[ASOIAF SI] The Gilded Stag: A Ruthless Joffrey Uplift | Chapter 31: JON SNOW II (Public) (Patreon)

The cold of the Kingsroad gnawed at their exposed skin. It was a physical presence that seeped through layers of boiled leather and thick wool, settling deep into the marrow of the bone.

Jon Snow sat hunched in the saddle of his shaggy grey garron, letting the rhythmic, plodding gait of the beast carry him across the desolate expanse of the northern plains. The dense, sheltering canopy of the wolfswood had long since given way to a barren, wind-scoured landscape of frozen moors and jagged foothills, marking the sprawling fringes of the Gift. The sky above stretched wide and empty, the color of bruised iron. Patches of dead, brown scrub-grass and frost-shattered rocks crunched loudly beneath the iron-shod hooves of the column, the bitter wind howling unbroken across the flatlands.

At his side, keeping pace with a silent, loping grace, ran Ghost. The direwolf pup had grown considerably in the past moons, his coat as white as new-fallen snow, his red eyes completely devoid of the mindless, noisy panic of the kennel hounds. Ghost made no sound as he padded over the frozen ruts.

Ahead of him rode his uncle Benjen, wrapped in the stark, unadorned black of the Night's Watch. Beside the First Ranger rode Tyrion Lannister, looking absurdly small atop a massive courser, bundled so thickly in furs that only his mismatched eyes—one green, one black—peered out from the depths of his cowl.

But it was the men riding behind Jon that soured the freezing air.

Yoren, the wandering crow, rode with a permanent, sour slouch, his unwashed hair tangled like a rat’s nest, spitting dark brown streams of sourleaf juice into the snow. Trailing him were the recruits he had pulled from the dungeons of the South.

"I told the Lord," a thick-necked brute named Kurz was boasting, his breath pluming in the cold air, "I said, the girl was willing enough until her father walked in. She asked for the silver, I gave it to her. Not my fault he took exception to how I paid."

The man riding beside him, a poacher with a missing ear, let out a crude, braying laugh. "Should have taken his purse while you were at it. Now look at you. Riding to freeze your stones off on a wall of ice."

Jon tightened his gloved grip on the reins, his jaw clenching so hard his teeth ached. He kept his eyes fixed strictly on the muddy ruts ahead.

For years, huddled in the warmth of the Great Hall at Winterfell, Jon had listened to the songs of the Night's Watch. He had envisioned an ancient, noble brotherhood of true knights and stern men standing shoulder-to-shoulder against the darkness. He had imagined a place where a bastard could forge his own honor, where the stain of his birth would be washed away by the solemn vows of the black cloaks.

The reality was riding a few paces behind him, smelling of stale wine, unwashed flesh, and cheap malice. The days of the elite order of protectors, he had heard about in the stories, was long gone. In its place, it had become a cesspool of abominations, the likes of which should have been hung at the gallows. The Night's Watch nowadays was a freezing midden heap where the Seven Kingdoms discarded its murderers, rapists, and thieves.

A heavy, suffocating melancholy settled over Jon’s chest. He thought of Winterfell, and the family now scattering to the winds. He pictured Robb, left behind to rule a vast castle that suddenly felt empty. He thought of little Bran, riding South in the Queen’s gilded wheelhouse to be fostered at court, surrounded by Lannister red cloaks. It was a high honor, the sort of wardship granted only to the most loyal of houses, but it meant Jon might never see the boy again. His father was riding to serve the Iron Throne as Hand, taking Arya and Sansa as well to the southern warmth, leaving Jon to the ice.

And then, unbidden, the memory of the Golden Stag surfaced.

Even leagues away, riding through the freezing barrens, recalling Prince Joffrey sent a sudden chill through Jon’s blood. The Northmen had cheered the Crown Prince in the Great Hall. They had marveled at his sheer physical presence, watching him match the Greatjon drink for drink and laugh uproariously with Lord Manderly. Joffrey had played the boisterous warrior perfectly, a golden reflection of King Robert in his prime.

