A Game of Thrones: The Story Continues Books 1-5: A Game of Thrones, A Clash of Kings, A Storm of Swords, A Feast for Crows, A Dance with Dragons. Джордж Р. Р. Мартин
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for gold nor glory nor a woman’s love, but for the realm, and all the people in it. A man of the Night’s Watch takes no wife and fathers no sons. Our wife is duty. Our mistress is honor. And you are the only sons we shall ever know.
“You have learned the words of the vow. Think carefully before you say them, for once you have taken the black, there is no turning back. The penalty for desertion is death.” The Old Bear paused for a moment before he said, “Are there any among you who wish to leave our company? If so, go now, and no one shall think the less of you.”
No one moved.
“Well and good,” said Mormont. “You may take your vows here at evenfall, before Septon Celladar and the first of your order. Do any of you keep to the old gods?”
Jon stood. “I do, my lord.”
“I expect you will want to say your words before a heart tree, as your uncle did,” Mormont said.
“Yes, my lord,” Jon said. The gods of the sept had nothing to do with him; the blood of the First Men flowed in the veins of the Starks.
He heard Grenn whispering behind him. “There’s no godswood here. Is there? I never saw a godswood.”
“You wouldn’t see a herd of aurochs until they trampled you into the snow,” Pyp whispered back.
“I would so,” Grenn insisted. “I’d see them a long way off.”
Mormont himself confirmed Grenn’s doubts. “Castle Black has no need of a godswood. Beyond the Wall the haunted forest stands as it stood in the Dawn Age, long before the Andals brought the Seven across the narrow sea. You will find a grove of weirwoods half a league from this spot, and mayhap your gods as well.”
“My lord.” The voice made Jon glance back in surprise. Samwell Tarly was on his feet. The fat boy wiped his sweaty palms against his tunic. “Might I … might I go as well? To say my words at this heart tree?”
“Does House Tarly keep the old gods too?” Mormont asked.
“No, my lord,” Sam replied in a thin, nervous voice. The high officers frightened him, Jon knew, the Old Bear most of all. “I was named in the light of the Seven at the sept on Horn Hill, as my father was, and his father, and all the Tarlys for a thousand years.”
“Why would you forsake the gods of your father and your House?” wondered Ser Jaremy Rykker.
“The Night’s Watch is my House now,” Sam said. “The Seven have never answered my prayers. Perhaps the old gods will.”
“As you wish, boy,” Mormont said. Sam took his seat again, as did Jon. “We have placed each of you in an order, as befits our need and your own strengths and skills.” Bowen Marsh stepped forward and handed him a paper. The Lord Commander unrolled it and began to read. “Halder, to the builders,” he began. Halder gave a stiff nod of approval. “Grenn, to the rangers. Albett, to the builders. Pypar, to the rangers.” Pyp looked over at Jon and wiggled his ears. “Samwell, to the stewards.” Sam sagged with relief, mopping at his brow with a scrap of silk. “Matthar, to the rangers. Dareon, to the stewards. Todder, to the rangers. Jon, to the stewards.”
The stewards? For a moment, Jon could not believe what he had heard. Mormont must have read it wrong. He started to rise, to open his mouth, to tell them there had been a mistake … and then he saw Ser Alliser studying him, eyes shiny as two flakes of obsidian, and he knew.
The Old Bear rolled up the paper. “Your firsts will instruct you in your duties. May all the gods preserve you, brothers.” The Lord Commander favored them with a half-bow, and took his leave. Ser Alliser went with him, a thin smile on his face. Jon had never seen the master-at-arms look quite so happy.
“Rangers with me,” Ser Jaremy Rykker called when they were gone. Pyp was staring at Jon as he got slowly to his feet. His ears were red. Grenn, grinning broadly, did not seem to realize that anything was amiss. Matt and Toad fell in beside them, and they followed Ser Jaremy from the sept.
“Builders,” announced lantern-jawed Othell Yarwyck. Halder and Albett trailed out after him.
Jon looked around him in sick disbelief. Maester Aemon’s blind eyes were raised toward the light he could not see. The septon was arranging crystals on the altar. Only Sam and Dareon remained on the benches; a fat boy, a singer … and him.
Lord Steward Bowen Marsh rubbed his plump hands together. “Samwell, you will assist Maester Aemon in the rookery and library. Chett is going to the kennels, to help with the hounds. You shall have his cell, so as to be close to the maester night and day. I trust you will take good care of him. He is very old and very precious to us.
“Dareon, I am told that you sang at many a high lord’s table and shared their meat and mead. We are sending you to Eastwatch. It may be your palate will be some help to Cotter Pyke when merchant galleys come trading. We are paying too dear for salt beef and pickled fish, and the quality of the olive oil we’re getting has been frightful. Present yourself to Borcas when you arrive, he will keep you busy between ships.”
Marsh turned his smile on Jon. “Lord Commander Mormont has requested you for his personal steward, Jon. You’ll sleep in a cell beneath his chambers, in the Lord Commander’s tower.”
“And what will my duties be?” Jon asked sharply. “Will I serve the Lord Commander’s meals, help him fasten his clothes, fetch hot water for his bath?”
“Certainly.” Marsh frowned at Jon’s tone. “And you will run his messages, keep a fire burning in his chambers, change his sheets and blankets daily, and do all else that the Lord Commander might require of you.”
“Do you take me for a servant?”
“No,” Maester Aemon said, from the back of the sept. Clydas helped him stand. “We took you for a man of Night’s Watch … but perhaps we were wrong in that.”
It was all Jon could do to stop himself from walking out. Was he supposed to churn butter and sew doublets like a girl for the rest of his days? “May I go?” he asked stiffly.
“As you wish,” Bowen Marsh responded.
Dareon and Sam left with him. They descended to the yard in silence. Outside, Jon looked up at the Wall shining in the sun, the melting ice creeping down its side in a hundred thin fingers. Jon’s rage was such that he would have smashed it all in an instant, and the world be damned.
“Jon,” Samwell Tarly said excitedly. “Wait. Don’t you see what they’re doing?”
Jon turned on him in a fury. “I see Ser Alliser’s bloody hand, that’s all I see. He wanted to shame me, and he has.”
Dareon gave him a look. “The stewards are fine for the likes of you and me, Sam, but not for Lord Snow.”
“I’m a better swordsman and a better rider than any of you,” Jon blazed back. “It’s not fair!”
“Fair?” Dareon sneered. “The girl was waiting for me, naked as the day she was born. She pulled me through the window, and you talk to me of fair?” He walked off.
“There is no shame in being a steward,” Sam said.
“Do you think I want to spend the rest of my life washing an old man’s smallclothes?”
“The old man is Lord Commander of the Night’s Watch,” Sam reminded him. “You’ll be with him day and night. Yes, you’ll pour his wine and see that his bed linen is fresh, but you’ll also take his letters, attend him at meetings, squire for him in battle. You’ll be as close to him as his shadow. You’ll know everything, be a part of everything … and the Lord Steward said Mormont asked for you himself!
“When I was little, my father used to insist that I attend him in the audience chamber whenever he held court. When he rode to Highgarden to bend his knee to Lord Tyrell, he made me come. Later, though, he started to take Dickon and leave me at home, and he no longer cared