Game of Thrones: The Impaler of the Blue Fork

Chapter 63: Gareth in the Tower

The official road becomes difficult to travel after leaving the Blue Fork River Valley.

It wasn't rotten; it was the kind of condition unique to roads that had been frozen for months and were just beginning to thaw—the surface looked dry, but when you stepped on it, you found it was all soft underneath. When you pulled your boots out, they would kick up a clump of yellow mud that you couldn't shake off cleanly. The horses' hooves fared even worse; every step required pulling them out of the mud, making that teeth-grinding sucking sound. After walking for half a day, the horses' legs from the knees down were covered in mud, one layer drying and another layer forming, varying in color, as if the horses were wearing a pair of hideously ugly mud boots.

Otto walked at the front, followed by ten people, and no one spoke. It wasn't that they weren't allowed to talk, but walking on this kind of road was tiring, talking was a waste of energy, and besides, if you opened your mouth you would inhale a bellyful of cold air, so it wasn't worth it.

After walking for most of the day, we passed a fork in the post road and crossed a gentle slope overgrown with withered pines, finally reaching an open area. There used to be a post station here, but it had long since burned down during the war of usurpers, leaving only the outline of its foundation, distorted by overgrown grass and frozen earth, resembling an unrecognizable old skeleton. In the middle of the foundation was a half-collapsed stone wellhead; the well was black, and the water level was invisible, whether dried up or too deep, it was unclear.

Otto told the team to stop here, rest, and feed the horses.

Just then, he saw that person.

To be precise, I heard it first.

It wasn't footsteps, it was whistling. Someone was whistling, a jumbled mess of tunes, not some serious melody, just something they were playing around with. The notes went up and down, and the whistling stopped twice, probably because the person whistling had forgotten what the next note was, paused to think, and then picked up a completely different tune to continue whistling.

The sound came from behind a pile of dry grass at the other end of the old site.

Otto's hand moved to the hilt of his sword, but he didn't grip it; he just rested it there. Two of the ten men behind him heard this too, and their hands had already reached for the spear shaft.

Then the man stood up from behind the pile of dry grass.

The way he stood up was remarkably casual, unlike the movements of someone lying in ambush—an ambush would rise quickly, decisively, and with a clear direction. This person rose as if he had just woken up naturally after a good night's sleep. He stretched, raising both arms overhead, fingers spread, giving himself a slight upward stretch, all while continuing to whistle—he kept whistling even after stretching, without pausing for a moment. Then he cracked his neck, making a crisp sound, shook off the dry grass clinging to his shoulders, and bent down to pat himself clean, handful by handful, very meticulously, as if genuinely concerned about his cleanliness.

After taking the picture, I looked up and saw Otto and the others.

A particularly obvious look of joy appeared on his face.

He strode over. He walked quickly and heavily, his footsteps making a louder sound on the frozen ground than Otto and the others, as if he didn't know how to write the words "tread carefully".

When he approached Otto, he stood almost half a step closer than the distance most people would maintain when meeting for the first time. Otto noticed this.

"My lord!" he said.

The sound was so loud that even the horse drinking water nearby raised its head.

"My name is Gareth, Gareth of the Tower! I'm a fence knight, currently without a lord!"

He spoke as if reciting a packing list, afraid of forgetting anything. He paused, as if mentally checking if there was anything he hadn't said, and then continued:

"I can fight, ride steadily, and take care of horses without any problem. I can also repair leather armor a little—not expertly, but usable. My swordsmanship is properly trained, not amateurish; I learned from a real knight. He's dead, but what he taught me is genuine. I'm strong, hardworking, not picky about food, and I fall asleep quickly, even on rainy days."

He paused here, frowned, as if he felt there was something important he had forgotten to say.

"Also, I don't eat much, so you don't need to prepare too much extra food."

Then he thought for a moment and added another sentence, his tone slightly different from the previous ones, a little softer:

"I know how to bandage. I can handle common cuts, sprains, and arrowhead lacerations—just enough to stop the bleeding until the other scholars arrive."

After he finished speaking, he looked at Otto and waited. His expression was one of earnest anticipation, waiting for the other person to make a judgment.

The wind blew through the withered pine forest on the north side of the official road, lifting a corner of the hem of his outer robe. He didn't press it down, letting it blow as he kept his eyes on Otto.

Otto did not speak immediately.

He's looking at this person.

This was his habit; whenever anyone stood before him for the first time, he would first look them over before deciding whether to speak. This habit was cultivated within his territory—whenever refugees came to seek refuge, merchants came to discuss business, or officials came to audit accounts, the first thing he did was to look at each person who stood before him.

