Welcome back to A Read of Ice and Fire! Please join me as I read and react, for the very first time, to George R.R. Martin’s epic fantasy series A Song of Ice and Fire.
Today’s entry is Part 4 of A Dance With Dragons, in which we cover Chapter 6 (“The Merchant’s Man”).
Previous entries are located in the Index. The only spoilers in the post itself will be for the actual chapters covered and for the chapters previous to them. As for the comments, please note that the Powers That Be have provided you a lovely spoiler thread here on Tor.com. Any spoileriffic discussion should go there, where I won’t see it. Non-spoiler comments go below, in the comments to the post itself.
And now, the post!
Before we begin, one last scheduling note: The holidays are RIGHT ON TOP OF US OMGGGGG, so there will be no ROIAF posts on either December 25th or January 1st, because I hope that most of you will have better things to do on those days anyway. The blog will resume on January 8th. Huzzah!
Onward!
Chapter 6: The Merchant’s Man
What Happens
In Volantis, Quentyn Martell and his companion Gerris Drinkwater are trying to find a ship to take them to Meereen. The smuggler captain they are speaking to points out that there are no slaves in Meereen any more and therefore no profit, and asks why they want to go there. Gerris lies that they seek to sell Dornish wine there. The captain reminds them that the slave cities are at war, and Gerris is forced to admit that every other ship they’ve approached has turned them down for that reason. The captain agrees to take them for triple the normal passage fee, but after they leave him, Gerris and Quentyn agree that the man would slit their throats as soon as they were at sea.
They head back to their inn, and Quentyn thinks of the three companions they lost when corsairs attacked their last ship. He mourns William Wells and Cletus Yronwood, but he especially misses Maester Kedry, who had been an expert on the Free Cities, and Quentyn feels the loss of his guidance keenly. They debate what to do, and Gerris suggests that “the big man” is right, and they should go overland rather than by sea. Quentyn tells him that going by the demon road is too dangerous and too slow, but Gerris points out that they might never find a ship. Quentyn dreads the idea of returning to Dorne a failure. He thinks of his inexperience with women, and that now he is expected to woo and marry “the most beautiful woman in the world.” He wonders why Daenerys Targaryen would ever want to marry him. He assures himself that she needs Dorne to win the Seven Kingdoms, and will “honor the agreement,” but worries that she may not love or even like him, and that he will not be equal to the task his father has set him.
Before the inn, they are briefly harassed by recruiters for the mercenary company Windblown, who are singing about going to Slaver’s Bay to “kill the butcher king and fuck the dragon queen,” and go in to find “the big man,” Ser Archibald Yronwood waiting for them. After hearing of their lack of success, Archibald is still pushing for going the demon road, but Quentyn fears Daenerys will be dead by the time they reach her that way, and suggests maybe they should take the smuggler’s ship after all. Gerris laughs and says no.
“Do you have a better way?” Quentyn asked him.
“I do. It’s just now come to me. It has its risks, and it is not what you would call honorable, I grant you… but it will get you to your queen quicker than the demon road.”
“Tell me,” said Quentyn Martell.
Commentary
Agh, no! grumblemumblecliffhangerspfeh
Well, so much for my sad cockamamie theory that “Griff” is Quentyn. Bummer. Man, if that means “Griff” is the dude’s actual name I’m going to have to sulk for a bit.
So much for my other wild theories that Quentyn is someone already close to Dany, too. In fact now that I’ve actually met him, Quentyn isn’t anything at all like I’d pictured him. For one, I would never have guessed him to be so… hapless.
Granted, most of my previous assumptions about him are owed to Arianne, who was busy being extremely paranoid about her brother’s supposed nefarious designs on her inheritance. That, combined with the fact that Doran had sent Quentyn on his Sooper Sekrit Fuck Tha Lannisters Quest in the first place, gave me the distinct impression that Quentyn was a pretty crafty guy, and probably also an asshole.
And instead he’s… nice. And really not crafty. At all.
At least so far. Which, in the context of ASOIAF, is so weird I’m not even sure what to do with it.
