Jon Flint
One day had passed since Tanya Snow's body was found, and nothing had changed.
Jon followed Robb through the corridors of Winterfell toward their father's solar. A servant had found them in the training yard twenty minutes ago, breathless and apologetic for the interruption. Lord Stark wanted them. Now.
The door to the solar stood slightly ajar. Firelight flickered through the gap, throwing dancing shadows across the hallway floor. Jon heard voices inside and exchanged a glance with Robb before pushing the door open.
He'd expected Father. He hadn't expected the room to be this full.
Lord Anden Flint stood near the window, his massive frame blocking most of the grey afternoon light that struggled through the glass. Even with his back to the room, he dominated it. Three meters of muscle and legend, arms crossed over a chest that could have served as a battering ram. His great-axe leaned against the wall beside him.
Uncle Benjen sat in a chair near the hearth, his scarred throat visible above his collar. He looked tired, but his eyes were awake.
And Father sat behind his desk, expression grim, grey eyes heavy with something that looked like defeat. Maps of the Wolfswood spread across the table before him, weighed down at the corners by candlesticks and a dagger. Red marks dotted the parchment, probably search areas that had already been covered.
"Close the door," Ned said.
Robb did.
"Sit."
They sat down.
"Jory returned an hour ago," Ned began. "He and the hounds found nothing."
Jon felt the words land like stones in his stomach.
"Nothing?" Robb leaned forward. "They searched the entire area?"
"Wide perimeter around where the body was found. No tracks. No camps. No trace of whoever killed that woman." Ned's fingers drummed once against the desk, then stilled. "Whoever this hunter is, he knows how to disappear."
"The killer is skilled," Anden said, his voice booming despite trying to be quiet. "This isn't some common poacher who panicked and ran. An arrow to the calf, then left to die in the snow. He must have used the river to disguise his scent from the hounds."
"Could be... ex-soldier." Benjen's rasping voice was heard. Each word cost him effort, but he pushed through anyway. "Deserter. Someone... trained."
Ned nodded slowly. "This isn't random violence. Whoever did this, they've done it before. Or they've been trained to do things like it."
"Does that mean he's already fled the area?" Jon asked. "If he knows we're searching..."
"For all we know, the killer is miles away by now." Ned's admission came reluctantly, like he was pulling teeth from his own mouth. "Or he's hiding somewhere we haven't thought to look. The Wolfswood is vast. A man who knows how to live off the land could stay hidden for months."
Silence settled over the room. The fire popped and hissed. Outside, wind rattled the window glass.
"We need to draw him out," Ned said finally. "I'm open to suggestions."
Robb straightened in his chair. Jon could see his brother's mind working, could practically hear the gears turning behind those Tully-blue eyes.
"Traps," Robb said. "We could set traps in the forest."
"What kind of traps?"
"Bait. Snares. Positions where archers could watch from concealment." Robb's hands moved as he spoke, sketching shapes in the air. "If we know roughly where he operates, we could—"
"The Wolfswood is too vast." Anden's voice cut through Robb's enthusiasm like an axe through kindling. "We could set a hundred traps and the killer would simply walk around them. He knows these woods, or he's learning them quickly. A man like that doesn't stumble into snares."
Robb's face fell, but only for a moment. Jon watched his brother rally, saw the determination settle back into his expression.
"If the killer is hunting people," Jon said slowly, "the forest isn't his only hunting ground."
Every eye in the room turned to him.
"What do you mean?" Ned asked.
"He found Tanya Snow somewhere. Tracked her, stalked her, drove her into the woods." Jon met his father's gaze. "The forest is where he kills. But it's not where he finds his victims."
Anden made a low sound of approval. "The boy has a point. Hunters don't wait in the wilderness hoping prey wanders past. They go where the prey already is."
"Wintertown," Benjen rasped.
Jon nodded. "Or the farms nearby. Somewhere he can watch without being noticed. Somewhere he can choose."
Wintertown was full of people. Full of women who worked late or walked home alone or had routines that could be observed and exploited.
Robb spoke again, and this time his voice was hesitant. "What if we used someone as bait?"
Ned's head snapped toward his heir. "What?"
"A woman. Walking alone near the forest edge at dusk." Robb's words came faster now, tumbling out before he could second-guess them. "We'd have soldiers hidden nearby, ready to spring when the killer appears. He wouldn't know it was a trap until—"
"Absolutely not." Ned's voice was ice. "I will not endanger my people. Not for this. Not for anything."
