I own nothing.

Thank you for reading and for a review which came in just as I was fighting to finish this chapter.

No kissing here, just a repeated warning for violence and gore. There are more violent stories on this site but I prefer to tell.

xx

Chapter 5

A Shadowcat and a Grumkin

Where the unknown comes to haunt the company travelling south

Mance

"We need more players," said Mance to the Elder Brother in desperation. "My tale asks for more faces to be told in full."

They thought they were about to ride further down south, on a cold crispy morning way too chilled for the autumn in the riverlands, when they discovered that the knights had left them in silence long before dawn, taking with them the horses stolen from the surviving brothers of the Quiet Isle. Four of those were set to drag the wagon with Baelish, Jon's sister and the squire, judging by the trail.

The monks lagged behind on foot, with no hope to catch up with Baelish and his party, all except for the one playing Rhaegar whose black beast did not let itself be stolen. The horse embarked on a furious pursuit with his rider before the rest of them woke up. They could see him in a distance, a black monster on the horizon, not too far behind the last knights in Baelish's company, despite the significant advantage they had in departing.

"It seems like you have just lost all your players," deemed the Elder Brother.

Mance still had his sturdy brown horse too, but he knew that the odds of that animal overtaking Baelish were very low. He almost wished he was back up north, with the wights of the dead on his tail, and the white walkers never far in the frozen dread of the night, because there, then, he could never sleep. He had always been alert and on edge. And the false safety south of the Wall had already cheated on him twice to miss an important change of tide. The third time could cost me my skin, he thought, scratching the healing injuries on the back of his legs.

"Let's move out and see what players we can find," Mance said. "We shouldn't linger. The night smelled way too cold for my liking."

"I wager we will not see the Brother Gravedigger or Lord Baelish and his daughter again," said one of the other monks, a young and scrawny creature called Robert, in the honour of the late king.

"I'll wager my horse that we will," offered Mance, not expecting an answer.

"I will take you on your offer," said the Elder Brother. "I am not pleased by the prospect of walking to the capital for the queen's trial."

"And what will you give me if you loose your bet?" said the King-beyond-the-Wall all of a sudden, with great unmasked interest.

"I have nothing of value to give. Ask of me any service I can provide as a payment."

"If I win, you and two of your monks will play the three brothers of the lady in my tale," said Mance, accomplished, viciously shaking the bony long arm of the Elder Brother to seal the arrangement. The limb felt warm under the robes the monk never took off, Mance reckoned. "At least two of them lived more chastely than any servant of any faith I met so far," he reassured the Elder Brother, "so it shouldn't pose you too much of a difficulty."

Sandor

The gnats camped at the beginning of a large forest of tall slender birches close to the plains, giving way to centenary oaks further behind, not even half a day of decent ride away from where they had abandoned the brothers to their grim fate. As many times before, Sandor was grateful for the overconfidence of the knights when they thought that the people from whom they stole and whom they slaughtered were defenceless lambs. I am not a lamb, my lords, he thought. And tonight I may well be the butcher for the likes of you.

And he would not commit the same mistake as them, arrogantly attacking alone and in the light of the day. He needed the shelter of the night and he needed the buggering singer and the Elder Brother to help him.

For if he let the little bird be towed away, against her will from what could be suspected, she would never finish reading her part of the song, fond as she was of such foolish things. And the Seven only knew what Littlefinger intended to do with her. He'll do her no good, Sandor thought, creeping around Sansa's captors without being seen, lithe, light-footed and quick despite his height. His black horse, Stranger, was left to roam free on the safe distance where the honourable thieving knights could not see him.

When he learned all he could about the grounds in a short time, he fell back and rode like in seven hells, until he saw the singer and his brothers, stepping forward through the mud created by the incessant rain, and then torn open like a freshly excavated grave by the hooves of the horses and the wagon wheels.

"Singer," he exclaimed, "you want your show to go on and we want our horses back. And the King's Landing's far away from here."

"That much is correct," Mance agreed.

"This is what we will do," Sandor said in a voice of a captain of men that broke no disagreement, and all fell silent to listen to his plan.

xxx

"My blood runs cold," said one of the brothers whom the others called Norbert, when they were crawling through the low bushes towards the edge of the wood where Baelish and his party had stopped for the night.

"You don't know what you're talking about, brother," commented Mance, "it is in the north that the man's blood freezes before his very life is taken away by the dread of old, forgotten in your lands until the day the north falls, and the terror of ice comes south to consume you all."

