𝐒𝐈𝐋𝐄𝐍𝐓 𝐁𝐎𝐘

ᴄʜᴀᴘᴛᴇʀ ᴛʜʀᴇᴇ

𝟛

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In tales from the Night's Watch, giants were outsized men who lived in colossal castles, fought with huge swords, and walked about in boots a boy could hide in. These were something else, more bearlike than human, and as wooly as mammoths.
Torsten looked for great swords ten feet long, but saw only a club. Their sloping chests might have passed for those of men, but their arms hung down too far, and their lower torsos looked half again as wide as their upper. Their legs were shorter than their arms, but very thick, and they wore no boots at all, their feet were broad splayed things, hard horny and black. Neckless, their huge heavy heads thrust forward from between their shoulder blades, and their faces were squashed and brutal. Rat's eyes no larger than beads were almost lost within folds of horny flesh, but they snuffled constantly, smelling as much as they saw. They were not wearing skins, but hair. Shaggy pelts covered their bodies, thick below the waist, sparser above. The stink that came off them was choking. 
Tormund shouted something up to one as he passed, harsh clanging words in tongue that Torsten did not comprehend. The giant's lips split to reveal a mouth full of huge square teeth, and he made a sound half blech and half rumble. After a moment, Torsten realized he was laughing. The giant shouted down something in the same coarse tongue that Tormund had used. "What did you say to him? Was that the Old Tongue?" Jon questioned, from behind Torsten.
Half the Wildling host had lived their lives without so much as a glimpse of the Wall, and most of those spoke no word of the Common Tongue.

"Aye. I asked him if it was his father he was forking, they looked so much alike, except his father had a better smell." Torsten lifted his head and shielded his eyes from the sun, as he looked up at the giant beast.

"And what did he say to you?" Torsten asked. Tormund Giantsbane cracked a gap-toothed smile.

"He asked me if that was my daughter walking next to me, with her smooth pink cheeks." The Wildling shook snow from his arm and turned his horse about. Torsten could hear Jon desperately trying to keep his laughter to himself, Ygritte didn't even bother. Her laughter echoed through Torsten.

"Is it true you killed a giant once?" He asked Tormund as they rode. Jon walked behind them, while Ghost loped beside him, leaving paw prints in the new fallen snow. 

"Now why would you doubt a mighty man like me? It was winter and I was half a boy, and stupid the way boys are. I went too far and my horse died and then a storm caught me. A true storm, not no little dusting such as this. Har! I knew I'd freeze to death before it broke. So I found me a sleeping giant, cut open her belly, and crawled up right inside her. Kept me warm enough, she did, but the stink near did for me. The worst thing was, she woke up when the spring come and took me for her babe. Suckled me for three whole moons before I could get away. Har! There's time I miss the taste o' giant's milk, though." Snowflakes speckled Tormund's board face, melting in his hair and beard.

"If she nursed you, you couldn't have killed her." Torsten said sending the man a side eye. 

"I never did, but see you don't go spreading that about. Tormund Giantsbane has a better ring to it than Tormund Giantsbabe, and that's the honest truth o' it." Torsten smiled at the Wildlings words.

"What about sheep fuckers?" Torsten asked scratching at the stubble on his chin. He hadn't expected Tormund to bellow with laughter. "Well... it's just, Qhorin had said the lot of you were sheep fuckers." Torsten recalled. 

"Of course, the old cunt did. Are all crows so curious?" Asked Tormund. 

"No." Jon answered before Torsten could. "Torsten's just a curious boy." Jon said truthful. Torsten spent most of his days in Tormund's company, and most night's as well. Mance Rayder had not been blind to Rattleshirt's mistrust of the 'crow come overs' so after he had given Torsten and Jon their new sheepskin cloaks he had suggested they might want to ride with Tormund Giantsbane instead. Torsten had happily agreed, and the very next day Ygritte, Jon and Longspear Ryk left Rattleshirt's band for Tormund's as well. "Free folk ride with who they want." Ygritte told them. "And we had a bellyful of Bag o' Bones." Every night when they made camp, Tormund threw his sleeping skin down beside Torsten's own, no matter if he was near the fire or well away from it.
Once he woke to find himself nestled against the big man, his arm sprawled across Tormund's chest. He lay listening to Tormund's breathing for a long time, trying to ignore the tension in his groin. He'd shaken himself at once and rolled over. Rangers often shared skins for warmth, yet this warmth made Torsten feel something he'd never felt before. And yet Torsten found himself making matters between them worse. Torsten made the mistake of wishing he had hot water for a bath. 

