My Triple Threat free essay sample

We look in the mirror together with beaming smiles on our faces. Holding back tears of laughter, Steve says, â€Å"Playboy?† Ten minutes later, we’re on the beach. I can feel the eyes piercing my skin, my self—esteem holding on by threads. I transfer the laser-like energy into a positive vibe as I strut by the sporadic crowd. The snickers come and go, but some people actually think we are for real. I welcome the spectators. The sun beats down on my unprotected thighs and shoulders, making me sweat more than I already am. We walk to the volleyball courts, pull up two lounge chairs, throw on the shades, and soak up the sun— we focus on getting perfect tan lines. Next thing I know, I’m in a photo shoot with three different cameras flashing at me. â€Å"We must look good,† I say to Steve. He responds with a seductive pose and a dramatic, â€Å"Smile with the eyes. We will write a custom essay sample on My Triple Threat or any similar topic specifically for you Do Not WasteYour Time HIRE WRITER Only 13.90 / page † Two hours later, I hang my pink leopard print delight on the railing for everyone to see. I shower, change, and go back out to the hub of the hotel. I am no longer Michael—I am now sexy pink, leopard print Speedo Man. Humor. The white walls close on me, just like how my entire world collapses on me. The blank walls share the same expression as my mind. Blank. I don’t know what to think, what to do, what to say. I can’t cry. That would make me feel sorry for myself. I can’t scream. Nobody else did anything wrong. But me. And I can’t talk. I have no one to talk to. I hear the footsteps closing in on the door that separates me in my isolated box in hell, from the disappointed authorities that wait on the other side. The door opens. I walk through the light into what I know is my own funeral, but I own my actions and step forward. I turn into a conference room and swell up, even though I knew what was going to be in front of me. My mom’s tears don’t cleanse me like water does. The tears are sharp and painful. They pierce my skin and attack my heart. A police officer enters the room. â€Å"Have you been drinking alcohol tonight?† He interrogated. â€Å"Yes sir.† I cracked out. Minutes later, I blew double zeroes on the breathalyzer. I could have lied and been free from the trouble and the pain. But I chose the high road. Honesty. â€Å"Have you thought about schools, Mike?† I shrugged my shoulders. Judy, my boss, is sitting across from me at a table in a small Hartland coffee shop talking about my future. â€Å"All I know is what I want to go into.† She nods and leans back, her mind working. I sit and focus intently on every word, every gesture, and every facial expression. After all, she is my ticket to the next level. If I ever want to complete my dream of being an anchor and a writer for ESPN, she is going to get me there. After our meeting, I stop in the school parking lot and t ake out a notebook. I write everything down. Everything she said. I study the words on the paper and close my eyes and hear the faint ESPN jingle, â€Å"Deh neh neh, deh neh neh.† I hear the voice over say, â€Å"This is Sports Center.† And I hear my voice—â€Å"Hi, I’m Mike. Welcome to Sports Center.† Ambition. Humor. Honesty. Ambition. Humor helps keep me rolling through tough situations. Honesty keeps my conscience clean and helps me stay positive on a personal level with myself. And ambition gives me the drive to do the improbable. Humor. Honesty. Ambition. My triple threat

Free Essays on Euthanasia, Your Right To Die

Through out a person’s life they have many choices to make. Probably the most difficult and important choice for them to make is that of their right to die. Today’s society has this set view in a structure functionalism type of mindset that no person should be in control of his or her own life in choosing whether to live or die. It is said that life should be lived to the end and no sooner then that. As stated in this web site â€Å"Not dead yet† http://acils.com/NotDeadYet/ Wednesday August 30, 2000 5:49 PM Americans with Disabilities don't want your pity or your lethal mercy, we want freedom, we want LIFE. Now one may ask â€Å"why does this person want to die.† Is it because the fact he or she thinks their lives are bad and wants to end the mental burden that they bestow upon themselves or is it a person who is willing to give up their life to end the mental and physical suffering of pain from a terminally ill disease? This is a question that many debates and trials are over. There also is suicide by a cop. Which many suicidal people attempt to accomplish. Though no matter what way a person chooses to die, the ultimate question is â€Å"Who’s right is it to choose to die?† Since the birth of Western medicine, more than 2,000 years ago, physician-assisted suicide and euthanasia have been profound ethical issues confronting all doctors. All the arguments made today to explain or condemn the two practices were created before any modern biomedical technology existed. The ancient Hippocratic Oath brands physicians to "neither give a deadly drug to anybody if asked for it, nor make a suggestion to this effect." The oath was written long ago when physicians commonly provided euthanasia and assisted suicide for ailments ranging from sever headaches and gallstones to cancer and small pox. Indeed, the Hippocratic Oath was concocted for the minority view in a debate within the ancient Greek medical community over the ethics and... Free Essays on Euthanasia, Your Right To Die Free Essays on Euthanasia, Your Right To Die Through out a person’s life they have many choices to make. Probably the most difficult and important choice for them to make is that of their right to die. Today’s society has this set view in a structure functionalism type of mindset that no person should be in control of his or her own life in choosing whether to live or die. It is said that life should be lived to the end and no sooner then that. As stated in this web site â€Å"Not dead yet† http://acils.com/NotDeadYet/ Wednesday August 30, 2000 5:49 PM Americans with Disabilities don't want your pity or your lethal mercy, we want freedom, we want LIFE. Now one may ask â€Å"why does this person want to die.† Is it because the fact he or she thinks their lives are bad and wants to end the mental burden that they bestow upon themselves or is it a person who is willing to give up their life to end the mental and physical suffering of pain from a terminally ill disease? This is a question that many debates and trials are over. There also is suicide by a cop. Which many suicidal people attempt to accomplish. Though no matter what way a person chooses to die, the ultimate question is â€Å"Who’s right is it to choose to die?† Since the birth of Western medicine, more than 2,000 years ago, physician-assisted suicide and euthanasia have been profound ethical issues confronting all doctors. All the arguments made today to explain or condemn the two practices were created before any modern biomedical technology existed. The ancient Hippocratic Oath brands physicians to "neither give a deadly drug to anybody if asked for it, nor make a suggestion to this effect." The oath was written long ago when physicians commonly provided euthanasia and assisted suicide for ailments ranging from sever headaches and gallstones to cancer and small pox. Indeed, the Hippocratic Oath was concocted for the minority view in a debate within the ancient Greek medical community over the ethics and...

How to be your own boss

How to be your own boss If you’ve ever had a job with a boss, you’ve probably had at least one of these thoughts at some point, especially on frustrating days: â€Å"I could be the boss, and do it better.†Ã¢â‚¬Å"Why don’t I do that?†And there are a few different ways to â€Å"do that.† One is to rise through the ranks, being a rockstar and getting promoted until get to that place where you’re in charge (though you’ll likely still be accountable to some level of management no matter what). The other way, the true independence route, is to say goodbye to working for others, and go into business for yourself. It’s not the easiest career path, or for everyone, but if this is truly your goal then we can help you figure out how to get started.Are you truly ready?Being your own boss sounds great, but if you’re not in a personal space where you’re mature or capable enough (yet) to handle the potentially large demands of running your own bus iness, it’s important to be honest about that up front. Management consultant Steve Tobak recommends starting with an honest assessment of how you are as an employee to see how well you might function in a situation where you’re depending on yourself to get everything done. For example, people who focus on responsibilities over branding and who seek achievements over power will likely be more successful when it comes time to assume responsibility for every aspect of a business. If you’re seeking to become your own boss just to be a boss (and not necessarily to take on additional responsibility), then this career change might not be the right move for you right now.It comes down to your personal temperament as well. If you do better when given a particular set of goals and benchmarks by someone else, you might struggle a bit when you need to generate those yourself. Or if you struggle with discipline and keeping on task during the workday, there’s a risk t hat the lack of outside constraints may feed your worst tendencies to procrastinate. Definitely ask yourself questions like:How do I respond to high-pressure situations?Do I get angry or upset easily?How effectively do I organize my to-do list and manage my time?How do I set boundaries in my life between work and personal space?Creating your own business requires a lot of honesty about your goals and your reality, as well as a lot of good old-fashioned hustle, since you don’t have the framework of an established company to handle things for you. You’re about to be the boss, but you’re also about to be Human Resources, the CFO, the IT department, and the one on the hook for every business decision. If that level of responsibility makes you a little queasy at this point, then maybe it’s best to table the idea for now and revisit in the future. But if you’re still thinking â€Å"bring it,† it’s time to start formulating your business pla n.Design a plan.Your next step should be deciding explicitly what it is you’ll be doing in your entrepreneurial business. Branding is great, but it comes later. The core business has to come first, so a solid plan is essential in making the decision to go rogue. Ask yourself these questions:What kind of service or product are you providing?Who will be your customers?What are you promising to those customers?What sets you apart from potentially similar vendors competing for the same customers?What are your short- and long-term goals for the business?What strategies do you have to achieve those goals?If you need help coming up with a business plan, there are a number of free and premium services online that can help you craft it, like LivePlan or Microsoft’s Dynamics 365. Every new business is a leap of faith, but you put yourself in a better position with the more information you have about your target audience, your market, and how you plan to develop your business bas ed on the market.Do a test run.Before you take the leap, think about doing a â€Å"soft launch† by creating your business as a side hustle, or a part-time commitment. This is a way of figuring out if this is the right path for you before you’ve committed fully to the idea of ditching your current path for the new one. Plus, it lets you start building a customer base and getting a real sense of what the market is really like- information that will be invaluable when you get to planning to do this full-time. Take a set amount of time to work on your business part-time, and then re-evaluate whether it makes sense to take it full-time. Sure, you’ll be in for a busy few months while you’re working on both, but consider it an essential research process to test the viability of your plan.Consider the money.Before you do anything drastic like quitting your current job, it’s important to do your homework on some baseline financial issues. Finances are an in credibly important consideration here- after all, this is your livelihood. And you’ll be the one writing the paychecks, so there’s not a lot of room for error here if you want to be able to keep your personal finances afloat. Gather your personal financial records and your favorite calculator, because it’s time to answer some brutally honest questions:Are there startup costs associated with your business idea? Will you need to buy specialized equipment or technology? Will you need to buy or rent a workspace? How much money would you need to have up front just to get started?What are the week-to-week operating costs?How long are you able to go without a paycheck, if your business is slow to develop? Do you have enough savings to get you by?Will you need to hire employees or contractors, or will it just be you? If it’s the latter, what can you afford to pay them?It may be that after your financial analysis, you find you aren’t quite ready to quit you r job and go it alone just yet. And that’s okay- it gives you more time to plan, set goals, and lay the groundwork for your business. What’s not quite right for now be much more viable in a year or two.Decide who’s on your team.Another essential element is your support network. Your company may be just you at first, and that’s a lot of pressure. What friends or family do you have in place to help provide a balance for that? Do you have people you trust who can listen to you and help you talk through decisions and provide valuable feedback?You should also start building your network in general, both using online social networks like LinkedIn and joining professional associations in your field. There are also organizations that specifically support small business owners, so you should do a little digging online to see if there are any specific to your field or your state/city/town.Build your brand.Self-marketing is going to be one of the best tools you have at your disposal as you get started with a new business. Creating dedicated social media profiles (apart from your personal ones) on Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Instagram, and whatever-platform-comes-next is a no-brainer. And make sure you stay engaged in those accounts, posting new content and updating the world on your achievements, expertise, and services.You’ll also need a website- ideally, one designed professionally. There are lots of hosting services that also help you build your sleek, functional site. This is not a job for your cousin’s friend’s roommate who wants to test out his design skills. Once you have your own URL and platform, you can use a blog, photo gallery, portfolio, and email to do outreach to potential customers.Get ready to make the transition.This is not the time for burning bridges, so you need to think about a careful transition from your current job to your entrepreneurship. This is especially true if your new company will be in th e same field. People talk, and other people who make ugly exits will be talked about. No matter how disgruntled you may be in your current gig, it’s important to exit gracefully. That means figuring out a timetable for quitting (potentially more than the standard two weeks) to figure out how to disentangle from your job. You may also want to consider asking your current boss if you can go part-time for a transition period. If that’s not an option, then a traditional exit is fine. You’ll need to give notice, and write a resignation letter. You don’t have to explicitly say what you’re doing next- â€Å"pursuing new opportunities† covers it.During this transition period, you should also see if there’s any fine print in your employment contract about pursuing clients or competitive job opportunities. Some companies have a â€Å"non-compete† clause that tries to limit what former employees can do in the same field.So what do you thi nk? Are you ready to make the transition from employee to boss? Or if not right now, is it something you can see in the near-ish future? We wish you all the best, entrepreneurs, and would love to hear what’s worked for you (and what hasn’t) in pursuit of being your own boss.

