Jaehaerys
The courtyard had been arranged for the ceremony to take place. Lord Commander Mormont was passing new recruits, six of them, along with Jaehaerys and Gwayne. Two long wooden tables were arranged neatly before the raised wooden platform where he took his seat with his soon to be brothers.
The high officers took their place in the raised platform; Lord Commander Mormont stood first in a blank wool doublet. Maester Aemon stood on his right side, fat Samwell Tarly by his side, Ser Alliser cold-eyed and grim took the left. Beside them were the senior members of the three orders: red-faced Bowen Marsh the Lord Steward, First Builder Othell Yarwyck, and Ser Jaremy Rykker, who commanded the rangers in the absence of Benjen Stark.
His uncle had left for a ranging with his rangers as soon as he came back from Winterfell and he has not returned since. None of the men he took with him has made it back to the Wall. Benjen Stark's disappearance was making everyone restless that Jaehaerys saw the truth of it in the faces of the black brothers. He has been away for too long, and there's been no words on him or the men he went in searching for. For days Jaehaerys waited for the return of his uncle, but days turned to weeks still Benjen Stark was nowhere to be found. He must feel nothing for the man, he knew that. Benjen Stark has been a complete stranger in all his life. Even when Jaehaerys was sent to the Wall, Benjen rode forth to Winterfell in a hurry to meet his long lost nephew while not even sparing a look at him. But somewhere in his heart, Jae couldn't help but to hope for his safe return. Most of the brothers of Night's Watch pretty much believed Benjen Stark to be dead but not Jaehaerys.
Mormont stood before them on the platform, the Wall sparkling behind him. "You came to us outlaws," he began, "poachers, rapers, debtors, killers, and thieves. You came to us children. You came to us alone, in chains, with neither friends nor honor. You came to us rich, and you came to us poor. Some of you bear the names of proud houses. Others have only bastards' names, or no names at all. It makes no matter. All that is past now. On the Wall, we are all one house.
"At evenfall, as the sun sets and we face the gathering night, you shall take your vows. From that moment, you will be a Sworn Brother of the Night's Watch. Your crimes will be washed away, your debts forgiven. So too you must wash away your former loyalties, put aside your grudges, forget old wrongs and old loves alike. Here you begin anew.
"A man of the Night's Watch lives his life for the realm. Not for a king, nor a lord, nor the honor of this house or that house, neither for gold nor glory nor a woman's love, but for the realm, and all the people in it. A man of the Night's Watch takes no wife and fathers no sons. Our wife is duty. Our mistress is honor. And you are the only sons we shall ever know.
"You have learned the words of the vow. Think carefully before you say them, for once you have taken the black, there is no turning back. The penalty for desertion is death." The Old Bear paused for a moment before he said, "Are there any among you who wish to leave our company? If so, go now, and no one shall think the less of you."
No one moved. For a moment, Jaehaerys wanted to leave, leave and go be with his family. He felt the blind white eyes of Aemon on him and looked at the old man. Despite of all the others around him, Aemon's milky eyes were fixed on him. He looked back at the old man and stayed in his seat unmoved.
"Well and good," said Mormont. "You may take your vows here at evenfall, before Septon Celladar and the first of your order. Do any of you keep to the old gods?"
Jaehaerys stood. "I do, my lord. I may have born in the south but I grew up in the north."
"Very well then," Mormont said. "Castle Black has no need of a godswood. Beyond the Wall the haunted forest stands as it stood in the Dawn Age, long before the Andals brought the Seven across the narrow sea. You will find a grove of weirwoods half a league from this spot, and mayhap the gods you seek as well."
"My lord." Gwayne voiced beside him. "I wish to accompany the prince as well, to say my vows before the Hear tree."
"Do you follow the old gods as well, ser?" Mormont asked.
"No, my lord," Gwayne replied. "But I do follow the prince in whatever he does."
"As you wish then," Mormont said. Gwayne took his seat again, as did Jaehaerys. "We have placed each of you in an order, as befits our need and your own strengths and skills." Bowen Marsh stepped forward and handed him a paper. The Lord Commander unrolled it and began to read. "Lio, to the builders," he began. Lio gave a stiff nod of approval. "Quid, to the rangers. Jos, to the builders. Geren, to the rangers." Geren looked over at Jaehaerys and gave a smile which Jae returned. "Gwayne, to the rangers." Gwayne looked at him and gave a nod, and Jaehaerys waited for his chance. "Orten, to the rangers. Kurt, to the rangers. Jaehaerys, to the stewards."
The stewards? For a moment Jaehaerys could not believe what he had heard. Mormont must have read it wrong. He started to rise, to open his mouth, to tell them there had been a mistake . . . and then he saw Ser Alliser studying him, eyes shiny as two flakes of obsidian, and he knew. The whole thing had his name written onto it.
The Old Bear rolled up the paper. "Your firsts will instruct you in your duties. May all the gods preserve you, brothers." The Lord Commander favored them with a half bow, and took his leave. Ser Alliser went with him, a thin smile on his face. Jae had never seen the master-at-arms look quite so happy. He should be happy now that he has condemned him to the life of a servant. And he managed to get him away from Gwayne.