"But we'd be right there," Robb pressed. "Close enough to—"
"The killer uses an arrow, Robb." Ned stood, planting his hands on the desk, leaning forward. "What happens when he aims for the throat this time instead of the leg? What happens when we're thirty feet away and he puts a broadhead through her neck before we can take a single step? By the time we reached her, she'd already be dead."
Robb went pale. His mouth opened, closed, opened again. No words came out.
Jon felt a strange mix of sympathy and frustration. Robb's plan wasn't stupid, not entirely. But it was the plan of someone who'd never seen a woman die. Who'd never held a body and felt how light it was, how empty.
"Father is right," Jon said quietly.
Robb turned to him, something like betrayal flickering across his face.
"The people of Wintertown are looking to us for protection," Jon continued. "We went to Harren's door. We carried his daughter's body into his home. We made promises. I made promises."
He paused, letting that sink in.
"If we use one of their women as bait and she dies... it won't matter that we were trying to catch a killer. It won't matter that we had good intentions. All they'll see is another body. Another failure. Another reason to believe that we can't protect them." Jon shook his head. "The people's trust is fragile. It took years to build, one candle and one ice house at a time. One more death under our watch, and that trust shatters."
"The boy speaks sense," Anden said finally. "Trust is harder to rebuild than walls. Once broken, some never mend at all."
Benjen made a rasping sound that might have been agreement. "Trust... binds... the North. Without it... we're just... cold strangers... sharing snow."
Ned sank back into his chair. The anger had drained out of him, leaving something worse behind. Exhaustion. Frustration. The weight of a problem with no good solutions.
"Then what do we do?" Robb asked. His voice was smaller now, the confidence stripped away. "Just... keep searching? Wait for him to kill again?"
"For now, yes." Ned's words came reluctantly. "Continue the search with hounds. Expand the perimeter. Post additional guards along the Wintertown road and the forest edges. If anyone sees a stranger acting oddly, they report immediately."
"That's not a plan," Robb said. "That's just... waiting."
"I know." Ned looked at his eldest son. "But I won't trade innocent lives for the chance to catch one guilty man. That's not who we are. That's not what it means to be Stark."
The meeting ended shortly after. No plan made. No solution found. Just more guards, more searching, more hoping that luck would deliver what skill could not.
Jon rose from his chair and followed Robb toward the door. His mind was already elsewhere, already turning over possibilities that he couldn't voice in this room. Conventional methods wouldn't work. His father was too honorable, too unwilling to take risks with innocent lives. Those were admirable qualities in a lord.
But they wouldn't catch this killer.
"Jon."
He stopped at the door and turned. Lord Anden was looking at him, those black eyes unreadable.
"A word."
Robb glanced between them, then shrugged and continued into the hallway. The door closed behind him with a soft click.
Anden crossed the room, stopping close enough that Jon had to crane his neck to meet his gaze. Up close, Jon could see the scars that mapped his great-grandfather's face.
"You have something," Anden said. Not a question.
Jon hesitated. "I don't know what you mean."
"Don't lie to me, boy. I've known you since you were small enough to carry on my shoulder. I can see when your mind is working." Anden's voice dropped lower. "You have something. A plan your father wouldn't approve of."
Jon said nothing.
"Good." Anden's massive hand landed on Jon's shoulder, heavy as a millstone. "Sometimes the right thing and the honorable thing aren't the same. Ned knows this, even if he can't act on it. He's the Lord of Winterfell. He has to be seen following the rules."
"And me?"
"You're the heir to Breakstone Hill." Anden's grip tightened, then released. "Do what needs to be done. Keep it quiet. And when you find this hunter..."
He didn't finish the sentence.
Jon held his great-grandfather's gaze for a long moment. Then he nodded once and left the solar.
The corridor was empty. Robb had already gone, probably to brood or train or do whatever he did when a conversation had left him feeling useless. Jon didn't follow him.
Instead, he turned toward the kitchens. He had a direwolf to feed.
And after that, he had a killer to catch.
The air in the alley behind Ross's brothel smelled of rotting vegetables and piss, the particular stink of a place where men relieved themselves rather than walk the extra twenty feet to a proper privy. Jon pulled his plain wool cloak tighter and pressed his back against the timber wall, waiting for the drunk stumbling past to disappear around the corner.
