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Wow, I Never Noticed That, v. 14


Isobel Harper

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9 hours ago, Walda said:

@Rhaenys_Targaryen No, there are no quotes linking Quaithe to Mirri in any way at all. But things can be proven to have taken place in the story without being explicitly stated. On the other hand, dammit, not Quaithe and Mirri leaving Asshai at the same time, or near the same time. (They still might have, but they might just as easily not have).

I was looking at the time frames, but having looked a bit closer, in order to lay it out for you, I realise I've miscalculated. I was misled by the apparent novelty of Marwyn's Book of Lost Books, and Pate's knowledge of the history and origins of Marwyn's nick-name 'the mage', to suppose that Marwyn had returned from his eight year sabbatical and written his book within the five years previous to 300AC (ie. within the time Pate had been at the Citidel).

But apparently not.

Marwyn was eight years away from Oldtown:

But Mirri Maz Duur drops a clue about when she learnt anatomy and the common tongue from him:

 "and dragons rule" was the bit I missed.

Even if Marwyn was the most bigoted Targaryen loyalist, if he had met Mirri any time within the previous fifteen years, he would have known Robert Baratheon was King on the Iron Throne, and the Targaryens were all dead or in hiding in Essos. If Marwyn had left Westeros around the time of the Battle of the Trident or later, he would have been able to correct or at least qualify Mirri's impression that 'dragons rule'.

Until just before the Battle of the Bells in 283, he would or might not, though. Robert's Rebellion was just that, a rebellion, that would seem to many, particularly in the South, as likely to end like the Duskendale defiance. The first outbreak of fighting was in the Vale, where half the rebels bannermen fought against the other half rather than the crown. At Summerhall, Robert was beaten back to Storms End, and at Ashford had retreated, a wounded fugitive, unable to return to besieged Storm's end, far from the Northern forces that were allied to him and that were not enough to win against the forces of the King and the Westerlands. The only wonder was that nobody had yet been able to bring Robert down and his rebellion with him. So the latest Marwyn could have left Westeros was 283, when the dragons still ruled.

In the same chapter, we are given Mirri's age:

  Fifteen years ago, she would have been twenty-five, a bit on the old side for GRRM's definition of 'young' but as he allows women to continue 'fair' to almost their mid-thirties (upon which, the fair become at best a fading 'handsome', while their breasts begin to sag like withered wineskins against their chests) and as she only claims to be younger and fairer, she could have met Marwyn (at the latest) sometime between 283 and 290 (not depending on her youthful good looks, but on it taking Marwyn nearly a year to get back from Asshai, assuming he books his passage on a ship taking the trader's circle, and doesn't tarry at any of the various ports longer than his ship, which completes it's voyage with no more than the usual number of misadventures and delays.  It is probably a bit more than 15 years ago, as his book and the reports of his adventures imply that he travelled all over the east, while, in order to get to Asshai in 283 and not hear of the death of Aerys, he could not have tarried at any port on his way to Asshai, or the news would have caught up with him before he tutored Mirri Maz Duur).

The earliest, based on Mirri Maz Duur's age, would be about  dozen years before then - 271 or thereabouts. I'm basing that on the notion that she would not be a 'woman', allowed to leave her mother and the temple, and travel to Asshai and participate in birthing rites, learn birthing songs, before the age of thirteen.  

I had not taken this into account when I made my calculations, which started with a three year window (294-297) for Marwyn, Mirri and Quaithe to leave Asshai and settle into their respective stations at Oldtown, Lhazar, and Qarth, and was whittled down futher by the press of the present (things like Euron's capture of Pyat Pree, and Hotho's obtaining Marwyn's book before the scribes ink was fully dry), but allowing for Mirri's account of it, my timeline is pushed back between seven and twenty-six years from the present, and will comfortably accommodate all the months and years it takes for the various events to happen in, giving Marwyn more time to publish his book than even his author has ever required, plenty of time for Mirri to return to her temple and settle back in to Godswiving for her community, far more than enough time for Quaithe to become connected enough in Qarth to secure her place on the welcoming committee, and find herself a camel.

So my bad. Sorry.

No worries!

Mentioning the timeline merely caught my interest (of course) ! And I was especially wondering how to determine when Quaithe had left Asshai..

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Compare this...

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“It could be they were in some outlaw band.” At Dosk, they’d heard a harper sing “The Day They Hanged Black Robin.” Ever since, Egg had been seeing gallant outlaws behind every bush.

The Sworn Sword

To this...

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"Stay quiet, Podrick. There may still be outlaws in these woods."

