That evening, Tyrion walked down to the beach, followed by Brienne, wearing their finest clothes. Podrick followed a few steps behind, carrying their cloaks. They had debated whether or not to bring him along, then decided that such an occasion was a perfect occasion for a squire to practice his skills, even among warlike barbarians.
They approached the longhouse, which was surrounded by blazing torches. Tyrion looked about him as he entered. The structure was wide enough to accommodate two rows of tables several feet apart, each occupied on one side by the enormous marauders, but far enough from the walls that cupbearers could pass unimpeded, and capped off at one end by a chair so huge it could only belong to the Wolf. At the far end he recognized the Deathbound bloodriders.
Benches ran the length of the longhouse, though next to the colossal throne were a pair of high-backed chairs. The roughly-hewn tables groaned under the weight of platters bearing slices of grilled meat as thick as a man's arm, which the marauders devoured with gusto. The improvised hall was lit by braseroes placed between the tables, the smoke escaping through holes in the roof. The floor was the sand of the beach itself, though it had been cleared of debris.
The Wolf himself came to greet his guests, showing them to their seats. Tyrion heard some sniggering as he climbed into his chair, but a clacking of skulls told him the Wolf must have turned his head at the sound.
As Tyrion sat down, a bald and bearded marauder placed a small golden goblet in front of him. It was a wondrously-crafted thing, showing short, stocky figures in magnificent armor and beards reaching to their knees. The Wolf snarled.
"Einarr! það er of lítið!"
The Wolf continued berating his henchman, who swiftly returned, carrying a visibly larger cup ornamented with rubies the size of Tyrion's fist. In it was a clear liquid that smelled strongly of honey.
The rest of the feasters looked expectantly at their captain. The Wolf raised his enormous tankard and yelled "Skull!", perhaps owing to his preferred decoration. They repeated the cry, lifting drinking horns Tyrion couldn't have carried with both hands and draining them as one.
Tyrion drained his cup, surprised that far from the rotgut he had expected such men to drink, it was quite pleasant. Brienne was similarly impressed, looking at her own goblet, a silver cup finely engraved with long-haired women with pointed ears.
The Wolf yelled something, and a marauder dragged a terrified-looking minstrel into the middle of the longhouse. The man looked all around him with wide eyes, protectively clutching a curious instrument like a fiddle with a wheel. The Wolf yelled at him and threw a small purse at his feet. The minstrel gulped visibly, but soon started singing a tune that grew in strength and confidence.
It was clearly an old favorite with the marauders, who were singing along in various keys and tempoes depending on how many toasts they'd participated in.
Several cups later, the Wolf bellowed a request, and the minstrel sang in a different tongue, though it was no less alien to Tyrion. At the end of the song, the Wolf burst into raucous laughter, soon followed by the other marauders. Tyrion, halfway through a goblet of the richest beer he had ever tasted, realized few of them could understand the song, and were only laughing along because their captain was.
"What was that about?"
The Wolf wiped a tear from his eye before answering.
"Bretonnian song. About an elf, a bag of apples, and the horrible fate bestowed on both by a Chaos troll."
Another marauder yelled at the minstrel, tossing a handful of coins at him to loud cheers from his fellows. The minstrel started another song with a faster rhythm, soon drowned out by the marauders pounding their cups, fists, and in one case, a passed-out comrade's skull, against the tables.
"Jarl!"
Once the minstrel had finished, a particularly fat marauder stood up from behind a tower of empty plates and pointed at Tyrion, bellowing something.
"Njall Never-Full would hear the southerlings sing, though he expects to be disappointed. You want him to piss off?"
Without a word, Tyrion finished his cup, stood on the chair and hopped onto the table. An expectant silence grew out around him, the Wolf looking amused. Tyrion spread his arms wide.
"Podrick?"
"Yes m'lord!"
"These... gentlemen would like to hear you sing."
Podrick looked around uncertainly at the hairy barbarians surrounding him. Then he grabbed a drinking horn from a passing servant, drained it in a single gulp, and launched into song.
When it was over, the Wolf looked over his warriors, many of which were silent.
"You a minstrel, boy?"
Unsure as to how he should answer the barbarian speaking to him, Podrick looked down at Tyrion and Brienne, who nodded at him.
"No, m'lord. I'm a squire. To Ser Brienne."
"Hmph. Can't say I liked the lyrics."
"Njall!"