He was around twenty-five or twenty-six years old, of medium height, but with broad shoulders—the kind of physique one gets from years of being out in the world, not from training, but from years of hard work. His face bore several faint, old scars, not from cuts, but from falls or scrapes—the kind of natural marks that come from someone who's been out in the world for many years. His skin was roughened by wind and sun, but not in a dirty, rough way; it was a clean but coarse roughness, like a piece of old wood sanded smooth by sandpaper.

The leather armor was old, its color a deep, dark shade, the kind that comes from being soaked in sweat and dust for a long time. But the patches were neatly applied—Otto glanced at them; each patch was perfectly fitted, with tight stitching.

The sword hung at his waist. The scabbard was old and frayed, the leather worn down to the point that the wood core was visible. But the cloth wrapped around the hilt was new, recently replaced, and its color was much brighter than the scabbard.

The boots were old, the soles worn thin, like those worn by people who walk long distances. But the uppers had been polished, and there was no sign of long-term neglect and a musty look.

Otto read through all of this and mentally calculated: Poor, but not bad. Capable of fighting, but unsure of their exact strength. Talkative, but not very good at judging distances.

Then he noticed the man's hands.

There was a thick callus on the web of his right hand, the result of holding a sword for a long time, not from holding a pickaxe or hoe; the location was different. Otto had seen this kind of callus on his veterans; only those who had truly practiced swordsmanship would develop calluses in that spot.

"What swordsmanship have you learned?" he asked.

"A straight sword, standard knightly swordsmanship, both offensive and defensive," Gareth said quickly, as if he had been waiting a long time to be asked this question.

He paused, then added, "But I'm more used to offense. Sometimes I forget a step when I'm defending. My master used to beat me many times, but even then, I sometimes forget."

Otto paused on that sentence.

Of all the people who had come to him for help over the years, not a single one had proactively mentioned their weaknesses when introducing themselves. Smart people hide their weaknesses, while unwise people are completely unaware of their own. This man was neither.

Just then, Gareth's eyes caught sight of a horse tethered not far away.

An old chestnut horse was tethered to a dead tree by the roadside. Its right foreleg was injured; the lower half was swollen, not from a fracture, but from a sprain that hadn't been treated and had been left untreated for several days. The saddle was gone, and only a loose, old rein was tied to the tree bark. The horse was unusually quiet, as if it had no complaints about its situation. Occasionally, it would lower its head to glance at its swollen leg, then raise it again and continue standing quietly.

Gareth saw it, and without saying a word, he walked over, squatted down next to the horse, and pressed on several different spots on the leg with two fingers.

As he pressed the button, he turned back to speak to Otto:

"Sir, this isn't mine. I slept here last night and found it here at dawn. Its leg is twisted, not broken, but it'll be ruined if left unattended. If you'd like to use mine, I'd like to tie it up first; it won't take much effort. I have some cloth myself."

He said this in a way that casually made a request, placing the rescue of a horse abandoned by the roadside on the same priority as joining an expeditionary force.

Otto glanced in the direction of the horse.

The horse stood beside the withered tree, its head drooping, its right foreleg slightly raised—an instinctive posture to minimize the weight on that leg. Its eyes were large, dark brown, and somewhat cloudy. When Otto looked over, their eyes briefly met his gaze before shifting back to the horse's leg.

A horse that had been abandoned. This was all too common on the roads of Westeros, and even more so after the wars—a horse would become lame, its owner would abandon it, tie it up by the roadside, and walk away. The owner of this horse probably felt it wasn't worth keeping; it would slow him down if he took it, and he wouldn't want to kill it for meat because it was too thin, so he simply left it there, leaving it to its fate.

Gareth had already pulled a neatly folded roll of linen from his pocket and began bandaging the leg. He first padded the most swollen area, then wrapped it outwards in circles, applying even pressure, neither too tight nor too loose, ensuring each wrap was secure. He was very focused as he did this, his movements steady and practiced, as if he had done it many times—not necessarily many times bandaging horses, but he had done bandaging itself many times before.

"Where do you come from?" Otto asked.

Gareth didn't look up, his hands still wrapped in cloth. "From the south. Last year I worked as a guard in a caravan. The caravan disbanded when it reached Riverrun, the owner said he didn't need me anymore, settled my payment, and I headed north alone, hoping to find a place where I could be of use."

Why are we heading north?

Gareth looked up at the sky—the late winter sky was a pale gray, cloudless, the light uniform, the same from every direction, as if the whole sky was glowing but not bright—and then he said:

"There wasn't any particular reason. I'd already traveled south, but not north, so I headed north."

After he finished speaking, he lowered his head and continued bandaging, as if the answer was complete and nothing more needed to be added.

