Chapter 15 Chapter Fourteen Tyrion

The northern border is long and endless. Although Tyrion Lannister was familiar with maps, after two weeks of traveling north, he deeply realized that what the map said was one thing, but in fact it was different. They had left Winterfell the same day as the king's host, through the fine snow, through the neighing of men and the creaking of coaches and the groaning of the queen's wheelhouse.The King's Road is adjacent to the main castle and the lower town.It was there that the king's banner and caravan, knights and freeriders turned south, and Tyrion went north with Benjen Stark and Jon's uncle and nephew.

After that, the weather became colder and colder, and the surroundings became more silent. The King's Road gradually becomes a trail not much bigger than a forest path.On the west side of the road are rugged limestone hills, with watchtowers towering on the low hills.On the east side, the terrain is low and gentle, and the flat wilderness stretches infinitely until the end of the eye.Stone bridges span the turbulent narrow rapids, and farms surround settlements with stone walls and wooden beams.There is a lot of traffic on the road, and it is very easy to find a rest hotel after sunset.

However, the good times didn't last long. Three days after leaving Winterfell, the farmland receded, only dense forests appeared, and the King's Road became increasingly deserted.The hills became steeper and steeper, and on the fifth day, they had become mountains, like gray-blue giants with snow and steep rock peaks on their shoulders.When the north wind blows, long ice needles fly down from the towering peaks like banners. The mountains are in the west, and the road winds to the northeast, winding through the woods.Benjen Stark called this forest of oaks and evergreens and black briars, which looked older than any wood Tyrion had ever seen, "Wolf's Wood," and at night there were indeed The howling of wolves came one after another in the distance, sometimes not far away from them.Snow's white son direwolf would prick up his ears when he heard it, but never responded.Tyrion had always found something deeply unsettling about that thing.

Not counting the coyotes, there were eight of them.First of all, Tyrion brought two followers according to the ostentation of the Lannister family.Benjen Stark took only his bastard nephew and some of the Night's Watch cattle.But when they spent the night in a wooden manor on the edge of the Wolfwood, they were joined by a brother in black named Yoren.Yoren was hunchbacked and rather sinister, his features hidden behind a beard as black as his uniform, but it wasn't hard to tell he was a man.He brought two ragged peasant boys from the Five Fingers Peninsula. "Rapists," Yoren said, looking at them coldly.Tyrion suddenly realized that life on the Wall, though hard, was better than castration.

Five men, three children, a direwolf, twenty horses, and a cage of ravens brought by Maester Tobanjen Stark, the Luwin maester, must have been a rather strange sight. Tyrion noticed that Jon Snow kept looking at Yoren and his two sullen companions all the way, with a strange expression on his face, which seemed to be troubled.Not only was Yoren hunchbacked, but he was sour and smelly, with greasy beard and hair, overgrown with lice, and ragged clothes, patched and seldom washed.Two of his men smelled worse and were stupid and cruel. It seemed the boy had mistaken the Night's Watch for his uncles.If he really thought so, it would be a shocking awakening for Yoren and his gang.Tyrion felt sorry for the kid, he had chosen the hard way...or should I say, someone else had chosen the hard way for him.

He didn't have such a fondness for the child's uncle.Benyan Stark seems to hate the Lannister family as much as his brother. When Tyrion said he wanted to go with him, his reaction was quite unhappy: "Lannister, I said before that, there is no hotel on the Great Wall Liveable." He stared at him aloofly. "You will find a way for me," said Tyrion. "I am small, as you see." Of course, no one dared to say no to the queen's brother, so it was settled, but Bunyan was still very upset. "I promise you won't enjoy the ride," he snapped back, and since the team set off, he's done everything in his power to make it true.

Tyrion, on the other hand, made a comeback in the cold leather jacket. Originally, Stark pretended to be courteous and offered an old and tattered bearskin full of fishy smell to show the night watchman's helping the poor and helping the poor. Obviously, he hoped that he would hinder Courtesy declined, but Tyrion accepted with a smile.When he left Winterfell, he had packed all the warmest clothes he could, but soon found that there wasn't enough.It's frighteningly cold here, and the temperature keeps dropping.The temperature at night has already dropped below freezing point, and whenever the wind blows, it will cut into his warmest sheepskin clothing like a sharp knife.Presumably Stark is regretting his whim of chivalry at this time.Maybe he'll learn a lesson from it: the Lannisters don't refuse anything, and I don't care what etiquette is, I'll take it if it's offered.

