On the third morning after the oaths, Hennet woke when somebody trod upon his hand.
He had let it hang over the side of the bunk. The man passing between the beds apologised in a whisper, then knocked his shin against the next one and stopped whispering. Hennet drew his hand under the blanket, his narrow face screwed up against the pain.
At home the morning began with his mother stirring the hearth. Here it began with men trying to find their boots. One had fallen asleep in his. Another had put his beneath the wrong bed and was accusing its owner of theft. The quarrel ended when Malcolm came down the aisle carrying a lamp, its light catching the sparse beard upon his square chin.
"Out from under the blankets. You can find the other boot by daylight."
Hennet sat up. The new barrack smelled of damp wool, fresh timber and a great many sleeping men. A narrow piece of sky showed grey through the window. He pulled his shirt over his head, wriggled into the black coat and found that he had put the belt through only half its loops. The boy beside him had done worse. Both sleeves of his coat were inside out.
"How did you get it into that state?" Hennet asked.
"My brother pulled it off me."
"He went home."
"I know." The boy pushed a fist into the lining and began wrestling. Hennet helped him find the cuff. By the time they had straightened both sleeves, Malcolm was coming back.
Outside, water stood in the hollows the carts had made. Hennet stepped across one and put his other foot into the next. He had meant to keep the shoes dry. His mother had scrubbed them before he left home, using a piece of cloth she afterwards washed and put away for the next pair.
The Old Watch rose dark above the camp. Lamplight showed in a narrow slit near its foot. Along the broken curtain, scaffold poles reached into the grey sky, and bundles of thatch lay under a weighted cloth. Mairi was lifting her sewing basket from a little cart beside the guardroom. A smell of porridge came from the hall. Hennet looked towards it until Malcolm called him back.
They assembled by tens with their wooden shields. Hennet had been placed in Malcolm's. He knew the decanus's face and the men to either side; beyond them he still confused names. He had learned to answer his own quickly. When Hewyn paused over the roll, nobody wanted to be the man who made him look up twice.
Lord Jon came from the guardroom carrying his gloves. Ser Arthur followed, stooping beneath the doorway. The boy's black hair had been tied behind his head, though a pale lock at his left temple remained loose. Hennet had seen him take a spade from a grown man the day before and cut the first reach of a drain himself. He still had to remind himself that this was the child who had done it.
Wylla put an oatcake in Jon's hand as he passed. He ate while Hewyn reported, then ordered a man with a swollen ankle kept off the run until Luwin had examined him.
Tomas brought the household up the road before Jon had finished eating. Hennet knew their captain by the grey braid. Twenty-five black coats came through the gate, some with patches so neatly fitted that he had not noticed them at first. Most looked younger than the new spearmen, some by several years. Yet they moved around the standing men without shoving, and when Tomas raised a hand they found their places without being called one by one.
A knight with a worn blue cloak came beside them. Hennet had heard his name the day before. Ser Gawen took the household's horses towards the clear ground while Arthur spoke to their file leaders. Jon handed his gloves to Tomas and went to Hewyn's side.
"Shields against the rail," he said. "Coats open. Follow me."
Hennet still felt foolish loosening his ankles, though the stiffness eased as he ran. Malcolm kept the ten together past the covered well and down towards the stream. Keeping another man's pace was harder than running his own. Through the trees Hennet saw Tomas leading the household round the longer course.
Jon ran the lower circuit beside them. Hennet could have outpaced the eight-year-old upon the straight, but at the stony turn the boy went lightly where Hennet jarred himself to the hip. At the top Jon stepped aside with Arthur to catch his breath. Hewyn sent the spears round again.
On the last climb Hennet watched only Malcolm's back and the ground ahead. They slowed before the gate and entered at a walk, sweating beneath their open coats.
"Keep moving," Jon told them. "You may sit at breakfast."
Hennet wanted to sit sooner. He took a cup of water, drank too quickly and coughed half of it over his sleeve. The man who had stepped on his hand thumped him once between the shoulders.
"Sorry about your hand," the man said.
"Mind the other one tonight," Hennet told him.
Hewyn sent the spears to breakfast by tens.
Two carpenters were setting a heavy oak block beside the barrack wall. Iron rings hung at either end. One man held it steady while the other drove a wedge beneath its foot. Hennet slowed as he passed. He had seen a groom whipped over such a block at Torrhen's Square, with his father's hand gripping the back of his neck to keep him watching.
