This rather short chapter is dedicated to all the fat boy sidekicks that get left by the wayside when fate comes a-calling.
~Bound~
In the great songs and stories, there are only two destinies for a boy called Hot Pie. The first is a sudden death like Lommy, and even the mere thought of it sends rivers of cold sweat down his back (some nights he can still see the blood bubbling at his lips, Needle piercing his throat easy as a knife through butter). The other is to just fade away into the background, left behind by the heroes who no longer need him. He doesn't want to leave this odd pair he's come to care for... but then he doesn't want to die either; Hot Pie is not disloyal or entirely without honour, but he is a coward, and he is terrified of a painful death.
Arya and Gendry are destined for great things, he knows it in his soul. They will sing songs of the Wolf and her Bull long after their bones are dust and their real names are forgotten. He can see it in the way Gendry looks at her, in the way Arya does not yet look at him. There will be no songs for Hot Pie, though, not for the orphaned baker boy with no animal to his name. But it is not all bad, not really. For now there is still a place for him in this rag tag band, and he takes pride in it, no matter how little they might notice it.
He may not have the fangs of a wolf or the strength of a bull, but he knows which berries are best this time of year, where to find the right herbs to season the game they catch. He knows the power of food, and when the tempers flare and the bonds holding this little group together are stretched to breaking, he is there to bring them back with fresh bannock and sweetened biscuits when he can spare the flour.
It's not easy being angry on a full stomach.
He will not be with them forever, though. There is something on the horizon, some great event that will change their relationship forever and when it comes it won't matter how many pastries he bakes. They will split and grow and never fit quite the same way again, and slow, fat Hot Pie will have no one to turn to when winter comes for them. He has already made his decision to leave them at the first opportunity he gets - not because he is eager to leave them, far from it; but because if not soon, then never. He has never had much, and never had enough of an imagination to want much more. Just somewhere safe with an oven and the smell of bread always in the air. But being near them, so close to the touch of destiny surrounding them, he has started longing for adventures of his own.
They will not sing songs of Hot Pie the baker and his bread of good will. Some secret part of him wishes they would.
He thinks again of poor Lommy, of Yoren and the prisoner that had told him to stare death in the face. No. Better the hearth and the dough. Better a quiet life than no life at all.