They had to leave again, had to leave again or they would be killed like the others. How had the soldiers known, how had they known from where they came? Didn't matter, they had to get away from here, had to leave this place or they would die like the others, like their family and like their friends. He had just arrived the day before there, had just arrived after saving Grandfather And there the three of them then pressed themselves down into the dark earth and the dead leaves from years past and watched with shocked and tearfilled eyes as their loved ones were slaughtered and then thrown together onto a large pile. Grandfather had put his gnarled hands on Lia's mouth when she started to scream because they all saw mother being dragged forward by two men in the Uniform of the King's Soldiers and he hated himself for being too afraid to run to them and to help mother but Grandfather grabbed his neck with the other hand while his left still hold Lia's mouth shut and then Grandfather tugged both him and his little sister closer to his own old and thin shoulders and held both of them close, so that they won't have to see mother's last moments. They still heard her horrible scream and then only the loud gurgling noise and then nothing more from mother. Grandfather still hold them tight to his shoulders and Lia cried silently into his old and hard hands. They needed to flee before they would be found too.
The large ship with the Merman on her Sails made good speed on her way back to her Home Harbor, the White City of the North.
The young Ser Manderly was taking his honor as good host quite seriously, way more than as the Lion Lord was interested in, though the Maester enjoyed the famous and varied hospitality of which the Manderly's all were famous for rather gladly.
The Lord of the Westerlands would have enjoyed a direct ship to the Westerlands more but there was the most important necessarity of finding Allys and the North at least presented a Chance. Which meant for a rather annoyed Tywin Lannister that he needed to make a journey to the Warden of the North.
He had at least already managed to organize through the Iron Bank the services of three sellsword companies and the Bank herself had written the contracts with his own stipulations agreed upon.
The companies would be shipped towards Westerlands with the Help of the quite well paid Bravoosi Captains.
At least, thought the Lion to himself, the numerous Captains stopped their jabbing over the former Captain and now soon to be Black Brother Omarro Degarro.
It still irritated him, just as he suspected that it irritated the Bravoosi too, that Maester Hother asked for this smug former Captain not to receive a proper death like it was Bravoosi law for breaking the City's law but instead to be given the Westerosi choice of taking the Black.
The Maester had argued that since Omarros intended victims were Westerosi and no permanent harm was done, that the disgraced Captain should be given the Chance to atone for his sins in a meaningful way like Westerosis could, by taking the Black.
Lord Lannister remembered how the Braavosi had finally agreed to the Maester's idea and had also agreed on the accompanying stipulations that Omarro's family could keep their possessions for they were officially declared uninvolved in Omarro's schemes.
Even the now disgraced former Captain had agreed, reluctantly but in the end he agreed to spare his large family from the typical downfall.
And now this former Captain was shackled deep down on this ship, to make this journey with them, him the Lion Lord and the irritating Maester, till their ways would then be parted in the North and the former Braavosi citizen would be brought to the Wall and forced to join the Black Brothers.
Maester Hother had even managed, while still in Braavos, to wean Degarro off of his drugs of choice. The Lion Lord truly was at a loss of his Maester sometimes, such an effective man and then sometimes he showed himself just too mild and gentle hearted towards unusefull people.
Tywin remembered the first day, the day on which his Maester and he met each other, back then in the Cell with the rapidly dying Aerys, moons ago now and he also remembered the other cell in which the Maester then had stepped behind the already dying and quite disfigured latest whore of Aerys and had nearly gently broken her neck to spare her any prolonged pain.
This Maester was really a curious one and it irked the Lion Lord immensely that he still had not figured out why the Maester proved himself so useful and loyal all the times to the Lion's course but as long as he did, it was well in Tywin's mind.
If the loyalty would ever change, than there would be ways to react to that.
And with these thoughts on his mind, the Warden of the West leaned back, received a newly filled cup of wine from one of the Manderly Servants near the Dinner table in the main Cabin and watched as the already plump Manderly heir shoved another large piece of deep fried fish in his open and greedy maw.
