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own up for her inspection "This is beauty Touch it Go on Caress the fabric"
Dany touched it The cloth was so sers like water She could not rehtened her She pulled her hand away "Is it really ister Illyrio," Viserys said, sht "The color will bring out the violet in your eyes And you shall have gold as well, and jewels of all sorts Illyrio has proht you ht She had forgotten what that was like Perhaps she had never really known "Why does he give us so h on half a year, they had lived in thehis food, pah to know that such gifts seldom come without their price, here in the free city of Pentos
"Illyrio is no fool," Viserys said He was a gaunt young man with nervous hands and a feverish look in his pale lilac eyes "The et my friends when I coister Illyrio was a dealer in spices, ges He had friends in all of the Nine Free Cities, it was said, and even beyond, in Vaes Dothrak and the fabled lands beside the JadeSea It was also said that he’d never had a friend he wouldn’t cheerfully sell for the right price Dany listened to the talk in the streets, and she heard these things, but she knew better than to question her brother when he wove his webs of drea when roused Viserys called it "waking the dragon"
Her brother hung the gown beside the door "Illyrio will send the slaves to bathe you Be sure you wash off the stink of the stables Khal Drogo has a thousand horses, tonight he looks for a different sort of hten yourself" He pushed back her shoulders with his hands "Let theers brushed lightly over her budding breasts and tightened on a nipple "You will not fail o hard for you You don’t want to wake the dragon, do you?" His fingers twisted her, the pinch cruelly hard through the rough fabric of her tunic "Do you?" he repeated
"No," Dany said meekly
Her brother smiled "Good" He touched her hair, aln, sweet sister, they will say that it began tonight"
When he was gone, Dany went to herand looked out wistfully on the waters of the bay The square brick towers of Pentos were black silhouettes outlined against the setting sun Dany could hear the singing of the red priests as they lit their night fires and the shouts of ragged children playing games beyond the walls of the estate For a moment she wished she could be out there with them, barefoot and breathless and dressed in tatters, with no past and no future and no feast to attend at Khal Drogo’s manse
Somewhere beyond the sunset, across the narrow sea, lay a land of green hills and flowered plains and great rushing rivers, where towers of dark stone rose ahts rode to battle beneath the banners of their lords The Dothraki called that land Rhaesh Andahli, the land of the Andals In the Free Cities, they talked of Westeros and the SunsetKingdoms Her brother had a simpler name "Our land," he called it The words were like a prayer with hiods were sure to hear "Ours by blood right, taken from us by treachery, but ours still, ours forever You do not steal froon reon did remember, but Dany could not She had never seen this land her brother said was theirs, this realm beyond the narrow sea These places he talked of, Casterly Rock and the Eyrie, Highgarden and the Vale of Arryn, Dorne and the Isle of Faces, they were just words to her Viserys had been a boy of eight when they fled King’s Landing to escape the advancing ar in their mother’s womb
Yet sometimes Dany would picture the way it had been, so often had her brother told her the stories Theon the ship’s black sails Her brother Rhaegar battling the Usurper in the bloody waters of the Trident and dying for the wo by the ones Viserys called the Usurper’s dogs, the lords Lannister and Stark Princess Elia of Dorne pleading for ar’s heir was ripped from her breast and ons staring down sightlessly froslayer opened Father’s throat with a golden sword
She had been born on Dragonstone ninesummer storm threatened to rip the island fastness apart They said that storaryen fleet was se stone blocks were ripped fro into the aters of the narrow sea Herher, and for that her brother Viserys had never forgiven her
She did not reain, just before the Usurper’s brother set sail with his new-built fleet By then only Dragonstone itself, the ancient seat of their House, had redo The garrison had been prepared to sell theht Ser Willem Darry and four loyalwith her wet nurse, and set sail under cover of darkness for the safety of the Braavosian coast
She rerey bear of aorders from his sickbed The servants had lived in terror of him, but he had always been kind to Dany He called her "Little Princess" and sometimes "My Lady," and his hands were soft as old leather He never left his bed, though, and the sht, a hot, moist, sickly sweet odor That hen they lived in Braavos, in the big house with the red door Dany had her own room there, with a lemon tree outside herAfter Ser Willem had died, the servants had stolen what little money they had left, and soon after they had been put out of the big house Dany had cried when the red door closed behind them forever
