The law dictates: deserters from the Night's Watch are public criminals, and all the Lords of the Seven Kingdoms are obligated to hunt them down and execute them, especially in the North, where the Stark family and their subordinate Lords, who have the closest relationship with the Night's Watch, show absolutely no mercy to deserters. Unless one flees North to join the Wildlings, the fate of simply running away is easily imaginable. But Aegon wanted to get rid of his Night's Watch identity precisely to stay far away from humanity's natural enemy, so how could he possibly run North?
As for heading South... if one is serious about escaping, preparation is essential. First, one needs a good horse, plenty of dry provisions, to change out of the black clothes, choose the right moment to quickly flee the Night's Watch's sphere of influence, avoiding all villages and inhabited areas along the way... As long as one can successfully cross the Neck and escape the North, the escape plan is half successful. The next step is to head straight for the warm and safe South. The further South one goes, the less the Lords and nobles care about the Night's Watch. One only needs to reach the fertile Riverlands or The Reach, find a place that can accept them without questioning their identity, and a new life in another world can begin.
The plan was clear and simple, but the problem was: in this feudal era with inconvenient transportation and extremely low population mobility, for someone with obvious foreign looks and no legal identity, wanting to smoothly complete the escape plan was truly...
Too difficult.
Shaking his head, Aegon cleared his thoughts. Now was not the time for thinking – as the horses' hooves made soft thudding sounds on the snow, tree trunks and branches quickly obscured the sunlight, and they truly entered this vast, unparalleled boreal forest located North of the North.
"These damned Wildlings," Gared cursed. "The weather is getting colder, but they're getting restless instead."
"If they settled down, they wouldn't be called Wildlings," Aegon replied casually, brushing off a few snowflakes that had landed on his sleeve. Due to the shortage of manpower and supplies, and to make it difficult for the Wildlings to figure out their activity patterns, the Night's Watch had abandoned regular patrols in favor of a more random and targeted schedule. The night before last, a brother on guard duty on The Wall reported seeing firelight a few miles North of the Wall. This was the direct reason the Commander and the First Ranger arranged this patrol. If this hadn't happened, the few of them should have finished their morning exercises by now and been comfortably warming themselves by the fire indoors.
"No idle chatter. Spread out to the sides and advance abreast. Don't miss any suspicious signs," Waymar ordered coldly, cutting off the nascent chat between the three Night's Watch soldiers without turning his head.
Hearing their officer's command, both Will and Gared shrugged and secretly made faces at the speaker's back. The four of them, from oldest to youngest, were Gared, Will, Aegon, and finally Waymar. Yet, the youngest was the officer. It was clearly impossible for the other three to have no opinion at all – this young noble from the Vale was the third son of the Lord of Runestone.
Because the possibility of inheriting the title was slim, he chose to join the Night's Watch. His Father personally escorted him to The Wall with a whole wagon load of luggage. This matter was often brought up by other Night's Watch men while drinking to mock him – the great Ser Waymar Royce, who seemed less like he was here to serve and more like he was on a holiday trip.
It was explicitly stated that every Night's Watch man was a brother to each other, yet a young, inexperienced, and untested recruit was placed in charge. Waymar Royce was even leading a patrol for the first time. Honestly, how were the other Night's Watch men supposed to trust and respect him?
Despite their reluctance, discipline was present. The three of them spread out as ordered, forming a line to begin patrolling and investigating forward.
Soon, they discovered signs of human activity near the area where the sentry had spotted the light: it hadn't snowed yesterday, and signs like the footprints left by the Wildlings walking around and the piles of ash from fires were clearly preserved.
"They're gone," Gared said, looking at Waymar, hesitating to say more.
The Night's Watch was born after The Long Night. During that long winter that lasted a generation, the White Walkers swept South, devastating the lands of the First Men and almost wiping out humanity... After this disaster, The Wall and the Black Cloaks, aimed at fighting the White Walkers and defending humanity, were established. It's easy to imagine that joining this armed force dedicated to protecting all of humanity was once the highest honor on this continent. Even with a very high entry barrier, volunteers were still more than abundant. But as the White Walkers retreated North to the Land of Always Winter and gradually disappeared, and after the generation that experienced The Long Night died out, the importance and treatment of this order were destined to decline.
