The Dornish Marches

[The Stranger]

There is the sound of whimpering, and a quiet female voice, "Please milord, we are just small folk, we've nothing to give you!"

[Sam]

"I am here hunting outlaws, you fools. Send someone out that I can speak with," Steffon said, struggling to keep his his frustration in check and his voice calm.

[The Stranger]

"There are no outlaws here just simple folk! Please milord..." The female voice pleads, "We don't know anything about that! Ser Iyan, he would know, speak to him."

[Sam]

"Where." Steffon growled.

[The Stranger]

"His holdfast is to the south, milord, we are his smallfolk."

[Sam]

Staffon shakes his head in frustration, and leaves the house and remounts his horse. "We have little other choice, I suppose. We will ride south, to the holdfast of this Ser Iyan, however keep watch for an ambush. Eight men on watch every night along the way." Steffon barked out orders to his men, and wheeled his horse in a circled before spurring it and riding off south.

[The Stranger]

It takes the remainder of the day to arrive at a well built mudbrick holdfast. Steffon and his men arrive just as the sun dips below the mountains.

[Sam]

Steffon rides up to the gates, his squire bearing the standard of Storm's End, and he calls up to the gate-guards requesting entry.

[The Stranger]

The squire is met by two men peering out from the top of a short tower, they bow nock arrows in curved Dornish bows.

"What do you want Stormlanders! You're far from home!"

[Sam]

"We are hunting bandits and their trail led us here. I would speak with the master of this holdfast, if he might help us with our hunt," Steffon called up to the men atop the gates.

[The Stranger]

"Hold yourself still," The bowman says, as his partner goes below. Eventually, after several minutes, a man appears at the top of the tower.

"I am Ser Iyan Whitesand. You trespass in Dorne my lord Baratheon, you are not the law here. Return to your side of the border. If there are bandits, tell me what you know of them, and I will see to it that Lord Wyl hears of it."

[Sam]

Steffon spat on the ground. "Very well, Ser. I will return to my land, and I shall remember Ser Iyan Whitesand." The stormlord wheeled his horse and rode back to the rest of his men who had reined in out of bow-shot.

"We will return north, the Dornish will not aid us simply out of spite, and it's more than likely that they're all sheltering the Vultures anyway," Steffon said. He gave the order to ride north, back to the burned village in the Stormlands.

[Sam]

////////////////////////////////////////////////////////
Ser Terrick of Storm's End leads twenty-four other mounted knights through the mountains of the Marches, three riderless led behind them. They make their way through the various passes, seeking Lord Rhaegar Targaryen and his small company that their Lord had instructed them to meet.

Ser Terrick spat on the dusty ground, and when his company made camp toward the end of the day he pulled a small book out of his saddlebags, and settled against a tree to read by torchlight, while his men took the first watches.

[Lord Rhaegar Targaryen]

Six men in black approach the camp. They are armoured and helmeted, though an echoey laugh can be heard from the foremost as they enter the camp.

[Sam]

The five men on watch are instantly alert and prepared, as Ser Tarrick gets to his feet, drawing his own sword. "Who goes there? Declare yourself!"