"Move along," Malcolm said. Hennet followed his ten towards the hall.
At the washing barrel Malcolm stopped them to clean their hands. Hennet dipped his hands, rubbed the dirt from between his fingers and found the water cold enough to hurt. Beside him the boy with the twisted sleeves was trying to smooth his hair in the reflection.
"Does it lie down?" he asked.
"No."
He pressed harder. Hennet gave him room and went in.
The bowls were already upon the benches. Hennet sat where Malcolm pointed, accepted the bread passed from his neighbour and waited while the last men found their places. Outside, a cart rattled towards the tower. Its driver was singing badly and loudly enough to rise above the wheels.
The porridge had been thickened with peas, and fat shone in a little hollow beneath the spoon. Hennet stirred it through. At home his mother always scraped her own bowl last. Here a woman came down the aisle with another pot before he had finished, asking which ten still lacked food. Malcolm sent her to the far end, where two men were only just taking their seats.
The boy who had fought with his sleeves tore the crust from his bread and set it aside.
"Saving that?" Hennet asked.
"My sister likes the crust." He looked at the piece, then put it back beside his bowl. "She is home."
"How far?"
"Beyond the Cerwyn road. I could walk there by dinner."
"You had better ask Malcolm."
"I know that. I only said I could." He ate the crust himself. Hennet finished his porridge and took another piece when the loaf reached him, without first looking to see whether anyone would object. The noise in the hall rose as the bowls emptied. Someone wanted to trade a belt; someone else had a brother who could mend boots. At the end of the table Malcolm was telling a man where his wife could leave a bundle when she came from town.
As they came out, Lord Jon was mounting beside the gate. Arthur waited on a grey horse, with William standing by his stirrup. Jon spoke to Hewyn before the two riders followed the clockmaker down the road. Malcolm took Hennet's ten to the tool shed.
Hennet would have been glad of his father's wood axe. He knew what to do with an axe. He had cut and stacked firewood for years without a man telling him that his left foot ought to have been his right.
Malcolm gave him a spade instead.
Their ten went down behind the new barrack, where a length of drain remained choked with roots. The sun had warmed the upper yard, but here the bank kept them in shade. Hennet could smell wet earth and the sour leaves lying under the thorn. He thrust the blade in, jumped upon it and found a stone.
"I have come a long way to do this," Harwyn said. The broad man leaned upon his spade and looked along the uncut bank.
"How far?"
"Four days."
"Should have stayed where you were. We have these at home." Hennet worked his spade beneath the stone. His shoulders hurt when he tried to lift it.
The boy with the ill-fitting sleeves began laughing. His name was Lew, Hennet had learned, and he laughed readily when there was nobody important nearby.
"He promised us spears."
"You will have one after dinner," Malcolm said. "Give Hennet a hand."
Lew took the other spade. Between them they brought the stone up, rolled it clear and stood panting over the hole. Downhill, Murch's men were doing the same work, their coats hung over the thorn. Beyond them a line of soldiers passed baskets of rubble towards the broken wall. There seemed to be men everywhere now: digging, carrying, waiting beneath a beam while a carpenter fitted the joint. A month ago Hennet had known most of the faces he saw in a day.
Someone began a song about a miller's wife. Malcolm let the first verse go by, then told the singer there were women working within earshot. The man substituted a miller's goat. That made it worse.
They were still laughing when Lord Jon rode through the lower gate. Hennet put his foot upon the spade and straightened. Around him, men pulled up their breeches and reached for coats they had no time to put on.
"Carry on," Jon said.
His horse's dark mane was flecked with dust from the road. A bundle of papers rode in the bag behind the saddle, and the boy held half a pear in one gloved hand. He finished it while Hewyn came down to meet him. Ser Arthur took the reins when Jon dismounted. The men bowed as he passed between the heaps of earth.
He came to the drain and looked uphill. Hennet could see what he was looking at: the space left beneath the lane, where Woods had laid two flat stones beside an unfinished crossing.
"Bring those down," Jon told Malcolm. "We can cover the drain before the timber cart comes back."
The stones were heavy enough for four men. Hennet took a corner with the others and carried it to the narrow channel. Jon had climbed down into it. Mud reached the tops of his boots. He cleared the ledge with a little iron trowel, then showed them where to lower the slab. Hewyn took Hennet's corner for the last of the lift.
