Chapter 38: The Hunt
The training ground went quiet faster than Henry had expected.
He had not raised his voice beyond what was necessary to carry across the yard. He had not needed to. The Gold Cloaks knew him on sight and responded to his presence the way soldiers respond to a commanding officer who has demonstrated that inattention has consequences — not with fear, exactly, but with the particular attentiveness of men who have learned to pay attention.
The Crownlands knights read the room and followed the Gold Cloaks' lead. The Baratheon household men looked at Joffrey, who had already made the decision to sheathe his sword after one glance from Henry, and took their cue from that.
The northern side was slower to settle, the way home ground always is. These were Stark men in a Stark yard, and their lord's son had just been publicly condescended to by a visiting prince. The grievance was legitimate and they knew it. But there was a difference between legitimate grievance and doing something about it in a training yard with children present, and the older men in the group understood that well enough to pull the younger ones back.
One of the younger northern warriors leaned toward the man beside him. "Who is that?"
The older man — weather-seamed, the kind of face that had been north of the Neck through a few hard winters — pulled him back without ceremony. "Red Lion," he said, at a volume that didn't carry far. "Was at Pyke. Don't."
That settled it.
Robb Stark was the last one standing in the center of the yard. He held his position for a moment — still coiled, still flushed, the anger not done with him yet — and looked at Joffrey across the empty space between them. Then he turned and walked to the edge of the ground with the deliberateness of someone who was choosing to leave rather than being made to.
Henry watched him go and gave it a moment before he spoke.
"It seems everyone has energy to spare this morning." He let his gaze move across the assembled youth — Joffrey, Robb, the watching northern boys, the Gold Cloak junior officers who had been involved in nothing useful. "Since that's the case — pack your gear. His Grace and Lord Stark are riding out to the Wolfswood within the hour. If you want to settle who's stronger, let the prey do the judging."
The effect was immediate.
The residual tension didn't resolve so much as it found somewhere better to go. Voices came up again, different in quality — the anticipation of young men who have been handed a purpose after spending their energy on something frustrating. Horses were already moving in the stables. Servants moved through the yard distributing hunting knives and quivers, filling the cloth bags behind saddles with provisions. Bows came down from racks. The training ground emptied itself in the efficient way that spaces empty when everyone in them has somewhere more interesting to be.
Tyrion was sitting on a wooden crate near the stable entrance, which was not a dignified position but was apparently the one his morning had left him with. He had managed to get his cloak around his shoulders. His hair had not been managed. His eyes had the particular quality of a man who had made decisions the night before that he did not currently regret but that had extracted a price.
He was yawning when Sandor dropped down beside him, leaned over, and began working off his sabatons to trade them for riding boots.
"You look terrible," Sandor observed, without apparent concern.
"I look exactly as good as I ought to, given the circumstances." Tyrion watched the busy yard through half-closed eyes. "The circumstances were worth it."
"The kind you pay for doesn't count as hunting."
"I never said it was hunting. I said it was worth it." Tyrion pulled his cloak tighter against the northern morning. "Besides, hunting implies the prey had a choice. Last night was considerably more cooperative than that."
Sandor stood, checked the dagger at his belt, and said nothing further, which was his version of agreeing to drop it.
On the far side of the yard, Eddard Stark was already mounted.
He wore hunting leathers in Stark grey — practical, well-broken-in, the clothing of a man who actually hunts rather than someone who attends hunts. A longbow across his back, a good hunting knife at his belt. He was pulling on deerskin gloves when one of his guards came forward.
The man was remarkable enough to notice. He stood close to seven feet, built proportionally, the kind of physical scale that made the horse beside him look briefly undersized. He held the gloves in both hands and presented them with the careful deliberateness of someone who was aware of his own size and had learned to compensate for it.
"Lord Stark."
"Thank you, Walder." Eddard took the gloves and worked his fingers into them. "How's your father?"
The big man's face changed. Not dramatically — something behind the eyes, a shift in whatever he was keeping in place. "The same, my lord. His mind is still gone. He calls out a name all day — Kaze — nobody knows where it comes from. Everyone's taken to calling him that too." A pause. "I want to thank you for the servants you've sent to look after him. Coming back from Pyke at all was more than most men managed."
"He bled for House Stark," Eddard said. "That's all the reason needed."
Walder bowed and moved off. He would not be riding out — a man built to that scale did not find horseback hunting comfortable, and he had long since made peace with that particular limitation.
"Ned." Robert rode up alongside on a dark roan, dressed for the field in black leather that fit him somewhat less well than it had been cut to fit. He was grinning the way he grinned when he was looking forward to something. "Can you still shoot? Or has the North frozen your draw arm?"
"I shoot well enough to beat you," Eddard said, settling his gloves. "As I recall, that was always sufficient."
Robert's laugh was loud enough to startle a groom's horse two stalls over. "Gods, I've missed you." He steadied his roan and looked across the yard to where Henry was checking arrows near the far rail. "You know what the Kingswood hunters call him now?"
"I've heard several things."
"Boar slayer." Robert shook his head, still grinning. "I'm not exaggerating, Ned — the man has killed so many boars in the Kingswood that I can barely find a decent hunt anymore. The remaining ones have apparently gotten wise and moved deeper into the wood, and even then." He waved a hand. "I have to chase deer now, like a common man."
Eddard glanced toward Henry with the considering expression of a commander evaluating someone he trained. "I hope the Wolfswood's boars are better at self-preservation. The northern hunters would appreciate having something left to hunt."
The laughter faded. Robert's horse moved a step to the side and he brought it back without thinking, the ease of a lifelong rider that had not left him despite everything else.
"Ned." His voice had changed register. "I know what I'm asking costs you something. Pulling you away from this." He gestured without looking, indicating Winterfell, the North, everything Eddard had built his life around. "I wouldn't have come myself if I had another way. I need someone I trust in that position. Someone who won't tell me what I want to hear." He paused. "Men like that are harder to find than they should be."
Eddard was quiet for a moment. Then: "I'll do what I can. I hope it's enough to matter."
"It will be." Robert straightened in the saddle. Something shifted in him — the brief gravity passing, the easier version of himself returning to the surface. "And once you're south, I'll see what I can do about that look you carry everywhere. Man looks like he's attending a funeral at all times."
"Someone has to."
Robert laughed again and wheeled his horse toward the gate. He had a voice that carried when he chose to use it, and he chose to now.
"Right then! Let's ride! Wolfswood boars won't wait all morning!"
The yard answered with the noise of men who have been waiting for exactly this — the scrape of boots in stirrups, the shift of horses finding their balance, voices rising over the sound of hooves on stone. The hunting party organized itself with the loose urgency of a group that had no precise formation to keep and no particular reason to wait.
Henry swung up onto his bay without ceremony, the motion easy from long habit, and moved into the flow of the column.
The gates of Winterfell opened.
They rode out into the northern morning, the mist still clinging to the treeline, the Wolfswood dark and deep ahead of them, and the sound of the column filling the quiet that the training ground's argument had not managed to disturb.
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