After a night spent at Winterfell, Wylla caught Jon halfway down the bedchamber stair and put two fingers through the gap between his glove and his sleeve.
Arthur and Robb were already in the covered yard below; Jon could hear ash striking limewood and Robb's laughter. Dawn had scarcely coloured the windows. He stopped on the cold stair while Wylla pulled his glove back.
Hugin croaked from the yard rail. He had begun following Jon between Winterfell and the Black Yard, sometimes riding the last stretch on his saddle roll. Munin preferred the roofs. She usually reached the kitchens first.
"That sleeve was long enough a moon ago."
"It catches across my back as well." Jon raised his arm, and the seam pulled tight.
"Then it is finished with you. Come." She took him back to the chamber, where Mairi brought a measuring cord and the basket of black thread. The coat had been a good one at midsummer: close black wool, horn buttons and grey linen at the neck. Wylla had let the cuffs down twice. Now his wrists showed, and the shoulders bound whenever he lifted a shield.
Growing still surprised him. He remembered letting out his belt in his first life, grey appearing at his temples, knees that ached after a climb. Here it was sleeves and stirrups that needed changing. His hands were larger than they had been a few moons before, though the forearms beneath the wool were still a boy's.
Wylla held the old coat open while Mairi fetched the other one. "Sometimes I stand outside your workroom and wait to be called."
"You need never wait."
"I know that." She drew the sleeve carefully over his hand. "Then I hear you with those men and forget. You sound so much older."
Jon looked up at her. She was studying him with the coat gathered against her breast. He touched her wrist.
"I still want you there."
"Aye, and you shall have me." She smoothed the white lock back from his brow before turning to Mairi. "Iain can wear this. Take off the badge and mend that elbow."
Jon pulled on his older practice coat. By the time he reached the yard, Robb had sweated a dark line down the back of his grey tunic. His red-brown hair curled at the nape, and his blue eyes brightened when he saw Jon fastening the last button.
"Did she shorten you enough to fit the coat again?" Robb asked, circling with his practice shield raised.
"She plans to, if I outgrow the next coat."
Arthur tossed Jon a round shield, then touched his padded sword to the boy's throat when Jon stepped too far. On the next pass Jon kept his step short. Robb came upon his open side; he caught the blow, but turned towards Arthur's low attack too soon and took Robb's edge beneath the ribs.
"You were watching him." Robb grinned. Jon caught his ankle with the shield edge, and both boys went down in the mud.
Arthur set aside his practice sword and planted a staff beside them. "Up."
"He is heavier than he looks," Robb complained.
Jon rolled off him. Above the yard Bran was making his way between the gallery pillars, his nurse close behind. Arya ran round the corner, saw the adults watching and slowed.
"I was walking."
"Walk beside Bran," Jon called.
She went back and took her brother's hand. For two pillars she kept his pace; at the third she hurried and pulled him off balance. The nurse steadied him. Arthur went up the stair and crouched beside the children.
"Do not pull him, Arya. Let him set the pace," he said.
Bran gripped Arthur's hand and reached the next pillar. Arya waited properly this time. When the knight returned, Jon kept his eyes on both opponents. Arthur caught him again, but had to change his attack to do it.
"Better."
Pate and two kitchen men waited at the arch for the passage to clear. The bellman lifted an approving fist; Arthur tapped Jon's boot, and Pate lowered it with a grin as Jon corrected his stance.
The bouts ended with both boys muddy and Robb complaining that Arthur had more arms than other men. Jon helped move the rack for the kitchen men.
"You nearly had him that time, my lord," Pate said.
"Tell him that. He keeps finding places I have left open."
One of the men asked when they would practise again. Arthur gave him the hour before he could stop himself. Eddard was waiting at the head of the stair.
"You have supplied him an audience," he said quietly when Jon went to fetch his cloak.
"They see him do something well and wish to see it again."
"I remember when you wanted them kept away from his lessons."
Arthur watched Pate help shift the last rack. "They looked at him differently then."