"Rangers with me," Ser Jaremy Rykker called when they were gone. Gwayne was staring at Jae as he got slowly to his feet. Quid, Geren, Kurt and Orten fell in beside him, and they followed Ser Jaremy from the sept.
"Builders," announced lantern-jawed Othell Yarwyck. Lio and Jos trailed out after him.
Jae looked around him in sick disbelief. Maester Aemon's blind eyes were raised toward the sun he could not see. Only he remained on the benches in the yard; him along with the fat boy Samwell and the blind maester.
Lord Steward Bowen Marsh rubbed his plump hands together. "Lord Commander Mormont has requested you for his personal steward, Jaehaerys. You'll sleep in a cell beneath his chambers, in the Lord Commander's tower."
And what will my duties be? Jae might've asked, but he will not give that satisfaction to Ser Alliser. He was a man of the Night's Watch now and he would not cry and weep like a girl about the duties that came with it.
They dismissed from the yard in silence. Outside, Jae looked up at the Wall shining in the sun, the melting ice creeping down its side in a hundred thin fingers. Jae's rage was such that he would have smashed it all in an instant, and the world be damned.
"Jaehaerys," Samwell Tarly said excitedly, following him. "Wait. Don't you see what they're doing?"
Jae turned on him, calmly. "I see Ser Alliser's bloody hand, that's all I see. He wanted to shame me, and he has."
"There is no shame in being a steward," Sam said.
"Do you think I want to spend the rest of my life washing an old man's smallclothes?"
"The old man is Lord Commander of the Night's Watch," Sam reminded him. "You'll be with him day and night. Yes, you'll pour his wine and see that his bed linen is fresh, but you'll also take his letters, attend him at meetings, squire for him in battle. You'll be as close to him as his shadow. You'll know everything, be a part of everything . . . and the Lord Steward said Mormont asked for you himself!
"When I was little, my father used to insist that I attend him in the audience chamber whenever he held court. When he rode to Highgarden to bend his knee to Lord Tyrell, he made me come. Later, though, he started to take Dickon and leave me at home, and he no longer cared whether I sat through his audiences, so long as Dickon was there. He wanted his heir at his side, don't you see? To watch and listen and learn from all he did. I'll wager that's why Lord Mormont requested you, Jae. What else could it be? He wants to groom you for command!"
Jaehaerys was taken aback. It was true, his father had often made Aegon part of his councils back at the Red Keep. Could Sam be right? Perhaps this is not a condemning after all.
"None of us are here for asking," Sam reminded him.
Jae let out a deep sigh. "You have the right of it. I was acting the boy like I was at Winterfell."
"Then you'll stay and say your words?"
"Of course, brother." He made himself smile.
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. Jae 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 reemerged into the afternoon light on the north side of the Wall.
Gwayne blinked at the sudden glare and looked around carefully. "What about the Wildlings?"
"They'd never dare come this close." the ranger accompanying them said. When Bowen Marsh and their ranger escort had mounted, they set off at once.
Once they had entered the forest, they were in a different world. Jae had often hunted with Gwayne and his men in the wolfswood. He knew the wolfswood around Winterfell as well as any man from the north and the Kingswood in King's Landing as well. The haunted forest was much the same, and yet the feel of it was very different.
Perhaps it was all in the knowing. They had ridden past the end of the world; somehow that changed everything. Every shadow seemed 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 his 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. Jae drew in a breath, and he even saw Gwayne staring. Even in the wolfswood, you never found more than two or three of the white trees growing together; a grove of nine was unheard of. The forest floor was carpeted with fallen leaves, bloodred on top, black rot beneath. The wide smooth trunks were bone pale, and nine faces stared inward. The dried sap that crusted in the eyes was red and hard as ruby. Bowen Marsh commanded them to leave their horses outside the circle. "This is a sacred place, we will not defile it."
When they entered the grove, Gwayne turned slowly looking at each face in turn. No two were quite alike. "This is it, my prince," he said.
"I know." Jae knelt, and Gwayne knelt beside him.
They 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 twilit grove. "Night gathers, and now my watch begins. It shall not end until my death. I shall take no wife, hold no lands, father no children. I shall wear no crowns and win no glory. I shall live and die at my post. I am the sword in the darkness. I am the watcher on the walls. I am the fire that burns against the cold, the light that brings the dawn, the horn that wakes the sleepers, the shield that guards the realms of men. I pledge my life and honor to the Night's Watch, for this night and all the nights to come."
The woods fell silent. "You knelt as boys," Bowen Marsh intoned solemnly. "Rise now as men of the Night's Watch."
Jae and Gwayne stood up. He smiled at Gwayne and embraced him tightly.
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."
They took a different route through the trees on their way back. It is then they came across the black bundles half frozen and abandoned amidst the forest.
A/N: So Jaehaerys' storyline will mostly follow the canon storyline of Jon, tbh. It will mostly follow the canon storyline but there will me some changes along the way. I hope you guys enjoy it. Let me know what you thought about it in the reviews.