Answer chapter 8 question Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 250 words

Answer chapter 8 question - Essay Example While listening, we must, concentrate on the meanings of the speaker, sustain eye contact, be quiet, send acknowledgement. While reading someone’s message, even then try your best to decipher the meaning of writer. Do not assume anything or draw conclusion if some word is confusing. Just write back for clarification. When speaking, try to keep listeners engaged through gestures and postures and make your meaning and words clear for listeners. Answer: Emotions are driving force. How to handle emotions intelligently is called emotional intelligence. Do not take anything personally. You would face a lot of conflicts but you need to manage conflicts by controlling your emotions by taking deep breath and trying to see the outcome of your would be action as a result of emotions. Answer: We write all the day: on cell phones, on the internet, in a class, etc. This demonstrates the importance of writing. Getting ready to write, writing a first draft and revising your draft are three phases of writing best practices. Following these phases make us write effectively. Answer: Academic writing papers and report are designed to make you do your own work that transforms your skills. But copying the works of other serves no purpose. It is unethical, it is a theft and it is a bar in the way of learning. So we must try to just use the research of other with proper citation and to prove our thesis

International Management and Cross-Cultural Competence Essay

International Management and Cross-Cultural Competence - Essay Example Hofstede analyses and defines uniqueness and peculiarities of world cultures and their impact on business relations. The Globe pays a special attention to leadership and organizational practices taken place on the global scale. One common understanding, however, seems to be that it is related to human values one way or the other and, like culture, interest in human values dates back many years. It should go without saying, but corporations consist of people. The Globe project investigates relationships and communication between employees and the global community. However, people are often not objectively rational and, even if they should fit such a model, they should be in there from the start (The Globe Project, 2008). Competition is a challenge to any participating firm. This challenge cannot be taken on by new technology and economic resources alone. Technological innovation and resource allocation (as all organizational activities) are results of human processes. Few leaders poss ess all the attributes, and many nonleaders may possess many or even most of them. Also, the attribute approach gives no guidance as to how much of each characteristic a person should have. The relations of the Global to Hofstede cultural dimensions can be explained by the fact that managers in a firm (as well as other employees), be they leaders or not, have a culture (not only from the national level) which is more or less shared and common. This fact influences, often implicitly, how they manage themselves and other employees, and how they conduct their business, for example, decisions they make about the organization's relationship with its environment and about its strategy. It seems as if culture is having a major effect on the success of the business, somehow. It is common to read statements such as 'the well-run corporations of the world have distinctive cultures that are somehow responsible for their ability to create, implement, and maintain their world leadership positions' However, drawing the conclusion from this that a strong and pervasive culture, directed by formal decree, means business success is not correct, as mentioned previously. At a somewhat dee per level lie the hidden values and assumptions -- the fundamental drives and beliefs behind all decisions and actions. In a business context, this understanding pertains, say, to the importance of listening to peers, what stakeholders to prioritize, the nature of the environment and what learning and progress is all about (Hofstede Cultural Dimensions 2008). In sum, the Globe project uses Hofstede's theory to investigate and analyze current leadership and organizational trends and create a unique vision of modern business culture and human relations. The actual content of the culture and the degree to which it relates to the environment (present or future) seem like the critical variables here, not strength, pervasiveness or direction. People have come to understand that culture is shared, no matter how it is defined. A key issue in discussing culture is then how deep-seated it is. The degree to which a culture is conscious and open rather than nonconscious and covered has implications for how easily a culture can be studied and, in a business management context, be managed. Works Cited The Globe Project. 2008. Hofstede Cultural

Life Course of a Mas Murderer Essay Example for Free

Life Course of a Mas Murderer Essay On April 16, 2007 one of the most devastating mass murders in U.S history occurred at a Virginia college. Seung-Hui Cho a 23 year old South Korean alone executed the killing of 33 people by securing colleges doors to prevent escape of any students. Events such as these are truly tragic and devastating to all involved. By gathering background information about Seung-Hui Cho, we can effectively examine social development theories as they relate to Cho and review my analysis that this particular occurrence was preventable. Born in South Korea, Seung-Hui Cho immigrated to America when he was 8 years old. Although Cho was a quiet well behave child he was awkwardly withdrawn and angry (cite book). Throughout school Cho was teased and bullied which could have been the cause of his average grades throughout school. Cho’s sister Sun-kyung was often in the school newspaper and was selected to attend the most elite Ivy League Universities (Schmalleger, 2009). Cho went on to attend Virginia tech where he was recognize once again for being extremely violent and was even removed from class. Cho was referred to multiple counselors and officials where he denied all thoughts of suicide and homicide. Although Cho denied these having these thoughts students that attend Virginia Tech could see the imminent risk rising with Cho. There are many social development theories that can be applied to Seung-Hui Cho but I feel that the Life Course Perspective accurately represents Cho most effectively. With the social development perspective, human development occurs on many levels simotaneously, including psychological, biological, familial, interpersonal, cultural, social, and ecological (Schmalleger, 2009). Social development d\theories focus on delinquencies over an extended period of time as well as transitions people go through within their life span. As the Life course perspective suggests Cho exhibited showed a distinct pattern of anti-social behavior throughout his childhood and had never committed any crimes. Cho had a hard childhood and was in the shadows of his very successful sister. Even in college Cho had no friends and began to look up to other school shooters as martyrs. Although these individuals were not his friends at all in his situation they were the closest thing to having friends. In college Cho was accused of stalking women on two different occasions, was caught taking photos of the legs of female students in class and was separated out of classes. I believe that Cho’s antisocial lifestyle along with the transition any from home eventually lead him to commit the mass murder. Cho’s anti-social lifestyle seemed to escalate to criminal behaviors from the time he went off to college until the time of the Virginia Tech shooting. I believe that this tragedy could have been prevented if the proper preventative measures and treatment techniques were taken. As a boy Cho should have been taken in for a mental evaluation but I believe the integration of his family into the American society prevented that. In high school Cho being bullied and teased could have been put to a stop by teachers and surrounding students. Also when Cho started writing gruesome poems short stories and plays he should have been recommended to a counselor. Any counselor that Cho had encounters with could have been a lot more persistent in getting to the bottom of Cho’s situations. A teacher college teacher doesn’t just separate a student from her class. Finally the two females who Cho supposedly stalked could have reported Cho and pressed charges, preventing him from escalating in criminal nature. Seung-Hui Cho may have lived a particularly difficult life but with appropriate preventative and treatment measures the Virginia Tech shooting could have been prevented. One way this could have been prevented is with the support of his family. Cho’s family should have played a larger role in providing guidance and discipline and instilling sound values in Cho. Also social institutions failed him. He was bullied in teased in schools and church which could have been the reason for him being anti-social throughout his lifespan (Seung-Hui, 2013). Finally individuals in Cho’s life should have intervened immediately and constructively when delinquent behavior first occurred. After closely reviewing Cho’s background information and examining social development theories as they relate to Cho my analysis is that the Virginia Tech shooting was preventable. References Schmalleger, F. (2009). Criminology today: An integrative introduction. (5th; ed., pp. 297-341). Columbus, OH: Pearson Prentice Hal. Retrieved from http://devry.vitalsource.com/ Seung-Hui Cho. (2013). The Biography Channel website. Retrieved 06:22, Jul 28, 2013, from http://www.biography.com/people/seung-hui-cho-235991.

