By the time the last of the fifty-one seekers had received the Solar Spark, the stars hung heavy in the black vault of the sky. Aldric stood before the silent, awed crowd and announced that the First Awakening had reached its end.
In the kitchens, the village matrons had been reheating the pottage for hours. They finally wheeled out carts laden with thick bowls of pumpkin and fish porridge. Kevin, having anticipated his master's hunger, brought a clean wooden bowl filled to the brim. In the war-torn Riverlands, such a meal was a rare indulgence, and Aldric ate with the focus of a man who had finally cleared a high mountain pass.
With the seven days of the Conclave behind him, Aldric felt a strange lightness. He had poured everything he knew into those sermons; for the first time, he didn't have to carry the entire weight of the strategy in his own head.
As he finished his second bowl, John and the Sparrow slid into the bench opposite him.
"Forty-nine new Sunwalkers," the Sparrow said, his voice hushed with reverence. "It is more than I dared hope for."
Aldric nodded. "We were eleven. Now we are sixty. Our hands are full enough to begin the real work."
"Indeed," the Sparrow said. "I will stay one more day to see who among the brothers will follow me to King's Landing. On the morrow after that, I depart."
Aldric frowned, setting his spoon down. "So soon? The Riverlands are a nest of vipers, Sparrow. Let me send a company to escort you."
The Sparrow shook his head. "You are needed here, Aldric. I shall take the Kingsroad south, gathering the broken and the lost as I go. We will petition the King and the High Septon to return to the true path."
Aldric's skepticism was a cold weight in his gut. "Asking a lord to admit he is wrong is harder than taking a kill from a shadowcat. If Joffrey Baratheon were a man of reason, I'd still be a sellsword in the North. I saw the boy in Winterfell—he is arrogant, cruel, and lacks a man's heart. Be wary, Brother."
The Sparrow offered a thin, tranquil smile. "King's Landing is safer under the gaze of a thousand eyes than a lonely road. Besides, faith is my mail. If the Sun decrees I must fall, then let the reformation begin with a martyr. I will not hide behind your shields while others bleed."
Aldric wanted to argue, but he saw the iron in the old man's gaze. A leader who would not lead from the front was no leader at all. "If you find yourself in the shadow of the gallows," Aldric said firmly, "send word. I don't care how many men it takes; I will come for you."
The Sparrow spent the next day gathering his flock. Of the original forty-nine he had hoped for, many had been lost to the war, but the Conclave had drawn enough strangers to fill the gap.
By the third morning, the Sparrow had a following of twenty—monks in tattered grey and commoners armed with nothing but cudgels and axes. Sir Theodore Wells and a few of his veteran men joined them as well. Though the Sparrow had refused Aldric's soldiers, he accepted the protection of a few dedicated seekers.
Aldric rode the palomino, Lightning, beside the Sparrow for the first few miles. At the final crossroads, the old monk turned to him. "Stay safe, Aldric. A living leader is a better thing for the poor than a silent icon."
"And you, Brother," Aldric replied. "May the Sun guide your steps."
As the Sparrow's ragged band vanished into the mist of the Kingsroad, another guest prepared to depart: Thoros of Myr.
Thoros had attended the Conclave in secret, fearing his presence as a Red Priest might bring Lannister steel down on the monastery. But after seven days of listening to Aldric, he was glad he'd kept his head down. The "Dawnguard" were far more radical than anything the Brotherhood had dreamed of.
"Your words have been a draft of cold water, Captain," Thoros said as they stood by the gates. "If I weren't already bound to the Lord of Light, I might have knelt before your Sun."
"Tell me, Thoros," Aldric asked, "what is the heart of R'hllor's word? I've been too busy to ask."
"The Lord of Light is the god of heat and life," Thoros explained. "His enemy is the Great Other—the god of ice and death. Their war decides the fate of all men. We wait for the rebirth of Azor Ahai, the warrior who will wield a burning blade called Lightbringer to end the Long Night."
Thoros shook his head, a wry smile on his face. "I was a poor priest back in Myr. I liked wine and girls more than prayers. They sent me to King's Landing hoping I'd convert King Aerys, since the Mad King loved fire so much. But the Alchemists' Guild had better tricks than I did. King Robert liked me, though. He laughed until his belly nearly burst when I unhorsed Kevan Lannister with a flaming sword in the tourney."
Thoros laughed at the memory. "I just soaked the steel in wildfire. A cheap mummers' trick. But now, seeing you... I wonder about that prophecy. You call yourself 'Lightbringer.' Your words are a fire that will consume the old order of this world. Perhaps the 'Burning Blade' isn't a sword at all. Perhaps it is you."
Aldric considered this. "A burning sword? Like this?"
He drew the Azure Song and channeled the Light. The blade didn't ignite with wildfire; it hummed with a pure, incandescent golden radiance that illuminated the entire yard.
Thoros stared, his jaw dropping. "Seven hells... how?"
The Light was a force of order—healing for the friend, a purifying burn for the dead, but little more than a glow against the living. Because his Sunwalkers had limited reserves, Aldric had taught them to save their magic for healing rather than combat skills like Seal of Righteousness. It was the first time Thoros had seen the Light applied to a weapon.
"It is a basic lesson for a Sunwalker," Aldric said. He beckoned to Kevin. "Kevin, show the Master the Sun's Edge."
Kevin drew his blade, Ellie, and the steel lit up with an identical golden shimmer. "Like this, Master?"
Aldric nodded. He turned back to the speechless Thoros. "If the savior of your prophecy is a man with a glowing sword, Thoros... I have sixty of them."
Thoros looked as though he had been struck by lightning.
Per the pact with Beric Dondarrion, Aldric assigned ten Sunwalkers to return with Thoros to the Brotherhood. He placed Kevin in command.
"Master," Kevin said, his voice full of doubt. "The Brotherhood has many of Lord Stark's men. Why not send Jon? They know him."
"That is exactly why I'm sending you," Aldric replied. "We go to help the Brotherhood, not to take their command. Jon is a Sunwalker now, but he is still the Bastard of Winterfell in their eyes. You go as a brother of the Light, nothing more. And besides... it's time you left the nest."
Kevin was fifteen. In Westeros, he was a man grown. He had been with Aldric since that first day on the beach, and while he was saddened to leave his mentor's side, he was burning with the fervor of the Word.
With ten Sunwalkers—including Roger Hughes—Kevin rode out with Thoros. Aldric was left with only a dozen men and a monastery that was now overcrowded and out of grain.
He had spent a moon at St. Maur's. It had been a reprieve, a moment of peace in a life of war. But the wagons were empty, and the "Solar Word" could not be spread from behind a wall. Leaving a small garrison to protect John and the monastery, Aldric gathered the rest of his flock. They turned their faces toward the smoke on the horizon, seeking those whom the war had left in the dark.
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