After supper, a simple fare of bread and stew which we took in the great hall with the rest of the guards and knights, I went to find the old castellan of Ivyfort.
The man's name was signed on the map. Arlan Lantry. A family name so minor I'd never even heard of it, despite Maester Rowen's exhaustive lessons on the genealogy of Stormlander houses both great and small.
Arlan Lantry had not come down to eat with the new lords of the castle, so I asked one of the servants where I might find him.
"The library, m'lord," she said, bobbing a curtsy. "That's where he takes his meals these days. Ol' Al don't like leaving his maps."
I was surprised such a small keep even had a library. Most castles this size made do with a maester's chambers and maybe a solar with a few books. But when I found the room tucked away in a corner of the tower's second floor, I understood.
It was tight and cramped but surprisingly long. Might had been some other kind of storage room at some point, but now it only had rows and rows of vellum scrolls and leather-bound books and crumbling parchment piled up on shelves that reached up to the low ceiling. The room ran the length of the keep's western face, with narrow windows every few yards letting in the last light of day.
I almost couldn't fit inside, and I had to turn sideways to navigate between the shelves without knocking anything over. The room smelled strongly of ink and dust and old paper, which I thoroughly enjoyed, and for a while I forgot all about Arlan Lantry and his maps.
I just looked around, pulling books out of their spots to leaf through them. One about the Conquest of Dorne by the Young Dragon, written by some maester whose name I didn't recognize. The ink was faded but the writing was clear, meticulous observations about troop movements and political machinations.
Another on the reign of King Aegon III, the Dragonbane. This one was older, the vellum yellowed and brittle at the edges. I handled it carefully like it was some ancient treasure.
Then I found the maps. Gods, there were so many.
But I noticed quickly that all of them seemed to be from Cape Wrath itself. Most focusing on the northern Rainwood around the Ivyfort. Showing waterfalls hidden deep in the forest, canyons that cut through the hills, even what looked like a cave system marked with warnings about flooding and unstable passages.
I was holding a small, neatly drawn map depicting trails that snaked around the Ivyfort when someone spoke behind me.
"Might I help you?"
I turned to find a young man staring back at me. Younger than me, even. Shorter by a head and likely half my body weight. Thin in that gangly way of boys who hadn't quite grown into their frames yet. Dark hair, sharp features, intense eyes.
"Yes, I suppose," I said. "I'm looking for Arlan Lantry, the man who made these." I pulled the map in my hands forward slightly.
The young man's gaze sharpened at the sight of it. Fixed on the parchment with an intensity that bordered on possessive.
"I'm Arlan Lantry."
I lifted an eyebrow. "I don't think you are."
The shorter, slighter boy took a step toward me. "I am and you are holding my map!"
He dashed forward then, quicker than I'd expected. Hands reaching for the parchment.
With one hand, I shoved him back. Gently, by my standards. Just enough to create space.
It was enough to send the boy flying backward into a desk against the wall. He crashed into it hard, scattering parchment everywhere and knocking over an inkwell that spilled in a black pool across the wood. He moaned in pain.
"That wasn't very smart, was it?" I kept my voice calm. "Who are you really, boy?"
Grunting, the boy pulled a piece of paper from his face and stood up. His teeth were gritted in anger, not fear. "I told you who I am. And careful with that! That's my best work you're holding."
I had to give it to him—he had guts. For a thief trying to steal from the newly arrived lords, he was remarkably bold.
Though something didn't quite fit. A smallfolk kid trying to get some treasure would have settled for something more obviously valuable than maps. And he certainly wouldn't have confronted me instead of just sneaking away with his findings.
Besides, he didn't speak like a commoner. His voice and vocabulary were too refined. Too educated.
"Unless I'm the blind one," I said, "you're not an old, blind, decrepit man quite yet. So you're not Arlan Lantry."
The boy scoffed even as he dusted himself off. "My grandfather? No one here calls him anything other than Ol' Al." He looked me up and down, some of his anger returning. "Who are you, then, to manhandle my work like a troll trying to destroy it?"
I hid a smile. I did like the boy. "I'm Ser Galladon Tarth, son of Lord Selwyn Tarth."
The boy's mouth made an O but no sound came out. He wasn't the brightest if he didn't make the connection between the new arrivals and a six and a half feet mini giant before him.