MapBot : An experiment in robotic mapping :: Robotics

Includes Source Code MapBot : An experiment in robotic mapping Abstract: Today Robots are often used to explore dangerous places where humans cannot go. However, what if there was a more easily available robot that could be used to explore places here on earth? This project is an attempt to build a very simple version of such a robot: a robot that follows a line, then creates a graph of the line on a computer. Exercises I did early in COSMOS gave me the backing I needed to attempt such an undertaking. I used basic line-following programs as the base, with a recording element thrown in. A C program was written to run on the computer and turn the data the robot collects into a graph. It took a lot of tweaking, but eventually I got a decently accurate representation of the line. Sadly, MapBot 2 though, I learned that if I want to graph another line, I would have to change the program all over again. With a little more work, I believe I could fix that, and the other problems plaguing this program as it stands. Also, I still believe that a personal MapBot is a viable idea, though I learned that it would require a lot of work. MapBot 3 Background/Purpose: There has always been a human drive to explore, to find out more about the world. Columbus sailed to America, and Cook to Australia, each driven by the promise of new uncharted territory. Recently this task of exploring new frontiers has been turned over to robots, as robots can explore locales that humans cannot. Robots have explored volcanoes, the planets in our solar system, and the deep sea—locations no person could survive. So far robots have been limited to exploring just such locations, those available exclusively to them, but I believe that there are earthly applications for exploring robots. Imagine, if you will, an inexpensive mapping robot. It operates very simply: simply set it down somewhere in the desired area, give it a set of bounds, and leave. The robot will send live data from the terrain to the user, creating a realtime map of the area. This map will be based on whatever data the robots sensors have collected; with add-ons, this could be anything from soil composition to topographic data. And when mapping is complete, the user simply returns to the robot and picks it up. Such a robot would be useful to many professions. Cartographers could create online maps that changed as the planet did. Field scientists could use them to take readings over a large swathe of terrain without taking any of their own time. With a camera attached, they could make a 3-dimensional

International Marketing Concepts Essay

How does the â€Å"standardized versus localized† debate apply to advertising? Communication takes place only when the intended meaning transfers from the source to the receiver. This can be a problem when a standardized approach is used. The message is not able to get through to the receiver due to different reasons such as lack of knowledge of the audience. There are people who feel an advertisement can be used anywhere in the world due to the converging tastes and preferences. The â€Å"standardized verses local debate† is very important in analyzing when advertising internationally. A standardized approach may be misinterpreted and/or misunderstood by certain cultures when the message is not altered to their values and beliefs. On the other hand, an advertisement using a localized or adaptation approach is able to reach a particular audience by portraying a message that is understood and comprehended. A localized approach is only meant for a particular audience so i t may cost more and it is not able to be used anywhere else. 3.) What is the difference between an advertising appeal and creative execution? The audience appeal is the communications approach that relates to the motives of the target audience. For example, ads based on a rational appeal depend on logic and speak to the audience’s intellect. Rational appeals are based on consumers’ needs for information. In contrast, ads using an emotional appeal may tug at the heartstrings or tickle the funny bone of the intended audience and evoke a feeling response that will direct purchase behavior. Creative execution is the way an appeal or proposition is presented. There can be differences between what one says and how one says it. There are a variety of executions including straight sell, scientific evidence, demonstration, comparison, testimonial, slice of life, animation, fantasy, and dramatization. The responsibility for deciding on the appeal, the selling proposition, and the appropriate execution lies with creatives, a term that appli es to art directors and copywriters. 5.) When creating advertising for world markets, what are some of the issues that art directors and copywriters should take into account? Art directors are in charge of choosing graphics, pictures, type styles, and other visual elements that appear in an advertisement. They must make sure that visual executions are not inappropriately extended into markets. For example, when I was in Europe I saw commercials for beer brands where the actors/actresses  were drinking the beer. In the United States, it is against the law to show people actually drinking beer in the commercial. Copywriters are language specialists who develop the headlines, subheads, and body copy used in print advertising and the scripts containing the words that are delivered by the talents in broadcast ads. A copywriter needs to be able to think in the target language and understand the consumers in the target country. A copywriter has the responsibility of accurately putting a message into writing that the target market is able to comprehend and understand. Both the role of the art director and copywriter have important roles in order for an advertisement to be successful. 7.) How does public relations differ from advertising? Why is PR especially important for global companies? Public relations is the department or function responsible for evaluating public opinion about, and attitudes toward, the organization and its products or brands. Public relations personnel also are responsible for fostering goodwill, understanding, and acceptance among a company’s various constituents and publics. One of the tasks of PR is to generate favorable publicity. PR is also responsible for handling issues and complications that arise in the media around the world that involve their company/product/service. PR is not responsible for any advertising, rather using different outlets to handle public relations related activities. PR is vital for global companies as they serve many different roles. They are called upon to build consensus and understanding, create trust and harmony, articulate and influence public opinion, anticipate conflicts, and resolve disputes. There are many differences between PR practices around the world. 8.) What are some of the ways public relations practices vary in different parts of the world? Public relations are affected by cultural traditions, social and political contexts, and economic environments. There are different ways to communicate in developing countries versus communicating in the United States. In the United States, PR is increasingly viewed as a separate management function. However, in Europe PR professionals are viewed as part of the marketing department. China is a country that lacks strong public relations. They are not able to handle damaging media content and they are not able to publicly explain their views.

A Weeping Child, Hidden by an Evil Front Essay

Many people say, those who can become good are not truly evil and that those who can become evil are not truly good. A person who is truly evil must have no remorse for the bad they have done. A truly evil person can never become good. Lady Macbeth and her husband Macbeth commit the ultimate evil. Together, they kill their King and afterwards murder and deceive many others. In the play Macbeth, by William Shakespeare, Lady Macbeth is depicted to be an evil and cruel woman in the beginning, but in the end it becomes clear that Lady Macbeth is not completely evil because she knew that what she was doing was wrong, was merely trying to please her husband, and shows complete remorse for her actions. In the early scenes of Macbeth, Lady Macbeth is portrayed to be a cruel and evil woman, but despite her actions she still realizes her wrongdoing. As she plots and demeans her husband she seems to be the backbone of the plan to kill the King. According to Bernad, a published literary critic, â€Å"She is the ambitious, unscrupulous, cruel woman who would pluck the infant smiling at her breast and dash its brains out. But beneath this iron front is a heart of flesh†¦ † (52). Lady Macbeth is putting on a front of evil to try and make her self think that what she is about to do is okay. She may seem to be evil, but she is in fact completely aware of how wrong her actions are. She even mocks the manhood of Macbeth saying, â€Å" Art thou afeard/ To be the same in thine own act and valor/ As thou art desire? Wouldst thou have that/ Which thou esteem’st the ornament of life/ And live a coward in thine own esteem,† and even suggests he is more of a woman than she is, however, she cannot kill Duncan herself (I. vii. 43-47). She begs the spirits to unsex her,† Come you spirits/ That ten on mortal thoughts, unsex me here,† knowing that she cannot do the terrible things that she must as the woman she is (I. v. 47-48). Even though she claims she could dash her infant’s brains out, she cannot find it in her to kill Duncan herself due to his so called resemblance to her father. All of the evil she seems to be in the early scenes is self-proclaimed. Lady Macbeth puts on this front of evil, but beneath it all she knows that what she is doing is ultimately wrong. Lady Macbeth not only knows her wrongdoing, but is also unselfish, doing all of this with her husband in mind. Her evil persona is simply bravery. Bernad writes, â€Å"To bolster up her husband’s courage, she puts up a brave front; but when alone, she shows how empty handed she is† (52). Although Lady Macbeth does have something to gain from Duncan’s death, she is trying to get her husband courage up to do something that he ultimately wants more than anything. This is a quality of unselfishness, which is far from evil. In front of him, she simply washes her hands of the blood as if it is nothing, but behind closed doors the blood would remain. Lady Macbeth knows as soon as she receives Macbeths letter that he wants to become the King. She says, â€Å"It is too full o’ th’ milk of human kindness/ To catch the nearest way: thou wouldst be great,/ Art not without ambition, but without/ The illness should attend it† (I. v. 17-20) Lady Macbeth knows that Macbeth wants to be the king. She also knows that without being pushed, he will not do this for himself. In order to be the unselfish and ultimately good wife she is, she must put on this brave and evil front to get her husband what he wants. She thinks of her husband and not of herself when she pushes him to do this evil act. Lady Macbeth is not an evil woman; she is simply an unselfish woman who must be brave for her husband. Remorse is another characteristic Lady Macbeth had that is not evil. A completely evil person has no guilt for the bad they do. As the play continues and begins to come to an end, a new side of Lady Macbeth is shown. A side is shown of a more feminine, and helpless woman. Bernad writes, â€Å" She has become like a scared little girl, suddenly conscious of all the wrong she has done†, and â€Å"she has become almost a pathetic figure† (52-53). By the end of the play Lady Macbeth has become crazy, consumed by her guilt. Her previous front of evil is completely erased and her true vulnerable side is shown in her sleep. As she confesses her guilt and wrongdoing, she becomes an object of sympathy. Lady Macbeth says, â€Å"The thane of Fife had a wife. Where is she now?/ What, will these hands ne’er be clean? No/ more o’ that, my lord, no more o’ that. You mar all/ with this starting† (V. i. 44-47). As she says this she knows she will never be able to get rid of the guilt. She asks if her hands will ever be clean, referring to the guilt she will always carry with her. She then goes to bed, and falls into a sleep she will never wake up from. As Lady Macbeth becomes overwhelmed with guilt, as Bernad says, â€Å" She is the heart-broken girl sitting on the doorstep, weeping over her broken doll. No man is so callous as not to have compassion on her weeping† (52). As Lady Macbeth begins to crumble, there is no evil to her. She is simply a broken woman. Lady Macbeth’s unselfishness, remorse, and complete knowledge of her actions show that she is not completely evil. Although she seems to be evil throughout the early scenes, she realizes that what she is doing is ultimately wrong. This is a trait of a good person and not an evil one. Another one of these traits is her unselfishness. All of her bad actions throughout the play were made simply with the goal to get her husband what he wanted. Lady Macbeth ultimately feels guilt and remorse for all of the wrong that comes out of what she has done. Lady Macbeth is not completely evil because she has traits that a completely evil person cannot have. No person with the ability to do good, and care for others is a completely evil person.

