Fishing Net 5

Asha looked as though she were staring at an idiot. "What Lord Regent Gryn wants is a living heir to the Iron Islands—more precisely..."

As she spoke, a piercing pain made her body tremble slightly. Her brow furrowed tighter, and after pausing to recover, she continued, "He wants a ruler of the Iron Islands who will be 'utterly loyal' to him."

"Don't look at me like that, damn it!" Theon felt a chill under Asha's stare and immediately grew angry from embarrassment.

After thinking for a moment, he dropped onto the cold ground, his face filled with doubt and scrutiny. "Did the Lord Regent deceive you?"

When Asha shook her head, his brow knotted up. Raising his voice, he demanded, "Don't tell me you fell in love with him?"

Without waiting for her reply, he began shouting furiously again. "Women are idiots! Men only whisper sweet nothings to you in bed, yet you believe every word! Hmph, look at you now—you're simply disgracing the honor of House Greyjoy!"

Asha's unblinking stare made Theon unconsciously draw his neck back a little, but he still stubbornly said, "I'm not wrong!"

"This was never a bargain I could refuse. It has nothing to do with love between a man and a woman, Theon."

Asha's voice was weary. She gently rested the back of her head against the cold, rough stone of the bridge railing, sighed, and continued, "Gryn Crabb had the right to choose whom he dealt with. I didn't. Neither of us did... Before him, I had no choice at all."

After hearing his sister, Theon's face was full of disagreement. He raised his chin. "The Drowned God blesses the Ironborn. The sea was born to belong to us."

Asha paused, lowered her head, and murmured, "Robert I and Lord Eddard proved