But Jon had watched from the shadows of the lower benches, far removed from the fumes of wine and flattery.

Jon remembered the unsettling discrepancy in the boy's face. While Joffrey’s mouth stretched into a wide, roaring laugh and his heavy hands clapped the northern lords on the shoulders, his emerald eyes remained alert. They were sharp, entirely sober, and relentlessly watchful. Beneath the guise of a drunken, roaring youth, Joffrey had been tracking every movement in the hall, observing the Stark bannermen with the quiet, predatory patience of a shadowcat watching a flock of sheep. He knew not if it was a figment of his imagination, but the mere thought sent shivers down his spine. Or it may have been the cold, who can tell.

"You look as though you've swallowed a lemon, Jon," a voice drifted back.

Jon blinked, pulling himself from the dark reverie. Tyrion Lannister had reined his courser back, allowing the beast to fall into step beside Jon’s garron. The dwarf shifted in his heavy saddle, a massive, leather-bound tome resting across his lap.

"The wind is bitter, my lord," Jon muttered, keeping his voice carefully neutral.

"The wind is a nuisance," Tyrion corrected mildly. "The company, however, truly sours the mood, I wager. Kurz and his missing-eared friend are hardly the stuff of the songs, are they?"

Jon looked away, his cheeks burning with a sudden, shameful heat. "They are... different than I expected."

"The world rarely matches the songs," Tyrion said, offering a small, sympathetic smile before turning his mismatched eyes forward. "And the Wall is the very edge of it. I confess, my own curiosity burns brighter than the cold. Tell me, Benjen," the dwarf called out, raising his voice to carry over the crunch of hooves. "The heavy book I borrowed from Maester Luwin speaks of the Gift and the New Gift. A fifty-league stretch of prime land meant to sustain your black brothers. Yet, we have ridden for days, and I have seen nothing but ruined holdfasts and empty fields."

Benjen Stark glanced back, his face shadowed beneath the black cowl of his cloak. He looked tired, the deep lines around his mouth carved by years of bitter ranging.

"The wildlings, Lord Tyrion," Benjen answered grimly. "They cross the gorge, or slip past the abandoned towers in small skiffs. They raid the crofters, steal the sheep, and carry off the women. The smallfolk cannot farm if they are constantly watching the tree line for raiders. They fled south, into the Umber lands or the mountain valleys. The Gift is empty."

Tyrion hummed, a low, calculating sound. He pulled a fine silk handkerchief from his sleeve and dabbed at his nose. "A profound waste of fertile soil. A hundred thousand acres of winter wheat and grazing land, given over to weeds. How does the Watch feed itself without the tithes?"

"We buy grain from the South," Yoren grunted, spitting another stream of sourleaf. "With whatever coppers the lords see fit to toss us. And we hunt."

"You buy grain," Tyrion repeated, the word rolling off his tongue with a faint, unmistakable note of disdain. "You guard a frozen wall of ice, and you must purchase your own bread. A fragile supply line for a fortress, wouldn't you say?"

Benjen’s jaw tightened. "The Watch has stood for eight thousand years, Lannister. We make do."

"Making do is a romantic notion, First Ranger, but a poor strategy for a siege," Tyrion said easily, letting the heavy tome rest against the saddle horn. "The riverlands and the crownlands are choking with landless men. Second sons, displaced peasants, hedge knights without a copper to their names. If the Crown were to offer them fifty acres of the New Gift and a modest keep, they would flock north."

"They would be slaughtered by the Wildings," Benjen countered sharply.

"They would survive if bound by charter to serve the Wall," Tyrion replied, his voice taking on a smooth, rapid cadence. "Offer a man the land on the strict condition that he serves five years bearing arms for the Watch. You do not ask for his whole life, nor demand he forsake a wife and children. You buy his sword arm for a fixed term, populating the Gift with hardened, fighting men who will fiercely defend their own crops."

Jon watched his uncle. Benjen looked entirely taken aback. The Night's Watch demanded a sacred vow, a lifelong commitment to the realm. To speak of hiring men for a term, trading land for temporary service, bordered on blasphemy against the ancient traditions of the First Men.

