A Storm of Swords

Every man must die, Jon Snow. But first he must live.

My skin has turned to porcelain, to ivory, to steel.

Old stories are like old friends, she used to say. You have to visit them from time to time.

Woman?” She chuckled. “Is that meant to insult me? I would return the slap, if I took you for a man.” Dany met his stare. “I am Daenerys Stormborn of House Targaryen, the Unburnt, Mother of Dragons, khaleesi to Drogo’s riders, and queen of the Seven Kingdoms of Westeros.

You're mine," she whispered. "Mine, as I'm yours. And if we die, we die. All men must die, Jon Snow. But first, we'll live.

We look up at the same stars and see such different things.

I crossed a thousand leagues to come to you, and lost the best part of me along the way. Don't tell me to leave.

The greatest fools are ofttimes more clever than the men who laugh at them.

My sister has mistaken me for a mushroom. She keeps me in the dark and feeds me shit.

When you know what a man wants you know who he is, and how to move him.

All these kings would do a deal better if they would put down their swords and listen to their mothers.

I've lost a hand, a father, a son, a sister, and a lover, and soon enough I will lose a brother. And yet they keep telling me House Lannister won this war.

And who are you, the proud Lord said that I must bow so low? Only a cat of a different coat, that's all the truth I know. In a coat of gold or a coat of red, a lion still has claws. And, mine are as long and sharp, my Lord as long and sharp as yours. And so he spoke, and so he spoke, that Lord of Castamere, but now the rains weep o'er his hall, with no one there to hear. Yes, now the rains weep o'er his hall, and not a soul to hear.

It all goes back and back," Tyrion thought, "to our mothers and fathers and theirs before them. We are puppets dancing on the strings of those who came before us, and one day our own children will take up our strings and dance in our steads.

Always keep your foes confused. If they are never certain who you are or what you want, they cannot know what you are like to do next. Sometimes the best way to baffle them is to make moves that have no purpose, or even seem to work against you. Remember that, Sansa, when you come to play the game.” “What . . . what game?” “The only game. The game of thrones.

You were made to be kissed, often and well.

Her name is Brienne," Jaime said. "Brienne, the maid of Tarth. You are still maiden, I hope?" Her broad homely face turned red. "Yes." "Oh, good," Jaime said. "I only rescue maidens.

It hurts so much, she thought. Our children, Ned, all our sweet babes. Rickon, Bran, Arya, Sansa, Robb… Robb… please, Ned, please, make it stop, make it stop hurting… The white tears and the red ones ran together until her face was torn and tattered, the face that Ned had loved. Catelyn Stark raised her hands and watched the blood run down her long fingers, over her wrists, beneath the sleeves of her gown. Slow red worms crawled along her arms and under her clothes. It tickles. That made her laugh until she screamed. “Mad,” someone said, “she’s lost her wits,” and someone else said, “Make an end,” and a hand grabbed her scalp just as she’d done with Jinglebell, and she thought, No, don’t, don’t cut my hair, Ned loves my hair. Then the steel was at her throat, and its bite was red and cold.— Catelyn Stark

They are children, Sansa thought. They are silly little girls, even Elinor. They’ve never seen a battle, they’ve never seen a man die, they know nothing. Their dreams were full of songs and stories, the way hers had been before Joffrey cut her fathers head off. Sansa pitied them. Sansa envied them.

Noseless and Handless, the Lannister Boys.

Sometimes I think everyone is just pretending to be brave, and none of us really are. Maybe pretending is how you get brave, I don't know.

There is a savage beast in every man, and when you hand that man a sword or spear and send him forth to war, the beast stirs.

Always keep your foes confused. If they are never certain who you are or what you want, they cannot know what you are like to do next.

I am the blood of the dragon. I must be strong. I must have fire in my eyes when I face them, not tears.