It also instantly makes me very concerned about his survival chances. But then, I’ve sort of gotten that feeling about several of the Martells and their friends. Arianne, for instance, displayed a shocking amount of naïveté during her shenanigans in AFFC, and even Doran with all his connivingness still makes me obscurely concerned that he’s being too trusting in some way with his plans.
(I was going to add “Oberyn and his Sand Snakes obviously not included” in that statement about the Martells, but then again, Oberyn’s survival chances turned out to be zero, didn’t they?)
Apparently it’s a Dornish thing, this tendency toward blithe and slightly doofy obliviousness. Which is worrying in context, but refreshing in the abstract. It also reinforces my impression that if I had to go someplace in ASOIAF, I’m pretty sure Dorne would be my first pick.
It’s amazing what a little humanity will do: after one chapter, I am officially rooting for Quentyn and Dany to get together, just because his basic appearance of decency (and his freely acknowledged shyness about relations with the ladies) is rendered even more adorable than it would normally be just by comparison to the rest of the absolute douchebags also currently after Dany.
It also helps, of course, that he clearly thinks of Dany as a person, even though he’s never actually met her, and is concerned about her reaction to the situation on a personal level as well as a political one. A trait which is, apparently, also one nearly exclusive to Dorne, this whole “thinking of women as people” thing. Sigh.
Speaking of the politics of it all, maybe there’s a larger picture I’m not seeing at the moment that would make this whole idea a bad one, but as of right now me and my liberal self is all about Dorne and Dany uniting forces and kicking the shit out of the patriarchy the rest of Westeros, and the Free Cities too while they’re at it. It’s almost definitely a pipe dream to root for a lack of slavery and misogyny All Across The Lands, but I can fondly imagine it for a moment. Aw. So pretty.
I’m a little confused about Quentyn’s comment that Dany would “honor the agreement,” though, which suggests that there is, well, an agreement of some kind already in place between Dany and Dorne, and if that’s the case then I have really missed something. Maybe he just meant that once an agreement is made, that Dany will surely honor it. I hope so, because otherwise I am super dumb.
I wonder if Tyrion and Quentyn are going to run into each other in Volantis. Seems like the sort of thing that should happen, but I have no idea what the result would be. I don’t think there’s been any hint so far that Illyrio and Varys’s plan to restore Dany to the Iron Throne has anything to do with Doran’s plan to basically do the same (except with bonus perks to Dorne, of course), but even if there is no connection whatsoever, it seems to me that both schemes would dovetail nicely together. They should totally join forces, y’all.
Other, random notes:
So we’re still doing the epithet chapter titles in ADWD? Enh. I mean, I guess it’s symmetrical structurally, which is definitely a thing with Martin, so okay, but it’s still not my favorite.
Demon road: contains actual demons? Let’s hope not!
Rich and ripe and rotted, Volantis covered the mouth of the Rhoyne like a warm wet kiss, stretching across hill and marsh on both sides of the river.
Ew.
Dwarf elephants! Ooh! I want one!
Okay, not really. But I want one metaphorically. Or something.
Another displayed a gigantic turtle, strung up by its legs on iron chains, heavy as a horse.
This made me perhaps disproportionately sad, considering all the other dead sealife in this bit. But man, killing giant tortoises? Not cool.
“I have no need for comic dwarfs. Unless they have a ship.”
“A small one, I would think.”
Ba dum-dum.
So that about does the ROIAF for the year, I think. I wish alla y’all a lovely and happy holiday season, and I will see you in 2015! Yay!
Well, have a good holiday Leigh. I bet you like that Quentyn’s name as a u after the q.
I love your reaction to Quentyn, especially your note about how it subverts the previous expectations. I can’t wait to see your thoughts on his whole arc.
Merry Christmas!
One thing I’ve noticed that always entertains me in this series is that Martin loves creating sidekick characters who mainly exist just to provide this touch of levity to a generally crappy world situation.
Gerris pretty much seems to live to make quips to anything Quentyn says. Much like Hyle Hunt while traveling with Brienne and Meribold. Or Dolorous Edd to Jon (Pyp to a lesser extent). Or Tyrion to….most people. Or Bronn to Tyrion.