"We are a sworn brotherhood," Benjen said stiffly. "We are no sellsword company to be bought and released."

"You are a border garrison bleeding manpower," Tyrion corrected, entirely unbothered by the First Ranger's rigid pride. "Tradition is a beautiful thing, Benjen, but it does not stop a wildling axe. You have nineteen castles along the Wall, do you not?"

"Nineteen," Benjen confirmed cautiously.

"And how many are manned?"

The silence that followed was heavy and fraught. The wind howled through the bare branches of the oaks.

"Three," Benjen finally admitted, the word drawn out of him like a confession. "Castle Black, the Shadow Tower, and Eastwatch-by-the-Sea."

"Three." Tyrion shook his head. "Sixteen fortresses abandoned to the ice. A perimeter holds only as strong as the men walking it. If Mance Rayder is truly massing the tribes in the Frostfangs, as the rumors in Winterfell suggest, he will avoid your manned gates. He will simply find an empty castle, scale the ice, and open the gate from the southern side."

Jon felt a cold knot tighten in his gut. He looked at Tyrion. The dwarf was reading from a book of histories, playing the part of a curious, wealthy tourist marveling at the edge of the world. But Jon recognized the meticulous exactitude of the questioning. It reminded Jon of Maester Luwin tallying the winter granaries, or Lord Eddard rigidly passing judgment on a thieving vassal. Tyrion was weighing the Watch’s ruin in silver and copper. He was mapping the exact structural and economic weaknesses of the ancient order.

"The wildlings are a savage, undisciplined rabble," Benjen said, though his voice lacked its usual unyielding certainty. "They have no siege engines. They cannot breach the Wall."

"Perhaps they have no need to," Tyrion said. "Your brother, Lord Eddard, executed a man not ten days past. A veteran of your order. Gared, I believe his name was?"

Benjen’s face darkened completely. "He was a deserter. The cold broke his wits."

"Did it?" Tyrion asked softly. "A man survives forty years of rangings, surviving every frost and wildling ambush he encounters, only to suddenly lose his mind to the very woods he knows perfectly? I find that passing strange. And I heard the whispers in the yard of Winterfell. Ser Waymar Royce, a knight of a proud and ancient house, vanished entirely in the haunted forest along with his patrol. Gared was the only survivor of that ranging."

Yoren spat. "The woods are dangerous. Men die."

"Men die, yes," Tyrion agreed. "But trained patrols do not vanish without a trace unless they encounter a force possessing superior numbers or superior cunning. With bleeding patrols and empty castles, your ancient Wall is nothing more than a crumbling monument waiting to fall."

Jon watched the dwarf close the heavy tome with a solid, echoing thud.

"The Crown maintains a vested interest in the security of the North," Tyrion said, adopting a tone of solemn, civic concern. "King Robert is a warrior. He understands the necessity of strong borders. If the Night's Watch is truly failing, if the wildlings are massing to strike a severely weakened perimeter, the Iron Throne cannot simply look away. The King may need to intervene. He might find it prudent to open the abandoned castles and garrison them with men loyal to the Crown, ensuring the realm does not bleed."

Benjen Stark stared at the dwarf, a war of emotions playing across his weathered face. For years, the Watch had begged the Iron Throne for men, for steel, for a crumb of the Crown's vast wealth. Now, a Lannister dangled the very promise of royal support right before his eyes.

But Jon saw the catch.

If the Crown sent its own men to garrison the Wall, funding the reopening of the castles and granting the lands of the Gift to its own loyal retainers, the Night's Watch would cease to be an independent, ancient order. The black brothers would become another holding of the Iron Throne, beholden entirely to the royal treasury.

Tyrion smiled, a genial, harmless expression. "But I am merely a reader of books, speaking of things far above my station. The logistics of ice and stone are best left to the Lord Commander."

He spurred his courser forward, leaving Benjen to brood in a tense, suffocated silence.

Jon fell back, letting his garron slow until he rode alone near the rear of the column, the recruits' crude laughter fading into the wind.

