"I'm afraid we can't help you," Dany said with an apologetic smile, explaining, "We just returned from King's Landing and are heading north."
Seeing the small friar's face fall with disappointment, she pointed to the wolf corpses and said, "Brother, do you want these wolves?"
"Yes, yes, of course we do—we're short on food," the old man pulling the cart called out eagerly.
Over a hundred people cheered and rushed to the riverbank, beginning to skin and butcher the wolves.
But when Dany saw a peasant woman draining the blood directly, she quickly hurried over to stop her and called out loudly, "Don't waste the blood—it can be used to make blood sausages!"
The Dothraki loved blood sausages, but in Westeros and the Free Cities, she rarely saw anyone making them.
"How did these wolves die? Not a single wound—so strange," someone murmured in confusion.
As she taught a few women how to make blood sausages by hand, Dany casually made something up, "See that red-nosed old man? Look at the chain around his neck—forty links in total. He's a poison master. But don't worry, that poison is harmless to humans."
Ser Barristan Selmy glanced at her with a blank face but said nothing.
Though inwardly criticizing the Dragon Queen as a deceitful sorceress, he was nonetheless astonished at how naturally she mingled with the ragged peasant women.
She wasn't faking it. In this kind of environment, where no one knew who she was, she had no reason to pretend to be close to commoners to win their hearts. Yet her expression—her smile—was sincere, not forced in the slightest.
If she had no magic, no dragons, she truly would be a good queen, the old knight sighed.
But then he smiled bitterly and shook his head. A deposed princess, just a young girl in her teens—without those mysterious powers, she would hardly have survived, let alone restored her dynasty.
There's strength in numbers. Over forty wolves were finally turned into smoked meat, strings of blood sausages, and more than forty wolfskin cloaks after two exhausting hours of work.
The women and children directly draped the still-bloody pelts over their shoulders. The autumn wind was bleak and the weather cold—a single hemp robe wasn't nearly enough for warmth.
Afterward, Dany and her companions joined the gathering of poor folk. The old maester was placed on a cart padded with burlap sacks, squeezed in beside a heap of blood sausages.
Through chatting, Dany learned where this group came from.
They had come from Saltpans in the east, following the Trident westward until reaching the Kingsroad a few kilometers away, and from there, heading south to King's Landing.
"Sigh, we didn't want to leave our home either," the old man pulling the cart said sorrowfully. "But two months ago, there was a light snowfall in our village. Winter's coming fast, and we have barely any food stored.
That one cow, ten sheep, a few sacks of barley, and half a cart of turnips—that's all the food the whole village had. If we didn't go to King's Landing, we'd starve to death!"
"Saltpans is a small port after all. There should still be work there, no?" Barristan asked, puzzled.
A burly man spat and cursed, "Don't mention it—Saltpans is ruined. Nothing's left except that dog Quincy Cox's stone castle. The rest was burned to the ground by bandits brought in by the Hound.
That damn beast Clegane—he kills everyone he sees, rapes any woman he catches, burns down every house, spares neither infants nor septas."
"Clegane has fallen that far?" The old knight widened his eyes in disbelief.
"Then why do you curse Ser Cox?" he asked again.
Saltpans sat along the Trident, with a small dock connecting the inland river to the bay. It was the fief of Ser Cox, a landed knight.
"That old bastard didn't care whether the townsfolk lived or died. When the bandits attacked, not only did he not send his soldiers to resist, he even shut the gates of his castle and wouldn't let us in to take shelter," a young man said angrily.
"Shh, someone's there," Dany's pupils narrowed. She took a shortbow from a nearby "Beggar Brother," and with a sharp twang, an arrow struck a crooked tree in the grove.
A man in gray leather armor slid down from the trunk like lightning and darted silently into the forest.
"Damn, must've been a bandit scout," a tall woman in the group cursed.
"Is the Riverlands really this chaotic?" Barristan murmured.
"Sigh, there are desperate refugees everywhere—deserters, bandits. Without a dozen brothers to back us up, we wouldn't dare step outside," the scrawny friar said with a sigh.
"Staying inside doesn't help either. Lions from the west, wolf cubs from the north—they take turns raiding our village for food and women, and the king does nothing about it," the old man shook his head.
"The king is useless. Only if we band together and build our own strength can we protect ourselves and our families," the small friar said passionately, waving his fist.
"Yes, our own strength!" A Starry Warrior pounded his chest and began loudly chanting scripture, with others gradually joining in.
Just like the first time they met—unified, in unison, their voices rolled like waves into the distance.
And truth be told, the Beggar Army's routine worked surprisingly well.
Along the way, they encountered several groups of bandits hiding in the woods. Their greedy eyes roamed over the water buffalo, goats, and the smoked wolf meat carried by the brothers. But in the end, faced with the overwhelming fervor of their prayers, the bandits backed off.
After walking another two kilometers west, the forest thinned, and they came across the first corpse.
It hung from a charred black tree branch.
As the loudly praying procession drew near, carrion crows that had been pecking at the man's face scattered with caws.
Dany saw that the lower legs near the ground were stripped to bare white bone with only a few scraps of cloth remaining. There were bite marks from sharp teeth on the bones.
The corpse's face was a horrifying grayish-green. Its mouth had been pried open, and someone had shoved a rough chunk of white stone between its teeth.
"Salt," Barristan said grimly.