No guards tonight. No Robb. Just Jon in clothes that could have belonged to any merchant's son, his face half-hidden beneath a hood that smelled faintly of the stables where he'd grabbed it.
The back door was unlocked, as it always was for him. He slipped through into the narrow servants' corridor, past the kitchen where a cook was scrubbing pots and humming something tuneless, up the cramped staircase that led to Ross's private rooms. The wood creaked under his boots.
He knocked twice, then once.
The door opened.
Ross stood in the gap, her red hair loose around her shoulders, her green eyes already searching his face for whatever had brought him here at this hour. She wore a simple dress of pale green wool, nothing like the silks she wore when working.
"I heard about the body," she said, stepping aside to let him in. "And about the oath you made to the blacksmith."
The room was warm. A fire burned low in the small hearth, and candles, his candles. A pitcher of wine sat on the table between two cups, already poured. She'd been expecting him.
Jon lowered his hood and crossed to the table. "What are the people saying?"
"That there's a killer in the Wolfswood." Ross closed the door and leaned against it, arms crossed. "Women are frightened. Some of them won't walk alone anymore, not even in daylight. The farmers' wives are keeping their daughters inside. The taverns empty an hour earlier than usual."
Jon picked up one of the wine cups but didn't drink. "And what else?"
"That Jon Flint will find him." A small smile played at the corner of her mouth. "Your oath to Harren has spread through every tavern and shop in Wintertown. By tomorrow it'll reach the outlying farms. By the end of the week, they'll be singing songs about it."
He set the cup down harder than he meant to. Wine sloshed over the rim, staining the wood.
Ross's expression softened. She crossed to him, her bare feet silent on the floor, and laid a hand on his arm. Her fingers were warm through his sleeve.
"They trust you," she said quietly. "Don't let that burden crush you."
Too late for that.
"Have you heard anything unusual?" he asked. "Anyone new in town? Anyone acting strangely?"
Ross shook her head. "Nothing odder than usual. A few new faces among the traveling merchants, but none that raised concerns. My girls have been watching since the soldiers came asking questions yesterday. If there was something to find, we'd have found it."
"Then he's careful."
Jon stared at the lights below. His mind was turning, examining possibilities, discarding them, circling back. The killer hunted women. Stalked them. Learned their routines before driving them into the forest. That meant he watched them first. Studied them. Found them somewhere.
Where did men go to watch women?
The answer was obvious.
"I'm going to ask you something," Jon said slowly. "And I'll pay you well for it."
Ross raised an eyebrow. "I'm listening."
"Tomorrow night. Spread word that everything is half-price."
Both eyebrows now, climbing toward her hairline. "Half-price? You want me to lose money?"
"I'll cover the difference." Jon looked at her, his purple eyes meeting her green ones, and saw pink spreading across her cheeks. "Every copper you'd lose, I'll replace. What I want is a packed house."
Ross studied him for a long moment.
"The killer hunts women," Jon said. "Targets them. Stalks them. He has to find them somewhere before he drives them into the woods."
Understanding began to dawn in her green eyes.
"Where better than a brothel?" Jon continued. "A place full of women. Many of them alone, many walking home late at night through empty streets. If the killer is still in the area, if he hasn't fled like Father thinks, he'll come here. Either for pleasure, or to scout his next victim." He paused. "Probably both."
Ross was quiet for several breaths. The fire popped. Outside, someone shouted something incomprehensible, and another voice shouted back.
"I see the logic," she said finally. "But I have a condition."
"Name it."
"I will not put my girls in danger." Her voice had gone hard, the same voice she had used the first time he made a deal with her. "Whatever you're planning, whatever trap you're setting, my girls come first. If this goes wrong..."
"It won't."
"If it goes wrong," she repeated, "and one of my girls gets hurt, I'll never forgive you. And neither will Wintertown."
Jon met her gaze steadily. "I'll have soldiers stationed nearby. Flint men, not Stark men. They'll watch every entrance. If any of your girls become suspicious of a client, she gives a signal. Red cloth waved from the window. My men move immediately, find that room, and take whoever she's with."
Ross considered this. "And if she can't safely reach the window?"
"You keep sleeping draughts for difficult customers."
A flicker of surprise crossed her face. She hadn't expected him to know that.
