Chapter 81: SI POV XXI
Early 168 AC
Bidding my wife goodbye was never an easy thing, especially since we had begun trying for another son, and the current lack of a spare still rendered our joined houses vulnerable. I extracted promises of good behavior from the younger attendants, as well as oaths that I would return safe and sound, but it was not easy. Bidding my children goodbye was even harder than departing from Mylenda's arms, as despite their adorable attempts at being stoic, watching my little Jon wimper into his mother's shoulder made my heart ache like now wound ever had. Yet leave I must, for the chances for our houses were never ones I could simply allow to pass by, and this was such an important one to attend. At least I could trust my fosterages to keep spirits up and aid my mother in ensuring everything went smoothly whilst I was away. Seven above know just how much this will come in handy for their own lands someday.
As it was, Lord Baratheon had celebrations in place for his heir's nameday, an eldest son whose name I had somehow forgotten, but along with that came a great deal of politicking I had been training for with my wife. Mylenda would always be the superior of us in that regard, but with Stormlords I might be able to hold my own for at least a while.
Betrothals, the settling of feuds outside of the battlefield, speaking with old war buddies over a keg of ale and the chance to make deals to strengthen houses were opportunities I could not pass up. I had suffered early in my life for my father's inability to make greater connections with older houses, but I did not fault him for that. Houses that had been in power for centuries, be they Frey, Martell, Tyrell or Tully faced problems within and without even now. My house would have to tread carefully over the generations, or else everything I was attempting to do would be for naught. On the bright side, I could also find myself being rewarded with the lands and titles I had been stewarding ever since the end of the Conquest of Dorne years ago. So, you know, positive and negatives abound with this trip.
"Lord Wytch," my travel companion said, his lone eye scanning the steadily brightening horizon. "Are we not moving to Lowhill first?"
"Nay, Jonnel, we have one last errand to run, as there is a project I have been working on since near the time you came into my fostering," I said. I was honestly surprised Maron didn't want to come and see his sister, but given how poorly his last meeting with his mother had gone, and his closeness with my family, it was for the best. "Tell me, what is a hindrance to ships when they are within water long enough?"
"Fouling?" he asked. The Stark man, for he was truly no longer just a boy, was quick on the uptake. At least he no longer took offense as readily as before.
"Aye, the rotting of wood, and the destruction wrought by barnacles and other creatures of the sea," I replied. "The house that can find a means of offsetting this problem, let alone creating a solution to stop it entirely, would become immeasurably rich and sought after by whatever houses ply their wares and incomes along water. As with other things I have worked on in the past, this is just another of many we have yet to see results of, but I am hoping for success today."
Jonnel nodded but remained silent as we dismounted from our horses, the stableboys of the Wytchmill readily awaiting our arrival. Guards around the premise ensured none could enter without my permission, and were this a town, I'd have likely been in trouble with Lord Baratheon for fortifying it with the walls I had without his due notification. T'was a nice little loophole in the law, then, that there were no laws in the Stormlands about fortifying such a place of forging and crafting. In other kingdoms there might be, but as I drew up to my first destination, I let such musing fall by the wayside.
In the cobbled halls of the Wytchmill, whose purpose had greatly expanded from my original vision, there was something potentially matching the first ideas of manufactories. Whilst I lacked steam, rubber, electricity and all other means of industrial might, what I had made instead was likely something more akin to an Essosi manufacturing center, albeit with no slaves and far less Valyrian brickwork. Still, the smell of the forge, the falling of drop hammers, the clouds of smoke billowing out into the wintry sky; it all created a tapestry of industry and efficiency that my father never could have dreamed of. He had only known the little castle forge as the place where our weapons and armor were repaired or crafted, where whatever needs our castle home had were crafted by the smiths. That he had entrusted their expertise to allow for my earliest experimentations with the improved plow and later creations was a testament to his foresight, though he could not have known at the time just how far his humoring of his young son would take his house.
Were he still alive, somehow, I was certain he would have been proud of me, just as I recall my former family was in my past life. I had an inkling of success from those halcyon days as well, but the specifics escape me to this day. Yet unlike the face of my dying second father, the details of my first family have also decayed during these many years. Perhaps, someday, I may remember them only as a feeling, a memory of a forgotten dream. The ache is no longer there, but the yearning still lingers sometimes, and the wonder of how they would see me now, so changed by this new life and world.