That being said, The Wall did, for a long time, effectively block the incursions of the Wildlings from the North for the Seven Kingdoms, thus maintaining its presence. However, a significant historical event eventually dealt the Night's Watch a fatal blow – Aegon's Landing and the establishment of the Targaryen Dynasty.
The Targaryen Dynasty didn't make things difficult for the Night's Watch, but its founder brought dragons from Valyria. During a subsequent large-scale Wildling attack, the kingdom's ruler boldly rode a dragon North and roasted the Wildlings. This quickly repelled the attackers but objectively greatly accelerated the decline of the Night's Watch – like cooking the hound after the cunning rabbit is caught. When one possesses a weapon capable of sweeping away the enemy, the role and influence of the Night's Watch plummeted. After all, if those crude Wildlings came again, wouldn't it be enough to just inform the Dragon Rider King?
Nobles and knights were no longer willing to dedicate their lives to a meaningless watch. The Night's Watch gradually lost its source of soldiers and had to repeatedly lower its entry requirements... After a century of evolution, the Night's Watch ultimately became what it is today.
"The Long Night is coming, and now my watch begins. It shall not end until my death. I shall take no wife, hold no lands, father no children. I shall wear no crowns and win no glory. I shall live and die at my post. I am the sword in the darkness. I am the watcher on The Wall. I am the fire that burns against the cold, the light that brings the dawn, the horn that wakes the sleepers, the shield that guards the Kingdom of men. I pledge my life and honor to the Night's Watch, for this night and all the nights to come."
When people feel their blood boiling for this Night's Watch oath, made up of numerous promises and titles, which sounds incredibly powerful at first listen, how many can guess that this wasn't its original content? And behind the repeated revisions, how much bitterness and helplessness were there?
The dragons and Dragon Riders of the Targaryen Dynasty are gone with the wind, but the decline of the Night's Watch is already irreversible. Today, the Black Cloaks are less the first line of defense against the Wildlings and more like security guards maintaining and watching over The Wall. Their members, now fewer than a thousand, can roughly be divided into the following three types:
The first type are the prisoners, like Aegon, who chose to serve on The Wall to avoid punishment: thieves, poachers, rapists, etc... These fellows, who once weren't even fit to tie the laces of a Night's Watch man, are now the main force of the Black Cloaks and are destined to live and die here, with no other way out except desertion;
The second type are those forced to join by circumstance: disgraced or out-of-favor officials and nobles who lost in political struggles, farmers who lost their land, bankrupt merchants, and bastards... These people are nominally encouraged to join the Night's Watch and theoretically can choose to leave freely before taking their vows, but in reality, they have nowhere else to go. The majority of the Night's Watch's Artisans and stewards are composed of this type.
The third and final, and also the smallest, type are voluntary recruits like Ser Waymar Royce – those who exile themselves out of so-called honor and responsibility, or to make way for brothers or sons to avoid internal family power struggles. They had other choices but stepped down from the stage of power in the Seven Kingdoms to come to The Wall. This type of person has become increasingly rare over time. The Commander Jeor Mormont, the First Ranger Benjen Stark, and even Maester Aemon Targaryen, who gave up his claim to rule the Seven Kingdoms, belong to this category. They are usually directly appointed as officers and leadership. This seemingly unfair rule is actually easy to understand – in the northernmost part of the Kingdom, far from the King, if a bunch of scum, criminals, or farmers were allowed to command the Night's Watch, which is not directly subordinate to any Lord, who knows what kind of bunch would end up guarding The Wall.
There are no filial sons before a long-sick bed, and no heroes before a long-frozen Wall. No matter what lofty ambitions young nobles who voluntarily joined the Night's Watch held upon arrival, once they discovered that the Wall and the legendary Night's Watch were completely different from their imagination and the environment was so harsh, their initial passion quickly turned into cold water.
Waymar Royce was no exception. He was utterly regretting it now – no one forced him to come to The Wall, but he was inspired by the Night's Watch oath, and coupled with his desire to show his beloved elder brother that he had no intention of competing for the family inheritance, he resolutely chose to come here. Now, the words had been spoken, and the vows taken. Even if he dared to shamelessly sneak back home, his family would never publicly welcome him.
As things stood, the only plan was to quickly earn merit. Then, when he applied to return home for a visit, he wouldn't be suspected of being unable to bear the hardship and running away.
The young Ranger lieutenant circled the area that had once been a Wildling camp on his horse. After a moment's thought, he quickly made a decision: "There aren't many of them. Follow the footprints. Pursue."