Hydro One Essays

Hydro One Essays Hydro One Essay Hydro One Essay Another objective to help this Lana for Formosa is to work out a long-term deal with the unions, preferably around five years. 2) Why are they spending on the Bruce-Milton/ Toronto line and the Smart Meters? As Formosa talked about, the environment is getting to be a bigger issue for the industry. The Smart Meter going hand-in-hand with smart pricing can hopefully reduce use and save customers money, and help customer satisfaction. They also want to bring electricity down from the Bruce nuclear plant on Lake Huron to Milton and the Greater Toronto area because the two nines they have are insufficient. There is a lot of wind generation in the Bruce area. 3) Putting yourself in the shoes of CEO Laura Formosa, what risks does Hydro One face? There are a number of risks that Hydro One faces. One risk includes the uncertainty involving the government, in particular the upcoming election in Ontario. If the ruling party is re-elected, Hydro One would be expected to lead the initiatives despite their adverse impact on the company revenues and earnings. Formosa has doubts whether they can deliver on the governments inspiration goals without compromising its commercial viability. Other risks include the safety issues for the employees, adequate electronic supply, equipment failure, and also issues in the environment. 4) Consider the elements of Hardy Ones ERM process. What are its strengths and weaknesses? What recommendations would you make to overcome the weaknesses about the ERM process? A strength of the ERM process are that it fully involves every aspect of the business. I also like the chart they use to rank each risk involved. Also, there is omelet separation between risk management and the internal audit. This process also gives high visibility and scrutiny, and the idea of reviewing the risk profile regularly is also a smart idea. Some weaknesses of the ERM process includes the fact that only management IS involved in the process. Risk experts arent really involved until the risks have been established by others. Also, only the highest risks have highest priority in terms of finding mitigation option. I would recommend getting the risk experts involved much earlier in the process.