The boy looked at the bare brown trees, the wet leaves, the muddy road ahead. "I have a longsword. I can fight."

...

"Slowly now," she told the boy. "They may take us for outlaws. Say no more than you must and be courteous."

"I will, ser. Be courteous. My lady." The boy seemed almost pleased by the prospect of being taken for an outlaw.

Brienne III, Feast 14

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A stout man of middling years rose to greet them, garbed in tattered finery. Flamboyant ginger whiskers framed his face. "Well met, Ser Duncan. You are a large one… and most welcome, certainly, as is your lad. Egg, was it? What sort of name is that, pray?"

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"You ought to come with us to Whitewalls, Ser Duncan," urged Ser Kyle. "Your size is sure to catch some lordling's eye. You might find good service there. I know I shall. Joffrey Caswell will be at this wedding, the Lord of Bitterbridge. When he was three, I made him his first sword. I carved it out of pine, to fit his hand. In my greener days my sword was sworn to his father."

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If any man upon the field felt worse than Dunk this morning, it had to be Lord Caswell, who had drunk himself insensible at the feast. "It's a wonder he can sit a horse, after last night," said Dunk. "The victory is yours, ser."

"Oh, no." Ser Kyle smiled a silken smile. "The cat who wants his bowl of cream must know when to purr and when to show his claws, Ser Duncan. If His Lordship's lance so much as scrapes against my shield, I shall go tumbling to the earth. Afterwards, when I bring my horse and armor to him, I will compliment His Lordship on how much his prowess has grown since I made him his first sword. That will recall me to him, and before the day is out, I shall be a Caswell man again, a knight of Bitter-bridge."

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"I know that feeling well." Ser Kyle sighed. "Lord Caswell did not know me. When I told him how I carved his first sword, he stared at me as if I'd lost my wits. He said there was no place at Bitterbridge for knights as feeble as I had shown myself to be."

Kyle the Cat in the Mystery Knight

 

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the larger of the riders, a brawny man with a shaggy beard and a shock of orange hair.

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The dwarf's sudden silence went unnoticed, as Duck had begun to regale him with his own life story. His father had been an armorer at Bitterbridge, he said, so he had been born with the sound of steel ringing in his ears and had taken to swordplay at an early age. Such a large and likely lad drew the eye of old Lord Caswell, who offered him a place in his garrison, but the boy had wanted more. He watched Caswell's weakling son named a page, a squire, and finally a knight. "A weedy pinch-faced sneak, he was, but the old lord had four daughters and only the one son, so no one was allowed to say a word against him. T'other squires hardly dared to lay a finger on him in the yard."

"You were not so timid, though." Tyrion could see where this tale was going easily enough.

"My father made a longsword for me to mark my sixteenth nameday," said Duck, "but Lorent liked the look of it so much he took it for himself, and my bloody father never dared to tell him no. When I complained, Lorent told me to my face that my hand was made to hold a hammer, not a sword. So I went and got a hammer and beat him with it, till both his arms and half his ribs were broken. After that I had to leave the Reach, quick as it were. I made it across the water to the Golden Company. I did some smithing for a few years as a 'prentice, then Ser Harry Strickland took me on as squire. When Griff sent word downriver that he needed someone to help train his son to arms, Harry sent him me."

 

Rolly Duckenfield in ADWD, Tyrion III.

 

Some interesting similarities and differences between the two:

Similar physical appearance - heavily built, ginger, facial hair.

Served the then Lord Caswell of Bitterbridge

The Lord Caswell's son was not suited to being a knight

They/their father made a sword that was used by the son

Then they react in two completely different ways, but both's service is spurned.

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I recently noticed a couple places where characters' eyes became wide as saucers (Bran when seeing Gared executed and being scared by the big kids in the crypt.)

But no one in the stories uses saucers for tableware, so how do the POVs know that the eyes are as big as saucers?

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2 hours ago, Seams said:

But no one in the stories uses saucers for tableware, so how do the POVs know that the eyes are as big as saucers?

Clearly a foreshadowing of more saucers to fly by in the next book.

I understand GRRM does not place too much emphasis on tableware used for their original purpose anyway.

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5 hours ago, Jon Weirgaryen said:

Clearly a foreshadowing of more saucers to fly by in the next book.

I understand GRRM does not place too much emphasis on tableware used for their original purpose anyway.

Just fill a trencher and fill it with crab stew!