Brushing aside such melancholy, I looked to my master blacksmith, the one who had long outgrown our original forge in Stormhall and had become one of the masters of the Wytchmill forges. Attended by several members of the Academy, along with a few of the more senior Alchemists that resided in my lands at my leisure, we stood before the largest furnace, waiting to see if our experiment had proven fruitful. By my side, Jonnel focused intently on the men at work, the apprentices donning the safety gear we had developed years before, all the handier when engaging in such experiments as this one.
From within the radiating heat of the large furnace, the men began to remove the vessel within, a large bowl of iron, glowing softly with heat yet in no danger of melting. Its contents, exposed to higher temperatures than a usual smithy, were carefully poured into the awaiting trough, also made of iron, to form a thin sheet once smoothed and the impurities removed with tongs. Yet from the iron vessel did not come molten copper, spreading as swiftly as spilled water, but a thick slurry reminiscent of toxic sludge, the heap barely sliding out onto the iron tray as one great clump.
"Another failure," one of the Alchemists said, making notes. As involved as these secretive proto-chemists were, they were not above letting me know everything that went wrong with one of these experiments.
"Yet once more, another chance for learning from our mistakes," one of the Academics chimed in, taking notes as well. The two schools of thought, though different in temperament, at least got along better than I'd originally expected. Think more of friendly rivals rather than ideological enemies, like the maesters were so often portrayed as. "It would seem the temperature was insufficient to allow for the material to separate without the application of force, as smiths do with their hammers."
"The quality of the ore was not the best, but even with almost pure ore, it would likely have not fully melted," my master blacksmith said, prodding the copper mixture with a long iron rod. It deformed under his touch, but there was nothing to indicate it would spread as easily as I had hoped. "A higher temperature would be needed, but there is only so much that charcoal can do for heating the stuff, no matter the shape or size of the furnace."
Not the first failure I had come across in my time in Westeros, as I lacked the means of making the ink and the paper for printing presses, my attempts at interbreeding large wild goats with my upland herds had failed repeatedly, and innumerable smaller experiments had either achieved minimal results or left me with nothing to show for the coin and time invested into them. Now, another attempt at molten copper had once again failed to materialize, and it was beginning to cost more than I'd like to admit. "We will let the matter sit for now, and return to it at a later date," I replied. "At the very least, we now know we are limited by the fuel and size of our furnaces, not the intensity of our efforts. See to it that the remaining copper set aside for this experiment is sold at the market for other smiths, but otherwise you are all dismissed, as I must be on my way."
Giving little attention to the dispersing men and their attendants, Jonnel remained silent by my side until we had reached our horses in the nearby stable. "The North has many deposits of copper in the more mountainous areas, but the means of transporting it effectively are few," he said, mounting without effort. His lack of a second eye truly did not inconvenience him as much as I thought it would, and this adaptability only further proved his father's wisdom in sending him to my halls to learn what he could. Being adaptable was far more important than being stubborn, with history and the now unlikely future of this world showing that quite clearly. "At least we understand what our limits currently are, even if we cannot yet find the means to overcome them."
I nodded as we made to depart. "Those who first learned to smelt iron likely shared our troubles, and those that first smelted bronze from copper and tin much the same. We are not innately smarter than they were, Jonnel, but we have a greater pool of knowledge from which to pull, courtesy of their own efforts and countless men and women before our time."
"I still think the Citadel are fools for hoarding it as they do, where set ideas can allow complacency to fester and induce rot," the young Stark replied. "To think of all those who could benefit from what knowledge they have secreted away is as maddening as it is insulting. Not every farmer need know how to smelt iron, lest they use it in an uprising against their lord, but the bevy of farming techniques you have shown me, and all that follows…"
"The hoarding of this knowledge gives them power, softer than a sword strike, but no less deadly when aptly applied." I had no idea how the Citadel had not made any noise about my little academy, but given their history, they likely saw a young trying his hand at glorious discovery, who would likely fail as any others had. "This is why I have been so forthright in teaching you and others everything we have discovered, regardless of my place in society. Even if others would think it strengthens a potential enemy, there is no reason to hoard every scrap of information you may accrue. Any lord who sees potential enemies in every face and shadow will more likely make those enemies a reality through his actions by withholding such knowledge. If I had held onto all my inventions, all my accrued wisdom, my house would be all the richer for it, but my neighbors would view me with envy and resentment when my fields were full and their larders were empty."
