A blowing rain lashed at Jon’s face as he spurred his
horse across the swollen stream. Beside him, Lord Commander Mormont
gave the hood of his cloak a tug, muttering curses on the weather.
His raven sat on his shoulder, feathers ruffled, as soaked and
grumpy as the Old Bear himself. A gust of wind sent wet leaves
flapping round them like a flock of dead birds. The haunted forest,
Jon thought ruefully. The drowned forest, more like it.
He hoped Sam was holding up, back down the column. He was not a
good rider even in fair weather, and six days of rain had made the
ground treacherous, all soft mud and hidden rocks. When the wind
blew, it drove the water right into their eyes. The Wall would be
flowing off to the south, the melting ice mingling with warm rain
to wash down in sheets and rivers. Pyp and Toad would be sitting
near the fire in the common room, drinking cups of mulled wine
before their supper. Jon envied them. His wet wool clung to him
sodden and itching, his neck and shoulders ached fiercely from the
weight of mail and sword, and he was sick of salt cod, salt beef,
and hard cheese.
Up ahead a hunting horn sounded a quavering note, half drowned
beneath the constant patter of the rain. “Buckwell’s
horn,” the Old Bear announced. “The gods are good;
Craster’s still there.” His raven gave a single flap of
his big wings, croaked “Corn,” and ruffled his feathers
up again.
Jon had often heard the black brothers tell tales of Craster and
his keep. Now he would see it with his own eyes. After seven empty
villages, they had all come to dread finding Craster’s as
dead and desolate as the rest, but it seemed they would be spared
that. Perhaps the Old Bear will finally get some answers, he
thought. Anyway, we’ll be out of the rain.
Thoren Smallwood swore that Craster was a friend to the Watch,
despite his unsavory reputation. “The man’s half-mad, I
won’t deny it,” he’d told the Old Bear,
“but you’d be the same if you’d spent your life
in this cursed wood. Even so, he’s never turned a ranger away
from his fire, nor does he love Mance Rayder. He’ll give us
good counsel.” So long as he gives us a hot meal and a chance to dry our
clothes, I’ll be happy. Dywen said Craster was a kinslayer,
liar, raper, and craven, and hinted that he trafficked with slavers
and demons. “And worse,” the old forester would add,
clacking his wooden teeth. “There’s a cold smell to
that one, there is.”
“Jon,” Lord Mormont commanded, “ride back
along the column and spread the word. And remind the officers that
I want no trouble about Craster’s wives. The men are to mind
their hands and speak to these women as little as need
be.”
“Aye, my lord.” Jon turned his horse back the way
they’d come. It was pleasant to have the rain out of his
face, if only for a little while. Everyone he passed seemed to be
weeping. The march was strung out through half a mile of woods.
In
the midst of the baggage train, Jon passed Samwell Tarly, slumped
in his saddle under a wide floppy hat. He was riding one dray horse
and leading the others. The drumming of the rain against the hoods
of their cages had the ravens squawking and fluttering. “You
put a fox in with them?” Jon called out.
Water ran off the brim of Sam’s hat as he lifted his head.
“Oh, hullo, Jon. No, they just hate the rain, the same as
us.”
“How are you faring, Sam?”
“Wetly.” The fat boy managed a smile. “Nothing
has killed me yet, though.”
“Good. Craster’s Keep is just ahead. If the gods are
good, he’ll let us sleep by his fire.”
Sam looked dubious. “Dolorous Edd says Craster’s a
terrible savage. He marries his daughters and obeys no laws but
those he makes himself. And Dywen told Grenn he’s got black
blood in his veins. His mother was a wildling woman who lay with a
ranger, so he’s a bas . . . ” Suddenly he realized what he was about
to say.
“A bastard,” Jon said with a laugh. “You can
say it, Sam. I’ve heard the word before.” He put the
spurs to his surefooted little garron. “I need to hunt down
Ser Ottyn. Be careful around Craster’s women.” As
if Samwell Tarly needed warning on that score. “We’ll
talk later, after we’ve made camp.”
Jon carried the word back to Ser Ottyn Wythers, plodding along
with the rear guard. A small prune-faced man of an age with
Mormont, Ser Ottyn always looked tired, even at Castle Black, and
the rain had beaten him down unmercifully. “Welcome
tidings,” he said. “This wet has soaked my bones, and
even my saddle sores complain of saddle sores.”
On his way back, Jon swung wide of the column’s line of
march and took a shorter path through the thick of the wood. The
sounds of man and horse diminished, swallowed up by the wet green
wild, and soon enough he could hear only the steady wash of rain
against leaf and tree and rock. It was midafternoon, yet the forest
seemed as dark as dusk. Jon wove a path between rocks and puddles,
past great oaks, grey-green sentinels, and black-barked ironwoods.
In places the branches wove a canopy overhead and he was given a
moment’s respite from the drumming of the rain against his
head. As he rode past a lightning-blasted chestnut tree overgrown
with wild white roses, he heard something rustling in the
underbrush. “Ghost,” he called out. “Ghost, to
me.”
But it was Dywen who emerged from the greenery, forking a shaggy
grey garron with Grenn ahorse beside him. The Old Bear had deployed
outriders to either side of the main column, to screen their march
and warn of the approach of any enemies, and even there he took no
chances, sending the men out in pairs.
“Ah, it’s you, Lord Snow.” Dywen smiled an
oaken smile; his teeth were carved of wood, and fit badly.
“Thought me and the boy had us one o’ them Others to
deal with. Lose your wolf?”
“He’s off hunting.” Ghost did not like to
travel with the column, but he would not be far. When they made
camp for the night, he’d find his way to Jon at the Lord
Commander’s tent.
“Fishing, I’d call it, in this wet,” Dywen
said.
“My mother always said rain was good for growing
crops,” Grenn put in hopefully.
“Aye, a good crop of mildew,” Dywen said. “The
best thing about a rain like this, it saves a man from taking
baths.” He made a clacking sound on his wooden teeth.
“Buckwell’s found Craster,” Jon told them.
“Had he lost him?” Dywen chuckled. “See that
you young bucks don’t go nosing about Craster’s wives,
you hear?”
Jon smiled. “Want them all for yourself, Dywen?”
Dywen clacked his teeth some more. “Might be I do.
Craster’s got ten fingers and one cock, so he don’t
count but to eleven. He’d never miss a couple.”
“How many wives does he have, truly?” Grenn
asked.
“More’n you ever will, brother. Well, it’s not
so hard when you breed your own. There’s your beast,
Snow.”
Ghost was trotting along beside Jon’s horse with tail held
high, his white fur ruffed up thick against the rain. He moved so
silently Jon could not have said just when he appeared.
Grenn’s mount shied at the scent of him; even now, after more
than a year, the horses were uneasy in the presence of the
direwolf. “With me, Ghost.” Jon spurred off to
Craster’s Keep.
He had never thought to find a stone castle on the far side of
the Wall, but he had pictured some sort of motte-and-bailey with a
wooden palisade and a timber tower keep. What they found instead
was a midden heap, a pigsty, an empty sheepfold, and a windowless
daub-and-wattle hall scarce worthy of the name. It was long and
low, chinked together from logs and roofed with sod. The compound
stood atop a rise too modest to name a hill, surrounded by an
earthen dike. Brown rivulets flowed down the slope where the rain
had eaten gaping holes in the defenses, to join a rushing brook
that curved around to the north, its thick waters turned into a
murky torrent by the rains.
On the southwest, he found an open gate flanked by a pair of
animal skulls on high poles: a bear to one side, a ram to the
other. Bits of flesh still clung to the bear skull, Jon noted as he
joined the line riding past. Within, Jarmen Buckwell’s scouts
and men from Thoren Smallwood’s van were setting up horse
lines and struggling to raise tents. A host of piglets rooted about
three huge sows in the sty. Nearby, a small girl pulled carrots
from a garden, naked in the rain, while two women tied a pig for
slaughter. The animal’s squeals were high and horrible,
almost human in their distress. Chett’s hounds barked wildly
in answer, snarling and snapping despite his curses, with a pair of
Craster’s dogs barking back. When they saw Ghost, some of the
dogs broke off and ran, while others began to bay and growl. The
direwolf ignored them, as did Jon. Well, thirty of us will be warm and dry, Jon thought once
he’d gotten a good look at the hall. Perhaps as many as
fifty. The place was much too small to sleep two hundred men, so
most would need to remain outside. And where to put them? The rain
had turned half the compound yard to ankle-deep puddles and the
rest to sucking mud. Another dismal night was in prospect.
The Lord Commander had entrusted his mount to Dolorous Edd. He
was cleaning mud out of the horse’s hooves as Jon dismounted.
“Lord Mormont’s in the hall,” he announced.
“He said for you to join him. Best leave the wolf outside, he
looks hungry enough to eat one of Craster’s children. Well,
truth be told, I’m hungry enough to eat one of
Craster’s children, so long as he was served hot. Go on,
I’ll see to your horse. If it’s warm and dry inside,
don’t tell me, I wasn’t asked in.” He flicked a
glob of wet mud out from under a horseshoe. “Does this mud
look like shit to you? Could it be that this whole hill is made of
Craster’s shit?”
Jon smiled. “Well, I hear he’s been here a long
time.”
“You cheer me not. Go see the Old Bear.”
“Ghost, stay,” he commanded. The door to
Craster’s Keep was made of two flaps of deerhide. Jon shoved
between them, stooping to pass under the low lintel. Two dozen of
the chief rangers had preceded him, and were standing around the
firepit in the center of the dirt floor while puddles collected
about their boots. The hall stank of soot, dung, and wet dog. The
air was heavy with smoke, yet somehow still damp. Rain leaked
through the smoke hole in the roof. It was all a single room, with
a sleeping loft above reached by a pair of splintery ladders.
Jon remembered how he’d felt the day they had left the
Wall: nervous as a maiden, but eager to glimpse the mysteries and
wonders beyond each new horizon. Well, here’s one of the
wonders, he told himself, gazing about the squalid, foul-smelling
hall. The acrid smoke was making his eyes water. A pity that Pyp
and Toad can’t see all they’re missing.