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After helping Sweetrobin down from the Eyrie:

Fresh mules awaited them at Snow, and a hot meal of stewed goat and onions. She ate with Mya and Myranda. "So you're brave as well as beautiful," Myranda said to her.

"No." The compliment made her blush. "I'm not. I was so scared. I don't think I could have crossed without Lord Robert." She turned to Mya Stone. "You almost fell."

If only someone had explained to her the true definition of bravery.

Bran thought about it. "Can a man still be brave if he's afraid?"

"That is the only time a man can be brave," his father told him.

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It was not as if she were the only woman there. Even the camp followers were prettier than she was, and up in the castle Lord Tyrell feasted King Renly every night, whilst highborn maids and lovely ladies danced to the music of pipe and horn and harp.

Brienne III, Feast 14

So, there were maidens in Renly's war host, but Randyll says...

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"Your being here encouraged them. If a woman will behave like a camp follower, she cannot object to being treated like one. A war host is no place for a maiden. If you have any regard for your virtue or the honor of your House, you will take off that mail, return home, and beg your father to find a husband for you."

Brienne III, Feast 14

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3 hours ago, Rhaenys_Targaryen said:

The first quote describes Renly's host as they were still at Highgarden. These maidens might have lived there, but remained at home when the host began to march.

Here is the entire passage. I don't see where it says that they had begun to march...

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They will laugh at me, as they laughed at Highgarden. A blush stole up her cheeks as she remembered.

When Renly donned his crown, the Maid of Tarth had ridden all the way across the Reach to join him. The king himself had greeted her courteously and welcomed her to his service. Not so his lords and knights. Brienne had not expected a warm welcome. She was prepared for coldness, for mockery, for hostility. She had supped upon such meat before. It was not the scorn of the many that left her confused and vulnerable, but the kindness of the few. The Maid of Tarth had been betrothed three times, but she had never been courted until she came to Highgarden.

Big Ben Bushy was the first, one of the few men in Renly's camp who overtopped her. He sent his squire to her to clean her mail, and made her a gift of a silver drinking horn. Ser Edmund Ambrose went him one better, bringing flowers and asking her to ride with him. Ser Hyle Hunt outdid them both. He gave her a book, beautifully illuminated and filled with a hundred tales of knightly valor. He brought apples and carrots for her horses, and a blue silk plume for her helm. He told her the gossip of the camp and said clever, cutting things that made her smile. He even trained with her one day, which meant more than all the rest.

She thought it was because of him that the others started being courteous. More than courteous. At table men fought for the place beside her, offering to fill her wine cup or fetch her sweetbreads. Ser Richard Farrow played love songs on his lute outside her pavilion. Ser Hugh Beesbury brought her a pot of honey "as sweet as the maids of Tarth." Ser Mark Mullendore made her laugh with the antics of his monkey, a curious little black-and-white creature from the Summer Islands. A hedge knight called Will the Stork offered to rub the knots from her shoulders.

Brienne refused him. She refused them all. When Ser Owen Inchfield seized her one night and pressed a kiss upon her, she knocked him arse-backwards into a cookfire. Afterward she looked at herself in a glass. Her face was as broad and bucktoothed and freckled as ever, big-lipped, thick of jaw, so ugly. All she wanted was to be a knight and serve King Renly, yet now . . .

It was not as if she were the only woman there. Even the camp followers were prettier than she was, and up in the castle Lord Tyrell feasted King Renly every night, whilst highborn maids and lovely ladies danced to the music of pipe and horn and harp. Why are you being kind to me? she wanted to scream, every time some strange knight paid her a compliment. What do you want?

Randyll Tarly solved the mystery the day he sent two of his men-at-arms to summon her to his pavilion. His young son Dickon had overheard four knights laughing as they saddled up their horses, and had told his lord father what they said.

They had a wager.

Three of the younger knights had started it, he told her: Ambrose, Bushy, and Hyle Hunt, of his own household. As word spread through the camp, however, others had joined the game. Each man was required to buy into the contest with a golden dragon, the whole sum to go to whoever claimed her maidenhead.

"I have put an end to their sport," Tarly told her. "Some of these . . . challengers . . . are less honorable than others, and the stakes were growing larger every day. It was only a matter of time before one of them decided to claim the prize by force."

"They were knights," she said, stunned, "anointed knights."

"And honorable men. The blame is yours."

The accusation made her flinch. "I would never . . . my lord, I did nought to encourage them."

"Your being here encouraged them. If a woman will behave like a camp follower, she cannot object to being treated like one. A war host is no place for a maiden. If you have any regard for your virtue or the honor of your House, you will take off that mail, return home, and beg your father to find a husband for you."

