The Sworn Sword

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In an iron cage at the crossroads, two dead men were rotting in the summer sun.

Egg stopped below to have a look at them. “Who do you think they were, ser?” His mule Maester, grateful for the respite, began to crop the dry brown devilgrass along the verges, heedless of the two huge wine casks on his back.

“Robbers,” Dunk said. Mounted atop Thunder, he was much closer to the dead men. “Rapers. Murderers.” Dark circles stained his old green tunic under both arms. The sky was blue and the sun was blazing hot, and he had sweated gallons since breaking camp this morning.

Egg took off his wide-brimmed floppy straw hat. Beneath, his head was bald and shiny. He used the hat to fan away the flies. There were hundreds crawling on the dead men, and more drifting lazily through the still, hot air. “It must have been something bad, for them to be left to die inside a crow cage.”

Sometimes Egg could be as wise as any maester, but other times he was still a boy of ten. “There are lords and lords,” Dunk said. “Some don’t need much reason to put a man to death.”

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