The king was angry. Sam saw that at once.
As the black brothers entered one by one and knelt before him,
Stannis shoved away his breakfast of hardbread, salt beef, and
boiled eggs, and eyed them coldly. Beside him, the red woman
Melisandre looked as if she found the scene amusing. I have no place here, Sam thought anxiously, when her red eyes
fell upon him. Someone had to help Maester Aemon up the steps.
Don’t look at me, I’m just the maester’s steward.
The others were contenders for the Old Bear’s command, all
but Bowen Marsh, who had withdrawn from the contest but remained
castellan and Lord Steward. Sam did not understand why Melisandre
should seem so interested in him.
King Stannis kept the black brothers on their knees for an
extraordinarily long time. “Rise,” he said at last. Sam
gave Maester Aemon his shoulder to help him back up.
The sound of Lord Janos Slynt clearing his throat broke the
strained silence. “Your Grace, let me say how pleased we are
to be summoned here. When I saw your banners from the Wall, I knew
the realm was saved. ‘There comes a man who neer forgets his
duty,’ I said to good Ser Alliser. ‘A strong man, and a true
king.’ May I congratulate you on your victory over the
savages? The singers will make much of it, I know—”
“The singers may do as they like,” Stannis snapped.
“Spare me your fawning, Janos, it will not serve you.”
He rose to his feet and frowned at them all. “Lady Melisandre
tells me that you have not yet chosen a Lord Commander. I am
displeased. How much longer must this folly last?”
“Sire,” said Bowen Marsh in a defensive tone,
“no one has achieved two-thirds of the vote yet. It has only
been ten days.”
“Nine days too long. I have captives to dispose of, a
realm to order, a war to fight. Choices must be made, decisions
that involve the Wall and the Night’s Watch. By rights your
Lord Commander should have a voice in those decisions.”
“He should, yes,” said Janos Slynt. “But it
must be said. We brothers are only simple soldiers. Soldiers, yes!
And Your Grace will know that soldiers are most comfortable taking
orders. They would benefit from your royal guidance, it seems to
me. For the good of the realm. To help them choose
wisely.”
The suggestion outraged some of the others. “Do you want
the king to wipe our arses for us too?” said Cotter Pyke
angrily. “The choice of a Lord Commander belongs to the Sworn
Brothers, and to them alone,” insisted Ser Denys Mallister.
“If they choose wisely they won’t be choosing
me,” moaned Dolorous Edd. Maester Aemon, calm as always,
said, “Your Grace, the Night’s Watch has been choosing
its own leader since Brandon the Builder raised the Wall. Through
Jeor Mormont we have had nine hundred and ninety-seven Lords
Commander in unbroken succession, each chosen by the men he would
lead, a tradition many thousands of years old.”
Stannis ground his teeth. “It is not my wish to tamper
with your rights and traditions. As to royal guidance, Janos, if
you mean that I ought to tell your brothers to choose you, have the
courage to say so.”
That took Lord Janos aback. He smiled uncertainly and began to
sweat, but Bowen Marsh beside him said, “Who better to
command the black cloaks than a man who once commanded the gold,
sire?”
“Any of you, I would think. Even the cook.” The look
the king gave Slynt was cold. “Janos was hardly the first
gold cloak ever to take a bribe, I grant you, but he may have been
the first commander to fatten his purse by selling places and
promotions. By the end he must have had half the officers in the
City Watch paying him part of their wages. Isn’t that so,
Janos?”
Slynt’s neck was purpling. “Lies, all lies! A strong
man makes enemies, Your Grace knows that, they whisper lies behind
your back. Naught was ever proven, not a man came
forward . . . ”
“Two men who were prepared to come forward died suddenly
on their rounds.” Stannis narrowed his eyes. “Do not
trifle with me, my lord. I saw the proof Jon Arryn laid before the
small council. If I had been king you would have lost more than
your office, I promise you, but Robert shrugged away your little
lapses. ‘They all steal,’ I recall him saying. ‘Better a
thief we know than one we don’t, the next man might be
worse.’ Lord Petyr’s words in my brother’s mouth,
I’ll warrant. Littlefinger had a nose for gold, and I’m
certain he arranged matters so the crown profited as much from your
corruption as you did yourself.”
Lord Slynt’s jowls were quivering, but before he could
frame a further protest Maester Aemon said, “Your Grace, by
law a man’s past crimes and transgressions are wiped clean
when he says his words and becomes a Sworn Brother of the
Night’s Watch.”
“I am aware of that. If it happens that Lord Janos here is
the best the Night’s Watch can offer, I shall grit my teeth
and choke him down. It is naught to me which man of you is chosen,
so long as you make a choice. We have a war to fight.”
“Your Grace,” said Ser Denys Mallister, in tones of
wary courtesy. “If you are speaking of the
wildlings . . . ”
“I am not. And you know that, ser.”
“And you must know that whilst we are thankful for the aid
you rendered us against Mance Rayder, we can offer you no help in
your contest for the throne. The Night’s Watch takes no part
in the wars of the Seven Kingdoms. For eight thousand years—”
“I know your history, Ser Denys,” the king said
brusquely. “I give you my word, I shall not ask you to lift
your swords against any of the rebels and usurpers who plague me. I
do expect that you will continue to defend the Wall as you always
have.”
“We’ll defend the Wall to the last man,” said
Cotter Pyke.
“Probably me,” said Dolorous Edd, in a resigned
tone.
Stannis crossed his arms. “I shall require a few other
things from you as well. Things that you may not be so quick to
give. I want your castles. And I want the Gift.”
Those blunt words burst among the black brothers like a pot of
wildfire tossed onto a brazier. Marsh, Mallister, and Pyke all
tried to speak at once. King Stannis let them talk. When they were
done, he said, “I have three times the men you do. I can take
the lands if I wish, but I would prefer to do this legally, with
your consent.”
“The Gift was given to the Night’s Watch in
perpetuity, Your Grace,” Bowen Marsh insisted.