Bonus points for when he makes utterly horrid people do this as well, as in the previous book’s short-lived “SHAGWELL AND TIMEON COMEDIC DUO!” performance.
Re: Quentyn
LMAO
/really not sure what to do with it?
I don’t know why I find the “The Adjective Noun” chapter titles so annoying, but I do, in a way completely disproportionate to the offense.
The description of Volantis rotting on both sides of the river made me think of Ankh-Morpork. “When dragons belch and hippos flee, my thoughts, Ankh-Morpork, are of thee!”. I think I’m overdue for a Discworld re-read.
What was Cletus and Archibald Yronwood’s relation? I can’t recall, and I don’t have my book handy to check the appendices. Was Cletus the Yronwood heir? That’s a pretty big political event if he was.
It’s funny how Quentyn turned out to be a rather sweet and dorky guy instead of a crafty and dangerous operator like his father, uncle, and really most of his extended family. Meanwhile, we’re constantly told in-world what a sweet, dorky cripple Wilas Tyrell is, that I just assume he’s a razor-sharp tactician like his Grandmother.
I strongly suspect that Quentyn is thinking of the agreement of a marriage alliance between Viserys and Arianne that Doran mentioned in AFFC. But assuming it would be transferred automatically to Dany and Quentyn may be taking it too far, especially given that Dany seems to know nothing about it. In fact, I doubt Viserys knew anything about it, so…
Hapless is a good word for Quentyn, yeah. Earnest. Self-consciously naive. It makes him seem so innocent compared to the rest of Planetos, even though he doesn’t seem to have grown up sheltered; or, well, he’s been educated about things at least, even though he seems to have had little practical experience. Comparing him to the Stark kids in early AGOT is interesting in that way. (Okay, that was very clumsily phrased, but my brain is too tired to go back and restructure.)
Quentyn is heading for Dany. Tyrion is heading for Dany. Victarion was last seen heading for Dany. Griff & co seem to be heading for Dany. But most of Westeros is ignoring her existence.
Self-flagging for moderators: the link to the spoiler thread on the index page is broken.
@7 Thanks for letting us know! It’s fixed now.
Chapter 6 – The Merchant’s Man:Now we get to see Quentyn. Starts chapter. Ends chapter. He seems like a decent sort. We haven’t had too many of those.
I think that Q thinks that Dany knows more about what is going on then she actually does. She may not react well if he comes in all demanding that she honors an agreement that I will guess that she knows nothing about.
The captain and ship they are thinking about hiring don’t seem very trustworthy, but maybe this alternate path they are considering will be interesting.
Hi Leigh – sorry you were limited to one chapter this time. The next one has perhaps my favorite scene in the entire book that would have been a rousing holiday send off – oh well.
I really like the Q introduction and you captured it well. The throwdown between Q and our favorite bad boy sellsword Daario will be epic if Q gets there….or maybe not.
Still stuck on Griff, eh? Still can’t say anything.
Re the whole Dany-Dorne kicking butt and taking names pipe dream: keep in mind that Dorne has maintained more ties to the Eastern continent than any other of the Seven Kingdoms, including Price Doron marrying someone from Norvos and, of course, an ancester marrying the warrior queen Nymeria from higher up in the Rhoyne River valley. It makes sense from an in-story history perspective. Will it happen? Who knows?
Yes, agree with Lyanna that Q is thinking about what appears to have been the marriage pact between Arianne and Viserys referenced in the last Arianne chapter, and the expectation/hope that Dany and he would mutually agree to be substitutes.
@6: Whathisname Maester is also on his way to her. And considering that these characters are essentially agents to bring her and the dragons to act as a power multiplier for their faction, it would appear that at lease half of the continent of Westeros has their sights set to either kill her or take her. And this is with the little notoriety she has there, while in comparison Dany has the undivided attention of the continent of Essos.
Aw couldn’t we have gotten 3 chapters in exchange for the two weeks off until the next blog???? wahhhhhhhhhh…..
Doran really should have sent Oberyn to court Dany (he wasn’t married, and he and his paramour had an open relationship), and someone else to King’s Landing. He seemed much more like Dany’s type, and Quentyn comes across as far too naive and callow for this kind of a mission.
