Chapter Thirty: The Death of Duty

It was the right choice, he averred. The only choice. Aye, it had been a difficult decision, Mance conceded, as painful decisions oft were. Yet, it was necessary and needed to be done. The she-wolf was a danger to his people to his son.

"What is this you have you done, Father?"

A sweet poison, aye, but a poison all the same. A noxious, carcinogenic that took its time to slowly devour and consume until there was nothing left save decomposition and rot. And finally, death. It was all that love was, anyway. Naught but a harbinger for death. If Lyanna's demise had taught Mance naught else, it was this.

"You betrayed me!"

The accusations were jagged and aciculated, filling Mance with simultaneous grief and shame. Aye, aye...Mance nodded his head in slow concession and finality, akin to an arbitrator giving his ultimate deliberation. Mayhap it was selfish and inadvertently cruel-to gift his son with but a touch of the sun's golden warmth only to snatch it away-yet it had to be done.

The she-wolf had to be sent off, to return to her own pack, to her beloved Kneelers within the safety and confines of their castles and stone keeps. Gods knew they could provide better sanctuary than Mance ever could. Than Jon ever could.

Mance shifted in his stool by the fire as he thought on his son. Since the discovery, he had become more sullen and morose, taciturn. Although he fulfilled his duties and obligations to the camp and his people, it was mirthless and mechanical. Afterwards, Jon would go off in seclusion to his hut and remain. To do what? Gods above only knew.

"She was mine! Mine to cherish, mine to protect. You had no right!"

His son was angry, unforgiving, his wolf's blood elevated and pulsing. Yet, it was not fear or timidity Mance felt when facing him, no. It was commiseration and sorrow. He was leaving camp, Tormund had informed him of that much.

No doubt trying to locate and recapture the Wolf Maiden.

Their relationship had soured as of late, tense like the string of an archer's bow. Jon was no fool, and easily deduced that both Tormund and Muirgayne conspired against him in enabling Sansa's escape. The betrayal akin to a thousand resounding blows upon his body.

Like Mance, Tormund tried to expatiate himself, atone for his sins, yet Jon was deaf to all entreaties and hardened his heart to all supplications. Not that it mattered. Jon was an implacable sort, once he got into his moods. Capricious and mercurial, quick to shift like the changing tide.

If one were wise, he would stay clear of the wolf-son and give him a wide berth. Wolves did not fare well when caged. Yet, Mance knew his son, held him in his arms as a suckling babe, secure and warm; he held no fear of him now despite his rage.

"It is easy to hate, to feel that raw, consuming anger pulse and thrum and seep inside you, until it's all you have to keep you going. It's mother's milk, warms a man's belly better than meat ever could. It was the anger and rage I felt when your mother died, knowing that I had forfeit the most sacred and precious thing. You share the same look in your eyes now, the same rage and darkness."

Jon shifted in his seat but remained silent, a shadow within the hut, angry and surging. Unforgiving.

"You knew what she was the moment you brought her here, my son. You knew you were not meant to keep her. It was a beautiful dream, yet sooner or later, we all must wake."

Once, when Jon was two and ten, he fought a young lad in his village, Moren, he was called. A head head taller than Jon with tousled, mousey hair that reached his shoulders, he was a cruel lad with cruel habits and proclivities. His parents had died in a Thenn raid, killed by its Magnar a year before, thus leaving him an orphan. Mance had taken the boy in, fostering him within his home; whether out of obligation or guilt, it was unclear.

The enmity between the two youths was instantaneous and palpable. Jon easily seeing through Moran's artifice, his simpering and prostrating, a well-crafted and believable mask had one not been paying attention. He had nearly everyone fooled-everyone save Jon, for wolves remembered everything. And waited.

Along with maliciousness, Moren was a lusty fellow who enjoyed the company of the wildling girls within the village, the most recent of his passing fancy being Muirgayne. Moren had set his sights on the wildling girl many a time and had let it be known of his not-so-subtle desires of stealing her away-whether she wished it so or not.

For a moment, Muirgayne had been successful in staying his hand, rebuffing his advances. Moren had not minded the dismissal, finding such repudiations amusing at best, for they never truly meant it. What maid would be stupid enough to deny him?

Soon, however, Moren's patience began to wane and spread thin. What kind of game was the bitch playing at, anyway? Couldn't he see that he had chosen her? That Murigayne was his? She was taking too long, and Moren was no one's fool.

The discovery was accidental and inadvertent. Jon did not pray or believe in any god or deity, long abandoning the practice after his mother's demise, but he was thankful to whatever force that led him to Murigayne. He shuddered tremulously at what could have been.

Murigayne's tunic had been shredded, the large tear renting the fabric into two, exposing a breast. There was a gash upon her cheek, thin and rufescent against the pallidity of her skin. Worse-much, much worse-was the trembling and palpitating of her hands as they tried to hold the garment in place.