"Some of them still do. Now they carry better stories."
"Would you have him do badly for their peace of mind?"
"I would have him free to do badly without the whole castle asking what has gone wrong." Eddard looked towards the changing room. "Praise the work. Give him room to leave it."
Arthur rubbed mud from the staff with his thumb. When Jon returned, he took the boy's shield himself and sent him to wash before riding out.
Later Jon and Robb rode down to the Black Yard. Bucephalus moved sideways at the smell of wet ash from Ewan's forge, and Robb's bay tossed its copper-red mane. Tomas had the household drawn up beside the rail. Iain held two spare reins in Jon's old coat. The sleeves ended at his wrists, and tiny needle holes showed where Mairi had removed the badge.
"It fits you better," Jon said. Iain began to bow.
"Thank you, my lord." Iain dipped his head and took Bucephalus's reins.
Robb fell in beside Rylas for the run. Afterward they washed and went in to porridge, sage mutton and hot brown loaves. Perkin found Jon at breakfast, rain beading on his hair.
"A factor from Oldtown is here, my lord. He bears Lord Leyton's silver tower."
"Give him breakfast and a place by the fire. I will receive him when we have eaten."
While Tomas told Jon which horses Gawen meant to take out, Robb tried to persuade Gage to race his grey against the bay after lessons. Arthur's presence made him careful to avoid calling it a wager.
"On the firm ground," Jon said. "The lower bend is still wet."
"We rode through it."
"That is why I am telling you."
Robb grinned and went on settling the race as Jon left to receive his visitor.
The factor was Master Ronnel, a narrow man in smoke-grey wool with a small silver tower pinned to his breast. Road mud remained in the seams of his boots. A locked chest stood beside his stool, and an oiled leather tube lay across the table. He bowed when Jon and Arthur entered. Woods and Ewan followed to examine the drawings. Perkin took a stool beside Jon with his writing board.
Ronnel had finished his breakfast and folded the cloth beside the bowl. In the warmth his neatly trimmed beard had dried into little points. He studied the working clock above the door, one hand resting on the leather tube.
"Lord Leyton sends his greetings, my lord. He was much taken with the account of the clock at White Harbor."
"Has he seen it?"
"No. One of his captains has, and brought him a drawing. Since then he has sent three letters asking whether I had reached Winterfell."
Jon took the chair at the head of the table. "Then we had better give him an answer." He put his cup clear of the leather tube and beckoned Ronnel to open it. The factor slid out the sheets, which sprang back into a roll until Woods fetched weights for their corners.
Four sheets showed the crown of the Hightower, with a great clock face on each side. Two bells stood above them: one to tell the common hour and another to call the faithful to prayer. Lord Leyton's masons would open the stone and raise the scaffolding. House Black would make the clock and send men south to install it.
"Nine hundred golden dragons," Ronnel said. "Half when you accept, half when Oldtown hears the first bell."
Woods laid a cord across the stair on the drawing. "This turn will not take the main frame. How far may the masons open it?"
"As far as need requires. Oldtown's masons know the tower better than any northern drawing can."
Ewan tapped a note beside one wall. The mason had marked a lean of a hand's width, though the drawing showed it straight.
"Then let them send a man who has worked inside it," Jon said. "The rods which turn the hands must pass straight through all four walls."
"A Myrish master has offered two faces for less," Ronnel said.
"Then you have his price for two faces," Jon answered. "Your drawings ask for four, and two bells larger than any we have yet cast."
"Lord Leyton asked for your work because the New Castle clock has not lost a quarter-hour since it was set."
"And he will have work as good. But nine hundred will not cover this."
Ronnel drew the western sheet nearer. "What price would you require, my lord?"
"Two thousand one hundred dragons," Jon said.
Ronnel looked down at the sheets. Jon waited while the factor traced the route of a shaft with one finger.
"If a hand lags, the whole city will see it. Lord Leyton will expect you to answer for that."