The farther you go north, the deeper you go into the dark country of the wolf forest, the more sparse the farms and farmhouses become, until there is no trace of people, and they are suddenly left alone. No matter whether camp is set up or camped out, Tyrion can't help.He was so small that a limp would only get in the way.So it became his habit, while Stark and Yoren and the others pitched their tents and tended their horses and lit their fires, to stagger away, wrapping themselves in furs and carrying a wineskin, to read by themselves. On the eighteenth day of the trip, he brought the precious amber liqueur produced in the Midsummer Islands all the way from Casterly Rock to the north, as well as books related to the anecdotes of the Dragon Clan—these precious books were Tyrion’s request. From the library at Winterfell, with Lord Eddard Stark's permission—going off alone.

He walked away from the hustle and bustle of the camp, and found a place of tranquility by the rushing stream and the water as cold as ice.A grotesque old oak tree just sheltered him from the cold wind.Tyrion leaned back against the tree trunk, tugged at the fur, and read about the keel after taking a sip of his wine.The keel has a high iron content, so it is black in color. According to the book, the keel is as hard as iron, but the material is extremely light and flexible, so it is not afraid of fire.It's no wonder that the Dothraki regard dragonbone bows as rare treasures. Equipped with dragonbone bows, archers can easily exceed the range of wooden bows and arrows.

Tyrion has a morbid fascination with dragons.When he first visited King's Landing, to attend his sister's wedding to Robert Baratheon, he had made up his mind to see the dragon heads hanging on the wall of the Targaryen Throne Hall.Although King Robert had long since replaced the dragon head with banners and tapestries, Tyrion still persisted, and finally found their collection in the dank cellar. He had thought dragon heads must be breathtaking, even daunting, but he had never imagined that they could be such beautiful things.They are indeed stunningly beautiful.Black as onyx, smooth and shiny, it seemed to glisten in the light of his torch.He felt that they liked fire, so he put a torch in the mouth of one of the larger dragons, and there was a lot of fire, and shadows danced wildly on the wall behind him.The dragon teeth are like long scimitars made of black diamonds, soaked in the hot flames for many years, the slight flame of the torch is nothing to them.As he pulled away, he swore the behemoth's empty eye sockets had watched him go.

