Game of Thrones · Season 1
Lord Stark! My lady. A guardsman just rode in from the hills. They've captured a deserter from the Night's Watch.
Get the lads to saddle their horses.
Do you have to?
He swore an oath, Cat.
Law is law, my lady.
Tell Bran he's coming too. [Rodrik nods and heads off]
Ned. 10 is too young to see such things.
He won't be a boy forever. And winter is coming.
[Ned Stark has beheaded Will as a deserter of the Night's Watch]
You understand why I did it?
Jon said he was a deserter.
But you understand why I had to kill him.
"Our way is the old way."
The man who passes the sentence should swing the sword.
Is it true he saw the White Walkers?
The White Walkers have been gone for thousands of years.
So he was lying?
A madman sees what he sees.
[Walking down a path near the riverbank, they find the body of a full-grown female direwolf with five direwolf pups huddling close to her]
It's a freak!
It's a direwolf. Tough old beast.
There are no direwolves south of the Wall.
Now there are five. You want to hold it?
[Bran takes the pup immediately and wraps it in his cloak.]
Where will they go?
They don't belong down here.
Better a quick death. They won't last without their mother.
[Theon draws his dagger and grabs the pup from Bran.]
Right, give it here!
No!
Put away your blade!
I take orders from your father, not you.
Please, Father!
I'm sorry, Bran.
Lord Stark? There are five pups, one for each of the Stark children. The direwolf is the sigil of your House. They were meant to have them.
You will train them yourselves, you will feed them yourselves, and if they die, you will bury them yourselves.
What about you?
I'm not a Stark. Get on.
[He notices something at the base of a tree and heads towards it.]
What is it?
[Jon straightens up, holding a sixth direwolf pup, an albino.]
Ah, the runt of the litter! That one's yours, Snow.
[King Robert Baratheon pays a visit to Lord Eddard Stark of Winterfell]
Your Grace.
You got fat.
[Ned looks at him with a cocked eyebrow as if to say "Look who's talking", then they both burst out laughing and hug.]
Cat! [hugs and kisses Catelyn.]
Your Grace.
Nine years! Why have I not seen you? Where the hell have you been?
Guarding the North for you, Your Grace. Winterfell is yours.
[Queen Cersei steps out of the carriage after her children with a distasteful look on her face.]
Where's the Imp?
Will you shut up?
[to Robb] And who have we here? You must be Robb. [to Sansa] My, you're a pretty one. And your name is...
Arya.
[to Bran] Ohhh, show us your muscles. You'll be a soldier!
[Robert chuckles and moves back towards Ned. Behind him, Jaime Lanniser removes his helmet]
That's Jaime Lannister, the Queen's twin brother.
Would you please shut up?!
[Cersei walks up to Ned and offers her hand; after a moment, Eddard kisses it.]
My Queen.
My Queen.
Take me to your crypt, I want to pay my respects.
We've been riding for a month, my love. Surely, the dead can wait.
Ned.
[Turns towards the crypts, followed hesitantly by Ned.]
Where's the Imp?
[Cersei overhears her and goes back over to Jaime]
Where is our brother? Go and find the little beast!
You're Tyrion Lannister? The Queen's brother?
My greatest accomplishment. And you, you're Ned Stark's bastard, aren't you?
[Jon walks away]
Did I offend you? Sorry. You are the bastard, though.
Lord Eddard Stark is my father.
And Lady Stark is not your mother, making you … the bastard. Let me give you some advice, bastard: never forget what you are. The rest of the world will not. Wear it like armor, and it can never be used to hurt you.
What the hell do you know about being a bastard?
All dwarfs are bastards in their fathers' eyes.
[Bran has just caught Queen Cersei having sex with her brother]
He saw us!
It's all right, it's all right, it's all right.
He saw us!
[to Cersei] I heard you the first time. [to Bran] Quite the little climber, aren't you? How old are you, boy?
Ten.
Ten? [looks to Cersei again, who says nothing] The things I do for love.
[Jaime pushes Bran out the window]
Is Bran going to die?
Apparently not.
What do you mean?
The Maester says the boy may live.
It's no mercy, letting a child linger in such pain.
Only the Gods know for certain. All the rest of us can do is pray. The charms of the North seem entirely lost on you.
