CHAPTER 3

“With the king. They have been together most of the night.”  There was a time when Lord Stannis would have woken him, no matter the hour, to have him there to give his counsel. “I should have been told,” Cressen complained. “I should have been woken.” He disentangled his fingers from Shireen’s. “Pardons, my lady, but I must speak with your lord father. Pylos, give me your arm. There are too many steps in this castle, and it seems to me they add a few every night, just to vex¹ me.”   Shireen and Patchface followed them out, but the child soon grew restless with the old man’s creeping pace and dashed ahead, the fool lurching after her with his cowbells clanging madly.  Castles are not friendly places for the frail², Cressen was reminded as he descended³ the turnpike stairs of Sea Dragon Tower. Lord Stannis would be found in the Chamber⁴ of the Painted Table, atop the Stone Drum, Dragonstone’s central keep, so named for the way its ancient walls boomed and rumbled⁵ during storms. To reach him they must cross the gallery, pass through the middle and inner walls with their guardian⁶ gargoyles⁷ and black iron gates, and ascend⁸ more steps than Cressen cared to contemplate⁹. Young men climbed steps two at a time; for old men with bad hips¹⁰, everyone was a torment¹². But Lord Stannis would not think to come to him, so the maester resigned himself to the ordeal¹³. He had Pylos to help him, at the least, and for that he was grateful.  Shuffling¹⁴ along the gallery, they passed before a row of tall arched windows with commanding views of the outer bailey, the curtain wall, and the fishing village beyond. in the yard, archers¹⁵ were firing at practice butts¹⁶ to the call of “Notch, draw, loose.” Their arrows made a sound like a flock of birds taking wing. Guardsmen strode the wallwalks, peering between the gargoyles on the host camped without. The morning air was hazy¹⁷ with the smoke of cookfires, as three thousand men sat down to break their fasts beneath the banners of their lords. Past the sprawl¹⁸ of the camp, the anchorage was crowded with ships. No craft that had come within sight of Dragonstone this past half year had been allowed to leave again. Lord Stannis’s Fury, a triple-decked war galley¹⁹ of three hundred oars²⁰, looked almost small beside some of the big-bellied carracks and cogs that surrounded her.  The guardsmen outside the Stone Drum knew the maesters by sight, and passed them through. “Wait here,” Cressen told Pylos, within. “It’s best I see him alone.”  “It is a long climb, Maester.”  Cressen smiled. “You think I have forgotten? I have climbed these steps so often I know each one by name.”  Halfway²¹ up, he regretted his decision. He had stopped to catch his breath and ease the pain in his hip¹¹ when he heard the scuff²² of boots on stone, and came face-to-face with Ser Davos Seaworth, descending²³.  Davos was a slight man, his low birth written plain upon a common face. A well-worn green cloak, stained by salt and spray and faded from the sun, draped his thin shoulders, over brown doublet and breeches that matched brown eyes and hair. About his neck a pouch²⁴ of worn leather hung from a thong²⁵. His small beard was well peppered with grey, and he wore a leather glove on his maimed left hand. When he saw Cressen, he checked his descent.

1 vex   

vt.使烦恼，使苦恼

参考例句：

• Everything about her vexed him.有关她的一切都令他困惑。
• It vexed me to think of others gossiping behind my back.一想到别人在背后说我闲话，我就很恼火。

2 frail   

adj.身体虚弱的；易损坏的

参考例句：

• Mrs. Warner is already 96 and too frail to live by herself.华纳太太已经九十六岁了，身体虚弱，不便独居。
• She lay in bed looking particularly frail.她躺在床上，看上去特别虚弱。

3 descended   

a.为...后裔的，出身于...的

参考例句：

• A mood of melancholy descended on us. 一种悲伤的情绪袭上我们的心头。
• The path descended the hill in a series of zigzags. 小路呈连续的之字形顺着山坡蜿蜒而下。

4 chamber   

n.房间，寝室；会议厅；议院；会所

参考例句：

• For many,the dentist's surgery remains a torture chamber.对许多人来说，牙医的治疗室一直是间受刑室。
• The chamber was ablaze with light.会议厅里灯火辉煌。

5 rumbled   

发出隆隆声，发出辘辘声( rumble的过去式和过去分词 )； 轰鸣着缓慢行进； 发现…的真相； 看穿（阴谋）

参考例句：

• The machine rumbled as it started up. 机器轰鸣着发动起来。
• Things rapidly became calm, though beneath the surface the argument rumbled on. 事情迅速平静下来了，然而，在这种平静的表面背后争论如隆隆雷声，持续不断。

6 guardian   

n.监护人；守卫者，保护者

参考例句：

• The form must be signed by the child's parents or guardian. 这张表格须由孩子的家长或监护人签字。
• The press is a guardian of the public weal. 报刊是公共福利的卫护者。

7 gargoyles   

n.怪兽状滴水嘴( gargoyle的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• Week of Gargoyle: Double growth for Gargoyle and O idia Gargoyles. 石像鬼周：石像鬼产量加倍。 来自互联网
• Fixed a problem that caused Gargoyles to become stuck in Stone Form. 修正了石像鬼在石像形态卡住的问题。 来自互联网

8 ascend   

vi.渐渐上升，升高；vt.攀登，登上

参考例句：

• We watched the airplane ascend higher and higher.我们看着飞机逐渐升高。
• We ascend in the order of time and of development.我们按时间和发展顺序向上溯。