I know I want you," he heard himself say, all his vows and his honor all forgotten. She stood before him naked as her name day, and he was as hard as the rock around them. He had been in her half a hundred times by now, but always beneath furs, with others all around them. He had never seeen how beautiful she was. Her legs were skinny and well muscled, the hair at the juncture of her thighs a brighter red than that on her head. Does that make it even luckier? He pulled her close. "I love the smell of you," he said. "I love your red hair. I love your mouth, and the way you kiss me. I love your smile. I love your teats." He kissed them, one and then the other. "I love your skinny legs, and what's between them." He knelt to kiss her there, lightly on her mound at first, but Ygritte moved her legs apart a little, and he saw the pink inside and kissed that as well, and tasted her. She gave a little gasp. "If you love me all so much, why are you still dressed?" she whispered. "You know nothing, Jon Snow. Noth---oh. Oh. OHHH." Afterward, she was almost shy, or as shy as Ygritte ever got. "The thing you did," she said, when they lay together on their piled clothes. "With your...mouth." She hesistated. "Is that...is it what lordss do to their ladies, down in the south?" "I don't think so." No one had ever told Jon just what lords did with their ladies. "I only...wanted to kiss you there, that's all. You seemed to like it." "Aye. I...I liked it some. No one taught you such?" "There's been no one," he confessed. "Only you.

Woman, you bray like an ass, and make no more sense." "Woman? Is that meant to insult me? I would return the slap, if I took you for a man.

My featherbed is deep and soft, and there I’ll lay you down, I’ll dress you all in yellow silk and on your head a crown. For you shall be my lady love, and I shall be your lord. I’ll always keep you warm and safe, and guard you with my sword. And how she smiled and how she laughed, the maiden of the tree. She spun away and said to him, no featherbed for me. I’ll wear a gown of golden leaves, and bind my hair with grass, But you can be my forest love, and me your forest lass.

Drifting snowflakes brushed her face as light as lover’s kisses, and melted on her cheeks. At the center of the garden, beside the statue of the weeping woman that lay broken and half-buried on the ground, she turned her face up to the sky and closed her eyes. She could feel the snow on her lashes, taste it on her lips. It was the taste of Winterfell. The taste of innocence. The taste of dreams.

Why ask for truth when you close your ears to it? - Ser Barristan Selmy to Daenerys

Why would the stars want to look down on such as me?

I'm not a lady, Arya wanted to tell her, I'm a wolf.

She should be more frightened herself, she knew. She was only ten, a skinny girl on a stolen horse with a dark forest ahead of her and men behind who would gladly cut off her feet. Yet somehow she felt calmer than ever had in Harrenhal. The rain had washed the guard's blood off her fingers, she wore a sword across her back, wolves were prowling through the dark like lean grey shadows, and Arya Stark was unafraid. Fear cuts deeper than swords, she whispered under her breath, the words that Syrio Forel had taught her, and Jaqen's words too, valar morghulis.

old stories are like old friends (...) you have to visit them from time to time.

Hoooodor," said Hodor, swaying. "Hooooooodor, hoooooodor, hoDOR, hoDOR, hoDOR." Sometimes he liked to do this, just saying his name different ways, over and over and over.

For Phyllis who made me put dragons in

I want her, he realized. I want Winterfell, yes, but I want her as well, child or woman or whatever she is. I want to comfort her. I want to hear her laugh. I want her to come to me willingly, bring me her joys and her sorrows and her lust.

Still, night falls for all of us in the end, and too soon for some.

Sobbing, Sam took another step. This is the last one, the very last, I can't go on, I can't. But his feet moved again. One and then the other. They took a step, and then another, and he thought, They're not my feet, they're someone else's, someone else is walking, it can't be me.

I wish it was all a dream. Then I could wake up.

Clegane would grunt from time to time, and once Tyrion heard him mutter a curse, but otherwise he fought in a sullen silence. Not Oberyn Martell. "You raped her," he called, feinting. "You murdered her," he said, dodging a looping cut from Gregor's greatsword. "You killed her children," he shouted, slamming the spearpoint into the giant's throat, only to have it glance off the thick steel gorget with a screech.

The dwarf has risen from the dead, Tyrion thought. And look, he's uglier than ever, run tell your friends.

Sometimes Old Nan would tell the same story she'd told before, but we bever mindedn if it was a good story. Old stories are like old friends, she use to saym you have to visit them from time to time.

Might have punctured a lung, if he had a lung. Most trees don't, as a rule.

The world grows a little darker every day.

There are fights no sword can win, Catelyn wanted to tell him, but she feared the king was deaf to such words.

Jaime watched her eyes. Pretty eyes, he thought, and calm.

