“Ghost,” he called softly, “to me.” And the wolf was there, eyes like embers.
“Jon, please. You must not do this.”
He mounted, the reins in his hand, and wheeled the horse around to face the night. Samwell Tarlystood in the stable door, a full moon peering over his shoulder. He threw a giant’s shadow, immenseand black. “Get out of my way, Sam.”
“Jon, you can’t,” Sam said. “I won’t let you.”
“I would sooner not hurt you,” Jon told him. “Move aside, Sam, or I’ll ride you down.”
“You won’t. You have to listen to me. Please …”
Jon put his spurs to horseflesh, and the mare bolted for the door. For an instant Sam stood hisground, his face as round and pale as the moon behind him, his mouth a widening O of surprise. Atthe last moment, when they were almost on him, he jumped aside as Jon had known he would,stumbled, and fell. The mare leapt over him, out into the night.
Jon raised the hood of his heavy cloak and gave the horse her head. Castle Black was silent and stillas he rode out, with Ghost racing at his side. Men watched from the Wall behind him, he knew, buttheir eyes were turned north, not south. No one would see him go, no one but Sam Tarly, strugglingback to his feet in the dust of the old stables. He hoped Sam hadn’t hurt himself, falling like that. Hewas so heavy and so ungainly, it would be just like him to break a wrist or twist his ankle getting outof the way. “I warned him,” Jon said aloud. “It was nothing to do with him, anyway.” He flexed hisburned hand as he rode, opening and closing the scarred fingers. They still pained him, but it felt goodto have the wrappings off.
Moonlight silvered the hills as he followed the twisting ribbon of the kingsroad. He needed to getas far from the Wall as he could before they realized he was gone. On the morrow he would leave theroad and strike out overland through field and bush and stream to throw off pursuit, but for themoment speed was more important than deception. It was not as though they would not guess wherehe was going.
The Old Bear was accustomed to rise at first light, so Jon had until dawn to put as many leagues ashe could between him and the Wall … if Sam Tarly did not betray him. The fat boy was dutiful andeasily frightened, but he loved Jon like a brother. If questioned, Sam would doubtless tell them thetruth, but Jon could not imagine him braving the guards in front of the King’s Tower to wakeMormont from sleep.
When Jon did not appear to fetch the Old Bear’s breakfast from the kitchen, they’d look in his celland find Longclaw on the bed. It had been hard to abandon it, but Jon was not so lost to honor as totake it with him. Even Jorah Mormont had not done that, when he fled in disgrace. Doubtless LordMormont would find someone more worthy of the blade. Jon felt bad when he thought of the old man.
He knew his desertion would be salt in the still-raw wound of his son’s disgrace. That seemed a poorway to repay him for his trust, but it couldn’t be helped. No matter what he did, Jon felt as though hewere betraying someone.
Even now, he did not know if he was doing the honorable thing. The southron had it easier. They had their septons to talk to, someone to tell them the gods’ will and help sort out right from wrong.
But the Starks worshiped the old gods, the nameless gods, and if the heart trees heard, they did notspeak.
tspeak.
When the last lights of Castle Black vanished behind him, Jon slowed his mare to a walk. He had along journey ahead and only the one horse to see him through. There were holdfasts and farmingvillages along the road south where he might be able to trade the mare for a fresh mount when heneeded one, but not if she were injured or blown.
He would need to find new clothes soon; most like, he’d need to steal them. He was clad in blackfrom head to heel; high leather riding boots, roughspun breeches and tunic, sleeveless leather jerkin,and heavy wool cloak. His longsword and dagger were sheathed in black moleskin, and the hauberkand coif in his saddlebag were black ringmail. Any bit of it could mean his death if he were taken. Astranger wearing black was viewed with cold suspicion in every village and holdfast north of theNeck, and men would soon be watching for him. Once Maester Aemon’s ravens took flight, Jon knewhe would find no safe haven. Not even at Winterfell. Bran might want to let him in, but MaesterLuwin had better sense. He would bar the gates and send Jon away, as he should. Better not to callthere at all.
