Chapter 68 Chapter 67 Bran

The oldest of them was an adult, seventeen or eighteen, and one was over twenty.But most of them are very young, under the age of sixteen. Bran watched them swing clubs and wooden swords from the balcony of Maester Luwin's tower, panting and moaning and cursing.The clacking sound of wood knocking resounded throughout the school grounds, and the screams of being beaten could be heard from time to time.Ser Rodrik was striding up and down the group of boys, blushing under his white beard, muttering something, Bran had never seen the old knight look so stern. "No," he kept muttering, "No, no, no!"

"They didn't play very well," Bran said suspiciously.He carelessly scratched the back of Xia Tian's ear, the direwolf was gnawing on a piece of hind leg meat, his teeth gnawed until the bones creaked. "Yes," Maester Luwin agreed with a long sigh.The old maester was measuring shadows with long mirror lens tubes, calculating the position of the comet low in the morning sky. "They need to spend more time training... Sir Rodrik is considerate, we need manpower to defend the castle. Your father took all the elite guards in the city to King's Landing, and your brother took all the rest, within a few miles All the young men who were available in Grange have gone with him, and many of them never come back. We have to find someone to take their place."

Bran looked resentfully at the sweating boy downstairs. "If I could still walk, none of them could beat me." He remembered that the last time he held a sword, it was when the king came to Winterfell. It was only a wooden sword, but he knocked Prince Tommen to the ground many times. . "Ser Rodrik should teach me how to use an axe. If I make a poleaxe, Hodor will be my foot, and we will be knights together." "I suppose that's ... unlikely," said Maester Luwin. "In war, Bran, a man must be of the same mind and hand." In the field below, Sir Rodrik was shouting: "You fight like goose, he pecks, you peck back, block it! Block the attack! How can you fight like a goose? This is the word of the real sword Peck your hand and it will be gone!" A boy next to him couldn't help laughing, and the old knight immediately turned to face him. "You think it's funny? Huh? Do you know how to be polite? Look at you, you fight like a hedgehog..."

"Once upon a time there was a knight who could not see," Bran said stubbornly.Ser Rodrik continued to curse below. "Old Nan told me he had a long stick with sharp knives on either side that he could turn in his hand and cut two people at a time." "That's Symeon Stareye," Luwin said, making a note in the notebook. "After losing both eyes, he put the star sapphire in the empty eye socket, so the bards sang. But that's only a story, Bran, from the age of heroes, like Foolian Florian's. A fable." The old bachelor clicked his tongue. "You have to learn to let go of these daydreams, they will only break your heart."

Speaking of daydreams, it reminded him. "I dreamed of that crow again last night, the one with the three eyes. It flew into my bedroom and asked me to go with it, which I did. We flew down to the crypt, father While there, I spoke to him. He was upset." "Why are you sad?" Luwin looked out through the mirror tube. "I remember . . . something about Jon," the dream made him uncomfortable, more than any other with crows. "Then Hodor refused to go down to the catacombs." Bran could see that the master was absent-minded.He lifted his eyes from the mirror tubes and blinked. "What if Hodor refuses?"

"Refused to go down to the crypt. When I woke up, I told him to take me down to see if my father was really there. At first he didn't understand what I was talking about, so I had to tell him to go here and there, and finally to the The stairs, but he refused to go down. He just stood on the top of the stairs, saying 'Hodor', like he was afraid of the dark, but I have a torch. I was so angry, I almost hit him on the head like Old Nan .” Seeing the old master frowning, he hastily added, “But I didn’t knock.” "Very well. Hodor is a human being, and he cannot be beaten casually like a donkey."

"In the dream, I flew down with the crow, but I couldn't fly when I woke up," Bran explained. "Why do you want to go to the catacombs?" "I told you, go find your father." The maester tugged at the necklace around his neck, as he often did when he felt uneasy. "Bran, boy, one day Lord Eddard will sit in the catacombs in stone, with his father, his grandfather, and all the Starks since the old King of Winter... may the gods By God, that was many years later. Your father is now in King's Landing, a prisoner of the Queen Mother, and you will not find him in the catacombs."