"I will," Jon said. "Send your mason north to work with Woods on a full-sized wooden model. We must know it will fit before Ewan cuts the great wheels. Mallon will oversee the bells."
Ronnel nodded slowly. "Fifteen hundred."
"Two thousand."
"Six hundred now. Six hundred when the wooden model is accepted. Six hundred when all four faces have kept time for a moon. Eighteen hundred, and Oldtown gives your men bread, beds, timber, and scaffold." Jon looked to Woods.
Woods nodded.
"We shall need better iron than we have here," Ewan said. "White Harbor can supply it."
"Eighteen hundred," Jon agreed. Green wax closed the bargain. Ronnel opened the iron chest and counted six hundred dragons into three low piles. His hand rested upon the last coin.
Perkin counted after him. For once no one spoke over the clerk. Ewan stood with his broad hands spread upon the edge of the drawing; Woods went to the window and called for William to fetch the long rule. By the time the last of the gold was locked away, the carpenter had begun measuring out room for the wooden model.
Ronnel fastened the empty chest. "There will be no quiet hour in Oldtown when it first rings."
"Bring back the mason's measures," Jon said. "Then I can tell you when that hour will be." He gave Perkin the signed sheet, keeping his own copy beside the working drawings.
A wagon wheel scraped the gatepost. Jon went out with Ronnel and found a timber wagon caught at the entrance, Garrick holding the leading horses while apprentices shifted boards out of its way. Finished clock cases stood all about them, carved with mermaid, falcon, rose and lion. More orders lay unopened on Perkin's sill. At the only clear bench William covered his finished brass pins against the dust.
"You have run out of room," Arthur said.
Jon had the boards moved under the awning and Garrick lead the horses round by hand. When the wagon came free, he stayed to watch its turn. Beyond the eastern palisade three goats cropped the pasture beside the old ditch.
"The foundry goes there. And the heavy smithing. Woods keeps this hall."
"Poole has the grazing roll," Arthur said.
"Have him bring it. I will speak to Father this afternoon."
* * *
Eddard agreed to consider the grant upon the boundary itself. They rode out after the midday meal in thinning rain: Jon on a shaggy grey, Eddard ahead on his chestnut, with Arthur, Perkin, Jory and the Stark riders following. Three crofters and Donella waited beside the lower ditch. From the gate the pasture had looked broad; here hooves had worn tracks between the hummocks, rushes filled the low strip, and water hidden beneath the grass rose shining round the horses' fetlocks.
Eddard halted beside the crofters. One wore a sheepskin patched with red cloth; another held a little girl before him on a dun pony. Donella had her old green shawl wrapped tightly round her head.
"Read their rights, Poole," Eddard said.
Poole read the grazing rights. Three crofters used the upper strip for goats and milk cows; Donella cut rushes below the ditch.
Donella waited until Poole had finished. "Will I still have the rush ground, my lord?"
"It lies below the boundary I want," Jon said. "You keep it." He turned his horse towards the drain. "Show me where the water stood after the last rain."
Donella led them to the little bridge where the ditch passed beneath the road. Mud had choked its narrow opening, leaving water standing in the pasture. Jon dismounted and crouched beside it.
"I shall widen this before the foundry roof goes up. Who keeps the watercourse clear farther down?"
"Harlon the miller, my lord. He clears it every spring."
"Have him meet Cley here tomorrow. They can clear it together."
Mud caught Jon's boot as he stood. Eddard took his arm while he worked his heel free.
They returned to the higher strip. Perkin sheltered his writing board beneath his cloak while Poole asked six dragons a year. Jon offered four, with the stone road and culvert improvements paid from his own purse.
"The wagons have worn that turn badly," Poole said.
"And a paved turn will serve Winterfell as well as me. Five dragons, with room for the road and the right to carry water across the pasture."
Eddard considered the distance to the gate. "Five. House Black lays a stone road from the market turn and mends the culvert before the foundry rises. No building beyond the second alder without my leave. The goats move west; Donella keeps the rush ground below the ditch."