"My father was wise to send me south, for it has opened my eye to that which I dismissed as southron ways that were incompatible with the life I once lived. Now? Now I see clearer, as if my missing eye has allowed my other to accrue… wisdom I lacked in my younger days."
Calm down there Odin, there's a time for deep metaphors and there's a time for simple pondering. "More that you have grown and experienced more than you would had you remained isolated in Winterfell. I fear isolating the North from the rest of the kingdoms will only hurt your people over the years, be it from reduced trade, the exchange of ideas, or the potential for alliances with richer or more prestigious houses outside." To say nothing of what might happen in a little over a century, should canon somehow assert itself in some manner regarding their more northerly neighbors.
"I agree, but my father and I must be clever about this," Jonnel replied. "Throwing caution to the wind will bring ruin no matter how prepared we thought we were. It is the way of the north to move slowly, carefully, as we don't have the option to fall back on stores the same way southrons do if some fields fail. Turnip winters will hopefully be a thing of the past before I am to become Lord of Winterfell, but one can never predict the future with the clarity needed to fully prepare."
"I agree as well, for the lands will shape us as readily as we remake them to suit our needs," I replied. "Those by rivers learn to harvest their bounty and traverse their paths, while mountain people learn to read the weather and track mountain game as readily as they breathe. Men born in hot climates learn to keep cool, and those in frigid lands learn the value of good hearths and warm, dry clothes. However, with this business finished, we best be on our way while the morning is young. The roads in my lands may be among the best in the Stormlands, but even they cannot allow us to travel to Storm's End in a mere day. This summons mirrors what I experienced when my father first brought me to Storm's End years ago, though hopefully there will be no bandits attacking us."
I glanced at our small cohort of guards, veterans from my campaigns and all mounted. There would be no such chicanery this time, not with the original plotters gone and two of their houses extinguished completely.
My lands had transformed much since the last time I'd been on this route to my liege lord's seat more than a decade ago. Gone were the dirt pathways haphazardly cutting their way through grass, with wagon trails turning to a muddy slurry whenever the frequent rains coincided with the need for wagons and carriages to venture through these lands. The numerous streams and smaller rivers no longer presented an obstacle to ford, their treacherous currents now known only to the fish that swam within. My roads and bridges had replaced the need for muddied wagon tracks and fording unknown waters, and with this came a change to the travel times within my lands, and indeed the culture itself.
Villages always found themselves forming along or just off to the side of these Wytchroads, though these were no mere cottages of whatever sod, wood and thatch the smallfolk could scrounge for themselves, as they had been in the time of my father. Nay, thanks to the great tracts of clay taken from the less productive regions of Stormhall and Windhall alike, these cottages were of stout brick construction, their walls thick for insulation and their roofs forged from the many tiles of slate exported from the quarries of my former enemies. Sturdier construction for the frame and increased insulation all around meant that these structures would require only minimal upkeep for decades, save for if unusually large hail or rare hurricane winds attempted to rip them apart.
Much the same went for the windmills, barns, stronghouses, and the paddocks that accompanied practically every settlement, solid in construction and built to last. In less than a full generation, my lands had jumped ahead several centuries in comparison to Earth's equivalent countrysides, and with it had come a desire from visitors far and near to see these for themselves. Some came with good intentions, curiosity and a desire to learn aching in their hearts, and many of these wealthier travelers spent time in the Lowhill Academy, absorbing whatever knowledge they could. Those with lesser intentions, whose hearts yearned for the wealth of my lands and attempted to rustle livestock, rob passerby, or harvest that which they had no right to… they were properly dealt with.
Jonnel had been by my side for years now, and had learned much in that time, and yet I could not hold back a smile when I saw him eyeing the innate wealth my lands had achieved. Far too many lords, I had come to learn, appreciated only the immediate wealth their lands could grant them, be it coin or the supplies needed for our feudal society to function. They often saw little need for the smallfolk to be content and protected, save for when it was too late. Too often they simply accepted the losses they accrued as part and parcel of such a life, and yet those same lords wrote to me, seeking trade deals with which they sought to enrich themselves. If only they sought to do the same for the people of their lands, then perhaps they might enjoy a much greater degree of success.
The Starks were not entirely above this mentality, but from what I had learned of Jonnel, it was rare for a Northman lord to see his smallfolk as little more than expendable chaff when push came to shove. By virtue of where they lived meant they could not be so aloof to the plight of everyone around them, lest they fall to starving and freezing mobs whilst they feasted in warm halls. It was a cultural austerity born of necessity, one that might not change until well into what would be considered an industrial age.
