It wasn’t exactly a new revelation.
He had known it since he was merely nine namedays, when his father had sent him to ward at Bear Island and Jorah had brought Karlon to one of the Mormont fishing vessels.
He felt the winds that were prevalent in the open sea, the deck moving beneath him under the waves of the Bay of Ice.
He knew then that to sail in the seas was his true calling in life.
That same feeling always came back whenever Karlon was on horseback.
They were fine animals.
He had no quarrel with them exactly, but he never did feel the same comfort atop a saddle rather than on a boat.
It was the whole reason why Jorah was able to unhorse him in the tourney of Lannisport.
The Lord of Bear Island was built for jousting.
It had been three days since they left Frostkeep, and the road from Sea Dragon Point was rough, especially since it wound through coastal scrubland that was the peninsula before going to firmer ground that was the lands near the Wolfswood.
They went through many farmsteads and fishing villages that had cropped up in the past decade, smallfolk who found themselves eager to toil the land now that there was ample protection from the Lord of Frostkeep.
Many abandoned villages were filled once more, people who had run away from the fear of the Ironborn, a fear that used to be constant in the western shores of the North.
Not anymore.
Karlon rode at the head of the column — Ser Egran to his right, Torrhen Karstark a half-length back on his left, the thirty men-at-arms stretched out behind in the loose but disciplined formation that Ser Egran preferred on open ground.
They passed by many such villages, and Karlon used the chance to also tour the grounds of the many settlements within Sea Dragon Point.
They were his people, and the one thing Rickard Stark made sure to knock into the heads of all of his sons was the truth of oaths.
An oath goes both ways.
He could still hear his father’s voice, The smallfolk swear to serve their liege with everything they have.
And it is a lord’s duty to make sure they thrive.
So he stopped at the first village, a fishing settlement called Saltmarsh that had not existed twenty years ago and now ran to thirty households and a small smokehouse that sent salted cod as far as Barrowton.
He dismounted while Ser Egran remained at his side, and spoke with the village elder, a weathered woman of sixty who had been among the first to settle the new harbor.
They spoke about the winter stores and the state of the road and a dispute between two families over fishing rights in the shallows.
He made three decisions, promised to have Maester Edric send word in writing, remounted, and rode on.
He did the same at the next village, and the one after that.
Ser Egran said nothing.
He had served Karlon long enough to know when silence was the most useful thing he could offer.
By mid morning of the third day, they had cleared the coastal settlements and found the road that ran southeast through the lower margins of the Wolfswood.
The forest was different from most other places, Karlon realized.
Despite having grown in the North all his life, he could never grow used to the massive forest that was the largest stretch of woods on this side of the Wall.
It was a primeval place.
That was the only word for it.
Larger than the Iron Islands put together, and half the size of the Vale, Ned had once told him, having walked its margins himself.
It spread north and west until it reached the Bay of Ice and east until it thinned into the moors below the Umber lands.
He remembered Old Nan saying that there were still places within the woods that no man had mapped and, if the old stories were believed, things that had not changed since the First Men came and found the children already waiting.
“My lord,” said Torrhen Karstark, drawing up alongside him atop his own horse.
The boy was six-and-ten, dark-haired and sharp-featured.
He had been with Karlon for two years, and he was shaping to be quite the man.
“Is the Wolfswood always this…quiet?” “Depends on the season,” Karlon said.
“And what’s in it.” Torrhen considered the trees with a sharp eye.
If Karlon remembered right, the lands of Karhold were supposedly surrounded by a forest too.
“Lord Robett says there are bears in the deep wood.
Wolves too.” “More wolves than bears.
Bears are solitary.
The wolves run in packs through the western reaches in winter.” Karlon watched the shadows between the pines.
“You won’t see either today.
The beasts won’t attack a party as large and as well armed as ours.” From his other side, Rickard Liddle snorted.
“Aye, and the noise that lot makes—” He jerked his head back at the column.
“—the wolves are probably spooked deeper into the forest.” “Which lot?” Torrhen asked, turning.
“The lot that includes you, lordling, rattling around in that armor like a pot of nails.” Torrhen opened his mouth.
Karlon raised a hand without looking at either of them, and the exchange died before it turned to bickering.
Unlike Karlon and Torrhen, the Little Liddle was only clad in thick furs and a single brigandine.
The pinecones of House Liddle etched and engraved on the armor.
Rickard wasn’t exactly Karlon’s first choice to bring as a retinue to Winterfell, but the man was loyal above all else and more importantly, extremely dangerous with an axe.
Besides, it wasn’t as if his first mate could sail the Frostfang without Karlon being there as well.