The crofter with the red patch said, "West grass is poorer."
"For the first year, take one cart of House Black's hay before winter," Jon said. "If the west field proves as poor as you fear, bring Poole and show us."
"Bring it before winter if there is trouble," Eddard said. "Poole will see that the grazing is fit." He and Jon clasped hands. Perkin sheltered his notes beneath Arthur's cloak; he would draw up the lease when they were dry.
Poole rolled the parchment and held out his hand for Perkin's ink horn.
"You have borrowed my clerk for three moons, Lord Jon."
"Four," Jon said. "I should like to keep him. There are too many accounts now for him to keep them in his spare hours."
"The harvest books still need him." Poole looked unconvinced.
"He can teach Edmyn before he leaves you. I have sealed work from White Harbor, the Vale, Barrowton and Oldtown, and inquiries from the Rock, Highgarden, Gulltown and Lannisport. I need someone to keep the commissions, payments and costs together."
"Winterfell has two hundred mouths more whenever the harvest guests arrive. I need the same man."
Jon turned to Perkin. "Keep my books and sail when I do. You will have a room of your own and two silver stags a moon above Winterfell's wage. I need the cost of each commission, what has been paid, and what is owed. When the copying outruns you, hire another hand and teach him."
"Three." Perkin's mouth remained open a moment after the word escaped him. Poole looked almost pleased. Arthur inspected the grey sky.
"Two, and Wylla gives you a new suit each year," Jon said.
Perkin looked down at his ink-stained sleeve. "Might I ask for two suits in the first year, my lord? Mine are nearly worn through."
Jon followed his glance. The cuff had been turned back to hide a tear. "Two in the first year."
Perkin bowed. "I will serve you gladly, my lord." Poole surrendered the ink horn with a sigh.
"You will show Edmyn the harvest books until the next moon," he said. "If he ruins my figures after that, I shall send both of you downhill."
"I will show him," Perkin promised.
On the climb to Winterfell Perkin rode beside Poole, learning which harvest accounts Edmyn needed first. Eddard glanced back. "He has served us well."
"He will have enough to do," Jon said. "I will give him a copying hand before the next orders arrive."
Three days later Garrick drove his broadest wagon between the stakes marking the new buildings. Woods moved one corner back to give him room. Jon placed the foundry downwind of the clockmakers, where smoke would blow clear of their benches, and the privy downhill from the well.
Harlon and Cley widened the opening beneath the bridge and cleared the ditch beyond it. At the next heavy rain Donella sent word that the pasture had drained.
The following morning she brought Jon a rush mat, green-gold and still smelling of wet hay.
"For your floor, my lord," she said. "The ditch took all that rain. The children slept through it."
Jon unrolled the mat. It was closely woven, with a darker border. "Wylla will be pleased to have something for my muddy boots."
Donella smiled. "It will take those well enough."
* * *
Hammers woke the lower town before the bakers lit their ovens. Stone carts came along the new road, and saws worked beneath Woods's long southern windows. Mallon, the bellfounder, arrived from White Harbor with his wife, two sons and three boxes of moulding tools. He knelt beside the casting pit and pressed a thumb into the damp clay.
"A few more days under the roof, my lord. Longer if rain gets in."
"See to the moulds while it dries." Jon took him to the small stone cottage beside the pit, where his wife had already opened the shutters and begun examining the hearth.
"Is this ours?" she asked.
"For as long as your husband serves here."
Mallon looked round the room. It was small, but sound and close to the work. "My elder boy can tend a furnace. The younger has helped with moulds since he was small."
"Ewan will find work for both. Settle their wages with Perkin."
His wife turned from the hearth. "We shall need an iron crane and a shelf for the pans, my lord."
Mallon sighed. "We have barely arrived."
"And I would like to cook before night." Jon sent for Ewan, leaving them to unpack.