"But he was really there last night, and I was talking to him." "What a stubborn boy." The old master sighed and moved the notebook aside. "Do you want to go down and have a look?" "I can't go, and Hoduo refuses, the stairs are too narrow and twists and turns, so Xiao Wu can't either." "I don't think it troubles me." So he hired Osha, a wild woman, to replace Hodor. She was tall and strong, and she never complained, and she went wherever she was told. "My lord, we grew up outside the Great Wall, a hole in the ground won't scare me," she promised.

"Summer, come here." Osha stretched out her thin and strong hands to hug Bran, and Bran called out.Immediately the direwolf dropped the bone and followed Osha across the schoolyard and down the spiral staircase to the cold crypt underground.Maester Luwin walked first, torch in hand.Bran didn't care—not much—to be held by her, not on his back.Ser Rodrik had ordered Osha's anklets to be cut off, for she had been faithful and efficient since she came to Winterfell.Although the two heavy shackles were still on her ankles—showing that she was not yet fully trusted—they did not affect her steady step down the stairs.

Bran couldn't remember the last time he'd been in the catacombs, but he was sure it was before the accident.He used to play down here with Robb and Jon and his sisters when he was a boy. He wished they were all there now, that way, the tomb wouldn't be so eerie.Xia Tian dived into the echoing darkness, stopped, raised his head, and sniffed the dead cold air.Then it opened its mouth and bared its fangs, and slowly crawled away, its eyes glowing gold in the light of the maester's torch.Even Osha, who was as strong as iron, felt a little uncomfortable at the moment. "Looks like spooky ones," she said, scanning the long row of marble thrones where the Starks of all ages sat.