It was quite stark then, when we crossed from my lands and into those of House Craggner, for though Corenna Craggner had long adopted much of what I had, it was clear she had not implemented it as well as me. Fields were neat and orderly but fewer in number and likely variety, and the pastures were large but sparse of certain livestock. Still, these lands prospered as best as could be hoped for, as none of the smallfolk seemed to be starving, though the villages were far fewer as my party traveled. On the outskirts of one such village, perhaps a day's travel from Cragghall, an encampment swamped the road, orderly as could be expected and secure. My outriders returned after a short ride ahead, their faces relieved as the sun began to dip towards the horizon.
"The Lady Craggner nee Wysp has retired for the night but extends an offer of joining us come the morn, my lord," my captain said.
"I see no reason as to why we would not accept such a polite suggestion, and besides, she knows these lands better than us," I replied. "See to it she knows of our acceptance, and that we will be ready to move when they are."
As my captain rode off, I signalled to the men around us to set up our camp, somewhat off the road, and slightly uphill of the lady's own encampment. My men moved fast, many of them veterans of the king's wars and my engineers to boot, so there was little to do but wait as our lodgings, a series of large and thick tents, were erected in the center of our encampment. By the time the sun began to fully set, Jonnel had ensured our lodgings were in order, a task he often relished whenever he and I ventured between towns.
"So these are the lands you've spoken of in the past," Jonnel said as he sat by the fire, the large flaps of the tents serving as a fine windbreak for the imperceptibly light breeze that carried away the smoke. "House Craggner, yes?"
"Indeed, Jonnel, and I myself never drew this far into them, even so long ago. I only needed to venture to their keep to put an end to the troubles the late Lord Craggner had stirred up."
"What are the chances we would meet the lady on our way to Storm's End, so close to her own castle? I am surprised she did not invite us to dine with her."
"Fairly unlikely, but given how little House Craggner has been involved in the wider goings-on of the Stormlands due to the interregnum of Lady Craggner, I doubt many of her men are versed in the means of quickly establishing a camp. Besides," I added, nodding towards the larger cooking fire, upon which roasted several herb-stuffed chickens, "the cooks have told me our suppers will be finished soon, and Lady Craggner has retired for the evening. Best not to offend the ones who feed you by insinuating another lord or lady's attendants can cook for you better than they can, yes?"
Jonnel cracked one of his rarer smiles, one filled with amusement and usually reserved for the times when my stories brought most of the others to uproarious laughter. "Aye, that I do. It will take some adjusting when returning to Winterfell, as I hate to say I have grown much accustomed to the foods of southron lands."
"I'll be sure to send as many recipes as you like for your own cooks, along with how they might substitute some ingredients for more local ones. Wild turkey is often leaner than chicken, so care must be taken to baste it more often, for instance."
"Your turkeys are fatter than the few we manage to keep, though I believe ours grow larger," my ward replied, his smile fading into a more neutral, pondering expression. "I will have to remember that when my future bride seeks some comforts of her old life, and how I might best reasonably accommodate some of her tastes."
It was rare for him to talk about his future, but from what I've gathered, he doesn't have grand ambitions when it comes to that. I might have rubbed off on him the idea of a good wife and dutiful, loving children over what most lords might expect for themselves. "Has your father written of whom he intends to be the next potential future Lady of Winterfell?"
The young man sighed. "Not recently, no, but the subject has come up in the past. There are more than enough for me to consider, be they Karstark, Umber, Reed, Flynt and even Bolton, but I had had thoughts of securing my brother's line with mine own, to prevent an issue with potential claimants."
"You would wed one of your nieces?" The thought made me queasy, but in Westeros such things were not entirely impossible. Usually reserved for the likes of the royal family, yes, but even other houses occasionally dabbled in it. It was also quite forward-thinking, in regards to heading off an issue with succession, but his elder brother had never married. I doubt Jonnel's nieces even had the well-rounded education required to become highborn ladies, even if they had lived in Winterfell.
"Serra may be a Snow, but she has known only Winterfell her whole life. Father might not approve at first, but he would see the wisdom in securing two errant branches. It would be less of an issue than legitimizing her as a Stark, as my brother wished for before the war."