"If a girl suspects her client is the killer but can't signal, she puts the draught in his wine. He won't wake up until he's in chains. Still, I don't think he will try something, if he tries it in a public place like a brothel, then he must know that he won't be able to run away this time without drawing too much attention to himself." Jon smiled, and it wasn't a pleasant smile. "I've had practice thinking these things through."
Ross was silent for a long time. The candles flickered. The fire settled, sending a small cascade of sparks up the chimney.
"Alright," she said at last. "Tomorrow night. Half-price. I'll brief my girls on what to watch for." She began counting on her fingers. "A man who asks too many questions about the girls' schedules. A man who seems more interested in watching than participating. A man who..."
"A man with cold eyes," Jon finished.
Ross nodded slowly. "A man with cold eyes."
Jon reached into his cloak and pulled out a leather purse heavy with coin. He pressed it into her hand, feeling her fingers close around it.
"For the price difference," he said. "And for the risk."
She weighed the purse without looking inside, then set it on the table beside the wine. When she turned back to him, her expression had shifted into something harder to read.
"You're playing a dangerous game, Jon Flint." She stepped closer, close enough that he could smell the lavender oil she used in her hair. "Laying traps for killers. Using whores as bait, even willing ones. This isn't what honorable man are supposed to do."
"I'm not an honorable man."
"No." Her hand came up to rest against his chest, just above his heart. "You are what we all need."
She kissed him. Jon kissed her back.
The kiss deepened, hungry and demanding. Jon's hands found her waist, fingers digging into the soft flesh hard enough to leave marks. Ross gasped against his mouth, and he swallowed the sound, pushing her backward until her shoulders hit the wall beside the hearth.
He's different tonight, she thought, feeling the bruising grip of his fingers. Something's burning in him.
She didn't mind. She never did.
Jon broke the kiss to drag his mouth down her throat, teeth scraping, tongue feeling wonderful. His hands moved up her ribs, rough and impatient, cupping the heavy weight of her breasts. He squeezed hard, thumbs finding her nipples through the thin shift she still wore, and Ross's head fell back against the timber.
"Ahhhn—"
He yanked the shift over her head, baring her completely. Firelight painted her skin in shades of gold and amber, shadows pooling in the valley between her breasts, the dip of her navel, the soft curve of her belly. Her red hair tumbled wild around her shoulders, bright as copper against pale skin.
Jon stepped back just long enough to pull his own tunic off. The firelight caught the lean muscle of his chest, the narrow hips, the hard line of his cock jutting forward, thick and flushed dark with blood. Ross's eyes dropped to it, her tongue wetting her lower lip.
"On the bed," he said. It was an order.
She went, crawling onto the mattress on hands and knees, looking back over her shoulder at him with those green eyes half-lidded and wanting. The position put her ass on display, round and full, and Jon was on her before she could settle.
His hands grabbed her hips, hauled her back against him. She felt the hot length of his cock slide between her thighs, dragging through the slick wetness already gathered there, and her whole body shuddered.
"Fuck," she breathed. "Jon—"
He didn't let her finish. One hand left her hip, wrapped around his shaft, and guided himself to her entrance. The thick head pressed against her cunt, stretched her open, and then he thrust forward in one brutal stroke that buried him to the hilt.
"NNGHH—!" Ross's fingers clawed at the sheets, her back arching, her toes curling. He was big, gods he was big, and he never gave her time to adjust.
She loved it.
Jon set a punishing pace from the start. His hips snapped forward, driving his cock deep into her clenching heat, then pulled back until only the head remained inside before slamming home again.
"Ahh—ahh—ahh—" Each thrust punched a sound out of her, sharp little cries that she couldn't have stopped if she'd tried.
So deep, she thought hazily, her mind going blank. He's so fucking deep—
His hand fisted in her red hair, yanked her head back. The angle changed, his cock hitting something inside her that made her vision white out like her eyes were covered in snow, and Ross screamed.
"FUCK! Oh gods, oh—nnnghh—right there, right—"
Jon didn't slow down. If anything, he fucked her harder, his grip on her hair keeping her spine arched, her tits swaying with every impact. Sweat gleamed on his chest in the firelight. His purple eyes were dark, almost black, fixed on the place where his cock disappeared into her body over and over again.
The bed didn't like what they were doing to it. The headboard knocked against the wall in a steady, damning rhythm. Ross didn't care. Let the whole brothel hear. Let them know what their mysterious benefactor did to her when the candles burned low.