Craster sat above the fire, the only man to enjoy his own chair.
Even Lord Commander Mormont must seat himself on the common bench,
with his raven muttering on his shoulder. Jarman Buckwell stood
behind, dripping from patched mail and shiny wet leather, beside
Thoren Smallwood in the late Ser Jaremy’s heavy breastplate
and sable-trimmed cloak.
Craster’s sheepskin jerkin and cloak of sewn skins made a
shabby contrast, but around one thick wrist was a heavy ring that
had the glint of gold. He looked to be a powerful man, though well
into the winter of his days now, his mane of hair grey going to
white. A flat nose and a drooping mouth gave him a cruel look, and
one of his ears was missing. So this is a wildling. Jon remembered
Old Nan’s tales of the savage folk who drank blood from human
skulls. Craster seemed to be drinking a thin yellow beer from a
chipped stone cup. Perhaps he had not heard the stories.
“I’ve not seen Benjen Stark for three years,”
he was telling Mormont. “And if truth be told, I never once
missed him.” A half-dozen black puppies and the odd pig or
two skulked among the benches, while women in ragged deerskins
passed horns of beer, stirred the fire, and chopped carrots and
onions into a kettle.
“He ought to have passed here last year,” said
Thoren Smallwood. A dog came sniffing round his leg. He kicked it
and sent it off yipping.
Lord Mormont said, “Ben was searching for Ser Waymar
Royce, who’d vanished with Gared and young Will.”
“Aye, those three I recall. The lordling no older than one
of these pups. Too proud to sleep under my roof, him in his sable
cloak and black steel. My wives give him big cow eyes all the
same.” He turned his squint on the nearest of the women.
“Gared says they were chasing raiders. I told him, with a
commander that green, best not catch ’em. Gared wasn’t
half-bad, for a crow. Had less ears than me, that one. The
’bite took ’em, same as mine.” Craster laughed.
“Now I hear he got no head neither. The ’bite do that
too?”
Jon remembered a spray of red blood on white snow, and the way
Theon Greyjoy had kicked the dead man’s head. The man was a
deserter. On the way back to Winterfell, Jon and Robb had raced,
and found six direwolf pups in the snow. A thousand years ago.
“When Ser Waymar left you, where was he bound?”
Craster gave a shrug. “Happens I have better things to do
than tend to the comings and goings of crows.” He drank a
pull of beer and set the cup aside. “Had no good southron
wine up here for a bear’s night. I could use me some wine,
and a new axe. Mine’s lost its bite, can’t have that, I
got me women to protect.” He gazed around at his scurrying
wives.
“You are few here, and isolated,” Mormont said.
“If you like, I’ll detail some men to escort you south
to the Wall.”
The raven seemed to like the notion. “Wall,” it
screamed, spreading black wings like a high collar behind
Mormont’s head.
Their host gave a nasty smile, showing a mouthful of broken
brown teeth. “And what would we do there, serve you at
supper? We’re free folk here. Craster serves no
man.”
“These are bad times to dwell alone in the wild. The cold
winds are rising.”
“Let them rise. My roots are sunk deep.” Craster
grabbed a passing woman by the wrist. “Tell him, wife. Tell
the Lord Crow how well content we are.”
The woman licked at thin lips. “This is our place. Craster
keeps us safe. Better to die free than live a slave.”
“Slave,” muttered the raven.
Mormont leaned forward. “Every village we have passed has
been abandoned. Yours are the first living faces we’ve seen
since we left the Wall. The people are
gone . . . whether dead, fled, or taken, I
could not say. The animals as well. Nothing is left. And earlier,
we found the bodies of two of Ben Stark’s rangers only a few
leagues from the Wall. They were pale and cold, with black hands
and black feet and wounds that did not bleed. Yet when we took them
back to Castle Black they rose in the night and killed. One slew
Ser Jaremy Rykker and the other came for me, which tells me that
they remember some of what they knew when they lived, but there was
no human mercy left in them.”
The woman’s mouth hung open, a wet pink cave, but Craster
only gave a snort. “We’ve had no such troubles
here . . . and I’ll thank you not to tell
such evil tales under my roof. I’m a godly man, and the gods
keep me safe. If wights come walking, I’ll know how to send
them back to their graves. Though I could use me a sharp new
axe.” He sent his wife scurrying with a slap on her leg and a
shout of “More beer, and be quick about it.”
“No trouble from the dead,” Jarmen Buckwell said,
“but what of the living, my lord? What of your
king?”
“King!” cried Mormont’s raven. “King,
king, king.”
“That Mance Rayder?” Craster spit into the fire.
“King-beyond-the-Wall. What do free folk want with
kings?” He turned his squint on Mormont. “There’s
much I could tell you o’ Rayder and his doings, if I had a
mind. This o’ the empty villages, that’s his work. You
would have found this hall abandoned as well, if I were a man to
scrape to such. He sends a rider, tells me I must leave my own keep
to come grovel at his feet. I sent the man back, but kept his
tongue. It’s nailed to that wall there.” He pointed.
“Might be that I could tell you where to seek Mance Rayder.
If I had a mind.” The brown smile again. “But
we’ll have time enough for that. You’ll be wanting to
sleep beneath my roof, belike, and eat me out of pigs.”
“A roof would be most welcome, my lord,” Mormont
said. “We’ve had hard riding, and too much
wet.”
“Then you’ll guest here for a night. No longer,
I’m not that fond o’ crows. The loft’s for me and
mine, but you’ll have all the floor you like. I’ve meat
and beer for twenty, no more. The rest o’ your black crows
can peck after their own corn.”
“We’ve packed in our own supplies, my lord,”
said the Old Bear. “We should be pleased to share our food
and wine.”
Craster wiped his drooping mouth with the back of a hairy hand.
“I’ll taste your wine, Lord Crow, that I will. One more
thing. Any man lays a hand on my wives, he loses the
hand.”
“Your roof, your rule,” said Thoren Smallwood, and
Lord Mormont nodded stiffly, though he looked none too pleased.
“That’s settled, then.” Craster grudged them a
grunt. “D’ya have a man can draw a map?”
“Sam Tarly can.” Jon pushed forward. “Sam
loves maps.”
Mormont beckoned him closer. “Send him here after
he’s eaten. Have him bring quill and parchment. And find
Tollett as well. Tell him to bring my axe. A guest gift for our
host.”
“Who’s this one now?” Craster said before Jon
could go. “He has the look of a Stark.”
“My steward and squire, Jon Snow.”
“A bastard, is it?” Craster looked Jon up and down.
“Man wants to bed a woman, seems like he ought to take her to
wife. That’s what I do.” He shooed Jon off with a wave.
“Well, run and do your service, bastard, and see that axe is
good and sharp now, I’ve no use for dull steel.”
Jon Snow bowed stiffly and took his leave. Ser Ottyn Wythers was
coming in as he was leaving, and they almost collided at the
deerhide door. Outside, the rain seemed to have slackened. Tents
had gone up all over the compound. Jon could see the tops of others
under the trees.
Dolorous Edd was feeding the horses. “Give the wildling an
axe, why not?” He pointed out Mormont’s weapon, a
short-hafted battle-axe with gold scrollwork inlaid on the black
steel blade. “He’ll give it back, I vow. Buried in the
Old Bear’s skull, like as not. Why not give him all our axes,
and our swords as well? I mislike the way they clank and rattle as
we ride. We’d travel faster without them, straight to
hell’s door. Does it rain in hell, I wonder? Perhaps Craster
would like a nice hat instead.”
Jon smiled. “He wants an axe. And wine as well.”
“See, the Old Bear’s clever. If we get the wildling
well and truly drunk, perhaps he’ll only cut off an ear when
he tries to slay us with that axe. I have two ears but only one
head.”
“Smallwood says Craster is a friend to the
Watch.”
“Do you know the difference between a wildling who’s
a friend to the Watch and one who’s not?” asked the
dour squire. “Our enemies leave our bodies for the crows and
the wolves. Our friends bury us in secret graves. I wonder how long
that bear’s been nailed up on that gate, and what Craster had
there before we came hallooing?” Edd looked at the axe
doubtfully, the rain running down his long face. “Is it dry
in there?”
“Drier than out here.”
“If I lurk about after, not too close to the fire, belike
they’ll take no note of me till morn. The ones under his roof
will be the first he murders, but at least we’ll die
dry.”
Jon had to laugh. “Craster’s one man. We’re
two hundred. I doubt he’ll murder anyone.”
“You cheer me,” said Edd, sounding utterly morose.
“And besides, there’s much to be said for a good sharp
axe. I’d hate to be murdered with a maul. I saw a man hit in
the brow with a maul once. Scarce split the skin at all, but his
head turned mushy and swelled up big as a gourd, only purply-red. A
comely man, but he died ugly. It’s good that we’re not
giving them mauls.” Edd walked away shaking his head, his
sodden black cloak shedding rain behind him.
Jon got the horses fed before he stopped to think of his own
supper. He was wondering where to find Sam when he heard a shout of
fear. “Wolf!” He sprinted around the hall toward the
cry, the earth sucking at his boots. One of Craster’s women
was backed up against the mud-spattered wall of the keep.
“Keep away,” she was shouting at Ghost. “You keep
away!” The direwolf had a rabbit in his mouth and another
dead and bloody on the ground before him. “Get it away,
m’lord,” she pleaded when she saw him.
“He won’t hurt you.” He knew at once what had
happened; a wooden hutch, its slats shattered, lay on its side in
the wet grass. “He must have been hungry. We haven’t
seen much game.” Jon whistled. The direwolf bolted down the
rabbit, crunching the small bones between his teeth, and padded
over to him.
The woman regarded them with nervous eyes. She was younger than
he’d thought at first. A girl of fifteen or sixteen years, he
judged, dark hair plastered across a gaunt face by the falling
rain, her bare feet muddy to the ankles. The body under the sewn
skins was showing in the early turns of pregnancy. “Are you
one of Craster’s daughters?” he asked.
She put a hand over her belly. “Wife now.” Edging
away from the wolf, she knelt mournfully beside the broken hutch.