“Which means it cannot be lawfully seized, attainted, or
taken from you. But what was given once can be given
again.”
“What will you do with the Gift?” demanded Cotter
Pyke.
“Make better use of it than you have. As to the castles,
Eastwatch, Castle Black, and the Shadow Tower shall remain yours.
Garrison them as you always have, but I must take the others for my
garrisons if we are to hold the Wall.”
“You do not have the men,” objected Bowen Marsh.
“Some of the abandoned castles are scarce more than
ruins,” said Othell Yarwyck, the First Builder.
“Ruins can be rebuilt.”
“Rebuilt?” Yarwyck said. “But who will do the
work?”
“That is my concern. I shall require a list from you,
detailing the present state of every castle and what might be
required to restore it. I mean to have them all garrisoned again
within the year, and nightfires burning before their
gates.”
“Nightfires?” Bowen Marsh gave Melisandre an
uncertain look. “We’re to light nightfires
now?”
“You are.” The woman rose in a swirl of scarlet
silk, her long copper-bright hair tumbling about her shoulders.
“Swords alone cannot hold this darkness back. Only the light
of the Lord can do that. Make no mistake, good sers and valiant
brothers, the war we’ve come to fight is no petty squabble
over lands and honors. Ours is a war for life itself, and should we
fail the world dies with us.”
The officers did not know how to take that, Sam could see. Bowen
Marsh and Othell Yarwyck exchanged a doubtful look, Janos Slynt was
fuming, and Three-Finger Hobb looked as though he would sooner be
back chopping carrots. But all of them seemed surprised to hear
Maester Aemon murmur, “It is the war for the dawn you speak
of, my lady. But where is the prince that was promised?”
“He stands before you,” Melisandre declared,
“though you do not have the eyes to see. Stannis Baratheon is
Azor Ahai come again, the warrior of fire. In him the prophecies
are fulfilled. The red comet blazed across the sky to herald his
coming, and he bears Lightbringer, the red sword of
heroes.”
Her words seemed to make the king desperately uncomfortable, Sam
saw. Stannis ground his teeth, and said, “You called and I
came, my lords. Now you must live with me, or die with me. Best get
used to that.” He made a brusque gesture. “That’s
all. Maester, stay a moment. And you, Tarly. The rest of you may
go.” Me? Sam thought, stricken, as his brothers were bowing and
making their way out. What does he want with me?
“You are the one that killed the creature in the
snow,” King Stannis said, when only the four of them
remained.
“Sam the Slayer.” Melisandre smiled.
Sam felt his face turning red. “No, my lady. Your Grace. I
mean, I am, yes. I’m Samwell Tarly, yes.”
“Your father is an able soldier,” King Stannis said.
“He defeated my brother once, at Ashford. Mace Tyrell has
been pleased to claim the honors for that victory, but Lord Randyll
had decided matters before Tyrell ever found the battlefield. He
slew Lord Cafferen with that great Valyrian sword of his and sent
his head to Aerys.” The king rubbed his jaw with a finger.
“You are not the sort of son I would expect such a man to
have.”
“I . . . I am not the sort of son he
wanted, sire.”
“If you had not taken the black, you would make a useful
hostage,” Stannis mused.
“He has taken the black, sire,” Maester Aemon
pointed out.
“I am well aware of that,” the king said. “I
am aware of more than you know, Aemon Targaryen.”
The old man inclined his head. “I am only Aemon, sire. We
give up our House names when we forge our maester’s
chains.”
The king gave that a curt nod, as if to say he knew and did not
care. “You slew this creature with an obsidian dagger, I am
told,” he said to Sam.
“Y-yes, Your Grace. Jon Snow gave it to me.”
“Dragonglass.” The red woman’s laugh was
music. “Frozen fire, in the tongue of old Valyria. Small
wonder it is anathema to these cold children of the
Other.”
“On Dragonstone, where I had my seat, there is much of
this obsidian to be seen in the old tunnels beneath the
mountain,” the king told Sam. “Chunks of it, boulders,
ledges. The great part of it was black, as I recall, but there was
some green as well, some red, even purple. I have sent word to Ser
Rolland my castellan to begin mining it. I will not hold
Dragonstone for very much longer, I fear, but perhaps the Lord of
Light shall grant us enough frozen fire to arm ourselves against
these creatures, before the castle falls.”
Sam cleared his throat. “S-sire. The
dagger . . . the dragonglass only shattered
when I tried to stab a wight.”
Melisandre smiled. “Necromancy animates these wights, yet
they are still only dead flesh. Steel and fire will serve for them.
The ones you call the Others are something more.”
“Demons made of snow and ice and cold,” said Stannis
Baratheon. “The ancient enemy. The only enemy that
matters.” He considered Sam again. “I am told that you
and this wildling girl passed beneath the Wall, through some magic
gate.”
“The B-black Gate,” Sam stammered. “Below the
Nightfort.”
“The Nightfort is the largest and oldest of the castles on
the Wall,” the king said. “That is where I intend to
make my seat, whilst I fight this war. You will show me this
gate.”
“I,” said Sam, “I w-will,
if . . . ” If it is still there. If it
will open for a man not of the black.
If . . .
“You will,” snapped Stannis. “I shall tell you
when.”
Maester Aemon smiled. “Your Grace,” he said,
“before we go, I wonder if you would do us the great honor of
showing us this wondrous blade we have all heard so very much
of.”
“You want to see Lightbringer? A blind man?”
“Sam shall be my eyes.”
The king frowned. “Everyone else has seen the thing, why
not a blind man?” His swordbelt and scabbard hung from a peg
near the hearth. He took the belt down and drew the longsword out.
Steel scraped against wood and leather, and radiance filled the
solar; shimmering, shifting, a dance of gold and orange and red
light, all the bright colors of fire.
“Tell me, Samwell.” Maester Aemon touched his
arm.
“It glows,” said Sam, in a hushed voice. “As
if it were on fire. There are no flames, but the steel is yellow
and red and orange, all flashing and glimmering, like sunshine on
water, but prettier. I wish you could see it, Maester.”