The Wolf yelled at the obese marauder, who stood up with some difficulty, then tramped up to Podrick, slapping a flipper-like hand on his shoulder and and thrust a jewel-hilted dagger into Podrick's belt.
"He liked it, in any case. To the southerlings, who can sing better than they fight!"
The Wolf yelled something to his marauders, ending with another cry of "Skull!"
The feasters still able to lift their drinks did so, and the night went on.
After a time Brienne looked around. The Wolf was engrossed in telling Tyrion a ribald tale involving a very self-satisfied man finding an unusual solution to missing a bench at his wedding feast. As she turned her head, she saw one of the revelers was drinking less than his comrades and staring intently at her.
Where most of the Wolf's marauders could be mistaken for bears in dim light, this one was not as tall or hairy as his comrades but still visibly muscled, long, Lannister-blonde hair dangling in thick plaits, and a chin as smooth as a maiden's. Clearly not one used to being dismissed by womenfolk.
The marauder caught her eye, and smirked.
"… but then in walks the bride, and all twelve of them go flying up, and break their necks when they hit their heads on the rafters!"
Tyrion laughed almost as loud as the Wolf. The handsome marauder took advantage of the lull in the conversation to stand up and leap lithely over the table, swaggering to stand before the Wolf.
His face was a mask of arrogance, as he turned to Brienne and said something that went on for a while, making several obscene gestures that made his meaning quite clear. The Wolf translated, though without the hand motions.
"Snorri Fairhair challenges Ser Brienne of Tarth to a test of strength and valor."
Tyrion spoke up as Brienne looked the marauder up and down.
"I take it that wasn't a literal translation?"
"Would you like the literal one?"
Brienne interrupted.
"Thank you, I think I rather understood. Would he be satisfied with flooring me, or are there other conditions?"
The Wolf took a gulp from his tankard.
"A single wrestling match, with the loser obeying the winner's demands until the sun rises. He was rather specific with those demands, if you want t-"
"Thank you, no."
Brienne stared coolly at the marauder.
"With or without armor?"
The Wolf translated the question. Snorri sniggered as he answered while bringing both hands to his groin.
"He says with, it'll be a finer victory for him, and more exciting once he pulls it off you."
"Here and now?"
The Wolf transmitted the question the the marauder, who looked surprised and less self-assured, but nodded. The Wolf's translation was entirely unnecessary.
"Very well. Any special rules? No biting, no gouging, that sort of thing? I wouldn't want to leave him disfigured, he looks the type to rely on his looks to get him by."
A visibly amused Wolf gave the answer.
"Usually the only rule is empty hands and nothing below the belt, but..."
Brienne nodded and stood up, taking the long way around the tables. Snorri smirked as Brienne passed him and waited until she had turned around to make a lecherous gesture with his tongue and fingers. Tyrion stared. The man's tongue was at least twice the length of an ordinary man's, and forked at the end like a snake's.
The marauder spread his arms wide, then said something that elicited raucous cheers among his comrades. Brienne waited until they had quieted down.
"Ser Wolf?"
"He said he'll make you scream four times: once in pain during the wrestling, and three times in pleasure while he's fucking you."
Snorri helpfully made thrusting motions with his hips into his cupped hands in case there were some who hadn't understood. Brienne made sure to put an undercurrent of disappointment in her reply.
"Only three?"
The Wolf snorted into his drink, spraying wine and coughing a few times before he was able to translate. Brienne was secretly pleased to have shattered the barbarian's annoyingly superior air and to see that several of the marauders looked impressed, some of them laughing. A lifetime spent fighting men and learning to puncture their egos was paying off handsomely. Snorri looked quite unhappy at having been upstaged, balling and unballing his fists.
The Wolf stood up, holding an empty gold-encrusted drinking horn high.
"When you hear it fall."
Brienne locked gazes with Snorri. The Wolf dropped the horn, which fell against the table with a clang.
Snorri lunged, both arms wide as if to catch Brienne around the waist and hoist her over his shoulder, but in an instant Brienne had caught his arm and pulled it to the side, leaving Snorri to spin around, stumbling into her extended leg and falling flat on his back on the sand with one arm across his chest as she released her grip.
Stunned silence filled the feast hall as Brienne knelt on her opponent's torso, pinning his arm under her knees, then grabbing his flailing arm with both hands, twisting it.
The hall filled with roars of laughter, cheers, and what sounded like encouragement and insults. Brienne managed to avoid smiling as she looked at the shamefaced barbarian. When he finally stopped struggling, she dropped his arm and got up, turning to return to her seat.
