The stableman's wife came after the last lord had ridden out. Catelyn saw her waiting beneath the gallery while the guest yard emptied around her. She wore a brown cloak mended at both elbows and held a good wool cap between hands roughened by lye. A raw-boned boy stood at her shoulder. He had combed his hair with water; it was already drying into dark spikes. Behind them, a Manderly wagon groaned through the gate. Two Karstark men shouted for a missing saddlecloth. Servants carried rolled pallets from the guest range, and Robb struck a leather ball against the wall until Cley's departing voice called one final insult from beneath the arch. "You are Alasdair's mother?" Catelyn asked.
The woman dipped her head. "Mara, my lady. His father kept the stable at the Brown Tankard until Master Harclay took him for the south teams."
Alasdair bowed late and too deeply. He was twelve, perhaps, all wrist and knee, with a rope burn crossing one palm. Catelyn asked what he had learnt in the stables since taking Jon's badge. "I can saddle, curry, and mend common tack. I know most lame steps upon level ground, read short words, and reckon feed for six horses."
"Four," Mara corrected. The boy's ears reddened, but he lowered his claim.
Catelyn looked from the boy to his mother. "What brings you here, Mara?"
Mara twisted the cap once. "Work for me, my lady. The innkeeper has put his cousins in the stable while my husband is away. They say I may keep the loft if I wash for the inn, but most of the washing wage goes in rent. My son gives me what he can. He cannot keep us both."
Catelyn asked what Harclay owed. "The last moon's silver and a share of barley," Mara said. Alasdair counted the weeks since his father left. The first month had been paid on the road; nothing had come home since.
"The keeper says payment waits until the teams return," Mara added. Her fingers tightened upon the cap. Alasdair looked towards the gate.
A broken axle could delay the teams for a fortnight. Mara still had to pay for her loft. Catelyn had watched her father hear enough of these quarrels at Riverrun; by the time a carter returned, the wife might have pawned everything she could spare. She sent for Harclay's keeper, who had come below the winter town to meet the north wagons.
While they waited, Alasdair watched the yard. Jon was speaking with Oren beside a pile of split shovel hafts, his wrapped hand tucked beneath his arm. "Lord Black means to have a house below the walls," Mara said. "There might be washing there."
"When it is built," Catelyn said. "For now his men sleep here."
Mara lowered her eyes. Catelyn gave her three days washing the bedding from the guest range at the common wage, with her bed still at the Tankard. "Poole will speak to the innkeeper. You will not lose the loft while this debt is heard. Alasdair may help Hullen clear the guest stable when Heward releases him from drill."
The boy asked whether the stable work carried pay. "For work beyond your lord's service," Catelyn said. "Hullen will keep the count. You will not miss the yard to earn another penny."
Mara made a small sound of disbelief.
The leather ball struck a gallery post, sprang past Robb, and rolled to Alasdair's boot. "Throw!" Robb called.
Alasdair sent it back in a hard, level cast. Robb caught it against his chest and laughed. "You have an arm. Come down."
Alasdair looked at Catelyn. She shook her head. "Wait here." Harclay's keeper arrived before the game ended, with two teamsters and his half of a tally stick. Catelyn received him in the lower hall. Poole sat beside her with an ink horn. Mara remained near the door, Alasdair on a low stool at her side.
"Paid through the first moon," the keeper said. He put one thick finger upon a split notch. "There."
Poole turned the wood. Beside the divided cut, another notch remained whole. "This marks a second moon."
"The teams have not come home. Drivers take part of their silver upon return, when lost feed, harness, and road damage are known."
"Was he hired for the second moon?" Catelyn asked.
"Aye, my lady. But road damage may be owed against it."
"Bring that claim when you know it. Who witnessed the hiring?"
One teamster raised his hand. "I loaded barley beside him. Harclay promised the second moon at the east bridge."
The other had heard the same hiring and the promise of barley when they came north again.
"How much barley?" Poole asked. The men disagreed. One remembered a sack. The other remembered a half-sack for each driver and a full one for the master carter. The keeper declared that memory always grew when grain changed hands.
Mara tightened her grip on the cap. Catelyn turned the tally towards Poole.
"Poole, advance her the unpaid moon and half a sack of barley. Deduct it from Harclay's next carriage payment." Catelyn turned to the keeper. "Tell him to bring the reckoning when he returns. Any claim against the driver can be heard then."
The keeper bowed. Poole counted out the silver and entered it against Harclay's name.
Mara counted the coins twice. She thanked Catelyn, then Poole and each teamster who had spoken for her. The keeper gathered his tally and left. Catelyn saw the worn leather beneath Alasdair's stool and turned to Poole. "House Black's cobbler must mend those shoes."
"He will outgrow them by winter."
"Then he must leave room for the boy to grow." Mara's mouth softened into a brief smile. With Heward's leave, Alasdair earned three extra coppers in the guest stable. A Manderly mare had returned under a groom after balking beneath the south arch. Sweat blackened one shoulder while the other had dried. The groom claimed the animal was stubborn.
Alasdair laid a hand under the saddlecloth. "There is something folded here."
The groom began to object, but Hullen had heard. He lifted the saddle and found the felt pad doubled beneath the near side. The skin below was hot and swollen.
"No saddle until that has eased," Hullen said. "Wash the pad and lay it flat to dry." He gave Alasdair the halter. "Take her inside."
The missing Manderly cup was found after dinner because Catelyn asked a different question. An under-steward had searched the rush baskets, the laundry bundles, and the sleeping places of every low hand who had served the guest range. By the time she reached him, a kitchen girl was crying and Alasdair stood with both fists shut. "We touched no silver," the boy said.
"The cup must be found," the under-steward said, lifting another bundle from Mara's basket.
Catelyn looked at the stripped bed, then at the feather mattress still resting upon its ropes. "Has that been lifted?"
"The maids removed the linens."
"I asked about the mattress." Alasdair and another stable boy raised one side. Beneath a folded blanket, caught between rope webbing and carved rail, the silver cup flashed in the lamplight.
The under-steward pulled it free. Catelyn looked at the emptied baskets. "Have those put back. Tell the women we found it."
When Sansa saw the recovered cup, she remembered the game: Wylla Manderly had hidden it as treasure for the wooden bear. Catelyn sent her to tell the frightened kitchen girl what had happened, then had her write to Wylla. The cup went east with the letter in a servant's keeping. Outside the stable, Mara met Alasdair with the barley beneath one arm. He put his three coppers into her free hand.
