A Feast for Dragons

beneath a silver drinking cup that had once been Donal Noye’s. The
one-armed smith had left few personal effects: the cup, six pennies and a
copper star, a niello brooch with a broken clasp, a musty brocade doublet that
bore the stag of Storm’s End.
His treasures were his tools, and the
swords and knives he made. His life was at the forge
. Jon moved the
cup aside and read the parchment once again.
If I put my seal to this, I
will forever be remembered as the lord commander who gave away the Wall
,
he thought,
but if I should refuse …
    Stannis Baratheon was proving to be a prickly guest, and a
restless one. He had ridden down the kingsroad almost as far as Queenscrown,
prowled through the empty hovels of Mole’s Town, inspected the ruined forts at
Queensgate and Oakenshield. Each night he walked atop the Wall with Lady
Melisandre, and during the days he visited the stockades, picking captives out
for the red woman to question.
He does not like to be balked
.
This would not be a pleasant morning, Jon feared.
    From the armory came a clatter of shields and swords, as the
latest lot of boys and raw recruits armed themselves. He could hear the voice
of Iron Emmett telling them to be quick about it. Cotter Pyke had not been
pleased to lose him, but the young ranger had a gift for training men.
He
loves to fight, and he’ll teach his boys to love it too
. Or so he
hoped.
    Jon’s cloak hung on a peg by the door, his sword belt on
another. He donned them both and made his way to the armory. The rug where
Ghost slept was empty, he saw. Two guardsmen stood inside the doors, clad in
black cloaks and iron halfhelms, spears in their hands. “Will m’lord be wanting
a tail?” asked Garse.
    “I think I can find the King’s Tower by myself.” Jon hated
having guards trailing after him everywhere he went. It made him feel like a
mother duck leading a procession of ducklings.
    Iron Emmett’s lads were well at it in the yard, blunted
swords slamming into shields and ringing against one another. Jon stopped to
watch a moment as Horse pressed Hop-Robin back toward the well. Horse had the
makings of a good fighter, he decided. He was strong and getting stronger, and
his instincts were sound. Hop-Robin was another tale. His clubfoot was bad
enough, but he was afraid of getting hit as well.
Perhaps we can make a
steward of him
. The fight ended abruptly, with Hop-Robin on the
ground.
    “Well fought,” Jon said to Horse, “but you drop your shield
too low when pressing an attack. You will want to correct that, or it is like
to get you killed.”
    “Yes, m’lord. I’ll keep it higher next time.” Horse pulled
Hop-Robin to his feet, and the smaller boy made a clumsy bow.
    A few of Stannis’s knights were sparring on the far side of
the yard.
King’s men in one corner and queen’s men in another
,
Jon did not fail to note,
but only a few. It’s too cold for most of them
.
As he strode past them, a booming voice called after him. “BOY! YOU THERE!
BOY!”
    Boy
was not the worst of the things that Jon
Snow had been called since being chosen lord commander. He ignored it.
    “
Snow
,” the voice insisted, “
Lord
Commander
.”
    This time he stopped. “Ser?”
    The knight overtopped him by six inches. “A man who bears
Valyrian steel should use it for more than scratching his arse.”
    Jon had seen this one about the castle—a knight of great
renown, to hear him tell it. During the battle beneath the Wall, Ser Godry
Farring had slain a fleeing giant, pounding after him on horseback and driving
a lance through his back, then dismounting to hack off the creature’s pitiful
small head. The queen’s men had taken to calling him Godry the Giantslayer.
    Jon remembered Ygritte, crying.
I am the last of the
giants
. “I use Longclaw when I must, ser.”
    “How well, though?” Ser Godry drew his own blade. “Show us.
I promise not to hurt you, lad.”
    How kind of you
. “Some other time, ser. I
fear that I have other duties just now.”
    “You fear. I see that.” Ser Godry grinned at his friends.
“He fears,” he repeated, for the slow ones.
    “You will excuse me.” Jon showed them his back.
    Castle Black seemed a bleak and forlorn place in the pale
dawn light.
My command
, Jon Snow reflected ruefully,
as
much a ruin as it is a stronghold
. The Lord Commander’s Tower was a
shell, the Common Hall a pile of blackened timbers, and Hardin’s Tower looked
as if the next gust of wind would knock it