Entirely certain as to how he would react, she spun around even before the surprised noises in the audience could warn her.
Snorri's fist, closed on a heavy metal tankard, crashed onto her breastplate and splashing it with strong-smelling wine. He only had time to look surprised before she backhanded him, still wearing her steel gauntlet, smashing him into the table, spilling food and drink. Angry hands pushed him away from the table, and the marauder slithered down, looking up at Brienne towering over him, nose and lips bleeding, all trace of arrogance gone.
She gave him a contemptuous glance.
"Is he surrendering yet, Ser Wolf? I believe he might need the use of both his hands for the upcoming siege."
"Indeed he will. Though given his performance, he might do better if they were broken."
The Wolf barked at the marauder. His companions' jeers rang out even louder as he nodded, then looked fearfully up at Brienne, still standing over him.
"Bit short, but well fought. He is yours until the dawn, Ser Brienne of Tarth."
"Hmm. What shall I do with him?"
Brienne looked over the marauder thoughtfully. Wine dripped from her breastplate.
"Podrick, help me remove this."
Podrick crawled under the table to join Brienne, undoing the shoulder straps of her breastplate. The Wolf didn't need to translate what the other marauders were saying when they saw she wore a loose-fitting jerkin underneath, their expressions of disappointment were clear enough. Snorri successively looked apprehensive, then confused, then hopeful, until Brienne placed the armor in his arms.
"He soiled my armor as he intended to soil me, he can clean and polish it until the sun rises!"
The Wolf smashed his fist on the table.
"HA!"
The barbarian translated the order, clearly enjoying himself. There were hoots of derisive laughter from the tables, Snorri looking furious and standing up. He threw the breastplate to the ground, facing the Wolf, but Tyrion saw his face pale and his eyes turn down. Looking at the Wolf, he noted the giant's hand was resting ostentatiously near a knife that could have served as a sword for a regular-sized man.
Snorri picked up the armor, huffing under the weight, and carried it over to the side of the longhouse, where he sat down, grabbed a rag and started cleaning the armor.
"Sarr Brienne af Tarth! Skull!"
The Wolf lifted his tankard, imitated by the rest of the drinkers. Brienne returned to her seat and sat down. Cupbearers were returning to fill horns and tankards, but she could tell her feat had rubbed several of the men the wrong way, stealing dark glances at her. She ignored them, having had ample experience with such occurrences.
"You really invited Brienne just to do that?"
"He boasted that no woman could resist him in battle or in bed. Any man who sails with me must make good on his claims."
Tyrion looked at the marauder scrubbing away.
"Is it really that much of a flaw?"
The Wolf wiped his mouth and looked at Tyrion, grabbing a golden drinking horn his henchman had just placed in front of him.
"It is a dangerous thing to make idle boasts you cannot back up. I learned that to my cost long ago, and will not see it happen on my ship if I can help it."
Tyrion looked incredulous.
"Like your Dothraki? I doubt there's any man who's never boasted of his real or imaginary exploits while drunk."
Beer erupted from the Wolf's drinking horn as his fist closed on it, crushing in an heartbeat. The Wolf seemed to be looking at something thousands of miles away.
"Got that right."
As the Wolf yelled at his henchman behind him, Tyrion and Brienne exchanged a look. Each made a silent vow to avoid asking the Wolf about what seemed a very touchy subject. The bald marauder took the crumpled wreck and replaced it with a tankard nearly two feet tall. Brienne interested herself in a plate of roasted meat.
The Wolf, his new tankard in hand, took a swig and looked at Tyrion.
"Speaking of feats that sound impossible. How did you come to kill a man with a shield?"
Tyrion sighed.
"It's not a regular occurrence, I assure you. I was ambushed, one of my attackers fell to the ground, I grabbed a shield and beat his head into pulp."
Tyrion drained his cup but found the Wolf looking thoughtfully at him.
"As good a method as any, given the circumstances."
The Wolf rose to his feet, holding his tankard aloft.
"Tyrion Skaldslaktr! Skull!"
The feasters raised their cups again and the Wolf sat down.
"You do anything else worthy of note, Shield-slayer?"
Tyrion held out his cup, Podrick quickly filling it.
"Well, there was the time I walked into a chamber containing a pair of live dragons."
The Wolf grinned.
"Of course you did. There's much to say about dwarves, but lacking courage isn't one of them."
The Wolf finished his drink, leaving Tyrion puzzled at his meaning.