"Shut up, both of you," Sandor snarled, trying to keep his own voice down as well. "No more talk of snarks and grumkins or I will cut your tongues out. Do you want them to hear us? Surprise is the only advantage we'll have. He's got fifty armed men over there." Mance and Sandor spent most of the day riding double to bring all the brothers close enough to the woods, with the result that both of their horses were exhausted. That was good since they would not be of much use in the night raid anyway. But it would turn bad if the knights prevailed and they had no means to outrun them.

Behind the bush next to them, the Elder Brother gripped a hiltless dagger and looked troubled.

"Think of this as a different kind of song, brother," Sandor told him with uncharacteristic politeness, "except that we will write our words in blood on their skins. Just follow my lead."

The Elder Brother shook his head, "The Seven do not approve of taking lives."

"They don't approve of many things that come to pass," said Sandor Clegane. "And your task is not to take any. Just go straight to Baelish and point your dagger at his throat. He'll not know if it's a blunt one. You only have to make him fear for his little life."

The other brothers, not more than fifteen survivors from the Quiet Isle, were armed with sticks and such tools they brought with them, in an effort not to leave any valuable goods for plunder.

"I hope your steel is still sharp, singer," the Hound said while they encircled the wagon where Baelish must have been sleeping, from the side of the wood.

In guise of an answer, Mance jumped from behind on the two guards in front of the wagon, cutting one's throat and hitting the other unconscious with the scabbard of his longsword, carved out of the same white wood like those bloody masks, Sandor had noticed.

"Seems sharp to me," said the singer as the monks made full circle around the wagon. The Elder Brother ventured inside and Sandor and Mance stood back to back in front of it, waiting for the other knights to wake up and resist them. The face of the northerner turned feral in the moonlight and Sandor straightened to his full height, his sword unsheathed next to Mance's, his terrible burnt face hidden by a monk's cowl.

Sandor was truly proud of the Elder Brother who dragged out a furious Littlefinger, calling in cold blood on his mercenaries for help, despite the dagger poised expertly on his throat. The little bird in a thick grey travelling dress followed behind on her two feet, her too dark hair loose all over her tiny elongated back.

"We want our horses and the girl," said Mance to the cravens who surrounded them by that time, finding strength in numbers, swords at ready. "Or we will kill him and you will lose all coin he promised to pay to you in the capital."

They agreed earlier that the singer would talk. He was better at words than the Hound, and the Elder Brother was simply not gifted for the kind of conversation their situation would surely require.

The knights seemed undecided and the ones standing in the back started to point at the woods. Sandor sensed a chill crawling upon him, of a kind he had never felt in his life. He exhaled and the air came out of his lungs as a puff of smoke, white and blue. So this is winter, Sandor thought. He had been born in winter but the long summer started just before Gregor put his face into fire, so he had no memories of the season. And by the account of the old maester in his father's keep the last winter was short-lived and mild. This must be proper winter, then, Sandor thought, morbidly enthralled with the icy sensation in his veins, ignoring the danger he knew it must contain. The air smelled sharp as if it held hidden blades, aimed straight at his battle hardened heart.

His body felt movement behind him in the woods before his mind did. In a sweeping motion he turned and hacked at the thing behind him with his greatsword, glad that he honed it daily in the Quiet Isle. His reflexes saved his life, because the thing that attacked him continued to claw after him with brute force despite that he severed one of its arms. It had human form but it was not made of living flesh and its eyes looked dark, and dead. He noticed Mance battling several more foes with deadly precision and all the monks and the brave knights just stood by and watched. Waiting for these things to do their killing, thought Sandor, as he cut both his first opponent and two more into small pieces twitching on the ground.

The singer was also doing a deft job, and the battle should have been over because no more had come from the woods.

Yet the frostiness kept increasing beyond measure, and Sandor's blood nearly froze when he looked down in a pair of eyes wide open on the detached head of one of the creatures on the ground. They were the blue colour of ice from the Imp's stories and descriptions of the great land beyond the Wall, that Sandor secretly listened to while standing guard for King Joffrey, to endure the tedium of the never ending royal meals and functions.

Sandor realized that the loose limbs and body parts he just butchered belonged to his murdered brothers from the Quiet Isle whom they had buried in the cold ground only two days ago. Had his soul been just a little less harsh, he would have dropped his sword and emptied his belly. The singer seemed unaffected by what they had done, and he just stared far ahead, towards the plains next to the river from where they had come.

A lone white figure approached from the distance, from the flat muddy land behind the woods they had crossed that day. The horses started whinnying; several tore the ropes they were tethered with, and wildly ran away.

The forest started howling as if it were born to a life of a giant beast. The sound of horse hooves was replaced by a thud of many fast paws on the moss growing low and green between the scattered trees.

