A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms. Джордж Р. Р. Мартин

through the sunny streets of Ashford town. The heft of all that coin in his pouch made him feel queer; almost giddy on one hand and anxious on the other. The old man had never trusted him with more than a coin or two at a time. He could live a year on this much money. And what will I do when it’s gone, sell Thunder? That road ended in beggary or outlawry. This chance will never come again, I must risk all.

      By the time he splashed back across the ford to the south bank of the Cockleswent, the morning was almost done and the tourney grounds had come to life once more. The winesellers and sausage makers were doing a brisk trade, a dancing bear was shuffling along to his master’s playing as a singer sang “The Bear, the Bear, and the Maiden Fair,” jugglers were juggling, and the puppeteers were just finishing another fight.

      Dunk stopped to watch the wooden dragon slain. When the puppet knight cut its head off and the red sawdust spilled out onto the grass, he laughed aloud and threw the girl two coppers. “One for last night,” he called. She caught the coins in the air and threw him back a smile as sweet as any he had ever seen.

      Is it me she smiles at, or the coins? Dunk had never been with a girl, and they made him nervous. Once, three years past, when the old man’s purse was full after half a year in the service of blind Lord Florent, he’d told Dunk the time had come to take him to a brothel and make him a man. He’d been drunk, though, and when he was sober he did not remember. Dunk had been too embarrassed to remind him. He was not certain he wanted a whore anyway. If he could not have a highborn maiden like a proper knight, he wanted one who at least liked him more than his silver.

      “Will you drink a horn of ale?” he asked the puppet girl as she was scooping the sawdust blood back into her dragon. “With me, I mean? Or a sausage? I had a sausage last night, it was good. They’re made with pork, I think.”

      “I thank you, m’lord, but we have another show.” The girl rose and ran off to the fierce fat Dornishwoman who worked the puppet knight while Dunk stood there feeling stupid. He liked the way she ran, though. A pretty girl, and tall. I would not have to kneel to kiss that one. He knew how to kiss. A tavern girl had showed him one night in Lannisport, a year ago, but she’d been so short she had to sit on the table to reach his lips. The memory made his ears burn. What a great fool he was. It was jousting he should be thinking about, not kissing.

      Lord Ashford’s carpenters were whitewashing the waist-high wooden barriers that would separate the jousters. Dunk watched them work a while. There were five lanes, arrayed north to south so none of the competitors would ride with the sun in his eyes. A three-tiered viewing stand had been raised on the eastern side of the lists, with an orange canopy to shield the lords and ladies from rain and sun. Most would sit on benches, but four high-backed chairs had been erected in the center of the platform, for Lord Ashford, the fair maid, and the visiting princes.

      On the eastern verge of the meadow, a quintain had been set up and a dozen knights were tilting at it, sending the pole arm spinning every time they struck the splintered shield suspended from one end. Dunk watched the Brute of Bracken take his turn, then Lord Caron of the Marches. I do not have as good a seat as any of them, he thought uneasily.

      Elsewhere, men were training afoot, going at each other with wooden swords while their squires stood shouting ribald advice. Dunk watched a stocky youth try to hold off a muscular knight who seemed lithe and quick as a mountain cat. Both had the red apple of the Fossoways painted on their shields, but the younger man’s was soon hacked and chipped to pieces. “Here’s an apple that’s not ripe yet,” the older said as he slammed the other’s helm. The younger Fossoway was bruised and bloody by the time he yielded, but his foe was hardly winded. He raised his visor, looked about, saw Dunk, and said, “You there. Yes, you, the big one. Knight of the winged chalice. Is that a longsword you wear?”

      “It is mine by rights,” Dunk said defensively. “I am Ser Duncan the Tall.”

      “And I Ser Steffon Fossoway. Would you care to try me, Ser Duncan the Tall? It would be good to have someone new to cross swords with. My cousin’s not ripe yet, as you’ve seen.”

      “Do it, Ser Duncan,” urged the beaten Fossoway as he removed his helm. “I may not be ripe, but my good cousin is rotten to the core. Knock the seeds out of him.”

      Dunk shook his head. Why were these lordlings involving him in their quarrel? He wanted no part of it. “I thank you, ser, but I have matters to attend.” He was uncomfortable carrying so much coin. The sooner he paid Steely Pate and got his armor, the happier he would be.

      Ser Steffon looked at him scornfully. “The hedge knight has matters.” He glanced about and found another likely opponent loitering nearby. “Ser Grance, well met. Come try me. I know every feeble trick my cousin Raymun has mastered, and it seems that Ser Duncan needs to return to the hedges. Come, come.”

      Dunk stalked away red-faced. He did not have many tricks himself, feeble or otherwise, and he did not want anyone to see him fight until the tourney. The old man always said that the better you knew your foe, the easier it was to best him. Knights like Ser Steffon had sharp eyes to find a man’s weakness at a glance. Dunk was strong and quick, and his weight and reach were in his favor, but he did not believe for a moment that his skills were the equal of these others. Ser Arlan had taught him as best he could, but the old man had never been the greatest of knights even when young. Great knights did not live their lives in the hedges nor die by the side of a muddy road. That will not happen to me, Dunk vowed. I will show them that I can be more than a hedge knight.

      “Ser Duncan.” The younger Fossoway hurried to catch him. “I should not have urged you to try my cousin. I was angry with his arrogance, and you are so large, I thought … well, it was wrong of me. You wear no armor. He would have broken your hand if he could, or a knee. He likes to batter men in the training yard, so they will be bruised and vulnerable later, should he meet them in the lists.”

      “He did not break you.”

      “No, but I am his own blood, though his is the senior branch of the apple tree, as he never ceases to remind me. I am Raymun Fossoway.”

      “Well met. Will you and your cousin ride in the tourney?”

      “He will, for a certainty. As to me, would that I could. I am only a squire as yet. My cousin has promised to knight me, but insists that I am not ripe yet.” Raymun had a square face, a pug nose, and short woolly hair, but his smile was engaging. “You have the look of a challenger, it seems to me. Whose shield do you mean to strike?”

      “It makes no difference,” said Dunk. That was what you were supposed to say, though it made all the difference in the world. “I will not enter the lists until the third day.”

      “And by then some of the champions will have fallen, yes,” Raymun said. “Well, may the Warrior smile on you, ser.”

      “And you.” If he is only a squire, what business do I have being a knight? One of us is a fool. The silver in Dunk’s pouch clinked with every step, but he could lose it all in a heartbeat, he knew. Even the rules of this tourney worked against him, making it very unlikely that he would face a green or feeble foe.

      There were a dozen different forms a tourney might follow, according to the whim of the lord who hosted it. Some were mock battles between teams of knights, others wild melees where the glory went to the last fighter left standing. Where individual combats were the rule, pairings were sometimes determined by lot and sometimes by the master of the games.

      Lord Ashford was staging this tourney to celebrate his daughter’s thirteenth name day. The fair maid would sit by her father’s side as the reigning Queen of Love and Beauty. Five champions wearing her favors would defend her. All others must perforce be challengers, but any man who could defeat one of the champions would take his place and stand as a champion himself, until such time as another challenger unseated him. At the end of three days of jousting, the five who remained would determine whether the fair maid retained the crown of Love and Beauty, or whether another would wear it in her place.

      Dunk stared at the grassy lists