Yet he saw the castle clear in his mind’s eye, as if he had left it only yesterday; the towering granitewalls, the Great Hall with its smells of smoke and dog and roasting meat, his father’s solar, the turretroom where he had slept. Part of him wanted nothing so much as to hear Bran laugh again, to sup onone of Gage’s beef-and-bacon pies, to listen to Old Nan tell her tales of the children of the forest andFlorian the Fool.
But he had not left the Wall for that; he had left because he was after all his father’s son, andRobb’s brother. The gift of a sword, even a sword as fine as Longclaw, did not make him a Mormont.
Nor was he Aemon Targaryen. Three times the old man had chosen, and three times he had chosenhonor, but that was him. Even now, Jon could not decide whether the maester had stayed because hewas weak and craven, or because he was strong and true. Yet he understood what the old man hadmeant, about the pain of choosing; he understood that all too well.
Tyrion Lannister had claimed that most men would rather deny a hard truth than face it, but Jonwas done with denials. He was who he was; Jon Snow, bastard and oathbreaker, motherless,friendless, and damned. For the rest of his life—however long that might be—he would becondemned to be an outsider, the silent man standing in the shadows who dares not speak his truename. Wherever he might go throughout the Seven Kingdoms, he would need to live a lie, lest everyman’s hand be raised against him. But it made no matter, so long as he lived long enough to take hisplace by his brother’s side and help avenge his father.
He remembered Robb as he had last seen him, standing in the yard with snow melting in his auburnhair. Jon would have to come to him in secret, disguised. He tried to imagine the look on Robb’s facewhen he revealed himself. His brother would shake his head and smile, and he’d say … he’d say …He could not see the smile. Hard as he tried, he could not see it. He found himself thinking of thedeserter his father had beheaded the day they’d found the direwolves. “You said the words,” LordEddard had told him. “You took a vow, before your brothers, before the old gods and the new.”
Desmond and Fat Tom had dragged the man to the stump. Bran’s eyes had been wide as saucers, andJon had to remind him to keep his pony in hand. He remembered the look on Father’s face whenTheon Greyjoy brought forth Ice, the spray of blood on the snow, the way Theon had kicked the headwhen it came rolling at his feet.
He wondered what Lord Eddard might have done if the deserter had been his brother Benjeninstead of that ragged stranger. Would it have been any different? It must, surely, surely … and Robbwould welcome him, for a certainty. He had to, or else …It did not bear thinking about. Pain throbbed, deep in his fingers, as he clutched the reins. Jon puthis heels into his horse and broke into a gallop, racing down the kingsroad, as if to outrun his doubts.
Jon was not afraid of death, but he did not want to die like that, trussed and bound and beheaded like acommon brigand. If he must perish, let it be with a sword in his hand, fighting his father’s killers. Hewas no true Stark, had never been one … but he could die like one. Let them say that Eddard Starkhad fathered four sons, not three.
Ghost kept pace with them for almost half a mile, red tongue lolling from his mouth. Man andhorse alike lowered their heads as he asked the mare for more speed. The wolf slowed, stopped, watching, his eyes glowing red in the moonlight. He vanished behind, but Jon knew he wouldfollow, at his own pace.
dfollow, at his own pace.
Scattered lights flickered through the trees ahead of him, on both sides of the road: Mole’s Town. Adog barked as he rode through, and he heard a mule’s raucous haw from the stable, but otherwise thevillage was still. Here and there the glow of hearth fires shone through shuttered windows, leakingbetween wooden slats, but only a few.
Mole’s Town was bigger than it seemed, but three quarters of it was under the ground, in deepwarm cellars connected by a maze of tunnels. Even the whorehouse was down there, nothing on thesurface but a wooden shack no bigger than a privy, with a red lantern hung over the door. On theWall, he’d heard men call the whores “buried treasures.” He wondered whether any of his brothers inblack were down there tonight, mining. That was oathbreaking too, yet no one seemed to care.
