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The next morning, “diligent” Hodor appeared at Leon’s bedside the moment he stirred awake, carrying a wooden washbasin.
The water was clean and warm, nothing added, and a soft white wool towel hung neatly from the rim.
Leon studied Hodor’s bruised, swollen face with puzzlement.
He was still a recruit himself.
When had he acquired an orderly?
He certainly hadn’t ordered one.
“Lord Leon, rise and wipe off the sweat.
Did you sleep well last night?”
Hodor hovered at the bedside, sycophantic, his battered features twisted into an expression so fawning it curdled the stomach.
Leon frowned but didn’t refuse the gesture.
Once he’d washed, the other recruits scrambled forward, each offering up some token like tribute.
One presented clean, well-tailored cloth armor.
Another, a longsword picked with care from the armory.
Leon’s original rusty blade had been whisked away at dawn by someone thoughtful to be sharpened.
Some had only an apple to give, or a piece of meat that had been tucked inside a tunic for gods knew how long and now reeked of stale sweat.
Leon refused none of it.
He set everything on his bed.
“You want something from me.”
“Lord Leon, please.
It’s only right we should serve you.”
“Not talking?
Fine.
I’ll handle it my way.”
“Wait — please, Lord Leon.” Hodor’s voice cracked.
“There’s another assessment today.
We beg you, show mercy.
Joining the Night’s Watch is our life’s ambition.
We don’t want to lose to you and have Ser Alliser sentence us to a lifetime of scrubbing latrines.”
The others who’d fought Leon the day before looked ready to drop to their knees.
“When they came at you yesterday, they were trying to kill you.” Edd stepped forward, seeing Leon’s ambiguous expression.
“Ducksauce carved two cuts across your back.
That shoulder wound — Toad did that.
The gash on your leg was Sissy, with the spear.”
Edd catalogued Leon’s injuries like a quartermaster taking inventory.
Every recruit whose name he spoke trembled.
If Leon hadn’t shown restraint yesterday, no killing blows, just defeat and done, they’d have abandoned their vows and scattered like startled birds by now.
Hearing Edd pile on only made them regret it so bitterly their guts twisted green.
They wished their parents had given them two more legs so they could run.
“I said I’ll handle it my way.”
Leon grabbed a clean, plump apple from the bed and bit into it hard.
At the look on his face, Hodor and the others dared say nothing more.
They left, still trembling.
Once they were gone, Jon ambled over with a grin and dropped onto the foot of Leon’s bed.
He picked up an apple and gnawed at it slowly.
“Come to think of it, you’re the first southerner I’ve ever seen who can fight like that.
And your style, it’s nothing like the elegant swordplay you usually see from southron fighters.”
He paused, as if trying to place exactly what Leon’s fighting reminded him of.
“Barbarians.” Edd picked up the thread.
“I’ve heard there are hundreds of thousands of wildlings north of the Wall, and among them a tribe of blue-skinned people called Berserkers.
They say when those wildlings fight, they do exactly what Leon does, never dodge, never block, just attack like madmen.
The legend goes that only by dying such a brave death in battle can their warriors enter their god’s Hall of Valor and enjoy eternal bliss.”
It was a myth from some wandering singer’s repertoire, where Edd had heard it, no one knew.
But the way he told it, everyone present nodded along in quiet agreement.
“Ha.
Does Leon look blue to you?” Jon craned his neck, utterly unconvinced.
Edd, as if the singer’s spirit had possessed him, swayed his head and countered, “Perhaps his father forbade him from painting his skin blue before he set out.”
The speculations were spiraling into absurdity.
Leon cut them off before Edd could furnish him with an even more outlandish ancestry and bloodline.
They went to the mess hall for breakfast.
The cook Jenny, it seemed, had heard about Leon’s appetite.
His bowl alone was heaped with dark, thick-cut slabs of wild boar, unadorned, unapologetic, drawing a chorus of protests from the other recruits.
Leon ignored the flirtatious glances Jenny aimed his way, finished his meal, and made his way to the training yard with a crowd in tow.
When would these endless recruit assessments end?
Probably when Ser Alliser Thorne finally scraped together a batch of barely passable recruits to hand over to the Old Bear.
Only then.
Today, Alliser Thorne seemed disinclined to waste breath.
Seeing Leon and Jon, the two he detested most, striding into the yard with a pack of men at their backs, he thought better of it and kept his mouth shut.
Mostly.
“Ten-Man Slayer.
You need not participate in today’s assessment.
If you’ve no other duties, perhaps you could see if the watchtower requires assistance.”
Leon had just emerged from the armory in full gear.
Alliser Thorne couldn’t help himself.
“My lord, I volunteer for the assessment.
As you can see, I’ve already changed into my equipment.”
The retort came out strange and mocking.
Leon saw the man was still trying to box him in, and gave it right back.
The recruits’ eyes went wide.
Stern, rigid Ser Alliser, so fond of pinning nicknames on everyone, had just been openly defied on his own training yard.
More than a few hands secretly clapped in satisfaction.
“You —!”
Alliser Thorne surged with rage.
He meant to step forward and teach Leon a lesson, prove that yesterday’s victories had been against a handful of misfits, nothing to boast about.
But the moment his foot moved, Leon, armored head to toe, drew his new longsword without hesitation.
Alliser Thorne paused, as if some instinct had seized him.
He remembered then: Leon’s reckless style, trading wound for wound without a second thought.
There was no chance he’d walk away from that with his dignity intact.
Alliser Thorne’s expression flickered, dark then uncertain.
He thought for a moment, then let out a cold snort.
“Hmph.
Ten-Man Slayer, I imagine ordinary recruits no longer whet your appetite.
So I’ve taken the liberty of inviting a company of rangers with no current duties.
Do you find them worthy opponents?”
As the words left his mouth, a far corner of the vast training yard erupted.
Thick dust billowed up.
Horses screamed, men shouted, chaos and clamor.
Out of the dust emerged more than a hundred hardened rangers.
The mingled reek of road dust and killing intent rolled off them, and the Night’s Watch Recruits, none of whom had yet tasted blood and fire, trembled.
At their head was a lean, capable man of perhaps forty or fifty years.
Behind him walked his steward, carrying a banner of black cloth on a jujube-wood shaft.
The flag bore a single image: a human hand, the palm slashed through with several ghastly scars.
“That’s the banner of House Halfhand.
The man at the front, Qhorin Halfhand.
They say he blocked a wildling’s battle axe with his right hand and it was hacked down to just the index finger and thumb.
So he trained his left hand to wield a sword, and in the end he became even stronger with it than he’d ever been with the right.
He’s acknowledged by all as the finest ranger.”
At a moment like this, you couldn’t count on Jon-who-knows-nothing to explain things.
Edd came through, as always.
Standing behind Leon, murmuring the details quietly, without him, Leon would have had to face this company of rangers in utter confusion.
➤ Next: The Rangers Rose Up, Leon One-Shot Them — What’s There to Say?