@13 – Yep. Dany likes the bad boys.
@13 – Quentyn & Tyene seem like they’d be perfect for the ‘observe & report’ role that Oberyn assigned, while Oberyn in turn would be better suited to the ‘covert diplomatic operation in a part of the world he’s very familiar with’ role. Especially because he knew Elia, Rhaegar, and Llewin Martell intimately, and could have formed a personal connection with Dany to help convince her.
On the other hand, I’m already a little squicked out by Quentyn trying to marry his aunt’s sister-in-law, even if it’s not really a direct blood relation. Then again, Oberyn marrying his sister-in-law is not exactly squick-free itself.
Oberyn probably left Dorne for KL long before they were aware Viserys turned golden brown in Vaes Dothrak. That forced them to go to Q without another realistic option.
@16: Joffrey learns about Viserys’s death at the begining of ACOK, before Doran was even offered Myrcella or a seat on the council. At the same time Dany was also somwhere in that desert so no one could have pinpointed her until she finally stopped at Meereen.
@17 – on the other hand, it wasn’t Viserys’ death that prompted Doran’s plan, but Dany’s conquests via dragons. That didn’t happen until the end of SOS, so I think Rob’s point stands.
In hindsight, though, it still seems like he sent exactly the wrong people to accomplish what might otherwise have been pretty good plan.
I doubt that this is a spoiler, although if it is I’m sure one of the friendly moderators will be happy to white out the remainder of this comment. I’ll flag the comment so they can decide.
Rather than re-reading A Dance With Dragons, I’m reading A Ball of Beasts, the merger of both books into one, theoretically chronological book. That way I get a feel for what’s happening elsewhere.
The Merchant’s Man was not the chapter immediately following last week’s reading. It also doesn’t appear in the drop down Go To menu. I ended up searching for the opening phrase — I do own Dance With Dragons — and found the chaper about 35% of the way through the book.
This means one of two things: either Dance With Dragons is seriously non-chronological or the compilers of Ball of Beasts screwed up. I don’t know which is true, but I found it interesting. I’m not going to read all of the chapters inbetween to catch up. I do have some semblance of a life.
@5 – Cletus was the eldest son, but the second child, of Lord Anders Yronwood, and cousin to Ser Archibald. The heir to Yronwood is Ynis Yronwood, Lord Anders’ eldest daughter.
Edit: ninja-ed on the Cletus-Archibald relationship!
Quentyn and Arianne already appear to have exceedingly different personalities, especially re: experience with love & sex. But I agree that both of them are naively earnest idealists.
Speaking of opposites, we’ve spent four ADWD chapters in the frigid winterlands at and above the wall, Tyrion’s two in temperate-ish areas, and now we’re in tropically-hot Volantis. Rather different from AFFC, which largely took place in relatively temperate areas.
@11: Maester Marwyn.
@13: True, but if Doran and Oberyn hoped to take immediate revenge on Gregor and Tywin, Oberyn was the man for it. Priorities. *eyeroll* Oberyn definitely would’ve appealed to Dany, though.
One note – KL was expecting Doran himself to fill the seat Tyrion gave Dorne on the Small Council. Oberyn was the substitute and had to be accepted. Query whether KL would have had a conniption if they had sent anyone in the next generation down (Q, A or a Sand Snake). Probably yes.
@22 – but if Doran was telling it true in FFC, his orders to Oberyn were to gather intelligence, and nothing more… which he had to have known Oberyn would never have obeyed. Oberyn also appears to have been a calculated insult to the Lannisters (who expected Doran) and the Tyrells (whose heir was crippled by him), so I really don’t know what Doran hoped to accomplish by sending him.
Regarding the “agreement”: basically what Lyanna @6 said, although I think Quentyn’s assumption is fairly reasonable based on the information he has. That is, as he and Doran understand it, there was a pact to marry a Martell to the head of House Targaryen, who was Viserys at the time. Dany now is House Targaryen. In Dorne’s more gender-neutral culture, Dany would’ve been involved in family politics from the start and would’ve been expected to take over all of Viserys’s titles and duties if he died without a child; Quentyn has no idea that Viserys treated Dany as chattel and never bothered to tell her anything. (Although, as Lyanna says, it’s really unclear whether Viserys himself was even in the loop; he never mentioned the Martells before, although since he was a grandiose asshole, he might’ve just assumed that any past arrangements with them wouldn’t matter once he returned to conquer Westeros.)