Two more days of watching this young stuffing his bottomless stomach and then they would finally arrive in White Harbor. And then another long journey on horses through the wastelands which the Starks called their lands till he, the Lord Lannister could finally speak with Lord Rickard Stark.
Aerys and especially Rhaegar be damned for how his own life turned to an endless chain of one unpleasantness following another.
Grandfather, Lia and he had managed to leave the shores when the pyres were lit by the murdering men and they could the screams of the last few of their friends who lost their lives and were tossed onto the burning piles of corpses then. He carried Grandfather again and Lia had forced herself to stop crying and so all three of them were creeping low in the shadows, as far away from the murderers as they could. Two days and nights they then spent in between the old Tree stumps and prickly bushes, the second day it had rained heavily and soaked them thoroughly through to their bones so that the three of them could not stop shivering, nothing to eat and only the greyish water of the puddles everywhere to drink from. Just when they had found a couple of shoddy but warm blankets and a full waterbag, they heard stomping feet in the far distance. He looked at his sister and both abonded their search, took the blankets and the leather waterbag and hurried to the boat on which Grandfather was. He helped his sister onboard and then pushed the boat off the shore with all his strength and with the fear of death making his heart beating powerful. Grandfather helped him into the boat then and they all grabbed the little paddles which had been bound to one side and then they all three started to paddle to get quickly away from these shores on which the last of their family and friends were killed. ...
Hother had left Wylis Manderly, the two honorable Officials of the Iron Bank who where also making a journey to the North and the Lord Lannister after another good meal and took a bowl of fish soup and a small loaf of bread alongside a small jug of good Northern Ale with him. Time to visit Degarro once more and see if finally the last bits of shaking stopped.
The Braavosi looked at him when he entered the small room where he was spending the journey in, arms and legs shackled together, laying on top of a small patch of straw and just a small bucket in a corner as a way to relief himself into.
Nonetheless, Degarro was holding himself together rather well, as well as possible for a man who had fallen down so deep and who had been forced through a rather ruthless week of inner cleansing from all of his former addictions.
"Hother, old friend. I have decided that you have forced me into the wrong decision, for I finally came to the conclusion that death would have been a better choice instead than this most unpleasant way to make a journey."
The Maester looked at his old friend in the shine of the single oil lamp which he carried and his own lips turned slightly up.
"I would be careful not to speak such words too loudly Omarro, there are enough men here onboard who would all only too gladly help you for your choice to come true quickly enough. Even the men of the Iron Bank and their Guards would only too gladly help you to avoid the Wall with a quick and final solution.
Here, rather than talking too much, you should better eat something. It is good thick fish soup, bread and good northern Ale."
Degarro looked at him in a queer way when he shoved the bowl of now cooling soup in Omarros shackled hands and put the bread and jug down and squated down nearby.
"You should eat it, it tastes better warm then cold."
Degarro was clearly hungry but he looked at the bowl in slight distaste.
"Still no spoon Hother? You still do not trust me with a spoon so that I might eat like a civilised man instead of a dog but you will sent me to the Wall of yours, where I will be given real weapons.
Is that not ironic to you, old friend?"
"Omarro, you will eat without a spoon not because I am afraid of you for my own safety but because I wish not to give you a chance to end your own life like the last time when I was generous enough to let you eat your Stew with a Spoon and you tried to ram said Spoon in your own neck to kill yourself."
"You could have let me finish off myself." was the dry reply by the Braavosi.
"You can still prove yourself to have a last bit of honor in your body, do you know that Omarro? The Nights watch recognizes bravery by forgetting all former misdeeds. Oh and what you might like to forget, only you agreeing to join the Watch made it possible to negotiate that your family was excluded from your crimes and could stay wealthy.
And now stop talking about and eat your soup or it is absolutely cold."
Nothing more was said between them and a short time later the Maester took the emptied bowl and jug, grabbed the lamp and left his old friend alone in the dark.
Behind him, a sailor closed and barricaded the door once more.