From the bank Hennet watched Jon push small stones under the edge until the slab rested firmly. The second covered the remaining gap. When Jon climbed out, one knee of his breeches was brown and his hair had come loose against his cheek.
"Pack stone over the slabs, then gravel," he said to Malcolm. "Keep the opening underneath clear."
Harwyn waited until Jon had gone to the next ten before looking into it.
"That will take a cart?"
Hewyn heard him. "When you have finished it."
They carried the filling up in baskets. By the time the timber wagon returned, the lane ran over the drain. Hennet stepped back while the wheel ground across the gravel. The horse flicked its tail in his face, and Lew laughed again.
The water beneath kept running.
Hennet crouched beside the opening until Lew called for the empty basket. His father would have sent for a mason before trusting a loaded wagon to that crossing.
They put away the tools when the dinner bell sounded. Hennet ate barley and onions with his coat spread over the bench to dry. By the time Malcolm called them out again, the sun had reached the ground beneath the barrack wall.
The men began with sand sacks. Jon brought Hennet's load nearer his feet so he could lift it from beneath; by the end his legs trembled. Beyond the rail Gawen reduced the weight for two younger household boys.
With spears and shields Hennet fared worse. He caught a heel, then crossed another man's shaft. His patched black coat bunched beneath the shield arm. Malcolm loosened the belt and promised to send him to Mairi; on the next attempt the ten reached the far end of the yard.
Benjen Stark arrived while they were returning. Hennet knew him by the black cloak and the long face, so like Lord Eddard's that he had once mistaken him at a distance. A second black brother rode behind him. The men at the gate bowed. Hennet nearly turned his head, then kept it where Hewyn had told him to keep it.
The two visitors dismounted. Jon went to his uncle, spoke briefly and brought him towards the household's ground. There Gawen had put a padded jerkin over a timber stand. It was small enough to pass for a boy, with an old black cloak over its shoulders. Arthur stood behind it holding a wooden sword.
Hennet understood the dressed post when Gawen attacked from the side. Tomas brought two files in: one met the knight while the other guarded the figure as Arthur moved it back. Gawen dragged a shield low, but another boy filled the opening. When he came again, Tomas stood beside the first file.
Benjen took a practice sword from Gawen. Hennet craned to see, and Hewyn tapped his shield.
"Your work is here."
He faced front. On the next turn he glimpsed Benjen inside the first pair of shields, one boy falling backwards and another closing before the ranger could follow. Nobody ran off to fight him alone.
At their next rest, Hennet watched Jon and Gawen show the boys the opening they had left; Benjen stood listening, his sword lowered. As the shields closed again, Hennet saw a boy move his rear foot first to leave room for his neighbour. He tried the step himself. He would ask Malcolm to show him properly.
From the shade beside the water cask, Hennet watched Martyn's swordsmen working in pairs across the lane. A short young man drove his opponent backwards with sweeping cuts; Hennet had scarcely seen him allow an answer.
"Colin," Martyn called. "Beside Gerralt."
With Fifth's centurion at his shoulder, Colin reached too far after a retreating opponent. A wooden blade passed between their shields and struck Gerralt beneath the arm. Martyn called the halt.
"You have left me open twice this week," Gerralt told him.
"I thought I could reach him."
"You could. So could his friend reach me."
Jon took Colin's place and thrust over the joined shield rims, his sword arm close. The point reached the opposite shoulder without uncovering Gerralt. When Colin tried again, he checked his first swing, shortened the stroke and struck. On the next pass he caught his own mistake before Gerralt had to warn him.
Martyn spoke quietly to Jon, pointing towards Colin. Malcolm called Hennet over to loosen his coat again; when he looked back, Jon and Arthur had returned to the household.
Tomas spoke to Jon, who looked towards the road. Beyond the trees, sunlight caught the upper walls of Winterfell. Benjen handed the practice sword to Gawen and went to his horse.
"Come and eat," he told Jon. "Your father is expecting you."
Jon gave Hewyn the evening's orders and asked Malcolm whether he had remembered Hennet's coat. Then he mounted beside Arthur, and Tomas brought the household through the gate.
Hewyn dismissed the spears. Hennet went to find Mairi before supper. She had laid her cloth out beneath the eaves, beside a shutter kept open with a wedge. He stood bareheaded until she looked up, then showed her the place Malcolm had loosened.
"Off with it."