In a blink of an eye they were surrounded by a numerous pack of wolves. A huge grey leader walked forward, passing among the knights who didn't dare touch it, straight towards Littlefinger, and sniffed him. The Elder Brother did not release his hold on the former master of coin. Not that it's needed any longer, thought Sandor, because the wet stain on the front of Baelish's sleeping breeches, revealed shamelessly by the full moon, said everything about the Lord Protector's condition. At least he shut up, Sandor concluded gingerly, curious what the beast would do next.

The beast sniffed Mance and howled its approval to the singer, almost bowing to the ground. Mance smiled at it and caressed the hair behind its ears, as if it was the most familiar thing to do.

Then the wolf prowled to Sandor and snarled, slowly circling around its prey, ready to attack and kill. Sandor gripped his sword and waited for the animal to make the first move. He wanted to defend his life for a little while longer, yet killing the wolf felt wrong and he would not do it if he could. In a corner of his eye Sandor saw that the singer tried to draw the wolf's attention away by throwing dry broken branches in the direction of the white apparition, which was still drawing closer to them all, advancing very slowly from across the plains.

But the wolf only had eyes for Sandor, and the Hound instinctively knew that it was after his blood.

It started to snow.

Gracious white crystals drifted downwards from the dark sky, not caring about the world of men or their miserable lives. If I fall, thought Sandor, my blood will redden the snow. Will she like the look of it? Will she find it pleasing? Or will she cry because that is what the ladies do when someone dies?

His chain of thoughts was interrupted by an old blind dog who used to accompany him when digging graves, and who stepped, seemingly out of nowhere, between Sandor and the beast.

The dog bayed insistently as if it wanted to speak but it could not. The beast nuzzled the dog and they rolled together in the mud like a ball, the big and small fur mingling together, the wolf taking care not to hurt the older smaller animal it played with.

And then, swift and strong like a thunder, the giant wolf disentangled itself and leaped forward. It jumped at the Elder Brother with precision, tearing the saddle bag from his shoulders, and massacred its contents with all four paws in the mixture of dirt and human remains that was slowly getting cleansed by the maidenly white blanket of the snow. The wolf growled to the singer, as if it said farewell, and than it sprinted away, followed closely by the pack. The infernal bunch stormed into the plain, running over the strange apparition in the distance, until all that was left of any of them was a new trail of paws and a layer of most unusual transparent crystals floating in the air, drifting to the ground with the petals of fresh snow.

The old blind dog limped into the little bird's arms, and then Sandor realized that was where it came from to begin with.

"What was that?" it was Lyn Corbray and not Baelish the first one who managed to speak. He unsheathed his sword only at that very moment when the battle was definitely over.

"Nothing important, my lord," the little bird answered with unwavering courtesy, cradling the dog as an old long lost friend. "The shadowcat has just killed the grumkin in the fields of the Trident. Haven't you seen it?"

"Was it the same shadowcat that attacked you on the way from the Vale?" inquired the Elder Brother, still holding a shivering Baelish by his throat.

"We have to burn them," Mance said before the little bird could answer, showing the body parts becoming half hidden by snow. "No graves for the brothers. I'm sorry but it has to be that way."

Sandor was grateful that no digging was required for the time being and he went to look for Stranger, letting Mance and the brothers the honours of making the funeral pyre. When he passed the place where the ghostlike foe had appeared, he noticed a small sharp black stone laying abandoned on the ground. Not knowing what it was, he picked it up and stored it in a small pouch on his belt where he always kept his honing stone. Stranger was not far behind, resting with the singer's brown mount in an idyllic harmony only animals could share. Why can't it be that simple with people? thought Sandor returning to the camp with both horses.

After the Battle with the Dead as the men immediately started to call it, none of the Corbray's men wanted to face Sandor or Mance in a fair fight, no matter what Baelish tried to say after he changed his sullied breeches. They whispered behind their backs that the bard from the north and the giant brother of the Faith were as unnatural as the Young Wolf once was, and that they could summon and command the army of beasts by a clap of their hands.

So they all continued travelling south all through the night as one company, not united by a common cause, or by obedience to a common lord. What kept them together was a common sense of fear. They were afraid of one another and of what was out there, lurking in the night. Baelish was pleasantly silent. The little bird kept the old dog close by on the wagon, and Sandor heard the singer talking cheerfully to the Elder Brother about how he and his monks should prepare to take part in the next reading of the play.

Sandor found, against his own expectations in the matter, that he also was eager to continue the buggering reading.

Contrary to his wishes, the singer informed him he was not to take part in a scene they would read in the morning before laying down to rest. Nevertheless, when they finally stopped going, he was eager to just sit down on his thick brotherly cloak in the shallow snow, and watch his little bird graciously ruffling her feathers before the play would start. Pretty grey wings to go with her new hair colour, just as they should be, and not the vain luxury of Lannister red and gold, he mused, drowsy, muscles beginning to ache when he allowed his body to rest after the efforts of the night.