"Yet she is your niece," I replied. "I would advise against marrying her, if only because marrying such close kin seems to work only for Targaryens. The North could grow well under the continued improvements my plows and other implements have made, and it would do well for you to look to link your house with that of another powerful or prestigious one, rather than simply marry within. Besides," I added, poking at the fire with a stick, "there are downsides to marrying close enough kin. You've seen this in the cattle we've been breeding when siblings mate too readily over the generations, and it makes sense that humans may fall to the same issues should there be no innate Valyrian magic involved."
"Ah yes, the miscarriages and… other problems," Jonnel muttered. He'd not enjoyed observing the birth of one calf that had come out with the wrong number of heads for one body. Thankfully, the poor creature had died shortly after birth, though not before Jonnel had tried to comfort its pitiful whines. I'd never thought him to have such a soft spot for animals. "Then why do the Targaryens seem so unaffected?"
"My guess would be longstanding leftovers of Valyrian bloodcraft, the kind that we can't even begin to fathom over untold generations," I replied. "Whatever the case may be, marrying more distant cousins seems fine so long as it's not too often, but marrying your niece might be too much. To say nothing of how the northern houses might react to Stark not marrying one of their own, let alone any other worthy house, and that is not even considering her status as a Snow."
"Then it shall fall to father's decision whom I shall wed, as is his right and duty as head of House Stark," Jonnel said, poking the fire again. "At the very least, he knows better than I of the politics the north is currently experiencing. It has always been a struggle for me to keep track of such things, as my brother was the far better of us in that regard, and even were I competent in such talks, I have been gone for years. Those I knew might not immediately recognize me for all that I have grown."
You've still got only one eye, buddy, they'd see the Stark sigil and immediately think of you. "Meeting with other lords has been similarly a struggle for me, Jonnel. My wife covers for me in that area wonderfully, and if it weren't for her, I doubt I would be as successful as I am, let alone how our united houses have become."
My foster son nodded at that. "Aye, I can only hope whomever I do marry is no soft flower, but a sharp lady in wit and tongue. Gods know how poorly a spineless or shrewish woman can bring a man to ruin."
Far be it from me to correct him, seeing as the opposite can be true, but an up-and-coming lord of Westeros just wasn't ready for that kind of conversation yet. At least, not when the only 'true' queen of Westeros was quietly blamed by many for starting a civil war that claimed countless lives, even though there were far more people to blame than just Rhaenyra Targaryen. She just had the misfortune of being an easy target for those with an axe to grind and a society more than willing to cast shame upon someone who 'rocked their boat' by assuming her rightful place upon the throne. I mean, she wasn't blameless, but that was old history at this point, and we had the future to look forward to now. "Whomever your father chooses, I am certain he will do so for as many of the right reasons as he can," I said, placing a hand on the younger man's shoulder. "At the very least, you shall not be under the threat my wife and I were with our own marriage; the end of two houses, one ancient and storied, the other young and rising without as solid a foundation upon which to stand."
"Indeed, I have enough younger brothers and nephews to pass the seat of Winterfell to if something should go wrong with mine own marriage," Jonnel replied. "I should instead look to what I can do as father's future heir, as none would follow my brother, even if he were to recover."
I doubted he would, and for that I blamed myself. If anything, the butterflies of my medics drew out his death much longer than they should have, and with it drew out his lingering existence. I can only hope his ending will be as painless as possible given his condition. "What would you do first?" I asked.
"Implement more of what you have shown me, Lord Wytch. Windbreaks for fields most susceptible to drier winds, the growing of beans, peas or clover for livestock in fallow fields, and replanting suitable orchards or tree plantations where fields or pastures are unlikely to grow well."
"All good things to start with, and that is just what can be done with what you already have," I said with a nod. Jonnel had taken well to these lessons, I think even more than Baelor had, but for all that he drove himself, not even Baelor and the smallfolk under his care faced the prospects that Northmen did if either their crops or their plans failed.
"Rotate our other crops, or grow those together that I have seen do well together," Jonnel continued, his words rolling off his tongue as if he had been practicing them for moons now. Likely he had, just to convince his father that such newfangled ideas would be for the benefit of the North, and not some southron folly that might doom them.
"Despite the goodwill I've achieved with Lord Stark, I must admit your father is a hard man, and an especially hard man to predict, though given how he became Lord of Winterfell this should not have surprised me. After meeting me just once in my own home, a peacetime journey southward no Stark had taken since potentially Bran the Builder himself, your father had the idea to foster you, his second son, with me. No Stormlands house had ever fostered a Northman as far as any records show, not even a Stark, and that has induced disbelief and intrigue across both kingdoms."
