Chapter Text
Year 209 AC
The rain beats down on the land, the sun obscured by grey clouds. The smell of mud, horse and the growing scent of decay fills Dunk’s lungs. He had known this was coming days ago, but that fact did little to ease the unending ache in his chest.
Maybe he pulled something when digging the grave. If he had, he would feel better in a few hours, but Dunk doubted that he would. Ser Arlan was dead, no amount of time would heal that hurt, only distance and other things to keep his mind full with.
His Ser’s body was easy to carry, the infection had eaten away at his body’s natural protection and his desire for food, he had lost several pounds. Maybe that wasn’t saying much, Dunk found it easy to carry him when he was hale and in a drunken slumber. This time, which Dunk realised would be the last time, carrying him felt very different. He was cold and he didn’t smell of cheap ale or sour wine, he smelled of rot.
The sound of rumbling thunder bounding over the hills fills Dunk’s ears as he places Ser Arlan down in the now soaked dirt. He curls his fists, a prickly pain shooting from his palms as the skin is pierced. He forces his hands open, breathing deeply as Ser taught him, and the pain fades. Dunk kneels beside the grave as he rakes his brain for the briefest of memories, the simplest of prayers, but with a grimace, he admits defeat as he finds nothing.
“I don’t know the right words… ‘ought to be a Septon here…” He stops himself from rambling to a dead man, and instead makes up his own method saying farewell, “You were a true knight. You never beat me when I didn’t deserve it. Except that time in Maidenpool, it was the inn boy who ate the widow woman’s pie. Not me, I told you… Doesn’t matter now.”
Dunk takes a shaky breath, deciding that’s the best he’s got. He stands up, grabbing the shovel on his way up, taking several more breaths as he resists the urge to cry again. The skin by his temple and cheeks tickle and itch in a familiar way, but he resists the urge to scratch.
“I’d leave your sword but…” his voice shakes, his breathing doing little to calm his running nose, “it would only rust in the ground… I wish you didn’t die, Ser… I’ll take good care of the horses.”
With that final goodbye, Dunk starts shovelling dirt into the grave, his master’s face slowly disappearing from view.
It was morning when his Ser died, but he’d gone with the poor weather and had left a lovely sunny afternoon in the wake. The birds chirped louder than usual to compensate for the late start to the day, but Dunk felt like his was already done. On his back, staring at the sky, hands clasped together on his stomach, just like how he sleeps. Night could be upon him in an instant and he’d hardly need to move.
A horse huffs as a fly tickles its nose hairs.
“Eat like a king if I sold you three-“
The horses respond with indignant noises.
A horse huffs as a fly tickles its nose hairs.
“Eat good if I sold you three-“
The horses respond with indignant noises.
“for a time, a few moons maybe… Then what? That road ends in outlawry, beggary or…” he purses his lips to prevent the words spilling out.
Looking over to Ser Arlan’s grave, the shovel still stuck in the dirt, a thought comes to mind. Dunk sits up, continuing to talk with the horses.
“We could go to a city… Kingslanding? Lannisport?” Even as he says it, Dunk shakes his head. Those places have too many people, too many agitations. His attention goes to the sword behind him, resting against the only tree within view.
He stands up, unsheathing the blade, fidgeting his hold until it feels comfortable.
“Could join the Night’s Watch, take the black? Barely anyone there. Everyone too cold to wonder about me.” He shuffles his feet into the position his master had taught him, pointing the blade at an imaginary wildling, “Stop pillaging, ser.”
With a huff, he steps out of the stance, swinging the sword in the practised manner he had learned mostly to show off. Just something to add to the list of things Ser Arlan could teach him. Dunk holds the blade firm, bringing it close as he remembers his master’s lessons. The skills he learned might just be enough.
“Fits my grip as well as it ever fit his… and there is a tourney at Ashford Meadow.”
Year 196 AC
Dunk learnt long ago that being alone was hard, lowborn and poor harder still. People always take and use those they deem lesser than themselves. His height gave him an advantage over the average man, but he was never sure if it came from his parents or that night when he was a boy.
