A Game of Thrones 4-Book Bundle

the men and fodder for the horses. I’ll
see Qhorin at once.”
    â€œI’ll bring him, my lord.” The men from the Shadow Tower had been expected
days ago. When they had not appeared, the brothers had begun to wonder. Jon had
heard gloomy mutterings around the cookfire, and not just from Dolorous Edd.
Ser Ottyn Wythers was for retreating to Castle Black as soon as possible. Ser
Mallador Locke would strike for the Shadow Tower, hoping to pick up Qhorin’s
trail and learn what had befallen him. And Thoren Smallwood wanted to push on
into the mountains. “Mance Rayder knows he must battle the Watch,” Thoren had
declared, “but he will never look for us so far north. If we ride up the
Milkwater, we can take him unawares and cut his host to ribbons before he knows
we are on him.”
    â€œThe numbers would be greatly against us,” Ser Ottyn had objected. “Craster
said he was gathering a great host. Many thousands. Without Qhorin, we are only
two hundred.”
    â€œSend two hundred wolves against ten thousand sheep, ser, and see what
happens,” said Smallwood confidently.
    â€œThere are goats among these sheep, Thoren,” warned Jarman Buckwell. “Aye,
and maybe a few lions. Rattleshirt, Harma the Dogshead, Alfyn
Crowkiller . . .”
    â€œI know them as well as you do, Buckwell,” Thoren Smallwood snapped
back. “And I mean to have their heads, every one. These are
wildlings.
No soldiers. A few hundred heroes, drunk most like, amidst a
great horde of women, children, and thralls. We will sweep over them and send
them howling back to their hovels.”
    They had argued for many hours, and reached no agreement. The Old Bear was too
stubborn to retreat, but neither would he rush headlong up the Milkwater,
seeking battle. In the end, nothing had been decided but to wait a few more
days for the men from the Shadow Tower, and talk again if they did not
appear.
    And now they had, which meant that the decision could be delayed no longer. Jon
was glad of that much, at least. If they must battle Mance Rayder, let it be
soon.
    He found Dolorous Edd at the fire, complaining about how difficult it was for
him to sleep when people insisted on blowing horns in the woods. Jon gave him
something new to complain about. Together they woke Hake, who received the Lord
Commander’s orders with a stream of curses, but got up all the same and soon
had a dozen brothers cutting roots for a soup.
    Sam came puffing up as Jon crossed the camp. Under the black hood his face was
as pale and round as the moon. “I heard the horn. Has your uncle come
back?”
    â€œIt’s only the men from the Shadow Tower.” It was growing harder to cling to
the hope of Benjen Stark’s safe return. The cloak he had found beneath the Fist
could well have belonged to his uncle or one of his men, even the Old Bear
admitted as much,

though why they would have buried it there, wrapped around the cache of
dragonglass, no one could say. “Sam, I have to go.”
    At the ringwall, he found the guards sliding spikes from the half-frozen earth
to make an opening. It was not long until the first of the brothers from the
Shadow Tower began wending their way up the slope. All in leather and fur they
were, with here and there a bit of steel or bronze; heavy beards covered hard
lean faces, and made them look as shaggy as their garrons. Jon was surprised to
see some of them were riding two to a horse. When he looked more closely, it
was plain that many of them were wounded.
There has been trouble on the
way.
    Jon knew Qhorin Halfhand the instant he saw him, though they had never met. The
big ranger was half a legend in the Watch; a man of slow words and swift
action, tall and straight as a spear, long-limbed and solemn. Unlike his men,
he was clean-shaven. His hair fell from beneath his helm in a heavy braid
touched with hoarfrost, and the blacks he wore were so faded they might have
been greys. Only thumb and forefinger remained on the hand that held the reins;
the other fingers had been sheared off catching a wildling’s axe that would
otherwise have split his skull. It was told that he had thrust his maimed fist
into the face of the axeman so the blood spurted into his eyes, and slew him
while he was blind. Since that day, the wildlings beyond the Wall had known no
foe more implacable.
    Jon hailed him. “Lord