Within a moon their chimney smoke had joined the rest over the yard. The baker lit his oven earlier because labourers queued for rye loaves at dawn. Wylla hired six women to cut black wool under an old seamstress with one cloudy eye. A collier sold his sacks before reaching the market well. Two alewives raised their bed prices on wagon nights. At Jon's counter Gage's elder sister brought a dozen rain covers. Perkin counted them and found one seam open.
"I missed that," she said, taking it back.
"Bring it before supper and Perkin can pay for all twelve," Jon told her. She tucked the cover beneath her arm and moved aside for a smith who had been waiting with a wrapped hinge.
The smith took off his cap. "Might I ask for work, my lord? Ewan sends to White Harbor for iron while my forge has stood cold these three days."
Jon picked up the hinge. Its two halves were uneven, though the pin turned smoothly despite the rust. "He buys iron for the Hightower wheels. Can you supply that?"
"I buy what the merchants bring. Hinges, shoes, gate irons—I can make those as well as any man here."
"Can you make two hundred of these, with both halves matched?"
"Two hundred, my lord?" The smith looked at the hinge again. "I could not give you the whole lot at once. I still shoe the brewers' teams."
"How many could you bring each sennight?"
"Let me reckon it before I promise. Those men have brought me work when there was little else. I would not put them off now." He turned the hinge over in his hands. "If you can take them as I finish them, I can keep a lad at the bellows."
"We can take them in batches. Bring Ewan a sound pair and give Perkin your price, with the number you can finish each sennight."
The smith returned next day with two sound hinges and his price. Perkin bargained, Ewan inspected, and Jon placed the order. Other men found work less easily. A carpenter who had refused Woods's first wage watched his cousin accept it. Rooms near the gate grew dearer; Elspeth paid more for smaller onions. Wylla brought the women's complaints to Jon. He sent Perkin to learn which trades lacked work and went with Ewan next morning to the cold forge. There were doors to fit and tools to mend beyond Ewan's own work.
William spent those weeks between the bench and his slate. Jon taught him beside the small workroom fire after supper, using the measures from pieces they had made that day. The boy still wrote slowly, with his head bent so low that his hair brushed the slate. Jon drew it towards the lamp before taking up a pair of wheels. He knew the temptation to finish the sum for the pupil. He had done it with his son's homework and discovered, the following evening, that only one of them had learned anything. He kept his own chalk still while William worked.
William marked the teeth with chalk as he counted and watched Jon turn the unequal wheels together. Jon set their counts upon the slate and worked the division beside them. William fetched another pair and set the small wheel against the larger. "This one will turn farther," he said, touching the smaller rim.
"How much farther?" Jon asked.
William began counting the teeth.
* * *
The Hightower mason arrived while the wooden model of the clock filled half of Woods's new hall. Master Lorcas was red-cheeked, with lime worked deep into the skin of his fingertips. He climbed the frame with Woods and compared it against the measures he had brought from Oldtown. By evening Perkin had corrections for the openings in the tower walls. On the second day Lorcas asked for a drawing of the clock's inner workings.
Jon gave him drawings showing where the clock would rest and how much room it needed. "These go with you. The rest stays here."
"My masons must know what they are supporting."
"The weights and measures are there. Examine the clock before you leave, if you wish. I will not give every Oldtown workshop a drawing to copy."
Lorcas looked through the supplied sheets, then took them back to Woods. When they had settled the openings and he accepted the model, Lord Leyton sent the second six hundred dragons.
Before that moon turned, Highgarden abandoned its demand for moving petals on its clock; a rose carved in oak would serve. Casterly Rock agreed to send a keeper to learn the winding and repairs, rather than a smith to learn how the clock was made. Perkin entered both deposits.
Woods began the cases while Ewan forged the rough parts. Perkin sent each buyer the promised completion season.
William's first work for a buyer was the bell hammer of a plain hall clock for a White Harbor salt merchant. Ewan forged it, and Olyver watched William file it to fit. Woods cased the clock in dark pine. William found a pin scraping its mounting when they hung the weights; Jon helped him brace the frame, and the boy replaced the damaged pin himself. On the morning the buyer came, William scrubbed his hands until they were red.