"Malcolm told me where it pulls." She held out her hand. Hennet gave her the coat and stood in his shirt, feeling the cool air upon the sweat between his shoulders. She turned the garment inside out, picked free a short length of stitching and spread the seam beneath her thumb. There were other coats waiting, some with new cuffs, some almost finished. His was one of the best he had ever owned, and the sight of the open seam troubled him until she began sewing it closed again with more room beneath the arm.
From the shelter he could see the road Lord Jon had taken. A stone cart was climbing towards them; downhill, men carried a long timber through the gate of the works. His father had doubted the promises made in the call. Hennet had his first pay wrapped inside his chest, and there had been meat in yesterday's stew. He meant to write home when he knew how to say that without sounding as though he thought his father a fool.
"Try it now." Mairi gave back the coat. Hennet drew it on and lifted his arm as he had with the shield. The cloth moved with him.
"Thank you, mistress."
She had already taken up the next garment. He fastened his belt outside and walked back to Malcolm's ten, making the turn once with an empty hand before he reached the hall.
Jon returned after dark. Hennet heard the horses pass beneath the barrack window while he was spreading his blanket.
The quarrel began over a boot.
Harwyn had left his wet pair upon Lew's rolled cloak. Lew knocked them to the floor. When their owner told him to pick them up, he threw one instead. It struck the man's thigh, and a moment later Lew was against a bedpost with a fist in his shirt. He hit out wildly. Harwyn drove him backwards, upsetting the stool between the bunks.
"Enough!" Malcolm came down the aisle. Hennet caught Lew's arm, but Harwyn struck once more before the decanus dragged him away. Blood ran from Lew's nose. He kept saying that the cloak was his own, as though nobody had understood him.
Malcolm took both men outside, then called Hennet after them. Jon stood beneath the guardroom lamp with his coat unfastened. Arthur had come to the doorway behind him. Hennet bowed and waited until Jon asked what he had seen.
Harwyn said Lew had attacked him without cause. Jon heard him out, then turned to Hennet. With the man staring at him, Hennet told it from the boots upon the cloak. Lew tried to interrupt.
"You will speak when I ask you," Jon said.
Lew shut his mouth. Malcolm gave his own account, including the last blow.
"You heard him call the halt?" Jon asked Harwyn.
"I was angry, my lord."
"Did you hear him?"
Harwyn looked down. "Aye."
Jon turned to Lew. "And you threw the boot."
"Yes, my lord." Lew pressed his sleeve beneath his nose. "I'll not do it again."
"Six strokes for fighting. Ten for you," Jon told Harwyn. "You struck again after your decanus ordered you to stop. At morning muster, before the cohort."
Lew's hand fell from his face. "My lord, please—"
"I warned you before you swore. The sentence stands." Jon called Hewyn from the barrack door. "Neither leaves camp this sennight. Keep them apart tonight and have the six centuries formed before breakfast."
"Aye, my lord." Hewyn sent Harwyn to sleep in the officers' shelter and took Lew inside. Hennet picked up the fallen stool before getting into his bunk. Lew lay awake across the aisle, his cloak pulled over him.
At dawn the six centuries formed on three sides of the yard. Mist clung to the broken wall. The cooks had begun stirring their kettles, and Hennet could smell oats and woodsmoke as Malcolm brought his ten to a halt. Lew and Harwyn stood beside the oak block in their shirts.
Jon came out with Arthur and walked to the open side of the square. His black coat was buttoned to the throat; the white lock showed plainly against his dark hair. Beside Hewyn he looked smaller than ever. He waited until the last men were still, then named the offences and repeated the sentences so that the rear ranks could hear.
Hewyn laid a leather scourge across the block. Lew stared at it.
"Shirt off," Hewyn told him.
Lew fumbled at the fastening. When he bent over the oak, a veteran secured his wrists to the rings. Hennet had worked beside him yesterday, laughing as they dug the drain. Now Lew turned his face towards the wood and gripped its edge.
Jon gave Hewyn a nod.
The first stroke made Lew gasp. Hennet stiffened with him. Hewyn counted aloud, giving each stroke the same space. By the fourth Lew was crying into his forearm. Hennet looked towards Jon. His lord stood with his hands at his sides, watching; when Hewyn reached six, Jon ordered Lew released.
Malcolm helped him straighten. Harwyn had gone pale. He obeyed Hewyn without a word and bent over the block in his turn. At the eighth stroke he cursed through clenched teeth. Hewyn counted the remaining two and lowered the scourge.