Otto watched him squatting there bandaging the leg of a horse that wasn't his, and thought about his own calculations: if this man was truly a capable fighter, having another strongman in his party on the way to Pike City wouldn't be a bad thing. Besides, he had a knack for judging people—a fence knight encountered on this kind of road who was willing to volunteer was either a deserter or a thief; deserters and thieves would simply avoid any group with armored soldiers.

"We'll go to the city of Haijian, and then we'll go to war," Otto said.

"Who are you going to hit?" Gareth asked without looking up.

"Iron People."

"Ironborn." Gareth repeated, as if chewing on the word, weighing its weight. Then he said, "I've never fought Ironborn, but I've fought far more than a few people, so I shouldn't be too bad."

How much money do you want?

Gareth finished wrapping the last piece of burlap, tied a knot, stood up, patted the mud off his knees, looked at Otto, thought for a moment, and called out a number.

That number wasn't low or high; it was a price quoted by someone who knew their own worth—no flattery, no exaggeration, just a quote and then they waited.

"I'll give you seventy percent," Otto said. "The rest, if you're still alive, will be given after the battle is over."

Gareth thought for a moment, about two breaths, then nodded: "Okay."

He bent down, patted the neck of the old chestnut horse, and said, "You stay here, don't run around. Your leg isn't healed yet. If someone passes by, let them take you. If not, just wait here. Waiting is better than running around."

The horse didn't respond to these words; it simply tilted its head slightly to avoid his approaching hand, then lowered its head again to continue looking at the bandaged leg.

Gareth turned around and looked at Otto, his expression shifting rapidly.

"Sir," he said, his voice lower than before.

"explain."

"If you want me to follow you, I must pledge my loyalty."

This remark caused two or three of the ten people behind him to raise their eyes. A fence knight, having just negotiated a price, turning around to pledge allegiance—this was not a common occurrence in the world of Westeros. Clever mercenaries took the money to do the job; pledging allegiance was something only knights did. Pledge of allegiance meant you were bound to the job, not simply finishing the work, taking the money, and leaving.

Without waiting for Otto's agreement or refusal, Gareth took a step forward and knelt down on one knee in front of Otto.

His kneeling motion was precise. His right knee pressed firmly into the ground—the ground was wet, the kind of wetness that comes from newly thawed frozen soil, and muddy water seeped out from the side as his knee pressed down, soaking his trousers, but he didn't care. His left knee was slightly bent, his back straight, his head held high, and he held the old sword in both hands—the scabbard was frayed, but the hilt was new—held horizontally in front of his chest.

Then he began to speak.

He spoke very slowly.

"I, Gareth, born of the tower, today I pledge my life, my sword, and the rest of my days."

He paused on the word "the rest of his life," for about a breath and a half, his mouth slightly open, before continuing:

"I swear allegiance to you, Lord Otto Hohenzollern."

Then it paused again.

"Wherever you point, my sword will point. Your enemy is my enemy, and what you defend is what I defend."

These are old sayings that knights have been saying for hundreds of years. There are no new words to them. They are the same few phrases that any knight in Westeros who has learned the basic rules would say.

Otto stood there watching him. The man was kneeling in the wet mud, water seeping from his trousers, holding a worn-out sword, and saying the same words all knights had uttered.

A breeze blew in from the withered pine forest, carrying a faint, almost imperceptible scent of pine resin. The old chestnut horse was still tethered to a withered tree, its head drooping, showing no interest in the scene.

Otto paused for a moment, then said:

"stand up."

Gareth stood up.

The first thing he did when he stood up was to brush the mud off his knees—he did it twice, but the mud was too wet to get clean, so he stopped. Then he hung his sword back on his waist and looked up at Otto.

Otto turned around and continued walking forward.

"Let's rest at sunset today. We'll stop again tomorrow after we cross the fork in the road." He spoke to everyone, including Gareth.

Gareth caught up. His steps were more steady than before.

He took a few steps and glanced back at the horse.

The old chestnut horse was still there, head bowed, legs bandaged, standing quietly. The sounds of people on the official road had faded into the distance. It neither raised its head nor moved, just stood there.

Gareth turned back, caught up with the team, and didn't look back again.

When they had walked about an arrow's length away, one of the ten people behind them, a talkative one, muttered under his breath, "Another mouth to feed."

Someone nearby retorted, "You think there aren't enough people eating here?"

"I mean there's not enough food to go around."

"Let Pollifer worry about the food; why are you fretting about it?"

"Too."

Gareth overheard the conversation but neither turned around nor interrupted. He walked slightly behind the middle of the group, keeping pace with those around him, neither deliberately leading nor lagging behind.

Otto was at the front, so of course he heard it too.

He remembered something: the person had just said, "Sometimes I forget a step when I'm defending."