“I see it now, Sam. A sword full of sunlight. So lovely to
behold.” The old man bowed stiffly. “Your Grace. My
lady. This was most kind of you. “
When King Stannis sheathed the shining sword, the room seemed to
grow very dark, despite the sunlight streaming through the window.
“Very well, you’ve seen it. You may return to your
duties now. And remember what I said. Your brothers will chose a
Lord Commander tonight, or I shall make them wish they
had.”
Maester Aemon was lost in thought as Sam helped him down the
narrow turnpike stair. But as they were crossing the yard, he said,
“I felt no heat. Did you, Sam?”
“Heat? From the sword?” He thought back. “The
air around it was shimmering, the way it does above a hot
brazier.”
“Yet you felt no heat, did you? And the scabbard that held
this sword, it is wood and leather, yes? I heard the sound when His
Grace drew out the blade. Was the leather scorched, Sam? Did the
wood seem burnt or blackened?”
“No,” Sam admitted. “Not that I could
see.”
Maester Aemon nodded. Back in his own chambers, he asked Sam to
set a fire and help him to his chair beside the hearth. “It
is hard to be so old,” he sighed as he settled onto the
cushion. “And harder still to be so blind. I miss the sun.
And books. I miss books most of all.” Aemon waved a hand.
“I shall have no more need of you till the
choosing.”
“The choosing . . . Maester,
isn’t there something you could do? What the king said of
Lord Janos . . . ”
“I recall,” Maester Aemon said, “but Sam, I am
a maester, chained and sworn. My duty is to counsel the Lord
Commander, whoever he might be. It would not be proper for me to be
seen to favor one contender over another.”
“I’m not a maester,” said Sam. “Could I
do something?”
Aemon turned his blind white eyes toward Sam’s face, and
smiled softy. “Why, I don’t know, Samwell. Could
you?” I could, Sam thought. I have to. He had to do it right away,
too. If he hesitated he was certain to lose his courage. I am a man
of the Night’s Watch, he reminded himself as he hurried
across the yard. I am. I can do this. There had been a time when he
had quaked and squeaked if Lord Mormont so much as looked at him,
but that was the old Sam, before the Fist of the First Men and
Craster’s Keep, before the wights and Coldhands, and the
Other on his dead horse. He was braver now. Gilly made me braver,
he’d told Jon. It was true. It had to be true.
Cotter Pyke was the scarier of the two commanders, so Sam went
to him first, while his courage was still hot. He found him in the
old Shieldhall, dicing with three of his Eastwatch men and a
red-headed sergeant who had come from Dragonstone with Stannis.
When Sam begged leave to speak with him, though, Pyke barked an
order, and the others took the dice and coins and left them.
No man would ever call Cotter Pyke handsome, though the body
under his studded brigantine and roughspun breeches was lean and
hard and wiry strong. His eyes were small and close-set, his nose
broken, his widow’s peak as sharply pointed as the head of a
spear. The pox had ravaged his face badly, and the beard he’d
grown to hide the scars was thin and scraggly.
“Sam the Slayer!” he said, by way of greeting.
“Are you sure you stabbed an Other, and not some
child’s snow knight?” This isn’t starting well. “It was the dragonglass
that killed it, my lord,” Sam explained feebly.
“Aye, no doubt. Well, out with it, Slayer. Did the maester
send you to me?”
“The maester?” Sam swallowed.
“I . . . I just left him, my lord.”
That wasn’t truly a lie, but if Pyke chose to read it wrong,
it might make him more inclined to listen. Sam took a deep breath
and launched into his plea.
Pyke cut him off before he’d said twenty words. “You
want me to kneel down and kiss the hem of Mallister’s pretty
cloak, is that it? I might have known. You lordlings all flock like
sheep. Well, tell Aemon that he’s wasted your breath and my
time. If anyone withdraws it should be Mallister. The man’s
too bloody old for the job, maybe you ought to go tell him that. We
choose him, and we’re like to be back here in a year,
choosing someone else.”
“He’s old,” Sam agreed, “but he’s
well ex-experienced.”
“At sitting in his tower and fussing over maps, maybe.
What does he plan to do, write letters to the wights? He’s a
knight, well and good, but he’s not a fighter, and I
don’t give a kettle of piss who he unhorsed in some fool
tourney fifty years ago. The Halfhand fought all his battles, even
an old blind man should see that. And we need a fighter more than
ever with this bloody king on top of us. Today it’s ruins and
empty fields, well and good, but what will His Grace want come the
morrow? You think Mallister has the belly to stand up to Stannis
Baratheon and that red bitch?” He laughed. “I
don’t.”
“You won’t support him, then?” said Sam,
dismayed.
“Are you Sam the Slayer or Deaf Dick? No, I won’t
support him.” Pyke jabbed a finger at his face.
“Understand this, boy. I don’t want the bloody job, and
never did. I fight best with a deck beneath me, not a horse, and
Castle Black is too far from the sea. But I’ll be buggered
with a red-hot sword before I turn the Night’s Watch over to
that preening eagle from the Shadow Tower. And you can run back to
the old man and tell him I said so, if he asks.” He stood.
“Get out of my sight.”
It took all the courage Sam had left in him to say,
“W-what if there was someone else? Could you s-support
someone else?”
“Who? Bowen Marsh? The man counts spoons. Othell’s a
follower, does what he’s told and does it well, but no
more’n that. Slynt . . . well, his men
like him, I’ll grant you, and it would almost be worth it to
stick him down the royal craw and see if Stannis gagged, but no.
There’s too much of King’s Landing in that one. A toad
grows wings and thinks he’s a bloody dragon.” Pyke
laughed. “Who does that leave, Hobb? We could pick him, I
suppose, only then who’s going to boil your mutton, Slayer?
You look like a man who likes his bloody mutton.”