“I was going to breed them rabbits. There’s no sheep
left.”
“The Watch will make good for them.” Jon had no coin
of his own, or he would have offered it to
her . . . though he was not sure what good a
few coppers or even a silver piece would do her beyond the Wall.
“I’ll speak to Lord Mormont on the morrow.”
She wiped her hands on her skirt.
“M’lord—”
“I’m no lord.”
But others had come crowding round, drawn by the woman’s
scream and the crash of the rabbit hutch. “Don’t you
believe him, girl,” called out Lark the Sisterman, a ranger
mean as a cur. “That’s Lord Snow himself.”
“Bastard of Winterfell and brother to kings,” mocked
Chett, who’d left his hounds to see what the commotion was
about.
“That wolf’s looking at you hungry, girl,”
Lark said. “Might be it fancies that tender bit in your
belly.”
Jon was not amused. “You’re scaring her.”
“Warning her, more like.” Chett’s grin was as
ugly as the boils that covered most of his face.
“We’re not to talk to you,” the girl
remembered suddenly.
“Wait,” Jon said, too late. She bolted, ran.
Lark made a grab for the second rabbit, but Ghost was quicker.
When he bared his teeth, the Sisterman slipped in the mud and went
down on his bony butt. The others laughed. The direwolf took the
rabbit in his mouth and brought it to Jon.
“There was no call to scare the girl,” he told
them.
“We’ll hear no scolds from you, bastard.”
Chett blamed Jon for the loss of his comfortable position with
Maester Aemon, and not without justice. If he had not gone to Aemon
about Sam Tarly, Chett would still be tending an old blind man
instead of a pack of ill-tempered hunting hounds. “You may be
the Lord Commander’s pet, but you’re not the Lord
Commander . . . and you wouldn’t talk so
bloody bold without that monster of yours always about.”
“I’ll not fight a brother while we’re beyond
the Wall,” Jon answered, his voice cooler than he felt.
Lark got to one knee. “He’s afraid of you, Chett. On
the Sisters, we have a name for them like him.”
“I know all the names. Save your breath.” He walked
away, Ghost at his side. The rain had dwindled to a thin drizzle by
the time he reached the gate. Dusk would be on them soon, followed
by another wet dark dismal night. The clouds would hide moon and
stars and Mormont’s Torch, turning the woods black as pitch.
Every piss would be an adventure, if not quite of the sort Jon Snow
had once envisioned.
Out under the trees, some rangers had found enough duff and dry
wood to start a fire beneath a slanting ridge of slate. Others had
raised tents or made rude shelters by stretching their cloaks over
low branches. Giant had crammed himself inside the hollow of a dead
oak. “How d’ye like my castle, Lord Snow?”
“It looks snug. You know where Sam is?”
“Keep on the way you were. If you come on Ser
Ottyn’s pavilion, you’ve gone too far.” Giant
smiled. “Unless Sam’s found him a tree too. What a tree
that would be.”
It was Ghost who found Sam in the end. The direwolf shot ahead
like a quarrel from a crossbow. Under an outcrop of rock that gave
some small degree of shelter from the rain, Sam was feeding the
ravens. His boots squished when he moved. “My feet are soaked
through,” he admitted miserably. “When I climbed off my
horse, I stepped in a hole and went in up to my knees.”
“Take off your boots and dry your stockings. I’ll
find some dry wood. If the ground’s not wet under the rock,
we might be able to get a fire burning.” Jon showed Sam the
rabbit. “And we’ll feast.”
“Won’t you be attending Lord Mormont in the
hall?”
“No, but you will. The Old Bear wants you to map for him.
Craster says he’ll find Mance Rayder for us.”
“Oh.” Sam did not look anxious to meet Craster, even
if it meant a warm fire.
“He said eat first, though. Dry your feet.” Jon went
to gather fuel, digging down under deadfalls for the drier wood
beneath and peeling back layers of sodden pine needles until he
found likely kindling. Even then, it seemed to take forever for a
spark to catch. He hung his cloak from the rock to keep the rain
off his smoky little fire, making them a small snug alcove.
As he knelt to skin the rabbit, Sam pulled off his boots.
“I think there’s moss growing between my toes,”
he declared mournfully, wriggling the toes in question. “The
rabbit will taste good. I don’t even mind about the blood and
all.” He looked away. “Well, only a
little . . . ”
Jon spitted the carcass, banked the fire with a pair of rocks,
and balanced their meal atop them. The rabbit had been a scrawny
thing, but as it cooked it smelled like a king’s feast. Other
rangers gave them envious looks. Even Ghost looked up hungrily,
flames shining in his red eyes as he sniffed. “You had yours
before,” Jon reminded him.
“Is Craster as savage as the rangers say?” Sam
asked. The rabbit was a shade underdone, but tasted wonderful.
“What’s his castle like?”
“A midden heap with a roof and a firepit.” Jon told
Sam what he had seen and heard in Craster’s Keep.
By the time the telling was done, it was dark outside and Sam
was licking his fingers. “That was good, but now I’d
like a leg of lamb. A whole leg, just for me, sauced with mint and
honey and cloves. Did you see any lambs?”
“There was a sheepfold, but no sheep.”
“How does he feed all his men?”
“I didn’t see any men. Just Craster and his women
and a few small girls. I wonder he’s able to hold the place.
His defenses were nothing to speak of, only a muddy dike. You had
better go up to the hall and draw that map. Can you find the
way?”
“If I don’t fall in the mud.” Sam struggled
back into his boots, collected quill and parchment, and shouldered
out into the night, the rain pattering down on his cloak and floppy
hat.
Ghost laid his head on his paws and went to sleep by the fire.
Jon stretched out beside him, grateful for the warmth. He was cold
and wet, but not so cold and wet as he’d been a short time
before. Perhaps tonight the Old Bear will learn something that will
lead us to Uncle Benjen.
He woke to the sight of his own breath misting in the cold
morning air. When he moved, his bones ached. Ghost was gone, the
fire burnt out. Jon reached to pull aside the cloak he’d hung
over the rock, and found it stiff and frozen. He crept beneath it
and stood up in a forest turned to crystal.
The pale pink light of dawn sparkled on branch and leaf and
stone. Every blade of grass was carved from emerald, every drip of
water turned to diamond. Flowers and mushrooms alike wore coats of
glass. Even the mud puddles had a bright brown sheen. Through the
shimmering greenery, the black tents of his brothers were encased
in a fine glaze of ice. So there is magic beyond the Wall after all. He found himself
thinking of his sisters, perhaps because he’d dreamed of them
last night. Sansa would call this an enchantment, and tears would
fill her eyes at the wonder of it, but Arya would run out laughing
and shouting, wanting to touch it all.
“Lord Snow?” he heard. Soft and meek. He turned.
Crouched atop the rock that had sheltered him during the night
was the rabbit keeper, wrapped in a black cloak so large it drowned
her. Sam’s cloak, Jon realized at once. Why is she wearing
Sam’s cloak? “The fat one told me I’d find you
here, m’lord,” she said.
“We ate the rabbit, if that’s what you came
for.” The admission made him feel absurdly guilty.
“Old Lord Crow, him with the talking bird, he gave Craster
a crossbow worth a hundred rabbits.” Her arms closed over the
swell of her belly. “Is it true, m’lord? Are you
brother to a king?”
“A half brother,” he admitted. “I’m Ned
Stark’s bastard. My brother Robb is the King in the North.
Why are you here?”
“The fat one, that Sam, he said to see you. He give me his
cloak, so no one would say I didn’t belong.”
“Won’t Craster be angry with you?”
“My father drank overmuch of the Lord Crow’s wine
last night. He’ll sleep most of the day.” Her breath
frosted the air in small nervous puffs. “They say the king
gives justice and protects the weak.” She started to climb
off the rock, awkwardly, but the ice had made it slippery and her
foot went out from under her. Jon caught her before she could fall,
and helped her safely down. The woman knelt on the icy ground.
“M’lord, I beg you—”
“Don’t beg me anything. Go back to your hall, you
shouldn’t be here. We were commanded not to speak to
Craster’s women.”
“You don’t have to speak with me, m’lord. Just
take me with you, when you go, that’s all I ask.” All she asks, he thought. As if that were nothing.
“I’ll . . . I’ll be your
wife, if you like. My father, he’s got nineteen now, one less
won’t hurt him none.”
“Black brothers are sworn never to take wives, don’t
you know that? And we’re guests in your father’s hall
besides.”
“Not you,” she said. “I watched. You never ate
at his board, nor slept by his fire. He never gave you guest-right,
so you’re not bound to him. It’s for the baby I have to
go.”
“I don’t even know your name.”
“Gilly, he called me. For the gillyflower.”
“That’s pretty.” He remembered Sansa telling
him once that he should say that whenever a lady told him her name.
He could not help the girl, but perhaps the courtesy would please
her. “Is it Craster who frightens you, Gilly?”
“For the baby, not for me. If it’s a girl,
that’s not so bad, she’ll grow a few years and
he’ll marry her. But Nella says it’s to be a boy, and
she’s had six and knows these things. He gives the boys to
the gods. Come the white cold, he does, and of late it comes more
often. That’s why he started giving them sheep, even though
he has a taste for mutton. Only now the sheep’s gone too.
Next it will be dogs, till . . . ” She lowered her eyes and stroked her
belly.
“What gods?” Jon was remembering that they’d
seen no boys in Craster’s Keep, nor men either, save Craster
himself.
“The cold gods,” she said. “The ones in the
night. The white shadows.”
And suddenly Jon was back in the Lord Commander’s Tower
again. A severed hand was climbing his calf and when he pried it
off with the point of his longsword, it lay writhing, fingers
opening and closing. The dead man rose to his feet, blue eyes
shining in that gashed and swollen face. Ropes of torn flesh hung
from the great wound in his belly, yet there was no blood.
“What color are their eyes?” he asked her.
“Blue. As bright as blue stars, and as cold.” She has seen them, he thought. Craster lied.
“Will you take me? Just so far as the
Wall—”
“We do not ride for the Wall. We ride north, after Mance
Rayder and these Others, these white shadows and their wights. We
seek them, Gilly. Your babe would not be safe with us.”
