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Daenerys

When the battle was done, Dany rode her silver through the fields of the dead Her hand a themselves

Dothraki hooves had torn the earth and traround, while arakhs and arrows had sown a terrible new crop and watered it with blood Dying horses lifted their heads and screamed at her as she rode past Woundedthe a harvest of heads fro alike After the arrows fros would cory, the feral pack that was never far behind the khalasar

The sheep had been dead longest There seemed to be thousands of the froo’s riders had done that, Dany knew; no o’s khalasar would be such a fool as to waste his arrows on sheep when there were shepherds yet to kill

The toas afire, black plu as they rose into a hard blue sky Beneath broken walls of driedwhips as they herded the survivors froo’s khalasar walked with a sullen pride, even in defeat and bondage; they were slaves now, but they seemed not to fear it It was different with the townsfolk Dany pitied them; she re with blank, dead faces, pulling sobbing children by the hand There were only a few randfathers

Ser Jorah said the people of this country named themselves the Lhazareen, but the Dothraki called theht have taken them for Dothraki, for they had the same copper skin and almond-shaped eyes Now they looked alien to her, squat and flat-faced, their black hair cropped unnaturally short They were herders of sheep and eaters of vegetables, and Khal Drogo said they belonged south of the river bend The grass of the Dothraki sea was not meant for sheep

Dany saw one boy bolt and run for the river A rider cut hi their whips in his face, running hi hihs ran red with blood Another snared his ankle with a lash and sent hirew bored of the sport and put an arrow through his back

Ser Jorah reen surcoat over his rey steel The Dothraki had ht had spit insults right back in their teeth, tesword had clashed with arakh, and the rider whose taunts had been loudest had been left behind to bleed to death

Ser Jorah lifted the visor of his flat-topped greathelm as he rode up "Your lord husband awaits you within the town"

"Drogo took no har of consequence He sleo khals this day Khal Ogo first, and then the son, Fogo, who becao fell His bloodriders cut the bells fros louder than before"

Ogo and his son had shared the high bench with her lord husband at the na feast where Viserys had been crowned, but that was in Vaes Dothrak, beneath the Mother of Mountains, where every rider was a brother and all quarrels were put aside It was different out in the grass Ogo’s khalasar had been attacking the tohen Khal Drogo caught hiht, when they first saw the dust of their horses froer and ods heard the prayers of desperate men, took it for deliverance

Across the road, a girl no older than Dany was sobbing in a high thin voice as a rider shoved her over a pile of corpses, facedown, and thrust himself inside her Other riders dismounted to take their turns That was the sort of deliverance the Dothraki brought the Laon, Daenerys Targaryen reminded herself as she turned her face away She pressed her lips together and hardened her heart and rode on toward the gate

"Most of Ogo’s riders fled," Ser Jorah was saying "Still, there may be as many as ten thousand captives"

Slaves, Dany thought Khal Drogo would drive them downriver to one of the towns on Slaver’s Bay She wanted to cry, but she told herself that sheThis is war, this is what it looks like, this is the price of the Iron Throne

"I’ve told the khal he ought to make for Meereen," Ser Jorah said "They’ll pay a better price than he’d get froue last year, so the brothels are paying double for healthy young girls, and triple for boys under ten If enough children survive the journey, the gold will buy us all the ships we need, and hirerapedwail that went on and on and on Dany’s hand clenched hard around the reins, and she turned the silver’s head "Make them stop," she coht sounded perplexed

"You heard my words," she said "Stop them" She spoke to her khas in the harsh accents of Dothraki "Jhogo, Quaro, you will aid Ser Jorah I want no rape"

The warriors exchanged a baffled look

Jorah Mormont spurred his horse closer "Princess," he said, "you have a gentle heart, but you do not understand This is how it has always been Those men have shed blood for the khal Now they claiirl was still crying, her high singsong tongue strange to Dany’s ears The first man was done with her now, and a second had taken his place

"She is a la, Khaleesi The riders do her honor The Lamb Men lay with sheep, it is known"

"It is known," her hando, astride the tall grey stallion that Drogo had given hio will bring you her tongue" He drew his arakh

"I will not have her harmed," Dany said "I claio will know the reason why"

"Ai, Khaleesi," Jhogo replied, kicking his horse Quaro and the others followed his lead, the bells in their hair chi

"Go with them," she coave her a curious look "You are your brother’s sister, in truth"

"Viserys?" She did not understand

"No," he answered "Rhaegar" He galloped off

Dany heard Jhogo shout The rapers laughed at hio’s arakh flashed, and the hter turned to curses as the horseo and Rakharo were there She saw Aggo point across the road to where she sat upon her silver The riders looked at her with cold black eyes One spat The others scattered to their

All the while the e in and out of her, so intent on his pleasure that he see on around him Ser Jorah dismounted and wrenched hi in the o’s arrow through his throat Morirl off the pile of corpses and wrapped her in his blood-spattered cloak He led her across the road to Dany "What do you want done with her?"

The girl was treue Her hair was matted with blood "Doreah, see to her hurts You do not have a rider’s look, perhaps she will not fear you The rest, with ate

It orse inside the town Many of the houses were afire, and the jaqqa rhan had been about their grisly work Headless corpses filled the narroisty lanes They passed other wo raped Each time Dany reined up, sent her khas to make an end to it, and claimed the victim as slave One of them, a thick-bodied, flat-nosed woue, but froot only flat black stares They were suspicious of her, she realized with sadness; afraid that she had saved them for some worse fate

"You cannot claim them all, child," Ser Jorah said, the fourth time they stopped, while the warriors of her khas herded her new slaves behind her

"I aon," Dany reminded him "It is not for you to tellcollapsed in a great gout of fire and shtened children

They found Khal Drogo seated before a square less temple with thick mud walls and a bulbous dome like some immense brown onion Beside him was a pile of heads taller than he was One of the short arrows of the Lah the meat of his upper arm, and blood covered the left side of his bare chest like a splash of paint His three bloodriders ith hirown cluer and heavier She knelt before the khal "My sun-and-stars is wounded" The arakh cut ide but shallow; his left nipple was gone, and a flap of bloody flesh and skin dangled fro

"Is scratch, o," Khal Drogo said in the Coo too" He turned his head, the bells in his braid ringing softly "Is Ogo you hear, and Fogo his khalakka, as khal when I slew him"

"No man can stand before the sun of my life," Dany said, "the father of the stallion who mounts the world"

A mounted warrior rode up and vaulted frory Dothraki too fast for Dany to understand The huge bloodrider gave her a heavy look before he turned to his khal "This one is Mago, who rides in the khas of Ko Jhaqo He says the khaleesi has taken his spoils, a daughter of the lao’s face was still and hard, but his black eyes were curious as they went to Dany "Tell me the truth of this, moon of my life," he commanded in Dothraki

Dany told hiue so the khal would understand her better, her words sio was frowning "This is the way of war These women are our slaves now, to do with as we please"

"It pleasesif she had dared too much "If your warriors would ently and keep them for wives Give them places in the khalasar and let them bear you sons"

Qotho was ever the cruelest of the bloodriders It was he who laughed "Does the horse breed with the sheep?"