There was nothing more to say. Defeated, Sam could only stammer
out his thanks and take his leave. I will do better with Ser Denys,
he tried to tell himself as he walked through the castle. Ser Denys
was a knight, highborn and well-spoken, and he had treated Sam most
courteously when he’d found him and Gilly on the road. Ser
Denys will listen to me, he has to.
The commander of the Shadow Tower had been born beneath the
Booming Tower of Seagard, and looked every inch a Mallister. Sable
trimmed his collar and accented the sleeves of his black velvet
doublet. A silver eagle fastened its claws in the gathered folds of
his cloak. His beard was white as snow, his hair was largely gone,
and his face was deeply lined, it was true. Yet he still had grace
in his movements and teeth in his mouth, and the years had dimmed
neither his blue-grey eyes nor his courtesy.
“My lord of Tarly,” he said, when his steward
brought Sam to him in the Lance, where the Shadow Tower men were
staying. “I am pleased to see that you’ve recovered
from your ordeal. Might I offer you a cup of wine? Your lady mother
is a Florent, I recall. One day I must tell you about the time I
unhorsed both of your grandfathers in the same tourney. Not today,
though, I know we have more pressing concerns. You come from
Maester Aemon, to be sure. Does he have counsel to offer
me?”
Sam took a sip of wine, and chose his words with care. “A
maester chained and sworn . . . it would not be
proper for him to be seen as having influenced the choice of Lord
Commander . . . ”
The old knight smiled. “Which is why he has not come to me
himself. Yes, I quite understand, Samwell. Aemon and I are both old
men, and wise in such matters. Say what you came to say.”
The wine was sweet, and Ser Denys listened to Sam’s plea
with grave courtesy, unlike Cotter Pyke. But when he was done, the
old knight shook his head. “I agree that it would be a dark
day in our history if a king were to name our Lord Commander. This
king especially. He is not like to keep his crown for long. But
truly, Samwell, it ought to be Pyke who withdraws. I have more
support than he does, and I am better suited to the
office.”
“You are,” Sam agreed, “but Cotter Pyke might
serve. It’s said he has oft proved himself in battle.”
He did not mean to offend Ser Denys by praising his rival, but how
else could he convince him to withdraw?
“Many of my brothers have proved themselves in battle. It
is not enough. Some matters cannot be settled with a battleaxe.
Maester Aemon will understand that, though Cotter Pyke does not.
The Lord Commander of the Night’s Watch is a lord, first and
foremost. He must be able to treat with other
lords . . . and with kings as well. He must be
a man worthy of respect.” Ser Denys leaned forward. “We
are the sons of great lords, you and I. We know the importance of
birth, blood, and that early training that can ne’er be
replaced. I was a squire at twelve, a knight at eighteen, a
champion at two-and-twenty. I have been the commander at the Shadow
Tower for thirty-three years. Blood, birth, and training have
fitted me to deal with kings. Pyke . . . well,
did you hear him this morning, asking if His Grace would wipe his
bottom? Samwell, it is not my habit to speak unkindly of my
brothers, but let us be frank . . . the
ironborn are a race of pirates and thieves, and Cotter Pyke was
raping and murdering when he was still half a boy. Maester Harmune
reads and writes his letters, and has for years. No, loath as I am
to disappoint Maester Aemon, I could not in honor stand aside for
Pyke of Eastwatch.”
This time Sam was ready. “Might you for someone else? If
it was someone more suitable?”
Ser Denys considered a moment. “I have never desired the
honor for its own sake. At the last choosing, I stepped aside
gratefully when Lord Mormont’s name was offered, just as I
had for Lord Qorgyle at the choosing before that. So long as the
Night’s Watch remains in good hands, I am content. But Bowen
Marsh is not equal to the task, no more than Othell Yarwyck. And
this so-called Lord of Harrenhal is a butcher’s whelp
upjumped by the Lannisters. Small wonder he is venal and
corrupt.”
“There’s another man,” Sam blurted out.
“Lord Commander Mormont trusted him. So did Donal Noye and
Qhorin Halfhand. Though he’s not as highly born as you, he
comes from old blood. He was castle-born and castle-raised, and he
learned sword and lance from a knight and letters from a maester of
the Citadel. His father was a lord, and his brother a
king.”
Ser Denys stroked his long white beard. “Mayhaps,”
he said, after a long moment. “He is very young,
but . . . mayhaps. He might serve, I grant you,
though I would be more suitable. I have no doubt of that. I would
be the wiser choice.” Jon said there could be honor in a lie, if it were told for the
right reason. Sam said, “If we do not choose a Lord Commander
tonight, King Stannis means to name Cotter Pyke. He said as much to
Maester Aemon this morning, after all of you had left.”
“I see.” Ser Denys rose. “I must think on
this. Thank you, Samwell. And give my thanks to Maester Aemon as
well.”
Sam was trembling by the time he left the Lance. What have I
done? he thought. What have I said? If they caught him in his lie,
they would . . . what? Send me to the Wall? Rip
my entrails out? Turn me into a wight? Suddenly it all seemed
absurd. How could he be so frightened of Cotter Pyke and Ser Denys
Mallister, when he had seen a raven eating Small Paul’s
face?
Pyke was not pleased by his return. “You again? Make it
quick, you are starting to annoy me.”
“I only need a moment more,” Sam promised.
“You won’t withdraw for Ser Denys, you said, but you
might for someone else.”
“Who is it this time, Slayer? You?”
“No. A fighter. Donal Noye gave him the Wall when the
wildlings came, and he was the Old Bear’s squire. The only
thing is, he’s bastard-born.”
Cotter Pyke laughed. “Bloody hell. That would shove a
spear up Mallister’s arse, wouldn’t it? Might be worth
it just for that. How bad could the boy be?” He snorted.
“I’d be better, though. I’m what’s needed,
any fool can see that.”
“Any fool,” Sam agreed, “even me.
But . . . well, I shouldn’t be telling
you, but . . . King Stannis means to force Ser
Denys on us, if we do not choose a man tonight. I heard him tell
Maester Aemon that, after the rest of you were sent
away.”