The merchant arrived with white salt dust along his boots. He listened to the bell twice.
"Who fitted the hammer?" he asked.
"I did, master," William answered. "Under Olyver's eye."
The merchant wound the clock. "Rendall has put his where every man entering his hall must pass it," he told Jon. "He had me to supper twice before I understood that I was meant to ask about the clock."
"Where will yours stand?"
"Above my counting-room door. My clerks can see it from their stools." He glanced at the pine case. "And my guests can hear it from the hall."
Jon showed the merchant where to oil the movement and had him wind it again. The merchant's wife called from the door about a chest they had bought in the market. Promising to see whether the carter had room, he followed Perkin to pay the remaining half of the clock's two hundred and forty dragons. He checked a worn coin before adding it to the stacks.
"Rendall paid more," he said.
"Rendall wanted oak and carved salt barrels," Perkin replied.
The merchant looked back at the plain case, pleased with his thrift. His wife called again. He took his receipt and hurried out. Garrick would carry word if the clock needed attention.
William waited until he had gone before grinning. Jon put another drawing on the bench, holding its corners with four brass weights.
"You will fit this one as well."
William touched the paper as carefully as he had touched the finished hammer. "The whole hammer, my lord?"
"Under Olyver's eye."
William bent over the drawing, still smiling. Olyver moved the finished pieces out of his way and fetched a fresh blank.
* * *
Ralf and Gawen spent part of the cleared clock profit on horses. Over two moons of markets they bought bays, browns, duns, a flea-bitten grey, three chestnuts and a black mare with a broad white nose. Some were older than the boys who would ride them, but all were sound and accustomed to work.
Robb watched the string being led past. "Lord Manderly's guards all ride greys."
"He pays dearly to match them," Ralf said. "I would rather have these."
Gawen held up his bandaged hand. "You missed the six bays outside Torrhen's Square. One tried to take a finger."
"The farmer still has them," Ralf said.
Each household boy cleaned and fitted his tack before receiving a mount. Tomas exchanged Edden's leather jack when it cut beneath his arm. Iain took the old girths to Ralf, saving sound buckles for new leather.
Gawen brought the household onto the lower field, where Heward waited with six mounted Winterfell guards and padded staves. Three white posts marked the way back to the gate.
"Lord Jon comes down the field," Gawen told Tomas. "Heward cuts him off. Get him through those posts."
Tomas sent four riders ahead and kept four behind Jon, with Gage's reserve at the centre post. Heward let the front riders pass before cutting across. The rear pair crowded forward, leaving Jon no room to turn. Gawen called the halt.
"I sent too many ahead," Tomas said.
"Too far. Walk it again."
This time two riders stayed within reach of Jon's bridle. Their shields met Heward's staves while Gage brought the reserve across. A guard gave ground beside the post.
"With me, my lord," Gage called.
Jon urged Bucephalus through the gap. Tomas came abreast on his right; the rear pair drew clear behind them. He had wanted to turn his horse into the nearer guard. Waiting for his men to open the way had been harder.
Robb took Heward's place for the last passes and found a gap along the wet edge. Tomas left a pair facing it. Later, as Jon rubbed Bucephalus down, he told Gage they would exchange places tomorrow. The file leader should feel what it was to wait inside the escort.
As the first harvest wagons came down to Winter Town, Perkin counted out the last silver owed for Gawen's first term.
"Will you stay another year?" Jon asked.
Gawen looked through the door at Tomas checking a girth beside Ralf. "Gladly, my lord."
"The same terms?"
"Aye. And I mean to have Cressen holding his place before the next hunt."
Jon smiled and pushed the silver towards him. Gawen counted it into his purse. Three stags would go to Kennet with a letter. He had postponed writing too long already.
