Ash & Aziz devour this new chapter from The Winds of Winter as if it were a 12 foot tall lemon cake threatened by a pimply gingerlad. Like so many of the Alayne chapters, and anything at all to do with Littlefinger, there are major political implications & of course, sneaky references and clues… many of them. Gather round and put on your plotting caps and enjoy Alayne I from The Winds of Winter.

“Four-and-sixty knights had been invited to vie for places amongst Lord Robert Arryn’s new Brotherhood of Winged Knights, and four­ and-sixty knights had come to tilt for the right to wear falcon’s wings upon their warhelms and guard their lord.”

“Men old enough to have known Jon Arryn in his youth said Ser Harrold had his look, she knew. He had a mop of sandy blond hair, pale blue eyes, an aquiline nose.”

“Post guardsmen on the docks. If need be, seize the ships. How does not matter, so long as no food leaves the Vale.”

A good melee is all a hedge knight can hope for, unless he stumbles on a bag of dragons. And that’s not likely, is it?”

“Alayne loved it here. She felt alive again, for the first time since her father…since Lord Eddard Stark had died.”

“Robb would be his age, if he were still alive, she could not help but think, but Robb died a king, and this is just a boy.”

“Old Oswell who had arrived last night from Gulltown on a lathered horse.”

“When their granaries are empty, they will need every scrap of that silver to buy sustenance from us.”