The king was angry. Sam saw that at once.
As the black brothers entered one by one and knelt before him,
Stannis shoved away his breakfast of hardbread, salt beef, and
boiled eggs, and eyed them coldly. Beside him, the red woman
Melisandre looked as if she found the scene amusing. I have no place here, Sam thought anxiously, when her red eyes
fell upon him. Someone had to help Maester Aemon up the steps.
Don’t look at me, I’m just the maester’s steward.
The others were contenders for the Old Bear’s command, all
but Bowen Marsh, who had withdrawn from the contest but remained
castellan and Lord Steward. Sam did not understand why Melisandre
should seem so interested in him.
King Stannis kept the black brothers on their knees for an
extraordinarily long time. “Rise,” he said at last. Sam
gave Maester Aemon his shoulder to help him back up.
The sound of Lord Janos Slynt clearing his throat broke the
strained silence. “Your Grace, let me say how pleased we are
to be summoned here. When I saw your banners from the Wall, I knew
the realm was saved. ‘There comes a man who neer forgets his
duty,’ I said to good Ser Alliser. ‘A strong man, and a true
king.’ May I congratulate you on your victory over the
savages? The singers will make much of it, I know—”
“The singers may do as they like,” Stannis snapped.
“Spare me your fawning, Janos, it will not serve you.”
He rose to his feet and frowned at them all. “Lady Melisandre
tells me that you have not yet chosen a Lord Commander. I am
displeased. How much longer must this folly last?”
“Sire,” said Bowen Marsh in a defensive tone,
“no one has achieved two-thirds of the vote yet. It has only
been ten days.”
“Nine days too long. I have captives to dispose of, a
realm to order, a war to fight. Choices must be made, decisions
that involve the Wall and the Night’s Watch. By rights your
Lord Commander should have a voice in those decisions.”
“He should, yes,” said Janos Slynt. “But it
must be said. We brothers are only simple soldiers. Soldiers, yes!
And Your Grace will know that soldiers are most comfortable taking
orders. They would benefit from your royal guidance, it seems to
me. For the good of the realm. To help them choose
wisely.”
The suggestion outraged some of the others. “Do you want
the king to wipe our arses for us too?” said Cotter Pyke
angrily. “The choice of a Lord Commander belongs to the Sworn
Brothers, and to them alone,” insisted Ser Denys Mallister.
“If they choose wisely they won’t be choosing
me,” moaned Dolorous Edd. Maester Aemon, calm as always,
said, “Your Grace, the Night’s Watch has been choosing
its own leader since Brandon the Builder raised the Wall. Through
Jeor Mormont we have had nine hundred and ninety-seven Lords
Commander in unbroken succession, each chosen by the men he would
lead, a tradition many thousands of years old.”
Stannis ground his teeth. “It is not my wish to tamper
with your rights and traditions. As to royal guidance, Janos, if
you mean that I ought to tell your brothers to choose you, have the
courage to say so.”
That took Lord Janos aback. He smiled uncertainly and began to
sweat, but Bowen Marsh beside him said, “Who better to
command the black cloaks than a man who once commanded the gold,
sire?”
“Any of you, I would think. Even the cook.” The look
the king gave Slynt was cold. “Janos was hardly the first
gold cloak ever to take a bribe, I grant you, but he may have been
the first commander to fatten his purse by selling places and
promotions. By the end he must have had half the officers in the
City Watch paying him part of their wages. Isn’t that so,
Janos?”
Slynt’s neck was purpling. “Lies, all lies! A strong
man makes enemies, Your Grace knows that, they whisper lies behind
your back. Naught was ever proven, not a man came
forward . . . ”
“Two men who were prepared to come forward died suddenly
on their rounds.” Stannis narrowed his eyes. “Do not
trifle with me, my lord. I saw the proof Jon Arryn laid before the
small council. If I had been king you would have lost more than
your office, I promise you, but Robert shrugged away your little
lapses. ‘They all steal,’ I recall him saying. ‘Better a
thief we know than one we don’t, the next man might be
worse.’ Lord Petyr’s words in my brother’s mouth,
I’ll warrant. Littlefinger had a nose for gold, and I’m
certain he arranged matters so the crown profited as much from your
corruption as you did yourself.”
Lord Slynt’s jowls were quivering, but before he could
frame a further protest Maester Aemon said, “Your Grace, by
law a man’s past crimes and transgressions are wiped clean
when he says his words and becomes a Sworn Brother of the
Night’s Watch.”
“I am aware of that. If it happens that Lord Janos here is
the best the Night’s Watch can offer, I shall grit my teeth
and choke him down. It is naught to me which man of you is chosen,
so long as you make a choice. We have a war to fight.”
“Your Grace,” said Ser Denys Mallister, in tones of
wary courtesy. “If you are speaking of the
wildlings . . . ”
“I am not. And you know that, ser.”
“And you must know that whilst we are thankful for the aid
you rendered us against Mance Rayder, we can offer you no help in
your contest for the throne. The Night’s Watch takes no part
in the wars of the Seven Kingdoms. For eight thousand years—”
“I know your history, Ser Denys,” the king said
brusquely. “I give you my word, I shall not ask you to lift
your swords against any of the rebels and usurpers who plague me. I
do expect that you will continue to defend the Wall as you always
have.”
“We’ll defend the Wall to the last man,” said
Cotter Pyke.
“Probably me,” said Dolorous Edd, in a resigned
tone.
Stannis crossed his arms. “I shall require a few other
things from you as well. Things that you may not be so quick to
give. I want your castles. And I want the Gift.”
Those blunt words burst among the black brothers like a pot of
wildfire tossed onto a brazier. Marsh, Mallister, and Pyke all
tried to speak at once. King Stannis let them talk. When they were
done, he said, “I have three times the men you do. I can take
the lands if I wish, but I would prefer to do this legally, with
your consent.”
“The Gift was given to the Night’s Watch in
perpetuity, Your Grace,” Bowen Marsh insisted.