There are nineteen dragon skulls in total. The oldest one has a lifespan of more than three thousand years, and the youngest one has a life span of one and a half centuries.The skulls of the young dragons were also the smallest, and those two were deformed, not much bigger than the skulls of a hound. They were the last two dragons hatched on Dragonstone, the last two of House Targaryen, and perhaps the last two dragons in the world. On the last two, they are very short lived. The other dragons grew larger and larger, and the three largest were the most terrifying monsters in ballad and legend, the three dragons on which Aegon Targaryen and his sisters rode when they conquered the ancient Seven Kingdoms. .The bard had given them all godly names: Balerion, Meraxes, and Vagarhar.Tyrion stood between their bloody mouths, too stunned to speak.Vhagar's throat is so big that you can ride in it without getting out alive.Milaxes' size is even more amazing.And the biggest of all, Balerion, known as the Black Death, could swallow a buffalo whole in one gulp, or the mammoth that is said to roam the icy wastelands north of Port Ibben. Tyrion stood for a long time in the dank cellar, staring at Balerion's huge hollow eye sockets, trying to imagine what the giant beast looked like before him when he was alive. burn out. His distant ancestor, King Roren of the Rock, once joined forces with King Mengen of the River Bend to resist the conquest of Targaryen.That was about three hundred years ago. At that time, the Seven Kingdoms were really independent kingdoms, rather than territories under the unified country today.The two armies have a total of 600 princes, 5,000 cavalry, and more than 50,000 mercenaries and infantry.According to historians' records, Aegon the "Dragon King"'s military strength is only about one-fifth of his opponent's, and most of them are recruited from the opponent's army he defeated before, and his loyalty is worrying. The two armies met in the fertile plains along the river bend, and fought on the golden wheat fields that were full of solid and waiting to be harvested.The allied forces charged, and the Targaryen army immediately scattered and fled.In just a few minutes, the historian wrote, years of conquest seemed to be coming to an end...but only those minutes before Aegon Targaryen and his two sisters were thrown into battle. This is the only time in history that Vagarhar, Meraxes, and Balerion attacked at the same time, and later bards called it "the fire of rage". A total of nearly 4,000 soldiers were burned to ashes that day, including Meng En, the king of the river bend.King Loren escaped by chance, surrendered to the Targaryen family not long after, and later gave birth to a son, for which Tyrion can only be grateful. "Why do you read so many books?" Tyrion looked up. Jon Snow was standing a few steps away, looking at him curiously.He clamped the page he was reading between one finger: "Look at me and tell me what you see?" The boy looked at him suspiciously and said, "What are you up to? I see you, Tyrion Lannister." Tyrion sighed. "You're a bastard, Snow, but you're very kind. You see a dwarf. How old are you? Twelve?" "fourteen." "You are only fourteen years old, but I will not grow up to your current height in my life. My feet are short and deformed, and I have trouble walking. I have to wear a special saddle to ride a horse so that I won't fall off. You I designed the saddle myself, if you'd like to see it. If I didn't use it, I'd just ride a kid's pony. My arms are fairly strong, but still too short to be a good warrior. If I had been born in an ordinary farm family, I would have been thrown on the side of the road to die, or sold into a monster sideshow. Well, who knows I was born in Casterly Rock to the Lannisters, and freaks are even more unpopular, because Everyone expected me so much before. You see, my father was the Prime Minister for twenty years, but my elder brother killed the king later. Life is so unpredictable. Now my elder sister is married to the new king, and Where's my irascible nephew, who will take the throne one day, and I'm the only one with the family name to spare, and I've got to do my best, right? But how? Well, my legs are too short and my head too Big, at last this head suits me well, with it I know what I can and can't do, it's my weapon. My brother has his sword, King Robert has his hammer, and I have my head Melon... But if a man wants to keep his mind clear and sharp, he needs to read as much as a sword needs a whetstone." Tyrion tapped the cover of the book, "Jon Snow, that's why I can't stop reading. .” The boy listened to the words in silence.Although he doesn't have the surname Stark in his name, he has the face of an authentic Stark family: long, serious and reserved, with no expression of emotion or anger.Whoever his mother was, she must have left little of her own in him. "So what are you reading?" he asked. "Dragon stuff," Tyrion told him. "What's the use of reading this? There are no more dragons in the world." The boy's tone carried the unique certainty of a teenager. "They are right," said Tyrion. "It's a pity, isn't it? When I was your age, I used to dream of having my own dragon." "Really?" the boy said in disbelief.Perhaps he thought Tyrion was making fun of him. "Of course it's true. As long as he can ride on the back of a dragon, even a stunted, deformed and ugly little boy can look down on the world." Tyrion pushed the bear skin away and stood up. "I used to hide in the tunnel deep in Casterly Rock City, lit a fire, looked at the raging flames, and watched for hours, imagining that it was the fire spit out by the dragon. Sometimes I would imagine that my father was burned to death, Sometimes it's my sister." Jon Snow had a look of fear and surprise on his face, and Tyrion laughed when he saw it, "Little bastard, don't look at me like that, I know what you're thinking What, you have had such a dream too." "I