The Sworn Sword

""There was a pot shop in King's Landing where I used to sell them rats and cats and pigeons for the brown. The cook always claimed my father was some thief or cutpurse. ‘Most like I saw him hanged,' he used to tell me, ‘but maybe they just sent him to the Wall.' When I was squiring for Ser Arlan, I would ask him if we couldn't go up that way someday, to take service at Winterfell or some other northern castle. I had this notion that if I could only reach the Wall, might be I'd come on some old man, a real tall man who looked like me.

We never went, though. Ser Arlan said there were no hedges in the north, and all the woods were full of wolves"". He shook his head. ""The long and short of it is, most like you're squiring for a bastard"".

For once Egg had nothing to say. The gloom was deepening around them. Lantern bugs moved slowly through the trees, their little lights like so many drifting stars. There were stars in the sky as well, more stars than any man could ever hope to count, even if he lived to be as old as King Jaehaerys.

Dunk need only lift his eyes to find familiar friends: the Stallion and the Sow, the King's Crown and the Crone's Lantern, the Galley, Ghost, and Moonmaid. But there were clouds to the north, and the blue eye of the Ice Dragon was lost to him, the blue eye that pointed north.

The moon had risen by the time they came to Standfast, standing dark and tall atop its hill. A pale yellow light was spilling from the tower's upper windows, he saw.

Most nights Ser Eustace sought his bed as soon as he had supped, but not tonight, it seemed. He is waiting for us, Dunk knew.

Bennis of the Brown Shield was waiting up as well. They found him sitting on the tower steps, chewing sourleaf and honing his longsword in the moonlight. The slow scrape of stone on steel carried a long way. However much Ser Bennis might neglect his clothes and person, he kept his weapons well.

""The lunk comes back"", Bennis said. ""Here I was sharpening my steel to go rescue you from that Red Widow"".

""Where are the men?""

""Treb and Wet Wat are on the roof standing watch, in case the widow comes to call. The rest crawled into bed whimpering. Sore as sin, they are. I worked them hard. Drew a little blood off that big lackwit, just to make him mad. He fights better when he's mad"". He smiled his brown-and-red smile. ""Nice bloody lip you got. Next time, don't go turning over rocks.