A Feast for Crows by George R. R. Martin Read Free Book Online Page A

with salt, bless him with stone, bless him with steel.” Water ran down Merlyn’s fat cheeks to soak his beard and fox-fur mantle. “What is dead may never die,” Aeron finished, “but rises again, harder and stronger.” But when Merlyn rose, he told him, “Stay and listen, that you may spread god’s word.”
    Three feet from the water’s edge the waves broke around a rounded granite boulder. It was there that Aeron Damphair stood, so all his school might see him, and hear the words he had to say.
    â€œWe were born from the sea, and to the sea we all return,” he began, as he had a hundred times before. “The Storm God in his wrath plucked Balon from his castle and cast him down, and now he feasts beneath the waves.” He raised his hands. “
The iron king is dead!
Yet a king will come again! For what is dead may never die, but rises again, harder and stronger!”
    â€œA king shall rise!”
the drowned men cried.
    â€œHe shall. He must. But who?” The Damphair listened a moment, but only the waves gave answer.
“Who shall be our king?”
    The drowned men began to slam their driftwood cudgels one against the other.
“Damphair!”
they cried.
“Damphair King! Aeron King! Give us Damphair!”
    Aeron shook his head. “If a father has two sons and gives to one an axe and to the other a net, which does he intend should be the warrior?”
    â€œThe axe is for the warrior,” Rus shouted back, “the net for a fisher of the seas.”
    â€œAye,” said Aeron. “The god took me deep beneath the waves and drowned the worthless thing I was. When he cast me forth again he gave me eyes to see, ears to hear, and a voice to spread his word, that I might be his prophet and teach his truth to those who have forgotten. I was not made to sit upon the Seastone Chair . . . no more than Euron Crow’s Eye. For I have heard the god, who says,
No godless man may sit my Seastone Chair!
”
    The Merlyn crossed his arms against his chest. “Is it Asha, then? Or Victarion? Tell us, priest!”
    â€œThe Drowned God will tell you, but not here.” Aeron pointed at the Merlyn’s fat white face. “Look not to me, nor to the laws of men, but to the sea. Raise your sails and unship your oars, my lord, and take yourself to Old Wyk. You, and all the captains and the kings. Go not to Pyke, to bow before the godless, nor to Harlaw, to consort with scheming women. Point your prow toward Old Wyk, where stood the Grey King’s Hall. In the name of the Drowned God I summon you.
I summon all of you!
Leave your halls and hovels, your castles and your keeps, and return to Nagga’s hill to make a kingsmoot!”
    The Merlyn gaped at him. “A kingsmoot? There has not been a true kingsmoot in . . .”
    â€œ. . . too long a time!”
Aeron cried in anguish. “Yet in the dawn of days the ironborn chose their own kings, raising up the worthiest amongst them. It is time we returned to the Old Way, for only that shall make us great again. It was a kingsmoot that chose Urras Ironfoot for High King, and placed a driftwood crown upon his brows. Sylas Flatnose, Harrag Hoare, the Old Kraken, the kingsmoot raised them all. And from
this
kingsmoot shall emerge a man to finish the work King Balon has begun and win us back our freedoms. Go
not
to Pyke, nor to the Ten Towers of Harlaw, but to Old Wyk, I say again. Seek the hill of Nagga and the bones of the Grey King’s Hall, for in that holy place when the moon has drowned and come again we shall make ourselves a worthy king, a
godly
king.” He raised his bony hands on high again. “
Listen!
Listen to the waves! Listen to the god! He is speaking to us, and he says,
We shall have no king but from the kingsmoot!
”
    A roar went up at that, and the drowned men beat their cudgels one against the other. “A
kingsmoot!
” they shouted.
“A kingsmoot, a