A Game of Thrones Chapter Forty

Pale white mists rose off Alyssa’s Tears, where the ghost waters plunged over the shoulder of the mountain to begin their long tumble down the face of the Giant’s Lance. Catelyn could feel the faint touch of spray on her face. Alyssa Arryn had seen her husband, her brothers, and all her children slain, and yet in life she had never shed a tear. So in death, the gods had decreed that she would know no rest until her weeping watered the black earth of the Vale, where the men she had loved were buried. Alyssa had been dead six thousand years now, and still no drop of the torrent had ever reached the valley floor far below. Catelyn wondered how large a waterfall her own tears would make when she died. â€Å"Tell me the rest of it,† she said. â€Å"The Kingslayer is massing a host at Casterly Rock,† Ser Rodrik Cassel answered from the room behind her. â€Å"Your brother writes that he has sent riders to the Rock, demanding that Lord Tywin proclaim his intent, but he has had no answer. Edmure has commanded Lord Vance and Lord Piper to guard the pass below the Golden Tooth. He vows to you that he will yield no foot of Tully land without first watering it with Lannister blood.† Catelyn turned away from the sunrise. Its beauty did little to lighten her mood; it seemed cruel for a day to dawn so fair and end so foul as this one promised to. â€Å"Edmure has sent riders and made vows,† she said, â€Å"but Edmure is not the Lord of Riverrun. What of my lord father?† â€Å"The message made no mention of Lord Hoster, my lady.† Ser Rodrik tugged at his whiskers. They had grown in white as snow and bristly as a thornbush while he was recovering from his wounds; he looked almost himself again. â€Å"My father would not have given the defense of Riverrun over to Edmure unless he was very sick,† she said, worried. â€Å"I should have been woken as soon as this bird arrived.† â€Å"Your lady sister thought it better to let you sleep, Maester Colemon told me.† â€Å"I should have been woken,† she insisted. â€Å"The maester tells me your sister planned to speak with you after the combat,† Ser Rodrik said. â€Å"Then she still plans to go through with this mummer’s farce?† Catelyn grimaced. â€Å"The dwarf has played her like a set of pipes, and she is too deaf to hear the tune. Whatever happens this morning, Ser Rodrik, it is past time we took our leave. My place is at Winterfell with my sons. If you are strong enough to travel, I shall ask Lysa for an escort to see us to Gulltown. We can take ship from there.† â€Å"Another ship?† Ser Rodrik looked a shade green, yet he managed not to shudder. â€Å"As you say, my lady.† The old knight waited outside her door as Catelyn summoned the servants Lysa had given her. If she spoke to her sister before the duel, perhaps she could change her mind, she thought as they dressed her. Lysa’s policies varied with her moods, and her moods changed hourly. The shy girl she had known at Riverrun had grown into a woman who was by turns proud, fearful, cruel, dreamy, reckless, timid, stubborn, vain, and, above all, inconstant. When that vile turnkey of hers had come crawling to tell them that Tyrion Lannister wished to confess, Catelyn had urged Lysa to have the dwarf brought to them privately, but no, nothing would do but that her sister must make a show of him before half the Vale. And now this . . . â€Å"Lannister is my prisoner,† she told Ser Rodrik as they descended the tower stairs and made their way through the Eyrie’s cold white halls. Catelyn wore plain grey wool with a silvered belt. â€Å"My sister must be reminded of that.† At the doors to Lysa’s apartments, they met her uncle storming out. â€Å"Going to join the fool’s festival?† Ser Brynden snapped. â€Å"I’d tell you to slap some sense into your sister, if I thought it would do any good, but you’d only bruise your hand.† â€Å"There was a bird from Riverrun,† Catelyn began, â€Å"a letter from Edmure . . . â€Å" â€Å"I know, child.† The black fish that fastened his cloak was Brynden’s only concession to ornament. â€Å"I had to hear it from Maester Colemon. I asked your sister for leave to take a thousand seasoned men and ride for Riverrun with all haste. Do you know what she told me? The Vale cannot spare a thousand swords, nor even one, Uncle, she said. You are the Knight of the Gate. Your place is here.† A gust of childish laughter drifted through the open doors behind him, and her uncle glanced darkly over his shoulder. â€Å"Well, I told her she could bloody well find herself a new Knight of the Gate. Black fish or no, I am still a Tully. I shall leave for Riverrun by evenfall.† Catelyn could not pretend to surprise. â€Å"Alone? You know as well as I that you will never survive the high road. Ser Rodrik and I are returning to Winterfell. Come with us, Uncle. I will give you your thousand men. Riverrun will not fight alone.† Brynden thought a moment, then nodded a brusque agreement. â€Å"As you say. It’s the long way home, but I’m more like to get there. I’ll wait for you below.† He went striding off, his cloak swirling behind him. Catelyn exchanged a look with Ser Rodrik. They went through the doors to the high, nervous sound of a child’s giggles. Lysa’s apartments opened over a small garden, a circle of dirt and grass planted with blue flowers and ringed on all sides by tall white towers. The builders had intended it as a godswood, but the Eyrie rested on the hard stone of the mountain, and no matter how much soil was hauled up from the Vale, they could not get a weirwood to take root here. So the Lords of the Eyrie planted grass and scattered statuary amidst low, flowering shrubs. It was there the two champions would meet to place their lives, and that of Tyrion Lannister, into the hands of the gods. Lysa, freshly scrubbed and garbed in cream velvet with a rope of sapphires and moonstones around her milk-white neck, was holding court on the terrace overlooking the scene of the combat, surrounded by her knights, retainers, and lords high and low. Most of them still hoped to wed her, bed her, and rule the Vale of Arryn by her side. From what Catelyn had seen during her stay at the Eyrie, it was a vain hope. A wooden platform had been built to elevate Robert’s chair; there the Lord of the Eyrie sat, giggling and clapping his hands as a humpbacked puppeteer in blue-and-white motley made two wooden knights hack and slash at each other. Pitchers of thick cream and baskets of blackberries had been set out, and the guests were sipping a sweet orange-scented wine from engraved silver cups. A fool’s festival, Brynden had called it, and small wonder. Across the terrace, Lysa laughed gaily at some jest of Lord Hunter’s, and nibbled a blackberry from the point of Ser Lyn Corbray’s dagger. They were the suitors who stood highest in Lysa’s favor . . . today, at least. Catelyn would have been hard-pressed to say which man was more unsuitable. Eon Hunter was even older than Jon Arryn had been, half-crippled by gout, and cursed with three quarrelsome sons, each more grasping than the last. Ser Lyn was a different sort of folly; lean and handsome, heir to an ancient but impoverished house, but vain, reckless, hot-tempered . . . and, it was whispered, notoriously uninterested in the intimate charms of women. When Lysa espied Catelyn, she welcomed her with a sisterly embrace and a moist kiss on the cheek. â€Å"Isn’t it a lovely morning? The gods are smiling on us. Do try a cup of the wine, sweet sister. Lord Hunter was kind enough to send for it, from his own cellars.† â€Å"Thank you, no. Lysa, we must talk.† â€Å"After,† her sister promised, already beginning to turn away from her. â€Å"Now.† Catelyn spoke more loudly than she’d intended. Men were turning to look. â€Å"Lysa, you cannot mean to go ahead with this folly. Alive, the Imp has value. Dead, he is only food for crows. And if his champion should prevail here—† â€Å"Small chance of that, my lady,† Lord Hunter assured her, patting her shoulder with a liver-spotted hand. â€Å"Ser Vardis is a doughty fighter. He will make short work of the sellsword.† â€Å"Will he, my lord?† Catelyn said coolly. â€Å"I wonder.† She had seen Bronn fight on the high road; it was no accident that he had survived the journey while other men had died. He moved like a panther, and that ugly sword of his seemed a part of his arm. Lysa’s suitors were gathering around them like bees round a blossom. â€Å"Women understand little of these things,† Ser Morton Waynwood said. â€Å"Ser Vardis is a knight, sweet lady. This other fellow, well, his sort are all cowards at heart. Useful enough in a battle, with thousands of their fellows around them, but stand them up alone and the manhood leaks right out of them.† â€Å"Say you have the truth of it, then,† Catelyn said with a courtesy that made her mouth ache. â€Å"What will we gain by the dwarf’s death? Do you imagine that Jaime will care a fig that we gave his brother a trial before we flung him off a mountain?† â€Å"Behead the man,† Ser Lyn Corbray suggested. â€Å"When the Kingslayer receives the Imp’s head, it will be a warning to him,† Lysa gave an impatient shake of her waist-long auburn hair. â€Å"Lord Robert wants to see him fly,† she said, as if that settled the matter. â€Å"And the Imp has only himself to blame. It was he who demanded a trial by combat.† â€Å"Lady Lysa had no honorable way to deny him, even if she’d wished to,† Lord Hunter intoned ponderously. Ignoring them all, Catelyn turned all her force on her sister. â€Å"I remind you, Tyrion Lannister is my prisoner.† â€Å"And I remind you, the dwarf murdered my lord husband!† Her voice rose. â€Å"He poisoned the Hand of the King and left my sweet baby fatherless, and now I mean to see him pay!† Whirling, her skirts swinging around her, Lysa stalked across the terrace. Ser Lyn and Ser Morton and the other suitors excused themselves with cool nods and trailed after her. â€Å"Do you think he did?† Ser Rodrik asked her quietly when they were alone again. â€Å"Murder Lord Jon, that is? The Imp still denies it, and most fiercely . . . â€Å" â€Å"I believe the Lannisters murdered Lord Arryn,† Catelyn replied, â€Å"but whether it was Tyrion, or Ser Jaime, or the queen, or all of them together, I could not begin to say.† Lysa had named Cersei in the letter she had sent to Winterfell, but now she seemed certain that Tyrion was the killer . . . perhaps because the dwarf was here, while the queen was safe behind the walls of the Red Keep, hundreds of leagues to the south. Catelyn almost wished she had burned her sister’s letter before reading it. Ser Rodrik tugged at his whiskers. â€Å"Poison, well . . . that could be the dwarf’s work, true enough. Or Cersei’s. It’s said poison is a woman’s weapon, begging your pardons, my lady. The Kingslayer, now . . . I have no great liking for the man, but he’s not the sort. Too fond of the sight of blood on that golden sword of his. Was it poison, my lady?† Catelyn frowned, vaguely uneasy. â€Å"How else could they make it look a natural death?† Behind her, Lord Robert shrieked with delight as one of the puppet knights sliced the other in half, spilling a flood of red sawdust onto the terrace. She glanced at her nephew and sighed. â€Å"The boy is utterly without discipline. He will never be strong enough to rule unless he is taken away from his mother for a time.† â€Å"His lord father agreed with you,† said a voice at her elbow. She turned to behold Maester Colemon, a cup of wine in his hand. â€Å"He was planning to send the boy to Dragonstone for fostering, you know . . . oh, but I’m speaking out of turn.† The apple of his throat bobbed anxiously beneath the loose maester’s chain. â€Å"I fear I’ve had too much of Lord Hunter’s excellent wine. The prospect of bloodshed has my nerves all a-fray . . . â€Å" â€Å"You are mistaken, Maester,† Catelyn said. â€Å"It was Casterly Rock, not Dragonstone, and those arrangements were made after the Hand’s death, without my sister’s consent.† The maester’s head jerked so vigorously at the end of his absurdly long neck that he looked half a puppet himself. â€Å"No, begging your forgiveness, my lady, but it was Lord Jon who—† A bell tolled loudly below them. High lords and serving girls alike broke off what they were doing and moved to the balustrade. Below, two guardsmen in sky-blue cloaks led forth Tyrion Lannister. The Eyrie’s plump septon escorted him to the statue in the center of the garden, a weeping woman carved in veined white marble, no doubt meant to be Alyssa. â€Å"The bad little man,† Lord Robert said, giggling. â€Å"Mother, can I make him fly? I want to see him fly.† â€Å"Later, my sweet baby,† Lysa promised him. â€Å"Trial first,† drawled Ser Lyn Corbray, â€Å"then execution.† A moment later the two champions appeared from opposite sides of the garden. The knight was attended by two young squires, the sellsword by the Eyrie’s master-at-arms. Ser Vardis Egen was steel from head to heel, encased in heavy plate armor over mail and padded surcoat. Large circular rondels, enameled cream-and-blue in the moon-and-falcon sigil of House Arryn, protected the vulnerable juncture of arm and breast. A skirt of lobstered metal covered him from waist to midthigh, while a solid gorget encircled his throat. Falcon’s wings sprouted from the temples of his helm, and his visor was a pointed metal beak with a narrow slit for vision. Bronn was so lightly armored he looked almost naked beside the knight. He wore only a shirt of black oiled ringmail over boiled leather, a round steel halfhelm with a noseguard, and a mail coif. High leather boots with steel shinguards gave some protection to his legs, and discs of black iron were sewn into the fingers of his gloves. Yet Catelyn noted that the sellsword stood half a hand taller than his foe, with a longer reach . . . and Bronn was fifteen years younger, if she was any judge. They knelt in the grass beneath the weeping woman, facing each other, with Lannister between them. The septon removed a faceted crystal sphere from the soft cloth bag at his waist. He lifted it high above his head, and the light shattered. Rainbows danced across the Imp’s face. In a high, solemn, singsong voice, the septon asked the gods to look down and bear witness, to find the truth in this man’s soul, to grant him life and freedom if he was innocent, death if he was guilty. His voice echoed off the surrounding towers. When the last echo had died away, the septon lowered his crystal and made a hasty departure. Tyrion leaned over and whispered something in Bronn’s ear before the guardsmen led him away. The sellsword rose laughing and brushed a blade of grass from his knee. Robert Arryn, Lord of the Eyrie and Defender of the Vale, was fidgeting impatiently in his elevated chair. â€Å"When are they going to fight?† he asked plaintively. Ser Vardis was helped back to his feet by one of his squires. The other brought him a triangular shield almost four feet tall, heavy oak dotted with iron studs. They strapped it to his left forearm. When Lysa’s master-at-arms offered Bronn a similar shield, the sellsword spat and waved it away. Three days growth of coarse black beard covered his jaw and cheeks, but if he did not shave it was not for want of a razor; the edge of his sword had the dangerous glimmer of steel that had been honed every day for hours, until it was too sharp to touch. Ser Vardis held out a gauntleted hand, and his squire placed a handsome double-edged longsword in his grasp. The blade was engraved with a delicate silver tracery of a mountain sky; its pommel was a falcon’s head, its crossguard fashioned into the shape of wings. â€Å"I had that sword crafted for Jon in King’s Landing,† Lysa told her guests proudly as they watched Ser Vardis try a practice cut. â€Å"He wore it whenever he sat the Iron Throne in King Robert’s place. Isn’t it a lovely thing? I thought it only fitting that our champion avenge Jon with his own blade.† The engraved silver blade was beautiful beyond a doubt, but it seemed to Catelyn that Ser Vardis might have been more comfortable with his own sword. Yet she said nothing; she was weary of futile arguments with her sister. â€Å"Make them fight!† Lord Robert called out. Ser Vardis faced the Lord of the Eyrie and lifted his sword in salute. â€Å"For the Eyrie and the Vale!† Tyrion Lannister had been seated on a balcony across the garden, flanked by his guards. It was to him that Bronn turned with a cursory salute. â€Å"They await your command,† Lady Lysa said to her lord son. â€Å"Fight!† the boy screamed, his arms trembling as they clutched at his chair. Ser Vardis swiveled, bringing up his heavy shield. Bronn turned to face him. Their swords rang together, once, twice, a testing. The sellsword backed off a step. The knight came after, holding his shield before him. He tried a slash, but Bronn jerked back, just out of reach, and the silver blade cut only air. Bronn circled to his right. Ser Vardis turned to follow, keeping his shield between them. The knight pressed forward, placing each foot carefully on the uneven ground. The sellsword gave way, a faint smile playing over his lips. Ser Vardis attacked, slashing, but Bronn leapt away from him, hopping lightly over a low, moss-covered stone. Now the sellsword circled left, away from the shield, toward the knight’s unprotected side. Ser Vardis tried a hack at his legs, but he did not have the reach. Bronn danced farther to his left. Ser Vardis turned in place. â€Å"The man is craven,† Lord Hunter declared. â€Å"Stand and fight, coward! † Other voices echoed the sentiment. Catelyn looked to Ser Rodrik. Her master-at-arms gave a curt shake of his head. â€Å"He wants to make Ser Vardis chase him. The weight of armor and shield will tire even the strongest man.