New chapter is live.
Settle in, take your time, and let’s see what waits in the dark 🖤 ✦ Two miles was not far, but the forest slowed them to a crawl.
Dusk deepened.
Night came quickly in the North.
The cloudless sky soon turned a bruised purple, and the stars and moon began to appear.
Their light was not even a fraction of the sun’s, but with the snow reflecting it, visibility was barely good enough.
“Just ahead,” Will whispered to Aeg, a trace of nervousness in his voice.
“Be careful.
If anything happens, run.” Aeg drew a deep breath.
Will feared whatever waited in the dark.
Aeg knew what they were about to face, and the knowledge sent adrenaline surging through him.
His body was already bracing itself for mankind’s ancient enemy.
Somewhere deep in the forest, a wolf howled.
Will stopped beside an old ironwood covered in knots and climbed down from his horse.
Aeg did the same.
The cold wind hissed through the trees, and he could clearly feel the temperature dropping.
Whether that was only his mind playing tricks on him or the cold the Others brought with them, he could not say.
If the plot followed its original course, the four of them were already surrounded.
“There’s something wrong here,” Gared murmured.
“Is there?” the young knight asked, smiling at him with contempt.
“Don’t you feel it?” Gared demanded.
“Listen to the darkness.” “Wind.
Rustling leaves.
Wolves howling.” Ser Waymar Royce dismounted gracefully and tied his horse to a low-hanging branch some distance from the other three.
Then he drew his longsword.
“Which one has frightened you so badly, Gared?
If you’re afraid, stay here and watch the horses.
Aeg, Will, come with me to look at those dead men.” Gared endured the insult with a frown and took out his tinder pouch.
“I’ll make a fire.” “Have you lost your wits, old man?
If there are enemies in these woods, a fire will draw them straight to us.” “Some things fear fire,” Gared said, flint in hand.
“Bears.
Direwolves.
And…
other things.” “I said no.” * * * Aeg watched the exchange with a frown and could not help wondering whether the Others might fail to find them if everyone kept their voices down.
Perhaps they would simply leave with their newly made servants.
But he had neither the authority nor the means to make these men shut up.
He opened his mouth, then forced back the urge to speak.
Instead, he tightened his grip on the dagger in his sleeve.
Gared glared at the young knight for a moment before finally lowering his head and accepting the arrangement.
Royce nodded in satisfaction and looked at Will and Aeg.
“Let’s go.” Will crept forward in small, cautious steps, leading him through dense undergrowth and up a gentle slope.
Both men moved carefully and lightly, doing everything they could to make no sound.
The knight behind them had no intention of being so furtive.
Head high and chest out, Waymar strode after them.
His body brushed against leaves.
The metal rings of his mail clicked together.
Branches caught his sword or snagged his fine cloak, drawing curses from him every few steps.
Every tiny noise from Royce made Aeg’s heart clench.
‘This damned fool.’ No one had been allowed to speak when nothing was happening.
Now, when silence actually mattered, he kept making noise.
He was hopeless.
He imagined turning back, pointing his sword at the young man, and ordering him to be quiet.
But that would only make more noise, and since Aeg was no match for him, it might send the whole situation spinning completely out of control.
All he could do was keep moving, one careful step at a time.
The short hundred-yard stretch felt as if it lasted a year.
At last, he followed Will to the top of the snow-covered rise.
Because he was so tense, he clearly heard Will suck in a breath beside him.
Below the slope, pale moonlight spilled across a clearing, revealing the remains of the wildling camp.
The fire’s embers still breathed thin white smoke.
Snow-covered rocks.
A half-frozen stream.
Nothing seemed out of place.
Except that the wildlings Will had seen were gone.
“Gods preserve us!” Behind them, Ser Waymar Royce cut away a branch blocking his face and climbed to the top of the rise.
He stood beside the two rangers, sword in hand, cloak snapping in the wind, starlight and moonlight outlining his noble figure with painful clarity.
“Damn it, get down!” Will grabbed Aeg and yanked him into a crouch.
“Something’s wrong.” Royce did not move.
He looked down at the empty clearing and laughed.
“Will, it seems your dead men have moved camp.” Will fell silent.
His chest rose and fell as he stared, trembling, at the empty camp.
Aeg felt cold gather from every direction and slip through the gaps in his clothes.
His right hand tightened around his steel sword.
His left hand closed around the dragonglass dagger hidden in his sleeve.
He strained to catch even the slightest sign of the Others.
In the show, one of them had appeared out of nowhere behind Royce.
In the books, Aeg had long since forgotten the description of how the thing emerged.
‘Where will these damned things come from this time?’ “Will, get up,” Ser Waymar commanded.
“There is no one here.
Enough skulking about.” Still uneasy, Will shot Aeg a nervous glance.
Then, reluctantly, he stood.
✦ ✦ ✦ Want to keep going?
I hope this chapter gave you another reason to stay with the story.
There’s still plenty ahead, and things are only starting to unfold.