Arya escapes the Red Keep

Arya Stark's flight from the Red Keep begins in the Small Hall, where her dancing master Syrio Forel is attacked by Ser Meryn Trant and five Lannister guardsmen. Syrio, armed only with a wooden practice sword, fights to buy her time, instructing her to run to her father. Arya flees through the kitchens and buttery, her panic channeled through the lessons Syrio has drilled into her: "Swift as a deer," "Quiet as a shadow," "Fear cuts deeper than swords." She emerges into a cellar, a dead end, but climbs through a high, narrow window to reach the bailey. From there, she sees the Tower of the Hand: its door is splintered, a dead guardsman in grey and white lies on the steps, and the sounds of fighting and screams come from within. She cannot go back.

The Killing of the Stable Boy

Arya makes her way to the stables, where she finds the master of horse, Hullen, stabbed to death, along with a groom and three of her father's household guard. Among the corpses is Desmond, who had promised to protect her father. A single Lannister guardsman lies dead among them. Arya's only plan is to saddle a horse and flee, but as she searches through a fallen chest for her sword Needle, a stable boy discovers her. He recognizes her as "the wolf girl" and announces that her father is dead, intending to turn her over to the queen for a reward. When he grabs her arm, Arya's training vanishes; she remembers only the first lesson Jon Snow ever gave her. She drives Needle upward through his leather jerkin and belly, the blade emerging between his shoulder blades. The boy dies, and Arya stands over the body, blood on her hands, realizing the castle gates will be closed and guarded.

The Descent into the Dungeons

Abandoning the plan to ride out, Arya recalls another way out of the castle: the hidden passage she discovered while chasing the one-eared black tomcat. She gathers a bundle of clothes, conceals Needle, and forces herself to walk calmly across the yard, keeping her eyes down, until she reaches the shadow of the royal sept. Inside, she takes two prayer candles and leaves through a back window. After getting lost, she eventually finds the low, narrow window that slants down to the dungeon where the dragon skulls are kept. This time, the monsters do not frighten her; they seem like old friends. She holds a candle and Needle as she passes through the long, windowless hall beyond. The memory of a prank in the crypts of Winterfell—when Jon, covered in flour, pretended to be a spirit—makes her smile, and the darkness holds no more terrors. She plunges deeper, her footsteps echoing, heading home.

Emergence and Return to the Castle

Arya emerges from a sewer where it empties into the river, miles from the castle. She strips, washes herself and her clothes in the moonlight, and then walks back to the Red Keep. When the gold cloaks at the postern door refuse her entry, mocking her as a beggar boy, she identifies herself as Arya Stark of Winterfell and threatens them with her father's wrath. They let her in. Her father is alone in his solar, bent over a large book. He listens to her report of the two men she overheard in the dungeons—a fat man with a forked yellow beard and a man in a steel cap—who spoke of killing him, of a book and a bastard, and of a princess being with child. He dismisses her story as the talk of mummers, but she insists they were not. Their conversation is interrupted by the arrival of Yoren, a black brother from the Night's Watch, who brings urgent news that sends a chill through the room.