Even at two and ten, Jon was not a stupid child, willingly blind and naive to the ways of the world. Theirs was a harsh existence within an equally cruel and pitiless world. A world that had no qualms in hurting young women and predating on the defenseless. Even more, Murigayne was as obstinate as she was proud, never would she welcome another's touch other than Tormund's. What Murigayne could not disclose with words, Jon could conclude with her shame. He knew, the damnable truth glaring and irrefutable.

Jon did not remember propelling himself at Moren, nor did he remember the barrage of his fists-ceaseless, deft, and heavy-handed-as he pummeled his foe into oblivion, like a baker kneading bread. He did not recall the blinding rage that overtook his person, white-hot and acerbic, as the blows continued to assail. Later, as he had a moment of retrospection, Jon knew he had acted akin to a beast, besieged within a blind haze of madness and viciousness. He had become a monster, a demon. Something both otherworldly and depraved.

When it was all over, Moren was indistinguishable and altered, his face a tattered pulp of flesh, sinew and broken bone. Jon did not remember being forcibly lifted from Moren's prone form, all he could recall were Murigayne's tears, glittering and iridescent in the night air. And the rage.

"You had no right!" he snarled, his grey eyes slitted and obsidian. "You had no right!"

Mance blinked, watching his son come apart. The outburst hurt, without question, but he supposed it was justified and deserved. Let it out, son. Let it out if you must, for I am sorry. So damned sorry for your pain.

"It was the right decision, my son. One of the many painful and difficult decisions we all must make. She was not part of our world, and you could not be part of hers, no matter how you would wish it otherwise."

Until now, Jon did not look at Mance, instead looking elsewhere, anywhere. Fucking coward. The upbraiding stung, bitter and cloying like wormwood. Yet, there was no deception, only truth.

Mance was right, as he always was. He was right about everything. He had been stupid, foolish. He had no right in abducting the wolf-maid and stealing her away from her family and those whom she loved.

But I love her…

Mance frowned, a deep furrowed crease in his brow. Had his son really admitted such a transgression? Confessed such guilt? Before now, Jon would not admit the truth to himself, locking it away in some dark recess somewhere-out of sight and out of mind. Gods be damned, but the she-wolf had sunken her fangs in deep…

"I love her."

There. It was out in the open now, no longer festering within the confines of his heart. Now, it was out in the open, raw and exposed, laying bare at Mance Rayder's feet; his to do with it whatever he willed, for Jon cared not. He was past caring. "I love her."

Mance sucked in his breath, feeling like a requiem and striving to tether himself back to Earth. Nay. Nay, this could not be. He knew his son held an attraction for the girl, aye, but love?

"I had hoped you would show more restraint, more reason, truly I did. Suppose your claim is true and you do love the Stark girl. Have you any thought as to what comes next? Her uncle and her betrothed have breached the Wall and are marching onto our lands like a ravenous plague. What think you their response once you declare your love for her?"

Again, Mance had the higher ground, but Jon refused to fold. Instead, he did what he had always done whenever he was angry and felt defeated-lashed out with anything that was sure to invoke pain, like a cornered, tethered wolf. The keener the bite, the sharper the sting.

"I am not afraid. I am not like you-too afraid and cowardly to love again! After Mother died, you gave up, like some beaten and kicked dog. I am not you. I will love and I will love hard and with everything within me. More than that, I will live."

Jon got up to abruptly leave then, heading for the tent flap. It was a low deed, shaming his father with Lyanna's memory, especially when the wound was still so raw and gaping. Immediately, Jon felt contrite and turned around to apologize, yet Mance was having none of it.

"You think me so calloused to not know love? That I am so dead inside that I cannot recall a woman's tender embrace? Feel the warmth of her smile upon my face? I loved your mother, aye. I always will, but I have a duty to my people and to their safety. Go if you must, for I cannot stop you; only know that yours is a fool's errand and you are condemning your people to death."

The rebuke stung, but Jon remained silent and sullen. Too many words had been spoken out in anger this day. He would apologize, he vowed silently. Yes, once he returned with Sansa, he would make amends and set everything right as it once was. However, Sansa needed him and he would go to her-wherever she was. He would find her. "Goodbye, Father." With that, Jon left, exiting the hut, not once looking back.

Mance sighed and closed his eyes tightly, suddenly feeling ragged and worn, older than his two score and ten years of age. His son was a fool. A damned and bloody fool. A damned and bloody fool who was in love.

...Just like he had loved Lyanna…

Mance's throat constricted as he thought on his wife. Gods, even now, after an elapse of years, he could still see her right in front of him. Gleaming, vibrant and more real than Jon or anyone else. He could still see and remember the color of her eyes, the shape of her nose; the mellifluousness of her laughter, like tinkling silvered bells.

His son was wrong, for Mance had loved and loved deeply, just as Jon has. Yet love was the death of duty and yielded naught save heartache. That was all.