A Game of Thrones 4-Book Bundle

would.”
    Dolorous Edd Tollett gave a sigh. “When I was a lad, we only ate mice on special feast days. I was the youngest, so I always got the tail. There’s no meat on the tail.”
    â€œWhere's your longbow, Sam?” asked Grenn. Ser Alliser used to call him
Aurochs,
and every day he seemed to grow into the name a little more. He had come to the Wall big but slow, thick of neck, thick of waist, red of face, and clumsy. Though his neck still reddened when Pyp twisted him around into some folly, hours of work with sword and shield had flattened his belly, hardened his arms, broadened his chest. He was
strong,
and shaggy as an aurochs too. “Ulmer was expecting you at the butts.”
    â€œUlmer,” Sam said, abashed. Almost the first thing Jon Snow had done as Lord Commander was institute daily archery drill for the entire garrison, even stewards and cooks. The Watch had been placing too much emphasis on the sword and too little on the bow, he had said, a relic of the days when one brother in every ten had been a knight, instead of one in every hundred. Sam saw the sense in the decree, but he hated longbow practice almost as much as he hated climbing steps. When he wore his gloves he could never hit anything, but when he took them off he got blisters on his fingers. Those bows were
dangerous.
Satin had torn off half his thumbnail on a bowstring. “I forgot.”
    â€œYou broke the heart of the wildling princess, Slayer,” said Pyp. Of late, Val had taken to watching them from the window of her chamber in the King’s Tower. “She was looking for you.”
    â€œShe was not! Don’t say that!” Sam had only spoken to Val twice, when Maester Aemon called upon her to make sure the babes were healthy. The princess was so pretty that he oft found himself stammering and blushing in her presence.
    â€œWhy not?” asked Pyp. “She wants to have your children. Maybe we should call you Sam the Seducer.”
    Sam reddened. King Stannis had plans for Val, he knew; she was the mortar with which he meant to seal the peace between the northmen and the free folk. “I don’t have time for archery today, I need to go see Jon.”
    â€œJon? Jon? Do we know anyone named Jon, Grenn?”
    â€œHe means the Lord Commander.”
    â€œ
Ohhh.
The Great Lord Snow. To be sure. Why do you want to see him? He can’t even wiggle his ears.” Pyp wiggled his, to show he could. They were large ears, and red from cold. “He’s
Lord
Snow for true now, too bloody highborn for the likes of us.”
    â€œJon has duties,” Sam said in his defense. “The Wall is his, and all that goes with it.”
    â€œA man has duties to his friends as well. If not for us, Janos Slynt might be our lord commander. Lord Janos would have sent Snow ranging naked on a mule. ‘Scamper on up to Craster’s Keep,’ he would have said, ‘and fetch me back the Old Bear’s cloak and boots.’ We saved him from that, but now he has too many
duties
to drink a cup of mulled wine by the fire?”
    Grenn agreed. “His duties don’t keep him from the yard. More days than not, he’s out there fighting someone.”
    That was true, Sam had to admit. Once, when Jon came to consult with Maester Aemon, Sam had asked him why he spent so much time at swordplay. “The Old Bear never trained much when he was Lord Commander,” he had pointed out. In answer, Jon had pressed Longclaw into Sam’s hand. He let him feel the lightness, the balance, had him turn the blade so that ripples gleamed in the smoke-dark metal. “Valyrian steel,” he said, “spell-forged and razor-sharp, nigh on indestructible. A swordsman should be as good as his sword, Sam. Longclaw is Valyrian steel, but I’m not. The Halfhand could have killed me as easy as you swat a bug.”
    Sam handed back the sword. “When I try to swat a bug, it always flies away. All I do is slap my arm. It stings.”
    That made Jon laugh. “As you will. Qhorin could have killed me as easy as you eat a bowl of porridge.” Sam was fond of porridge, especially when it was sweetened with honey.
    â€œI don’t have time for this.” Sam left his friends and made his way toward the armory, clutching his books to his chest.
I am the shield that guards the realms of men,
he remembered. He wondered what those men would say if they realized their realms were