* * *
Arthur put Robb on his back before the next dinner bell. Wind chased straw beneath the eastern arches. Theon lounged upon the mounting rail and declared himself too old for children's drills while watching every pass. Ser Rodrik stood with folded arms. Eddard had come from the small hall and stopped beneath the gallery without announcing himself. Robb struck high with an ash sword. Arthur stepped through the reach and touched a willow wand behind his knee. The movement barely stirred his black hair; Robb had spent twice the effort only lifting the ash sword. Robb's legs went away. He caught himself upon one hand and rolled. "Dead," Theon said.
Robb rose. "He has a stick."
"He has had more practice," Rodrik said.
"Again."
Arthur beckoned Jon forward. Jon tucked his wrapped hand against his belt and took the ash sword in his left. He advanced before Robb could finish describing the trick.
Arthur offered the same shoulder. Jon held the centre and waited. The wand slipped beneath his blade and tapped his chest.
"Dead," Theon said. "A smaller corpse, but very lordly."
"You waited too long," Arthur told Jon. He made the movement again, slowly. "His heel tells you he can turn. Strike before he does."
Jon tried it with Robb. His brother offered the same feint, and this time Jon's point caught him beneath the ribs. Robb looked down at it.
"Domeric showed you."
"He showed both of us." Jon returned the sword to Arthur.
Eddard stepped into the yard. "You have lost a pin from that bandage."
Jon looked down. The linen had worked loose at the base of his thumb. He held it out for Eddard to see.
Eddard took him towards the covered stair while Rodrik set Robb to footwork. Jon glanced at the loosened fold.
"You saw that from the gallery?"
"You have been tugging at it since I came out."
Jon tucked the loose end beneath his finger so it would not catch again. He climbed the stair beside Eddard. The riders seeking Edden returned while Wylla changed the linen. One had followed the northern road past the steaming pools; the other had searched the south camps until departing wheels had made three tracks of every one. Neither had found the boy or his mother.
Robb waited for Jon outside. They went down to the gate together to ask for news.
"Has anyone brought word of Edden?" Robb asked.
The clerk shook his head.
Jon stayed beside the gate while Robb stopped the next wagoner to ask whether he had seen a boy in a blue-patched coat. He had not.
At the family table Arya threw peas until her nurse carried her away. Bran slept through the fish course and woke crying for milk. Sansa earned stewed plums by keeping her hands clean, then tried to save the largest for Jeyne, who had been sent to eat with her father. Catelyn had a small dish fetched for it.
"She may have it tomorrow," she said. "Eat yours before it cools."
Robb had Cley's wooden ball beneath his chair. He rolled it from one foot to the other while Eddard cut through the crisp skin of a trout. With the guest benches empty, the small sounds carried farther: Sansa scraping her spoon, the click of Arthur's cup, rain beginning against the shutter. Jon could hear the great hall being swept beyond the passage.
"Cley says his father will let him come back when the hay is in," Robb said.
"His father said we would discuss it," Catelyn answered. "That is not quite the same thing."
Robb caught the ball between his heels. "Could we ask him?"
"When Lord Cerwyn writes." She moved the platter nearer Eddard without looking at Jon. "You may put a letter of your own with mine."
Jon took a piece of fish and worked the bones free against the edge of his trencher. Robb nudged the ball beneath his boot, wanting it held still while he reached for bread. After a while he began moving a crust round the edge of his bowl.
"Will the riders look again tomorrow?"
"Jory has left word at the inns," Eddard said. "They know to send here if he comes."
Eddard put down his bread. "Your lady mother found work for Alasdair's mother today. His father is with Harclay's wagons, and she has been waiting for wages."
"She will have them," Catelyn said. "Poole has the keeper's tally."
Robb looked at her. "Did she ask?"
"She came to the gallery with her son." Catelyn glanced towards Jon. "There will be more of them when word of the new house spreads. Know what you offer before you call them."
"The household will have its own roof," Jon said. "Heward wants room to drill all four files without waiting for Ser Rodrik's men to clear the yard."
Arthur leaned forward. "Give him room, then. And hear what he needs before you set the armoury door."
"He walks the ground with us," Jon said.
Wylla reached for the house drawing beside Poole's book. "And Elspeth wants to see this kitchen before you put a wall through her pantry."
"You have both altered it already."
"She has altered her half. I have not begun." Wylla spread it between them and pointed to the sickroom doorway. "A fevered boy comes in from the yard. I should be able to bring him straight off the stair, not carry him through the upper rooms."
Catelyn moved her wine out of the drawing's path. "Nor should Elspeth leave my kitchen without training the woman who takes her place."
"I will speak to you before I hire her." Jon kept the drawing where both women could see it. Elspeth was in Lady Stark's service; that leave was hers to give. He would respect it without asking her to approve the house itself.
"See that you do." She called Robb back to his chair when he climbed onto the bench to look. Wylla left the drawing where he could see it.
They moved the sickroom entrance on the plan before Wylla folded it away. Jon finished his supper while Poole asked Woods about the extra doorway posts. The next packet from Dragonstone came with a White Harbor trader: six lines in Ethan's hand and a broken harbour link wrapped in sailcloth. A tide had torn the western capstan loose. Tobin closed the damaged berth, called Ethan down and had masons reset its bed before another ship used it.
Jon turned the orange-scaled link while Eddard read the letter. "Tobin did well," Jon said. "Tell him he may close a damaged berth at once. He is to let Ethan know what men and stone he needs, as he did here."
Black showed beneath the rust where the iron had opened. "Tell Ethan to include the repair in his next account. I want Tobin's drawing of the new capstan bed as well."
Luwin drew the ink nearer. "Anything else?"
"The old harvest and harbour returns. Bad years as well as good."
Jon took a quill from Luwin. It sat poorly between his bandaged fingers, so he used his left hand. The letters came large and uneven. Eddard waited until he had finished, then passed him the wax.
* * *
Twelve days after the feast, Lord Wyman returned to settle the carving and bring his earnest. Jon's invitation had caught him visiting Castle Cerwyn. Wylis and Wendel rode beside the litter as it came into the ward. Pate's bell began to strike nine above them. Wyman held up a hand until the greeting could be heard over it.
