GOT: The Great — Chapter 158 - Pressing for Marriage

Brienne rowed for a full day and a night. The new sun crawled up from the eastern horizon and set the whole sea on fire, burning it gold.

She shipped the oars and caught her breath, looking ahead. Tarth had already pulled free of the sea mist, its ridge lying across the water from south to north.

The water grew bluer as she closed on the island. She remembered the old steward telling her, when she was small, that foreign merchants called Tarth the Sapphire Isle.

She had thought the name was stupid. The island produced no sapphires. It was only the color of the water.

Later, when she grew up and traveled farther, when she had seen the dull gray chop around King's Landing and Storm's End, she decided the name wasn't so stupid after all.

The prow split through the last surge of swells and she rowed into the harbor.

Evenfall Hall sat on the western coast of Tarth, facing Shipbreaker Bay, a castle of blue-veined marble. The island was full of the stone. The islanders quarried it and stacked it block by block into walls, towers, and halls. Years of sea wind couldn't wear it down. If anything, the wind only scoured the blue veins cleaner.

Two guards stood watch on the dock. They saw a small boat pulling in from a distance and gave it no thought. Fishing boats came and went every day.

Then the boat drew closer, and one of them recognized the rower. The spear nearly dropped from his hands.

"Lady — Lady Brienne?!"

He sprinted into the castle to deliver the news. The other guard fumbled with the bow line and managed to tie it off to the dock post.

Brienne jumped from the boat onto the shore. Her legs were weak beneath her, she'd sat too long, her muscles gone stiff. She steadied herself against a post, waited for the numbness to pass, then walked toward the castle gates.

Footsteps in the gate passage.

She stopped.

Lord Selwyn Tarth emerged from the shadow of the passage. His steps were slower than she remembered.

He wore that dark blue robe, washed so many times the color had faded almost to gray, a silver sun-and-moon brooch pinned at the collar. He stopped in front of her and tilted his head back to look up at her. She stood a full two heads taller than her father.

"You've grown thin," Selwyn said.

"You've grown old," Brienne said.

Lord Selwyn laughed, every wrinkle on his face crowding together.

"Come on, then. If your mother were still alive and heard her daughter's first words call her father old, she'd chase you down and beat you."

Brienne followed him into the castle.

The great hall of Evenfall Hall sat deep in the main keep, the vaulted ceiling soaring high overhead, the walls hung from floor to vault with enormous tapestries. Mountains, lakes, waterfalls of Tarth. The history and legends of House Tarth.

She slowed when she passed one of them. When she was small, her mother would hold her and stand in this spot, pointing out which was Rainbow Falls and which was Whitehead Falls. She hadn't thought of her mother's face in a very long time.

Between the tapestries, tall arched windows let in light from the sea, filtered through gauze curtains, flooding the hall bright.

The lord's high table stood at the far end. The stone door behind it opened onto a stone balcony, and from that balcony you could see the finest view on all of Tarth.

The kitchen sent up breakfast. Oat porridge with honey and chopped dried fruit. A basket of black bread fresh from the oven, the crust cracked and crisped. A plate of pickled herring. A few pats of butter and a jug of goat's milk.

Brienne sat down. The old lord took his seat at the head. The servants set everything out and withdrew with a bow.

Father and daughter alone in the great hall.

Lord Selwyn broke the bread, spread a thick layer of butter on it, and held it out to her.

"Eat. You've lost far too much weight."

"I told you, I haven't."

"You can fool yourself. You can't fool me. When you lose weight, your jaw goes squarer." He bit into his own piece and talked through it. "These years you've been out there — you've had a hard time of it, haven't you?"

Brienne didn't answer. She picked up the goat's milk and drank. It was rich and thick, with a grassy taste.

"After Renly died, I heard all manner of rumors," Lord Selwyn said. "They caused me great pain. They accused you of killing him. But I knew it couldn't have been you."

"It was Stannis's shadow that killed him. Lady Catelyn Stark could have borne witness for me."

Selwyn paused. Anyone else would have thought her a fool, who would believe something so absurd? But she was his only daughter.

"Lady Catelyn is dead." He didn't press the point. "Later I received a blackmail letter from Bolton's men in the North. I offered 300 gold dragons to ransom you. They refused. They insisted I pay your weight in sapphires."

He looked at her.

"Now you're back safe. That's all that matters."

"I'll be leaving in a couple of days," Brienne said. "I swore an oath to protect Lady Sansa."

"And then?"

"And then..." She paused. "The Dothraki invaded. She became one of Khal Drogo's wives."

Lord Selwyn set down his bread and looked at her for a long moment.

"You are loyal to her?"

"Yes."

"Is she worthy of it?"

"Yes."

Selwyn nodded and asked nothing more.

Quiet settled over the table.

"You ought to marry," Selwyn said. "You're not young anymore."

"I know."

"You don't know." His voice went flat. "You are the sole heir to Tarth. Your brother Galladon drowned in Shipbreaker Bay when he was eight. Your two sisters didn't live to see their first month. If you die, House Tarth dies with you."

Brienne said nothing.

"I have found a few candidates," Selwyn said. "Lord Grandison's eldest grandson — twenty-three, decent with a sword, and the alliance would be good for the island. And the second son of House Seastone, three years younger than you, quiet and mannerly. You met him at a feast."

"I did meet him," Brienne said. "He cried when he saw my face. He was ten years old."

The old lord choked, lifted his cup, and drank deeply, coughing twice.

"That was when he was a child. He's twenty-four now. He won't cry."

Brienne said nothing.

"There's one more." The old lord set down his cup and wiped his mouth. "Jorris Mormont. You know House Mormont? Bear Island. Bear Island is far, I'll grant you, but, "

"Father." Brienne cut him off.

"Hm?"

"I don't want to marry."

Selwyn brought the bread down hard onto the plate. Butter splattered across the tablecloth. He stared at her, his chest rising and falling.

"Can't you just be like any ordinary woman? Find someone, marry him, bear a few children?"

His voice dropped, and something crept into it that she had never heard before, a deep, bone-level exhaustion. "When I die, you will be the Evenstar. Tarth needs a lord."

"I've told you before. I don't want to be the heir to Tarth." She turned her gaze to the sea outside the window.

Selwyn's lips trembled, as though she'd struck him.

He stared at her for a long time. Those eyes she had thought, as a child, looked like stars on a winter night, they were much cloudier now.

"You are still young." His voice softened, the way you'd speak to a sick child who wouldn't take the medicine. "When you reach my age, you'll understand. A child. That matters more than anything."

He sighed.

"Is that why you came back? To quarrel with me?"

"No. I came to bring you a message."

"From whom?"

"Daenerys Targaryen."

Selwyn leaned back in his chair and folded his arms across his chest.

"Speak."

Brienne drew a slow breath. "The Mother of Dragons wants Tarth's fealty. She will protect the island from any aggressor. In return, Tarth opens its harbor to her fleet, and Tarth acknowledges the rule of Khal Drogo."

The old lord didn't answer.

He lifted his cup, took a sip of goat's milk, swallowed it slowly, and set the cup back on the table. It touched the wood with a sound that was neither loud nor soft.

➤ Next: The Traitor — Heartbreak