* * *
The next packet from Dragonstone reached the Black Yard before noon, smelling of tar and salt. Oilskin had kept the pages dry, but white crystals crusted the knots. Jon took it up to Winterfell with Arthur and Perkin before breaking Ethan's seal. Eddard was in his solar, finishing a letter beside a bowl of cold broth. He set down his quill when Jon laid the packet upon his desk. "From Ethan?"
"And Tobin." Jon waited until Arthur had closed the door, then cut the cord and passed the papers to Perkin. Beneath the harbour chart lay Denys's report on the fleet. Eight warships were back in service. Stone Drum had her new planking, but the captain would not take her to sea until the seams were sealed properly. Salt Wraith still needed a new mast. Stannis had released the captured galley after the captors and the dead men's families received their shares; she was Jon's now, with the expense of making her useful.
"Send Ethan the money Denys asks for," Jon said. "From the clocks already paid for. I want both ships under sail before the year turns." He drew the harbour chart nearer. "And timber for the repair berth. He should not have to borrow a merchant's crane whenever a mast comes out."
Eddard studied the two estimates. "You will keep all ten?"
"Black Gull burned at Fair Isle. Her men held off the ironborn while the boats got away. I will not leave the ships they saved rotting against a quay." Jon put Denys's report beside the chart. "When the repairs are finished, he can put them on the coastal patrols in turn. The crews need their sea time."
Beneath the chart lay letters from the men Jon's factors had approached across the narrow sea. The shipwright Qavo Ryndoon would bring his wife, their three children and the three apprentices who had worked beside him through lean years. Eight mouths, with a house to find for them. A Myrish creditor held two of the apprentices and their tools against old debts; another claimed Qavo's hull patterns. Maester Stewart would not leave Pentos while his brother's family lacked passage.
"Pello, our factor in Myr, can redeem the debts," Perkin said. "The creditor asks less than the Hightower gave for its wooden model."
"Have him settle them and bring away the releases," Jon replied. "They come as free men, with their families and tools. If any chooses to leave our service later, pay his passage home."
Perkin noted the order and asked about their lodgings.
"Ethan is to find a sound house for all eight, close enough to the work. Send him the list of their tools as well." Jon signed the letters to Ethan, Pello in Myr and the Pentoshi factor speaking for Stewart. Perkin sanded them and went to Luwin's raven room.
Jon stayed at his father's desk with Arthur after Perkin had gone. Ethan had his trust; now he had the money to carry out the work. Jon turned the harbour drawing so Eddard could see it.
Arthur read Ethan's smaller private note twice. His factors were still asking after Hightower and Whent, but no fresh report named a man who had spoken with either.
"Nothing?" Jon asked.
"Nothing Ethan trusts." Arthur passed the sheet to Eddard. "Still no place to send a letter."
Eddard read it before answering. "He is to keep asking. Have him send the reports with his private letters, even those he cannot yet prove."
Arthur nodded and took the note back. He folded it carefully while Jon waited beside the harbour drawing.
Arthur set one hand upon Ethan's harbour map. "Jon must still go to Dragonstone."
"When the island can receive him."
"It is his seat, Eddard."
"And Winterfell is his home."
Arthur glanced at Jon before answering. "You speak as though the two must contend."
"You have spoken so since Ethan went south."
"Because you call every delay prudence. Ethan has governed the island for years, while Jon has yet to set foot there. How much longer must he wait?"
Eddard's voice went low. "He is learning men, harvest, justice and command beside those who love him. Those lessons will serve him on Dragonstone too."
"But he knows every turn of the road to Winter Town and must learn the faces of his own people from letters."
"Here I know who is asking things of him. On Dragonstone I would hear of it in a letter, when it was already done."
"Then tell him when he may go. Do not leave him asking whether he is wanted there."
"He is wanted here." Colour rose above Eddard's beard. "I will not send him south merely because men who have never held him begin to ask after him."
"Ethan has held the island in his name all these years. He has a right to ask when his lord is coming."