Catelyn came forward to welcome him and asked after Lady Leona and the girls. Eddard wanted news of the harbour road and the fishing boats. Robb asked whether Wendel's lame courser had recovered. "The swelling is gone," Wendel said. "My brother says the horse merely tired of carrying me."
Wylis nodded. "A beast of judgement."
Wendel struck his brother's shoulder. Wyman let them quarrel as they crossed the yard, then asked to see the clock's winding before they went down to the workshop.
"The steps are steep," Wylis warned him.
"They were steep before I grew fat. Give me your arm."
Between his sons, Wyman climbed to the landing. Pate had a chair ready, which he accepted gratefully. Arthur waited at the door while the children found room beside the wall. In the close chamber the little beat was loud and steady.
Pate showed him the winding and the spare cord. Wyman watched the key come free before asking to see the movement itself.
"May I look behind the grille?"
"Once Pate has stopped the weights." Jon nodded to the bellman. "Keep your hands clear, my lord."
Pate secured the stones and opened the grille. Wyman leaned close without touching. He asked how often a new cord was needed and listened closely to the bellman's answer.
Rain followed them to the old storeroom serving as a workshop. Rough blanks filled two racks beside the fine bench. Spoiled wheels, bent arbors and the cracked bell hung above it. A bucket stood beneath a leak near the door. Wyman looked around. "This is the workshop?"
"For now," Jon said. "We need another fine bench and a dry place for the timber."
"My privy at New Castle has more floor."
Jon glanced at the racks. "We could use the space." Wendel coughed into his fist, and Wyman's beard lifted with his smile.
Wyman leaned upon the rail. "Where does my merman go?"
Jon showed him the full-sized chalk outline Woods had made on a board. The movement would fit within the body; the carving carried none of its weight. Wyman compared the outline with his own armspan and asked whether the silver tail could curve farther out.
Woods bowed his head. "It would not pass the stair at New Castle, my lord. Your man brought us its breadth."
Wylis took the folded measures from his sleeve. The stair had not widened. Wyman conceded the tail and turned to the single fine bench.
"You will need more of those. When the northern lords see mine, they will all find reasons their halls require bells."
"And hands trained to use them," Jon said. "Mikken can rough the blanks while Woods makes the cases. The fine cutting still waits its turn here."
Wyman glanced at Olyver, then at the locked grille. "Train them well. I do not wish to be the last man who pays only six hundred."
They settled the carving in Eddard's solar before supper. Wyman's cook had baked a lamprey pie that morning at Cerwyn, and a servant brought him a slice while Osric unrolled the drawing. Below, roast goose waited with pease, buttered turnips and black bread.
"The silver merman, white and green upon the face, and the bell we named," Poole read. "Six hundred dragons. Two hundred in earnest. The balance when it has kept seven days at New Castle."
"I have brought the earnest," Wyman said. "And an offer. A dry shed beneath the Wolf's Den, if you will set your bench there."
Mikken looked up. Woods stopped turning the drawing towards the light.
"For this clock?" Jon asked.
"For this and the next. You need iron, bronze and ships. I have all three."
"I have the bench." Jon put his good hand on the edge of the drawing. "Your keeper learns to wind it and your smith learns the common repairs. The making stays with me."
Wyman chewed a mouthful of pie before answering. "You could save yourself the road."
"And put every clock I sell through your gate."
Wyman's eyes creased. He took another mouthful of pie.
"Ask me again when I need a harbour workshop," Jon said. "For now, the making stays here."
Wyman signed and set his seal beside the measure. The price did not change. After dark four Manderly guards carried the advance to Poole's room, where each coin met a scale. One clipped dragon rose light. Wendel replaced it from his purse and made the clerk name the chest it had left.
Olyver watched from the doorway. Poole set the bitten coin beside a whole one and beckoned him nearer. "Tell me what differs."
Olyver ran a thumbnail round the clipped edge. "This one has been cut, master."
Poole let him weigh both. The clipped coin rose.
* * *
Work on the merman began the following morning. Mallon went back to his foundry with the agreed measures and payment for the metal he had reserved. At Winterfell, Mikken forged the great wheel blank and left it to cool before Jon set it against the pattern pin. One part of the rim stood high.
"Here," Jon said, marking the high place with chalk.
Mikken tried it against the flat iron plate. "A little spring from the hub, my lord. I can bring it true."
He supported the rim and dressed the high place down. Jon turned it on the pin again, checked the opposite face and marked what remained for the file. They left it overnight and tested it cold in the morning before cutting any teeth.
"Do the smaller blanks the same way," Jon said. "I want them settled before Olyver takes the teeth to the line."
Mikken grunted and called his journeyman back to the anvil.
Once the rim ran true, Jon set out the teeth. He finished the first spaces himself, then gave the file to Olyver and stood beside him for the next.
The boy leaned close, his fair lashes lowered over the work. Jon put a finger against the back of his wrist and lowered it a little.
"Keep that level. You are opening the near side faster than the far."
Olyver took another stroke. Jon turned the wheel so that the window light fell through the space, then fitted the pinion beside it. He held one arbor while Olyver turned the other. The new tooth entered, drove its smaller fellow and came clear.
"Again," Jon said. This time he let Olyver feel both pieces. "You want it to pass like that all the way round. Do not take more off a sound tooth merely to make it shine."
The boy tried the next pair, listening as well as feeling. Mikken brought over the smaller blanks on a board, still rough at their edges. Jon laid them in order beside the drawing and gave each man his next piece. The journeyman could clean the sides while Mikken made the arbors; Woods need not wait upon either of them to finish the lower case. Only the fine fitting came back to Jon's bench.
By the afternoon a bright crescent of iron dust lay beneath Olyver's hand. Jon brushed it into the tray and fetched a clean cloth before touching the movement again. They turned the wheels together, dressing the high edges until the train ran without catching. At the open door Woods waited with an oak shaving caught in his beard and a question about the shelf.
While the new wheel was being prepared, Woods built the case in his winter town shed. At the first fitting, an inner brace stood a finger too near the descending cord. He showed Jon where it would foul.
"I could take one scale from the merman, my lord."
"Leave the carving. There is room behind the rear post." Jon took the drawing.
Jon narrowed the shelf and set the brace behind the rear post. Woods cut a trial joint from waste oak and tested it under a load before altering the case. Mallon's bell arrived under wool and oiled hide. Once it was hung clear for testing, Mikken struck it with the small hammer. Robb waited through the long fading note, then asked for another.
