Oliver sat in the grass with a stem between his teeth and let other people move around him. The anger that had begun in the murdered village had finally burned itself out. After everything, the stillness inside him felt almost pleasant.
Hoofbeats approached from behind.
“You exceeded my boldest hopes, ser.” Roderic drew his horse up beside him. “I don't like to think what would have happened to me and my people without you.”
“Probably a disaster.” Oliver looked up with a tired smile. “But it didn't happen. No sense dwelling on it.”
Roderic laughed. Some of the tension seemed to leave him with the sound.
“True enough. Where will you go next?”
“I haven't decided. I don't know this country.”
Roderic looked across the woods and meadow in the low sunlight.
“The North is a hard place. But we can still offer bread and salt to friends. When Harrick comes back, I'd like you to spend a few days at my manor.”
“I'd be glad to.” Oliver was curious to see how a man like Roderic lived. “Has he gone after the fugitives? Do you need me?”
“Looking for their camp. We must destroy the longships. Let one or two men get back with them, and we might have another band on the coast before the week's out. And they took a great deal from my villages before I could stop them. I intend to have it back.”
“To return it to the people?”
Roderic looked genuinely puzzled. “Return it? It's my spoil.”
Oliver looked away across the field. He had nothing to add.
* * *
The fighting had involved about two hundred people and lasted less than half an hour. Clearing the field took more than three times as long.
They couldn't leave the bodies so near Beambridge, attracting animals and threatening disease. The enemy dead went into deep pits. Their own were burned, their remains gathered to be taken home. Kellan's collection of heads had to be presented to Roderic and counted.
Stars filled the sky before they were done. Too many men were hurt to march any great distance, so Roderic took the force back to Beambridge.
The fires were out. Water and old smoke made a sour, heavy smell between the houses. The villagers had collected their dead and were waiting to bury them. Yet when the soldiers arrived, people cheered. They had survived, and the men who had done this had been beaten.
Many of the militiamen knew one another from neighboring villages. Men from Beambridge took their comrades home with them. Oliver and Kellan received an invitation from one of the fighters and found a place to spend the night.
The raiding force was broken. Once its boats were destroyed, the scattered survivors would be stranded in the forest, left to hunger and the animals. If any crossed into another lord's lands and caused trouble there, Roderic's people seemed content to leave that concern to somebody else.
He arranged the village's defenses and dealt with compensation according to the local rules, then released his men. Those well enough to travel left with the remains or ashes of friends from home. The badly wounded stayed behind to recover.
On the third day after the battle, Oliver and Kellan went with Roderic and his household guards to Redfield.
The red in its name came from a large stone near the entrance, where an exposed face of rock showed a reddish color. Once it had been another unremarkable coastal village under House Colbert. More than ten years of Roderic's attention had turned it into the most prosperous settlement in his holding, almost a town.
He rode slowly through it, returning the greetings of people at work along the road. Then he lifted his whip to point out the houses and the clean street.
“My manor. Not bad, is it?”
“It's good.” Oliver meant it.
The villages he had seen so far had offered mud, wheel ruts, low damp houses, and thin people with tired faces. Here, stone paved the street. People looked healthy. Whatever Oliver thought of Roderic's ability to direct a battle, he knew how to manage a settlement.
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Legally, the whole village formed his manor. His own residence occupied only a small corner to the northeast: a three-story timber building behind a stone wall twice a man's height. Two towers flanked the thick wooden gate, each with an archer watching the approaches.
The gatekeepers hurried to open the way and take their lord's reins. It was shortly after noon. Roderic sent his guests to wash and rest, and had suitable clothes brought to their rooms. Oliver and Kellan bathed, then stretched out on their beds.
Near dusk, the steward came to summon them to dinner.
They changed and followed him downstairs. A generous meal waited on a long table. Roderic sat at one end and had left the other for Oliver. Along one side were a comfortably built woman and two girls; Harrick sat opposite. The steward placed Kellan beside him.
“My wife, Delana of House Hornwood,” Roderic said. “Our elder daughter, Kessa. And our youngest, Nerys.”
He turned to the little girl, who looked six or seven.
“These are the men I told you about. Ser Oliver, and his brave attendant, Kellan the Head-Taker. They helped us defeat the pirates.”
Long brown curls framed Nerys's face. She looked at Kellan with open curiosity.
“Why's he called that?”
“Because he brought me sixteen pirates' heads. Earned a whole golden dragon for them.”
Her eyes widened. “Oh!”