That night, they made camp in a sheltered hollow beneath a jagged outcropping of grey granite. The fire crackled and spat, burning the dead pine branches Yoren had gathered. The smell of charring salted mutton filled the air, cutting through the freezing damp.

Jon sat away from the main fire, cross-legged on a patch of frozen moss, sharpening his longsword with a whetstone. Ghost lay curled at his side, a massive ball of white fur chewing contentedly on a marrow bone.

The rhythmic shhh-shhh of the stone against the steel provided the only sound, until the soft crunch of boots on the snow announced a visitor.

Tyrion Lannister approached, holding a skin of wine. He offered it to Jon.

Jon hesitated, then took the skin, drinking deeply. The wine was strong, dark, and sweet, burning a welcome path of heat down his throat.

"You are quiet tonight, Jon Snow," Tyrion observed, seating himself on a nearby stone, pulling his furs tight against the chill.

"I have nothing to say," Jon muttered, handing the skin back.

"A rare and commendable trait. Most men speak simply to fill the silence." Tyrion took a drink, his mismatched eyes studying Jon in the flickering firelight. "You watched me closely today on the road when I spoke with your uncle."

Jon stopped his whetstone. He looked at the dwarf. "You ask a great many questions for a man who only reads books."

"Books are full of answers, Jon. But one must know the correct questions to ask the world to find out if the books are true." Tyrion smiled, though the warmth did not reach his eyes. "You are angry. At the recruits. At the cold. At the realization that your noble brotherhood is a myth."

"I am fine," Jon lied, his voice tight.

"Of course you are," Tyrion said softly. "You are the Bastard of Winterfell. You grew up in the shadow of trueborn brothers, eating at the lower tables, wearing the grey while they wore the direwolf. You thought the Wall would be the great equalizer. You thought you would don the black cloak and suddenly stand as a man of honor, washed clean of the stain of your birth."

Jon stood up, his hand dropping to the hilt of his sword. Ghost raised his head, sensing his master’s sudden, sharp anger, a low growl rumbling in his chest.

"You know nothing of my life, Lannister," Jon warned, his voice a low, dangerous rasp.

Tyrion did not flinch. He made no move toward a weapon. He simply sat on the stone, looking up at the furious fourteen-year-old boy.

"I know that I am a dwarf," Tyrion said, his voice completely devoid of pity or jest. "I know that my father, the great Lord Tywin Lannister, looks at me and sees a twisted, stunted punishment sent by the gods. I know that men mock me when my back is turned, and women suffer my touch only for the gold in my purse."

Tyrion leaned forward, the firelight catching the sharp, harsh angles of his face.

"All dwarfs are bastards in their father's eyes, Jon Snow. We are both outcasts, born into a world that despises what we are. The difference lies in our expectations. I do not expect the world to change, and I do not seek a magical cloak to hide my shame."

Jon slowly released his grip on the hilt of his sword. The anger drained out of him, replaced by a hollow, aching truth.

"Never forget what you are," Tyrion told him, the words striking like hammer blows on an anvil. "For surely the world will not. Make it your strength. Then it can never be your weakness. Armor yourself in it, and it will never be used to hurt you."

Jon stared into the flames. The dwarf’s brutal, unsentimental advice stripped away the last of his boyhood illusions. The Night's Watch was a penal colony of thieves and rapists, commanded by desperate men guarding an undefended border. Fantasies of noble knights and glorious last stands belonged to summer children. To survive this frozen edge of the world, Jon realized he would have to become harder, faster, and more ruthless than the criminals riding beside him. He would need to understand the brutal realities of survival in a world that had no place for naivety.

"Armor," Jon whispered to the flames.

"The thickest of plates a man can wear," Tyrion agreed, rising from the stone. He offered the wine skin one last time. "Drink, Jon Snow. The road only grows colder from here."

Jon took the skin. He drank the dark wine, feeling the heat spread through his chest. He turned his face to the North, welcoming the freezing wind against his cheeks as he accepted the harsh, unromantic reality of the ice.

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