Gendry and the girl left the small campsite and went out into the darkness. They followed the river downstream, in the direction of the Inn. She'd refused his offer of extra food for her journey, insisting him and his friends keep what supplies they had left for themselves. A part of her was relieved to be away from Arya and her unsettling words, but an equal measure wanted to run straight back and demand a thousand answers.

Gendry suggested that for cutting metal links the best tool was a long-handled axe with a downward curving, preferably wedge-shaped head. He started to outline the merits of crucible-processed steel over cemented, but the girl wasn't listening. All she could hear was Arya saying: 'I had a friend died here, and a wolf too...'

There had been talk of a wolf who was said to have attacked the Prince that day, along with Mycah. Was it possible that Arya had been there? Had she and Mycah really known each other? Or was Arya some kind of witch?

Or, have I simply read too much into the whole conversation by the fire, too tired and upset to hear anything except that I wanted to hear?

'Who is that kid you're travelling with?' she asked Gendry, interrupting his steel-processing review.

'Arya?' He said the name somewhat guardedly.

'She's a bit... odd. Don't you think?'

'No more than anyone.'

'She's kind of obsessed with death. Revenge. More than... most little girls.'

'She's older than she looks,' Gendry said. 'And besides, she's been through a lot. Everyone copes with stuff in their own way.'

'Who is she, exactly?'

'What do you mean? She's a refugee from the Capital, like me, and HotPie.' Gendry looked shifty.

'Oh you're the worst liar, Gendry Waters. I know you three are on the run from Lannister soldiers, and you want to protect her, of course. That's fine. You always had a soft spot for urchins. But this is me you're talking to. The least likely person in all the seven Kingdoms to dob anyone in for anything.'

'I dunno if I should say, she'd kill me. She ain't even told me everything.'

'It's me, Gendry. Here I thought our history together meant something.'

He avoided the girl's gaze, conflicted. Finally he stopped walking and turned to face her, talking quietly although the riverbank was otherwise deserted. 'Alright, but you can't breathe a word of it to no-one.'

'Promise.'

'She's a Lady. A Highborn. You know Lord Stark? Guardian of the North and such? Until he got his head lopped off for treason after the old King died?'

The girl nodded. 'Yeah, how the war started and all that. I got the gist of it.'

'Well, she's his kid. Grew up in fucking Winterfell.'

'Really? A proper little Lady.' The girl turned this information over in her mind, trying to match it up with what else she knew. 'So why's she's slumming it out in the wilderness with lowlifes like you and Hotdog?'

'HotPie. And us lowlifes are better company than none. She wanted out of the Capital. When her father was executed, she thought it wisest to leave, and join us lot headed for the Wall.'

'You at the Wall?' the girl laughed. 'You spent all your life in a armoury with your shirt off, where it was hot enough to melt your chest hairs. You whine about frosty mornings.'

Gendry grinned and shoved her. 'Didn't have no choice did I? Like most of 'em.'

'Why was Arya in the Capital with Lord Stark in the first place?'

'Because he was appointed Hand of the King when the other one died. And her sister was engaged to the Prince. Now King. O' course none of that worked out real well in the end.'

The girl must have looked a bit lost, because Gendry sighed. 'I know you pride yourself on knowing as little as humanly possible 'bout the Nobility.'

'Hey, I'm not totally ignorant,' she bristled. 'I do know the basics.'

Gendry smirked. 'Sure you do. I bet you couldn't even tell me the King's full name.'

'The old one or the new one?'

'Either.'

'King Robert Baratheon.'

'Well that was too easy. Name a Lord.'

'Any?'

'Any,' he challenged.

'The new Lord of Winterfell, King in the North? I believe his name is...' she paused and tapped her chin as if thinking. 'Lord Robb Stark.'

Gendry looked suitably impressed. 'What's got into you, you takin' lessons?'

As they walked on, the girl kept prying. 'So, this Arya kid. She was travelling with the old King, King Robert's, party when they came through here about a year and a half ago?'

'I guess.'

She thought for a while, then nodded.

'Why you wanna know all this for, anyhow?' Gendry asked.

'I merely care who you're travelling with,' she said innocently. 'Can't have a friend of mine wandering around the countryside with just anyone.'

'I would be touched,' Gendry put his hand to his heart, 'if I'd ever known you to care about another person, outside of your own family. And your horse.'

'That hurts. I care about people.'

'Only so far as you can use 'em.'

'Gendry!' she mock-punched him.

'Luckily I like bein' used.'

The trees began to thin out, and they reached a dirt track that led away from the river. 'This is the way to the Inn', the girl said. 'Do you think it'll still be open?'