Another few dozen meters down, they found the second corpse. This one had been pulled down by scavengers, its remains scattered across the withered grass. A tattered noose still swung from a branch above.
A boy of about ten tripped and nearly fell, accidentally unearthing a half-buried helmet. Inside was a decaying head, crawling with maggots and small black beetles.
On top of the helmet was a lion's head sigil.
"A lion's helmet—fine steel," the burly man picked it up, knocked the rotten head and bugs off on a tree trunk, and said, "No rust, no dents. Clean it up, it's still usable."
As they continued forward, every few steps brought them face-to-face with one or more corpses. This continued all the way to the intersection—stretching nearly a kilometer—where about a hundred to two hundred bodies lay.
They hung from tree branches, nooses around their necks, their bodies swollen, cheeks pecked by crows, swaying beneath the trees. Every mouth was stuffed with salt.
Many had crests sewn onto their chests—an ice wolf, an axe, arrows and salmon, a pine tree, an oak leaf, a squat rooster, a wild boar's head.The sigils of nearly every noble house in the North, the Riverlands, and the West could be found here.
"By the Seven, were they all deserters who turned to banditry?" the White Knight asked grimly.
"These are the ones who looted Saltpans," the small monk replied. "They were captured by Lord Tarly and hanged in this forest to warn other outlaws."
Then the group set foot on the Kingsroad—the main highway of Westeros, a five-meter-wide muddy road.
The yellow dirt road stretched to a small dock by the river, where a few ferries were moored. There was also an inn by the roadside.
It was a three-story stone building nestled beside the Trident River, facing east with its back to the west. The Kingsroad passed right by its front door, and from afar, a white stone chimney could be seen rising from its side.
As they approached, Dany was surprised to see that the southern wing extended out over the river, with half the building supported by stone pillars in the water.
If travelers wished, they could even open a window, lie in bed, cast a fishing line into the river, and catch a few trout.
On the north side of the inn stood a thatched cowshed and a bell tower, the entire compound surrounded by a crumbling white stone wall.
The three of them parted ways with the group of poor folk by the inn. Before leaving, the White Knight quietly handed the monk a pouch of gold dragons. "King's Landing is 600 kilometers from here—it'll take over a month on foot. This food won't last you."
The inn's yard was a large patch of brown, soggy mud. Dany hesitated at the gate for a long while, then clenched her teeth and stepped in.
An old gallows stood in the middle of the yard, and a small boy was swinging back and forth on its rusted chains.
Four girls stood in the porch watching him. The youngest was just two or three years old, with a bowl cut and no clothes, crawling around on the ground.
The oldest was around ten, with brown hair and eyes, skinny as a stick, pale-faced, wearing a worn blue dress. As she saw Dany and the others approach, she instantly stepped protectively in front of the younger children.
"Who are you?"
Barristan clutched his backside, limping and snapping irritably, "Guests, of course! Go get your mother and have her prepare a basin of hot water."
"I don't have a mother. She was killed," the girl in the blue dress replied, visibly uneasy.
"Little one, where's the innkeeper?" Dany asked with a warm smile.
The girl was affected by her gentle tone. She looked at Dany curiously and said, "My sister Janny is the innkeeper. She went to the river to fetch fish. We've set nets there and usually catch a few trout every morning."
"You're very pretty, miss. Even in men's clothes, you look beautiful," the little girl added, blushing.
"Heh, armor isn't just for men," Dany shook her head and asked, "What's your name?"
"Willow. My name is Willow. Miss, are you here to eat or stay the night? Oh, do you have any silver coins?"
"We're only staying one night. A single silver coin should cover it, shouldn't it? What, are you trying to rob us?" the old maester growled angrily.
Willow glanced at Dany, gritted her teeth, and insisted, "Not one—at least three. We need money to buy food."
"Fine, three it is. Prices do rise in times of chaos," Dany said, walking under the porch. She found a stick near the steps and scraped the mud from her iron boots before stepping onto the wooden floor. Looking at the little girl rolling around on the ground, she frowned. "Isn't she cold? Why isn't your sister wearing any clothes?"
Willow shook her head and said, "The fireplace is burning inside. It's warm. And as you can see, Trissy loves crawling on the floor—her clothes get filthy and torn up."
Lifting the little girl, she headed inside while saying, "Trissy isn't my sister. Some of them were brought here by the Sparrows, some came on their own. They're all poor children without parents."
"Them?"
Willow whistled. Like magic, in the blink of an eye, ragged, unkempt boys and girls emerged from under tables, by window sills, beside the fireplace, and in the stairwell.Several older girls clutched cocked crossbows tightly, while the boys held slingshots or stones.
All of them were "fully armed."
"Are you really trying to rob us?" Barristan exclaimed.
Willow shot him a glance, then stood tall like a queen in a castle and commanded the orphans loudly, "Put down your weapons—they're not enemies.Watt, boil some water. Will, go to the river and find Janny, tell her we have guests. Daisy, Pet, fetch some firewood for the hearth. I'll take them to see the rooms."
The doors along the corridor stood open, allowing Dany to choose freely. From the second floor to the third, all the rooms were empty.
Barristan frowned. "I was here two years ago—it was nearly full."
"There aren't many guests now," Willow replied. "These days, the only ones on the road are Sparrows or bandits. The former have no money, and the latter steal ours."
(End of chapter)
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