A Game of Thrones(45)

27.EDDARD(1)

“Hard duty, my lord.” Jory grinned. “The men will be glad to help. Porther has made a fair start already.”
   Ned’s favorite horse was saddled and waiting in the yard. Varly and Jacks fell in beside him as he rode through the yard. Their steel caps and shirts of mail must have been sweltering, yet they said no word of complaint. As Lord Eddard passed beneath the King’s Gate into the stink of the city, his grey and white cloak streaming from his shoulders, he saw eyes everywhere and kicked his mount into a trot. His guard followed.
   He looked behind him frequently as they made their way through the crowded city streets. Tomard and Desmond had left the castle early this morning to take up positions on the route they must take, and watch for anyone following them, but even so, Ned was uncertain. The shadow of the King’s Spider and his little birds had him fretting like a maiden on her wedding night.
   The Street of Steel began at the market square beside the River Gate, as it was named on maps, or the Mud Gate, as it was commonly called. A mummer on stilts was striding through the throngs like some great insect, with a horde of barefoot children trailing behind him, hooting. Elsewhere, two ragged boys no older than Bran were dueling with sticks, to the loud encouragement of some and the furious curses of others. An old woman ended the contest by leaning out of her window and emptying a bucket of slops on the heads of the combatants. In the shadow of the wall, farmers stood beside their wagons, bellowing out, “Apples, the best apples, cheap at twice the price,” and “Blood melons, sweet as honey,” and “Turnips, onions, roots, here you go here, here you go, turnips, onions, roots, here you go here.”
   The Mud Gate was open, and a squad of City Watchmen stood under the portcullis in their golden cloaks, leaning on spears. When a column of riders appeared from the west, the guardsmen sprang into action, shouting commands and moving the carts and foot traffic aside to let the knight enter with his escort. The first rider through the gate carried a long black banner. The silk rippled in the wind like a living thing; across the fabric was blazoned a night sky slashed with purple lightning. “Make way for Lord Beric!” the rider shouted. “Make way for Lord Beric!” And close behind came the young lord himself, a dashing figure on a black courser, with red-gold hair and a black satin cloak dusted with stars. “Here to fight in the Hand’s tourney, my lord?” a guardsman called out to him. “Here to win the Hand’s tourney,” Lord Beric shouted back as the crowd cheered.
   Ned turned off the square where the Street of Steel began and followed its winding path up a long hill, past blacksmiths working at open forges, freeriders haggling over mail shirts, and grizzled ironmongers selling old blades and razors from their wagons. The farther they climbed, the larger the buildings grew. The man they wanted was all the way at the top of the hill, in a huge house of timber and plaster whose upper stories loomed over the narrow street. The double doors showed a hunting scene carved in ebony and weirwood. A pair of stone knights stood sentry at the entrance, armored in fanciful suits of polished red steel that transformed them into griffin and unicorn. Ned left his horse with Jacks and shouldered his way inside.
   The slim young serving girl took quick note of Ned’s badge and the sigil on his doublet, and the master came hurrying out, all smiles and bows. “Wine for the King’s Hand,” he told the girl, gesturing Ned to a couch. “I am Tobho Mott, my lord, please, please, put yourself at ease.” He wore a black velvet coat with hammers embroidered on the sleeves in silver thread, Around his neck was a heavy silver chain and a sapphire as large as a pigeon’s egg. “If you are in need of new arms for the Hand’s tourney, you have come to the right shop.” Ned did not bother to correct him. “My work is costly, and I make no apologies for that, my lord,” he said as he filled two matching silver goblets. “You will not find craftsmanship equal to mine anywhere in the Seven Kingdoms, I promise you. Visit every forge in King’s Landing if you like, and compare for yourself. Any village smith can hammer out a shirt of mail; my work is art.”
   Ned sipped his wine and let the man go on. The Knight of Flowers bought all his armor here, Tobho boasted, and many high lords, the ones who knew fine steel, and even Lord Renly, the king’s own brother. Perhaps the Hand had seen Lord Renly’s new armor, the green plate with the golden antlers? No other armorer in the city could get that deep a green; he knew the secret of putting color in the steel itself, paint and enamel were the crutches of a journeyman. Or mayhaps the Hand wanted a blade? Tobho had learned to work Valyrian steel at the forges of Qohor as a boy. Only a man who knew the spells could take old weapons and forge them anew. “The direwolf is the sigil of House Stark, is it not? I could fashion a direwolf helm so real that children will run from you in the street,” he vowed.
   Ned smiled. “Did you make a falcon helm for Lord Arryn?”
   Tobho Mott paused a long moment and set aside his wine. “The Hand did call upon me, with Lord Stannis, the king’s brother. I regret to say, they did not honor me with their patronage.”
   Ned looked at the man evenly, saying nothing, waiting. He had found over the years that silence sometimes yielded more than questions. And so it was this time.
