"We will settle the Night King beneath Winterfell!" Arya's tone was calm, yet incomparably resolute.
Arianne's eyes flickered, and she said gently, "We will all do our utmost to aid Winterfell, but it never hurts to prepare a second plan."
"I'm not charging for dragonglass weapons or indulgences. I'm supplying them freely to every castle willing to fight the Others. What more support does Dorne want?" Dany asked curiously.
For a brief moment, Arianne's expression turned rather strange. "My father is willing to lead Dorne in swearing fealty to you and to have you concurrently serve as Warden of Dorne, commanding all Dornish forces to defend against the invading Others."
Not only Dany and the Hound, but even Arya, whose face was expressionless and whose heart was as still as clear ice, were stunned.
If it were only the title of Warden of Dorne, the request would actually be quite rude. A Warden of one of the Seven Kingdoms was equivalent to a commander-in-chief. Asking Dany to serve as Doran's supreme commander of armies was outrageous.
If Dorne merely declared fealty, in these days when the king's banners changed atop city walls, it would not carry much practical value. After all, the Dragon Queen currently had no intention of contending for the Iron Throne.
Hadn't the northern House Stark previously sought to pledge allegiance to the Dragon Queen?
She had refused without hesitation.
But when those two conditions were combined, the meaning became entirely different.
It meant that Dorne would submit to the Dragon Queen completely and wholeheartedly, the kind of submission that laid bare one's very heart.
Even so, though Dorne was willing to offer such complete devotion, the Dragon Queen still hesitated.
"I can fully support Dorne, just as I am supporting Winterfell, but fealty and the title of Warden of Dorne are unnecessary," Dany declined tactfully.
Arianne froze, then quickly said, "We know you've established a refuge on the Crackclaw Peninsula, but you have dragons. You can fly between both places without delay. The Dornish defensive line won't take much of your time.
"Moreover, the Crackclaw Peninsula is so small. The total number of refugees you can rescue there surely cannot compare to Dorne."
"I can travel between both fronts and offer advice for Dorne's defenses, but I do not need Dorne, or any other noble house, to swear fealty to me. This is my oath!" the Dragon Queen said solemnly.
Arianne's face showed pleading. "Then perhaps you could consider it further? We can discuss this again after the Battle of Winterfell."
When Prince Doran assigned the task to his daughter and his Sand Snake niece, he had made the reasons for Dorne's complete allegiance to the Dragon Queen very clear. First, the Dragon Queen had won the Battle of Meereen; she possessed the bearing of a world conqueror. Second, with the Long Night descending, pledging to the powerful Dragon Queen was the most effective way to preserve their house and their people. Third, looking over the Dragon Queen's entire record, from her debut until now, no matter how formidable the enemy, she had never been defeated.
In terms of military talent alone, there was no commander in the Seven Kingdoms more suitable than her, especially for Dorne, where capable generals were scarce.
To be honest, Princess Arianne had not fully agreed with her father's decision before. She believed her own ability to command troops was not weak; she had simply never had the opportunity to display it before the world. She deliberately ignored what had happened at the Blackwater.
Thus, she had once hesitated and even wanted to resist her father's plan.
But now, after being rejected repeatedly by the Dragon Queen, something shifted within her.
For some reason, the Dornish princess's thoughts made a complete one-hundred-and-eighty-degree turn. She became even more radical and more urgent than her father.
If they could not pledge themselves to the Dragon Queen, it felt as though Dorne were suffering an immense loss.
Watching the Dragon Queen repeatedly decline and seeing Arianne's anxious expression, Arya remained wooden-faced.
She thought of her sister's ambitions.
If Dorne had said the same words to Sansa, she would probably have gone mad with excitement.
Yet here the Dragon Queen was, reluctantly refusing.
The difference between people could truly be this great.
"And you? What did you come to see me about?"
As Arya was sighing inwardly for her sister, the Dragon Queen had already finished speaking with Arianne and turned her gaze toward her.
"My brother Bran broke his spine. Can you make him stand again? And his fertility, can that be restored?" A faint trace of hope flickered across Arya's otherwise blank face.
Dany looked at her with amusement. "Did Bran ask you to inquire? Why doesn't he come to me himself?"
"It has nothing to do with Bran. I saw you heal Jaime Lannister's crippled leg and had some thoughts," Arya said insincerely.
"In fact, your brother and sister have both asked me the same question. I gave them the same answer. If Bran wants to stand again, he can come and speak with me himself," Dany said meaningfully.
"Bran? Do you mean Bran Stark? He didn't die? Is he at Winterfell now?" Arianne asked, confused.
No one answered her.
Dany did not wish to overstep, and Arya did not wish to reveal her brother's secret.
They stood in awkward silence for quite some time before Dany beckoned to the Hound. "Come. I'll fix your lame leg.
"If you study a maester's anatomy and understand the structure of the human body's meridians, you could treat it yourself."
At that moment, a strange thought suddenly arose in Dany's mind: could she transform the Hound, the roughest brute in the Seven Kingdoms, into an elegant and tidy white-robed healer?
"You're a priest now, aren't you? Have you treated injured commoners?" she turned and asked the scarred man who had remained reserved and silent.
"After becoming a priest, I've been aiding the wounded in the Riverlands. But the Mother's healing arts are not very effective. They only work wonders on bleeding wounds," the Hound replied honestly.
"It isn't that holy healing is ineffective. It's just that the way you apply it directly onto patients is too crude. Only when combined with herbal medicine and anatomy can its full power be realized."
For common ailments such as colds, diarrhea, inflammation, or poisoning, holy healing indeed did not produce immediate results. But that did not mean it was useless.