Her fear was plain on her face. “You will come back,
though. When your warring’s done, you’ll pass this way
again.”
“We may.” If any of us still live.
“That’s for the Old Bear to say, the one you call the
Lord Crow. I’m only his squire. I do not choose the road I
ride.”
“No.” He could hear the defeat in her voice.
“Sorry to be of trouble, m’lord. I
only . . . they said the king keeps people
safe, and I thought . . . ” Despairing,
she ran, Sam’s cloak flapping behind her like great black
wings.
Jon watched her go, his joy in the morning’s brittle
beauty gone. Damn her, he thought resentfully, and damn Sam twice
for sending her to me. What did he think I could do for her?
We’re here to fight wildlings, not save them.
Other men were crawling from their shelters, yawning and
stretching. The magic was already faded, icy brightness turning
back to common dew in the light of the rising sun. Someone had
gotten a fire started; he could smell woodsmoke drifting through
the trees, and the smoky scent of bacon. Jon took down his cloak
and snapped it against the rock, shattering the thin crust of ice
that had formed in the night, then gathered up Longclaw and
shrugged an arm through a shoulder strap. A few yards away he made
water into a frozen bush, his piss steaming in the cold air and
melting the ice wherever it fell. Afterward he laced up his black
wool breeches and followed the smells.
Grenn and Dywen were among the brothers who had gathered round
the fire. Hake handed Jon a hollow heel of bread filled with burnt
bacon and chunks of salt fish warmed in bacon grease. He wolfed it
down while listening to Dywen boast of having three of
Craster’s women during the night.
“You did not,” Grenn said, scowling. “I would
have seen.”
Dywen whapped him up alongside his ear with the back of his
hand. “You? Seen? You’re blind as Maester Aemon. You
never even saw that bear.”
“What bear? Was there a bear?”
“There’s always a bear,” declared Dolorous Edd
in his usual tone of gloomy resignation. “One killed my
brother when I was young. Afterward it wore his teeth around its
neck on a leather thong. And they were good teeth too, better than
mine. I’ve had nothing but trouble with my teeth.”
“Did Sam sleep in the hall last night?” Jon asked
him.
“I’d not call it sleeping. The ground was hard, the
rushes ill-smelling, and my brothers snore frightfully. Speak of
bears if you will, none ever growled so fierce as Brown Bernarr. I
was warm, though. Some dogs crawled atop me during the night. My
cloak was almost dry when one of them pissed in it. Or perhaps it
was Brown Bernarr. Have you noticed that the rain stopped the
instant I had a roof above me? It will start again now that
I’m back out. Gods and dogs alike delight to piss on
me.”
“I’d best go see to Lord Mormont,” said
Jon.
The rain might have stopped, but the compound was still a morass
of shallow lakes and slippery mud. Black brothers were folding
their tents, feeding their horses, and chewing on strips of salt
beef. Jarman Buckwell’s scouts were tightening the girths on
their saddles before setting out. “Jon,” Buckwell
greeted him from horseback. “Keep a good edge on that bastard
sword of yours. We’ll be needing it soon enough.”
Craster’s hall was dim after daylight. Inside, the
night’s torches had burned low, and it was hard to know that
the sun had risen. Lord Mormont’s raven was the first to spy
him enter. Three lazy flaps of its great black wings, and it
perched atop Longclaw’s hilt. “Corn?” It nipped
at a strand of Jon’s hair.
“Ignore that wretched beggar bird, Jon, it’s just
had half my bacon.” The Old Bear sat at Craster’s
board, breaking his fast with the other officers on fried bread,
bacon, and sheepgut sausage. Craster’s new axe was on the
table, its gold inlay gleaming faintly in the torchlight. Its owner
was sprawled unconscious in the sleeping loft above, but the women
were all up, moving about and serving. “What sort of day do
we have?”
“Cold, but the rain has stopped.”
“Very good. See that my horse is saddled and ready. I mean
for us to ride within the hour. Have you eaten? Craster serves
plain fare, but filling.” I will not eat Craster’s food, he decided suddenly.
“I broke my fast with the men, my lord.” Jon shooed the
raven off Longclaw. The bird hopped back to Mormont’s
shoulder, where it promptly shat. “You might have done that
on Snow instead of saving it for me,” the Old Bear grumbled.
The raven quorked.
He found Sam behind the hall, standing with Gilly at the broken
rabbit hutch. She was helping him back into his cloak, but when she
saw Jon she stole away. Sam gave him a look of wounded reproach.
“I thought you would help her.”
“And how was I to do that?” Jon said sharply.
“Take her with us, wrapped up in your cloak? We were
commanded not to—”
“I know,” said Sam guiltily, “but she was
afraid. I know what it is to be afraid. I told
her . . . ” He swallowed.
“What? That we’d take her with us?”
Sam’s fat face blushed a deep red. “On the way
home.” He could not meet Jon’s eyes. “She’s
going to have a baby.”
“Sam, have you taken leave of all your sense? We may not
even return this way. And if we do, do you think the Old Bear is
going to let you pack off one of Craster’s wives?”
“I thought . . . maybe by then I could
think of a way . . . ”
“I have no time for this, I have horses to groom and
saddle.” Jon walked away as confused as he was angry.
Sam’s heart was a big as the rest of him, but for all his
reading he could be as thick as Grenn at times. It was impossible,
and dishonorable besides. So why do I feel so ashamed?
Jon took his accustomed position at Mormont’s side as the
Night’s Watch streamed out past the skulls on Craster’s
gate. They struck off north and west along a crooked game trail.
Melting ice dripped down all about them, a slower sort of rain with
its own soft music. North of the compound, the brook was in full
spate, choked with leaves and bits of wood, but the scouts had
found where the ford lay and the column was able to splash across.
The water ran as high as a horse’s belly. Ghost swam,
emerging on the bank with his white fur dripping brown. When he
shook, spraying mud and water in all directions, Mormont said
nothing, but on his shoulder the raven screeched.
“My lord,” Jon said quietly as the wood closed in
around them once more. “Craster has no sheep. Nor any
sons.”
Mormont made no answer.
“At Winterfell one of the serving women told us
stories,” Jon went on. “She used to say that there were
wildlings who would lay with the Others to birth half-human
children.”
“Hearth tales. Does Craster seem less than human to
you?” In half a hundred ways. “He gives his sons to the
wood.”
A long silence. Then: “Yes.” And “Yes,”
the raven muttered, strutting. “Yes, yes, yes.”
“You knew?”
“Smallwood told me. Long ago. All the rangers know, though
few will talk of it.”
“Did my uncle know?”
“All the rangers,” Mormont repeated. “You
think I ought to stop him. Kill him if need be.” The Old Bear
sighed. “Were it only that he wished to rid himself of some
mouths, I’d gladly send Yoren or Conwys to collect the boys.
We could raise them to the black and the Watch would be that much
the stronger. But the wildlings serve crueler gods than you or I.
These boys are Craster’s offerings. His prayers, if you
will.” His wives must offer different prayers, Jon thought.
“How is it you came to know this?” the Old Bear
asked him. “From one of Craster’s wives?”
“Yes, my lord,” Jon confessed. “I would sooner
not tell you which. She was frightened and wanted help.”
“The wide world is full of people wanting help, Jon. Would
that some could find the courage to help themselves. Craster
sprawls in his loft even now, stinking of wine and lost to sense.
On his board below lies a sharp new axe. Were it me, I’d name it
‘Answered Prayer’ and make an end.” Yes. Jon thought of Gilly. She and her sisters. They were
nineteen, and Craster was one, but . . .
“Yet it would be an ill day for us if Craster died. Your
uncle could tell you of the times Craster’s Keep made the
difference between life and death for our rangers.”
“My father . . . ” He
hesitated.
“Go on, Jon. Say what you would say.”
“My father once told me that some men are not worth
having,” Jon finished. “A bannerman who is brutal or
unjust dishonors his liege lord as well as himself.”
“Craster is his own man. He has sworn us no vows. Nor is
he subject to our laws. Your heart is noble, Jon, but learn a
lesson here. We cannot set the world to rights. That is not our
purpose. The Night’s Watch has other wars to
fight.” Other wars. Yes. I must remember. “Jarman Buckwell said I
might have need of my sword soon.”
“Did he?” Mormont did not seem pleased.
“Craster said much and more last night, and confirmed enough
of my fears to condemn me to a sleepless night on his floor. Mance
Rayder is gathering his people together in the Frostfangs.
That’s why the villages are empty. It is the same tale that
Ser Denys Mallister had from the wildling his men captured in the
Gorge, but Craster has added the where, and that makes all the
difference.”
“Is he making a city, or an army?”
“Now, that is the question. How many wildlings are there?
How many men of fighting age? No one knows with certainty. The
Frostfangs are cruel, inhospitable, a wilderness of stone and ice.
They will not long sustain any great number of people. I can see
only one purpose in this gathering. Mance Rayder means to strike
south, into the Seven Kingdoms.”
“Wildlings have invaded the realm before.” Jon had
heard the tales from Old Nan and Maester Luwin both, back at
Winterfell. “Raymun Redbeard led them south in the time of my
grandfather’s grandfather, and before him there was a king
named Bael the Bard.”
“Aye, and long before them came the Horned Lord and the
brother kings Gendel and Gorne, and in ancient days Joramun, who
blew the Horn of Winter and woke giants from the earth. Each man of
them broke his strength on the Wall, or was broken by the power of
Winterfell on the far side . . . but the
Night’s Watch is only a shadow of what we were, and who
remains to oppose the wildlings besides us? The Lord of Winterfell
is dead, and his heir has marched his strength south to fight the
Lannisters. The wildlings may never again have such a chance as
this. I knew Mance Rayder, Jon. He is an oathbreaker,
yes . . . but he has eyes to see, and no man
has ever dared to name him faintheart.”
“What will we do?” asked Jon.
“Find him,” said Mormont. “Fight him. Stop
him.” Three hundred, thought Jon, against the fury of the wild. His
fingers opened and closed.