@19 – I believe they did it that way in order to not spoil the secret of Doran’s plan before it could be revealed to Arianne. So, it’s intended for a theoretical first time reader. (Isn’t there also an alternate version for non-first time readers?)
@20 My copy of ADWD lists Cletus as “son and heir.” Don’t know whether that’s a mistake or not.
Re: Oberyn/Quentyn swap: Putting Quentyn in King’s Landing seems like it would give the Lannisters the equivalent of a hostage to ensure Dorne’s good behavior. Oberyn could be expected to look after himself, but Quentyn? Cersei would devour him in no time. (Well, not AFFC Cersei, but before, when she still had some sanity left.)
Also, I doubt anyone could’ve talked Oberyn out of going where he might have a chance of finally facing the Mountain and holding Tywin responsible for Elia’s and the kids’ deaths.
@24:
I sometimes say that respect, true respect, is only given to those with a history. Or that people will not show deference to unknowns Like Arianne and Quentyn. Doran felt he couldn’t go himself and lacked the capacity to send his children, who is either too untrustworthy (and not known out of Dorne) or too out of their element in politics. Who else is he going to send but his brother who happens to have exposure to politics as well as enough credibility to deal with the Lannisters/Tyrells? Either he sends Oberyn or he goes himself.
If his goal was intelligence gathering, I think his man in King’s Landing had to be proven to be (1) loyal, (2) capable, (3) discrete, and (4) expendible. Oberyn was loyal and capable, Quentyn is loyal and discrete, and neither was really expendible. The Sand Snakes were all expendible and varying degrees of capable and discrete, but not especially loyal. So it was really flawed choices all around.
//On the other hand, I remain convinced that Taena Merryweather is Doran’s inside man, so he already had someone on the inside.//
I think that the important thing to understand about Quentyn is that he isn’t a shy prince, he’s a plucky princess, in terms of his narrative role. The debut chapter shows that quite clearly. The scion of a powerful house is supposed to wed the powerful ruler that they want/need an alliance with, and is traveling to the court of this person. The normal power dynamics of the arranged marriage are reversed. A princess travelling across the world to meet her supposed eventual husband would be considered plucky (and obviously, she’d be facing some dangers that a man is substantially less likely to need to fear).
Quentyn is essentially Belle in a lot of ways, and Dany is the Beast – leader of a slave army, raising dragons, her Dothraki ties, etc, make her quite frightening. With Quentyn and Dany, you have the potential for an inverted Disney romance.
@5: Heeheehee at the Ankh-Morpork/Volantis comparison. I’m following Mark Oshiro’s Discworld Read, and my mind still didn’t go there. Where’s that quote from?
@25: I dunno. Arianne doesn’t seem to have been involved in family politics while growing up. Doran kept his Revenge Mission secret from her, but he could’ve done more to involve and educate her on other matters.
@29: Good point, though Belle hadn’t initially sought the Beast with romantic intent. Changing a character’s gender can really change one’s perspective on them, and is a thought experiment I enjoy.
Then again, Oberyn marrying his sister-in-law is not exactly squick-free itself.
Well, not his sister-in-law- his brother-in-law’s sister (Oberyn’s sister Elia married Dany’s brother Rhaegar). Which is fairly squick free. In normal families it would be rather sweet in a sort of double-dating way were it not for the fact that a) Oberyn is 42 and Dany is 16, b) all the other stuff.
Awwww I got my hopes up for 2 chapters… Oh well, yay, AROIF!
As for the “agreement”, Leigh, remember that originally Arianne was supposed to marry Viserys, according to the secret pact made years ago. So I just assumed that this “agreement” was an attempt to use that old pact, and change it from Viserys+Arianne to Dany+Quentyn.
I agree that Quentyn is actually very nice, and surprisingly sweet and innocent. Arianne is innocent in some ways, but she’s not clueless to the extent that her brother appears to be.