Take a cold as an example. Even with injections and medicine, many people might lose their lives to influenza. If the mortality rate were one percent, then after taking medicine and applying holy healing to the lungs, the rate could be reduced to 0.001 percent. That was the correct way to use holy healing.
In the final analysis, the Holy Healing Art merely enhances the vitality of the body's cells; it does not kill viruses or expel poison.
Seeing the Hound's blank expression, Dany did not elaborate further. "When I treat your leg later, watch carefully."
Arya's eyes flashed. "Can I watch?"
"I want to see too. Is that okay?" asked a baby-faced Sand Snake, her eyes wide.
Dany hesitated only briefly before nodding. "Don't speak. Don't disturb me."
The girls agreed readily, but during the operation they still cried out in alarm for quite a while.
Especially when they saw the Dragon Queen using her blood-smeared right hand to tug forcefully at the Hound's white blood vessels and bluish nerves, the youngest baby-faced Sand Snake let out a scream and fainted.
Dany promptly told them to get out.
Arya was not afraid. She even watched with great interest, yet she was driven out as well.
When Dany finished the operation and left the lounge, she found that everyone else had gone. Arya was still standing in the corridor outside the door.
But Arya was not alone. Danys, clad in a gray cloak, stood opposite her.
The two were about the same age and height. Even their stances were identical: right hands resting on their swords, bodies leaning forward, left feet stepping half a pace ahead like cats, landing lightly on the ball of the foot with the heel raised, their right legs poised to step forward at any moment.
Both were among the best of the Water Dancers. The only difference was that Danys's cheeks were pale, sweat beaded on her forehead, her expression shifting back and forth, as if her body were struggling to restrain itself from lunging forward.
Arya was expressionless. Her eyes were like icicles hanging from the eaves, and there was a still, abyssal aura about her.
Before they even began to fight, Dany already knew that Danys had lost.
"What are you doing?"
The Dragon Queen wiped her hands with a towel as she casually stepped to stand beside them.
For no apparent reason, Danys felt the pressure over her entire body vanish. The cruel, starving wolf that had been crouched in the snow before her, ready to pounce, reverted to a cold-faced, horse-faced girl.
No. Looking more closely, the Stark family's horse-faced little princess had already lost her earlier icy composure.
Although the Dragon Queen's movements were casual and her tone calm, and she did not even carry a sword, when she approached, Arya felt as if an incomparably sharp giant sword was pressing down upon her.
That sword seemed to pierce heaven and earth, like a towering mountain, like a monstrous wave in a raging sea.
Thud, thud, thud. In an instant Arya was drenched in sweat. She staggered back three steps, her gray eyes wide with shock as she stared at the Dragon Queen, who had just tossed the towel to an Unsullied behind her. "You—"
The single word escaped her lips. It was as if she had awakened from a nightmare. The divine sword that had split heaven and earth in her dream vanished, leaving before her only a calm-faced queen-knight with casual manners.
An illusion?
Arya shook her head vigorously. The divine sword that had shattered her "Death God's Ice-Clear State of Mind" could not have been an illusion.
"What was that?" she asked hoarsely.
"A realm of swordsmanship you cannot yet reach. It cannot be explained with words. What were you doing?" Dany asked with a smile.
"She's the assassin protecting you?" Arya pointed at Danys.
Though phrased as a question, her tone was certain.
"Her name is Danys," Dany said.
"Danys has been hiding and following you all along, but in my eyes she was as conspicuous as a fly on a white porcelain plate."
"Fly?" Danys's face filled with anger.
Arya shrugged, her expression unchanged. "Just like now. She has lost the Water Dancer's state of mind of 'still as a shadow, moving like a snake.'
After discovering that I had been tracking her movements with a contemptuous gaze the entire time, she became angry and jumped out to challenge me to a duel. I know where this is. I won't kill people recklessly."
Her words were somewhat arrogant, and Danys felt deeply humiliated.
"I know this is Winterfell. I won't kill the King in the North's sister," she shot back with the same phrasing.
Danys's accent was somewhat heavy. Her Westerosi was not very fluent.
Arya responded with a look of godlike disdain.
Dany smiled. With a gentle smile she said to Arya, "Make no mistake. Danys's realm is inferior to yours, but if you truly fought, you would certainly die."
"If that wasn't an illusion just now, and you were helping her, then I would indeed lose," Arya replied, still refusing to look at her defeated opponent and keeping her grave gaze fixed on the Dragon Queen.
"If you truly think that way, Danys could most likely kill you without suffering a scratch," Dany said, shaking her head with a sigh.
"Believe what you like. I don't care about your opinion or hers." Arya lifted her chin slightly, her face full of disdain.
"How about trying it?" Dany suggested.
"You don't care about her life?" Arya asked in surprise.
"Your Majesty, please rest assured. I will exercise restraint," Danys said almost at the same time.
Arya's gaze sharpened. "Since the Dragon Queen even possesses resurrection magic, I don't mind playing along."
The next instant, the two girls, both under five feet tall, shot forward like bullets and collided.
Danys wore a gray-black cloak; Arya was dressed in black leather armor. The two were like twin shadows, entangled together.
Within the gray blur, two streaks of black lightning clashed, producing indistinguishable sounds of impact and a string of unextinguished sparks.
Bang. One shadow was sent flying backward; the other stood proudly in place.
"Why did it turn out like this? I clearly slashed her several times." Arya supported herself with her left hand on the ground, her face pale.
Dany only smiled faintly without speaking.
(End of Chapter)
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