She came without warning, her cunt clamping down on him like a vice, her mouth falling open in a silent scream. Her whole body shook, tremors rolling through her in waves, and still he didn't stop.
"Again," Jon growled, releasing her hair to grab both hips with bruising force. He pulled her back onto his cock as he thrust forward, doubling the impact, and Ross sobbed into the pillow.
"I can't—it's too—ahhhnnn—"
Her protests dissolved into incoherent moaning. She could feel another peak building already, impossible and overwhelming, her oversensitive flesh screaming at the continued assault. Jon's cock stretched her open with every stroke, thick and relentless, and she was helpless to do anything but take it.
"So wet," he said through gritted teeth. "You're dripping down my fucking cock, Ross."
She was. She could feel it, the slick mess of her arousal coating his shaft, running down her inner thighs, soaking the sheets beneath her knees. The obscene squelching sound every time he bottomed out.
Jon's hand came down on her ass with a sharp crack. Ross yelped, her cunt clenching hard around him, and she let out a moan of pleasure.
"AGAIN!!"
He spanked her again, harder.
"AHHH—! Yes, fuck, yes—more, please, more—"
He'll ruin me, she thought wildly, pleasure making it difficult to think straight. He'll ruin me for anyone else and I don't even care.
Jon shifted his grip, one arm wrapping around her waist to haul her upright. Her back pressed against his chest, his cock still buried inside her, and the new angle made stars burst behind her eyelids. His free hand came up to cup her breast, squeezing the heavy flesh, pinching her nipple until she whined.
"Mmnnh—Jon—" Her head fell back against his shoulder, red hair spilling down his arm. "Gods, you're so—you feel so—"
His teeth found the junction of her neck and shoulder and bit down.
Ross came again, harder than before, her vision going dark. She felt her cunt spasm around him, felt the gush of wetness between her thighs, heard herself making sounds that weren't quite words anymore.
Jon fucked her through it, his pace finally stuttering as he chased his own release. His breath came harsh against her ear, his grip on her hip and breast bruising, possessive.
"Inside," she gasped. "Come inside me, Jon—fill me up—"
He slammed one last time and held, his cock pulsing deep inside her, spilling rope after rope of hot seed into her clenching cunt. Ross moaned at the sensation, the warmth spreading through her, until he groaned and his forehead dropped to her shoulder.
For a long moment, neither of them moved. The fire crackled. Their breathing slowed. Sweat cooled on their skin.
Then Jon pressed a kiss to the red mark his teeth had left on her neck, and slowly pulled out of her. Ross shivered at the sensation of his spent leaking out of her, trailing down her inner thigh.
She collapsed onto the bed, boneless and satisfied, and reached for the wine on the bedside table. Her hand shook slightly as she brought the cup to her lips. When she looked back at Jon, he was already pulling on his trousers, those purple eyes distant again.
Thinking about the killer. About tomorrow night.
Ross drained her wine in one long swallow and watched firelight play across the lean muscles of his back. Ross looked down at the cum leaking from her well fucked cunt, and for a moment, she didn't want to drink moon tea tomorrow; she wanted to carry his child. Jon Flint was more of a man than everyone else. She wouldn't mind raising his bastard children; she could almost imagine a little boy or girl walking around with her red hair and his purple eyes. It was a sight, it was a dream...and it had to stay that way.
Her mother had told her once that dreams were beautiful. Sela had been a whore too, in a smaller establishment two towns over, and she'd filled young Ross's head with stories of handsome lords who'd sweep her away to castles made of warmth and plenty. Dreams are gifts, she'd said, braiding flowers into her daughter's copper hair. The gods give them to us so we remember what beauty looks like.
Her mother had died at thirty-two, coughing blood into a rag, still waiting for her handsome lord to arrive.
She'd been wrong. Dreams weren't gifts.
Dreams were the cruelty of gods...to show you everything you desired, let you hold it close enough to feel its warmth, and then rip it away. To make you ache for things you could never have, lives you could never live, children you could never keep. The gods dangled hope like bait on a hook, and laughed when you bit down and felt the steel pierce through.
Ross pulled the furs up over her cooling body. Across the room, Jon was buckling his belt, his mind clearly elsewhere. Already thinking about tomorrow night. About killers and traps and the weight of promises he'd made to grieving fathers.