don't," said Jon Snow terrified, "I won't..." "No? Never?" Tyrion raised an eyebrow. "The Starks must have treated you well? Must the Lady treat you as her own? And your half-brother Robb, always They are all very close to you, right? Why not? He got Winterfell, but you got the Great Wall. As for your father... He must have a valid reason to send you to be a night watchman... .” "Don't say any more," Jon Snow said angrily with a gloomy face, "Joining the Night Watch is a sacred mission!" Tyrion smiled. "Smart as you are, how can you believe such nonsense? The Night's Watch is a garbage dump that accepts scum from all over the country. I saw the way you looked at Yoren and his two boys. They are your new brothers. Jon Snow, do you still like it? Dead-faced serfs, debtors, poachers, rapists, thieves, and bastards like yourself are all sent to the Great Wall to guard against what your nanny told you when you were a child There are all kinds of weirdness. On the bright side, there is no weirdness at all; but on the downside, the place is so cold that you will freeze your life. But since you were not allowed to have offspring, I don't think it matters." "Stop talking!" The boy screamed and took a step forward, clenched his hands into fists, and was about to shed tears. Tyrion, feeling absurdly guilty all of a sudden, took a step forward too, wanting to pat the boy on the shoulder for reassurance, or to apologize. Where did the wolf appear from, he never saw it.One moment he was walking towards Xue Nuo, and the next moment he was thrown head-on on the rocky ground, and the book in his hand flew far away.He was knocked out of breath, and his mouth was full of mud and blood and dead branches and leaves.When he struggled to get up, his back convulsed violently. He must have twisted it when he fell.He clenched his teeth angrily, hooked a tree root, and barely sat still. "Help me." He held out his hand to the boy. Suddenly the wolf was between them again, and it didn't growl—the damn thing never made a sound—just looked at him with bright red eyes and a mouth full of fangs, and that was scary enough .Tyrion flinched back to the ground with a grunt. "It's fine if you don't help, I'll be here, and we'll talk about it after you leave." Jon Snow rubbed Ghost's thick white fur, but smiled. "Please, I'll help you." Tyrion Lannister felt a wave of anger gradually brewing in his body, so he had to suppress it.This wasn't the first time he had been humiliated in his life, and it certainly wouldn't be the last, not to mention that this time he was asking for trouble. "Jon, I would be very grateful if you would help me," he said gently. "Ghost, sit down," the boy ordered, and the direwolf squatted down, but his red eyes never left Tyrion.Jon came around behind him, put his hands under his armpits, helped him up easily, and picked up the book and handed it to him. "Why did it attack me just now?" Tyrion asked, squinting at the direwolf and wiping the blood and mud from his mouth with the back of his hand. "Maybe he thinks you're just weird." Tyrion glared at him, then laughed, a raw laugh he hadn't expected at all. "Oh, gods," he laughed so hard that he couldn't stop shaking his head, "I think I do look alike! How would he react if he met a real weirdo?" "You don't want to know." Jon picked up the wineskin and handed it back to Tyrion. Tyrion uncorked it, tilted his head and took a long gulp. The wine flowed down his throat like a pool of cold fire, warming his stomach.He passed the skin on to Jon Snow. "Would you like some?" The boy took the wine bag and took a cautious sip. "What you said about the Night's Watch just now," he asked after finishing his drink, "is it true?" Tyrion nodded. Jon Snow pursed his lips solemnly. "Then I'll be safe when I come." Tyrion grinned at him. "Bastard, you really are. Most people would rather deny the truth than face the truth." "That's most people," the boy said, "but not you." "You are right," Tyrion agreed. "Not me. I hardly think about dragons now. There are no more dragons." He picked up the bear skin that had fallen. "Come on, let's go back to the camp before your uncle comes out to find someone." Although the journey back to the camp was not long, the ground was rough. By the time he got back to the camp, his legs were already suffering from severe cramps.Jon Snow offered a hand to help him over a thick tangle of roots, but Tyrion waved him off.He wants to go his own way, just like his whole life.The camp was a delightful sight: Men were sheltered from the wind around the crumbling walls of a long-abandoned cottage, the horses were fed, the campfires were lit, and Yoren sat on a stone Skin the squirrel.The smell of stew filled Tyrion's nostrils.He limped and shuffled over to Maurice, the servant, who was stirring the hot soup.Maurice handed him the ladle without a word, and Tyrion tasted it and handed it back. "More pepper," he said. Benjen Stark emerged from the tent he shared with his nephew. "Jon, you're back at last. Damn, don't run around by yourself, I thought you were taken by the White Walkers." "He was taken by the Goblin," Tyrion told him, laughing, and Jon Snow smiled too.Stark looked at Yoren in bewilderment, but the old man just shrugged and grunted, then lowered his head and concentrated on skinning again. The squirrel made a nice addition to the broth, and they sat around the fire that night with black bread and hard cheese.Tyrion shared his wine, and drank it until even Yoren blushed.Then, everyone got up one by one and went back to the tent to sleep, except for Jon Snow, who was the first watchman. As usual, Tyrion was the last one to go to bed. When he stepped into the barracks that his men had built for him, he stopped and turned his head to look back.I saw the boy standing by the campfire with a resolute and dignified face, looking deeply into the jumping flames. Tyrion Lannister smiled sadly, and went back to his tent to sleep.