Chapter 168: The Woods Remembered Everything

In Eddard’s eyes, Lannor’s connection with Arya likely began and ended with finding the lost girl and teaching her a little swordplay.

So the Lord of Winterfell had no idea that Lannor had only stepped into this whole mess because of his youngest daughter.

Eddard’s party numbered a little over twenty, each man given two horses for the long ride. Yet even with spare mounts, men still had better endurance than horses. They could not spend every hour in the saddle.

In theory, to avoid whatever ambush their enemies would surely send, Lannor’s group should have traveled when the roads were empty.

In practice, that was impossible.

Ancient roads did not forgive darkness. Even in a city, night could leave a man blind past the end of his own hand, let alone on a wild road. Unless they wanted horses snapping legs and riders breaking necks, daylight remained the only sensible choice.

“Where are we now?”

The horses jolted beneath them as Lannor urged his mount up beside Eddard.

He knew they had passed through this place on the way to King’s Landing, but not whose lands these were by feudal boundary.

“We’re at the edge of the Crownlands.” Eddard answered between breaths. Long hours in the saddle had worn even him thin. “Another twenty kilometers or so, and we’ll enter the Riverlands.”

By the strange reckoning of Westeros, autumn had begun. According to the maesters who watched the skies, after years of long summer, a terrible winter and a long night were coming.

For now, this was only the frail little bridge between summer and cold.

Even so, night already carried a bite.

Steam puffed from the horses’ broad nostrils. Beneath leather armor, shirts first soaked with sweat, then chilled as the evening wind crept through every seam and buckle.