A blowing rain lashed at Jon’s face as he spurred his
horse across the swollen stream. Beside him, Lord Commander Mormont
gave the hood of his cloak a tug, muttering curses on the weather.
His raven sat on his shoulder, feathers ruffled, as soaked and
grumpy as the Old Bear himself. A gust of wind sent wet leaves
flapping round them like a flock of dead birds. The haunted forest,
Jon thought ruefully. The drowned forest, more like it.
He hoped Sam was holding up, back down the column. He was not a
good rider even in fair weather, and six days of rain had made the
ground treacherous, all soft mud and hidden rocks. When the wind
blew, it drove the water right into their eyes. The Wall would be
flowing off to the south, the melting ice mingling with warm rain
to wash down in sheets and rivers. Pyp and Toad would be sitting
near the fire in the common room, drinking cups of mulled wine
before their supper. Jon envied them. His wet wool clung to him
sodden and itching, his neck and shoulders ached fiercely from the
weight of mail and sword, and he was sick of salt cod, salt beef,
and hard cheese.
Up ahead a hunting horn sounded a quavering note, half drowned
beneath the constant patter of the rain. “Buckwell’s
horn,” the Old Bear announced. “The gods are good;
Craster’s still there.” His raven gave a single flap of
his big wings, croaked “Corn,” and ruffled his feathers
up again.
Jon had often heard the black brothers tell tales of Craster and
his keep. Now he would see it with his own eyes. After seven empty
villages, they had all come to dread finding Craster’s as
dead and desolate as the rest, but it seemed they would be spared
that. Perhaps the Old Bear will finally get some answers, he
thought. Anyway, we’ll be out of the rain.
Thoren Smallwood swore that Craster was a friend to the Watch,
despite his unsavory reputation. “The man’s half-mad, I
won’t deny it,” he’d told the Old Bear,
“but you’d be the same if you’d spent your life
in this cursed wood. Even so, he’s never turned a ranger away
from his fire, nor does he love Mance Rayder. He’ll give us
good counsel.” So long as he gives us a hot meal and a chance to dry our
clothes, I’ll be happy. Dywen said Craster was a kinslayer,
liar, raper, and craven, and hinted that he trafficked with slavers
and demons. “And worse,” the old forester would add,
clacking his wooden teeth. “There’s a cold smell to
that one, there is.”
“Jon,” Lord Mormont commanded, “ride back
along the column and spread the word. And remind the officers that
I want no trouble about Craster’s wives. The men are to mind
their hands and speak to these women as little as need
be.”
“Aye, my lord.” Jon turned his horse back the way
they’d come. It was pleasant to have the rain out of his
face, if only for a little while. Everyone he passed seemed to be
weeping. The march was strung out through half a mile of woods.
In
the midst of the baggage train, Jon passed Samwell Tarly, slumped
in his saddle under a wide floppy hat. He was riding one dray horse
and leading the others. The drumming of the rain against the hoods
of their cages had the ravens squawking and fluttering. “You
put a fox in with them?” Jon called out.
Water ran off the brim of Sam’s hat as he lifted his head.
“Oh, hullo, Jon. No, they just hate the rain, the same as
us.”
“How are you faring, Sam?”
“Wetly.” The fat boy managed a smile. “Nothing
has killed me yet, though.”
“Good. Craster’s Keep is just ahead. If the gods are
good, he’ll let us sleep by his fire.”
Sam looked dubious. “Dolorous Edd says Craster’s a
terrible savage. He marries his daughters and obeys no laws but
those he makes himself. And Dywen told Grenn he’s got black
blood in his veins. His mother was a wildling woman who lay with a
ranger, so he’s a bas . . . ” Suddenly he realized what he was about
to say.
“A bastard,” Jon said with a laugh. “You can
say it, Sam. I’ve heard the word before.” He put the
spurs to his surefooted little garron. “I need to hunt down
Ser Ottyn. Be careful around Craster’s women.” As
if Samwell Tarly needed warning on that score. “We’ll
talk later, after we’ve made camp.”
Jon carried the word back to Ser Ottyn Wythers, plodding along
with the rear guard. A small prune-faced man of an age with
Mormont, Ser Ottyn always looked tired, even at Castle Black, and
the rain had beaten him down unmercifully. “Welcome
tidings,” he said. “This wet has soaked my bones, and
even my saddle sores complain of saddle sores.”
On his way back, Jon swung wide of the column’s line of
march and took a shorter path through the thick of the wood. The
sounds of man and horse diminished, swallowed up by the wet green
wild, and soon enough he could hear only the steady wash of rain
against leaf and tree and rock. It was midafternoon, yet the forest
seemed as dark as dusk. Jon wove a path between rocks and puddles,
past great oaks, grey-green sentinels, and black-barked ironwoods.
In places the branches wove a canopy overhead and he was given a
moment’s respite from the drumming of the rain against his
head. As he rode past a lightning-blasted chestnut tree overgrown
with wild white roses, he heard something rustling in the
underbrush. “Ghost,” he called out. “Ghost, to
me.”
But it was Dywen who emerged from the greenery, forking a shaggy
grey garron with Grenn ahorse beside him. The Old Bear had deployed
outriders to either side of the main column, to screen their march
and warn of the approach of any enemies, and even there he took no
chances, sending the men out in pairs.
“Ah, it’s you, Lord Snow.” Dywen smiled an
oaken smile; his teeth were carved of wood, and fit badly.
“Thought me and the boy had us one o’ them Others to
deal with. Lose your wolf?”
“He’s off hunting.” Ghost did not like to
travel with the column, but he would not be far. When they made
camp for the night, he’d find his way to Jon at the Lord
Commander’s tent.
“Fishing, I’d call it, in this wet,” Dywen
said.
“My mother always said rain was good for growing
crops,” Grenn put in hopefully.
“Aye, a good crop of mildew,” Dywen said. “The
best thing about a rain like this, it saves a man from taking
baths.” He made a clacking sound on his wooden teeth.
“Buckwell’s found Craster,” Jon told them.
“Had he lost him?” Dywen chuckled. “See that
you young bucks don’t go nosing about Craster’s wives,
you hear?”
Jon smiled. “Want them all for yourself, Dywen?”
Dywen clacked his teeth some more. “Might be I do.
Craster’s got ten fingers and one cock, so he don’t
count but to eleven. He’d never miss a couple.”
“How many wives does he have, truly?” Grenn
asked.
“More’n you ever will, brother. Well, it’s not
so hard when you breed your own. There’s your beast,
Snow.”
Ghost was trotting along beside Jon’s horse with tail held
high, his white fur ruffed up thick against the rain. He moved so
silently Jon could not have said just when he appeared.
Grenn’s mount shied at the scent of him; even now, after more
than a year, the horses were uneasy in the presence of the
direwolf. “With me, Ghost.” Jon spurred off to
Craster’s Keep.
He had never thought to find a stone castle on the far side of
the Wall, but he had pictured some sort of motte-and-bailey with a
wooden palisade and a timber tower keep. What they found instead
was a midden heap, a pigsty, an empty sheepfold, and a windowless
daub-and-wattle hall scarce worthy of the name. It was long and
low, chinked together from logs and roofed with sod. The compound
stood atop a rise too modest to name a hill, surrounded by an
earthen dike. Brown rivulets flowed down the slope where the rain
had eaten gaping holes in the defenses, to join a rushing brook
that curved around to the north, its thick waters turned into a
murky torrent by the rains.
On the southwest, he found an open gate flanked by a pair of
animal skulls on high poles: a bear to one side, a ram to the
other. Bits of flesh still clung to the bear skull, Jon noted as he
joined the line riding past. Within, Jarmen Buckwell’s scouts
and men from Thoren Smallwood’s van were setting up horse
lines and struggling to raise tents. A host of piglets rooted about
three huge sows in the sty. Nearby, a small girl pulled carrots
from a garden, naked in the rain, while two women tied a pig for
slaughter. The animal’s squeals were high and horrible,
almost human in their distress. Chett’s hounds barked wildly
in answer, snarling and snapping despite his curses, with a pair of
Craster’s dogs barking back. When they saw Ghost, some of the
dogs broke off and ran, while others began to bay and growl. The
direwolf ignored them, as did Jon. Well, thirty of us will be warm and dry, Jon thought once
he’d gotten a good look at the hall. Perhaps as many as
fifty. The place was much too small to sleep two hundred men, so
most would need to remain outside. And where to put them? The rain
had turned half the compound yard to ankle-deep puddles and the
rest to sucking mud. Another dismal night was in prospect.
The Lord Commander had entrusted his mount to Dolorous Edd. He
was cleaning mud out of the horse’s hooves as Jon dismounted.
“Lord Mormont’s in the hall,” he announced.
“He said for you to join him. Best leave the wolf outside, he
looks hungry enough to eat one of Craster’s children. Well,
truth be told, I’m hungry enough to eat one of
Craster’s children, so long as he was served hot. Go on,
I’ll see to your horse. If it’s warm and dry inside,
don’t tell me, I wasn’t asked in.” He flicked a
glob of wet mud out from under a horseshoe. “Does this mud
look like shit to you? Could it be that this whole hill is made of
Craster’s shit?”
Jon smiled. “Well, I hear he’s been here a long
time.”
“You cheer me not. Go see the Old Bear.”
“Ghost, stay,” he commanded. The door to
Craster’s Keep was made of two flaps of deerhide. Jon shoved
between them, stooping to pass under the low lintel. Two dozen of
the chief rangers had preceded him, and were standing around the
firepit in the center of the dirt floor while puddles collected
about their boots. The hall stank of soot, dung, and wet dog. The
air was heavy with smoke, yet somehow still damp. Rain leaked
through the smoke hole in the roof. It was all a single room, with
a sleeping loft above reached by a pair of splintery ladders.
Jon remembered how he’d felt the day they had left the
Wall: nervous as a maiden, but eager to glimpse the mysteries and
wonders beyond each new horizon. Well, here’s one of the
wonders, he told himself, gazing about the squalid, foul-smelling
hall. The acrid smoke was making his eyes water. A pity that Pyp
and Toad can’t see all they’re missing.
