It had been a tense supper at the marcher keep overlooking the Red Mountains, once built to defend against her kind, now housing her. Wine had flowed freely and her husband had carried the bitterness back to their chambers after a reminder of some long dead relative being cut down by the Dornish. It had been a squire of Wyl, but he wouldn't know the difference between Stone Dornish or Sandy Dornish. They were all the same to him.

Now the door had shut hard behind them.

He stood near the hearth, speaking of Vulture Kings and burned villages, of the dead in the passes a century past, as if Eleyna herself had ridden at their head.

She had endured it before. Tonight, she struggled to keep herself from tearing her ears off.

Eleyna turned from the balcony where the cold wind stirred her dark hair, her gold chains glinting in firelight. She pressed her fingers to her temple, exhausted beyond anger.

“Oh yes, of course. It was I. I who slew your great-uncle or whoever it was and set your precious marches aflame. I am the incarnation of all of my peoples' sin sent here to torment you.”

She gave him a flat look.

“Do shut up, husband. I was not a Vulture King. I have never raided your hills. I was not even born when your grandsire’s brother died.”

She stepped closer, voice edged with tired sarcasm.

“Shall I apologize for every corpse in the Red Mountains since Nymeria crossed the sea? Or would you prefer I confess to battles fought three hundred years before my mother drew breath?”