He wouldn't think about the seed he'd spilled inside her. Why would he? He was young and noble and had a thousand more important things demanding his attention. She was a comfort, a release, a warm place to empty himself when the pressure grew too great. She, too, enjoyed him more than she had enjoyed everyone else combined.
And that was fine. That was the arrangement. That was survival.
But gods, those purple eyes on a red-haired child would have been beautiful.
Ross closed her eyes and let the dream die quietly, like all the others before it.
The Following Night
The night air carried the sound of pleasure along the street, the sound that people made in moments of passion, in moments of bliss, in moments of forgiveness. In those moments, they could forget about the world and feel the pleasure of flesh and life. Jon stood in the shadows between two buildings across from Ross's brothel, his back pressed against cold timber, his breath misting white in front of his face.
The sun had been down for hours.
Eleven Flint soldiers spread out around him, positioned at angles that covered every entrance to the brothel and most of the windows, along with five hounds ready to be set free. They wore plain clothes, roughspun wool and patched leather, nothing that would mark them as soldiers. No sigils. No house colors. Just men who might have been farmers or craftsmen or the sons of farmers and craftsmen, blending into the evening crowd of Wintertown.
Jon had briefed them that afternoon in a stable outside the castle walls, away from Stark ears. Watch the brothel. Watch for the signal. Red cloth from any window means you move immediately. Find that room. Capture whoever the girl is with. He'd looked each of them in the eye as he said it, and each of them had nodded. Flint men, all of them. Loyal to Lord Anden, loyal to Jon. They wouldn't talk.
The brothel was packed.
News of half-price had spread through Wintertown like fire through dry grass. Men streamed in and out of the front entrance, some of them stumbling drunk, others trying to appear sober, but they all had one thing in common. They wore the biggest smiles of their lives. Laughter spilled from the windows along with warm candlelight and the occasional shriek of feminine delight that was often performed. Jon could tell the difference.
He recognized faces. The baker's son, a thick-necked boy Jon had spoken to just last week about flour prices. Two guards from one of the smaller holdfasts, off-duty and grinning like fools. Several merchants he'd seen haggling in the market square. A farmer who'd bought candles from the guild last month.
Normal faces. Expected faces. Men he knew, or knew of, or could have known if he'd bothered to learn their names.
Hours passed. Jon's legs ached from standing still. His feet had gone numb inside his boots despite the wool socks he'd doubled up that morning. He shifted his weight from one foot to the other, trying to restore feeling, watching the brothel door swing open and closed and open again.
Maybe I was wrong.
The thought crept in like cold through a crack in a wall. Maybe the killer had fled. Maybe he was miles away by now, laughing at the soldiers searching empty forest. Maybe Jon had spent his gold and Ross's patience on nothing but a theory.
Then he saw him.
A man approaching from the north end of the street, walking with a gait that was different from the others. Not drunk.
His hood was pulled low over his face, but Jon caught a glimpse of skin beneath it.
White. Pale as fresh snow. Unnaturally so, even for a northerner in winter.
The man reached the brothel door. The doorwoman said something to him, some greeting or joke, but he didn't laugh. Didn't even seem to hear her. Just pressed coins into her palm and slipped inside without a word.
Jon's instincts screamed.
But he didn't move. They waited for the signal. That was the plan.
The minutes stretched like hours. Jon counted his own heartbeats, lost track, started over. The cold crept deeper into his bones. His soldiers shifted in their positions, restless, watching him for a sign.
Come on. Come on.
A window on the second floor opened.
An arm appeared, pale in the lamplight, and in that hand, a red cloth waving frantically against the darkness.
Jon's heart slammed against his ribs.
"Move!"
He was already running as he said it, boots pounding against the frozen mud of the street. His soldiers converged from their positions, rushing toward the brothel entrance.
The common room was chaos. Men in various states of undress scrambled out of their way, shouting protests that Jon didn't hear. A whore screamed. Someone knocked over a table, sending cups and pitchers crashing to the floor.
Jon pushed through without slowing. The stairs. Second floor. Third window from the left.
He took the steps two at a time, his soldiers thundering behind him. The hallway at the top was narrow, lit by a single candle in a wall sconce. Doors on both sides, most of them closed. Jon counted as he ran.
First door. Second door.
Third door.
And from behind it, he heard screaming.
Not pleasure. Terror.
Jon didn't slow down. He raised his boot and kicked, putting his full weight behind it. The lock shattered. The door flew open.
