The King of Winters

Chapter-113

My princess' home, thought Jorah. And my honour or whatever that's left of it, if the gods are good. Sometimes at night he lay awake imagining saving Daenerys Targaryen from the dungeons of Oldtown and earning her love in turn for it. It was a sweet dream, but a dream nonetheless. At least other things could be won by rescuing the princess of House Targaryen even if it isn't love.

Jorah answered with the tale he had concocted. "Smithing is our family trade. My father owned an extensive armoury here in Oldtown, and now I wish to find new markets. I hope that the good King Rhaegar will welcome what I could make for him and his army."

"Swords? Weapons?" The captain was not convinced. "I am told that Oldtown is at war with King's Landing. Can it be you do not know this? Why would a Oldtowner would want to make swords for the Targaryens"

"The fighting is between the nobles who won't ever stop playing their dirty games," Jorah said. "Why should I or anyone else for that matter should be involved in that? Lord Hightower has never done any good for me, only affronted me by bringing the war to us. It is not my war to fight and die in it."

"Not as yet. But soon you might find that in King's Landing. The King might have some use for you. Even the slavers pay handsomely for good metalwork. But the talk is that the Dragonslayer is already on his way to King's Landing, and war will follow once he arrives there. Then the defenders will have to start filling out their ranks and with the look of you, you will most likely end up fighting with a sword instead of making one."

"If you say so. I deal in making swords, not fighting with it. The Targaryens will pay a good price for putting swords in the hands of ten guards instead of dying in the first battle for them."

The master of Adventure fingered his beard. "I am not the first captain you have approached, I think. Nor the tenth."

"No," Jorah admitted.

"How many, then? A hundred?"

Close enough, thought Jorah. Ships were everywhere in the port of Oldtown, coming down the river or headed out to sea, crowding the wharves and piers, taking on cargo or off-loading it: warships and whalers and trading galleys, carracks and skiffs, cogs, great cogs, long-ships, swan ships, ships from Lys and Tyrosh and Pentos, Qartheen spicers big as palaces, ships from Tolos and Yunkai and the Basilisks. So many that Jorah had thought finding a ship would be his most easiest task.

Yet several days and several ships had passed, and here he remained, still shipless. The captains of the Flower Maiden, the Sea Shark, and the Mermaid's Kiss had all refused him. A mate on the Bold Voyager had laughed in their faces. The master of the Dolphin berated them for wasting his time, and the owner of the Seventh Son accused him of being a pirate. All on one day.

Only the captain of the Fawn even gave him a reason for his denial.

"It is true that I am sailing east," he said. "South around the Sea of Dorne and the Stepstones and thence into the sunrise. We will take on water and provisions at Tyrosh, then bend all oars toward Pentos and then Braavos. Every voyage has perils, long ones more than most. Why should I seek out more danger by turning into Blackwater Bay? The Fawn is my livelihood. I will not risk her to take a man and his wife into the middle of a war."

Jorah had begun to think that he might have a better chance of buying his own ship instead of convincing a sailor to bring him to King's Landing.