† She had seen men practice at their swordplay near every day of her life, had viewed half a hundred tourneys in her time, but this was something different and deadlier: a dance where the smallest misstep meant death. And as she watched, the memory of another duel in another time came back to Catelyn Stark, as vivid as if it had been yesterday. They met in the lower bailey of Riverrun. When Brandon saw that Petyr wore only helm and breastplate and mail, he took off most of his armor. Petyr had begged her for a favor he might wear, but she had turned him away. Her lord father promised her to Brandon Stark, and so it was to him that she gave her token, a pale blue handscarf she had embroidered with the leaping trout of Riverrun. As she pressed it into his hand, she pleaded with him. â€Å"He is only a foolish boy, but I have loved him like a brother. It would grieve me to see him die.† And her betrothed looked at her with the cool grey eyes of a Stark and promised to spare the boy who loved her. That fight was over almost as soon as it began. Brandon was a man grown, and he drove Littlefinger all the way across the bailey and down the water stair, raining steel on him with every step, until the boy was staggering and bleeding from a dozen wounds. â€Å"Yield!† he called, more than once, but Petyr would only shake his head and fight on, grimly. When the river was lapping at their ankles, Brandon finally ended it, with a brutal backhand cut that bit through Petyr’s rings and leather into the soft flesh below the ribs, so deep that Catelyn was certain that the wound was mortal. He looked at her as he fell and murmured â€Å"Cat† as the bright blood came flowing out between his mailed fingers. She thought she had forgotten that. That was the last time she had seen his face . . . until the day she was brought before him in King’s Landing. A fortnight passed before Littlefinger was strong enough to leave Riverrun, but her lord father forbade her to visit him in the tower where he lay abed. Lysa helped their maester nurse him; she had been softer and shyer in those days. Edmure had called on him as well, but Petyr had sent him away. Her brother had acted as Brandon’s squire at the duel, and Littlefinger would not forgive that. As soon as he was strong enough to be moved, Lord Hoster Tully sent Petyr Baelish away in a closed litter, to finish his healing on the Fingers, upon the windswept jut of rock where he’d been born. The ringing clash of steel on steel jarred Catelyn back to the present. Ser Vardis was coming hard at Bronn, driving into him with shield and sword. The sellsword scrambled backward, checking each blow, stepping lithely over rock and root, his eyes never leaving his foe. He was quicker, Catelyn saw; the knight’s silvered sword never came near to touching him, but his own ugly grey blade hacked a notch from Ser Vardis’s shoulder plate. The brief flurry of fighting ended as swiftly as it had begun when Bronn sidestepped and slid behind the statue of the weeping woman. Ser Vardis lunged at where he had been, striking a spark off the pale marble of Alyssa’s thigh. â€Å"They’re not fighting good, Mother,† the Lord of the Eyrie complained. â€Å"I want them to fight.† â€Å"They will, sweet baby,† his mother soothed him. â€Å"The sellsword can’t run all day.† Some of the lords on Lysa’s terrace were making wry jests as they refilled their wine cups, but across the garden, Tyrion Lannister’s mismatched eyes watched the champions dance as if there were nothing else in the world. Bronn came out from behind the statue hard and fast, still moving left, aiming a two-handed cut at the knight’s unshielded right side. Ser Vardis blocked, but clumsily, and the sellsword’s blade flashed upward at his head. Metal rang, and a falcon’s wing collapsed with a crunch. Ser Vardis took a half step back to brace himself, raised his shield. Oak chips flew as Bronn’s sword hacked at the wooden wall. The sellsword stepped left again, away from the shield, and caught Ser Vardis across the stomach, the razor edge of his blade leaving a bright gash when it bit into the knight’s plate. Ser Vardis drove forward off his back foot, his own silver blade descending in a savage arc. Bronn slammed it aside and danced away. The knight crashed into the weeping woman, rocking her on her plinth. Staggered, he stepped backward, his head turning this way and that as he searched for his foe. The slit visor of his helm narrowed his vision. â€Å"Behind you, ser!† Lord Hunter shouted, too late. Bronn brought his sword down with both hands, catching Ser Vardis in the elbow of his sword arm. The thin lobstered metal that protected the joint crunched. The knight grunted, turning, wrenching his weapon up. This time Bronn stood his ground. The swords flew at each other, and their steel song filled the garden and rang off the white towers of the Eyrie. â€Å"Ser Vardis is hurt,† Ser Rodrik said, his voice grave. Catelyn did not need to be told; she had eyes, she could see the bright finger of blood running along the knight’s forearm, the wetness inside the elbow joint. Every parry was a little slower and a little lower than the one before. Ser Vardis turned his side to his foe, trying to use his shield to block instead, but Bronn slid around him, quick as a cat. The sellsword seemed to be getting stronger. His cuts were leaving their marks now. Deep shiny gashes gleamed all over the knight’s armor, on his right thigh, his beaked visor, crossing on his breastplate, a long one along the front of his gorget. The moon-and-falcon rondel over Ser Vardis’s right arm was sheared clean in half, hanging by its strap. They could hear his labored breath, rattling through the air holes in his visor. Blind with arrogance as they were, even the knights and lords of the Vale could see what was happening below them, yet her sister could not. â€Å"Enough, Ser Vardis!† Lady Lysa called down. â€Å"Finish him now, my baby is growing tired.† And it must be said of Ser Vardis Egen that he was true to his lady’s command, even to the last. One moment he was reeling backward, half-crouched behind his scarred shield; the next he charged. The sudden bull rush caught Bronn off balance. Ser Vardis crashed into him and slammed the lip of his shield into the sellsword’s face. Almost, almost, Bronn lost his feet . . . he staggered back, tripped over a rock, and caught hold of the weeping woman to keep his balance. Throwing aside his shield, Ser Vardis lurched after him, using both hands to raise his sword. His right arm was blood from elbow to fingers now, yet his last desperate blow would have opened Bronn from neck to navel . . . if the sellsword had stood to receive it. But Bronn jerked back. Jon Arryn’s beautiful engraved silver sword glanced off the marble elbow of the weeping woman and snapped clean a third of the way up the blade. Bronn put his shoulder into the statue’s back. The weathered likeness of Alyssa Arryn tottered and fell with a great crash, and Ser Vardis Egen went down beneath her. Bronn was on him in a heartbeat, kicking what was left of his shattered rondel aside to expose the weak spot between arm and breastplate. Ser Vardis was lying on his side, pinned beneath the broken torso of the weeping woman. Catelyn heard the knight groan as the sellsword lifted his blade with both hands and drove it down and in with all his weight behind it, under the arm and through the ribs. Ser Vardis Egen shuddered and lay still. Silence hung over the Eyrie. Bronn yanked off his halfhelm and let it fall to the grass. His lip was smashed and bloody where the shield had caught him, and his coal-black hair was soaked with sweat. He spit out a broken tooth. â€Å"Is it over, Mother?† the Lord of the Eyrie asked. No, Catelyn wanted to tell him, it’s only now beginning. â€Å"Yes,† Lysa said glumly, her voice as cold and dead as the captain of her guard. â€Å"Can I make the little man fly now?† Across the garden, Tyrion Lannister got to his feet. â€Å"Not this little man,† he said. â€Å"This little man is going down in the turnip hoist, thank you very much.† â€Å"You presume—† Lysa began. â€Å"I presume that House Arryn remembers its own words,† the Imp said. â€Å"As High as Honor.† â€Å"You promised I could make him fly,† the Lord of the Eyrie screamed at his mother. He began to shake. Lady Lysa’s face was flushed with fury. â€Å"The gods have seen fit to proclaim him innocent, child. We have no choice but to free him.† She lifted her voice. â€Å"Guards. Take my lord of Lannister and his . . . creature here out of my sight. Escort them to the Bloody Gate and set them free. See that they have horses and supplies sufficient to reach the Trident, and make certain all their goods and weapons are returned to them. They shall need them on the high road.† â€Å"The high road,† Tyrion Lannister said. Lysa allowed herself a faint, satisfied smile. It was another sort of death sentence, Catelyn realized. Tyrion Lannister must know that as well. Yet the dwarf favored Lady Arryn with a mocking bow. â€Å"As you command, my lady,† he said. â€Å"I believe we know the way.† A Game of Thrones Chapter Forty Pale white mists rose off Alyssa’s Tears, where the ghost waters plunged over the shoulder of the mountain to begin their long tumble down the face of the Giant’s Lance. Catelyn could feel the faint touch of spray on her face. Alyssa Arryn had seen her husband, her brothers, and all her children slain, and yet in life she had never shed a tear. So in death, the gods had decreed that she would know no rest until her weeping watered the black earth of the Vale, where the men she had loved were buried. Alyssa had been dead six thousand years now, and still no drop of the torrent had ever reached the valley floor far below. Catelyn wondered how large a waterfall her own tears would make when she died. â€Å"Tell me the rest of it,† she said. â€Å"The Kingslayer is massing a host at Casterly Rock,† Ser Rodrik Cassel answered from the room behind her. â€Å"Your brother writes that he has sent riders to the Rock, demanding that Lord Tywin proclaim his intent, but he has had no answer. Edmure has commanded Lord Vance and Lord Piper to guard the pass below the Golden Tooth. He vows to you that he will yield no foot of Tully land without first watering it with Lannister blood.† Catelyn turned away from the sunrise. Its beauty did little to lighten her mood; it seemed cruel for a day to dawn so fair and end so foul as this one promised to. â€Å"Edmure has sent riders and made vows,† she said, â€Å"but Edmure is not the Lord of Riverrun. What of my lord father?† â€Å"The message made no mention of Lord Hoster, my lady.† Ser Rodrik tugged at his whiskers. They had grown in white as snow and bristly as a thornbush while he was recovering from his wounds; he looked almost himself again. â€Å"My father would not have given the defense of Riverrun over to Edmure unless he was very sick,† she said, worried. â€Å"I should have been woken as soon as this bird arrived.† â€Å"Your lady sister thought it better to let you sleep, Maester Colemon told me.† â€Å"I should have been woken,† she insisted. â€Å"The maester tells me your sister planned to speak with you after the combat,† Ser Rodrik said. â€Å"Then she still plans to go through with this mummer’s farce?† Catelyn grimaced. â€Å"The dwarf has played her like a set of pipes, and she is too deaf to hear the tune. Whatever happens this morning, Ser Rodrik, it is past time we took our leave. My place is at Winterfell with my sons. If you are strong enough to travel, I shall ask Lysa for an escort to see us to Gulltown. We can take ship from there.† â€Å"Another ship?† Ser Rodrik looked a shade green, yet he managed not to shudder. â€Å"As you say, my lady.† The old knight waited outside her door as Catelyn summoned the servants Lysa had given her. If she spoke to her sister before the duel, perhaps she could change her mind, she thought as they dressed her. Lysa’s policies varied with her moods, and her moods changed hourly. The shy girl she had known at Riverrun had grown into a woman who was by turns proud, fearful, cruel, dreamy, reckless, timid, stubborn, vain, and, above all, inconstant. When that vile turnkey of hers had come crawling to tell them that Tyrion Lannister wished to confess, Catelyn had urged Lysa to have the dwarf brought to them privately, but no, nothing would do but that her sister must make a show of him before half the Vale. And now this . . . â€Å"Lannister is my prisoner,† she told Ser Rodrik as they descended the tower stairs and made their way through the Eyrie’s cold white halls. Catelyn wore plain grey wool with a silvered belt. â€Å"My sister must be reminded of that.† At the doors to Lysa’s apartments, they met her uncle storming out. â€Å"Going to join the fool’s festival?† Ser Brynden snapped. â€Å"I’d tell you to slap some sense into your sister, if I thought it would do any good, but you’d only bruise your hand.† â€Å"There was a bird from Riverrun,† Catelyn began, â€Å"a letter from Edmure . . . â€Å" â€Å"I know, child.† The black fish that fastened his cloak was Brynden’s only concession to ornament. â€Å"I had to hear it from Maester Colemon. I asked your sister for leave to take a thousand seasoned men and ride for Riverrun with all haste. Do you know what she told me? The Vale cannot spare a thousand swords, nor even one, Uncle, she said. You are the Knight of the Gate. Your place is here.† A gust of childish laughter drifted through the open doors behind him, and her uncle glanced darkly over his shoulder. â€Å"Well, I told her she could bloody well find herself a new Knight of the Gate. Black fish or no, I am still a Tully. I shall leave for Riverrun by evenfall.† Catelyn could not pretend to surprise. â€Å"Alone? You know as well as I that you will never survive the high road. Ser Rodrik and I are returning to Winterfell. Come with us, Uncle. I will give you your thousand men. Riverrun will not fight alone.† Brynden thought a moment, then nodded a brusque agreement. â€Å"As you say. It’s the long way home, but I’m more like to get there. I’ll wait for you below.† He went striding off, his cloak swirling behind him. Catelyn exchanged a look with Ser Rodrik. They went through the doors to the high, nervous sound of a child’s giggles. Lysa’s apartments opened over a small garden, a circle of dirt and grass planted with blue flowers and ringed on all sides by tall white towers. The builders had intended it as a godswood, but the Eyrie rested on the hard stone of the mountain, and no matter how much soil was hauled up from the Vale, they could not get a weirwood to take root here. So the Lords of the Eyrie planted grass and scattered statuary amidst low, flowering shrubs. It was there the two champions would meet to place their lives, and that of Tyrion Lannister, into the hands of the gods. Lysa, freshly scrubbed and garbed in cream velvet with a rope of sapphires and moonstones around her milk-white neck, was holding court on the terrace overlooking the scene of the combat, surrounded by her knights, retainers, and lords high and low. Most of them still hoped to wed her, bed her, and rule the Vale of Arryn by her side. From what Catelyn had seen during her stay at the Eyrie, it was a vain hope. A wooden platform had been built to elevate Robert’s chair; there the Lord of the Eyrie sat, giggling and clapping his hands as a humpbacked puppeteer in blue-and-white motley made two wooden knights hack and slash at each other. Pitchers of thick cream and baskets of blackberries had been set out, and the guests were sipping a sweet orange-scented wine from engraved silver cups. A fool’s festival, Brynden had called it, and small wonder. Across the terrace, Lysa laughed gaily at some jest of Lord Hunter’s, and nibbled a blackberry from the point of Ser Lyn Corbray’s dagger. They were the suitors who stood highest in Lysa’s favor . . . today, at least. Catelyn would have been hard-pressed to say which man was more unsuitable. Eon Hunter was even older than Jon Arryn had been, half-crippled by gout, and cursed with three quarrelsome sons, each more grasping than the last. Ser Lyn was a different sort of folly; lean and handsome, heir to an ancient but impoverished house, but vain, reckless, hot-tempered . . . and, it was whispered, notoriously uninterested in the intimate charms of women. When Lysa espied Catelyn, she welcomed her with a sisterly embrace and a moist kiss on the cheek. â€Å"Isn’t it a lovely morning? The gods are smiling on us. Do try a cup of the wine, sweet sister. Lord Hunter was kind enough to send for it, from his own cellars.† â€Å"Thank you, no. Lysa, we must talk.† â€Å"After,† her sister promised, already beginning to turn away from her. â€Å"Now.† Catelyn spoke more loudly than she’d intended. Men were turning to look. â€Å"Lysa, you cannot mean to go ahead with this folly. Alive, the Imp has value. Dead, he is only food for crows. And if his champion should prevail here—† â€Å"Small chance of that, my lady,† Lord Hunter assured her, patting her shoulder with a liver-spotted hand. â€Å"Ser Vardis is a doughty fighter. He will make short work of the sellsword.† â€Å"Will he, my lord?† Catelyn said coolly. â€Å"I wonder.† She had seen Bronn fight on the high road; it was no accident that he had survived the journey while other men had died. He moved like a panther, and that ugly sword of his seemed a part of his arm. Lysa’s suitors were gathering around them like bees round a blossom. â€Å"Women understand little of these things,† Ser Morton Waynwood said. â€Å"Ser Vardis is a knight, sweet lady. This other fellow, well, his sort are all cowards at heart. Useful enough in a battle, with thousands of their fellows around them, but stand them up alone and the manhood leaks right out of them.† â€Å"Say you have the truth of it, then,† Catelyn said with a courtesy that made her mouth ache. â€Å"What will we gain by the dwarf’s death? Do you imagine that Jaime will care a fig that we gave his brother a trial before we flung him off a mountain?