'It's an Inn. Pretty sure they stay open.'

They started along the narrow track, keeping watch for other travellers or soldiers. The silhouette of the Crossroads Inn loomed into view, its turrets towering over the surrounding trees. A few wagons and carts were parked at the side, and there were a couple of low building that the girl remembered as stables and staff quarters. A bell tower sat behind them. Light shone faintly from the open doors. Gendry and the girl stopped and crouched behind a hedge that marked the tended property of the Inn, scanning the gardens for anyone either of them would rather avoid.

The dirt track they'd been following ran through a gap in the hedge and disappeared around the corner of the out-buildings, where untrimmed shrubs and weeds probably hid a back entrance for deliveries and staff. Before the hedge was a wide ditch, which under the moonlight looked black with sludge. A haze of mosquitoes danced around it, and unknown creatures scuttled and splashed. The girl wrinkled her nose at the stench.

'What is that?'

'Looks like a drainage ditch. From the kitchens, most like,' Gendry said. 'If there's rats I ain't going near it.'

She gave him a look, pointedly appraising his thick biceps and wide shoulders. 'You scared of rats?' she joked.

Gendry held one hand to his stomach, looking pained. 'I could tell you stories.'

The girl took a step, her boot squelching into the water-logged ground. 'This stinks.'

'Yeah. And... there's rats.'

'I don't recall you being so squeamish, Gendry. I'm sure the rodents here in Riverlands are of no lesser quality than those on Steel street.' She took another slurping step. 'Ugh, this place is a fucking swamp. They probably dump all the muck from the bathrooms out here too. Sewerage waste.'

'We could go 'round the front but then we're out on the King's Road. Could be soldiers there, ' Gendry said.

As if on cue, voices came from the stables, and a couple of men walked out, leading three horses apiece. They hitched them to a rail and began to saddle them. The girl looked over at Gendry, and he shook his head. 'What if there's Lannister soldiers in there?' he whispered.

'I haven't seen red soldiers for months, they're all holed up in KingsLanding.'

'I don't wanna risk it, for the sake of the others.'

'It's alright,' the girl assured him. 'You stay here, I'm just going to check things out.'

'Don't be long,' Gendry said. 'I think there's leeches here too. I ain't mad keen on leeches neither.'

The girl rolled her eyes and crept away from him along the hedge. She skirted around the worst of the boggy ground, sneaking past the men saddling the horses, keeping behind the parked wagons and in the shadows. She came out on the King's Road, and walked up to the front door of the Crossroads Inn. It had been so long since she'd been here that she felt like a stranger. I used to play in these gardens, feed the cart-horses, sit under my father's table playing marbles while he had a pint after work. It seems like a lifetime ago.

Walking up the paving stones, the smoke and smells seeping from cracks under the entrance arch awakened old memories. For a moment the ghosts of everyone from her past stood beside her on the step. She paused to clear her head, then pushed the heavy door open and went in.

Inside, the air was stale and hazy with wood-smoke, thick with the fumes of old food, old sweat and the mud from hundreds of boots. The rows of bench seats on either side of the room had a few people in them, some fast asleep or passed out with their heads in their arms, but overall the place wasn't crowded. It was more run-down than the girl remembered, she guessed the war wasn't great for business. Table tops were cluttered with empty plates and glasses, cobwebs hung in faintly drifting ribbons from the ceiling.

She strolled up the aisle, her clothes and hair dishevelled enough not to look out of place among the equally grimy clientele. Well-practised at avoiding eye-contact, she slipped unnoticed past a table of card-players, a troubadour strumming an instrument, and a fat man bawdily singing along. On the last table, a group of men were laughing uproariously. No-one paid her any attention. Slouched on the bar, a man not much older than herself gave her the once over.

'Help you?'

'Yes,' the girl said. 'I'm looking to buy an axe, and I heard you were selling.'

He yawned, showing a haphazard shelf of yellow teeth. 'Might be. Depends what you got.'

'Twenty coins, and two fine rubies.' She patted her pocket.

The man looked bored. 'I have nothing to suit your budget.'

'How about you tell me what axes you have for sale, and we'll discuss it further.'

'How about you double your offer and I'll peruse my inventory.' His watery eyes regarded her with a cunning she recognised. Years of haggling and bartering at markets around the country had made the girl an expert in knowing when she was about to be ripped off. And this was undoubtedly one of those times. Inwardly she cursed, but she didn't have time to spare, nor any other options right now. Jaime was relying on her. She'd already been away too long.

