Esther had never studied singing, but she was a girl with a naturally beautiful voice.
She had just come of age, was pretty with delicate features, and had a slender build. She had started her period last month.
Esther and her grandfather Buzz sell their famous 'brown soup' on the streets of Flea Nest.
Flea Nest is a slum in King's Landing.
Brown soup refers to the color of the soup, which is named for its yellowish-brown color.
The brown soup is made by cooking all sorts of things in a big pot. You throw anything in and boil it repeatedly. You add vegetables, meat, shellfish and all sorts of things and cook them until they become a paste. Then you take out the things that can't be cooked through, like the shellfish, and clean them. You add water and cook it into a thick soup, sprinkle with salt, and it tastes delicious.
For those who can't afford to eat, this soup not only provides sustenance but is also rich in various nutrients and very inexpensive, costing only five copper coins.
Five copper coins are equivalent to 50 cents in Earth's civilization.
Brown soup is a local specialty of Flea Nest Street.
Esther's brown soup sells very well; it tastes better than the brown soup from other vendors.
She and her grandfather installed a rat-catching device in the flea shed: a small bucket with some meat inside, with a small stick attached to the meat by a thread. Whenever a rat jumped into the bucket and dragged the meat, the stick would move, causing the metal lid to fall and trap the rat inside.
There are a lot of rats in the rental house with flea nests. Sometimes, if you're lucky, you can even catch a fat rat.
Esther and her grandfather caught a rat, skinned it, gutted it, and cleaned it thoroughly. They chopped the snow-white rat meat into small pieces and simmered it in the broth, giving the brown soup a delicious meaty aroma.
In the evening, Esther and her grandfather went to the fish market in the muddy gate to pick up rotten fish and shells from the garbage dump. They cut off the rotten parts with a knife, picked out the edible fish meat and shells, removed the fish bones, and threw them into the old soup to cook.
As for the unwanted vegetables picked up from the market, they are carefully picked out, the blackened and rotten parts are removed, the good edible parts are kept, chopped into small pieces, and thrown into brown soup to simmer.
Esther's brown soup is clean and flavorful, completely different from the brown soup of other stalls.
The other vendors' brown soup contained more and larger pieces of meat than Esther's, but the meat was unclean; no one dared to investigate what kind of meat it was. Everyone knew perfectly well that it was the flesh of the dead.
Flea nests are never short of people who die from disease, starvation, or fighting.
The "burnt brown soup" is a phenomenon here that everyone knows about but no one talks about.
Before Esther and Grandpa Booz came to sell brown soup, people who came to drink it would just drink it silently without asking what kind of meat it was or where it came from.
Although those soups... cannot be examined in detail, they are cheap, and more importantly, a bowl of brown soup can save the lives of homeless people and the poor.
But ever since Esther and her grandfather Buzz started selling brown soup, many people who want brown soup have come to Esther's stall to drink the soup.
Because Esther and her grandfather drink this soup themselves every day, everyone feels reassured.
Other vendors selling brown soup do not drink the brown soup they make themselves.
Five copper coins, standing up, and a large bowl of brown soup down. Warm and satisfied, it was both filling and nutritious.
Grandpa Buz was originally a worker at the mint, reportedly the master craftsman responsible for casting various coin models. In addition, he was also responsible for polishing the finished coins. All coins were polished before being released into circulation.
Because of his age and slow movements, he was kicked out by the mint officials. Booz was now destitute; his son was a gambler who spent his days gambling, frequenting brothels, or getting into street fights; and his only granddaughter, Esther, was supported entirely by her grandfather's meager salary at the mint.
After being expelled from the mint, Booz took his granddaughter Esther to a poor man's haven: Flea Nest. He rented a small, low shack and spent three months waiting outside Littlefinger's brothel.
Petyr Baelish, Littlefinger, was the highest-ranking official at the Mint, and Master Butz hoped that Lord Petyr would grant him a retirement allowance. Butz had worked at the Mint for over fifty years, and when he was kicked out by the officials, he hadn't even received his last month's salary, let alone the retirement allowance he was entitled to.
Three months later, he finally managed to win over Lord Petyr Baelish, Littlefinger. Lord Petyr Baelish didn't give him a single copper coin, but he did give him the opportunity to sell brown soup on the streets of Flea Nest.
From then on, a grandfather and grandson squeezed into the dozen or so stalls selling brown soup on the street in the flea den.
Before long, Esther and Grandpa Buz's clean, tidy, and fragrant brown soup made their business surpass that of the other stall owners. Every day, only after Esther and Grandpa Buz's soup sold out would the other stall owners' business start to improve.
The grandfather and grandson never use rotten, inedible vegetable leaves or any unspeakable meats to make their brown soup. They have broken the unspeakable cycle, and their brown soup is clean, fragrant, and safe to eat.
But this is not a good thing.
Grandpa Booz and Esther have already had several clashes with the surrounding stall owners. Although they all ended without serious incident, it's clear that these people won't let them have it so easily if they continue doing business.
Littlefinger Petyr Baelish only showed up on the first day the grandfather and grandson set up their stall, and never came back.
The vendors who dare to set up stalls selling brown soup in Flea Nest are no ordinary people: they either have the support of local thugs, or they have connections with ruthless mercenaries, or they are familiar with and have a relationship with the street's minor officials. It is the first time that the Buz grandfather and grandson have squeezed in here by relying on the influence of a minister of the court.
As time passed and Petyr Baelish disappeared, many people realized that the grandfather and grandson had no special relationship with the Lord Chancellor Littlefinger.
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And so, the conflict began.
The flea den was also the most chaotic place in the whole city.
At night, people from other places generally don't dare to enter those alleys.
King's Landing has the largest transient population of the Seven Kingdoms, far exceeding that of the old towns in the south.
Even mercenaries from across the Narrow Sea try to avoid passing through the streets of Flea Nest at night.
However, as long as it's daytime, although there are many fights and brawls in the flea den, there are generally no incidents on the street where brown soup is sold.
This seems to be some kind of divine will or rule.
After all, it was a place where homeless people, the poor, pitiful retired workers, sick poor people, and so on could get a bowl of soup.
The poorer but more diverse the population, the more violence is rampant in those places.
Because of its cheap rent, Flea Nest is a popular lodging for low-level mercenaries, especially in desirable locations. It's also a haven for thugs from various gangs who like to sneak into wealthy homes to hide after petty theft.
That morning, a mercenary came to Esther and Grandpa Booz's stall to drink brown soup.
This mercenary wasn't from any of the seven nations, but rather from across the Narrow Sea. He was bald, dressed in a thin shirt and trousers, with an Arak scimitar at his waist.
This bald man is a member of the infamous Warriors, and he comes from across the Narrow Sea. He is a Dothraki skilled in using scimitars.
The Warriors are the most notorious and infamous mercenary group in King's Landing, and they also have a chilling name: the Blood Troupe.
The mercenaries who make up the Blood Play Troupe are mainly criminals and exiles from all over the continent of Essos, across the Narrow Sea.