Meals came covered to the table by the door. Jon had the fine work put away before the dishes were opened, and Woods's wife made her husband wash his hands before she passed him the bread. On the ninth evening one bearing warmed more than its fellow. Jon stopped the train and called Mikken; together they found a burr at the arbor's shoulder, dressed it away and cleaned the bush. By dusk both bearings were cool. Mikken took the next watch, and Jon showed him the point to feel when he made his round. He had once relied on gauges that could be read without opening a machine. Mikken had his fingertips, his hearing and long experience of hot iron. Jon showed him the fault plainly and stayed until the smith could recognise it for himself.
Arthur was waiting with Jon's cloak when he turned from the bench. "Coming?"
Jon looked back at Mikken, already putting the little sandglass beside the frame. There was no reason to remain merely to watch another man do the task he had given him. He took the cloak.
"Call me if the bearing heats again," he told the smith.
"Aye, my lord." Mikken sat where he could hear the beat and began cleaning his tools.
Wylla had left bread and cheese in Jon's room. He ate while Arthur worked a stiff buckle free on his sword belt. From the bed Jon could just hear the clock through the open shutter. For once he left the counting to someone else.
The clock kept for fourteen days beside Pate's glasses. They checked the beat after cold nights and damp mornings, and each of the three keepers wound it in turn. When the trial was done, the bell went east upon one wagon and the movement upon another. Felt lined the oak cradles; each loose wheel travelled separately in clean wool, marked for its place. Jon barred the trains, and Woods checked the lashings with the carters. Robb inspected both loads. "When one loses a wheel, Lord Wyman receives half a clock."
"Come with us," Jon said. "I shall lash you beneath the axle to catch it."
Robb brightened until Eddard told him he remained at Winterfell. Thereafter he blamed the merman whenever Jon passed within reach. Arthur rode on the first wagon's left and Jon upon its right. Osric's hired horseman, Ralf, followed with the spare mounts and fodder. Desmond, Harwin, Porther, and Quent spread before and behind. Osric kept the road purse among the carters. The carters tended their teams at each halt while Woods and Olyver saw to the cases. Jon rode ahead with Arthur to examine the next stretch of road, then returned to the wagons. Rain silvered Bucephalus's black neck and soaked the edge of Jon's gloves. The stallion wanted to overtake the slow wagons; Jon took him a little ahead, then let the wagons catch up rather than hold a hard rein all day. At the Brown Tankard, Mara brought hot mash to the wagon mares. Alasdair ran a hand down the off animal's foreleg and stopped above the hoof. "She is warm here."
The carter frowned. "She has not limped."
"Not yet."
Jon dismounted beside the wheel. "Lift the foot." A small stone lay wedged beside the frog, bruising the soft edge. Ralf freed it and walked the mare. She went short for several steps. They left her in the Tankard stable; Osric arranged a sound replacement before the carts moved on.
Mara watched Jon put one copper in Alasdair's palm. "His household pay came yesterday, my lord."
"This is for the work he did beyond it."
"Will you set him to the horses when the new stable stands?"
Jon looked at the boy, who was already helping Ralf lead the mare into an empty stall. "If Ralf judges him ready. He saw what the carter missed tonight."
Alasdair closed his fingers around the coin and hurried back to the mare.
Several days later, White Harbor announced itself by salt, fish scales, tar, smoke, horse dung, and a thousand people unwilling to leave silence between them. Pale walls rose through rain. Gulls spun above tiled roofs. The first clock wagon stopped behind a fish cart being unloaded in the narrow lane. Osric called to its driver, who hastened to move his baskets when he saw the mounted party. A fishwife caught two children running after the silver merman painted on the wagon cloth and pulled them against her skirts. Jon rode through at a walk while the driver stood with his cap in his hand.
Beyond the crowded approach, the streets opened broad and straight between whitewashed walls. Rain ran from the steep slate roofs into stone gutters. A silversmith had set his shutters out as a counter; behind the small cups and brooches Jon glimpsed a boy working a bow drill. Farther on, men rolled casks towards the waterside while a septon picked his way past them with his robe gathered clear of the puddles.
Jon eased Bucephalus aside for a dray. The stallion's flank brushed Arthur's boot.
"You are looking at every shop," Arthur said.
"At the hands in them." Jon watched the drill bow move again. "Mikken has to make a farmer wait whenever I need an arbor. Here there are men who do nothing all day but cut, bore and polish silver."
"Manderly will tell you so himself."
"He has. I can still buy their work without giving him mine."
Arthur smiled a little and moved his horse forward. A Manderly man had come to lead them through the next crossing. He wore a sea-green cloak fastened with a silver trident, and the traffic parted when he called. Above the nearer roofs Jon could see the New Castle on its hill and, lower down, the smoke from the furnaces they had come to visit.
Mallon's foundry stood below the Wolf's Den, black around its high vents. Three men worked the furnace. Two boys carried charcoal in shallow baskets. A girl not much older than Olyver scraped mould clay from small castings at a low bench. Mallon left the casting he had been examining and came to meet Jon.
Mallon called a charcoal boy over. "This lad heard a mould crack before I did, my lord."
The boy lowered his eyes. Jon asked his age and how long he had worked at the furnace. He was old enough to begin learning the casting.
"Put him on my next bell," Jon told Mallon. "I will pay his apprentice's wage while he learns."
Mallon bowed. At New Castle, Woods and the local carpenters were preparing the frame. Two days passed in raising it, fitting the movement and hanging the bell. The first trial sounded before the merman's silver tail had been fixed to the case. Wyman came in his chair to listen. When his granddaughter Wylla slipped towards the open work door, Lady Leona caught her hand.
"A kitten could fit through that door," the girl said.
"No kittens near the weights," Jon told her.
"Then why make a kitten door?"
"For the keeper's hand, not the keeper," Jon said, pointing to the small access hatch. Wyman asked the women to stand beside his chair while the test began. The first stroke set a kitchen dog barking. The second brought servants to the passage ends. By the sixth, Wylla counted aloud. At the ninth, Wyman ceased pretending to watch only for faults.
That evening Jon changed out of his work coat before entering the Merman's Court. Arthur straightened the silver clasp at his throat; a maid had brushed the last road dust from the black wool, though she had been unable to tame the white lock above his temple. Between the marble mermen outside the doors, voices and lamplight spilled into the passage.
