GOT: Khal — Chapter 106 - What Was Lost, Taken Back by My Own Hands
Jorah lowered his head, his voice sinking low, words dug out one by one from somewhere deep in his chest.
"Those years, I circled around her. All I wanted was to make her laugh. That was the only thing I cared about."
"I hired musicians. Changed cooks. Went into town to buy her clothes, commission jewelry. Whatever she wasn't satisfied with, I replaced it. She never said thank you. Just — this one's passable, that one still falls short."
He paused. His throat moved.
"That's when I understood. I couldn't afford to keep her. Not because I wasn't working hard enough. The things she wanted simply didn't grow on Bear Island."
"I even secretly cut down some of the woodland on the estate and built a ship. Sailed with her along the coast, wherever there was something worth seeing. If a city had a festival, we went. I took her to Braavos too — racked up a mountain of debt there. The interest alone still hasn't been paid off. Collectors came to the door and I'd put a blade to their throats just to get a few more days."
"She said she'd first fallen for me watching me fight in the tourneys, so I went back to competing. But that sort of thing..." A bitter laugh scraped out of him. "How can the luck hold every time? Lose once — horse gone, armor ruined, and you still have to pay out the losses."
Jorah said it again, flat and certain: "She didn't love me. She loved the sound of the crowd cheering when I won."
"The family money flowed out like water. The cook and the musicians were gone before half a year passed, I couldn't meet their wages. Lynese's jewels kept piling up. Her smiles kept growing fewer."
"Later... I did something that's legal here but in Westeros would cost me my head. There were poachers on Bear Island hunting bear paws. I caught them. By law, they should have been sent to the Wall. But my head was full of nothing but her face, nothing but wanting to put a smile back on it. I sold those men into slavery."
"Not long after, someone reported it. From that day on, my good life was finished. I tried to keep Lynese and lost everything."
"Word came that Ned Stark was riding for Bear Island. I ran with her that same night, took a ship and drifted overseas. I told myself it didn't matter, as long as she was beside me. We made landfall in Lys. I sold the ship for a bag of gold and told myself it would last us a while."
Jorah licked his split lips. The dry skin peeled back around the cuts.
"Less than half a year. The gold ran out. I took work as a sellsword, selling my blood by the day. While I was fighting Braavosi on the banks of the Rhoyne, she had already moved into Tregar Ormollen's mansion. Spice merchant. Rich enough to pave that river with coin. Word is she's his most favored concubine now, even his lawful wife has to yield to her."
Wodefa Tamade cut in without warning: "Do you hate her?"
Jorah didn't look up. His voice was muffled, flat. "Hated her. Still love her. Burning together, can't pull them apart."
Drogo shifted. He leaned forward, elbows on his knees. "This Lynese of yours. What did she actually look like?"
Jorah went quiet for a moment. A sour curve pulled at the corner of his mouth.
"Like... like the Khaleesi. First time I saw her, I was dazed. For a moment I thought it was the same person."
That settled it. No wonder the man was so utterly devoted to Dany.
"So how did you end up working with the Spider?" Drogo asked. No preamble.
"I waited 3 years." Something lit behind Jorah's eyes. "Just waiting for a chance. I wanted to prove something, not that I was great. I wanted to tell the world: everything I lost, I'm taking it back."
"So when Varys came to me, I took the job. But once I came to know Daenerys Targaryen, once I saw that she was a genuinely good person, I knew I'd made the wrong choice. I abandoned the mission. I exposed the assassin's plot and saved her."
Drogo was quiet for a beat. Then, slowly: "Your answer satisfies me. Ser Jorah, one day I'll personally go and pay my respects to your Lady Lynese. Follow me, and what you've lost, I will help you take back. What you gain will be ten times more than Bear Island ever was."
He'd already worked out how to use this man. Jorah had grown up on Bear Island, spent most of his life dealing with the sea. Tides, wind direction, shipcraft, he knew it better than anyone Drogo had.
That surrendered commander Nimitz in Astapor was too unreliable to leave unsupervised. Perfect time to slot Jorah in beside him as a set of eyes.
And Nimitz wouldn't trust a Westerosi man either.
"I'm appointing you Vice-Admiral of the Navy," Drogo said. "Go with Nimitz, sail to Westeros, and take Dragonstone for me."
Jorah dropped to one knee. "As you command, Khal. I will not fail this trust."
The remaining matches went on.
A female gladiator took the floor next, tall, gripping a short sword, wearing only a few plates of hardened leather that left the solid muscle of her shoulders bare.
The opposite gate crashed open. A massive wild boar charged out, tusks like two curved blades, white foam hanging from the corners of its mouth, hooves tearing up the sand in sprays.
The gladiator circled, her steps steady, looking for an angle to drive the blade into its neck.
The boar kept its head low. Its small eyes tracked her without blinking. A deep, rolling grunt built in its throat.
A few exchanges, and then the boar burst forward, far faster than it looked, and drove her straight into the ground.
She hadn't gotten up when it lowered its head. The tusks plunged into her belly. One toss, and her intestines unspooled across the sand, dragging a dark wet trail behind them.
The stands erupted. Daenerys turned her head away and didn't look back.
Drogo had already stopped watching.
He'd gotten what he came for. His warriors would understand the value of armor down to their bones, and Jorah Mormont was now his. He tilted his head toward Missandei. "Bring me the match schedule."
Missandei produced a roll of parchment. The upcoming events were listed out:
Beast Tide: multiple starving predators released at once, hunting a single target, a wholesale slaughter;
Beast Duel: man against beast, one-on-one to the death, the survivor earns the right to walk off the sand;
Battle Royale: open melee, last person breathing wins, all others are buried with them;
Beast Roulette: lion, crocodile, or giant lizard, chosen by lot, the gladiator finds out only when they step onto the sand.
Drogo scanned it, handed it back, and added without looking up: "Going forward, Ser Jorah is not to meet with the Khaleesi alone."
Missandei nodded. She didn't ask why.
That night, on the garden terrace of the pyramid's thirty-third floor, beneath an open sky with three great dragons as witnesses, Drogo brought out every technique he had mastered in Yunkai, the Seven Breath Regulation forms, along with sixteen combat disciplines including Beggar's Claypot Rice, Dragon Boat Hanging Drum, Taking Fire Across the Mountain, Dragonfly Skimming the Water, and Invincible Wind Fire Wheel, and applied them in full to Daenerys Targaryen, Scarlet, and Missandei.
Their soft, lilting cries pierced the thick night air and drifted out over the city for a very long time.
➤ Next: The Night Before the Western Expedition