And yes, the dwarf elephants are awesome, I would totally want one. If I could keep one in my tiny NYC apartment. And fit it in the elevator. And house-train it.
#13: First of all, Doran knows nothing about Dany’s personality or what kind of men she likes. At that point, all that anyone would have known wa that she was married to khal Drogo – but that had not been her choice, and nobody in Westeros would have a clue about how she felt about him. (Not that Dany falling in love with the guy who was already her husband and first lover would have been a sure indicator of what kind of men she likes, even if we accept “one” as enough to form a pattern, which we should not.) All that he knows is that she is a 15/16-year old widowed Targaryen princess and Dothraki khaleesi.
Secondly, Dany may be into “bad boys”, but I’m not so sure she’d be into marrying someone who practically already had a wife, even if she was a common law one aka “paramour”, and several children with her (not to mention he’s 40 and has 8 children all in all). It’s certainly not something you’d think would look great to a 16-year old Targaryen princess; offering her your 16-year old son seems like a much more favorable option.
Thirdly – I didn’t get the impression that Oberyn and Ellaria had an “open” relationship, I had the impression that they liked to have threesomes/perhaps foursomes, “sharing” sexual partners, and generally enjoying sex with different people, but I don’t know if they’d have been OK with either of them having a real romantic and emotional relationship with someone else; granted, a marriage of “duty” may not be a real romantic/emotional relationship at all, and often is not. And Oberyn claimed Ellaria liked the idea of accepting Cersei’s offer of marriage could have been a good idea (if that was serious rather than humorous), so who knows. But there’s also no indication that Oberyn ever had any intention of marrying for politics, or at all – or he could have done it before, some time during the last 25 years of his life. He seemed perfectly content to remain officially unmarried, have a bunch of bastard children, and have a serious long-term relationship with Ellaria (who he probably couldn’t marry for being a bastard, even in the progressive Dorne, but Oberyn and Ellaria didn’t seem concerned about marriage anyway). After all, as Doran’s younger brother, he didn’t need to produce any heirs.
And I don’t think that Doran really could have ordered Oberyn what to do and whether to marry someone/who to marry.
Leigh, you can have Dorne. I will live in the Vale.
Thanks for reading my musings,
AndrewB
Not much to say on the Boiled Leather reading order. For the “first-time friendly” version, you skip this chapter for spoiler reasons and don’t pick it up again until quite a bit later. For a less newb-friendly version, you read this right after our last ADWD chapter. Ah well, the post-holidays is bound to bring a ton to say!
Let’s not forget that Doran, himself, had pretty much shelved the marriage agreement after the fall of the Targs and it became clear that Viserys was not going to live up to his expectations, preferring to appear neutral to the rest of Westeros. It wasn’t until the emergence of Dragons and Dany’s own agency as a leader that he decided to dust off that agreement and try to use it for political gain.
@36 Marbelcal- I’m not sure Doran had “shelved” the marriage agreement between Viserys and Marianne. He tells Marianne that he had hoped to have her meet her betrothed in secret, but her mother refused (because he had already sent away Quentyn to the Yronwoods). Yes, the emergence of dragons helped spur him to send Q to Dany to woo her, but I don’t think he ever gave up on his hopes to destroy the Baratheons and Lannisters. Doran is just very, VERY, patient, perhaps a bit too passive sometimes.
Leigh
re: Oberyn
but then again, Oberyn’s survival chances turned out to be zero, didn’t they?
No, his survival chances were fine. Growing even. It was his combat pragmatism and actual survival that turned out to be quite overestimated at zero…
re: Griff
Seriously? You’re still hung up on a perfectly fine name, but no comment at all on “Cletus, the slack-jawed Yronwood Yokel”?
re: Quentyn’s name
If it is so cromulent, why doesn’t he feel embiggened by it?
@30 – They’re from the Ankh Morpork anthem.
Bits and pieces of it are scattered throughout the series, but the (sort of) full lyrics can be found here, and it can be heard sung in all its glory here.
Also: thanks for pointing me to that Discworld read. I expect I’ll be joining in the conversation sometime after the holidays.