"I came to fight," she insisted. "To be a knight."

"The gods made men to fight, and women to bear children," said Randyll Tarly. "A woman's war is in the birthing bed."

Brienne III, Feast 14

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9 minutes ago, Lost Melnibonean said:

Here is the entire passage. I don't see where it says that they had begun to march...

Brienne III, Feast 14

Lord Tyrell feasted Renly in the castle. The fact that Mace was the one feasting Renly indicates that they were still at Highgarden, as that is Mace's seat. The fact that they were in "the castle" indicates that they were not yet marching, as Renly was crowned at Highgarden and marched with his army from there.

The maidens Brienne mentions in the first quote would thus have been living in/at/near Highgarden, whereas during the march, those girls (save perhaps a few companions for Margaery) would not have been present.

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15 minutes ago, Rhaenys_Targaryen said:

Lord Tyrell feasted Renly in the castle. The fact that Mace was the one feasting Renly indicates that they were still at Highgarden, as that is Mace's seat. The fact that they were in "the castle" indicates that they were not yet marching, as Renly was crowned at Highgarden and marched with his army from there.

The maidens Brienne mentions in the first quote would thus have been living in/at/near Highgarden, whereas during the march, those girls (save perhaps a few companions for Margaery) would not have been present.

I'm not saying you're wrong, but there is no indication in that passage to indicate thE host had marched from Highgarden before Randyll told Brienne abut the game, is there?

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11 hours ago, Lost Melnibonean said:

I'm not saying you're wrong, but there is no indication in that passage to indicate thE host had marched from Highgarden before Randyll told Brienne abut the game, is there?

Ah, that's what you mean..

I think that this quotes implies that they were still at Highgarden when Randyll informed Brienne:

The boy may be a stumbletongue, but he’s not stupid. “At Highgarden, when King Renly called his banners, some men played a game with me. Ser Hyle was one of them. It was a cruel game, hurtful and unchivalrous.”

There's also this quote:

It was a harsh lesson, one that left her weeping, but it had stood her in good stead at Harrenhal when Ser Hyle and his friends had played their game. A maid has to be mistrustful in this world, or she will not be a maid for long, she was thinking, as the rain began to fall.

I think we've discussed this quote a while back, where the general conclusion was that it most likely was supposed to read Highgarden (does anyone have a reasonably recently printed copy of the book to check if the mistake was corrected?), as Harrenhal is obviously a mistake.

 

However, my point was that the "highborn maids" at Highgarden which Brienne describes are not part of the host, whereas Brienne is part of the host. That's why Randyll states "a war host is no place for a maiden". She should go home, according to him. If she had put on a dress, and gone to attend to e.g., Margaery in the castle, that would probably have been acceptable for him as well. However, according to Randyll, she behaves more like a campfollower than the highborn maid she is, and thus, she should be expected to be treated as such.

Your being here encouraged them. If a woman will behave like a camp follower, she cannot object to being treated like one.

Instead of playing the role of the highborn maiden, however, Brienne choses to mingle with the soldiers instead, as part of Renly's host. In Randyll's eyes, that means she no longer should be expected to seen as a highborn woman, and the women who can actually be found in the host are washerwomen, camp followers, etc.

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16 hours ago, Rhaenys_Targaryen said:

Ah, that's what you mean..

I think that this quotes implies that they were still at Highgarden when Randyll informed Brienne:

The boy may be a stumbletongue, but he’s not stupid. “At Highgarden, when King Renly called his banners, some men played a game with me. Ser Hyle was one of them. It was a cruel game, hurtful and unchivalrous.”

There's also this quote:

It was a harsh lesson, one that left her weeping, but it had stood her in good stead at Harrenhal when Ser Hyle and his friends had played their game. A maid has to be mistrustful in this world, or she will not be a maid for long, she was thinking, as the rain began to fall.

I think we've discussed this quote a while back, where the general conclusion was that it most likely was supposed to read Highgarden (does anyone have a reasonably recently printed copy of the book to check if the mistake was corrected?), as Harrenhal is obviously a mistake.

 

However, my point was that the "highborn maids" at Highgarden which Brienne describes are not part of the host, whereas Brienne is part of the host. That's why Randyll states "a war host is no place for a maiden". She should go home, according to him. If she had put on a dress, and gone to attend to e.g., Margaery in the castle, that would probably have been acceptable for him as well. However, according to Randyll, she behaves more like a campfollower than the highborn maid she is, and thus, she should be expected to be treated as such.