“Which means it cannot be lawfully seized, attainted, or
taken from you. But what was given once can be given
again.”
“What will you do with the Gift?” demanded Cotter
Pyke.
“Make better use of it than you have. As to the castles,
Eastwatch, Castle Black, and the Shadow Tower shall remain yours.
Garrison them as you always have, but I must take the others for my
garrisons if we are to hold the Wall.”
“You do not have the men,” objected Bowen Marsh.
“Some of the abandoned castles are scarce more than
ruins,” said Othell Yarwyck, the First Builder.
“Ruins can be rebuilt.”
“Rebuilt?” Yarwyck said. “But who will do the
work?”
“That is my concern. I shall require a list from you,
detailing the present state of every castle and what might be
required to restore it. I mean to have them all garrisoned again
within the year, and nightfires burning before their
gates.”
“Nightfires?” Bowen Marsh gave Melisandre an
uncertain look. “We’re to light nightfires
now?”
“You are.” The woman rose in a swirl of scarlet
silk, her long copper-bright hair tumbling about her shoulders.
“Swords alone cannot hold this darkness back. Only the light
of the Lord can do that. Make no mistake, good sers and valiant
brothers, the war we’ve come to fight is no petty squabble
over lands and honors. Ours is a war for life itself, and should we
fail the world dies with us.”
The officers did not know how to take that, Sam could see. Bowen
Marsh and Othell Yarwyck exchanged a doubtful look, Janos Slynt was
fuming, and Three-Finger Hobb looked as though he would sooner be
back chopping carrots. But all of them seemed surprised to hear
Maester Aemon murmur, “It is the war for the dawn you speak
of, my lady. But where is the prince that was promised?”
“He stands before you,” Melisandre declared,
“though you do not have the eyes to see. Stannis Baratheon is
Azor Ahai come again, the warrior of fire. In him the prophecies
are fulfilled. The red comet blazed across the sky to herald his
coming, and he bears Lightbringer, the red sword of
heroes.”
Her words seemed to make the king desperately uncomfortable, Sam
saw. Stannis ground his teeth, and said, “You called and I
came, my lords. Now you must live with me, or die with me. Best get
used to that.” He made a brusque gesture. “That’s
all. Maester, stay a moment. And you, Tarly. The rest of you may
go.” Me? Sam thought, stricken, as his brothers were bowing and
making their way out. What does he want with me?
“You are the one that killed the creature in the
snow,” King Stannis said, when only the four of them
remained.
“Sam the Slayer.” Melisandre smiled.
Sam felt his face turning red. “No, my lady. Your Grace. I
mean, I am, yes. I’m Samwell Tarly, yes.”
“Your father is an able soldier,” King Stannis said.
“He defeated my brother once, at Ashford. Mace Tyrell has
been pleased to claim the honors for that victory, but Lord Randyll
had decided matters before Tyrell ever found the battlefield. He
slew Lord Cafferen with that great Valyrian sword of his and sent
his head to Aerys.” The king rubbed his jaw with a finger.
“You are not the sort of son I would expect such a man to
have.”
“I . . . I am not the sort of son he
wanted, sire.”
“If you had not taken the black, you would make a useful
hostage,” Stannis mused.
“He has taken the black, sire,” Maester Aemon
pointed out.
“I am well aware of that,” the king said. “I
am aware of more than you know, Aemon Targaryen.”
The old man inclined his head. “I am only Aemon, sire. We
give up our House names when we forge our maester’s
chains.”
The king gave that a curt nod, as if to say he knew and did not
care. “You slew this creature with an obsidian dagger, I am
told,” he said to Sam.
“Y-yes, Your Grace. Jon Snow gave it to me.”
“Dragonglass.” The red woman’s laugh was
music. “Frozen fire, in the tongue of old Valyria. Small
wonder it is anathema to these cold children of the
Other.”
“On Dragonstone, where I had my seat, there is much of
this obsidian to be seen in the old tunnels beneath the
mountain,” the king told Sam. “Chunks of it, boulders,
ledges. The great part of it was black, as I recall, but there was
some green as well, some red, even purple. I have sent word to Ser
Rolland my castellan to begin mining it. I will not hold
Dragonstone for very much longer, I fear, but perhaps the Lord of
Light shall grant us enough frozen fire to arm ourselves against
these creatures, before the castle falls.”
Sam cleared his throat. “S-sire. The
dagger . . . the dragonglass only shattered
when I tried to stab a wight.”
Melisandre smiled. “Necromancy animates these wights, yet
they are still only dead flesh. Steel and fire will serve for them.
The ones you call the Others are something more.”
“Demons made of snow and ice and cold,” said Stannis
Baratheon. “The ancient enemy. The only enemy that
matters.” He considered Sam again. “I am told that you
and this wildling girl passed beneath the Wall, through some magic
gate.”
“The B-black Gate,” Sam stammered. “Below the
Nightfort.”
“The Nightfort is the largest and oldest of the castles on
the Wall,” the king said. “That is where I intend to
make my seat, whilst I fight this war. You will show me this
gate.”
“I,” said Sam, “I w-will,
if . . . ” If it is still there. If it
will open for a man not of the black.
If . . .
“You will,” snapped Stannis. “I shall tell you
when.”
Maester Aemon smiled. “Your Grace,” he said,
“before we go, I wonder if you would do us the great honor of
showing us this wondrous blade we have all heard so very much
of.”
“You want to see Lightbringer? A blind man?”
“Sam shall be my eyes.”
The king frowned. “Everyone else has seen the thing, why
not a blind man?” His swordbelt and scabbard hung from a peg
near the hearth. He took the belt down and drew the longsword out.
Steel scraped against wood and leather, and radiance filled the
solar; shimmering, shifting, a dance of gold and orange and red
light, all the bright colors of fire.
“Tell me, Samwell.” Maester Aemon touched his
arm.
“It glows,” said Sam, in a hushed voice. “As
if it were on fire. There are no flames, but the steel is yellow
and red and orange, all flashing and glimmering, like sunshine on
water, but prettier. I wish you could see it, Maester.”
