A Game of Thrones 4-Book Bundle

circled the pool, sniffed at her. The tall woman flinched.
    â€œSummer, to me,” Bran called. The direwolf took one final sniff, spun, and bounded back. Bran wrapped his arms around him. “What are
you
doing here?” He had not seen Osha since they’d taken her captive in the wolfswood, though he knew she’d been set to working in the kitchens.
    â€œThey are my gods too,” Osha said. “Beyond the Wall, they are the only gods.” Her hair was growing out, brown and shaggy. It made her look more womanly, that and the simple dress of brown roughspun they’d given her when they took her mail and leather. “Gage lets me have my prayers from time to time, when I feel the need, and I let him do as he likes under my skirt, when he feels the need. It’s nothing to me. I like the smell of flour on his hands, and he’s gentler than Stiv.” She gave an awkward bow. “I’ll leave you. There’s pots that want scouring.”
    â€œNo, stay,” Bran commanded her. “Tell me what you meant, about hearing the gods.”
    Osha studied him. “You asked them and they’re answering. Open your ears, listen, you’ll hear.”
    Bran listened. “It’s only the wind,” he said after a moment, uncertain. “The leaves are rustling.”
    â€œWho do you think sends the wind, if not the gods?” She seated herself across the pool from him, clinking faintly as she moved. Mikken had fixed iron manacles to her ankles, with a heavy chain between them; she could walk, so long as she kept her strides small, but there was no way for her to run, or climb, or mount a horse. “They see you, boy. They hear you talking. That rustling, that’s them talking back.”
    â€œWhat are they saying?”
    â€œThey’re sad. Your lord brother will get no help from them, not where he’s going. The old gods have no powerin the south. The weirwoods there were all cut down, thousands of years ago. How can they watch your brother when they have no eyes?”
    Bran had not thought of that. It frightened him. If even the gods could not help his brother, what hope was there? Maybe Osha wasn’t hearing them right. He cocked his head and tried to listen again. He thought he could hear the sadness now, but nothing more than that.
    The rustling grew louder. Bran heard muffled footfalls and a low humming, and Hodor came blundering out of the trees, naked and smiling. “Hodor!”
    â€œHe must have heard our voices,” Bran said. “Hodor, you forgot your clothes.”
    â€œHodor,” Hodor agreed. He was dripping wet from the neck down, steaming in the chill air. His body was covered with brown hair, thick as a pelt. Between his legs, his manhood swung long and heavy.
    Osha eyed him with a sour smile. “Now there’s a big man,” she said. “He has giant’s blood in him, or I’m the queen.”
    â€œMaester Luwin says there are no more giants. He says they’re all dead, like the children of the forest. All that’s left of them are old bones in the earth that men turn up with plows from time to time.”
    â€œLet Maester Luwin ride beyond the Wall,” Osha said. “He’ll find giants then, or they’ll find him. My brother killed one. Ten foot tall she was, and stunted at that. They’ve been known to grow big as twelve and thirteen feet. Fierce things they are too, all hair and teeth, and the wives have beards like their husbands, so there’s no telling them apart. The women take human men for lovers, and it’s from them the half bloods come. It goes harder on the women they catch. The men are so big they’ll rip a maid apart before they get her with child.” She grinned at him. “But you don’t know what I mean, do you, boy?”
    â€œYes I do,” Bran insisted. He understood about mating; he had seen dogs in the yard, and watched a stallion mount a mare. But talking about it made him uncomfortable. He looked at Hodor. “Go back and bring your clothes, Hodor,” he said. “Go dress.”
    â€œHodor.” He walked back the way he had come, ducking under a low-hanging tree limb.
    He
was
awfully big, Bran thought as he watched himgo. “Are there truly giants beyond the Wall?” he asked Osha, uncertainly.
    â€œGiants and worse than giants, Lordling. I tried to tell your brother when he asked his questions, him and your