"Take them to the guardroom," Jon said. "I have sent for Maester Luwin. Until he has seen them, neither drills nor carries a load." He faced the ranks. "When an officer calls a halt, you obey him. That applies in the barracks as well as the field. Centurions, dismiss your men to breakfast."
Arthur moved aside to let Malcolm bring Lew through the door. Jon followed them. Hennet stayed in his place until Malcolm's second called the ten forward. Harwyn's shirt lay folded beside the block; a soldier fetched it and hurried after him.
At breakfast the usual scramble for the loaf did not begin. Hennet passed it along and kept two pieces beside Lew's empty bowl. Outside, Hewyn hung the scourge upon an iron hook beneath the eaves.
* * *
Two afternoons later Hewyn took First Century onto newly cleared ground beyond the tower. Bracken lay heaped along the bank; an old ditch crossed the field. Malcolm's ten was short of Lew and Harwyn, still kept from drill by Luwin. They picked stones from dried peas under the cook shelter while the other centuries spread across the meadow, Martyn's round shields distinct from the longer spear lines.
At the ditch the front rank slowed, those behind kept coming, and Hennet found his shield pressed against another man's back.
"Halt!" Hewyn called.
They disentangled themselves while one man climbed from the mud. Jon sent Malcolm's ten across alone and kept them moving until the next ten had room to follow. Coll's men formed crookedly; Mallador came over too fast. Nobody was trapped against the bank.
On the next crossing Jon took a place beside Malcolm. Hennet matched his shorter steps at the slope and waited for his neighbour at the turn. They reached open ground together. Jon stood breathing hard while the next century crossed. Arthur brought him water and spoke quietly; after a second drink, Jon gave him the shield.
"He has had enough of it as well," someone whispered behind Hennet. Malcolm looked down the ten, and the man fell quiet.
Later they changed their spears for throwing shafts. Hennet's first cast turned sideways and fell short of the wicker. Jon shifted his grip and made him try with his shield high. The rim brushed Hennet's jaw, but the padded point struck home. By supper his shield arm ached more than his throwing arm. He had not expected that.
* * *
The aches changed through the week. Hennet stopped feeling the run in his chest and began feeling it in his calves. The shield grip still rubbed his palm, though he no longer held it quite so desperately. Lew slept upon his stomach and had Hennet help him with his shirt. By the week's end he could dress himself, but Malcolm still kept him at the cooks' light work until Luwin permitted more.
After the morning run they ate, then went to work until dinner. Their ten cleared fallen stones from the old hall and carried them to Ormund, the mason, who showed them which pieces could be used again. Hennet learned to recognise the smell of lime before he saw the white tubs, and to tell the tower hammer from the smith's hammer downhill.
Lord Jon was at both places so often that the men began looking for his horse before they spoke too freely. Hennet saw him kneeling upon a new beam beside Woods, holding one end of a cord while the carpenter worked. Another day he found him on the riverbank with Ewan, drawing in the dirt. The two men who had come to carry stone waited bareheaded until Jon looked up and sent them to Ormund.
It was slow work, whatever his lord intended the place to become. They could spend a whole morning clearing a patch scarcely wider than the hall. Yet from Hennet's bunk the gap above the shutter no longer showed the sky. There was a roof over the next century's belongings, and the carts crossed the drain his ten had covered without stopping.
At the week's end, Perkin came with the pay chest.
Malcolm took his men to the hall after the afternoon drill. They waited along the wall while the clerk called each name. Harwyn went first. Hennet watched the coins pass across the table into his hand. Harwyn counted them, put them away, and stepped aside for Lew.
When Hennet's turn came, he took off his cap. Perkin asked his name again before paying him. The coins felt cool upon his sore palm. He had earned money before, carrying wood or helping bring in a harvest, but never while being fed as well as this. He closed his fingers over it and moved away, reluctant to put it out of sight.
Outside, Lew wanted to know whether the sennight without leave was reckoned from the fight or from the whipping.
"Ask Malcolm."
"You always say that."
"He always knows."
Hennet went back to the hall. Malcolm was sitting at the end of a table, taking a stone from his boot.
"Decanus, could you write something for me?"
Malcolm looked up. "For home?"
Hennet nodded. His mother could ask the miller to read it. She would know how to get the letter to him without his father hearing it first.
"Sit down, then." Malcolm put the boot back on. "What do you want said?"