"Cold is better." Tormund had once told him. "If you've got someone to warm you up after. The river's only part ice, go on." Torsten had not meant to turn beetroot red, but he did. Though he knew Tormund hadn't meant it that way, he couldn't help but think otherwise.

"You'd probably crush me, then freeze me to death." Torsten nervously laughed.

"Are all crows afraid o' gooseprickles? A little ice won't kill you, boy. I'll jump in with yer t'prove it so." Tormund had said. 

"And ride the rest of the day with wet clothes frozen to our skins?" Torsten objected. Tormund only laughed at the young bastard boy.

"Har! Boy, you don't go in with clothes." Torsten had been lost for words, the way the Wildling had been so casual made his stomach churn. Luckily Jon had saved him, he heard the other bastard bellow for him. Torsten found the Widling way unsettling. He knew Tormund had no clue on how he was making him feel. 

Torsten followed Tormund back towards the head of the column, his new cloak hanging heavy from his shoulders. It was made of unwashed sheepskin, worn fleece side in, as the Wildlings suggested. It kept snow off well enough, and at night it was good and warm, but he kept his black cloak well, folded up beneath his saddle. "Do you mislike the girl?" Tormund asked as they passed a group of hunters. Tormund hadn't missed the way Torsten would avoid Ygritte every time her and Jon would approach. He dared not make eye contact with her, or even speak a word to her. 

"No..." Torsten muttered. 

"Do you fancy her?" Tormund smirked. 

"No!" Torsten suddenly bellowed, causing Tormund to raise an eyebrow at the younger. "Definitely not... the Wall has no women, it's not that I don't like her... it's that I don't like women... I mean, I know nothing about them, they're scary." Torsten admitted, making a gargling howl of laughter erupt from Tormund. 

"Scared of girls! Yar!" Torsten could feel himself turning red again, feeling a fool. Small wonder that the Seven Kingdom thought the free folk scarcely human. They have no laws, no honor, not even simple decency. They steal endlessly from each other, breed like beasts, and fill the world with baseborn children. Yet he was growing fond of Tormund Giantsbane rather quickly, great bag of wind a lie though he was. Longspear as well. And Ygritte... she wasn't too bad. 

Along with the Tormunds and the Longspears rode other sorts of Wildlings, though, men like Rattleshirt and the Weeper who would as soon slit you as spit on you.  
Mance Rayder spoke the Old Tongue, even sang in it. Mance had spent years assembling this vast plodding host, talking to this clan mother and that magnar, winning one village with sweet words and another with a song and a third with the edge of his sword, making peace between Harma Dogshead and the Lord of Bones, between the Hornfoots and the Nightrunners, between the walrus men of the Frozen Shore and the cannibal clans of the great ice rivers, hammering a hundred different daggers into one great spear, aimed at the heart of the Seven Kingdoms. He had no crown nor scepter, no robes of silk and velvet, but it was plain to Torsten that Mance Rayder was a king in more than name.  
The King beyond the Wall was doing all he could, yet the Wildlings remained hopelessly undisciplined, and that made them vulnerable. Here and there within the leagues long snake that was their line of march were warriors as fierce as any in the Watch, but a good third of them were grouped at either end of the column, in Harma Dogshead's van and the savage rearguard. Another third rode with Mance himself near the center, guarding the wayns and sledges and dog carts that held the great bulk of the host's provision and supplies, all that remained of the last summer harvest. The rest, divided into small bands under the likes of Rattleshirt, Jarl, Tormund Giantsbane, and the Weeper, served as outriders, foragers, and whips, galloping up and down the column endlessly to keep it moving in a more or less orderly fashion. 
And even more telling, only one in a hundred wildlings was mounted. The Old Bear will go through them like an axe through porridge. And when that happened, Mance must give chase with the center, to try and blunt the threat. If he should fall in the fight that must follow, the Wall would be safe for another hundred years, Torsten judged. And if not...
He flexed the burned fingers of his sword hand.

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