Quentyn Martell and Gerris Drinkwater meet with the captain of Adventure, seeking passage from Volantis to Meereen. They have been in Volantis for twenty days and have sought passage from many captains without success. Gerris is 24-years-old, tall and fair, with blue-green eyes, sandy hair streaked by the sun, and a lean and comely body. Quentyn is 18-years-old, short-legged and stocky, thickly built, with hair the brown of new-turned earth. Concealing their true identities from the captain of Adventure, Gerris poses as a wineseller, and Quentyn as his servant. The captain advises against traveling to Slaver’s Bay. Yunkai is at war with Astapor, he explains, and has been recruiting sellswords in Volantis: the Long Lances, the Windblown, and the Company of the Cat. New Ghis has also allied with Yunkai, and the Golden Company marches east. Gerris offers the captain three times the usual fee for passage to Slaver’s Bay; the captain tells him they will leave on the morrow an hour before first light.
Quentyn had started his journey from Dorne, along with five companions, three of which are now dead. Doran Martell had summoned Quentyn to the Water Gardens and instructed him to travel to Meereen to claim Daenerys as his bride. The group left Dorne from Planky Town and sailed to Lys. From Lys, they travelled to Volantis aboard the Meadowlark. Maester Kedry, William Wells, and Cletus Yronwood were slain by corsairs aboard the Meadowlark. The corsairs had come aboard in the darkness before dawn, as the Meadowlark was anchored off the coast of the Disputed Lands. Kedry had been fluent in the tongues of all of the Free Cities, and even the mongrel Ghiscari spoken along the shores of Slaver’s Bay. Now in Volantis, the three surviving travellers seek passage to Meereen.
Gerris and Quentyn depart the pier and climb into their hathay – an ornate cart pulled by a dwarf elephant. The two men do not trust the captain and foresee treachery aboard the Adventure. They travel along the wharves on their way to the Merchant’s House where they are lodging. In Volantis, the slaves are all tattooed: their driver has a wheel tattooed upon one cheek. While riding, Quentyn spots the Black Wall, a great oval of fused stone two hundred feet high. Outlanders, foreigners, and freedmen are not allowed inside, save at the invitation of those who dwell within – scions of the Old Blood who can trace their ancestry back to Valyria. From a cross street, a triarch appears atop an elephant, escorted by a dozen Unsullied spearmen; triarchs are considered so elevated that their feet are not allowed to touch the ground. Volantis is a freehold, modeled after Valyria of old. All freeborn landholders share the rule. The three triarchs are chosen from amongst those noble families who can prove unbroken descent from old Valyria. Each serves for one year.
Outside the Merchant’s House four sellswords behind a trestle table call out to every passing man and boy. They are sellswords from the Windblown company gathering new recruits. Archibald Yronwood, called the big man, is waiting for Quentyn and Gerris inside their room within the Merchant’s House. Archibald is six-and-a-half-feet tall, broad of shoulder, huge of belly, with legs like tree trunks, and no neck to speak of. Moreover, he has been bald since childhood. Archibald listens to Quentyn and Gerris explain how they were unable to find a ship and suggests that they travel to Meereen overland; an old Valyrian road, known as the demon road, runs eastward from Volantis to Meereen. Gerris announces he has thought of a better way of reaching Meereen: it is risky and perhaps dishonorable, but it will get them to Daenerys quicker than the demon road. Tell me, Quentyn replies.
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