a moment, letting out another roar of anger, this time mixed with pain, and the two went around and around in a quick orbit of desperate violence.

Viserys pulled the dagger out and then sank it in again and this time Mopatis screamed in agonised pain. Again the two whirled around and this time they slammed against the barrels. The lanterns there shuddered and two fell, breaking apart. More flames.

I have to get out of here, she thought desperately, I have to get help. The rope yielded to the blade – and then she heard the desperate whimpering to her side. "Tirys," she muttered, "I'll free you." She crouched over the girl and hacked at the bindings quickly, her heart still singing in terror. It wasn't easy and her hands were slippery with blood from her desperate frenzy and the way that her grip slipped.

And then something caught with a roar. She looked over her shoulder. Something in one of those barrels was now alight and there were flames everywhere. Mopatis and Viserys were swaying backwards and forwards on the edge of it – and then suddenly the Magister collapsed into the flames, pulling her brother down with him. One of them or both of them were screaming and she looked away and kept sawing at the bindings of the servant. It seemed to take an age. Hands first, then feet and, and then they were both pulling themselves upright, sobbing with terror.

"Get out of here – get help!" Dany urged. "I have to help them!"

"Princess… they're dead." Tirys choked the words out. "They're dead."

She shook her head and looked over. And then she saw movement in the flames. A smouldering figure shakily stood up, garments aflame, hair gone, face blackened and cracked, eyes that were no more than red holes in his head. It was Viserys. Her brother reached out with smoking and blackened claw, gabbling something in a hoarse voice – and then he collapsed back into the flames.

"Go!" Dany sobbed as she pushed the servant ahead of her. And then she remembered the eggs. The dragon eggs. Something stubborn sparked in her heart and she darted back deeper into the room and grabbed them, holding them close against her chest. The three were real, she knew it and she pulled a face at the black stone that had driven her brother mad.

"Princess! Come!" Tirys was at the doorway now, with a what seemed to be a wild-eyed guard, but as Dany took a step towards that doorway something else seemed to catch and then burst and all of a sudden there were flames creeping over the walls and floor by the door. She shrank back. It was too dangerous. And then she saw the door to one side. She darted through it – and then stopped dead. It was small and had what looked like the underside of a flight of stairs to one side. There was crockery stacked in places and she realised that this was where Viserys must have been when the Magister had found her.

She crept into the void under the stairs and waited for the end to come, cradling the eggs with her bloodied hands. Yes, this was the end.