<blockquote>Three weeks into their delightful slog across Westeros, during yet another charming day of shitting in the woods, eating half-raw squirrel, and trudging his feet bloody, the single most dour and uninteresting woman Jaime had ever met in all of Westeros stopped in the middle of a field, drew a deep breath, and said, “When I was seven, my aunt came to visit with her son. My father told me that as the daughter of the house, it was my duty to show hospitality to my guests and to be gracious to them. I wanted to make him proud. So for three weeks, I let my cousin follow me around and talk to me about spiders.”
“Spiders?” Jaime said, mildly interested. It was the most she’d volunteered in the entire time.
“He was five years old. It was all he wanted to talk about. He’d describe them to me. He’d talk about how they ate by sucking the life out of their prey alive. He’d catch them and bring them to me and want me to hold them. One of them bit me and my hand swelled to the size of a melon. He told me spiders fall into our mouths from the ceilings while we sleep.”
“He sounds truly charming,” Jaime said. “It must run in the family.”
“And in all my life,” she went on, as if he hadn’t spoken, “I’ve never, ever, met anyone as annoying as him. Until you.”</blockquote>