Sandor's joy increased when he saw the singer getting upset with the players again, and for once Sandor was not the cause.

"Can't you read?" Mance said in disbelief. "I thought you all learned your letters in these southern kingdoms. We're not in the wild north your lords proclaim to be barbaric for its prayers to the trees."

Two of Sandor's brothers just gazed forward, and the Elder Brother felt obliged to speak in their defence, "Most of the brothers are sons of peasants, they have seen no keep, or a man who knows his letters in their lives."

"If I tell you the words, can you learn them by heart?" Mance asked the young skinny brother and the sturdy brother Norbert, originally from somewhere in the Vale. The two of them, together with the Elder Brother, were selected to play three brothers of Sandor's lady love in the silly show.

Mance went behind the trees with the new mummers to agree what they should be saying, and that gave Sandor even more time to savour the silence of the little bird reading eagerly from her parchment the next scene for herself. She is truly enjoying this, he understood, and it gave him more joy. And he would keep up with the stupid readings, castrate that bastard Littlefinger if she only asked, or battle all the snarks from the north single-handed, just to keep her smiling.

"Your betrothed is a good man," said the Elder Brother to the lady.

"Has he told you that when you were in taverns together?" Sansa read back.

"He may seem lecherous, but his heart is strong and pure. We were fostered together. I know him better than my own brothers. He would die for me and I for him."

"Why don't you marry him then, dear brother?"

"I will take the black when you are married and when our older brother becomes lord. It is honourable and fitting for the second son."

"And I will seek out the will of the old gods in their sacred domains in the north," peeped the skinny monk playing the younger brother.

"And I will have all the women of the kingdom in my bed before I commit to lordship and the burden of marriage," thundered the sturdy monk ludicrously, staggering on his feet, exaggerating in emotion. Mance ran to the stage and stopped them, dishevelling his hair in discontent. The sentence had to be repeated many times before it sounded confident and manly enough in the singer's opinion.

Sandor was tired and simply happy to watch his little bird without having to stand guard for any king. The dress hid her body and the mask her face, so Sandor gazed at her hands holding the parchment. Her skin was unblemished like those weird white trees growing all entangled together he had seen in the north, the wonder of nature he would never have witnessed if the late King Robert didn't force almost his entire court to travel to Winterfell. The Hound had known ever since that the godswood in King's Landing was but a dwarf cousin of the great forests of the north.

"I will do my duty," Sansa read, "as will all of you. But my heart is not in it."

"Where is your heart then, sweet sister?" the second son asked, through the mouth of the Elder Brother.

"Left in the ruins of Queensgate with the cold northern winds," Sansa smiled wickedly at her would-be brothers, and her eyes examined the small crowd watching the scene when she read the last words, as if she was searching for something. Or someone.

She is looking at me, Sandor thought, worse, he was certain. Easy to do that now with my cowl always on, isn't it so, little bird?

Brother Norbert turned red. It was apparently his turn to speak but he forgot his words again. After another moment alone with the singer and some incoherent shouting from behind the trees, the unsuccessful mummer managed to address his siblings, cutting every word out harshly, like a war catapult spitting stones.

"I have no fear, brothers. Our sister will do her duty for she will never love. There is too much wolf blood in her for any tender feelings to take root. She is as cold as the ancient walls of Winterfell!"

"Who said my feelings were tender?" Sansa read out loud, terrifying and wonderful like the snow, just like the sensation of winter in Sandor's veins was in the dark. Staring towards where he was seated, she continued in a voice he had never heard her use, deeper and dreamy, "When I love, it will be like a winter storm that sweeps away everything on its path. Until then, I will just be myself."

Mance waved his arms in many directions imitating the movement of the wind. All monks started blowing the air from their lungs at Sansa, imitating the storm, laughing at her as she laughed back, a bird freed from her cage, until they all exited the stage chasing each other, ending the scene for that day.

Sandor's inside squeezed, stirring the cravings best left forgotten when one mostly lived as a brother of the Faith. Yet the thought that Sansa's love could be like a storm stayed with him for hours, until he fell in fitful sleep.

They slept until it was time for the afternoon meal, determined as they became to travel all night, to stay well ahead of any enemy who might still be on their trail. Mance said there was to be no more camping in the open at night, only behind the walls where there was fire. No one questioned his leadership and even Baelish had the good sense to keep to himself. For the time being, thought Sandor. The whoreson is bound to try something again. I'd better keep my sword sharp.

They had to keep going and if they did so, on the next day they might get a chance to reach the castle of the Blackwoods, known for its high walls, and to find shelter there for a night or two, before continuing south.