“I see it now, Sam. A sword full of sunlight. So lovely to
behold.” The old man bowed stiffly. “Your Grace. My
lady. This was most kind of you. “
When King Stannis sheathed the shining sword, the room seemed to
grow very dark, despite the sunlight streaming through the window.
“Very well, you’ve seen it. You may return to your
duties now. And remember what I said. Your brothers will chose a
Lord Commander tonight, or I shall make them wish they
had.”
Maester Aemon was lost in thought as Sam helped him down the
narrow turnpike stair. But as they were crossing the yard, he said,
“I felt no heat. Did you, Sam?”
“Heat? From the sword?” He thought back. “The
air around it was shimmering, the way it does above a hot
brazier.”
“Yet you felt no heat, did you? And the scabbard that held
this sword, it is wood and leather, yes? I heard the sound when His
Grace drew out the blade. Was the leather scorched, Sam? Did the
wood seem burnt or blackened?”
“No,” Sam admitted. “Not that I could
see.”
Maester Aemon nodded. Back in his own chambers, he asked Sam to
set a fire and help him to his chair beside the hearth. “It
is hard to be so old,” he sighed as he settled onto the
cushion. “And harder still to be so blind. I miss the sun.
And books. I miss books most of all.” Aemon waved a hand.
“I shall have no more need of you till the
choosing.”
“The choosing . . . Maester,
isn’t there something you could do? What the king said of
Lord Janos . . . ”
“I recall,” Maester Aemon said, “but Sam, I am
a maester, chained and sworn. My duty is to counsel the Lord
Commander, whoever he might be. It would not be proper for me to be
seen to favor one contender over another.”
“I’m not a maester,” said Sam. “Could I
do something?”
Aemon turned his blind white eyes toward Sam’s face, and
smiled softy. “Why, I don’t know, Samwell. Could
you?” I could, Sam thought. I have to. He had to do it right away,
too. If he hesitated he was certain to lose his courage. I am a man
of the Night’s Watch, he reminded himself as he hurried
across the yard. I am. I can do this. There had been a time when he
had quaked and squeaked if Lord Mormont so much as looked at him,
but that was the old Sam, before the Fist of the First Men and
Craster’s Keep, before the wights and Coldhands, and the
Other on his dead horse. He was braver now. Gilly made me braver,
he’d told Jon. It was true. It had to be true.
Cotter Pyke was the scarier of the two commanders, so Sam went
to him first, while his courage was still hot. He found him in the
old Shieldhall, dicing with three of his Eastwatch men and a
red-headed sergeant who had come from Dragonstone with Stannis.
When Sam begged leave to speak with him, though, Pyke barked an
order, and the others took the dice and coins and left them.
No man would ever call Cotter Pyke handsome, though the body
under his studded brigantine and roughspun breeches was lean and
hard and wiry strong. His eyes were small and close-set, his nose
broken, his widow’s peak as sharply pointed as the head of a
spear. The pox had ravaged his face badly, and the beard he’d
grown to hide the scars was thin and scraggly.
“Sam the Slayer!” he said, by way of greeting.
“Are you sure you stabbed an Other, and not some
child’s snow knight?” This isn’t starting well. “It was the dragonglass
that killed it, my lord,” Sam explained feebly.
“Aye, no doubt. Well, out with it, Slayer. Did the maester
send you to me?”
“The maester?” Sam swallowed.
“I . . . I just left him, my lord.”
That wasn’t truly a lie, but if Pyke chose to read it wrong,
it might make him more inclined to listen. Sam took a deep breath
and launched into his plea.
Pyke cut him off before he’d said twenty words. “You
want me to kneel down and kiss the hem of Mallister’s pretty
cloak, is that it? I might have known. You lordlings all flock like
sheep. Well, tell Aemon that he’s wasted your breath and my
time. If anyone withdraws it should be Mallister. The man’s
too bloody old for the job, maybe you ought to go tell him that. We
choose him, and we’re like to be back here in a year,
choosing someone else.”
“He’s old,” Sam agreed, “but he’s
well ex-experienced.”
“At sitting in his tower and fussing over maps, maybe.
What does he plan to do, write letters to the wights? He’s a
knight, well and good, but he’s not a fighter, and I
don’t give a kettle of piss who he unhorsed in some fool
tourney fifty years ago. The Halfhand fought all his battles, even
an old blind man should see that. And we need a fighter more than
ever with this bloody king on top of us. Today it’s ruins and
empty fields, well and good, but what will His Grace want come the
morrow? You think Mallister has the belly to stand up to Stannis
Baratheon and that red bitch?” He laughed. “I
don’t.”
“You won’t support him, then?” said Sam,
dismayed.
“Are you Sam the Slayer or Deaf Dick? No, I won’t
support him.” Pyke jabbed a finger at his face.
“Understand this, boy. I don’t want the bloody job, and
never did. I fight best with a deck beneath me, not a horse, and
Castle Black is too far from the sea. But I’ll be buggered
with a red-hot sword before I turn the Night’s Watch over to
that preening eagle from the Shadow Tower. And you can run back to
the old man and tell him I said so, if he asks.” He stood.
“Get out of my sight.”
It took all the courage Sam had left in him to say,
“W-what if there was someone else? Could you s-support
someone else?”
“Who? Bowen Marsh? The man counts spoons. Othell’s a
follower, does what he’s told and does it well, but no
more’n that. Slynt . . . well, his men
like him, I’ll grant you, and it would almost be worth it to
stick him down the royal craw and see if Stannis gagged, but no.
There’s too much of King’s Landing in that one. A toad
grows wings and thinks he’s a bloody dragon.” Pyke
laughed. “Who does that leave, Hobb? We could pick him, I
suppose, only then who’s going to boil your mutton, Slayer?
You look like a man who likes his bloody mutton.”