He stopped just inside. Painted fish swam between the windows, and the rafters rose above a sea of green and blue. Beneath his boots a crab seemed to crawl out of a tangle of dark weed. Wylla Manderly came to tell him which creatures she liked best and pointed towards a shark higher up the wall. Her elder sister caught her hand before she could drag him across the path of the serving men.
"Grandfather is waiting," Wynafryd said.
Wyman had given Jon a place near his own, with Arthur beside Wendel. Men who had visited the clock that afternoon rose when Jon reached the dais. Their manners were polished, their coats richer than most he had seen in Winter Town. A shipowner bowed over a ringed hand and asked whether the next movement could be made small enough for his own hall. Another wanted a painted face in the colours of his wife's family.
"Give Osric the breadth of the wall and where you mean the weights to hang," Jon told them. "He can have drawings sent to you. The present orders take their place first."
The shipowner glanced towards Wyman. "Lord Manderly has made it difficult to entertain him without one."
"I remain capable of eating in a silent hall," Wyman assured him. He settled a cloth beneath his beard while the first platter came. "Provided the cooking is good."
There were mussels in their shells, a white fish dressed with parsley, warm bread and little dishes of salted butter. Wendel prised a stubborn shell apart and narrowly saved his sleeve from the broth. Conversation passed from the clock to ships overdue from the Sisters and a cargo of wine whose owner insisted that some other man's casks had been loaded first. Jon listened while he ate. These men knew the cost of an idle quay down to the day, and Wyman knew which of them was concealing his profit.
When the wine came, Wynafryd asked after Sansa. Jon told her about the recovered cup and her grandfather demanded to hear the whole tale. Wylla hid her face against her sister's shoulder. She emerged only to insist that the wooden bear had needed treasure. Wendel asked whether the bear had paid for it; Lady Leona told him to stop helping. For several minutes the clock was forgotten.
New Castle's keeper, Tobren, wound the clock at dawn for seven days while Jon watched. The air was damp, but the covered bearings stayed clean. On the fourth morning a loose thread from Tobren's wool glove caught around the winding key.
Jon stopped him before he wound again. "Your glove is fraying." He unwound the loose thread from the key and showed it to Tobren.
"Take them off for the winding," Jon said. "You can warm your hands afterwards."
Tobren tucked the gloves into his belt and finished with bare hands.
Once the keeper had finished, Jon rode down to the harbor with Wendel and Arthur. The morning tide was lifting a deep-bellied merchantman against her moorings. Bare-legged men moved sacks along a gangplank while a mate shouted the count from the rail. Across the water a shipwright's mallet kept a slower beat, driving caulking into a hull propped above the mud.
Wendel pointed out the fishing boats and the berths used by the larger traders. Jon asked which quay could take a laden ship at low water. When Wendel did not know, he called the harbor man over and let him answer. Jon dismounted to look along the face of the stonework; Arthur stayed close while he knelt above the wet steps and judged the drop to the water.
"Are you buying a quay as well?" Wendel asked.
"I want to see how this one was built. Ethan has repairs to make on Dragonstone."
He stood and brushed grit from his knees. Beyond the moored hulls, the open water was grey under the morning sky. He had missed its smell more than he knew. For a little while he watched the men aboard the merchantman, following an order from the mate's mouth to the hands that obeyed it, and thought of a deck that would be his to command again.
Wendel waited until he turned back. On the climb to New Castle they bought hot fish wrapped in coarse bread, and Jon ate his from the saddle while Arthur kept the stallion at a walk. Wendel was halfway through a second piece before the gate came into view.
On the seventh morning Jon stood back and let Tobren work without prompting. When the eighth noon struck clean, Wyman pronounced himself satisfied and paid the balance. "Six hundred for all that," he said, watching the men close the case. "Do you regret the price yet?"
"Perhaps I should have asked for more," Jon said.
Wyman laughed. "Too late." He watched Jon pass the winding key back to the keeper. "Tell Maester Luwin I should be glad to hear how he has taught you. My granddaughters have their lessons every morning. Neither has yet put my bellman out of work."
"Pate still has work, my lord. So does your keeper."
"And Luwin?"
"Has helped me a great deal."
Wyman's smile lingered. He looked towards Arthur, who was fastening Jon's travelling cloak, and seemed about to ask more. Instead he called for the letters he had prepared for Eddard. Three jars of lamprey went north with them.
* * *
Poole counted the gain in Winterfell's lower room. Metal, oak, wages, carriage, guards, food upon the road, the damaged cloth, and the debt of the king's clock came away. Two hundred and ninety-four dragons remained on the table. Robb stared at the gold. "You could buy fifty suits of armour."
"Plain ones," Mikken said. "Forty if blackened. Thirty if you put wolves upon every buckle."
"No wolves," Jon said.
Mikken grinned. Jon left enough with Poole for the next promised work and locked the rest in the iron-bound chest.
Arthur waited until Robb had gone before speaking of the house again. The gold had been locked away, but Jon still had Woods's plan open beneath the lamp. He was moving the sleeping hall farther from the stable when Arthur put two fingers upon the little chamber drawn above the counting room.
"This is yours?"
"Aye."
Arthur looked at him. "I thought you meant to house the boys below the walls."
"I do." Jon set down the charcoal. "I mean to live there as well."
For a moment Arthur said nothing. Rain tapped softly against the shutter.
"Does Ned know that?"
"Not yet."
"Then tell him before Woods lays your bed floor." Arthur drew the plan nearer. "He may hear more in it than another room for Heward."
"I know." Jon looked down at the four files marked beside the yard. "They rise before dawn because I require it. They eat together, train together, learn together, and one day I mean to take them across the sea. I cannot call them my household and spend every night in Father's castle while other men keep the house for me."
"You could command them from Winterfell."
"That is the problem." Jon tapped the counting room, kitchen and store in turn. "Poole finds half of what I need now. Winterfell's kitchens feed them. Rodrik gives us whatever part of the yard is free. If a roof leaks, I tell Father's steward. If grain runs short, someone in this castle puts it right. Dragonstone will not teach me gently because I arrived ignorant."
Arthur's mouth bent slightly. "You intend this house to do so?"
"I would rather make the first mistakes where Father can ride down and tell me I have been a fool."
"He may do that before you move."
Jon smiled. "Then I save time."
Arthur looked again at the little upper chamber. "You know Winterfell will still be your home."
"Aye."
"Good. Tell Ned that part too."
