AFfC 22: Arya 350

Arya is still praying for GREGOR's death but he is dead now; I'm pretty sure of it. His head is on its way to Dorne. She is hanging out with the Faceless Men of Braavos. She is expected not only to serve (valar dohaeris means all men must serve), but to give her entire being over to service. No playing with swords or otherwise being Arya Stark is to be allowed. So she goes for a walk and naturally strips all her clothes off and throws everything into the river. Except for Needle, which she hides under a stone step. Then she gets accepted as a full member of the temple. And sent off to go and work for a Fishmonger called Brusco to learn better to speak Braavosi.

As usual there is some mystery about just how much the Faceless Men are magical and how much they are tricksters. But it's basically a cult about freedom from slavery by dying, which doesn't sound particularly healthy. Then again the people who come to the temple to die seem pretty peaceful and happy about it, which is better than dying in agony from festering wounds but also slightly suspicious.

The other main message from this chapter is that we really should feel sad for Arya, who has lost everything and seems to have no place in the world, to the extent that she's fallen in with a sinister death cult. I'm pretty sure she's going to come out of this even more badass than she already is, though. Maybe she'll team up with Dany and together they will conquer all of Westeros.

AFfC 21: The Queenmaker 335

Quentyn to presumably become ruler of Dorne, but she thinks it won't be enough. She learns from Arys that Tywin is dead. So that news has now reached Dorne. She thinks Cersei will be easier to deal with.

It is also made very clear (surprise surprise) that she's just using Arys. He might be all right in the sack but she thinks he is dim-witted.

All she has to do is reach Hellholt (sounds like a lovely place) and crown Myrcella. So obviously it goes wrong. They reach an appointed boat crossing and Areo Hotah is waiting. Arys tries to fight but gets his head chopped off. Arianne goes completely to pieces, which makes me wonder how effective at Queenmaking she could ever have been anyway. Myrcella is on the ground having a fit with her head in her hands and blood everywhere. I think she could be dead. That will probably get Cersei to attack the Dornish, which probably won't go well as it sounds like even the Targaryens had trouble with them thanks to the hot climate which is not conducive to fighting in armour.

Oh dear, what a mess.

AFfC 20: Brienne 314

Nimble Dick leads Brienne across the countryside towards the Whispers, a castle where he says he took the Jester. Nimble Dick wins the chapter with his trope-busting no-nonsense advice about magic swords. "The Perfect Knight? The perfect fool he sounds like. What's the point o' having some magic sword if you don't bloody well use it?" Brienne invokes a trope about honour. "Ser Clarence Crabb would have wiped his hairy arse with your Perfect Knight, m'lady. If they'd ever have met, there'd be one more bloody head sitting on the shelf at the Whispers, you ask me. 'I should have used the magic sword,' it'd be saying to all the other heads. 'I should have used the bloody sword.'"

This does Brienne the world of good when she turns up at the castle and it's not Dontos and Sansa but remnants of Vargo Hoat's men. She kills them all with her Valyrian steel sword. Winning the chapter doesn't do Nimble Dick any good: he gets buried.

In other possible trope-busting, the obvious scoundrel turns out to be trustworthy. Or possibly it's more that Brienne didn't give him a chance to run off with all her gold.

Now she thinks that Sansa is at Riverrun. It's actually Arya who was headed for Riverrun.  But she didn't get there. Brienne's quest is not going well.

Nimble Dick did make the possibly prescient point that Crack-claw folk are "all good dragons". There may be some useful support for Dany there, when she turns up.

AFfC 19: The Drowned Man 299

It's Kingsmoot time. Thankfully it's not like and Entmoot; it's over in an afternoon. After a bunch of hopless idiots, we have Victarion, Asha and Euron. Asha wants to live in peace. Euron wants to conquer the universe. Victarion is the moderate. Nobody we have met so far wants Euron to win because he is terrifying. Naturally the crowd choose him because he has a big horn and hands out the best goody bags.

AFfC 18: The Iron Captain 286

Hopeful heir to the Seastone Chair of the Iron Islands Victarion goes to the Kingsmoot. We learn that Moat Cailin has been left in command of someone called Ralf Kenning. Probably it would be easier to take now than ever, but I'm not sure the Lannisters or Stannis are aware of this. Asha tries to get Victarion to let her be Hand in return for support, but he doesn't go for it because she wants to just live happily in the islands and not conquer anything.

We also lear that Victarion has had a bit of trouble with wives and his brother Euron, who got his wife pregnant then made him kill her. Is that worse than what GREGOR did to the Hound? Westerosi nobles really do have terrible families, have I said that before?

Asha wins the chapter when Jon Myre complains that her father let her think she was a man. "Your father made the same mistake with you."

AFfC 17: Cersei 267

Someone brings the wrong dwarf's head to Cersei. Could it be the dwarf Brienne met a few chapters back? Oh yes, page 153: "His nose was veined and bulbous." Cersei observes that this wrong dwarf's nose is "a rather bulbous one". GRRM doesn't do this by accident. Oh yes, and he said he was a "sparrow", which is some religious thing I think, same as Brienne's dwarf. Cersei doesn't mind killing all the dwarfs, though, to get to Tyrion.

Qyburn is the new Varys, since Cersei just announced it and supposedly all of Varys' old informers came running. I don't think he will be as effective, though, since even Cersei notices he doesn't have the same level of background contextual knowledge; the kind which is useful for making sense of whispers.

GREGOR is seemingly dead. Qyburn has his head in a nice box to send to Prince Doran. Cersei is annoyed with Doran Martell. She should not be: he's her only friend in Dorne as far as I can tell.