† â€Å"Behead the man,† Ser Lyn Corbray suggested. â€Å"When the Kingslayer receives the Imp’s head, it will be a warning to him,† Lysa gave an impatient shake of her waist-long auburn hair. â€Å"Lord Robert wants to see him fly,† she said, as if that settled the matter. â€Å"And the Imp has only himself to blame. It was he who demanded a trial by combat.† â€Å"Lady Lysa had no honorable way to deny him, even if she’d wished to,† Lord Hunter intoned ponderously. Ignoring them all, Catelyn turned all her force on her sister. â€Å"I remind you, Tyrion Lannister is my prisoner.† â€Å"And I remind you, the dwarf murdered my lord husband!† Her voice rose. â€Å"He poisoned the Hand of the King and left my sweet baby fatherless, and now I mean to see him pay!† Whirling, her skirts swinging around her, Lysa stalked across the terrace. Ser Lyn and Ser Morton and the other suitors excused themselves with cool nods and trailed after her. â€Å"Do you think he did?† Ser Rodrik asked her quietly when they were alone again. â€Å"Murder Lord Jon, that is? The Imp still denies it, and most fiercely . . . â€Å" â€Å"I believe the Lannisters murdered Lord Arryn,† Catelyn replied, â€Å"but whether it was Tyrion, or Ser Jaime, or the queen, or all of them together, I could not begin to say.† Lysa had named Cersei in the letter she had sent to Winterfell, but now she seemed certain that Tyrion was the killer . . . perhaps because the dwarf was here, while the queen was safe behind the walls of the Red Keep, hundreds of leagues to the south. Catelyn almost wished she had burned her sister’s letter before reading it. Ser Rodrik tugged at his whiskers. â€Å"Poison, well . . . that could be the dwarf’s work, true enough. Or Cersei’s. It’s said poison is a woman’s weapon, begging your pardons, my lady. The Kingslayer, now . . . I have no great liking for the man, but he’s not the sort. Too fond of the sight of blood on that golden sword of his. Was it poison, my lady?† Catelyn frowned, vaguely uneasy. â€Å"How else could they make it look a natural death?† Behind her, Lord Robert shrieked with delight as one of the puppet knights sliced the other in half, spilling a flood of red sawdust onto the terrace. She glanced at her nephew and sighed. â€Å"The boy is utterly without discipline. He will never be strong enough to rule unless he is taken away from his mother for a time.† â€Å"His lord father agreed with you,† said a voice at her elbow. She turned to behold Maester Colemon, a cup of wine in his hand. â€Å"He was planning to send the boy to Dragonstone for fostering, you know . . . oh, but I’m speaking out of turn.† The apple of his throat bobbed anxiously beneath the loose maester’s chain. â€Å"I fear I’ve had too much of Lord Hunter’s excellent wine. The prospect of bloodshed has my nerves all a-fray . . . â€Å" â€Å"You are mistaken, Maester,† Catelyn said. â€Å"It was Casterly Rock, not Dragonstone, and those arrangements were made after the Hand’s death, without my sister’s consent.† The maester’s head jerked so vigorously at the end of his absurdly long neck that he looked half a puppet himself. â€Å"No, begging your forgiveness, my lady, but it was Lord Jon who—† A bell tolled loudly below them. High lords and serving girls alike broke off what they were doing and moved to the balustrade. Below, two guardsmen in sky-blue cloaks led forth Tyrion Lannister. The Eyrie’s plump septon escorted him to the statue in the center of the garden, a weeping woman carved in veined white marble, no doubt meant to be Alyssa. â€Å"The bad little man,† Lord Robert said, giggling. â€Å"Mother, can I make him fly? I want to see him fly.† â€Å"Later, my sweet baby,† Lysa promised him. â€Å"Trial first,† drawled Ser Lyn Corbray, â€Å"then execution.† A moment later the two champions appeared from opposite sides of the garden. The knight was attended by two young squires, the sellsword by the Eyrie’s master-at-arms. Ser Vardis Egen was steel from head to heel, encased in heavy plate armor over mail and padded surcoat. Large circular rondels, enameled cream-and-blue in the moon-and-falcon sigil of House Arryn, protected the vulnerable juncture of arm and breast. A skirt of lobstered metal covered him from waist to midthigh, while a solid gorget encircled his throat. Falcon’s wings sprouted from the temples of his helm, and his visor was a pointed metal beak with a narrow slit for vision. Bronn was so lightly armored he looked almost naked beside the knight. He wore only a shirt of black oiled ringmail over boiled leather, a round steel halfhelm with a noseguard, and a mail coif. High leather boots with steel shinguards gave some protection to his legs, and discs of black iron were sewn into the fingers of his gloves. Yet Catelyn noted that the sellsword stood half a hand taller than his foe, with a longer reach . . . and Bronn was fifteen years younger, if she was any judge. They knelt in the grass beneath the weeping woman, facing each other, with Lannister between them. The septon removed a faceted crystal sphere from the soft cloth bag at his waist. He lifted it high above his head, and the light shattered. Rainbows danced across the Imp’s face. In a high, solemn, singsong voice, the septon asked the gods to look down and bear witness, to find the truth in this man’s soul, to grant him life and freedom if he was innocent, death if he was guilty. His voice echoed off the surrounding towers. When the last echo had died away, the septon lowered his crystal and made a hasty departure. Tyrion leaned over and whispered something in Bronn’s ear before the guardsmen led him away. The sellsword rose laughing and brushed a blade of grass from his knee. Robert Arryn, Lord of the Eyrie and Defender of the Vale, was fidgeting impatiently in his elevated chair. â€Å"When are they going to fight?† he asked plaintively. Ser Vardis was helped back to his feet by one of his squires. The other brought him a triangular shield almost four feet tall, heavy oak dotted with iron studs. They strapped it to his left forearm. When Lysa’s master-at-arms offered Bronn a similar shield, the sellsword spat and waved it away. Three days growth of coarse black beard covered his jaw and cheeks, but if he did not shave it was not for want of a razor; the edge of his sword had the dangerous glimmer of steel that had been honed every day for hours, until it was too sharp to touch. Ser Vardis held out a gauntleted hand, and his squire placed a handsome double-edged longsword in his grasp. The blade was engraved with a delicate silver tracery of a mountain sky; its pommel was a falcon’s head, its crossguard fashioned into the shape of wings. â€Å"I had that sword crafted for Jon in King’s Landing,† Lysa told her guests proudly as they watched Ser Vardis try a practice cut. â€Å"He wore it whenever he sat the Iron Throne in King Robert’s place. Isn’t it a lovely thing? I thought it only fitting that our champion avenge Jon with his own blade.† The engraved silver blade was beautiful beyond a doubt, but it seemed to Catelyn that Ser Vardis might have been more comfortable with his own sword. Yet she said nothing; she was weary of futile arguments with her sister. â€Å"Make them fight!† Lord Robert called out. Ser Vardis faced the Lord of the Eyrie and lifted his sword in salute. â€Å"For the Eyrie and the Vale!† Tyrion Lannister had been seated on a balcony across the garden, flanked by his guards. It was to him that Bronn turned with a cursory salute. â€Å"They await your command,† Lady Lysa said to her lord son. â€Å"Fight!† the boy screamed, his arms trembling as they clutched at his chair. Ser Vardis swiveled, bringing up his heavy shield. Bronn turned to face him. Their swords rang together, once, twice, a testing. The sellsword backed off a step. The knight came after, holding his shield before him. He tried a slash, but Bronn jerked back, just out of reach, and the silver blade cut only air. Bronn circled to his right. Ser Vardis turned to follow, keeping his shield between them. The knight pressed forward, placing each foot carefully on the uneven ground. The sellsword gave way, a faint smile playing over his lips. Ser Vardis attacked, slashing, but Bronn leapt away from him, hopping lightly over a low, moss-covered stone. Now the sellsword circled left, away from the shield, toward the knight’s unprotected side. Ser Vardis tried a hack at his legs, but he did not have the reach. Bronn danced farther to his left. Ser Vardis turned in place. â€Å"The man is craven,† Lord Hunter declared. â€Å"Stand and fight, coward! † Other voices echoed the sentiment. Catelyn looked to Ser Rodrik. Her master-at-arms gave a curt shake of his head. â€Å"He wants to make Ser Vardis chase him. The weight of armor and shield will tire even the strongest man.† She had seen men practice at their swordplay near every day of her life, had viewed half a hundred tourneys in her time, but this was something different and deadlier: a dance where the smallest misstep meant death. And as she watched, the memory of another duel in another time came back to Catelyn Stark, as vivid as if it had been yesterday. They met in the lower bailey of Riverrun. When Brandon saw that Petyr wore only helm and breastplate and mail, he took off most of his armor. Petyr had begged her for a favor he might wear, but she had turned him away. Her lord father promised her to Brandon Stark, and so it was to him that she gave her token, a pale blue handscarf she had embroidered with the leaping trout of Riverrun. As she pressed it into his hand, she pleaded with him. â€Å"He is only a foolish boy, but I have loved him like a brother. It would grieve me to see him die.† And her betrothed looked at her with the cool grey eyes of a Stark and promised to spare the boy who loved her. That fight was over almost as soon as it began. Brandon was a man grown, and he drove Littlefinger all the way across the bailey and down the water stair, raining steel on him with every step, until the boy was staggering and bleeding from a dozen wounds. â€Å"Yield!† he called, more than once, but Petyr would only shake his head and fight on, grimly. When the river was lapping at their ankles, Brandon finally ended it, with a brutal backhand cut that bit through Petyr’s rings and leather into the soft flesh below the ribs, so deep that Catelyn was certain that the wound was mortal. He looked at her as he fell and murmured â€Å"Cat† as the bright blood came flowing out between his mailed fingers. She thought she had forgotten that. That was the last time she had seen his face . . . until the day she was brought before him in King’s Landing. A fortnight passed before Littlefinger was strong enough to leave Riverrun, but her lord father forbade her to visit him in the tower where he lay abed. Lysa helped their maester nurse him; she had been softer and shyer in those days. Edmure had called on him as well, but Petyr had sent him away. Her brother had acted as Brandon’s squire at the duel, and Littlefinger would not forgive that. As soon as he was strong enough to be moved, Lord Hoster Tully sent Petyr Baelish away in a closed litter, to finish his healing on the Fingers, upon the windswept jut of rock where he’d been born. The ringing clash of steel on steel jarred Catelyn back to the present. Ser Vardis was coming hard at Bronn, driving into him with shield and sword. The sellsword scrambled backward, checking each blow, stepping lithely over rock and root, his eyes never leaving his foe. He was quicker, Catelyn saw; the knight’s silvered sword never came near to touching him, but his own ugly grey blade hacked a notch from Ser Vardis’s shoulder plate. The brief flurry of fighting ended as swiftly as it had begun when Bronn sidestepped and slid behind the statue of the weeping woman. Ser Vardis lunged at where he had been, striking a spark off the pale marble of Alyssa’s thigh. â€Å"They’re not fighting good, Mother,† the Lord of the Eyrie complained. â€Å"I want them to fight.† â€Å"They will, sweet baby,† his mother soothed him. â€Å"The sellsword can’t run all day.† Some of the lords on Lysa’s terrace were making wry jests as they refilled their wine cups, but across the garden, Tyrion Lannister’s mismatched eyes watched the champions dance as if there were nothing else in the world. Bronn came out from behind the statue hard and fast, still moving left, aiming a two-handed cut at the knight’s unshielded right side. Ser Vardis blocked, but clumsily, and the sellsword’s blade flashed upward at his head. Metal rang, and a falcon’s wing collapsed with a crunch. Ser Vardis took a half step back to brace himself, raised his shield. Oak chips flew as Bronn’s sword hacked at the wooden wall. The sellsword stepped left again, away from the shield, and caught Ser Vardis across the stomach, the razor edge of his blade leaving a bright gash when it bit into the knight’s plate. Ser Vardis drove forward off his back foot, his own silver blade descending in a savage arc. Bronn slammed it aside and danced away. The knight crashed into the weeping woman, rocking her on her plinth. Staggered, he stepped backward, his head turning this way and that as he searched for his foe. The slit visor of his helm narrowed his vision. â€Å"Behind you, ser!† Lord Hunter shouted, too late. Bronn brought his sword down with both hands, catching Ser Vardis in the elbow of his sword arm. The thin lobstered metal that protected the joint crunched. The knight grunted, turning, wrenching his weapon up. This time Bronn stood his ground. The swords flew at each other, and their steel song filled the garden and rang off the white towers of the Eyrie. â€Å"Ser Vardis is hurt,† Ser Rodrik said, his voice grave. Catelyn did not need to be told; she had eyes, she could see the bright finger of blood running along the knight’s forearm, the wetness inside the elbow joint. Every parry was a little slower and a little lower than the one before. Ser Vardis turned his side to his foe, trying to use his shield to block instead, but Bronn slid around him, quick as a cat. The sellsword seemed to be getting stronger. His cuts were leaving their marks now. Deep shiny gashes gleamed all over the knight’s armor, on his right thigh, his beaked visor, crossing on his breastplate, a long one along the front of his gorget. The moon-and-falcon rondel over Ser Vardis’s right arm was sheared clean in half, hanging by its strap. They could hear his labored breath, rattling through the air holes in his visor. Blind with arrogance as they were, even the knights and lords of the Vale could see what was happening below them, yet her sister could not. â€Å"Enough, Ser Vardis!† Lady Lysa called down. â€Å"Finish him now, my baby is growing tired.† And it must be said of Ser Vardis Egen that he was true to his lady’s command, even to the last. One moment he was reeling backward, half-crouched behind his scarred shield; the next he charged. The sudden bull rush caught Bronn off balance. Ser Vardis crashed into him and slammed the lip of his shield into the sellsword’s face. Almost, almost, Bronn lost his feet . . . he staggered back, tripped over a rock, and caught hold of the weeping woman to keep his balance. Throwing aside his shield, Ser Vardis lurched after him, using both hands to raise his sword. His right arm was blood from elbow to fingers now, yet his last desperate blow would have opened Bronn from neck to navel . . . if the sellsword had stood to receive it. But Bronn jerked back. Jon Arryn’s beautiful engraved silver sword glanced off the marble elbow of the weeping woman and snapped clean a third of the way up the blade. Bronn put his shoulder into the statue’s back. The weathered likeness of Alyssa Arryn tottered and fell with a great crash, and Ser Vardis Egen went down beneath her. Bronn was on him in a heartbeat, kicking what was left of his shattered rondel aside to expose the weak spot between arm and breastplate. Ser Vardis was lying on his side, pinned beneath the broken torso of the weeping woman. Catelyn heard the knight groan as the sellsword lifted his blade with both hands and drove it down and in with all his weight behind it, under the arm and through the ribs. Ser Vardis Egen shuddered and lay still. Silence hung over the Eyrie. Bronn yanked off his halfhelm and let it fall to the grass. His lip was smashed and bloody where the shield had caught him, and his coal-black hair was soaked with sweat. He spit out a broken tooth. â€Å"Is it over, Mother?† the Lord of the Eyrie asked. No, Catelyn wanted to tell him, it’s only now beginning. â€Å"Yes,† Lysa said glumly, her voice as cold and dead as the captain of her guard. â€Å"Can I make the little man fly now?† Across the garden, Tyrion Lannister got to his feet. â€Å"Not this little man,† he said. â€Å"This little man is going down in the turnip hoist, thank you very much.† â€Å"You presume—† Lysa began. â€Å"I presume that House Arryn remembers its own words,† the Imp said. â€Å"As High as Honor.† â€Å"You promised I could make him fly,† the Lord of the Eyrie screamed at his mother. He began to shake. Lady Lysa’s face was flushed with fury. â€Å"The gods have seen fit to proclaim him innocent, child. We have no choice but to free him.† She lifted her voice. â€Å"Guards. Take my lord of Lannister and his . . . creature here out of my sight. Escort them to the Bloody Gate and set them free. See that they have horses and supplies sufficient to reach the Trident, and make certain all their goods and weapons are returned to them. They shall need them on the high road.† â€Å"The high road,† Tyrion Lannister said. Lysa allowed herself a faint, satisfied smile. It was another sort of death sentence, Catelyn realized. Tyrion Lannister must know that as well. Yet the dwarf favored Lady Arryn with a mocking bow. â€Å"As you command, my lady,† he said. â€Å"I believe we know the way.†

