Jon and Qotho's trip to the City of Goats had not been without incident; twice, Dothraki riders had stopped them, and Qotho had spoken to them. Some gold changed hands, and on they went. Once, a group of bandits made the mistake of crossing swords with them, much to their regret. Arms and heads littered the battlefield afterward, and the two picked up some gold and needed supplies. Qotho found a bow and some arrows in the bandits' supplies that he went on and on about. He said it was the best-made dragon bone bow he had ever seen. Qotho wore the bow over one shoulder and two quivers of arrows over the other. Once, when they were at camp, Qotho had given Jon his two curved Dothraki swords to study. Jon had handed him Longclaw. The Dothraki seemed surprised at how light Longclaw was for its size. He studied the metal of the blade and smiled. "This sword is worth a fortune, Jon, real Valyrian steel." Jon had wielded the two arakh, clumsily at first but slowly gaining a feel for the two balanced but odd weapons. He had handed them back to Qotho, saying, "Deadly unless you fight an armored opponent." Qotho had nodded back at him.
To the east, the two could see the outlines of the ruins of Vaes Jini, and a small party of people camped at the edge of the crumbled buildings. When the two arrived, Qotho had dismounted and spoken to the group. He returned to Jon, saying, "A party of traders whose caravan was waylaid in the stone pass. They barely escaped with their lives. They have been here three days." Jon said, "Ask if they have seen a dragon." Qotho went back to the group, and after a few words, a man in that party pointed towards a peak northeast of the ruins. Qotho returned, saying, "Two days ago, a dragon was seen entering a cave on that tallest peak." Jon took a deep breath of the cooling evening air and sighed, like he was at last at the end of a very long quest, and the two of them made camp.
Brienne was in a meeting with Hassan in her tent, discussing the unusual size of the Zonian patrols they were encountering, when they were interrupted by an older, grey-haired hunter. He was a volunteer who had boarded the train at the tree-kin camp named Fess. Fess had grey hair and grey eyes, but every hunter of the Wolfwood recognized him as the best of them. Fess apologized for butting in, and Brienne tut-tutted him, saying, "Sit, good hunter, and say your piece." Fess nodded at Hassan and turned to Brienne, "Begging your pardon, ma'am, but I have a piece of news that might be turned in our favor." After a real smile from Brienne, he continued. "We've discovered a right nest of the large spiders about 30 miles south of here. What with all the hunting those Zon bastards have been doing in the wood, those spiders are starving. If we stirred them up a little bit, they would block any intrusion from the south. They like Zon just as much as deer or wolf meat, and those Zon have no idea what a starving nest of spiders that size can do. If you see my meaning, ma'am."
An evil grin crossed Hassan's face as he contemplated Fess's plan. He chuckled at the thought of it and then burst out in laughter. Fess chortled at that laughter, and Brienne began laughing too. When they were done, Brienne said, "Fess, please put this bold plan into action, if you would. But Fess....try not to get our own men killed in the process?" Fess nodded solemnly and went out of the tent smiling.
The next day, Fess and two of his men carted three Zonian prisoners to a slight hill less than a quarter mile west of the spiders' nests. The prisoners were bound and gagged, and two were tied to a tree. Fess and another shot two fire arrows down into the spider's nest, right where their eggs were hanging. The fire spread like crazy among the eggs hanging in webs, and the spiders went ballistic. Fess and his men let the one bound Zonian run free, and the man began crashing through the woods back towards the Zonian lines, less than 6 miles away. The three Westerosi ran and ducked for cover just as the first spider came charging up the hill. 10 giant Empress spiders pounced on the two bound Zonians, and three other spiders went off after the sounds of the third Zonian crashing through the woods.
Three days later, the Zonians were hard at work cutting trees and pulling stumps in their cut slinger path, some miles south of Deepwood Motte, when a pack of Empress spiders overran them. They lost over 20 troops and only killed one spider before the spiders gathered their conquests and headed back into the woods. The few survivors gathered their wits and ran back to the main group, some miles to the south. The Zonian captain threatened their cowardice until the body of the giant spider was brought before him. He sent 30 men to guard a new group of cutters and stump pullers, and they were promptly all killed a few days later. The effort to finish cutting the path forward slowed for many days. Several 20-man Zonian patrols were lost after that, and they all began avoiding going east from that place.