Said night had Kingslanding up in arms, soldiers, lordlings, knights and other such marching out of the gates to put down the Black Dragon. The sound of armour clanging and hooves hitting stone echoed even down to his and Rafe’s hidey-hole. She tried to stop him, but Dunk couldn’t help himself. He slipped out to have a look, to see the army as they leave to end the Blackfyre Rebellion on the morn.
Hidden behind a crowd, seeing through the gaps of shoulders and sides, Dunk managed to see a flash of silver hair atop a horse. He tried to follow the obviously royal man from behind the people, but quickly slammed into a wall.
Dunk turned and realised it wasn’t, it was a hooded man. He had stared at the him, and just as abruptly as Dunk had ran into him, the man had grabbed him.
The rest of the night was a blur, metal clamps holding him down on a table in a dark room. Flashing memories of eyes green and blue. Chains clinking together against grey cloth. Worms being pressed against his skin and digging in, sending fire through his muscles. Blue lips mumbling. A green liquid that stung his nose, being shoved down his throat, burning as it went. He remembered screaming as they cut him and collected the nearly black blood.
The torture ended with multiple voices chanting in a tongue Dunk didn’t understand, then nothingness.
A full moon shining down on his face was what woke him. A singular bright light stared down at him as he stared blankly back. After a few seconds, he became aware of the pain. It burnt, it stung, it ached, in every part of his body, it hurt.
Dunk had let out a groan as he tried to sit up, but quickly realised he was pinned down. Looking away from the moon, he saw what trapped him. The bodies of mutilated children. He had woken in a mass grave of other tortured children and it seemed Dunk had been the only survivor.
Panic filled him and he clawed his way out, pure terror and nausea seeping out of him. The last bit of pressure, Dunk turned to see what it was and saw it was the arm of a little girl whose mouth was burnt completely away to her spine, her unkempt silver hair glistening in the moonlight.
Dunk could remember her in perfect detail and he believed he always would.
He didn’t know how long he stared, but after some time, the sound of a cart broke his trance. Dunk scrambled behind a tree, pressing his back against the trunk and his hand against his nose and mouth.
There was the dull wet thud of something hitting the bodies. More bodies, Dunk’s mind had unhelpfully guessed, but then there was another… and another… and another… and another… and another.
A deep Flea Bottom male voice caused Dunk to flinch violently, “That’s that then… and you said we’d run out of time.”
Another voice, slightly harsher, answered, “Concerned, that’s all. We had till morning or there’d be too many eyes in the city. This was the only time she said she could do this without being caught. ‘Men love war’, she said.”
“I don’t love war, do you?” He had paused, “Right. That’s what I thought. Only highborn folk and their bastards love war. Men like us, we like coin and spending it, why bother killing each other when we can wait till others do it and we clean up the bodies for some stags?”
“Aye, well said. Elephant.”
They started to pour a lot of something onto the bodies.
“It’s ’ellow-quaint’, you lump.”
Something solid was then thrown onto the bodies and the area was suddenly illuminated. A disgusting and wholly individual smell filled Dunk’s nose and when he heard the sound of footsteps quieting, he couldn’t help but look around the tree.
The hole filled with bodies was engulfed in flame, the fire eating away at the evidence of the horrors done that night. After what must have been hours, the fire had started to go out and the sun slowly entered the sky.
Dunk had ran, followed the tracks left by the cart back to Kingslanding and slipped past snoozing Gold Cloaks into the city. He sneaked into the hidey-hole where Rafe had welcomed him home with a whack to the arm for worrying her.
But he didn’t feel anything from it and instead wrapped his arms around her, hiding his face in her hair. Rafe tried kicking him to make him let go. Her action got no reaction from him. She then went to rip at his at his hair, but stopped as she felt warm tears drop onto her. Rafe could only sigh, relax into the hug and drop her hand onto his head, comforting instead of hurting.
She never asked about that night. She never got the chance to. She was dead by the next day’s nightfall.