𝐒𝐈𝐋𝐄𝐍𝐓 𝐁𝐎𝐘

ᴄʜᴀᴘᴛᴇʀ ᴛʜʀᴇᴇ

𝟚

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Ghost loped ahead of them. The grounds seemed deserted this morning, with so many rangers off at the brothel in Mole's Town, digging for buried treasure and drinking themselves blind.
Grenn had gone with them. Pypar and Halder as well as Toad had offered to buy Torsten his first women to celebrate his first ranging. They'd wanted Jon and Samwell to come as well, Samwell was almost as frightened of whores as he was of the haunted forest, and Jon had wanted no part of it. "Do what you want." Torsten told Toad. "I took my vow." Jon knew Torsten was just as frightened of whores as Samwell was.

As they passed the sept, Torsten heard voices raised in song. Some men want whores on the eve of battle, and some want gods. Torsten wondered who felt better afterwards. The sept tempted him no more than the brothel, his own gods kept their temples in the wild places, where the weirwoods spread their bone white branches. The seven have no power beyond the Wall, but the old gods will be waiting.
Outside the armory, Ser Endrew Tarth was working with some raw recruits. They'd come in last night with Conwy, one of the wandering crows who roamed the Seven Kingdoms collecting men for the Wall. This new crop consisted of a greybeard leaning on a staff, two blond boys with the look of brothers, a foppish youth in soiled satin, a raggy man with a clubfoot, and some grinning loon who must have fancied himself a warrior. Ser Endrew was showing him the error of that presumption. He was a gentler master-at-arms than Ser Alliser Thorne had been, but his lessons would still raise bruises.
Samwell winced at every blow, but Torsten Snow watched the swordplay closely. "What do you think of them, Snow?" Donal Noye stood in the door of his armory, bare chested under a leather apron, the stump of his left arm uncovered for once. With his big gut and barrel chest, his flat nose and bristly black jaw, Noye did not make a pretty sight, but was a welcome one nonetheless. The armorer had proved himself a good friend.

"They smell of summer." Torsten said as Ser Endrew bullrushed his foe and knocked him sprawling. "Where did Conwy find them?"

"A lord's dungeon near Gulltown." The smith replied. "A brigand, a barber, a begger, two orphans, and a boy whore. With such do we defend the realms of men." Torsten couldn't help but smile.

"They'll do." He told him. "We did." Torsten gave Samwell a private smile.

"You've heard these tidings of Lord Snows brother?" Torsten nodded.

"Aye, last night, I was with him when he received the news." Conwy and his charges had brought the news north with them, and the talk in the Common Hall had been of little else. Jon had told Torsten he hadn't been certain how he felt about it. "Jon said he'd make a good King." Torsten shrugged.

"Will he now?" The smith eyed him frankly. "I hope that's so, but once I might have said the same of Robert."

"You forged his Warhammer." Torsten recalled.

"Aye, I was his man, a Baratheon man, smith and armorer at Storm's End until I lost the arm. I'm old enough to remember Lord Steffon before the sea took him, and I knew those three sons of his since they got their names. I tell you this – Robert was never the same after he put on that crown. Some men are like swords, made for fighting. Hang them up and they go to rust." Noye told him.

"And his brothers?" Torsten asked. The armorer considered that a moment.

"Robert was the true steel. Stannis is pure iron, black and hard and strong, yes, but brittle, the way iron gets. He'll break before he bends. And Renly, that one, he's copper, bright and shiny. Pretty to look at but not worth all that much at the end of the day." Torsten wondered what metal Jon's brother would be, but he did not ask. Noye was a Baratheon man, likely he thought Joffery the lawful king and Robb a traitor.
Among the brotherhood of the Night's Watch, there was an unspoken pact never to probe too deeply into such matters. Men came to the Wall from all of the Seven Kingdoms, and old loves and loyalties were not easily forgotten, no matter how many oaths a man swore.
Torsten had never belonged to a house, nor ever known who his family stood with, but he now had a new family, and that was with the Starks. At the end of the day, the Night's Watch took no sides.

"Lord Mormont awaits us." Torsten said.

"I won't keep you from the Old Bear." Noye clapped him on the shoulder and smiled. "May the gods go with you on the morrow, Snow. You bring back Benjen, you hear." Torsten couldn't help but smile.

"I will." He promised.

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