They had wandered since then, from Braavos to Myr, from Myr to Tyrosh, and on to Qohor and Volantis and Lys, never staying long in any one place Her brother would not allow it The Usurper’s hired knives were close behind theh Dany had never seen one
At first the isters and archons and aryens to their homes and tables, but as the years passed and the Usurper continued to sit upon the Iron Throne, doors closed and their lives grew meaner Years past they had been forced to sell their last few treasures, and now even the coin they had gotten froone In the alleys and wine sinks of Pentos, they called her brother "the beggar king" Dany did not want to knohat they called her
"We will have it all back someday, sweet sister," he would promise her Sometimes his hands shook when he talked about it "The jewels and the silks, Dragonstone and King’s Landing, the Iron Throne and the SevenKingdoms, all they have taken from us, ill have it back" Viserys lived for that day All that Daenerys wanted back was the big house with the red door, the lemon tree outside her , the childhood she had never known
There ca away from theIllyrio’s servants entered, bowed, and set about their business They were slaves, a gift froister’s many Dothraki friends There was no slavery in the free city of Pentos Nonetheless, they were slaves The old woirl made up for it She was Illyrio’s favorite, a fair-haired, blue-eyed wench of sixteen who chattered constantly as she worked
They filled her bath with hot water brought up froirl pulled the rough cotton tunic over Dany’s head and helped her into the tub The water was scalding hot, but Daenerys did not flinch or cry out She liked the heat It made her feel clean Besides, her brother had often told her that it was never too hot for a Targaryen "Ours is the house of the dragon," he would say "The fire is in our blood"
The old woently coirl scrubbed her back and her feet and told her how lucky she was "Drogo is so rich that even his slaves wear golden collars A hundred thousand men ride in his khalasar, and his palace in Vaes Dothrak has two hundred rooms and doors of solid silver" There was more like that, so much more, what a handsome man the khal was, so tall and fierce, fearless in battle, the best rider ever toShe had always assue For centuries the Targaryens had on the Conqueror had taken his sisters to bride The line must be kept pure, Viserys had told her a thousand tiolden blood of old Valyria, the blood of the dragon Dragons did not le their blood with that of lesser er, a barbarian
When she was clean, the slaves helped her froirl brushed her hair until it shone like molten silver, while the old woman anointed her with the spiceflower perfume of the Dothraki plains, a dab on each wrist, behind her ears, on the tips of her breasts, and one last one, cool on her lips, down there between her legs They dressed her in the wisps that Magister Illyrio had sent up, and then the gown, a deep pluirl slid the gilded sandals onto her feet, while the old woolden bracelets crusted with amethysts around her wrists Last of all caolden torc elyphs
"Now you look all a princess," the girl said breathlessly when they were done Dany glanced at her ihtfully provided A princess, she thought, but she reo was so rich even his slaves wore golden collars She felt a sudden chill, and gooseflesh pi in the cool of the entry hall, seated on the edge of the pool, his hand trailing in the water He rose when she appeared and looked her over critically "Stand there," he told her "Turn around Yes Good You look"
"Regal," Magister Illyrio said, stepping through an archway Hedelicacy for such a arled as he walked Geer, and his man had oiled his forked yellow beard until it shone like real gold "May the Lord of Light shower you with blessings on this ister said as he took her hand He bowed his head, showing a thin gliold of his beard "She is a vision, Your Grace, a vision," he told her brother "Drogo will be enraptured"
"She’s too skinny," Viserys said His hair, the sahtly behind his head and fastened with a dragonbone brooch It was a severe look that eaunt lines of his face He rested his hand on the hilt of the sword that Illyrio had lent hio likes his wo?"
"She has had her blood She is old enough for the khal," Illyrio told hiold hair, those purple eyesshe is the blood of old Valyria, no doubt, no doubtand highborn, daughter of the old king, sister to the new, she cannot fail to entrance our Drogo" When he released her hand, Daenerys found herself tre
"I suppose," her brother said doubtfully "The savages have queer tastes Boys, horses, sheep"
"Best not suggest this to Khal Drogo," Illyrio said
Anger flashed in her brother’s lilac eyes "Do you take htly "I take you for a king Kings lack the caution of coiven offense" He turned away and clapped his hands for his bearers
The streets of Pentos were pitch-dark when they set out in Illyrio’s elaborately carved palanquin Two servants went ahead to light their way, carrying ornate oil lanterns with panes of pale blue glass, while a dozen strong men hoisted the poles to their shoulders It arm and close inside behind the curtains Dany could sh his heavy perfumes