𝐒𝐈𝐋𝐄𝐍𝐓 𝐁𝐎𝐘

ᴄʜᴀᴘᴛᴇʀ ᴛᴇɴ

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They set out late that afternoon. The Wall had no gates as such, neither here at Castle Black nor anywhere along its three hundred miles. They led their horses down a narrow tunnel cut through the ice, cold dark walls pressing in around them as the passage twisted and turned. Three times their way was blocked by iron bars, and they had to stop while Bowen Marsh drew out his keys and unlocked the massive chains that secured them. Torsten could sense the vast weight pressing down on him as he waited behind the Lord Steward. The air was colder than a tomb, and more still. He felt a strange relief when they remerged into the afternoon light on the north side of the Wall.
Samwell blinked at the sudden glare and looked around apprehensively. "The Wildlings... they wouldn't... they'd never dare come this close to the Wall. Would they?"

"They never have." Torsten climbed into his saddle. When Bowen Marsh and their ranger escort had mounted, Jon put two fingers in his mouth and whistled. Ghost came loping out of the tunnel.
The Lord Steward's garron whickered and backed away from the direwolf.

"Do you mean to take the beast?" He asked.

"Yes, my Lord." Jon said. Ghost's head lifted. He seemed to taste the air. In the blink of an eye, he was off, racing across the broad, weed choked field to vanish in the trees.
Once they had entered the forest, they were in a different world. Torsten had often hunted with his brothers of the Watch. He knew the woods as well as any man of the Watch, maybe even better.
Once he swore his vow, the Wall would continue to be his home until he was old as Maester Aemon.
They had ridden past the end of the world. Every shadow darker, every sound more ominous. The trees pressed close and shut out the light of the setting sun. A thin crust of snow cracked beneath the hooves of their horses, with a sound like breaking bones. When the wind set the leaves to rustling, it was like a chilly finger tracing a path up Torsten's spine. The Wall was at their backs, and only the gods knew what lay ahead.
The sun was sinking below the trees when they reached their destination, a small clearing in the deep of the wood where nine weirwoods grew in a rough circle. Torsten drew in a breath, and he saw Samwell Tarly staring.
The weirwood's bark was white as bone, its leaves dark red, like a thousand bloodstained hands. A face had been carved in the trunk of the great tree, its features long and melancholy, deep cut eyes red with dried sap and strangely watchful. They were old, those eyes. Older than the Watch itself.
If the tales were true, they had watched the Castle's granite walls rise around them. It was said that the children of the forest had carved the faces in the trees during the dawn centuries before the coming of the First Men across the narrow sea.
In the south, the last weirwoods had been cut down or burned out a thousand years ago, except on the Isle of Faces where the green men kept their silent watch.
In the north it was different. Here every castle had its godswood, and every godswood had its heart tree, and every heart tree its face.
Bowen Marsh commanded them to leave their horses outside the circle.

"This is a sacred place, we will not defile it." He said. When they entered the grove, Samwell Tarly turned slowly looking at each face in turn. No two were quite alike.

"They're watching us." He whispered. "The old Gods."

"Yes." Jon knelt, and Torsten knelt beside him with Samwell following suit. The three said the words together, as the last light faded in the west and grey day became black night.

"Hear my words, and bear witness to my vow." They recited, their voices filling the twilight grove.
The woods fell silent as they finished.

"You knelt as boys." Bowen Marsh intoned solemnly. "Rise now as men of the Night's Watch." Torsten held out a hand to pull Jon back to his feet. Both boys helped Samwell up with smiles on their faces.
Jon moved first, engulfing Torsten into a tight warm hug.
The rangers gathered round to offer smiles and congratulations, all but the gnarled old forester Dywen.

"Best we be starting back, m'lord." He said to Bowen Marsh. "Dark's falling, and there's something in the smell o' the night that I mislike." And suddenly Ghost was back, stalking softly between two weirwoods.
White fur and red eyes. Torsten realised the wolf had something in his jaws. Something black.

"Jon, what's he got?" Asked Torsten, frowning.

"To me, Ghost." Jon knelt. "Bring it here." The direwolf trotted to him. Torsten heard Samwell Tarly's sharp intake of breath.

"Gods be good." Dywen muttered.

"That's a hand." Torsten barely breathed.

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