"Aye, my father is hard to predict, like a coming winter storm. He is not entirely unreasonable, and I believe the growing of beans, squash and corn together will be an easy idea for him to accept, especially in gardens of the smallfolk. I might have to convince him that the smallfolk outside the walls will need personal plots for such crops, untaxed as well to encourage them to plant them."
"The north taxes gardens?" I asked. I'd never done so, and as far as records showed my father never had, but Westeros was huge. There could be any number of taxes or tithes I'd never heard of being collected by noble houses, potentially for generations at this point. Was I the odd one out for not doing so?
"Yes, but not when times are hard," Jonnel replied. "You do not?"
"No," I replied, equally flabbergasted and intrigued. It would seem I had more to speak with Mylenda about when I returned home. "I see gardens as a place where smallfolk may grow anything additional for the sake of securing more food or production for themselves, be it coops for chickens, geese and turkeys for their meat and feathers, or for rabbits for their furs, and so on and so forth. I suppose you could say I include the garden as part of the tax for the land they dwell upon, but I have never collected any tax specifically for gardens. At the very least, I have never collected any portion of their produce for such a tax."
"In the North, where food can become much scarcer, much easier, I suppose it was created as a way to ensure that larders would be full enough by having those better able of preserving the foods keeping them in safer storage," Jonnel replied, rubbing his chin in thought. "It would make sense that a lord with, say, a salt mine, would have the coin and resources to better build a larder for salting and storing meat than, say, a group of farmers or fishermen would."
"I see." Actually, I could see several problems with that line of thinking, but some of what he said did hold some weight.
"Any changes to the way of life of my people must come slowly, surely, like that of the eventual approach of winter, or a glacier's movement. In time, perhaps ours might not be so readily on the edge of a knife, where the winters will no longer outlast our larders and we might be able to no longer need to import any grain from the Reach, much as the Stormlands does."
I'd not foreseen just how angry some of the Reach lords were with how little they could export to the Stormlands these days, but the smarter houses had already begun to branch out. Finer flour, more exotic crops, attempts at foreign spices and greater herds of livestock were only some of the more recent rumors from that kingdom. My Reach trade partners were informative, but there was only so much they could or were willing to tell me. "It will only be a matter of time until that is true for most of the kingdoms, if not all," I replied. "At the very least, once more and more of the North has the plows and seed drills, it will be easier to support the Night's Watch, or better yet, allow them to support themselves."
"Aye, if the wildling raids don't drive off all the smallfolk by then. The raids have grown worse according to my father's last letter, but nothing we haven't seen before. If a wildling has claimed the title of king, then neither we nor the Nights Watch have heard anything about it."
The wildlings raiding for supplies never made sense to me, given that there were no easy routes over or through, and that wasn't even counting the legends of the wildlings lost in the caves beneath the Wall. If they must climb up and over the ice wall, and then back over it after raiding, then why raid for food? Other supplies I could understand, but they don't have ships like Ironborn do, so they could only raid for what they could carry, and that much more weight on the ropes over the wall wouldn't be really all that feasible…
"I know little of Wildlings, and what I have heard is likely twisted by retellings, but are they not a tribal people? Could contact be established with those living nearest the Wall to broker some kind of peace?"
Jonnel paused for a moment, looked at me, and laughed. Not chuckled, not giggled, but outright laughed, deep and bellowing, as if I had told the greatest joke in the world. I had seen him laugh like this all of three times in the entire time I had been fostering him, so to say I was shocked was a bit of an understatement.
"Lord Wytch," he said, wiping a tear from his eye, "the Nights Watch have long made truces with whatever tribes dwelt closest to the Wall, but every time a tribe made peace with them, one of three things would occur. The displeased members of the tribe would overthrow the chief for making peace, or they would abandon the tribe en masse, weakening the former against their enemies. Those same enemies would often attack them for 'daring to make peace with kneelers' as they call us. Whatever tribes made peace and survived these ordeals would then break the peace themselves, either out of self-preservation, or from bitterness of peace with the Nights Watch bringing such misfortune upon their heads."
"Surely there has been some sort of peace that didn't bring such calamity?"