The road bent north around a stand of ancient oaks, their roots so large they had forced the track wide over the years, and Karlon’s horse sidestepped something in the undergrowth without breaking stride.
Above him, the canopy was thick enough to turn the light grey and directionless, the kind of light that made it hard to read the time of day.
Then he heard the owls.
A cacophony of hoots calling back and forth in the branches somewhere to the east.
It was an odd hour for it since owls hunted at night, not in the thin light of mid-afternoon, and the sound of them raised something at the back of his neck that he could not name.
He had been at sea long enough to trust the things his body noticed before his mind caught up with them.
He was still listening to it when the white owl came out of the trees.
It crossed the road as silent as the grave — white as fresh snow — and he had one moment to register it before it banked and dropped toward him.
His horse shied.
Karlon brought it steady with his knees and put up his left forearm on instinct, and the owl landed on it.
The talons gripped through his sleeve, but was tender enough not to rip into it.
He could feel the weight of the bird on his arm.
It turned its head and looked at him with eyes the color of old amber, and for a moment the Wolfswood was very quiet.
Then Torrhen said, softly, “Gods.” “Looks like it likes you, my lord,” Ser Egran said from behind him.
Karlon looked at the owl.
The owl looked back.
There was nothing in those amber eyes that a man could read easily, and perhaps nothing to read — it was a bird, and birds did not traffic in meaning, and any northerner who went looking for omens in the behavior of animals was probably finding more omens than the gods had actually sent.
He believed that, mostly.
The owl blinked once and lifted from his arm in a single smooth motion, catching the air and rising into the canopy without a sound.
It settled on a branch twenty feet up and sat there, watching.
“Let’s keep moving,” Karlon said, and they rode.
He did not look back.
But he heard the owl call once behind him as the trees closed over the road.
A few hours into their journey, Karlon turned in the saddle.
“How much longer Robett?” “We should be another hour, Lord Stark.” Robett Glover said as he pulled his horse up beside Karlon’s on the rising ground above the treeline.
“Perhaps less.
The road’s been kept well this season.” Robett was a compact, capable man of six-and-twenty who had come to Frostkeep three years ago as a lord’s second son, and had discovered a talent for reading coastal water that had surprised even Karlon.
He captained the Ironwood now, a patrol galley that ran the stretch of water between the Cape Kraken and Blazewater Bay, and he did it well.
His elder brother Galbart was proud to hear it, especially now that House Glover had a fleet to call its own, as small as it was.
“How long since you’ve been home?” Karlon asked.
“A year.” Robett’s expression shifted slightly, “The longest I’ve been.
My wife will have words for me.” “As she should.” Robett said nothing to that, which was the correct response.
An hour later, almost to Robett’s word, six riders appeared from the direction of the castle wearing the colors of House Glover — a silver mailed fist on a field of scarlet — and Robett rode to meet them.
After a brief conversation, they were escorted the rest of the way.
It didn’t take long for them to arrive after that.
Deepwood Mott was—as appropriate for its name—a motte-and-bailey keep located deep within the woods of the Wolfswood.
It was not a large keep nor a particularly strong one.
The walls were timber-framed stone, solid but unadorned, its towers square rather than round.
The gate was made of iron-banded ironwood doors, with no moat or portcullis to speak of.
The yard was busy when they rode in.
Glover retainers moving to and fro as they prepared for the arrival for a lord of Karlon’s standing.
Despite being a rather new lord, Karlon was a Stark who proved his mettle more than twice over.
And beyond the Neck, the Stark name commanded respect, and there were only a few places he wouldn’t be welcomed.
Stable hands appeared for the horses.
A steward met them at the yard’s edge with a bow, with Galbart Glover standing beside him.
He was a broad-shouldered man of thirty, dark-bearded, and steady.
He moved down the steps with purpose, bypassed Karlon entirely—which Karlon did not take personally—and caught his younger brother in an embrace.
“You look well,” Galbart said, holding Robett at arm’s length to examine him.
“I am well,” Robett said, “It’s good to see you again, brother.” Galbart clapped him on the shoulder hard, and turned to Karlon.
“Lord Stark.
Welcome to Deepwood Motte.” The steward stepped forward with a tray to offer bread and salt, and Karlon nodded as he took a bite.
With the guest rights done, the rest of Karlon’s retinue dismounted.
“My companions and I are only to stay for the day,” Karlon said, “We will continue to ride to Winterfell on the morrow.” “Of course,” Galbart’s expression warmed by a fraction, “House Glover’s hospitality is yours.” …
Check it out if you’re interested, at least chapter 9 (long form, which is around chp 17 in webnovel) should be available by the time this chapter was uploaded.