Eddard's hand closed upon the table edge. "And I ask when you will cease treating every ordinary year with his brothers as something I must answer for." His knuckles whitened. Arthur's shoulders went still.
"I am here," Jon said. Both men looked at him.
"You argue as if I have already sailed."
Eddard's hand eased upon the table. "You are right. What would you have us do?"
"I mean to go," Jon said. "But I want to know what you are waiting for. The ships and houses can be made ready. If there is more I must learn first, tell me."
Arthur drew his stool back. "Forgive me. I should have asked you."
"We will set it out together," Eddard said. "What the island needs, and what I would still have you learn here. The three of us."
Jon nodded. Wylla opened the door carrying hot onion broth, three heels of buttered bread, and no patience for an argument that had kept Jon from dinner.
"A pair of fools, the two of you. He still needs feeding." She set the tray over the harbour chart. "Move those papers, my lord. The broth will spill."
Eddard said, "You heard all of that?"
"I heard the last of it from the door. You have argued the rest often enough."
Arthur cleared the papers from beneath the tray and passed Jon a bowl.
The broth was sweet with onions browned in butter, peppered enough to warm his nose, and thickened with torn bread. Eddard sat beside him rather than at the head of the table. Arthur took the stool opposite. For a time they ate with Ethan's harbour drawing between them.
"Ride with me at dawn," Eddard said. "North along the wolfswood road."
Jon looked up from his bowl. "Robb will want to come."
"Then we shall take him."
Arthur broke another piece of bread. "He will be ready before either of you."
At the family supper that evening, Bran struck his cup with a spoon whenever Robb tried to speak. Arya joined him with the handle of her knife. Catelyn took the spoon; Sansa took the knife. Jeyne Poole sat beside Sansa, trying to hide her laughter. They ate cold capon, barley with mushrooms, sharp cheese and apples baked until their red skins split. Robb speared the last mushroom before Jon reached it.
"Father says I may come," he said.
"Then leave me something to eat."
Robb split the mushroom and pushed half towards Jon. Eddard cut an apple while Sansa reached for the bread.
Sansa leaned around Jeyne. "She has never heard the song from the sea."
Jeyne's cheeks coloured. "You need not sing, my lord."
"Go on, Jon," Robb said. "I want to hear it again."
Bran found another spoon and struck the cup once.
Jon began before the accompaniment grew. The tune belonged to the life no one at the table could know. His wife had sung it without words while mending by rainlight; years later their daughter had hummed it over a feverish child while Jon walked the floor with his first grandson against his shoulder. He no longer knew which woman had changed the third note. Both voices lived there now.
He gave the melody northern words. A sailor followed one lamp through black water until war drew him beyond its light. He came home with white in his beard and found the woman who had tended the flame beneath a stone above the shore. Their daughter had kept the lamp burning in her mother's place. Arya liked the storm and demanded another broken mast. Sansa's fingers went still upon Jeyne's sleeve when the old sailor reached the grave. Robb stopped tapping before the final verse.
"Home?" Bran asked when the sailor reached his daughter.
"For a little while," Jon said. "Then he goes to sea again."
Arya scowled. "Why? He only just got there."
"It is a sad song," Sansa told her.
"He could stay." Arya folded her arms. Robb smiled, but Sansa looked thoughtful.
"I should want him to stay," she said.
Bran pushed his spoon towards Jon. For an instant Jon thought of his own daughter, grown old in a world he could no longer reach. He wondered who had sat with her after his death, whether she still hummed the tune to her children. Here Robb was watching him across the dish of apples, and Eddard had promised to ride with him in the morning.
"You are right," Jon said. "He stays until spring. Then they sail together."
Robb pointed his knife. "You changed the song."
"It needed another verse."
Bran struck the cup again, and Catelyn took back her spoon. Eddard gave Jon the other half of the baked apple. Below the hill the last hammers fell silent in the Black Yard. Jon stayed at the table while Robb told him where he wanted to ride.