And this is Bronn. Perchance you recall Ser Vardis Egen, who was captain of Lord Arryn’s household guard?” “I know the man.” Ser Mandon’s eyes were pale grey, oddly flat and lifeless. “Knew,” Bronn corrected with a thin smile. Ser Mandon did not deign to show that he had heard that.

“Be that as it may,” Tyrion said lightly, “I truly must see my sister and present my letter, ser. If you would be so kind as to open the door for us?” The white knight did not respond. Tyrion was almost at the point of trying to force his way past when Ser Mandon abruptly stood aside.

“You may enter. They may not.” A small victory, he thought, but sweet. He had passed his first test. Tyrion Lannister shouldered through the door, feeling almost tall. Five members of the king’s small council broke off their discussion suddenly. “You,” his sister Cersei said in a tone that was equal parts disbelief and distaste. “I can see where Joffrey learned his courtesies.”

Tyrion paused to admire the pair of Valyrian sphinxes that guarded the door, affecting an air of casual confidence. Cersei could smell weakness the way a dog smells f ear. “What are you doing here?” His sister’s lovely green eyes studied him without the least hint of affection. “Delivering a letter from our lord father.” He sauntered to the table and placed the tightly rolled parchment between them.

The eunuch Varys took the letter and turned it in his delicate powdered hands. “How kind of Lord Tywin. And his scaling wax is such a lovely shade of gold.” Varys gave the seal a close inspection. “It gives every appearance of being genuine.” “Of course it’s genuine.” of his hands. She broke the wax and unrolled the parchment.

Tyrion watched her read. His sister had taken the king’s seat for herself- he gathered Joffrey did not often trouble to attend council meetings, no more than Robert had- so Tyrion climbed up into the Hand’s chair. it seemed only appropriate. “This is absurd,” the queen said at last.

“My lord father has sent  

'My bride's mother I had never seen: I understood she was dead. The honeymoon over, I learned my mistake; she was only mad, and shut up in a lunatic asylum. There was a younger brother, too- a complete dumb idiot. The elder one, whom you have seen (and whom I cannot hate, whilst I abhor all his kindred, because he has some grains of affection in his feeble mind, shown in the continued interest he takes in his wretched sister, and also in a dog-like attachment he once bore me), will probably be in the same state one day. My father and my brother Rowland knew all this; but they thought only of the thirty thousand pounds, and joined in the plot against me .
'These were vile discoveries; but except for the treachery of concealment, I should have made them no subject of reproach to my wife, even when I found her nature wholly alien to mine, her tastes obnoxious to me, her cast of mind common, low, narrow, and singularly incapable of being led to anything higher, expanded to anything larger- when I found that I could not pass a single evening, nor even a single hour of the day with her in comfort; that kindly conversation could not be sustained between us, because whatever topic I started, immediately received from her a turn at , perverse and imbecile- when I perceived that I should never have a quiet or settled household, because no servant would bear the continued outbreaks of her violent and unreasonable temper, or the vexations of her absurd, contradictory, exacting orders- even then I restrained myself: I eschewed upbraiding, I curtailed remonstrance; I tried to devour my repentance and disgust in secret; I repressed the deep antipathy I felt nuskin.
'Jane, I will not trouble you with abominable details: some strong words shall express what I have to say. I lived with that woman upstairs four years, and before that time she had tried me indeed: her character ripened and developed with frightful rapidity; her vices sprang up fast and rank: they were so strong, only cruelty could check them, and I would not use cruelty. What a pigmy intellect she had, and what giant propensities! How fearful were the curses those propensities entailed on me! Bertha Mason, the true daughter of an infamous mother, dragged me through all the hideous and degrading agonies which must attend a man bound to a wife at once intemperate and unchaste .
  

In Europe he would have been an easy, well-liked prince or duke of no great territory. He kept a simple state, wore some slight apparel of cotton and a golden necklet. He brought gifts and an unfeigned sympathy for that death upon the sand bar .
He and the Admiral sat and talked together. "Gods from heaven?"—"Christian men and from Europe," and we could not make him, at this time, understand that that was not the same thing. We began to comprehend that "heaven" was a word of many levels, and that they ascribed to it everything that they chose to consider good and that was manifestly out of the range of their experience.
In his turn the Admiral was ready for all that Guacanagari could tell him. "Gold?" His eyes were upon the Indian's necklet. Removing it, the cacique laid it in the god's hand. All Indians now understood that we made high magic with gold, getting out of it virtues beyond their comprehension. In return the Admiral gave him a small brazen gong and hammer. "Where did they get the gold?" Again like the Cuban chief this cacique waved his hand to the mountains. "Cibao!" and then turning he too pointed to the south. "Much gold there," said Diego Colon. "Inland, in the mountains," quoth the Admiral, "and evidently, in very great quantity, in some land to the south! This is not Cipango, but I think that Cipango lies to the south." He asked who ruled Hayti that we called Hispaniola. We understood that there were a number of caciques, but that for a day's journey every way it was Guacanagari's country .
"A cacique who ruled them all?" No, there was no such thing.
"Had ships like ours and clothed men ever before come to them?"
No, never! But then he seemed to say that there was undoubtedly a tradition. Gods had come, and would come again, and when they did so great things would follow! But no cacique nor priest nor any knew when the gods had come.
The Admiral made some question of Caribs. Again there was gesture southward, though it seemed to us that something was said of folk within this great island who were at least like Caribs. And where was the most gold and the greatest other wealth that they knew of? Again south, though this time we thought it rather south by west. The Admiral sighed, and spoke of Cuba. Yes, Guacanagari knew of Cuba. Had it end far yonder to the westward, or no end? Had any one ever come to its end? The cacique thought not, or knew not and assumed deliberation. we had not met among these Indians any true notion of a continent reenex.