"They are the Kings of Winter," Bran whispered.Somehow, it seemed to him that speaking loudly was not the right thing to do here. Osha smiled. "Winter has no king. If you have seen the power of winter, you will know it, boy of summer." "They have been kings in the North for thousands of years," Maester Luwin said, raising a torch to light the face of the stone statue.Some of them have extremely long hair and big beards, and their furry and resolute faces are like direwolves crouching under their feet; "They are all resolute people who grew up in a difficult environment. Come on." He walked quickly towards the depths of the tomb, passing rows of stone pillars and countless statues, and pulled out a long tongue from the torch held high in his hand. The catacombs were wide, longer than Winterfell itself.Jon had told him that there were other tombs, deeper and darker under the catacombs, where older kings slept.So it would be bad if the torches went out.Summer would not leave the stairs, only Osha held Bran in her arms and followed the torch. "Bran, do you remember the history you learned?" The maester said as he walked, "If you haven't forgotten it, tell Osha who these people are and what happened in their lives." So he looked around at the faces passing by, and their stories emerged one after another.Maester Luwin had told him these stories, but it was Old Nan who kept them alive. "That's Jon Stark, who drove off the pirates when they came from the east, and built a castle in White Harbor. His son is Rickard Stark, not my grandfather, but another A Rickard, who took the Neck from the Marsh King and married the Marsh King's daughter. The very thin one with the long hair and beard is Theon Stark, and everyone calls him "The Hungry Wolf" ', for he fought all day long. The tall, dreamy king was also called Brandon, Brandon the Shipbuilder, and he loved the sea. His tomb is empty because he sailed Crossing the Sea of ​​the Setting Sun westward, his whereabouts are unknown. His son is Brandon the Burner, who, in grief, set fire to all his father's ships. That is Rodrik Stark, legend He won Bear Island in a wrestling match and presented it to the Mormont family. That is Toren Stark, the 'King of Submission', the last King in the North and the first Duke of Winterfell , it was he who surrendered to Aegon the Conqueror. Oh, look over there, he was Cregan Stark, who once fought Prince Aemon, and later, the Dragon Knight said that he had never met a better man in his life Swordsman." They were almost at the end, and Bran felt a pang of sadness welling up in him. "That was my grandfather, Lord Rickard, who was put to death by Aerys the 'Mad King'. His daughter Lyanna and his son Brandon were in the grave beside him. Not me, but another Brandon, My father's brother. They shouldn't have statues, that's the honor of dukes and kings, but my father loved them so much that he made them too." "The girl is beautiful," Osha said. "Robert and she were engaged, but Prince Rhaegar took her by force and raped her," Bran explained. "To get her back, Robert started a war. Killed Rhaegar with his own hammer, but Lyanna was dead, and he was too late to save her." "It's a sad story," Osha said, "but those empty holes are even sadder." "From now on, Lord Eddard's tomb will be there," Master Luwin said, "Bran, is this where you saw your father in your dream?" "Yeah." The memory made him tremble, and he looked around the vault uneasily, the hair on the back of his neck standing on end.What did he seem to hear?Is there anyone else here? Maester Luwin walked toward the open tomb, holding the torch. "You see, he's not here, and he won't be here for years and years. Child, dream, it's just a dream." He reached into the darkness of the tomb, like a monster's jaws. "You see clearly, this place is empty—" The darkness came roaring at him. Eyes like green fire, a row of teeth that flickered white, and fur black as a tomb.Maester Luwin let out a cry and threw up his hands.The torch flew from his fingers, hit Brandon Stark's stone face, bounced off, and rolled down to the statue's feet, licking his calf.In the flickering light that seemed to be drunk, they saw Luwin wrestling with a direwolf, beating the wolf's mouth with one hand, and the wolf's other hand was firmly bitten. "Summer!" Bran screamed. Xia Tian immediately shot out from the darkness behind him, like a leaping shadow, knocking the Shaggy Dog away, and the two direwolves rolled back and forth on the ground, their gray and black fur tangled together, tearing and biting each other.Maester Luwin struggled to his feet, and Osha let Bran lean against Lord Rickard's stone wolf, and hurried over to help the old maester.In the flickering light of the fire, Wolf Shadow became a twenty-foot-tall colossus, fighting on the walls and ceiling. "Maomao." A small voice called out.Bran looked up to see his little brother standing at the entrance to his father's grave.Shaggydog bit Xia Tian's face for the last time, turned around and ran to Rickon's side. "You leave my father alone," Rickon warned Luwin, "you leave him alone." "Rickon," Bran said softly, "father is not here." "He's clearly there, I saw it," Rickon said with tears streaming down his face. "I saw it last night." "Did you dream of...?" Rickon nodded. "Don't bother him, don't hurt him, he's going home, he promised me, he's going home." Bran had never seen Maester Luwin so indecisive.Shaggydog tore his woolen sleeve, bleeding from his exposed arm. "Osha, bring the torch," he said, holding back the pain, and she picked it up and handed it to him while the torch was still extinguished.The legs of the Uncle statue were blackened. "That... that wild thing," Luwin continued, "should be chained to the kennel." Rickon patted Shaggydog's bloodied mouth. "I let him out. He doesn't like being chained." He licked his fingers. "Rickon," Bran said, "will you come