Hennet looked down at the coins in his hand. He would keep a little for himself. The rest could go with the letter; one of the wood carters knew his village.
"Tell her I have been paid. And tell her there is some for her."
"Is that all?"
"Tell her I am eating well." He thought of the porridge, the extra bread, the meat they had twice that week. "She will ask."
Malcolm nodded and made room for him on the bench. Outside, Lew was asking someone else about Winter Town.
At the week's end Hallis took most of the Stark guards back to Winterfell; Hewyn's sworn men could now keep the lanes clear and account for the stores. Two guards stayed until the visiting lords left, with orders to bring serious trouble to Hallis. Hennet watched the grey cloaks leave while his ten cleared the gate for a wagon.
* * *
During the following days, six smaller black coats came up from the sewing room with the next clothing bundle. Their sleeves had been shortened, the hems left deep enough to let down as the boys grew. Wylla put shoes beside them and made each child try his pair upon both feet. None received a soldier's weapon or a place upon the muster roll.
Heward gave each century a page. Before letting the centurions take their boys, he made them hear when the children must eat and when they must be released for lessons. They would change centuries at the new moon; Aries remained Jon's own page. Nibs stood beside Gerralt, staring at the sword upon his hip, until Heward called the boys back for their first errands.
Heward sent them with men who knew the paths. In the yard afterwards he laid seven light wooden swords on the ground, shorter even than those Jon had first learned upon. Gawen showed the grip and the first step. Nibs tried to strike Timm's blade before anyone had been told to begin.
Heward took it away, showed him where to stand, and kept him there until the other boys had finished the passage. Then he returned it.
"You may have a turn now. When Ser Gawen says."
The boy waited. Aries watched that lesson with an attention Jon had not seen over the letters. When Gawen called him forward, he kept the point down until the knight raised his own.
They finished well before the soldiers did. Gawen sent them to the pump and then to their bowls, while Heward went back to make a whole ten repeat its turn. The pages had time to hear him twice before their porridge cooled.
* * *
By then Jon's mornings belonged to the works and his afternoons to Hewyn's throwing field. He kept the little guardroom, riding to the Black Yard when the benches needed him and to Winterfell for supper with his family. Each time he came back, there was less nettle in the yard and more stone laid bare.
Four tens began the ditch along Woods's western boundary stakes, beating the earth into a bank and saving turf to cover it. Jon worked beside Malcolm until his shoulders shook, then marked the corner-tower posts with Arthur and Woods. The bank would stand higher than a man before the timber went on top; the towers' upper floors would meet the wall walk, with room to pass beneath. A sword century would relieve the diggers after dinner.
At the meal bell Hennet lifted a turf square and showed Lew a worm as long as his finger. "Leave that for the crows," Malcolm said. "There is beef today." Jon's arms trembled as he fastened his plan case. Arthur took it and handed him bread for the walk back between the barrack frames.
On the throwing field Hewyn began with five abreast. Later that week he brought forward the front ten with covering ranks behind. Jon kept the iron heads locked up. They moved the wicker closer, gave the men at either end more room and practised casting together on the drumbeat. By the evening bell most shafts struck together; the throwers stepped back for their long spears while raised shields covered them.
When one of Mallador's men let his shield drift aside, Mallador began shouting. "Show him, Mallador," Hewyn said. Mallador went to the man and spoke close, guiding his shield back beside his neighbour's.
Benjen watched from the rail with Robb and Theon. "Tomorrow half the North arrives for the harvest gathering. By supper, every lord will know why your fifth cast missed."
"They will have plenty to say about it," Jon said. He took another practice shaft from the rack.
"I want to see what Greatjon makes of it," Benjen said. At the family supper that evening, Robb asked whether Smalljon had crossed Cerwyn land, and Sansa asked whether Marna Dustin and the Manderly girls could be lodged near her. Arya asked whether Lyanna Mormont could sleep in her room. Catelyn said she would speak to Lady Maege; Arya immediately asked whether Lyra was bringing her pony again.
"Is Lady Dustin bringing her ladies?" Theon asked.
"Do you mean to dance with all of them?" Robb asked.
"As many as I can." Theon helped himself to the bread.
Benjen listened until the children had divided every expected guest between them. Jon was about to remind Theon that Barbrey Dustin owned sharp ears when a horn sounded from Winterfell's east gate. Men upon the road took it up. Beyond the castle wall, black horsehair streamed above Karstark riders, dark against a strip of clearing gold.