Craster sat above the fire, the only man to enjoy his own chair.
Even Lord Commander Mormont must seat himself on the common bench,
with his raven muttering on his shoulder. Jarman Buckwell stood
behind, dripping from patched mail and shiny wet leather, beside
Thoren Smallwood in the late Ser Jaremy’s heavy breastplate
and sable-trimmed cloak.
Craster’s sheepskin jerkin and cloak of sewn skins made a
shabby contrast, but around one thick wrist was a heavy ring that
had the glint of gold. He looked to be a powerful man, though well
into the winter of his days now, his mane of hair grey going to
white. A flat nose and a drooping mouth gave him a cruel look, and
one of his ears was missing. So this is a wildling. Jon remembered
Old Nan’s tales of the savage folk who drank blood from human
skulls. Craster seemed to be drinking a thin yellow beer from a
chipped stone cup. Perhaps he had not heard the stories.
“I’ve not seen Benjen Stark for three years,”
he was telling Mormont. “And if truth be told, I never once
missed him.” A half-dozen black puppies and the odd pig or
two skulked among the benches, while women in ragged deerskins
passed horns of beer, stirred the fire, and chopped carrots and
onions into a kettle.
“He ought to have passed here last year,” said
Thoren Smallwood. A dog came sniffing round his leg. He kicked it
and sent it off yipping.
Lord Mormont said, “Ben was searching for Ser Waymar
Royce, who’d vanished with Gared and young Will.”
“Aye, those three I recall. The lordling no older than one
of these pups. Too proud to sleep under my roof, him in his sable
cloak and black steel. My wives give him big cow eyes all the
same.” He turned his squint on the nearest of the women.
“Gared says they were chasing raiders. I told him, with a
commander that green, best not catch ’em. Gared wasn’t
half-bad, for a crow. Had less ears than me, that one. The
’bite took ’em, same as mine.” Craster laughed.
“Now I hear he got no head neither. The ’bite do that
too?”
Jon remembered a spray of red blood on white snow, and the way
Theon Greyjoy had kicked the dead man’s head. The man was a
deserter. On the way back to Winterfell, Jon and Robb had raced,
and found six direwolf pups in the snow. A thousand years ago.
“When Ser Waymar left you, where was he bound?”
Craster gave a shrug. “Happens I have better things to do
than tend to the comings and goings of crows.” He drank a
pull of beer and set the cup aside. “Had no good southron
wine up here for a bear’s night. I could use me some wine,
and a new axe. Mine’s lost its bite, can’t have that, I
got me women to protect.” He gazed around at his scurrying
wives.
“You are few here, and isolated,” Mormont said.
“If you like, I’ll detail some men to escort you south
to the Wall.”
The raven seemed to like the notion. “Wall,” it
screamed, spreading black wings like a high collar behind
Mormont’s head.
Their host gave a nasty smile, showing a mouthful of broken
brown teeth. “And what would we do there, serve you at
supper? We’re free folk here. Craster serves no
man.”
“These are bad times to dwell alone in the wild. The cold
winds are rising.”
“Let them rise. My roots are sunk deep.” Craster
grabbed a passing woman by the wrist. “Tell him, wife. Tell
the Lord Crow how well content we are.”
The woman licked at thin lips. “This is our place. Craster
keeps us safe. Better to die free than live a slave.”
“Slave,” muttered the raven.
Mormont leaned forward. “Every village we have passed has
been abandoned. Yours are the first living faces we’ve seen
since we left the Wall. The people are
gone . . . whether dead, fled, or taken, I
could not say. The animals as well. Nothing is left. And earlier,
we found the bodies of two of Ben Stark’s rangers only a few
leagues from the Wall. They were pale and cold, with black hands
and black feet and wounds that did not bleed. Yet when we took them
back to Castle Black they rose in the night and killed. One slew
Ser Jaremy Rykker and the other came for me, which tells me that
they remember some of what they knew when they lived, but there was
no human mercy left in them.”
The woman’s mouth hung open, a wet pink cave, but Craster
only gave a snort. “We’ve had no such troubles
here . . . and I’ll thank you not to tell
such evil tales under my roof. I’m a godly man, and the gods
keep me safe. If wights come walking, I’ll know how to send
them back to their graves. Though I could use me a sharp new
axe.” He sent his wife scurrying with a slap on her leg and a
shout of “More beer, and be quick about it.”
“No trouble from the dead,” Jarmen Buckwell said,
“but what of the living, my lord? What of your
king?”
“King!” cried Mormont’s raven. “King,
king, king.”
“That Mance Rayder?” Craster spit into the fire.
“King-beyond-the-Wall. What do free folk want with
kings?” He turned his squint on Mormont. “There’s
much I could tell you o’ Rayder and his doings, if I had a
mind. This o’ the empty villages, that’s his work. You
would have found this hall abandoned as well, if I were a man to
scrape to such. He sends a rider, tells me I must leave my own keep
to come grovel at his feet. I sent the man back, but kept his
tongue. It’s nailed to that wall there.” He pointed.
“Might be that I could tell you where to seek Mance Rayder.
If I had a mind.” The brown smile again. “But
we’ll have time enough for that. You’ll be wanting to
sleep beneath my roof, belike, and eat me out of pigs.”
“A roof would be most welcome, my lord,” Mormont
said. “We’ve had hard riding, and too much
wet.”
“Then you’ll guest here for a night. No longer,
I’m not that fond o’ crows. The loft’s for me and
mine, but you’ll have all the floor you like. I’ve meat
and beer for twenty, no more. The rest o’ your black crows
can peck after their own corn.”
“We’ve packed in our own supplies, my lord,”
said the Old Bear. “We should be pleased to share our food
and wine.”
Craster wiped his drooping mouth with the back of a hairy hand.
“I’ll taste your wine, Lord Crow, that I will. One more
thing. Any man lays a hand on my wives, he loses the
hand.”
“Your roof, your rule,” said Thoren Smallwood, and
Lord Mormont nodded stiffly, though he looked none too pleased.
“That’s settled, then.” Craster grudged them a
grunt. “D’ya have a man can draw a map?”
“Sam Tarly can.” Jon pushed forward. “Sam
loves maps.”
Mormont beckoned him closer. “Send him here after
he’s eaten. Have him bring quill and parchment. And find
Tollett as well. Tell him to bring my axe. A guest gift for our
host.”
“Who’s this one now?” Craster said before Jon
could go. “He has the look of a Stark.”
“My steward and squire, Jon Snow.”
“A bastard, is it?” Craster looked Jon up and down.
“Man wants to bed a woman, seems like he ought to take her to
wife. That’s what I do.” He shooed Jon off with a wave.
“Well, run and do your service, bastard, and see that axe is
good and sharp now, I’ve no use for dull steel.”
Jon Snow bowed stiffly and took his leave. Ser Ottyn Wythers was
coming in as he was leaving, and they almost collided at the
deerhide door. Outside, the rain seemed to have slackened. Tents
had gone up all over the compound. Jon could see the tops of others
under the trees.
Dolorous Edd was feeding the horses. “Give the wildling an
axe, why not?” He pointed out Mormont’s weapon, a
short-hafted battle-axe with gold scrollwork inlaid on the black
steel blade. “He’ll give it back, I vow. Buried in the
Old Bear’s skull, like as not. Why not give him all our axes,
and our swords as well? I mislike the way they clank and rattle as
we ride. We’d travel faster without them, straight to
hell’s door. Does it rain in hell, I wonder? Perhaps Craster
would like a nice hat instead.”
Jon smiled. “He wants an axe. And wine as well.”
“See, the Old Bear’s clever. If we get the wildling
well and truly drunk, perhaps he’ll only cut off an ear when
he tries to slay us with that axe. I have two ears but only one
head.”
“Smallwood says Craster is a friend to the
Watch.”
“Do you know the difference between a wildling who’s
a friend to the Watch and one who’s not?” asked the
dour squire. “Our enemies leave our bodies for the crows and
the wolves. Our friends bury us in secret graves. I wonder how long
that bear’s been nailed up on that gate, and what Craster had
there before we came hallooing?” Edd looked at the axe
doubtfully, the rain running down his long face. “Is it dry
in there?”
“Drier than out here.”
“If I lurk about after, not too close to the fire, belike
they’ll take no note of me till morn. The ones under his roof
will be the first he murders, but at least we’ll die
dry.”
Jon had to laugh. “Craster’s one man. We’re
two hundred. I doubt he’ll murder anyone.”
“You cheer me,” said Edd, sounding utterly morose.
“And besides, there’s much to be said for a good sharp
axe. I’d hate to be murdered with a maul. I saw a man hit in
the brow with a maul once. Scarce split the skin at all, but his
head turned mushy and swelled up big as a gourd, only purply-red. A
comely man, but he died ugly. It’s good that we’re not
giving them mauls.” Edd walked away shaking his head, his
sodden black cloak shedding rain behind him.
Jon got the horses fed before he stopped to think of his own
supper. He was wondering where to find Sam when he heard a shout of
fear. “Wolf!” He sprinted around the hall toward the
cry, the earth sucking at his boots. One of Craster’s women
was backed up against the mud-spattered wall of the keep.
“Keep away,” she was shouting at Ghost. “You keep
away!” The direwolf had a rabbit in his mouth and another
dead and bloody on the ground before him. “Get it away,
m’lord,” she pleaded when she saw him.
“He won’t hurt you.” He knew at once what had
happened; a wooden hutch, its slats shattered, lay on its side in
the wet grass. “He must have been hungry. We haven’t
seen much game.” Jon whistled. The direwolf bolted down the
rabbit, crunching the small bones between his teeth, and padded
over to him.
The woman regarded them with nervous eyes. She was younger than
he’d thought at first. A girl of fifteen or sixteen years, he
judged, dark hair plastered across a gaunt face by the falling
rain, her bare feet muddy to the ankles. The body under the sewn
skins was showing in the early turns of pregnancy. “Are you
one of Craster’s daughters?” he asked.
She put a hand over her belly. “Wife now.” Edging
away from the wolf, she knelt mournfully beside the broken hutch.