Cersei has installed her council of lackeys and suckups:

• Qyburn replaces Varys
• Orton Merryweather is not the hand but a dim-witted judge.
• Gyles Rosby is the blood-coughing treasurer.
• Aurane Waters is the admiral.
• Harys Swyft is Hand. He's also dim-witted and Kevan's father-in-law, which is supposed to keep Kevan at bay.

The council is a handy situation report. Let my try to summarise:

• Balon Swann of the Kingsguard is going to Sunspear with GREGOR's head and to do something else secret. Rescue Myrcella probably.
• Lots of sparrows (some sort of religious cult, as met by Brienne on the road some chapters back) are coming to the city and they are outspoken about Rh'llor being a demon god and about the Red Wedding being a terrible crime possibly instigated by Lannisters.
• The Septon appointed by Tyrion is dead; no-doubt Cersei had a hand in this.
• A bunch of lords are planning to overthrow Littlefinger, but Littlefinger is unconcerned and Cersei mainly wishes he'd come back and be treasurer again. She tells the Lords to harm Littlefinger.
• Cersei is going to delay paying debts to the Iron Bank in Braavos and to the Sept in order to build ships. No doubt that will cause trouble later.
• Lord Frey wants more land; Cersei wants him dead so she can tell his heirs to blame inconvenient relatives for the Red Wedding and kill them to placate the Red Wedding complainers.
• There is a Golden Company of mercenaries no longer working for Myr and the Myrish (where Taena Merryweather is from?). They might be working for Stannis, but if so why are they going towards Volantis? It's on the way to Meereen: could they be joining Dany?
• Lord Tyrell is going to attack Stannis's Storm's End
• The Freys are beseiging Riverrun (but aren't' they also supposed to be helping Bolton take Moat Cailin?)
• Daven Lannister is new the warden of the West and is helping the Freys with Riverrun.
• Lord Paxter Redwyne has ships which are attaking Stannis's Dragonstone.
• Stannis helping wildlings is expected to annoy the Northmen into joining Roose Bolton to help take Moat Cailin from the Ironmen.
• Wyman Manderley from White Harbor is on the brink of joining with the Lannisters, if only they can rescue his heir from Harrenhal (where he was previously held by GREGOR).
• Davos is in a cell at White Harbor after Stannis sent him to bring Manderley to his side. Cersei has asked Manderley to chop off his head. Somehow I don't think Davos will end up that way.
• There are rumours of dragons which Cersei is not taking seriously.
• Neither is Cersei taking the Night's Watch seriously.

Cersei still thinks Sansa helped Tyrion kill Joffrey and she means to kill Sansa. She thinks Arya is already dead and that Fake Araya will ensure Bolton gets Winterfell. But, of course, Littlefinger is ambitious and has Sansa and it turns out he is behind the Fake Arya scheme and can presumably end it at his convenience.

Catelyn hatches a plan with Taena's help to have the younger, non-Kingsguard Kettleblack Osney seduce Maergery. Then she can behead Maergery, send Osney to the wall with a hundred fake Watch volunteers to take out Jon Snow. She's relying on Jon being as trusting as his dad was.

How GRRM keeps track of all this I have no idea.

AFfC 16: Jaime 254

Jaime has a chat with his uncle Kevan Lannister who is leaving the city. Jaime wants him to capture Riverrun, but Kevan basically can't be arsed any more and just wants to go home to Darry so his ailing son Lancel can get married. Jaime realises it's true that Kevan knows about the incest. Mace Tyrell is on his way to Storm's End to capture it. Paxter Redwyne is on his way to Dragonstone to capture that. Success at these would presumably put an end to Stannis, except that Stannis is still up at the wall.

We learn that Lollys and Bronn have named Lollys' bastard Tyrion. Cersei has a mysterious gift in mind for the boy, which Jaime thinks involves killing Bronn. That would make sense. I wonder if Bronn is harbouring Tyrion.

We learn that Mad King Aerys only performed his marital duty after killing someone, and that he wasn't exactly the most tender lover. Yet more reason to forgive Jaime for being a Kingslayer. There's still the whole pushing Bran out of the window thing, though.

We learn that Taena Merryweather was spying on Cersei for Maergery but is now spying on Maergery for Cersei as well as feeding her with what Cersei wants her to know. Cersei has learned from her that the hilarious old lady Olenna Tyrell pays people in old coins. Like the old coin Jaime found in the jailer's quarters? Is that somehow a clue for Jaime to Joffrey's real killer? It seems significant, anyway.

Cersei is relying on Roose Bolton and Freys to deal with Stannis. She's planning to install Taena Merryweather's husband Owen as Hand. Jaime thinks him ineffectual. Cersei thinks only weak rulers need help and that strong rulers like her just need lackeys. Oh boy, that is not going to end well. She's going to put someone called Aurene Waters in charge of the Navy, but aside from the nominal determinism Jaime thinks he's useless too. Jaime doesn't trust ex-maester Qyburn either.

Jaime is still jealous of Osmund Kettleblack and Lancel.

Jaime has a mysterious chat with Loras Tyrell the flower knight who Jaime thinks is a younger and more whole version of himself. He talks about various previous members of the Kingsguard who have broken their vows in various ways. He finishes up by talking about Criston Cole the Kingmaker. I think he's been mentioned before by Asha in the context of being the one who prevented a woman from ascending to the Iron Throne. Is Jaime plotting to have Lancel put an end to Cersei's de-facto reign, somehow?