Not until he was well beyond the village did Jon slow again. By then both he and the mare weredamp with sweat. He dismounted, shivering, his burned hand aching. A bank of melting snow layunder the trees, bright in the moonlight, water trickling off to form small shallow pools. Jon squattedand brought his hands together, cupping the runoff between his fingers. The snowmelt was icy cold.
He drank, and splashed some on his face, until his cheeks tingled. His fingers were throbbing worsethan they had in days, and his head was pounding too. I am doing the right thing, he told himself, sowhy do I feel so bad?
The horse was well lathered, so Jon took the lead and walked her for a while. The road wasscarcely wide enough for two riders to pass abreast, its surface cut by tiny streams and littered withstone. That run had been truly stupid, an invitation to a broken neck. Jon wondered what had gotteninto him. Was he in such a great rush to die?
Off in the trees, the distant scream of some frightened animal made him look up. His marewhinnied nervously. Had his wolf found some prey? He cupped his hands around his mouth.
“Ghost!” he shouted. “Ghost, to me.” The only answer was a rush of wings behind him as an owltook flight.
Frowning, Jon continued on his way. He led the mare for half an hour, until she was dry. Ghost didnot appear. Jon wanted to mount up and ride again, but he was concerned about his missing wolf.
“Ghost,” he called again. “Where are you? To me! Ghost!” Nothing in these woods could trouble adirewolf, even a half-grown direwolf, unless … no, Ghost was too smart to attack a bear, and if therewas a wolf pack anywhere close Jon would have surely heard them howling.
He should eat, he decided. Food would settle his stomach and give Ghost the chance to catch up.
There was no danger yet; Castle Black still slept. In his saddlebag, he found a biscuit, a piece ofcheese, and a small withered brown apple. He’d brought salt beef as well, and a rasher of bacon he’dfilched from the kitchens, but he would save the meat for the morrow. After it was gone he’d need tohunt, and that would slow him.
Jon sat under the trees and ate his biscuit and cheese while his mare grazed along the kingsroad. Hekept the apple for last. It had gone a little soft, but the flesh was still tart and juicy. He was down tothe core when he heard the sounds: horses, and from the north. Quickly Jon leapt up and strode to hismare. Could he outrun them? No, they were too close, they’d hear him for a certainty, and if theywere from Castle Black …He led the mare off the road, behind a thick stand of grey-green sentinels. “Quiet now,” he said in ahushed voice, crouching down to peer through the branches. If the gods were kind, the riders wouldpass by. Likely as not, they were only smallfolk from Mole’s Town, farmers on their way to theirfields, although what they were doing out in the middle of the night …He listened to the sound of hooves growing steadily louder as they trotted briskly down thekingsroad. From the sound, there were five or six of them at the least. Their voices drifted through thetrees.
“… certain he came this way?”
“We can’t be certain.”
“He could have ridden east, for all you know. Or left the road to cut through the woods. That’swhat I’d do.”
“In the dark? Stupid. If you didn’t fall off your horse and break your neck, you’d get lost andwind up back at the Wall when the sun came up.”
“I would not.” Grenn sounded peeved. “I’d just ride south, you can tell south by the stars.”
“What if the sky was cloudy?” Pyp asked.
“Then I wouldn’t go.”
Another voice broke in. “You know where I’d be if it was me? I’d be in Mole’s Town, digging forburied treasure.” Toad’s shrill laughter boomed through the trees. Jon’s mare snorted.
“Keep quiet, all of you,” Halder said. “I thought I heard something.”
“Where? I didn’t hear anything.” The horses stopped.
“You can’t hear yourself fart.”
“I can too,” Grenn insisted.
“Quiet!”
They all fell silent, listening. Jon found himself holding his breath. Sam, he thought. He hadn’tgone to the Old Bear, but he hadn’t gone to bed either, he’d woken the other boys. Damn them all.
Come dawn, if they were not in their beds, they’d be named deserters too. What did they think theywere doing?
The hushed silence seemed to stretch on and on. From where Jon crouched, he could see the legs oftheir horses through the branches. Finally Pyp spoke up. “What did you hear?”
“I don’t know,” Halder admitted. “A sound, I thought it might have been a horse but …”
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