back with me?" "No, I like being here." "But it's dark and cold here." "I'm not afraid. I'm going to wait for Dad to come back." "You can wait with me," Bran said, "you and me, and our little wolf, and we'll wait for him to come back." Both direwolves were licking their wounds, and after the fight, they needed Take good care of. "Bran," said the maester firmly, "I know you mean well, but Shaggydog is too wild to let him run around like this. I'm the third person he's bitten. If he's in the city If you move around at will, sooner or later you will die. It is hard to accept the fact, but this wolf must be tied up, otherwise..." He hesitated. . . . just kill it, Bran thought, but instead he said, "It wasn't born to be chained, let's wait in your tower." "It's really impossible," said Maester Luwin. Osha giggled and said, "If I remember correctly, this kid should run the house here," she handed the torch back to Luwin and picked up Bran. "So go to the maester's tower." "Rickon, do you want to come together?" The younger brother nodded. "If Fluffy goes too." After saying that, he ran behind Osha and Bran, and now Maester Luwin had to follow, but he still watched the two wolves warily. Maester Luwin's tower was so full of items that Bran thought it a miracle that he could find anything in it.Books were piled high on the tables and chairs, rows of bottles and cans were displayed on the shelves, and the furniture was full of burnt candles and dried wax drops. On the tripod next to the balcony door, there are astrological charts on the wall, scattered maps on the straw mat, papers, quills, and ink bottles can be seen everywhere, and many things are stained by the ravens that live between the beams of the house. feces.Osha followed Luwin's succinct instructions, washed his wound, and began to bandage it.The crows overhead kept quacking. "Such a thought is absurd," said the thin gray-haired little maester as she applied a pungent-smelling ointment to his wolf bite wounds. It is strange, but when you think about it, it is very natural. You miss your lord father, and know that he is now in prison. Fear affects the mind and makes people think strange things. Rickon is too young to understand -" "I'm four years old," Rickon said.He was looking through the mirror tube at the gargoyles on the First Castle.Two direwolves occupied one end of the large circular room, licking wounds and nibbling bones. "—was young, so—oh, seven hells, it hurts. No, don't stop, put more on. As I said, he's still young, but Bran you should know: Dreams are It doesn't make any sense." "Some have it, some don't." Osha poured the light red fire milk on the long wound, and Luwin took a breath. "The children of the forest can tell you about dreams." The old master was so painful that tears flowed down his face, but he still shook his head stubbornly. "The children of the forest... themselves only exist in dreams. They have long since perished and disappeared. That's enough, that's enough, now bring the bandages. First pad the cotton, then wrap the bandages, tie them tighter, I may still bleed A lot of blood." "Old Nan said the children of the forest knew the songs of the trees and spoke the language of the animals. They could fly like birds and swim like fish," said Bran. You cry like a baby." "They did it by magic," Maester Luwin said absently. "I wish they were still there. If there were magic, my hands wouldn't hurt so much, and they could communicate with Shaggydog, bark Don't bite people." He glanced at the big black wolf angrily. "Bran, you have to remember that you can't believe in magic, or you'll do stupid things like fighting people with glass swords. The children of the forest are like that. Come, let me show you something." He stood up suddenly, walked through the Room, when he came back, there was a green jar in his uninjured hand. "Look at these." He opened the bottle cap and poured out a few shiny black arrowheads. Bran picked one up. "It's made of glass." Rickon also leaned over curiously, looking at the table. "This kind of glass is called dragon crystal." Osha said.Bandage in hand, she sat down beside Luwin. "The scientific name is obsidian." Luwin clarified, holding out his injured arm. "This substance is forged deep in the heart of the earth with the fire of the gods. Thousands of years ago, the children of the forest used obsidian to hunt, because they did not know how to smelt metal. They used clothes woven from leaves instead of armor. The bark serves as leggings, so they seem to blend in with the forest. Their arrows and blades are of obsidian." "It's still the same now." Osha put a padded cloth over the wound on the maester's forearm, and then tied it tightly with a long cotton bandage. Bran held the arrow up close. The black glass was smooth and shiny, and he thought it was beautiful. "Can I have one?" "Just take it," said the old master. "Me too," Rickon said, "I want four, because I'm four." Luwin made him figure it out. "Be careful, they're still sharp, don't cut yourself." "Tell me about the Children of the Forest," Bran said.This is very important. "What do you want to know about?" "Everything I want to know." Maester Luwin tugged on the choker. "They were the race that lived in the Age of Dawn, the first rulers of the world, long before kings and kingdoms appeared." He said, "At that time there were no castles, no villages, and no cities. Not even half a market place. There were no Men, only the Children of the Forest who dwelt in the lands we call the Seven Kingdoms." "They were a dark and beautiful people, and of small stature, and even their grown-ups were about as tall as our little children. They dwelt in deep forests, in caves, in swampy islands, and in secret tree-towns. Small though they were, The Children of the Forest are swift and graceful, and men and women hunt with weirwood bows and flying nets. They worship old gods