He suddenly dropped, knees thudding hard on the floor. "My lord... I... I apologize, my lord. I apologize profusely. I did not know! I thought... my maps!"
A bit taken aback by the sudden shift, I frowned. "Calm down, man. I'm not going to kill you for it."
The boy flinched despite my words.
I paused, confused. I'd never met him before. Why be so afraid? I hadn't even raised my voice. And though I was tall, I didn't really look that scary. A shame, really. Intimidation often works best when you look like you ate puppies for breakfast.
Some noise outside caught my attention then, coming from an open window on the eastern side of the room. From there, I could see the campfires of the people camped outside the castle walls. Dozens of them, flickering in the gathering darkness.
People who'd come from the Weeping Town. Which I had, officially speaking, burnt and razed to the ground in a fit of vengeful rage.
"Oh," I said aloud. "I see. I imagine the fleeing people of the Weeping Town must tell quite the stories about me."
On the ground, the boy winced. Right in one.
"Tell me," I said. "What do they say? The truth now. I feel like I've grown tired of saying this recently, but I'll take simple honesty over empty bootlicking any day."
The boy looked up at me. His gaze struggled to keep from straying down to the floor. He wet his lips nervously.
"My lord, they say..." He swallowed. "And it's only what I've heard, of course, but they say you slew half the town guard at the walls in your fury. That you butchered your way into the keep on your own. Killed the lady with your bare hands. And only stopped because there was so much blood on your hands you could no longer hold onto your sword."
My eyebrows climbed higher and higher with each word. Then I burst out laughing.
The boy winced at the sound as if I might jump on him.
"That paints quite the picture," I managed between chuckles. "Do you truly believe all of it? I've had my hands covered in blood once before, in fact. You know what I did?"
The boy shook his head wildly. "No, my lord." His voice was barely a squeak.
"I wiped them, of course." I grinned. "If I wanted to keep the slaughter going, I could've just wiped them clean. Point is, don't believe everything people say. The truth is rarely a good enough story worth spreading around." I sobered slightly. "Though I don't blame them for hating me."
"Not at all, my lord!" Jumping to his feet, the boy waved his arms around even more frantically. "I don't think they hate you at all! They're afraid of you, yes, it is true. But they tell the story as if you're the hero of it." The words tumbled out in a rush. "That your rampage was a just and godly campaign to save your mother from the monstrous lady who'd ensnared old Elmar Whitehead to her evil whims. They say the Warrior himself blessed you that night!"
"Huh," was all I could say.
I supposed they wouldn't have come here if they feared and hated me to the point of telling horror stories about my name. In fact, now that I thought about it, it was likely because of what happened that they'd come at all.
In a world where martial prowess was the highest currency, why wouldn't you want the lord whose umbrella you sheltered under to be capable of terrifying, righteous violence? Better to be protected by a monster than devoured by one.
"I see," I said. "Then that is good to hear."
There was silence in the library then. Only the sounds of the refugees outside drifting through the window. Voices murmuring. A baby crying. Someone playing a flute badly.
"Uhm, my lord," the boy asked hesitantly. "You wished to meet with my grandfather?"
I blinked. "Oh, aye. So I did. I have a few questions about these maps of his."
The boy straightened. "But... my lord, as I've said, that is my work. I drew them."
I looked down at the map in my hands, then back at the boy. "Forgive me if I don't believe a boy younger than me could do such work."
Some of the indignation came back to his voice. "But I did! My grandfather hasn't worked on a map for ten years." He pointed emphatically. "Look at the signature at the bottom. That's me, Arlan Lantry. He always signed as Lantry only! You can see his old work at the back. He was good, yes, but I'm better, my lord, I really am!"
I thought back on the Arlan Lantry signature on the map Endrew had shown me earlier. Had it been different? I couldn't remember clearly.
"Your grandfather told my cousin, Ser Endrew Tarth, that he was the one to draw it," I said.
The boy—Arlan Lantry, the real one perhaps—scoffed. "He only says so because he's jealous of my maps. Even though he taught me what I knew, he says I should've become a knight instead. I wanted to be a knight too, of course. What boy doesn't?" His expression fell slightly. "But I barely have any talent for it. Maps though... maps is what I know."