Grandfather was holding Lia close and rubbed his workrough hands over her shivering body, desperately trying to rub some warmth back into her body. He, Owen himself, was working the sails and the stiff ropes while stearing the little boat at the same time. Grandfather had told him that he believed them now to be halfway up the Vale Coasts and he hoped that Grandfather's instinct proved through, even though it was many years since Grandfather had been a sailor and fisherman himself. In this night, the Gods proved once more that they were cruel for a Storm broke the mast and carried them over the Sea for hours.
...
Maester Hother had barely left his old former friend when warning shouts were to hear throughout the large ship, warning shouts of an approaching Storm.
The next hours proved themselves to be even more lively than everyone had feared in the first place and even the Lords were needed to assist in the end.
And while everyone on board had known that even though the Manderly heir looked like a fat useless Lord, when times were troubling he could be trusted to hold fast and to Know his way around on ships in Storms.
The Maester had been known by a few men before and they knew he had Umber blood and thus no one had been surprised of his steady grip and nonplussed behavior.
The Braavosi showed themselves true too their City's honor and even the Iron Bank officials did know enough of ships to proved themselves to be helpful.
The one who had been really astonishing to everyone, was Lord Lannister himself. Nobody, not even the Maester had known that the Lion understood the ways of ships and that he was thus useful too in such a weather.
When the Storm finally released them from its clutches in the early hours of the morning, the Merman Sail was soon tugged up again on a reserve mast and they had to repair a few other minor damages. They lost not even one man and thus the Sailors were soon gossiping happily among them.
Lord Lannister was highly praised for his usefulness in such a Situation, a Lord who was not afraid of work was not that often to be found from among of the Southern nobility after all.
They were soon sailing on their old course, when the Watchman on top of the mast screamed down that a wrecked little boat was not far in front of them.
...
They saved three wretched people from the hardly functionable anymore boat and the Maester had them brought into his cabin.
A Girl, maybe barely flowered from the looks of her thin and shivering frame was laid down on the woolen blankets, the old man with only one leg and as thin as the girl was laid on the blankets too.
The young man, who Looked less thin and to be between sixteen to twenty namedays old way laid down on another set of blankets on the floor.
Both men shivered, though quite less than the girl and Hother thought to himself that all three had less chance to live than to die.
He started to work on them nonetheless, at least one of them might get lucky enough to survive.
...
All three proved themselves to be even more resilient than even the Maester had hoped for and were holding not only on to their lives, especially after Hother had cut away their soaked through and torn shabby clothing and then rubbed each of them dry and wrapped them into dry blankets, but the young man even woke up in the late evening.
Food and jugs with wine were brought by Hother and the young man looked at first suspiciously towards everyone but as soon as he was told to be on a Northern ship, he calmed down and accepted food and drink happily.
Both the girl, who he called his sister and the old man, who he called his Grandfather were still too tired and exhausted and remained asleep, though now at least without shivering the whole time.
The young men seemed absolutely terrified and only after hearing for the utmost time that this ship was on course to the White Harbor, he finally calmed down.
He mumbled of horrors Dragonstone and of fleeing families and of murdering soldiers but when Hother asked him, or even the ever jovial Wylis tried to find out more, then the young man only looked at them with terrified eyes.
Finally Hother decided to let the three of them rest in his room and gladly accepted the Manderly heirs invitation to stay in the Shipowners room.
Owen watched over his sister and their Grandfather, while they both were sleeping peacefully.
Peacefully, what a silly word this was in these times. Could the world be peaceful when Monsters were living on it and no one stopped them?
Owen sat back, grabbed the jug of wine which he had been given by the shipmaster earlier that evening and took a big gulp. It was a good wine, the best he had ever tasted, well not that he had ever tasted much wine at all in his years. Beer and Ale, that were drinks to which he was used to but wine, wine he had only drunk a few times in his life at all.
But this one was really the best, surely because this ship was one with mighty Lords on it. Lords had always good wine, hadn't they?
He took another gulp, thankful for the strong taste and the numbness he felt in his tired body.
Thank the Sevens, that his little fishermen boat had been rescued by this Northern Lord's ship...
Tomorrow, no better the day after tomorrow, when this ship would arrive in the North, than he would tell these men who rescued him and his sister and Grandpa, then he would tell them what had happened...