of forests and streams and rocks whose names are secret. Their wise men are called 'Green Prophet', the Green Seer carved strange faces into the weirwood to guard the forest. How long the children of the forest ruled here, or where they came from, no one knows." "About twelve thousand years ago, the 'First Men' appeared, and they came across the sea from the east through the still-unbroken Horn of Dorne. The First Men rode horses, with bronze swords and leather giant shields. Narrow The creatures on this side of the sea have never seen a horse, and the children of the forest must be as afraid of their horses as they are of faces carved in trees. When the First Men built their houses and fields, they chopped down the trees with faces. Come down for firewood. The children of the forest, terrified, went to war with them. The old ballads say that the Greenseer cast a mighty spell that raised the seas, swept the land, and shattered the Arm of Dorne, but it was too late. The war went on. , until the blood of humans and the children of the forest stained the earth. Because humans were taller and stronger, and wood, stone, and obsidian were no match for bronze, the children of the forest suffered heavy casualties. At last, wise men on both sides proposed peace, and the ancestors The chieftains and heroes, and the greenseers and wood dancers of the children of the forest came to the isle in God's Eye, and met among the weirwood forests on the island." "They made an 'Oath' there, stipulating that the ancestors owned the coast, plains, grasslands, mountains, and swamps, but the lush forests belonged to the children of the forest forever, and no weirwood was allowed to be cut down in the whole kingdom. In order for the gods in the sky to witness this sacred oath, they carved faces for every tree on the island, and established a sacred organization of 'green men' here to guard Qianmian Islet." "The 'Oath' began the four thousand years of friendship between humans and the Children of the Forest. Later, the ancestors even abandoned the beliefs they brought from the East and worshiped the mysterious gods of the Children of the Forest. The signing of the Oath ended the War of Dawn. Era, begins the age of heroes." Bran's hand, gripping the shiny black arrow. "But you say the children of the forest are extinct." "Here they are extinct," Osha said, snapping off the end of the bandage with her teeth. "It's different north of the Wall. That's where the Children of the Forest and Giants and other old peoples go." Maester Luwin sighed: "Woman, you should be sentenced to death or at least put in chains. The Starks have treated you far more than you deserve. They have treated you so well, and you put this It is ungrateful for a child to fill his head with absurd ideas." "Tell me, where did they go?" Bran said. "I want to know." "Me too," Rickon agreed. "Well, well," murmured Luwin, "as long as the kingdom of the First Men stands, the 'Oath' will still be valid, after the Age of Heroes, the Long Night, and the birth of the Seven Kingdoms, many centuries later, the other The nation has finally crossed the sea." "The first to come were the tall and blond Andal warriors. About a thousand years ago, they carried weapons made of fine steel, with a seven-pointed star drawn on their chests symbolizing the new gods, and crossed the sea to kill them. The war between the ancestors and them continued. For hundreds of years, the six southern kingdoms fell into their hands one by one. Only here did the King of Winter defeat all armies that tried to cross the Neck; only here did the First Men still hold a place. The Andals burned They destroyed all the weirwood forests, cut down the human face tree, and hunted and killed the children of the forest. Wherever they went, they vigorously advocated the belief of the seven gods and belittled the ancient gods. So the children of the forest fled north—" Xia Tian raised his head to the sky and howled. Startled, Maester Luwin stopped talking.Then Shaggydog jumped up and joined his brother in howling, and Bran was filled with fear. "Here it comes," he whispered, with a certain desperation in his tone.He suddenly realized that he had known it since last night, because the Three-Eyed Raven took him to the catacombs to say goodbye.He knew, but refused to believe it, subconsciously hoping that Maester Luwin was right.The crow, he thought, the three-eyed crow... The howling of wolves had just begun, and it was over.Xia Tian walked across the room, walked to Shaggy Dog, and began to lick the dried blood clot on the back of his brother's neck.There was the sound of flapping wings at the window. A raven landed on the greystone window-sill, opened its beak, and uttered a sharp, hoarse, distressed cry. Rickon wept as the arrows slipped from his hands, one by one, and fell to the ground, clanging.Bran pulled him towards him and hugged him tightly. Maester Luwin stared at the blackbird as if it were a feathered scorpion.He stood up, moved slowly, and walked towards the window as if he was sleepwalking.When he whistled softly, the raven jumped onto his bandaged forearm.There were dried blood on the bird's wings. "It must have been a falcon," Luwin murmured. "Or a night owl. Poor thing, it's a wonder it made it there alive." He took the letter from the bird's foot. Seeing the maester unfold the letter, Bran found himself trembling. "What did the letter say?" he asked, holding his brother tighter. "Boy, you already know what it is." Osha said, there was no malice in her words.She reached out and stroked his head. Maester Luwin looked up at them blankly.This thin old man in gray clothes and gray hair has blood on the sleeves of his robe, and tears glisten in his bright gray eyes. "My lord," he said to the duke's two sons, in a voice that was entirely hoarse and withered, "we... we must find a master sculptor who knows his face..."