Roderic lifted his glass. “To our guest. A great warrior and a noble knight. Welcome, Ser Oliver.”
The family joined the welcome. Oliver drank the red wine in his silver cup.
Roderic kept the meal pleasant, finding subjects that included everyone. Delana's questions were harder. How many people belonged to Oliver's family? How much land did he have? How many cattle? They were courteous questions, entirely reasonable for the person they thought they were hosting. He answered with a mixture of truth and invention and tried not to let it show how awkward he found them.
* * *
After dinner, Roderic took him to the study. A servant brought wine. On the wall hung a rough map, drawn by hand.
“The Narrow Sea lies between us and the Free Cities,” Roderic said. “If you're still going east, start southwest.” He traced a route from the dot marking Redfield to a bay below it. “White Harbor first. Find a ship there.”
Oliver studied the map, fixing its details in his memory.
“What if we wanted to see more of Westeros?”
“Still White Harbor. Largest trading port in the North. If this country's a wolf, that's its mouth.” Roderic followed the river inland with his finger. “Goods come in there and travel up the White Knife. An enterprising man can find ways to make his fortune.”
“And beyond it?”
“A ship south to King's Landing. The king's city, the richest in the Seven Kingdoms. Wealth, beautiful women, titles. Anything you can pay for. And Robert loves a tourney. A fighter like you would soon be noticed.”
Being noticed in the capital might not suit the history Oliver had invented for himself.
“Anywhere else?”
“Winterfell. The Starks' seat. Follow the White Knife north, land near the castle, and see eight thousand years of history.”
“Eight thousand?”
“Built by Bran the Builder, with giants to help him. That's what the histories say.” Roderic seemed to take Oliver's interest for a visitor's excitement. “You won't see much inside. It's the Starks' home, after all. I've only been in the great yard and the hall myself. But the walls are worth the journey.”
Oliver wasn't thinking about admission. He had grown up in a world of enormous buildings. What troubled him was the time: eight thousand years of civilization, and people still lived like this. What had kept them here? Had something prevented them from developing further?
“Winterfell's where the North's business gathers,” Roderic continued. “Military matters, disputes, trouble a local lord can't settle. Sooner or later, someone comes looking for men in the taverns outside the castle.”
He drank a little wine.
“Not every lord has enough reliable soldiers. Perhaps he can't solve a problem himself, but doesn't want to ask a neighbor or his liege. Hire a few wandering knights in the winter town, and it's a matter of silver. Ask someone you know, and it becomes a debt of a different sort. There's work for a man like you. Good work could make your name.”
That part, at least, was familiar. Oliver knew how to take a job, gather people, and lead them against something dangerous.
The invitation from the Spirit Healer still bothered him. War in the south. A threat gathering in the frozen north. He didn't know what either meant, but personal skill would only take him so far if the continent really was approaching disaster. He needed people beside him, people with whom he could work. Without them, he could scarcely hope to complete whatever task had brought him here, much less find a way home.
“Then we'll go to White Harbor,” he said. “Tomorrow, if we can. Thank you for having us.”
Roderic looked surprised.
“No need to rush. You don't even know the road. Rest for a few days.” He set his cup aside. “There might be a useful arrangement here.”
“I send a caravan between White Harbor and Colwick every three months. Travel with it. You won't have to stop at every crossroads asking the way, and I'd be glad of your help guarding it.”
He explained that the fighting had cost him men and money. Some of the guards who normally accompanied the caravan were dead; others were hurt. Replacements would take time to find.
“If you came with us as far as White Harbor, I think we'd both benefit.”
“So do I,” Oliver said. “When do you leave?”
“A few days. Not long.”
* * *
Roderic's business followed two main routes. The northern caravan, bound for Winterfell, had left two months before and would need at least another month to return. The southern caravan had been resting in Redfield when the pirates came. Its presence had given him extra fighting men, but they were employees, not subjects bound to defend his land. Getting them into the battle had required a substantial promise of extra pay.
Now some were injured. He could not simply order wounded guards onto the road, and even if they agreed, they might need more protection than they could provide. Waiting for them to heal would delay the whole journey. Lost profit was one concern. Failing to keep agreements with the lords along the route was worse.
His brother, Cerran Cob, led the southern caravan. Roderic trusted him, and the two had settled on a plan: recruit guards in the villages and towns along the way. If they found enough by White Harbor, they could make the return journey safely even if Oliver went elsewhere.
That was why Roderic had been so eager to point his guest toward White Harbor. Oliver needed a road, and the caravan needed time to replace its men.