"And what'd you do then? Kill them both, beat them into submission or shame them with the size of your balls?"
"No, I unchained them. They were kept apart from each other, and...went right back to sleep next to each other."
Though bleary-eyed, the Wolf looked at Tyrion with what looked like respect.
"You unchained them. Just like that. Well, I can certainly understand that going up to your sister unarmed holds no fear after pulling something like that. I don't think your namesake could ever claim to have done something similar."
"My... namesake?"
"Another Tyrion."
The Wolf downed his tankard.
"Nothing like you though, arrogant bastard, tall for his kind, hair like Snorri over there... Good fighter, but he won't take kindly to knowing there's someone with his name walking up to chained dragons, freeing them and emerging unscathed. I'll be sure to tell him if I see him."
The Wolf chuckled at what seemed to be a private joke. Another barrel was brought out and tapped, to the audible joy of those still drinking.
Tyrion, feeling inspired by the wine, felt another story was called for.
"And then, there was the time I brought a donkey and a honeycomb into a brothel..."
Hours later, Brienne had long since retired and Podrick been given permission to relieve himself outside, as his incessant squirming was getting on Tyrion's nerves.
Tyrion would have been entirely unable to recount how it had happened, but the topic had turned to love.
"Her father was opposed to it on principle, thought she was too good for the likes of me... Where his ancestors had carved out their holding by sweat and blood, he made deals and alliances, growing fat on tribute rather than stolen plunder. He saw her as a piece on his playing-board, her happiness irrelevant in the face of his grandiose plans. You must know some people like that."
Tyrion stared into his cup. He had indeed known someone like that, and even shot him with a crossbow.
"And then I..."
The Wolf's voice trailed off.
"I lost her. All thanks to her father, curse his name. I would..."
The Wolf drained his tankard.
"I would never have found happiness, nor could I have given her the life she deserved. I can see that now, but I found that out in a manner needlessly cruel on his part."
Tyrion, remembering the Mountain's excruciating death and not wanting to know what the barbarian considered needless cruelty, stayed silent but drank again.
"When did you kill your father?"
Through the haze of wine, Tyrion vaguely felt as though he should be offended. But coming from the Wolf, who seemed to judge a man's worth by the number and relative worth of victims, the question seemed entirely natural, as if asking how many winters one had survived.
"After you came and killed the Mountain. I was back in my cell, my brother broke me out, and I went up for a last word with my father. I found him... or rather, I found the woman I loved, in his bed. Just after they'd..."
The Wolf said nothing. Tyrion pushed on anyway, his own voice sounding as though it belonged to someone else.
"I... murdered her. I didn't mean to, I didn't want to, and yet her blood remains on my hands just the same. After that, killing my father was barely an afterthought. Tywin Lannister, killed by his son while taking a shit... "
Tyrion drank deep. He noticed the Wolf was staring into the depths of his own tankard. The wine pushed him to ask.
"And you?"
The Wolf sighed like a hurricane.
"Nothing so liberating. After I k- ... After I... lost her, when the moment came to make her father pay for the life he had denied us... I let him live. It would have brought me great pleasure to gut him then and there, alone in his darkened hall, abandoned by vassals and allies alike, but I knew it would be better in the long run to let him live long enough to see his life's work, all that his forefathers had striven to build up from nothing, ravaged and brought to ruin in less than a year. He even tried to apologize, after he had exhausted all other options."
Tyrion snorted.
"Mine didn't."
"Then whatever your father's faults, he was braver than Viglundr Lie-Spewer."
Without a word, the giant and the dwarf's cups collided, and both were drained in a single gulp.
His cup empty, searching desperately for a way to lighten the mood, Tyrion pointed to a particularly deformed skull on the Wolf's armor, too long and fang-filled to be a man's and yet too short to be a dog's.
"What the hell was that thing?"
The Wolf picked up the skull, seemingly glad for the interruption from what must have been melancholic thoughts.
"This? One of the first ones I took when the gods deemed there were no suitable heads left for me to take east, west and south of Norsca. They tasked me with killing a wolf-kin, who I found in the middle of a war between wizards. Magic flying everywhere, children fighting with the courage of men... a courage he lacked. After a few, increasingly sad attempts on my life, he fled, into a forest of horrible things, living plants and giant spiders and worse."
"The bastard ran for so long the sun was rising when I finally slew him, and he was halfway through transforming into what you see here, neither fully man nor wolf... and of course, making his hide useless as a rug, which had been my intent."