There was nothing more to say. Defeated, Sam could only stammer
out his thanks and take his leave. I will do better with Ser Denys,
he tried to tell himself as he walked through the castle. Ser Denys
was a knight, highborn and well-spoken, and he had treated Sam most
courteously when he’d found him and Gilly on the road. Ser
Denys will listen to me, he has to.
The commander of the Shadow Tower had been born beneath the
Booming Tower of Seagard, and looked every inch a Mallister. Sable
trimmed his collar and accented the sleeves of his black velvet
doublet. A silver eagle fastened its claws in the gathered folds of
his cloak. His beard was white as snow, his hair was largely gone,
and his face was deeply lined, it was true. Yet he still had grace
in his movements and teeth in his mouth, and the years had dimmed
neither his blue-grey eyes nor his courtesy.
“My lord of Tarly,” he said, when his steward
brought Sam to him in the Lance, where the Shadow Tower men were
staying. “I am pleased to see that you’ve recovered
from your ordeal. Might I offer you a cup of wine? Your lady mother
is a Florent, I recall. One day I must tell you about the time I
unhorsed both of your grandfathers in the same tourney. Not today,
though, I know we have more pressing concerns. You come from
Maester Aemon, to be sure. Does he have counsel to offer
me?”
Sam took a sip of wine, and chose his words with care. “A
maester chained and sworn . . . it would not be
proper for him to be seen as having influenced the choice of Lord
Commander . . . ”
The old knight smiled. “Which is why he has not come to me
himself. Yes, I quite understand, Samwell. Aemon and I are both old
men, and wise in such matters. Say what you came to say.”
The wine was sweet, and Ser Denys listened to Sam’s plea
with grave courtesy, unlike Cotter Pyke. But when he was done, the
old knight shook his head. “I agree that it would be a dark
day in our history if a king were to name our Lord Commander. This
king especially. He is not like to keep his crown for long. But
truly, Samwell, it ought to be Pyke who withdraws. I have more
support than he does, and I am better suited to the
office.”
“You are,” Sam agreed, “but Cotter Pyke might
serve. It’s said he has oft proved himself in battle.”
He did not mean to offend Ser Denys by praising his rival, but how
else could he convince him to withdraw?
“Many of my brothers have proved themselves in battle. It
is not enough. Some matters cannot be settled with a battleaxe.
Maester Aemon will understand that, though Cotter Pyke does not.
The Lord Commander of the Night’s Watch is a lord, first and
foremost. He must be able to treat with other
lords . . . and with kings as well. He must be
a man worthy of respect.” Ser Denys leaned forward. “We
are the sons of great lords, you and I. We know the importance of
birth, blood, and that early training that can ne’er be
replaced. I was a squire at twelve, a knight at eighteen, a
champion at two-and-twenty. I have been the commander at the Shadow
Tower for thirty-three years. Blood, birth, and training have
fitted me to deal with kings. Pyke . . . well,
did you hear him this morning, asking if His Grace would wipe his
bottom? Samwell, it is not my habit to speak unkindly of my
brothers, but let us be frank . . . the
ironborn are a race of pirates and thieves, and Cotter Pyke was
raping and murdering when he was still half a boy. Maester Harmune
reads and writes his letters, and has for years. No, loath as I am
to disappoint Maester Aemon, I could not in honor stand aside for
Pyke of Eastwatch.”
This time Sam was ready. “Might you for someone else? If
it was someone more suitable?”
Ser Denys considered a moment. “I have never desired the
honor for its own sake. At the last choosing, I stepped aside
gratefully when Lord Mormont’s name was offered, just as I
had for Lord Qorgyle at the choosing before that. So long as the
Night’s Watch remains in good hands, I am content. But Bowen
Marsh is not equal to the task, no more than Othell Yarwyck. And
this so-called Lord of Harrenhal is a butcher’s whelp
upjumped by the Lannisters. Small wonder he is venal and
corrupt.”
“There’s another man,” Sam blurted out.
“Lord Commander Mormont trusted him. So did Donal Noye and
Qhorin Halfhand. Though he’s not as highly born as you, he
comes from old blood. He was castle-born and castle-raised, and he
learned sword and lance from a knight and letters from a maester of
the Citadel. His father was a lord, and his brother a
king.”
Ser Denys stroked his long white beard. “Mayhaps,”
he said, after a long moment. “He is very young,
but . . . mayhaps. He might serve, I grant you,
though I would be more suitable. I have no doubt of that. I would
be the wiser choice.” Jon said there could be honor in a lie, if it were told for the
right reason. Sam said, “If we do not choose a Lord Commander
tonight, King Stannis means to name Cotter Pyke. He said as much to
Maester Aemon this morning, after all of you had left.”
“I see.” Ser Denys rose. “I must think on
this. Thank you, Samwell. And give my thanks to Maester Aemon as
well.”
Sam was trembling by the time he left the Lance. What have I
done? he thought. What have I said? If they caught him in his lie,
they would . . . what? Send me to the Wall? Rip
my entrails out? Turn me into a wight? Suddenly it all seemed
absurd. How could he be so frightened of Cotter Pyke and Ser Denys
Mallister, when he had seen a raven eating Small Paul’s
face?
Pyke was not pleased by his return. “You again? Make it
quick, you are starting to annoy me.”
“I only need a moment more,” Sam promised.
“You won’t withdraw for Ser Denys, you said, but you
might for someone else.”
“Who is it this time, Slayer? You?”
“No. A fighter. Donal Noye gave him the Wall when the
wildlings came, and he was the Old Bear’s squire. The only
thing is, he’s bastard-born.”
Cotter Pyke laughed. “Bloody hell. That would shove a
spear up Mallister’s arse, wouldn’t it? Might be worth
it just for that. How bad could the boy be?” He snorted.
“I’d be better, though. I’m what’s needed,
any fool can see that.”
“Any fool,” Sam agreed, “even me.
But . . . well, I shouldn’t be telling
you, but . . . King Stannis means to force Ser
Denys on us, if we do not choose a man tonight. I heard him tell
Maester Aemon that, after the rest of you were sent
away.”