'Thirty coins, two rubies.' The coins and stones in her purse were everything she had to show for the last three month's deliveries. She thought of her sister and nieces, how much they relied on her earnings just to survive. She thought of how dark and cold the nights were in Goldgrass without oil for the lanterns, how the girls needed new jackets.

'Thirty coins?' the InnKeeper shook hs head. 'I may have a small skinning knife for that price.'

The girl fixed him with a steely glare. 'Cole at RedHollow sells broadswords for thirty coins.'

'Then I suggest you go and buy off him.'

'Fine.' The girl pulled out her pouch, weighed it in her hand. She leaned forward keeping a smile on her face and hissed: 'I have exactly thirty-five coins and a number of different stones here. Their combined worth is twice that of any weapon you keep out the back of this degenerate establishment. I want a heavy, long-handled axe capable of splitting metal, and it's only because I'm in a good mood that I don't go back outside, bring my horse into your bar and have her rearrange your teeth with her hooves.'

The InnKeeper didn't look particularly intimidated, he was the landlord of a notorious Inn, after all. But some of her bluster must have impressed him, or maybe he'd heard stories, because he returned her fake-smile with one of his own and disappeared out the back. The girl sat down on a nearby vacant bench and waited.

The group of men who'd been so loud behind her were finishing up their drinks. One of them drained his glass and belched loudly. 'Glad you're so sure of yourself, Locke. I still reckon we shoulda kept 'er for bear-bait.'

'What, and risked the wrath of the Tyrells and the Lannisters? You 'eard what she said,' replied the man evidently called Locke, who sat directly behind the girl. He mimicked a woman's voice, '"He'll pay a lot for me. Unharmed." No-one wants their property all spoiled now, does they?'

The girl sat very still, suddenly paying attention.

'He's only gonna kill 'er anyways,' the first man said, and burped again.

'No, she reckons they was... special friends.' Here the men laughed so much one of them sounded like he was dying. When they finally got their breath back, Locke went on, 'And like Roose says, the Tyrells will wanna hear what she has to say 'bout the whole Renly situation. So, that's how it is, lads. Find yerselves some other whore to have fun with.'

'Still. Was lookin' forward to seein' 'er in a dress.' The men sniggered.

'Put yer fuckin' bear in a dress it'll be a sight prettier.' Locke said. 'Ain't the promise o' riches better than ten minutes of entertainment?'

'Woulda got more 'n ten minutes out of 'er. She looked like she coulda put up a half-decent fight.'

'Shut yer gob. What's done is done.' Locke banged his empty glass down. 'Time we was off. Has Zollo saddled them horses yet?'

'How do we even know 'e's gonna pay us anyfing? He might just pay Steelshanks, seein' as that's who she's wiv. How do we know 'e's even gonna be in KingsLanding when she gets there?'

'Well look around, numbnuts. Where is he, then? We searched that fucking river for two days. The Riverlands is positively swarmin' with North soldiers. If he were here, think they'd 'a flushed 'im out by now. Not like he knows how to go bush, does he? He's a fuckin' toff.'

'Nah. He could be fish food. Stark soldiers don't care no more. Who can blame 'em. Most of 'em is sick of this war an' just wanna fuck off home. The King in the Norf is too busy stickin' his sword into his new lady love to even care how little his men give a fuck 'bout his war any more.'

Locke stood up and the other men followed him, pulled on their long coats. 'Never you mind. House Bolton knows what side to throw its hat in with.'

'Yeah. The winnin' side.' They all laughed again as they walked out.

The girl didn't stir, didn't move a muscle. She listened to the men's footsteps fading down the steps and her mind was whirling. She tried to put together what they'd been talking about. Was it Jaime? His companion, who'd been captured, had she been a woman? A woman who was claiming that if they returned her to Jaime 'unharmed' that he'd pay 'a lot' for her?

A lot? Like 500 gold coins?

Maybe Jaime really is rich enough to make good on these promises, these men seem to think so. Is he a Lord in KingsLanding, someone valuable to the Tyrells and Lannisters? A spy? Someone captured by the North during the war, maybe a General or a Captain? Has everyone really given up on finding him?

Or, was this conversation nothing to do with Jaime at all?

She just didn't know anything any more.

'Hey, girl.'

She looked up and saw that the InnKeeper was leaning on the bar, a long-handled, downward-curving, wedge-headed axe in his hand. She stood up, handed him the pouch of coins with one hand while taking hold of the axe with the other. It was heavy and she hefted it up to her chest, the steel resting on her shoulder.

The InnKeeper nodded at her, and she turned and walked out of the Inn. No-one at the tables paid her any attention.