* * *
Eddard heard them the next morning in the small solar. Woods's plan lay between them. Arthur stood by the hearth while Jon sat opposite his father, his boots not quite reaching the floor.
Eddard studied the sleeping hall, stable and workshop before putting one finger upon the chamber above the counting room. "Whose room is this?"
"Mine."
Eddard looked up. "Your household may sleep there without you. Your bed is here."
Jon had expected the words. They still made him glance towards the door and the familiar passage beyond it.
"I know. I want to keep the house myself."
"You already give your men their orders."
"And then Poole finds their bedding, your kitchens feed them, and Ser Rodrik finds us a piece of yard. I pay what Poole asks, but most of the keeping is still done by your people."
Eddard leaned back. "That is because you are my son and still a boy."
"It is also why this is the best place to learn." Jon kept his voice even. "I am not asking to leave Winterfell for Dragonstone tomorrow. I am asking to keep a house less than a mile from your gate while you can still see what I do badly."
Arthur shifted beside the hearth. "Better his first poor store count costs him a supper here than a winter on an island."
Eddard gave him a flat look. "You are helping."
"I thought so."
Jon continued before the old argument between them could find room. "The boys are going to be my men. Heward will command their yard, Wylla will keep my chambers, Elspeth the kitchen, and I will expect all of them to answer when I call. I should know how they live. I should know when the roof leaks, when the bread is short and when a boy is sick before someone rides uphill to tell me."
"You can ride downhill every morning."
"Then I am visiting my own household." Jon met his father's eyes. "It cannot become mine if I return to yours every night and leave other people to keep it."
The room went quiet.
Eddard's gaze returned to the plan. "Have I ever made you think you had no place here?"
"No, Father."
"Or that Dragonstone changed whose son you are?"
"No." Jon leaned forward. "I want my own house. I do not want to stop being part of yours."
Arthur spoke more quietly. "He will have me, Wylla and Heward below. Luwin is a short ride away. So are you. One day he will have to do this where you cannot look over the wall and see the smoke from his chimney."
Eddard rubbed his thumb along the edge of the drawing. "And when the novelty passes? When it is raining, the roof is leaking and you would rather eat at this table?"
"Then I come to supper, complain about my roof, and go back down to have it mended."
Arthur coughed into one hand. Eddard's mouth almost moved.
"You will still attend Luwin's lessons," Eddard said. "You will still train here when Rodrik requires you. You come when I summon you, and no man below those walls forgets that the ground is held of Winterfell while you are in my keeping."
"Agreed."
"And no war wall."
"I know."
Eddard looked at Arthur. "If he begins sleeping at the bench because a wheel displeases him, carry him uphill."
"Gladly."
"Uncle Arthur."
"You heard your father."
Eddard drew the plan back towards Jon. "Show me the ground you want."
* * *
Robb found out before dinner because he saw the chamber marked on Woods's copy. He had come looking for Jon with two practice balls beneath one arm and stopped over the table instead.
"That is your room."
"Aye."
Robb looked from the drawing to Jon. "At the new house?"
"Aye."
"You are sleeping there?"
Jon nodded.
Robb's first expression was delight. "Then you can stay up as late as you like."
"Wylla is moving too."
The delight faded a little. "Oh."
Jon waited.
Robb traced the road between the drawn house and the little square Woods had used for Winterfell. "You could ride down in the morning and come back with me."
"I could."
"Then why not?"
"Because they are my household. I want to live with them before I ask them to follow me to Dragonstone."
"You are not going to Dragonstone yet."
"No. I am going down the road."
Robb did not laugh. "You are always down there already. Or at the workshop."
Jon had been about to tell him how close the new house would be. Robb knew the distance as well as he did.
"I will still come up."
"When you are not busy."
Jon turned towards him. "For supper. For lessons. To ride with you. To train. Father is not releasing me from being your brother because I have another bed."
Robb worried at the edge of the parchment. "Not every supper."
"No. Some nights I should eat with my own men."
"Can I eat there?"
"If Father and your mother give you leave."
"Can I stay?"
"Ask them."
Robb brightened. "Then I need a bed."
"You need a pallet."
"A bed."
"A pallet with a mattress."
Robb considered the concession. "Beside yours."
"No."
"Why not?"
"Because you are visiting, not moving in."
Robb grinned at last. "We shall see."
* * *
The matter might have ended there if Robb had known how to keep anything interesting from his sisters.
Jon discovered that he did not the following evening. He came into the family solar before supper and found Catelyn beside the hearth with Sansa upon her lap. The girl was growing too large to fit there neatly, though her mother did not seem to mind. One arm circled Sansa's waist. Arya sat upon the rug with a wooden horse, pushing it through a fortress made from two cushions.
Arya looked up first. "Robb says you are leaving."
Jon stopped. Across the room Catelyn's eyes rose to him. So did Sansa's.
"I am moving to the new house."
Arya abandoned the horse. "When?"
"When it is ready."
"Tomorrow?"
"No."
"After tomorrow?"
Jon smiled. "Not that soon."
Arya seemed satisfied for all of three heartbeats. "I am coming."
Sansa twisted around upon her mother's lap. "You cannot."
"Yes I can."
"You live here."
"So does Jon."
"Not anymore."
Arya looked back at him. The triumph disappeared from her little face. "You do not live here?"
"Winterfell is still my home."
"But you sleep there?"
"I will."
"Why?"
There was no accusation in it. Arya simply wanted an answer. Jon crouched before her.
"My guards are going to live there. Wylla too. There will be horses and the workshop, and I have to look after all of it."
Arya considered this. "Where will you eat?"
"Sometimes there. Sometimes here."
"Where will Wylla eat?"
"With me, most likely."
Arya's little face tightened. Sansa had gone very still upon her mother's lap.
"Is Wylla leaving too?" Sansa asked.
"Aye."
Catelyn's hand moved slowly over her daughter's hair. She had not spoken. Jon was conscious of her watching him nevertheless.
Arya came closer. "Can I sleep there?"
"Sometimes, perhaps."
"Tonight?"
"The house is not built yet."
"When it is."
"If Father says you may."
Arya frowned at this unnecessary complication. "I will ask him."
"I thought you might."
She took his hand. "Can I bring my horse?"
Jon glanced at the wooden horse upon the rug. "You may bring your horse."
"And my blanket."
"If you mean to stay the night."
"And Sansa can come."
"I did not say I wanted to," Sansa said.