9 contemplate   

vt.盘算，计议；周密考虑；注视，凝视

参考例句：

• The possibility of war is too horrifying to contemplate.战争的可能性太可怕了，真不堪细想。
• The consequences would be too ghastly to contemplate.后果不堪设想。

10 hips   

abbr.high impact polystyrene 高冲击强度聚苯乙烯，耐冲性聚苯乙烯n.臀部( hip的名词复数 )；[建筑学]屋脊；臀围（尺寸）；臀部…的

参考例句：

• She stood with her hands on her hips. 她双手叉腰站着。
• They wiggled their hips to the sound of pop music. 他们随着流行音乐的声音摇晃着臀部。 来自《简明英汉词典》

11 hip   

n.臀部，髋；屋脊

参考例句：

• The thigh bone is connected to the hip bone.股骨连着髋骨。
• The new coats blouse gracefully above the hip line.新外套在臀围线上优美地打着褶皱。

12 torment   

n.折磨；令人痛苦的东西(人)；vt.折磨；纠缠

参考例句：

• He has never suffered the torment of rejection.他从未经受过遭人拒绝的痛苦。
• Now nothing aggravates me more than when people torment each other.没有什么东西比人们的互相折磨更使我愤怒。

13 ordeal   

n.苦难经历，（尤指对品格、耐力的）严峻考验

参考例句：

• She managed to keep her sanity throughout the ordeal.在那场磨难中她始终保持神志正常。
• Being lost in the wilderness for a week was an ordeal for me.在荒野里迷路一星期对我来说真是一场磨难。

14 shuffling   

adj. 慢慢移动的, 滑移的 动词shuffle的现在分词形式

参考例句：

• Don't go shuffling along as if you were dead. 别像个死人似地拖着脚走。 来自英汉文学 - 嘉莉妹妹
• Some one was shuffling by on the sidewalk. 外面的人行道上有人拖着脚走过。 来自英汉文学 - 嘉莉妹妹

15 archers   

n.弓箭手，射箭运动员( archer的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• The next evening old Mr. Sillerton Jackson came to dine with the Archers. 第二天晚上，西勒顿？杰克逊老先生来和阿切尔家人一起吃饭。 来自辞典例句
• Week of Archer: Double growth for Archers and Marksmen. 射手周：弓箭手与弩手（人类）产量加倍。 来自互联网

16 butts   

笑柄( butt的名词复数 )； （武器或工具的）粗大的一端； 屁股； 烟蒂

参考例句：

• The Nazis worked them over with gun butts. 纳粹分子用枪托毒打他们。
• The house butts to a cemetery. 这所房子和墓地相连。

17 hazy   

adj.有薄雾的，朦胧的；不肯定的，模糊的

参考例句：

• We couldn't see far because it was so hazy.雾气蒙蒙妨碍了我们的视线。
• I have a hazy memory of those early years.对那些早先的岁月我有着朦胧的记忆。

18 sprawl   

vi.躺卧，扩张，蔓延；vt.使蔓延；n.躺卧，蔓延

参考例句：

• In our garden,bushes are allowed to sprawl as they will.在我们园子里，灌木丛爱怎么蔓延就怎么蔓延。
• He is lying in a sprawl on the bed.他伸开四肢躺在床上。

19 galley   

n.（飞机或船上的）厨房单层甲板大帆船；军舰舰长用的大划艇；

参考例句：

• The stewardess will get you some water from the galley.空姐会从厨房给你拿些水来。
• Visitors can also go through the large galley where crew members got their meals.游客还可以穿过船员们用餐的厨房。

20 oars   

n.桨，橹( oar的名词复数 )；划手v.划（行）( oar的第三人称单数 )

参考例句：

• He pulled as hard as he could on the oars. 他拼命地划桨。
• The sailors are bending to the oars. 水手们在拼命地划桨。 来自《简明英汉词典》

21 halfway   

adj.中途的，不彻底的，部分的；adv.半路地，在中途，在半途

参考例句：

• We had got only halfway when it began to get dark.走到半路，天就黑了。
• In study the worst danger is give up halfway.在学习上，最忌讳的是有始无终。

22 scuff   

v. 拖着脚走；磨损

参考例句：

• Polly,bewildered and embarrassed,dropped her head and scuffed her feet.波莉既困惑又尴尬，低下头拖着脚走开了。
• Constant wheelchair use will scuff almost any floor surface.任何地板上经常有轮椅走动几乎都会有所磨损。

23 descending   

n. 下行 adj. 下降的

参考例句：

• The results are expressed in descending numerical order . 结果按数字降序列出。
• The climbers stopped to orient themselves before descending the mountain. 登山者先停下来确定所在的位置，然后再下山。

24 pouch   

n.小袋，小包，囊状袋；vt.装...入袋中，用袋运输；vi.用袋送信件

参考例句：

• He was going to make a tobacco pouch out of them. 他要用它们缝制一个烟草袋。
• The old man is always carrying a tobacco pouch with him.这老汉总是随身带着烟袋。

25 thong   

n.皮带；皮鞭；v.装皮带

参考例句：

• He fastened the dog to the post with a thong.他用一根皮带把狗拴到柱子上。
• If I switch with Harry,do I have to wear a thong?如果我和哈里调换，我应该穿皮带吗？