“I was going to breed them rabbits. There’s no sheep
left.”
“The Watch will make good for them.” Jon had no coin
of his own, or he would have offered it to
her . . . though he was not sure what good a
few coppers or even a silver piece would do her beyond the Wall.
“I’ll speak to Lord Mormont on the morrow.”
She wiped her hands on her skirt.
“M’lord—”
“I’m no lord.”
But others had come crowding round, drawn by the woman’s
scream and the crash of the rabbit hutch. “Don’t you
believe him, girl,” called out Lark the Sisterman, a ranger
mean as a cur. “That’s Lord Snow himself.”
“Bastard of Winterfell and brother to kings,” mocked
Chett, who’d left his hounds to see what the commotion was
about.
“That wolf’s looking at you hungry, girl,”
Lark said. “Might be it fancies that tender bit in your
belly.”
Jon was not amused. “You’re scaring her.”
“Warning her, more like.” Chett’s grin was as
ugly as the boils that covered most of his face.
“We’re not to talk to you,” the girl
remembered suddenly.
“Wait,” Jon said, too late. She bolted, ran.
Lark made a grab for the second rabbit, but Ghost was quicker.
When he bared his teeth, the Sisterman slipped in the mud and went
down on his bony butt. The others laughed. The direwolf took the
rabbit in his mouth and brought it to Jon.
“There was no call to scare the girl,” he told
them.
“We’ll hear no scolds from you, bastard.”
Chett blamed Jon for the loss of his comfortable position with
Maester Aemon, and not without justice. If he had not gone to Aemon
about Sam Tarly, Chett would still be tending an old blind man
instead of a pack of ill-tempered hunting hounds. “You may be
the Lord Commander’s pet, but you’re not the Lord
Commander . . . and you wouldn’t talk so
bloody bold without that monster of yours always about.”
“I’ll not fight a brother while we’re beyond
the Wall,” Jon answered, his voice cooler than he felt.
Lark got to one knee. “He’s afraid of you, Chett. On
the Sisters, we have a name for them like him.”
“I know all the names. Save your breath.” He walked
away, Ghost at his side. The rain had dwindled to a thin drizzle by
the time he reached the gate. Dusk would be on them soon, followed
by another wet dark dismal night. The clouds would hide moon and
stars and Mormont’s Torch, turning the woods black as pitch.
Every piss would be an adventure, if not quite of the sort Jon Snow
had once envisioned.
Out under the trees, some rangers had found enough duff and dry
wood to start a fire beneath a slanting ridge of slate. Others had
raised tents or made rude shelters by stretching their cloaks over
low branches. Giant had crammed himself inside the hollow of a dead
oak. “How d’ye like my castle, Lord Snow?”
“It looks snug. You know where Sam is?”
“Keep on the way you were. If you come on Ser
Ottyn’s pavilion, you’ve gone too far.” Giant
smiled. “Unless Sam’s found him a tree too. What a tree
that would be.”
It was Ghost who found Sam in the end. The direwolf shot ahead
like a quarrel from a crossbow. Under an outcrop of rock that gave
some small degree of shelter from the rain, Sam was feeding the
ravens. His boots squished when he moved. “My feet are soaked
through,” he admitted miserably. “When I climbed off my
horse, I stepped in a hole and went in up to my knees.”
“Take off your boots and dry your stockings. I’ll
find some dry wood. If the ground’s not wet under the rock,
we might be able to get a fire burning.” Jon showed Sam the
rabbit. “And we’ll feast.”
“Won’t you be attending Lord Mormont in the
hall?”
“No, but you will. The Old Bear wants you to map for him.
Craster says he’ll find Mance Rayder for us.”
“Oh.” Sam did not look anxious to meet Craster, even
if it meant a warm fire.
“He said eat first, though. Dry your feet.” Jon went
to gather fuel, digging down under deadfalls for the drier wood
beneath and peeling back layers of sodden pine needles until he
found likely kindling. Even then, it seemed to take forever for a
spark to catch. He hung his cloak from the rock to keep the rain
off his smoky little fire, making them a small snug alcove.
As he knelt to skin the rabbit, Sam pulled off his boots.
“I think there’s moss growing between my toes,”
he declared mournfully, wriggling the toes in question. “The
rabbit will taste good. I don’t even mind about the blood and
all.” He looked away. “Well, only a
little . . . ”
Jon spitted the carcass, banked the fire with a pair of rocks,
and balanced their meal atop them. The rabbit had been a scrawny
thing, but as it cooked it smelled like a king’s feast. Other
rangers gave them envious looks. Even Ghost looked up hungrily,
flames shining in his red eyes as he sniffed. “You had yours
before,” Jon reminded him.
“Is Craster as savage as the rangers say?” Sam
asked. The rabbit was a shade underdone, but tasted wonderful.
“What’s his castle like?”
“A midden heap with a roof and a firepit.” Jon told
Sam what he had seen and heard in Craster’s Keep.
By the time the telling was done, it was dark outside and Sam
was licking his fingers. “That was good, but now I’d
like a leg of lamb. A whole leg, just for me, sauced with mint and
honey and cloves. Did you see any lambs?”
“There was a sheepfold, but no sheep.”
“How does he feed all his men?”
“I didn’t see any men. Just Craster and his women
and a few small girls. I wonder he’s able to hold the place.
His defenses were nothing to speak of, only a muddy dike. You had
better go up to the hall and draw that map. Can you find the
way?”
“If I don’t fall in the mud.” Sam struggled
back into his boots, collected quill and parchment, and shouldered
out into the night, the rain pattering down on his cloak and floppy
hat.
Ghost laid his head on his paws and went to sleep by the fire.
Jon stretched out beside him, grateful for the warmth. He was cold
and wet, but not so cold and wet as he’d been a short time
before. Perhaps tonight the Old Bear will learn something that will
lead us to Uncle Benjen.
He woke to the sight of his own breath misting in the cold
morning air. When he moved, his bones ached. Ghost was gone, the
fire burnt out. Jon reached to pull aside the cloak he’d hung
over the rock, and found it stiff and frozen. He crept beneath it
and stood up in a forest turned to crystal.
The pale pink light of dawn sparkled on branch and leaf and
stone. Every blade of grass was carved from emerald, every drip of
water turned to diamond. Flowers and mushrooms alike wore coats of
glass. Even the mud puddles had a bright brown sheen. Through the
shimmering greenery, the black tents of his brothers were encased
in a fine glaze of ice. So there is magic beyond the Wall after all. He found himself
thinking of his sisters, perhaps because he’d dreamed of them
last night. Sansa would call this an enchantment, and tears would
fill her eyes at the wonder of it, but Arya would run out laughing
and shouting, wanting to touch it all.
“Lord Snow?” he heard. Soft and meek. He turned.
Crouched atop the rock that had sheltered him during the night
was the rabbit keeper, wrapped in a black cloak so large it drowned
her. Sam’s cloak, Jon realized at once. Why is she wearing
Sam’s cloak? “The fat one told me I’d find you
here, m’lord,” she said.
“We ate the rabbit, if that’s what you came
for.” The admission made him feel absurdly guilty.
“Old Lord Crow, him with the talking bird, he gave Craster
a crossbow worth a hundred rabbits.” Her arms closed over the
swell of her belly. “Is it true, m’lord? Are you
brother to a king?”
“A half brother,” he admitted. “I’m Ned
Stark’s bastard. My brother Robb is the King in the North.
Why are you here?”
“The fat one, that Sam, he said to see you. He give me his
cloak, so no one would say I didn’t belong.”
“Won’t Craster be angry with you?”
“My father drank overmuch of the Lord Crow’s wine
last night. He’ll sleep most of the day.” Her breath
frosted the air in small nervous puffs. “They say the king
gives justice and protects the weak.” She started to climb
off the rock, awkwardly, but the ice had made it slippery and her
foot went out from under her. Jon caught her before she could fall,
and helped her safely down. The woman knelt on the icy ground.
“M’lord, I beg you—”
“Don’t beg me anything. Go back to your hall, you
shouldn’t be here. We were commanded not to speak to
Craster’s women.”
“You don’t have to speak with me, m’lord. Just
take me with you, when you go, that’s all I ask.” All she asks, he thought. As if that were nothing.
“I’ll . . . I’ll be your
wife, if you like. My father, he’s got nineteen now, one less
won’t hurt him none.”
“Black brothers are sworn never to take wives, don’t
you know that? And we’re guests in your father’s hall
besides.”
“Not you,” she said. “I watched. You never ate
at his board, nor slept by his fire. He never gave you guest-right,
so you’re not bound to him. It’s for the baby I have to
go.”
“I don’t even know your name.”
“Gilly, he called me. For the gillyflower.”
“That’s pretty.” He remembered Sansa telling
him once that he should say that whenever a lady told him her name.
He could not help the girl, but perhaps the courtesy would please
her. “Is it Craster who frightens you, Gilly?”
“For the baby, not for me. If it’s a girl,
that’s not so bad, she’ll grow a few years and
he’ll marry her. But Nella says it’s to be a boy, and
she’s had six and knows these things. He gives the boys to
the gods. Come the white cold, he does, and of late it comes more
often. That’s why he started giving them sheep, even though
he has a taste for mutton. Only now the sheep’s gone too.
Next it will be dogs, till . . . ” She lowered her eyes and stroked her
belly.
“What gods?” Jon was remembering that they’d
seen no boys in Craster’s Keep, nor men either, save Craster
himself.
“The cold gods,” she said. “The ones in the
night. The white shadows.”
And suddenly Jon was back in the Lord Commander’s Tower
again. A severed hand was climbing his calf and when he pried it
off with the point of his longsword, it lay writhing, fingers
opening and closing. The dead man rose to his feet, blue eyes
shining in that gashed and swollen face. Ropes of torn flesh hung
from the great wound in his belly, yet there was no blood.
“What color are their eyes?” he asked her.
“Blue. As bright as blue stars, and as cold.” She has seen them, he thought. Craster lied.
“Will you take me? Just so far as the
Wall—”
“We do not ride for the Wall. We ride north, after Mance
Rayder and these Others, these white shadows and their wights. We
seek them, Gilly. Your babe would not be safe with us.”