Arya looked at her as though this proved some failing in her sister. "You can stay here, then."
"I might come."
"You just said you did not want to."
"I said I did not say I wanted to."
Arya stared at her. Jon had lived more than one lifetime and still found himself defeated by the answer.
"When the house is finished, you may both come and see it."
"Sleep there," Arya corrected.
"See it first."
"Then sleep there."
"We will ask Father."
Arya gave him a suspicious look. "I will ask him now."
She released Jon's hand and started for the door.
"Arya," Catelyn said.
Arya stopped.
"Your father is not at supper yet."
"Oh." She returned for her wooden horse. "I will ask him at supper."
Sansa spoke before Arya could begin planning anything else. "Will you still come to supper?"
Jon looked at her. She had stopped smiling. Catelyn's arm remained around her, Sansa leaning back against her mother's breast.
"Of course."
"Every night?"
"Not every night."
Sansa's mouth turned down.
"But often. And I shall still see you during the day."
"On namedays?"
"Aye."
"Feasts?"
"Aye."
"When Father has guests?"
"If he wants me here."
"He will," Sansa said with absolute certainty.
Jon smiled. "I expect he will."
Sansa thought about that before giving a small nod. Catelyn stroked her hair once.
Still she said nothing.
Jon's eyes met hers over Sansa's head. There was no anger upon her face. No relief either. Only that composed, guarded look she wore so well.
He wondered what she saw. A bastard finally preparing a roof of his own beyond her husband's walls? Or a boy who had gathered men, coin and work around himself until another household had begun to take shape?
Perhaps both.
Jon had no wish to ask.
Arya tugged at his fingers again. "Can I come tomorrow?"
"To an unfinished house?"
"Yes."
"There is not even a roof."
"I have a cloak."
Sansa giggled. Even Catelyn's mouth threatened, for the briefest instant, to soften.
"Arya," she said.
Arya looked towards her.
"Leave Jon be. It is nearly supper."
"But I am going to his house."
"When there is a house to go to."
Arya considered that judgment and apparently found it acceptable. She tucked the wooden horse beneath her arm. "He is coming too."
This time Sansa laughed properly.
Jon rose. Catelyn was still watching him.
"My lady."
"Jon."
Nothing more passed between them. It did not need to.
As he followed the girls towards supper, Arya chattering about where her horse would sleep and Sansa correcting every third thing she said, Jon looked back once at the room.
He was moving less than a mile. To Arya, it might as well have been across the sea.
* * *
Two mornings after Jon's talk with his sisters, Eddard went with him to look at ground for the new house. Rain shone upon the grass. Jon mounted Bucephalus from the block; his hand had healed, though the new skin was still tender. Catelyn rode her chestnut mare, Arthur a rangy bay. Wylla came on the broad brown palfrey she trusted not to shy at every puddle. Jory and the Stark guards followed as they took the road beyond the winter town.
Eddard gave the stallion a little more room, and Jon brought him alongside with the outer rein. They climbed past the last gardens at a walk.
The first site rose north of the road. Dry turf ran to a stony back. From the crown Jon could see Winterfell's east gate, the roofs below and every cart approaching for half a mile. A ditch and timber wall would command the road.
Arthur dismounted first. He drove a heel into the turf. "Dry footing. Stone near the surface. A small wall makes this hard to rush."
Catelyn remained in the saddle. "A wall here also watches my son's gate."
"It watches any man who comes against it," Arthur said.
"Including Winterfell," Catelyn said. Jon looked from the height to the castle. The site was cheaper because the ground did part of the defence. That virtue had another face. Men remembered walls longer than the lord who raised them.
"We could defend it with few men," Jon said.
"And close Winterfell's road," Eddard answered. "I will not permit a fort here."
Arthur looked towards the lower pasture. "That ground is open on three sides."
"Then show me where the house would stand." Jon gathered his reins. "I want to see both."
They rode back past the last gardens to rough pasture. Water shone among reeds along the western edge. Midges rose in grey clouds. Jon put one boot down and sank above the sole. He pulled it free, stirring a brown pool beneath the sedge. The smell of rot lifted from the grass. Wylla covered her nose. "I hope you were not counting that as drinking water."
Arthur looked over the open approach. "This will cost twice the labour."
"At least we could build here without barring Winterfell's road," Jon said.
Eddard dismounted beside him. "The choice is yours. I will forbid a war wall upon the rise. I will not make you take this mud."
Jon walked a little farther along the bank. The eastern ground rose clear of the reeds; there was room for the hall above it, if the old watercourse could be opened.
"I will have Branch sound the ground before I decide."
Wylla dismounted and joined him. She pointed to the castle beyond the roofs. "Near enough to send for Luwin. Let us see where you mean to put the kitchen."
The next morning Jon brought Oren, Alasdair, Master Branch and Woods to the field with three bundles of willow rods. Ralf led the measuring party's horses. Eddard and Catelyn followed with Robb and Wylla, while Jory kept the guards near the road. One cord ran from the high eastern turf towards the reed bed; another followed the old watercourse south. Oren drove a rod every ten paces while Branch tested the depth of wet ground.
"The surface falls south," Jon said. "I want the buried clay, every older cut you remember, and the place this water joins Winter Town's drain. We open nothing above until the lower road is clear."
The ditcher probed the straight run on Jon's sketch and struck clay. Farther south, the rod found an older cut still carrying water. Jon followed it towards the willows. Flood debris hung above the bank.
"Has it risen higher than this?" he asked.
"Not since I have worked here, my lord."
Alasdair pointed to a fork where grass and twigs had caught above Jon's knee. "The Tankard's pig gate reached the mill that year."
Poole, who had come on a mule with the ground grant in his saddlebag, frowned at the mark. "That lies twelve paces beyond the bank."
Jon set a black cord two full timber courses above the debris. "No sleeping floor, workshop sill, grain store, or hearth below this. The pasture may flood; the house must not. Master Branch, trace the race to the town grate before a spade opens the upper end. Alasdair, ask the older neighbours whether they remember water higher than this."
Woods spread his house drawing across a board held under two cloaks. The two-storey hall stood nearest the road. Callers entered a counting room without crossing the yard. Jon's chamber and solar lay above. Arthur had chosen the room beside the stair. Wylla's chamber adjoined a small sickroom at the rear.
Wylla found the altered doorway on the landing. "That is better. A litter can come straight from the stair."