There was something honest in the way he said it. A resignation mixed with pride. The way someone might admit to being bad at archery but excellent at chess.
I studied him more carefully. "Did you also draw the one of the Ivyfort from above? The one that shows the castle and surrounding lands as if seen by a bird?"
Arlan smirked. "Yes, my lord, I did. Fine work, is it not?"
I tilted my head. It was amusing that the boy didn't realize what he'd just basically admitted.
"So you're the skinchanger, then?"
The boy sputtered. His face went red. He opened and closed his mouth like a fish gasping on a dock.
"I— that's— my lord, I would never— it's not— how did you—"
"Do you prefer the term warg?" I asked mildly.
As the boy continued to issue the weakest denials I'd ever heard, I sighed. "Look, Arlan, right?"
The boy didn't say anything. Completely paralyzed now. His eyes were wide, his breathing fast and shallow.
I snapped my fingers in front of him. "Wake up, Arlan. You like maps, don't you? And you said you wanted to be a knight?"
The boy nodded mechanically.
"Have you ever wanted to draw other maps?" I asked. "I see the only maps you have around here are of the surrounding lands. The forests and the canyons and the keep. Don't you ever want to see what lies beyond Cape Wrath? What the rest of Westeros looks like from above?"
Arlan swallowed hard. "I... I've only ever been here with my grandfather. It's all I could draw."
I nodded. "Good. Then you'll come with me."
The boy's eyes widened even further, if that was possible. "What?"
"Aye. I'll make a knight out of you yet. And you'll get to draw all sorts of maps. Maps of places you've never seen. Maps that could change how we understand the world." I leaned forward slightly. "And you know what's the best part of it?"
Suddenly mute, Arlan Lantry could only shake his head.
I smiled. "That you'll teach me everything you know about being a warg, Arlan. Every damned thing."
"I—" He found his voice, though it came out strangled. "My lord, I don't— I can't— it's not something that can be taught. It's just... it just is. I slip into crows and rats sometimes. And I have a hawk too. It started when I was a boy and I thought it was normal until grandfather told me never to do it again, that it was a family curse."
"A curse, huh?" I thought it through for a moment. "Let me guess, he told you it was dark magic too? That the Faith would take you for it if they knew? That you should never speak of it to anyone?"
He nodded miserably, but I thought he was simply too young and sheltered to understand what his grandfather tried to do with this so-called family curse. Likely, it was the same reason why the old men had hid here in this forgotten corner of the world. Why he had told everyone the maps were his work, not his grandchild's.
All to protect him. To hide him from the scrutiny and danger that being a warg here in the south would bring over him.
I shook my head. The boy was loved and he didn't even know it.
"Listen to me, Arlan," I said seriously. "I don't care what the Faith says. I don't care what anyone says. You have a gift. A rare one. Not only as a warg, but as a mapmaker." I gestured around the library. "You've spent your whole life hiding here, making maps of the same forests over and over. Don't you want more?"
"More," he repeated, like the word was foreign.
"More," I confirmed. "Seeing the Free Cities, King's Landing. The Wall, if we're feeling ambitious. Drawing maps that will be used by lords and merchants and explorers for generations."
Arlan was quiet for a long moment. I could see him thinking, weighing his options. The safe, small life he knew against the unknown I was offering.
"My grandfather won't allow it," he said finally. "He'll say I'm needed here. That I shouldn't abandon him."
"Your grandfather is no longer castellan of this keep," I pointed out. "And I am the son of the man who rules it. If I say you're coming with me, you're coming with me." I softened my tone. "But I'll speak with him if you'd like. Explain that you'll be serving House Tarth in a capacity that suits your talents."
And tell him I'd take care of him. One day, the boy might even understand what his grandfather meant with all this.
"And if I refuse?" he asked quietly.
I shrugged. "Then you stay here and spend the rest of your life drawing the same canyons and waterfalls while your gift withers from disuse. It's your choice."
He looked down at the map still in my hands. His map. His best work, he'd said.
"I'll do it," he said suddenly. "I'll come with you. I'll teach you what I can, though I make no promises about whether you can actually learn."
"We'll see," I said, smiling slightly. "I've managed to surprise myself before."
xxx
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