   “They asked to see the boy,” the armorer said, “so I took them back to the forge.”
   “The boy,” Ned echoed. He had no notion who the boy might be. “I should like to see the boy as well.”
   Tobho Mott gave him a cool, careful look. “As you wish, my lord,” he said with no trace of his former friendliness. He led Ned out a rear door and across a narrow yard, back to the cavernous stone barn where the work was done. When the armorer opened the door, the blast of hot air that came through made Ned feel as though he were walking into a dragon’s mouth. Inside, a forge blazed in each corner, and the air stank of smoke and sulfur. Journeymen armorers glanced up from their hammers and tongs just long enough to wipe the sweat from their brows, while bare-chested apprentice boys worked the bellows.
   The master called over a tall lad about Robb’s age, his arms and chest corded with muscle. “This is Lord Stark, the new Hand of the King,” he told him as the boy looked at Ned through sullen blue eyes and pushed back sweat-soaked hair with his fingers. Thick hair, shaggy and unkempt and black as ink. The shadow of a new beard darkened his jaw. “This is Gendry. Strong for his age, and he works hard. Show the Hand that helmet you made, lad.” Almost shyly, the boy led them to his bench, and a steel helm shaped like a bull’s head, with two great curving horns.
   Ned turned the helm over in his hands. It was raw steel, unpolished but expertly shaped. “This is fine work. I would be pleased if you would let me buy it.”
   The boy snatched it out of his hands. “It’s not for sale.”
   Tobho Mott looked horror-struck. “Boy, this is the King’s Hand. If his lordship wants this helm, make him a gift of it. He honors you by asking.”
   “I made it for me,” the boy said stubbornly.
   “A hundred pardons, my lord,” his master said hurriedly to Ned. “The boy is crude as new steel, and like new steel would profit from some beating. That helm is journeyman’s work at best. Forgive him and I promise I will craft you a helm like none you have ever seen.”
   “He’s done nothing that requires my forgiveness. Gendry, when Lord Arryn came to see you, what did you talk about?”
   “He asked me questions is all, m’lord.”
   “What sort of questions?”
   The boy shrugged. “How was I, and was I well treated, and if I liked the work, and stuff about my mother. Who she was and what she looked like and all.”
   “What did you tell him?” Ned asked.
   The boy shoved a fresh fall of black hair off his forehead. “She died when I was little. She had yellow hair, and sometimes she used to sing to me, I remember. She worked in an alehouse.”
   “Did Lord Stannis question you as well?”
   “The bald one? No, not him. He never said no word, just glared at me, like I was some raper who done for his daughter.”
   “Mind your filthy tongue,” the master said. “This is the King’s own Hand.” The boy lowered his eyes. “A smart boy, but stubborn. That helm?.?.?.? the others call him bullheaded, so he threw it in their teeth.”
   Ned touched the boy’s head, fingering the thick black hair. “Look at me, Gendry.” The apprentice lifted his face. Ned studied the shape of his jaw, the eyes like blue ice. Yes, he thought, I see it. “Go back to your work, lad. I’m sorry to have bothered you.” He walked back to the house with the master. “Who paid the boy’s apprentice fee?” he asked lightly.
   Mott looked fretful. “You saw the boy. Such a strong boy. Those hands of his, those hands were made for hammers. He had such promise, I took him on without a fee.”
   “The truth now,” Ned urged. “The streets are full of strong boys. The day you take on an apprentice without a fee will be the day the Wall comes down. Who paid for him?”
   “A lord,” the master said reluctantly. “He gave no name, and wore no sigil on his coat. He paid in gold, twice the customary sum, and said he was paying once for the boy, and once for my silence.”
   “Describe him.”
   “He was stout, round of shoulder, not so tall as you. Brown beard, but there was a bit of red in it, I’ll swear. He wore a rich cloak, that I do remember, heavy purple velvet worked with silver threads, but the hood shadowed his face and I never did see him clear.” He hesitated a moment. “My lord, I want no trouble.”
   “None of us wants trouble, but I fear these are troubled times, Master Mott,” Ned said. “You know who the boy is.”
   “I am only an armorer, my lord. I know what I’m told.”
   “You know who the boy is,” Ned repeated patiently. “That is not a question.”
   “The boy is my apprentice,” the master said. He looked Ned in the eye, stubborn as old iron. “Who he was before he came to me, that’s none of my concern.”
   Ned nodded. He decided that he liked Tobho Mott, master armorer. “If the day ever comes when Gendry would rather wield a sword than forge one, send him to me. He has the look of a warrior. Until then, you have my thanks, Master Mott, and my promise. Should I ever want a helm to frighten children, this will be the first place I visit.”
   His guard was waiting outside with the horses. “Did you find anything, my lord?” Jacks asked as Ned mounted up.
   “I did,” Ned told him, wondering. What had Jon Arryn wanted with a king’s bastard, and why was it worth his life?