I still can't believe you're going. It's ridiculous, even for you.
Where's your sense of wonder? The greatest structure ever built, the intrepid men of the Night's Watch, the wintry abode of the White Walkers!
Tell me you're not thinking of taking the Black.
And go celibate? The whores would go begging from Dorne to Casterly Rock! No, I just want to stand on top of the Wall and piss off the edge of the world!
The children don't need to hear your filth. Come.
Even if the boy lives, he'll be a cripple. A grotesque. Give me a good, clean death any day.
Speaking for the grotesques, I'd have to disagree. Death is so final, whereas life, ahh, life is full of possibilities. I hope the boy does wake. I'd be interested to hear what he has to say.
My dear brother, at times you make me wonder whose side you're on.
My dear brother, you wound me. You know how much I love my family.
We ride for King's Landing today.
Before you go, you will call on Lord and Lady Stark and offer your sympathies.
What good will my sympathies do them?
None, but it is expected of you. Your absence has already been noted.
The boy means nothing to me, and I can't stand the wailing of women.
[slaps Joffrey] One word and I hit you again.
I'm telling Mother!
[slaps Joffrey] Go, tell her! But first you will get to Lord and Lady Stark. And you will fall on your knees in front of them and tell them how very sorry you are, that you are at their service and that all your prayers are with them. Do you understand?
You can't!
[slaps Joffrey] Do you understand?
[Joffrey scurries away]
The Prince will remember that, little Lord.
I hope so. If he forgets, be a good dog and remind him.
Sansa can keep her sewing needles. I've got a Needle of my own.
There was that one... oh, what was her name? That common girl of yours? Becca, with the great big tits you could bury your face in?
Bessie. She was one of yours.
Bessie! Thank the gods for Bessie, and her tits! Yours was, uh... Aleena? No, you told me once. Uh... Meryl? Your bastard's mother?
[grimaces] Wylla.
That's it. She must have been a rare wench to make Lord Eddard Stark forget his honour. You never told me what she looked like.
Nor will I.
We were at war. None of us knew if we were gonna go back home again. You're too hard on yourself. You always have been. I swear, if I weren't your king, you'd have hit me already.
The worst thing about your coronation, I'll never get to hit you again.
Trust me, that's not the worst thing. [pulls out a folded slip of paper from his coat] There was a rider in the night.
[opens the note and reads it] Daenerys Targaryen has wed some Dothraki horselord. What of it? Should we send her a wedding gift?
A knife, perhaps. A good, sharp one, and a bold man to wield it.
She's little more than a child.
Soon enough, that child will spread her legs and start breeding.
Tell me we're not speaking of this.
Oh, it's unspeakable to you? What her father did to your family, that was unspeakable! What Rhaegar Targaryen did to your sister, the woman I loved! I'll kill every Targaryen I get my hands on!
But you can't get your hands on this one, can you?
This Khal Drogo, it's said he has a hundred thousand men in his horde.
Even a million Dothraki are no threat to the realm, as long as they remain on the other side of the Narrow Sea. They have no ships, Robert!
There are still those in the Seven Kingdoms who call me 'Usurper'. If a Targaryen boy crosses with a Dothraki horde at his back, the scum will join him!
He will not cross! And if by chance he does, we'll throw him back into the sea!
There's a war coming, Ned. I don't know when, I don't know who we'll be fighting... but it's coming.
[Tyrion and Jon Snow watch as several captured criminals are brought in by the band of Watchmen and fed]
Ah, rapers. They were given a choice, no doubt: castration, or the Wall. Most choose the knife. Not impressed with your new brothers? Lovely thing about the Watch. You discard your old family and get a whole new one.
Why do you read so much?
Look at me and tell me what you see.
Is this a trick?
What you see is a dwarf. If I had been born a peasant, they might've left me out in the woods to die. Alas, I was born a Lannister of Casterly Rock. Things are expected of me. My father was the Hand of the King for twenty years.
Until your brother killed that King.
Yes. Until my brother killed him. Life is full of these little ironies. My sister married the new King, and my repulsive nephew will be King after him. I must do my part, for the honour of my House. Wouldn't you agree? But how? Well, my brother has his sword, and I have my mind, and a mind needs books like a sword needs a whetstone. That's why I read so much, Jon Snow. And you? What's your story, bastard?