Your being here encouraged them. If a woman will behave like a camp follower, she cannot object to being treated like one.

Instead of playing the role of the highborn maiden, however, Brienne choses to mingle with the soldiers instead, as part of Renly's host. In Randyll's eyes, that means she no longer should be expected to seen as a highborn woman, and the women who can actually be found in the host are washerwomen, camp followers, etc.

Doesn't the fact that Margaery accompanied Renly to Bitterbridge suggest that her ladies in waiting traveled with her? Where did Petyr find Olenna? 

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7 hours ago, Lost Melnibonean said:

Doesn't the fact that Margaery accompanied Renly to Bitterbridge suggest that her ladies in waiting traveled with her? Where did Petyr find Olenna? 

Sure, I mentioned her companions in an earlier post. They probably did. But they would still not be hanging around with the soldiers the way Brienne had been doing, right? And that's the big difference Randyll sees.

Petyr travelled to Bitterbridge, if I recall correctly, where Renly had left Margaery and the bigger part of his host when he decided to race to Storm's End. 

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1) Varamyr and Jon both got their hand frozen to something and left some skin behind when they tore it away:

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Varamyr woke suddenly, violently, his whole body shaking. "Get up," a voice was screaming, "get up, we have to go. There are hundreds of them." The snow had covered him with a stiff white blanket. So cold. When he tried to move, he found that his hand was frozen to the ground. He left some skin behind when he tore it loose. (Prologue, ADWD)

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Up top they found a tunnel as long as Winterfell's great hall though no wider than the wormways. The walls were ice, bristling with iron hooks. From each hook hung a carcass: skinned deer and elk, sides of beef, huge sows swinging from the ceiling, headless sheep and goats, even horse and bear. Hoarfrost covered everything.

As they did their count, Jon peeled the glove off his left hand and touched the nearest haunch of venison. He could feel his fingers sticking, and when he pulled them back he lost a bit of skin. His fingertips were numb. What did you expect? There's a mountain of ice above your head, more tons than even Bowen Marsh could count. Even so, the room felt colder than it should. (Jon IV, ADWD)

2) In Dany's first ADWD chapter, she punished a man for forgetting the name of a slave he owned six years ago:

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Dany listened quietly, her face still. When he was done, she said, "What was the name of the old weaver?"

"The slave?" Grazdan shifted his weight, frowning. "She was … Elza, it might have been. Or Ella. It was six years ago she died. I have owned so many slaves, Your Grace."

"Let us say Elza. Here is our ruling. From the girls, you shall have nothing. It was Elza who taught them weaving, not you. From you, the girls shall have a new loom, the finest coin can buy. That is for forgetting the name of the old woman." (Daenerys I, ADWD)

Yet in Dany's last ADWD chapter, only a matter of months later, she herself couldn't remember the name of the girl who was killed by one of her own dragons (whose bones were presented at the end of that first chapter):

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"I am the blood of the dragon," she told the grass, aloud.

Once, the grass whispered back, until you chained your dragons in the dark.

"Drogon killed a little girl. Her name was … her name …" Dany could not recall the child's name. That made her so sad that she would have cried if all her tears had not been burned away. "I will never have a little girl. I was the Mother of Dragons." (Daenerys X, ADWD)

3) In AFFC, we learn that in the past Podrick might have been hanged, but he was saved because of his family name, and later sent to squire for Tyrion:

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Far from home, alone, and penniless, the boy had attached himself to a fat hedge knight named Ser Lorimer the Belly, who was part of Lord Lefford’s contingent, charged with protecting the baggage train. “The boys who guard the foodstuffs always eat the best,” Ser Lorimer liked to say, until he was discovered with a salted ham he’d stolen from Lord Tywin’s personal stores. Tywin Lannister chose to hang him as a lesson to other looters. Podrick had shared the ham and might have shared the rope as well, but his name had saved him. Ser Kevan Lannister took charge of him, and sometime later sent the boy to squire for his nephew Tyrion. (Brienne III, AFFC)

Later in the book, Podrick is sentenced to hang again, but precisely because of his association with the Lannisters:

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"Judgment?" She frowned. "Podrick Payne is just a boy."

"He says he is a squire."

"You know how boys will boast."

"The Imp's squire. He has fought in battles, by his own admission. He has even killed, to hear him tell it."

"A boy," she said again. "Have pity."

[...]

The big man turned and beckoned, the ranks of outlaws parted, and two more captives were brought forth. "The boy was the Imp's own squire, m'lady," he said to Lady Stoneheart. "T'other is one of Randyll Bloody Tarly's bloody household knights."