Tyrion stared up at his father's hard green eyes with their flecks of cold bright gold. "Guilty," he said, "so guilty. Is that what you want to hear?" Lord Tywin said nothing. Mace Tyrell nodded. Prince Oberyn looked mildly disappointed. "You admit you poisoned the king?" "Nothing of the sort," said Tyrion. "Of Joffrey's death I am innocent. I am guilty of a more monstrous crime." He took a step toward his father. "I was born. I lived. I am guilty of being a dwarf, I confess it. And no matter how many times my good father forgave me, I have persisted in my infamy.

Seventeen, and beautiful, and already a legend. Half the girls in the Seven Kingdom want to bed him, and all the boys want to be him.

When I don't fancy a man's eyes, I put an arrow through one.

In Sansa's dreams, her children looked just like the brothers she had lost. Sometimes there was even a girl who looked like Arya.

expected. Lord Tywin did not suffer disloyalty in his vassals. He had extinguished the proud Reynes of Castamere and the ancient Tarbecks of Tarbeck Hall root and branch when he was still half a boy. The singers had even made a rather gloomy song of it.

I am still half a world from Westeros, Dany reminded herself, but every hour brings me closer. She tried to imagine what it would feel like, when she first caught sight of the land she was born to rule. It will be as fair a shore as I have ever seen, I know it. How could it be otherwise?

You are grown so very great now, yet the higher a man climbs the farther he has to fall.

I do so hope he plays us 'The Rains of Castamere.' It has been an hour. I've forgotten how it goes.

A valiant deed unsung is no less valiant.

Noooo," Cersei wailed, "Father help him, someone help him, my son, my son...' Tyrian found himself thinking of Robb Stark. My own wedding is looking much better in hindsight.

In King’s Landing, there are two sorts of people. The players and the pieces.

He might as well wish for another thousand men, and maybe a dragon or three.

Jaime gave her [Brienne] a hard smile. "See, wench? We know each other too well.

I was very sorry to hear about your losses. Your brother was a terrible traitor, I know, but if we start killing men at weddings they'll be more frightened of marriage than they are presently. (Olenna Tyrell to Sansa Stark

So go to sleep, my little Brandon, my baby boy. You needn’t fear. There are no monsters here.

Robb, listen to me. Once you have eaten of his bread and salt, you have the guest right, and the laws of hospitality protect you beneath his roof.

He rode through the streets of the city, down from his hill on high, O’er the wynds and the steps and the cobbles, he rode to a woman’s sigh. For she was his secret treasure, she was his shame and his bliss. And a chain and a keep are nothing, compared to a woman’s kiss.

Nothing but this: I did not do it. Yet now I wish I had.” He turned to face the hall, that sea of pale faces. “I wish I had enough poison for you all. You make me sorry that I am not the monster you would have me be, yet there it is. I am innocent, but I will get no justice here. You leave me no choice but to appeal to the gods. I demand trial by battle.

If you keep all your treasures in one purse, you only make it easier for those who would rob you.

Tommen looked back to Ser Kevan. "Can I seal them now, Great-Uncle?" Pressing his royal seal into the hot wax was his favorite part of being king, so far.

A sword so fine must bear a name. It would please me if you would call this one Oathkeeper.

Her big hand wrapped tight around Oathkeeper. "I will. And I will find the girl and keep her safe. For her lady mother's sake. And for yours.

The Others never come when the sun is up.

Aside from her aged maid, Sansa’s only companion was the Lord Robert, eight going on three.

glutton. When Ami was caught in the stables with no fewer than three

Dany said nothing. There was nothing to say.

The outriders came on them an hour from the Green Fork, as the wayn was slogging down a muddy road.

Stay," she said. "Rule. And be a queen.

I can't forgive you," she said. "I can't.

The gods always smiled on Watt, though. When the wildlings knocked him off the Bridge of Skulls, somehow he landed in a nice deep pool of water. How lucky was that, missing all those rocks?” “Was it a long fall?” Grenn wanted to know. “Did landing in the pool of water save his life?” “No,” said Dolorous Edd. “He was dead already, from that axe in his head. Still, it was pretty lucky, missing the rocks.

Never believe anything you hear in a song.

It must be you or no one. The Wall is yours, Jon Snow.