Ask me nicely, and maybe I'll tell you, dwarf.
A bastard boy with nothing to inherit, off to join the ancient Order of the Night's Watch. Alongside his valiant brothers-in-arms.
The Night's Watch protects the Realm from--
Ah, yes, yes, against grumpkins and snarks, and all the other monsters your wet-nurse warned you about! You're a smart boy, you don't believe all that nonsense.
Thank the gods you're here, Stark. About time we had some stern, Northern leadership.
Glad to see you're protecting the Throne.
Sturdy old thing. How many Kings' arses have polished it, I wonder? Um, what's the line? The King shits and the Hand wipes.
Very handsome armor. Not a scratch on it.
I know. People have been swinging at me for years, but they always seem to miss.
You've chosen your opponents wisely then.
I have a knack for it. It must be strange for you, coming into this room. I was standing right here when it happened. He was very brave, your brother. Your father too. They didn't deserve to die like that. Nobody deserves to die like that.
But you just stood there and watched.
Five hundred men just stood there and watched. All the great knights of the Seven Kingdoms, you think anyone said a word, lifted a finger? No, Lord Stark. Five hundred men and this room was silent as a crypt. Except for the screams, of course, and the Mad King laughing. And later, when I watched the Mad King die, I remembered him laughing, as your father burned. It felt like justice.
Is that what you tell yourself at night? You're a servant of justice? That you were avenging my father when you shoved your sword in Aerys Targaryen's back?
Tell me, if I'd stabbed the Mad King in the belly instead of the back, would you admire me more?
You served him well. When serving was safe.
How could you be so stupid?!
Calm down.
He's a child! Ten years old! What were you thinking?
I was thinking of us. You're a bit late to start complaining about it now. What has the boy told them?
Nothing. He said nothing, he remembers nothing.
Then what are you raving about?
What if it comes back to him? If he tells his father what he saw—
We'll say he was lying. We'll say he was dreaming. We'll say whatever we like. I think we can outfox a ten-year-old.
And my husband?
I'll go to war with him if I have to. They can write a ballad about us! "The War for Cersei's Cunt."
[Looking furious, Cersei slaps him. Jaime chuckles, then grabs her when she tries again]
Let me go!
Never.
[more afraid] Let me go...
The boy won't talk. And if he does, I'll kill him. Him, Ned Stark, the King, the whole bloody lot of them, until you and I are the only people left in this world.
[a crow lands in the window]
Don't listen to it. Crows are all liars. I know a story about a crow.
I hate your stories.
I know a story about a boy who hated stories. I can tell you about Ser Duncan the Tall. Those were always your favorites.
Those aren't my favorites. My favorites were the scary ones.
Oh, my sweet summer child, what do you know about fear? Fear is for the winter when the snows fall a hundred feet deep. Fear is for the long nights when the sun hides for years, and children are born and live and die all in darkness. That is the time for fear, my little Lord: when the White Walkers roam through the woods. Thousands of years ago there came a night that lasted a generation. Kings froze to death in their castles, same as the shepherds in their huts, and women smothered their babies rather than see them starve, and wept, and felt their tears freeze on their cheeks! So is this the sort of story that you like? [Bran nods] In that darkness, the White Walkers came for the first time. They swept through cities and kingdoms, riding their dead horses, hunting with their packs of pale spiders, big as hounds! —
[entering suddenly] What are you telling him now?
Only what the little Lord wants to hear.
Do the Dothraki buy their slaves?
The Dothraki don't believe in money. Most of their slaves were given to them as gifts.
From whom?
If you rule a city and you see the horde approaching, you have two choices: pay tribute or fight. An easy choice for most. Of course, sometimes it's not enough. Sometimes a Khal feels insulted by the number of slaves he's given. He might think the men too weak or the women too ugly. Sometimes a Khal decides his riders haven't had a good fight in months and need the practice.
[Dany becomes uncomfortable when she sees a slave getting whipped for not walking fast enough]
Tell them all to stop.
You want the entire horde to stop? For how long?
Until I command them otherwise.
You're learning to talk like a Queen.
Not a Queen. A Khaleesi.
These quotes come from Wikiquote's Game of Thrones pages and are available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License.