"What... or where is Norsca?"
"My home. It's far to the north. Very far."
The Wolf finished his tankard, and yelled at his henchman. Tyrion looked around. Podrick reentered the hall, an expression of blissful relief on his face. Three marauders entered after him, looking at him with expressions of awe, horror and jealousy respectively.
"What will you do after the siege, Ser Wolf? Will you remain in Danaerys' employ?"
"I'll likely not remain at all. A free Norscan with a ship who remains in the same place grows soft. We come from harsh lands, and it made us strong. As Viglundr forgot."
The Wolf drained his tankard.
"No, once the city is taken and our deal ended, I will set sail again. I never know where the gods will send me next."
"Your gods... speak to you?"
"In a way. I receive dreams, visions, of the man or beast the gods wish to see beheaded. I see him, I see those around him, I see the lands where he lives... more or less."
The Wolf shrugged.
"It wouldn't be as satisfying a hunt if I were to jump him in the bath or a whorehouse."
Tyrion stared.
"I too have seen men, monsters and faraway places and in my sleep, especially if there was a lot of cheese at dinner, and yet felt no inclination to see them for myself."
Strangely, the Wolf did not look insulted.
"Ah, but you were not chosen by the gods for such a destiny. They must have other plans for you, or how could you have evaded death so often, been spared for so long, been granted so many chances ordinary men would slit throats to obtain, been brought so low and now set to rise even higher? You were born with a body that would have condemned you to a life of abuse and contempt from even gutter-trash, capering at the beck and call of some petty Southerner lordling, the lowest of the low, the weakest of the weak."
Despite the offensive description, Tyrion felt it was a list of facts rather than the Wolf's usual provocative intent.
"And yet here you are, feared and respected as the right hand of the Dragonqueen, on the cusp of victory, ready to take back her city, to stand triumphant over your sister, to avenge yourself of every wrong she has heaped upon you over the years. I take it the incident with your nephew was only the culmination of a lifetime of hate?"
Tyrion drained his cup.
"Yes. Ever since childhood, she... blamed me for our mother's death. Difficult birth. Tyrion Lannister, the self-made orphan..."
Tyrion shook his head as if to dispel evil memories.
"And then there was the incident, as you say, but I cannot claim to have lost much sleep over that."
Tyrion could not help but smile at the memory of Cersei's face at his trial, shortly before his clever decision to demand trial by combat turned against him.
"Ill-tempered little bastard, was he?"
Tyrion chuckled.
"In more ways than one, yes. Spoiled, self-centered, obeying his own whims... He was one of the worst kings we ever had, vicious and stupid all in one... and a coward to boot."
"Ah. I've known many like him."
The Wolf turned around, his tankard remaining empty. His henchman was leaning against a barrel, snoring gently.
"Need to do everything myself around here. EIN-"
Tyrion held his hands to his ears.
"No, no, let him sleep. I'm not far from nodding off myself."
The Wolf looked at Tyrion, and nodded.
"Then the last toast of the night, to the Dragonqueen, and her victory. Skull!"
Their cups were filled by Podrick, clinked together, and emptied.
The Wolf looked to the hall, now filled with snoring men, slumped on the table or against the wall. He and Tyrion were the only ones left drinking.
"Seems we ran out of drinkers before we ran out of drink."
Tyrion looked down the hall, where empty casks were strewn about and used as pillows by the sleeping marauders.
"You mean you still have more?"
"I do. It seems I overestimated the stomach of the horse-lovers."
The Wolf shook his head, then looked at Tyrion.
"Let me give you a gift, Shield-slayer, for I have rarely met a man to match me in drinking."
Tyrion bowed his head modestly.
"The remaining barrels are yours. By my count there must be a dozen casks left over of wines from Bordeleaux and Eataine, Couronne water-of-life, kvass and mjöðr from the northern fjords, the rice-wine of the eastern islands, Kislev firewater, even some of Bugman's Best. Come to the Seafang whenever you wish, and claim them."
Tyrion only recognized some of the names from the Wolf's comments during the feast, but each had been a true delight to drink.
"Thank you, Ser Wolf. I will make good use of them."
Tyrion stepped down from his chair, his legs slightly wobbly. Podrick, who was almost asleep himself, helped him put his cloak back on. Tyrion stepped around Snorri, who looked exhausted but still industriously polished Brienne's armor.
As they left the feasting hall, festooned with passed-out marauders, servants and Dothraki, Tyrion felt rather than saw the Wolf watching them go.