B G R. R. M Y EORGE ARTIN A S I F ONG OF CE AND IRE Book One: A Game of Thrones Book Two: A Clash of Kings Book Three: A Storm of Swords Book Four: A Feast for Crows Book Five: A Dance with Dragons Dying of the Light Windhaven (with Lisa Tuttle) Fevre Dream The Armageddon Rag Dead Man’s Hand (with John J. Miller) S S C HORT TORY OLLECTIONS Dreamsongs, Volume I Dreamsongs, Volume II A Song of Lya and Other Stories Songs of Stars and Shadows Sandkings Songs the Dead Men Sing Nightflyers Tuf Voyaging Portraits of His Children Quartet E G R. R. M DITED BY EORGE ARTIN New Voices in Science Fiction, Volumes 1–4 The Science Fiction Weight-Loss Book (with Isaac Asimov and Martin Harry Greenberg) The John W. Campbell Awards, Volume 5 Night Visions 3 Wild Card I–XXI A Dance with Dragons is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental. Copyright © 2011 by George R. R. Martin. Endpaper and interior maps copyright © by Jeffrey L. Ward Heraldic crests by Virginia Norey All rights reserved. Published in the United States by Bantam Books, an imprint of The Random House Publishing Group, a division of Random House, Inc., New York. BANTAM BOOKS and the rooster colophon are registered trademarks of Random House, Inc. LIBRARY OF CONGRESS CATALOGING-IN-PUBLICATION DATA Martin, George R. R. A dance with dragons / George R. R. Martin. p. cm — (A song of ice and fire; bk. 5) eISBN: 978-0-553-90565-6 I. Title. PS3563.A7239D36 2011 813’.54—dc22 2011015508 www.bantamdell.com v3.1 this one is for my fans for Lodey, Trebla, Stego, Pod, Caress, Yags, X-Ray and Mr. X, Kate, Chataya, Mormont, Mich, Jamie, Vanessa, Ro, for Stubby, Louise, Agravaine, Wert, Malt, Jo, Mouse, Telisiane, Blackfyre, Bronn Stone, Coyote’s Daughter, and the rest of the madmen and wild women of the Brotherhood Without Banners for my website wizards Elio and Linda, lords of Westeros, Winter and Fabio of WIC, and Gibbs of Dragonstone, who started it all for men and women of Asshai in Spain who sang to us of a bear and a maiden fair and the fabulous fans of Italy who gave me so much wine for my readers in Finland, Germany, Brazil, Portugal, France, and the Netherlands and all the other distant lands where you’ve been waiting for this dance and for all the friends and fans I have yet to meet thanks for your patience A CAVIL ON CHRONOLOGY It has been a while between books, I know. So a reminder may be in order. The book you hold in your hands is the fifth volume of A Song of Ice and Fire. The fourth volume was A Feast for Crows. However, this volume does not follow that one in the traditional sense, so much as run in tandem with it. Both Dance and Feast take up the story immediately after the events of the third volume in the series, A Storm of Swords. Whereas Feast focused on events in and around King’s Landing, on the Iron Islands, and down in Dorne, Dance takes us north to Castle Black and the Wall (and beyond), and across the narrow sea to Pentos and Slaver’s Bay, to pick up the tales of Tyrion Lannister, Jon Snow, Daenerys Targaryen, and all the other characters you did not see in the preceding volume. Rather than being sequential, the two books are parallel … divided geographically, rather than chronologically. But only up to a point. A Dance with Dragons is a longer book than A Feast for Crows, and covers a longer time period. In the latter half of this volume, you will notice certain of the viewpoint characters from A Feast for Crows popping up again. And that means just what you think it means: the narrative has moved past the time frame of Feast, and the two streams have once again rejoined each other. Next up, The Winds of Winter. Wherein, I hope, everybody will be shivering together once again.… —George R. R. Martin April 2011 Contents Cover Other Books by This Author Title Page Copyright Dedication A Cavil on Chronology Map Prologue Tyrion Daenerys Jon Bran Tyrion The Merchant’s Man Jon Tyrion Davos Jon Daenerys Reek Bran Tyrion Davos Daenerys Jon Tyrion Davos