International entrepreneurship and innovation Essay

International entrepreneurship and innovation - Essay Example It makes life comfortable for a lot of people but the strength of Cochlear Property is that it is a unique technology which cannot be easily replicated due to the fact that the company has a patent right to the technology. The second factor responsible for the success of Cochlear Property is the Australian governments policy of encouraging pharmaceutical and medical research entities. This provided the much needed capital which was used to get the company to move to a high pedestal in its operations and attain a sustained level of productivity. The fourth element of the success of Cochlear Property is the fact that the company has been able to penetrate specific markets. This is because it is a specialised product that is suitable for deaf people in different parts of the world. The ability to get the products to consumers makes the company solvent and keeps it going. Risk-reward trade off refers to balancing entrepreneurial risk for rewards in the form of profits or revenues (Mankiw, 2012). Cochlear has a technology that is unique, distinct and very much in demand amongst a particular niche of the markets around the world. However, the risks relate to the challenge of financing. Hence, financing risk was the main and central risk that faced Cochlear Property. The main risks involve the internationalisation of the company through the acquisition of funds. The low capital and the the need for internationalisation came with the challenge of raising funds and this had the inherent risk of destabilising the company and its capital structures as well as its going concern status. Acquiring funds from sources that proved to be extremely expensive meant the company would pay too much money to finance their debts. This will mean too much interest to be paid at different points in time and this could cut down profitability and lead to the collapse of the company. On the other hand, equity financing meant the risk of opening the door