Her fear was plain on her face. “You will come back,
though. When your warring’s done, you’ll pass this way
again.”
“We may.” If any of us still live.
“That’s for the Old Bear to say, the one you call the
Lord Crow. I’m only his squire. I do not choose the road I
ride.”
“No.” He could hear the defeat in her voice.
“Sorry to be of trouble, m’lord. I
only . . . they said the king keeps people
safe, and I thought . . . ” Despairing,
she ran, Sam’s cloak flapping behind her like great black
wings.
Jon watched her go, his joy in the morning’s brittle
beauty gone. Damn her, he thought resentfully, and damn Sam twice
for sending her to me. What did he think I could do for her?
We’re here to fight wildlings, not save them.
Other men were crawling from their shelters, yawning and
stretching. The magic was already faded, icy brightness turning
back to common dew in the light of the rising sun. Someone had
gotten a fire started; he could smell woodsmoke drifting through
the trees, and the smoky scent of bacon. Jon took down his cloak
and snapped it against the rock, shattering the thin crust of ice
that had formed in the night, then gathered up Longclaw and
shrugged an arm through a shoulder strap. A few yards away he made
water into a frozen bush, his piss steaming in the cold air and
melting the ice wherever it fell. Afterward he laced up his black
wool breeches and followed the smells.
Grenn and Dywen were among the brothers who had gathered round
the fire. Hake handed Jon a hollow heel of bread filled with burnt
bacon and chunks of salt fish warmed in bacon grease. He wolfed it
down while listening to Dywen boast of having three of
Craster’s women during the night.
“You did not,” Grenn said, scowling. “I would
have seen.”
Dywen whapped him up alongside his ear with the back of his
hand. “You? Seen? You’re blind as Maester Aemon. You
never even saw that bear.”
“What bear? Was there a bear?”
“There’s always a bear,” declared Dolorous Edd
in his usual tone of gloomy resignation. “One killed my
brother when I was young. Afterward it wore his teeth around its
neck on a leather thong. And they were good teeth too, better than
mine. I’ve had nothing but trouble with my teeth.”
“Did Sam sleep in the hall last night?” Jon asked
him.
“I’d not call it sleeping. The ground was hard, the
rushes ill-smelling, and my brothers snore frightfully. Speak of
bears if you will, none ever growled so fierce as Brown Bernarr. I
was warm, though. Some dogs crawled atop me during the night. My
cloak was almost dry when one of them pissed in it. Or perhaps it
was Brown Bernarr. Have you noticed that the rain stopped the
instant I had a roof above me? It will start again now that
I’m back out. Gods and dogs alike delight to piss on
me.”
“I’d best go see to Lord Mormont,” said
Jon.
The rain might have stopped, but the compound was still a morass
of shallow lakes and slippery mud. Black brothers were folding
their tents, feeding their horses, and chewing on strips of salt
beef. Jarman Buckwell’s scouts were tightening the girths on
their saddles before setting out. “Jon,” Buckwell
greeted him from horseback. “Keep a good edge on that bastard
sword of yours. We’ll be needing it soon enough.”
Craster’s hall was dim after daylight. Inside, the
night’s torches had burned low, and it was hard to know that
the sun had risen. Lord Mormont’s raven was the first to spy
him enter. Three lazy flaps of its great black wings, and it
perched atop Longclaw’s hilt. “Corn?” It nipped
at a strand of Jon’s hair.
“Ignore that wretched beggar bird, Jon, it’s just
had half my bacon.” The Old Bear sat at Craster’s
board, breaking his fast with the other officers on fried bread,
bacon, and sheepgut sausage. Craster’s new axe was on the
table, its gold inlay gleaming faintly in the torchlight. Its owner
was sprawled unconscious in the sleeping loft above, but the women
were all up, moving about and serving. “What sort of day do
we have?”
“Cold, but the rain has stopped.”
“Very good. See that my horse is saddled and ready. I mean
for us to ride within the hour. Have you eaten? Craster serves
plain fare, but filling.” I will not eat Craster’s food, he decided suddenly.
“I broke my fast with the men, my lord.” Jon shooed the
raven off Longclaw. The bird hopped back to Mormont’s
shoulder, where it promptly shat. “You might have done that
on Snow instead of saving it for me,” the Old Bear grumbled.
The raven quorked.
He found Sam behind the hall, standing with Gilly at the broken
rabbit hutch. She was helping him back into his cloak, but when she
saw Jon she stole away. Sam gave him a look of wounded reproach.
“I thought you would help her.”
“And how was I to do that?” Jon said sharply.
“Take her with us, wrapped up in your cloak? We were
commanded not to—”
“I know,” said Sam guiltily, “but she was
afraid. I know what it is to be afraid. I told
her . . . ” He swallowed.
“What? That we’d take her with us?”
Sam’s fat face blushed a deep red. “On the way
home.” He could not meet Jon’s eyes. “She’s
going to have a baby.”
“Sam, have you taken leave of all your sense? We may not
even return this way. And if we do, do you think the Old Bear is
going to let you pack off one of Craster’s wives?”
“I thought . . . maybe by then I could
think of a way . . . ”
“I have no time for this, I have horses to groom and
saddle.” Jon walked away as confused as he was angry.
Sam’s heart was a big as the rest of him, but for all his
reading he could be as thick as Grenn at times. It was impossible,
and dishonorable besides. So why do I feel so ashamed?
Jon took his accustomed position at Mormont’s side as the
Night’s Watch streamed out past the skulls on Craster’s
gate. They struck off north and west along a crooked game trail.
Melting ice dripped down all about them, a slower sort of rain with
its own soft music. North of the compound, the brook was in full
spate, choked with leaves and bits of wood, but the scouts had
found where the ford lay and the column was able to splash across.
The water ran as high as a horse’s belly. Ghost swam,
emerging on the bank with his white fur dripping brown. When he
shook, spraying mud and water in all directions, Mormont said
nothing, but on his shoulder the raven screeched.
“My lord,” Jon said quietly as the wood closed in
around them once more. “Craster has no sheep. Nor any
sons.”
Mormont made no answer.
“At Winterfell one of the serving women told us
stories,” Jon went on. “She used to say that there were
wildlings who would lay with the Others to birth half-human
children.”
“Hearth tales. Does Craster seem less than human to
you?” In half a hundred ways. “He gives his sons to the
wood.”
A long silence. Then: “Yes.” And “Yes,”
the raven muttered, strutting. “Yes, yes, yes.”
“You knew?”
“Smallwood told me. Long ago. All the rangers know, though
few will talk of it.”
“Did my uncle know?”
“All the rangers,” Mormont repeated. “You
think I ought to stop him. Kill him if need be.” The Old Bear
sighed. “Were it only that he wished to rid himself of some
mouths, I’d gladly send Yoren or Conwys to collect the boys.
We could raise them to the black and the Watch would be that much
the stronger. But the wildlings serve crueler gods than you or I.
These boys are Craster’s offerings. His prayers, if you
will.” His wives must offer different prayers, Jon thought.
“How is it you came to know this?” the Old Bear
asked him. “From one of Craster’s wives?”
“Yes, my lord,” Jon confessed. “I would sooner
not tell you which. She was frightened and wanted help.”
“The wide world is full of people wanting help, Jon. Would
that some could find the courage to help themselves. Craster
sprawls in his loft even now, stinking of wine and lost to sense.
On his board below lies a sharp new axe. Were it me, I’d name it
‘Answered Prayer’ and make an end.” Yes. Jon thought of Gilly. She and her sisters. They were
nineteen, and Craster was one, but . . .
“Yet it would be an ill day for us if Craster died. Your
uncle could tell you of the times Craster’s Keep made the
difference between life and death for our rangers.”
“My father . . . ” He
hesitated.
“Go on, Jon. Say what you would say.”
“My father once told me that some men are not worth
having,” Jon finished. “A bannerman who is brutal or
unjust dishonors his liege lord as well as himself.”
“Craster is his own man. He has sworn us no vows. Nor is
he subject to our laws. Your heart is noble, Jon, but learn a
lesson here. We cannot set the world to rights. That is not our
purpose. The Night’s Watch has other wars to
fight.” Other wars. Yes. I must remember. “Jarman Buckwell said I
might have need of my sword soon.”
“Did he?” Mormont did not seem pleased.
“Craster said much and more last night, and confirmed enough
of my fears to condemn me to a sleepless night on his floor. Mance
Rayder is gathering his people together in the Frostfangs.
That’s why the villages are empty. It is the same tale that
Ser Denys Mallister had from the wildling his men captured in the
Gorge, but Craster has added the where, and that makes all the
difference.”
“Is he making a city, or an army?”
“Now, that is the question. How many wildlings are there?
How many men of fighting age? No one knows with certainty. The
Frostfangs are cruel, inhospitable, a wilderness of stone and ice.
They will not long sustain any great number of people. I can see
only one purpose in this gathering. Mance Rayder means to strike
south, into the Seven Kingdoms.”
“Wildlings have invaded the realm before.” Jon had
heard the tales from Old Nan and Maester Luwin both, back at
Winterfell. “Raymun Redbeard led them south in the time of my
grandfather’s grandfather, and before him there was a king
named Bael the Bard.”
“Aye, and long before them came the Horned Lord and the
brother kings Gendel and Gorne, and in ancient days Joramun, who
blew the Horn of Winter and woke giants from the earth. Each man of
them broke his strength on the Wall, or was broken by the power of
Winterfell on the far side . . . but the
Night’s Watch is only a shadow of what we were, and who
remains to oppose the wildlings besides us? The Lord of Winterfell
is dead, and his heir has marched his strength south to fight the
Lannisters. The wildlings may never again have such a chance as
this. I knew Mance Rayder, Jon. He is an oathbreaker,
yes . . . but he has eyes to see, and no man
has ever dared to name him faintheart.”
“What will we do?” asked Jon.
“Find him,” said Mormont. “Fight him. Stop
him.” Three hundred, thought Jon, against the fury of the wild. His
fingers opened and closed.