Hyle Hunt had been beaten so badly that his face was swollen almost beyond recognition. He stumbled as they shoved him, and almost fell. Podrick caught him by the arm. "Ser," the boy said miserably, when he saw Brienne. "My lady, I mean. Sorry."

"You have nothing to be sorry for." Brienne turned to Lady Stoneheart. "Whatever treachery you think I may have done, my lady, Podrick and Ser Hyle were no part of it."

"They're lions," said the one-eyed man. "That's enough. I say they hang." (Brienne VIII, AFFC)

4) Marwyn:

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He has a mocking name for everyone, thought Pate, but he could not deny that Marwyn looked more a mastiff than a maester. As if he wants to bite you. The Mage was not like other maesters. People said that he kept company with whores and hedge wizards, talked with hairy Ibbenese and pitch-black Summer Islanders in their own tongues, and sacrificed to queer gods at the little sailors' temples down by the wharves. Men spoke of seeing him down in the undercity, in rat pits and black brothels, consorting with mummers, singers, sellswords, even beggars. Some even whispered that once he had killed a man with his fists. (Prologue, AFFC)

Volantis:

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Heat shimmers rose off the street as the hathay rattled and jounced along on its iron-rimmed wheels, giving a dreamlike quality to their surroundings. In amongst the warehouses and the wharves, shops and stalls of many sorts crowded the waterfront. Here fresh oysters could be bought, here iron chains and manacles, here cyvasse pieces carved of ivory and jade. Here were temples too, where sailors came to sacrifice to foreign gods, cheek by jowl with pillow houses where women called down from balconies to men below. (The Merchant's Man, ADWD)

5) Dunk knocked Ser Lucas Inchfield into water:

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Dunk dived forward. Ser Lucas had wrenched his sword free for another cut. Dunk slammed into him waist-high and knocked him off his feet. The stream swallowed both of them again, but this time Dunk was ready. (The Sworn Sword)

Brienne knocked Ser Owen Inchfield into a fire:

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When Ser Owen Inchfield seized her one night and pressed a kiss upon her, she knocked him arse-backwards into a cookfire. (Brienne III, AFFC)

6) Dunk came across a tall, timbered inn beside a stream that had warm yellow light spilling from its windows:

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Sweetfoot had an easier gait than old Chestnut, but Dunk was still sore and tired when he spied the inn ahead, a tall daub-and-timber building beside a stream. The warm yellow light spilling from its windows looked so inviting that he could not pass it by. I have three silvers, he told himself, enough for a good meal and as much ale as I care to drink. (The Hedge Knight)

Brienne came across a tall, timbered inn beside a river that had warm yellow light shining through its windows:

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Night was gathering by the time their party came upon the inn, a tall, timbered building that stood beside a river junction, astride an old stone bridge.

[…]

Warm yellow light shone through the diamond-shaped panes of the inn's windows, and Brienne heard a stallion trumpet at the scent of her mare. (Brienne I, AFFC)

As Dunk dismounted, a boy appeared who Dunk mistook for the stableboy, and Dunk lied that he was a knight:

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As he dismounted, a naked boy emerged dripping from the stream and began to dry himself on a roughspun brown cloak. "Are you the stableboy?" Dunk asked him. The lad looked to be no more than eight or nine, a pasty-faced skinny thing, his bare feet caked in mud up to the ankle. His hair was the queerest thing about him. He had none. "I'll want my palfrey rubbed down. And oats for all three. Can you tend to them?"

The boy looked at him brazenly. "I could. If I wanted."

Dunk frowned. "I'll have none of that. I am a knight, I'll have you know."

"You don't look to be a knight."

"Do all knights look the same?"

"No, but they don't look like you, either. Your sword belt's made of rope."

"So long as it holds my scabbard, it serves. Now see to my horses. You'll get a copper if you do well, and a clout in the ear if you don't." He did not wait to see how the stableboy took that, but turned away and shouldered through the door.

After Brienne dismounted, a stableboy appeared who mistook her for a knight, but Brienne told the truth that she wasn't:

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She was loosening the saddle when a boy came out the stable door, and said, "Let me do that, ser."

"I am no ser," she told him, "but you may take the horse. See that she is fed and brushed and watered."

The boy reddened. "Beg pardons, m'lady. I thought . . ."

"It is a common mistake." Brienne gave him the reins and followed the others into the inn, with her saddlebags across a shoulder and her bedroll tucked up beneath one arm.

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