THE BLOODS OF BOLTON | GAME OF THRONES

CHAPTER 27

"CLOSE THE WINDOW," Ramsay told Myranda for the fifth time. "I won't tell you again."

Myranda stuck her head outside and gazed up at the darkening sky, breathing in the cool, damp air. "But it's such a lovely day." She held out her hand and let the cold raindrops patter into her open palm. A pleasant shiver rippled through her. "It's going to storm, I think." She hoped it would.

"All the more reason to close the window."

Frowning, Myranda turned to look at him. Her young master sat slumped in a chair beside the fire, his back to her, expression lost somewhere in the shadows. Myranda sighed. His back was all she ever saw. She'd visited his chamber countless times since the little lady imprisoned him. He never looked at her, not once, and he rarely spoke. Most of the time, he just sat by the fire, watching and listening to the bright red flames so intently, like they were whispering to him in secret. Other times, on very quiet nights, she would find him standing before the open window with the moonlight shining over him.

"Do you see that?" he would sometimes ask, pointing down into the courtyard below.

Myranda never saw anything. "What do you see?"

"Nothing," he would always say, and he would abruptly close the window and walk away. "Just a trick of my mind, I suppose. Think nothing of it."

An unpleasant feeling crept up her back. Myranda closed the window and went to the bed. It was just as she'd left it days ago, not even a pillow out of place. Does he ever sleep? she wondered, as the hearth fire crackled and popped. Violet doesn't think so. She says he doesn't like to sleep.

She moved to the small table, which had been neatly set the night before, for a supper her master had yet to touch. The stench of it was quickly becoming unbearable, so Myranda thought she might clear the table. When she went to lift one of the platters, however, a huge black beetle crawled out of the beef-and-bacon pie. Myranda gasped and pushed the dish away.

Out of the corner of her eye, she saw her master stir. "My brother," he said suddenly, "how is he?"

She struggled to find the proper words. "Not well, I'm told. The infection is in his blood now. It won't be long before he ..." The rest got stuck in her throat. She sat down on the bed and started wringing her hands. "The gods can be so cruel," she said as she pictured her young lord, lying sick and frail on Death's bed. "Everyone loved him, you know. He was quiet but kind. And always reading, that's what I remember most. My father said he would make a good lord because he liked books so much. Meant he was smart, right? I thought so too, even when I was small and knew nothing. He was just so handsome and so perfect."

"And now he's nothing."

Myranda nodded. "Now he's nothing. And she inherits everything. Fitting, isn't it? In the end, the little lady always gets what she wants."

Without realizing it, Myranda had touched her fingers to her scarred lips, remembering the thread which had once bound them so tightly. Sometimes she could still feel the hot needle digging through her skin, moving in and out so slowly. She would wake suddenly in the night, paralyzed and afraid, and the little lady would be standing over her, smiling with those horrible grey eyes.

But I'm not afraid anymore, she realized, dropping her hand to her side. Then she stood proudly and walked across the room, to where her master sat. I saw the terror in her eyes that night, the terror that you brought when you walked through those doors, and suddenly my monster vanished. She smiled in admiration of the boy sitting by the fire. If she had been more confident, she might have kissed him, but she stopped just short of him and stared at his back. His broad shoulders rose and fell as he breathed. She wondered if he was even listening.