A Song of Ice and Fire, #3
A Storm of Swords
by George R. R. Martin
Contents
CHAPTER 61: SANSA
Overview
As bells toll for Joffrey, Sansa changes into hidden clothes and meets Ser Dontos, who leads her out of the Red Keep down a cliff and across Blackwater Bay. Aboard a galley, Petyr Baelish reveals he orchestrated her escape and Joffrey’s humiliations, then has Dontos killed.
Baelish claims credit for the plot surrounding Joffrey’s death, secures Sansa as his ward and asset, and sets their course “home,” while Tyrion’s arrest cements the political fallout.
Summary
With King’s Landing’s bells tolling for Joffrey, Sansa dresses in the hidden dark clothes Dontos told her to wear. Discovering a missing “black amethyst” from her silver hair net, she panics, suspecting the net’s stones were more than adornment. Ser Dontos arrives, drunk, urging flight and warning that Tyrion has been arrested for the king’s death.
Dontos leads Sansa through hidden ways to the outer wall, where she must descend a rock face via carved handholds. Terrified but resolute, Sansa climbs down and reaches a waiting skiff rowed by a cowled, taciturn old man. In heavy mist they pass the ruins of the Blackwater and reach a galley bearing a crowned merman figurehead.
Aboard, Sansa recognizes Petyr Baelish. When Dontos asks for his promised gold, Baelish instead has crossbowmen kill him and burns the body with the skiff. Baelish explains Dontos only acted at his behest, calling him a catspaw who would have sold Sansa again, and insists a quarrel buys silence forever.
As Baelish settles her into a prepared cabin, he boasts of arranging the dwarf joust to provoke Tyrion and using the godswood note to reach Sansa beyond Varys’s spies. He counsels confusion as strategy, names it the game of thrones, and invokes his past with Catelyn as justification for protecting Sansa. He promises safety and says they are sailing “home,” while the city reels and Tyrion remains in custody.
Who Appears
- Sansa StarkEscapes King’s Landing during Joffrey’s death aftermath; descends a cliff, boards Baelish’s ship, and learns of Littlefinger’s manipulations.
- Petyr Baelish (Littlefinger)Reveals he orchestrated Sansa’s rescue and provocations at the wedding; has Dontos killed; claims strategic authorship and secures Sansa.
- Ser Dontos HollardDrunken escort who guides Sansa out of the Red Keep; seeks payment and is executed by Baelish’s men.
- Lothor BruneLittlefinger’s man; oversees the ambush that kills Dontos and manages the shipboard operation.
- Cowled oarsmanGrim, elderly rower who ferries Sansa and Dontos to Baelish’s galley; enforces silence on the water.