Woods checked the width between the posts with her. Her own chamber would still open onto Jon's through the inner passage.
Mara had followed with Elspeth and the workmen's kettle. She looked at the washhouse. "Where does the dirty water run?"
Jon pointed to the southern cord. "Beside the stable drain after both pass below the well. Clean water comes from the eastern rise and never crosses dung, wash water, or the privy trench. The washhouse has its own hearth and a stone lip so hot ash does not reach the boards."
He walked the route with Mara and Wylla while Woods laid out the stable posts. Jon moved the path inside them, away from the horses, and widened the corner for women carrying pails. At the kitchen he set the entrance behind a short screen wall so the north wind would not blow straight into the hearth.
Elspeth looked over the pantry on the drawing. "I should need more room for the bread, my lord. Twenty-five lads will eat a great deal after a morning's work."
Jon had allowed a fortnight's grain within the inner store. "What would you add?"
"A cool wall for bread, hooks beyond the hearth heat, and a hatch from store to kitchen." She pointed out the space she meant. "That would save carrying everything round through the yard."
"Put the hatch there, Woods. Extend the pantry to the next post." Jon turned to Elspeth. "Will you keep the kitchen when it stands?"
She glanced at Catelyn. "Gladly, my lord, if Lady Stark will give me leave."
"Not before the next feast," Catelyn said. "Morna can manage the second kitchen. She has yet to learn the larger ovens."
"I can teach her, my lady. She knows the stores already."
Catelyn considered it. "She receives your chamber and key. You remain until she can do the work."
Elspeth curtseyed. "Thank you, my lady."
Jon drew the plan towards him again. "Bring me what you will need for the first month. Pots, food and hands. I want the kitchen ready before the boys arrive."
"It will be, my lord."
Heward came to inspect the ground he would no longer share with Rodrik's men. He paced from the sleeping hall to the armoury, his staff keeping time with his stiff leg, then turned and covered the distance again.
"Leave this clear," he said. "If I call them out armed, I will not have a cart between their beds and their shields."
Jon moved the stacking ground beyond the stable posts. Heward planted his staff where the morning ranks would stand and had Woods shift the nearest store door out of their way.
Heward followed the privy trench below the well and kitchen while Jon inspected the approach with Ralf. At Jon's order a carter brought the longest wagon through the proposed gate. Its rear wheel cut across the corner stake.
"Move that out six paces," Jon said. "There must be room to pass a horse beside it."
Ralf agreed and helped Robb reset the stake. When the wagon had cleared, Jon drew the horseman aside.
"How long are you bound to Osric?"
"Until these teams return sound."
"And after?"
Ralf rubbed his crooked knee. "My last master sold his horses and took ship. I have my saddle, my eye, and no wish to sleep beneath another cart."
"Ride with me for six days," Jon said. "I need garrons for the boys and a man to teach them horsecraft. You shall have road money, board and a horse master's wage while I judge your work."
Ralf glanced towards Arthur. "And afterwards, my lord?"
"If you suit the post, it is yours."
Ralf pulled his cap off. "I shall be glad to try."
Poole read the ground grant before witnesses. House Black held the pasture of Winterfell. For this ground Jon answered to Eddard Stark. Until Jon came of age, Eddard answered for what rose there. The fine bench remained inside the castle until the new workshop stood dry and locked. The lower field might have a ditch and post fence, but no war palisade. Jon set his plain black seal beneath the words. Eddard's direwolf followed. Master Branch opened the lower townward run before any spade touched the upper ditch. Black water moved south with a smell that drove Robb uphill. Only then did Oren clear roots from the pasture end. Alasdair carried stakes, lost one in the mud, and found it with his whole arm while every man nearby offered useless counsel. Elspeth sent onion broth to the field. Woods's wife brought coarse bread and white cheese. Workers ate upon overturned turf. Jon sat among them with mud to his calves. Eddard lowered himself beside him and accepted the same wooden bowl. Jory and the guards who had come down with him ate a little farther up the bank.
Eddard tasted the broth. "Good."
"Elspeth," Jon said. "She has sent enough for the men still working at the ditch."
His father broke the bread and gave him half. They ate while the ditcher's mattock rang against a buried stone. Jon looked along the cleared channel to see how far the lower cutting had reached.
A beetle climbed out of the upturned turf and disappeared beneath Eddard's cloak. He shook the hem free and moved his bowl to the other knee. Jon held the bread while he did it.
"Benjen would have chosen the dry rise," Eddard said, looking over the field. "Then he would have spent the afternoon racing me down it."
Jon smiled. He had heard enough of Benjen's boyhood to believe it. The damp soil beneath his boots called up another place altogether: a field after rain, an older man's hands on a spade, the patient work of opening a run that cattle had trodden shut.
"This ground will dry," he said. "We have the fall for it. Once the roots are out, it should carry the water away."
Eddard looked towards the ditcher and the men waiting with the timber. "I can see why you wanted to come down yourself."
Jon scraped the last barley from his bowl. Across the field Woods raised an arm to ask where the next load should stand. Jon gave his father the empty bowl and went to show him, stepping over the cord that marked the future wall.
At dusk, a thin ribbon of brown water began moving south. The old digger washed his spade in it and came over to Jon. "With your leave, my lord, I could use Oren until the hall stands. Cerwyn has culverts after. I would teach him the trade."
Jon called Oren over. "You heard him. What do you want?"
Oren stood his shovel against the bank. "The ditching, my lord. If you will release me."
"For this roof, or to learn the trade?"
"The trade." He touched the black badge on his coat. "I can keep a shield beside another boy. Master Branch says I have an eye for the water."
Jon looked towards the old digger. "Will you take him on those terms?"
"Aye, my lord. Paid work while he learns, here and at Cerwyn."
Jon sent for Heward. The old soldier heard Oren out, then stood beside him while Jon released him from armed service. Poole entered the release beneath his name and read the new hiring aloud. Oren unfastened his black badge and put it into Jon's hand.
"Leave us a dry yard," Jon said. Oren bowed and went back to his shovel.
When the footings were ready, timber wagons stood upon the road and the winter town men unloaded the oak. Woods set the first sill on the stone pads above Alasdair's flood mark. Jon checked the cord against it and called for the far end to rise a little. Four labourers took the weight while Woods packed the bearing beneath. Eddard stood beside Jon with the drawing held clear of the rain. When the sill lay level, Jon wiped the wet from the rule and went to check the next pair of stones.