"Certainly, here and there perhaps, but if these tribes somehow made peace long enough to be allowed into the North, they were absorbed by whatever houses were nearest the Wall. Their cultures and tongue faded within generations just by fact of being outnumbered so greatly by those they suddenly lived beside, and the ones still north of the Wall came to hate it, with some claiming it 'ate' the souls of those who ventured south, what with turning them into kneelers. Come to think of it, Umbers might have descended from one of these tribes, but old gods help you if you insinuate it wasn't a tale where some Umber lad found and made a wildling woman his wife through 'rustic Northern charm' or something equally ridiculous. Any claims of a wildling man in their direct lineage and you're liable to lose a few teeth, if not worse."
"I… see," I replied, realizing just how little thought I'd given to the 'True North' all these years, having far too much on my plate to gaze that far. Issues with the wildlings ran deeper than I thought, almost as deep as that cave whose name I cannot remember which may or may not be filled with the Westerosi equivalents of wildling CHUDs. "Yet if a peace was to be made, one founded on trade rather than trying to rule them, would that work?"
"What do you mean?" Jonnel asked.
"If the North came to no longer fear long winters, being finally able to produce enough food for itself and then some, would it be possible to neuter the threat of wildling raids by trading food for whatever goods they might have? Rare or exotic furs, walrus and mammoth ivory, anything of that sort?"
Jonnel rubbed his chin in thought, his singular eye focused on the fire. "Perhaps, but it would take more convincing of the northern lords and Nights Watch alike than what I am capable of. The thought of trading with the wild folk will not sit right with even the most open-minded of Northmen, given how many of them have suffered either directly or through some ancient battle their ancestors participated in. Even my father, as respected as he is, would face great backlash were he to suggest something like that unless there was serious benefits for all involved on this side of the Wall. Trust me, Lord Wytch, many lords and ladies have given this thought throughout the ages, and almost always these plans come back to bite them in the ass."
"Well, if there is ever a lord capable of at least forwarding the idea to the North as a whole, your father is one of the few that could do it without causing a revolt," I said. "Whatever the case may be, appeasing doesn't work, but making the wildlings dependent on you would at least open avenues through which they could be managed or at least reasoned with. I doubt the ways of Westeros will ever extend past the Wall, but if the tribes nearest the Wall can at least be traded with, then they can be a buffer against tribes further north still."
"The Skagosi and Bear Islanders would be most displeased with that, as would any lords with lands that run near the Wall and the Gifts. If any tribes wished to leave the lands north of the Wall behind, they would need to be disarmed and made a part of whatever lands they settled in, if any lords would even take them. Not even the Nights Watch would be liable to allow them to the settle either of the Gifts, as the chance of them smuggling supplies to other tribes north of the Wall or attempts at sabotage on behalf of their fellows would be suspicions too ingrained to overcome."
"Well, should the North manage to at least grow enough food for itself, what of its fleets? As you have seen, the trading company between myself and other houses has been expanding a port for the main branch of House Connington. Our fleet will eventually be liable to trade in White Harbor, and I can't imagine the Manderlys would pass up the control of trade flowing out of the North."
"The North has no fleets," Jonnel said. "You can thank Brandon the Shipwright, whose disappearance led to his son, Brandon the Burner, to burn the shipyards and ships of the North. Since then, we make do with whatever ships we have managed to build despite our lack of facilities, or the fleets of others we have paid for at exorbitant prices."
"Well, the time will come, sooner than later, for the North to have ships, and in the end making your own will become cheaper than paying sellsails," I replied. "When that time comes, be it during your own potential rule as Lord of Winterfell, or that of your descendants, it is best to get started on it early. I can have the plans I have drawn for Lord Connington sent with the Manderlys and whatever Northern houses have the innate need of ships, such as the Mormonts. With them, they might be able to build harbors and have the means for making fleets of their own without incurring costs that could beggar their houses."
"That is a very kind gesture, Lord Wytch, and one that my father will most certainly not approve of," Jonnel countered. "He would see it as a southron lord interfering with the affairs of the North. He may hold you in high regard, hence my fosterage, but even he has his limits when it comes to the likes of outsiders."
I raised my hands in defeat, knowing when I was unlikely to make further progress as our meals were brought to us. "I will try to discuss the matter with him personally at the king's wedding, but if what you say is true, then I have little hope of succeeding where generations of others have failed. As it is, however, our journey to Storm's End will be an early start. Best enjoy your chicken now, Jonnel, while it is still hot, as we will be unlikely to break our fast with little more than pork sausages and bread tomorrow."