Small room. A bed shoved against the wall. A nightstand with a single candle, a cup spilled on the floor with wine. And there, in the center of it, the pale man.
He had a girl pressed against him, one arm wrapped around her waist, holding her back against his chest. His other hand held a knife to her throat. The blade had already drawn blood. A thin red line traced down her neck toward her collarbone.
The girl was crying. Shaking. Her eyes met Jon's, and he saw pure terror in them.
Mira. Ross's girl. Barely twenty, with dark hair and a gap between her front teeth that made her smile memorable. Jon had spoken to her once, maybe twice. Enough to know her name.
"Back off!" The man's voice was high, but he wasn't afraid; he sounded excited. "Back off or I cut her throat!"
Jon's soldiers crowded the doorway behind him, blades half-raised. He heard their breathing, harsh and fast.
"I'll make her smile red!" The killer pressed the blade harder against Mira's neck. More blood welled up. "Smile more than she ever has in her miserable life!"
Jon's mind flashed.
Bella on the ground. Blood in the snow.
Not again.
"Everyone lower your weapons." Jon ordered.
One by one, swords clattered to the floor. The sound was loud in the small room.
The killer watched with eyes that were pale as his skin, pale as snow, pale as something dead. Wild, those eyes, but calculating too. Counting enemies. Looking for the angle.
Jon stepped forward slowly. His hands rose to shoulder height, palms open, fingers spread.
"Let her go."
The killer laughed. The sound was ugly. "And let you take me? I think not."
"Then take me instead."
The laugh died. Confusion flickered across that pale face.
"A whore is worthless," Jon said. He kept his voice even, kept walking forward, one slow step at a time. "But me? I'm Jon Flint. Heir to Breakstone Hill. Son of Lord Stark."
He could see understanding in his eyes.
"If you have me as a hostage, even Lord Stark will hesitate. You can walk out of here."
The killer's eyes narrowed. Jon could see him thinking, see the gears turning behind those dead-fish eyes.
Slowly, a smirk spread across the pale face.
"You're either very brave or very stupid, boy."
"I've been called both."
The killer laughed again, and this time there was genuine amusement in it.
"Alright." The smirk widened. "Come here. Slowly. One wrong move and I open her throat anyway."
Jon walked forward.
He let his sword slip from his grip and fall to the floor with a clang that echoed off the walls. He dropped his Kukri, too.
Closer.
Close enough to see the veins standing out in the killer's pale throat. Close enough to smell him. He smelled like a corpse...strange, he wasn't dead.
Focus.
Jon stopped within arm's reach.
The killer's eyes moved over Jon's face, searching for the trick, the trap, the hidden weapon.
Then he shoved Mira away.
She stumbled, fell, caught herself on hands and knees. Scrambled toward the soldiers without looking back.
The killer's hand shot out and grabbed Jon's collar. Strong grip. Stronger than Jon expected. He was spun around, his back pressed against the killer's chest, and then cold steel kissed his throat.
"Smart," the killer breathed in his ear. The man's breath was worse than his smell. "Now, tell your men to..."
He never finished the sentence.
Jon's left arm moved. A flex of his wrist. The spring-loaded mechanism inside his bracer activated.
Six inches of steel shot out from beneath his sleeve.
Warm blood poured down his hand.
The killer's grip loosened. The knife at Jon's throat fell away, clattering to the floor.
Jon twisted. Pulled his arm free. The blade slid out with a wet, sucking sound.
The killer dropped to his knees.
His hands went to his throat, clutching at the wound, but there was nothing to clutch. The blood came fast. Too fast. Arterial spray painting the floor, the walls, Jon's boots.
He tried to speak. Managed only bubbling gasps.
Jon looked down at him with eyes that felt as cold as the purple color they held.
"The woman you killed, her name was Tanya Snow, she was loved, and will be remembered by her loved ones... Only worms and maggots will remember you."
The killer's eyes went glassy. He swayed.
Then he fell forward. Dead before his face hit the floor.
Silence.
Then Mira's sobs broke it. She was on her knees by the door, crying in great heaving gasps, one hand pressed against the cut on her throat. Jon's soldiers stood frozen for a moment, but they quickly grabbed their swords, and one checked on the girl.
Jon looked down at his left hand. Blood dripped from his fingers, pooling on the floor. The hidden blade gleamed wetly in the candlelight. He flexed his wrist, and the mechanism clicked softly as the blade retracted back into its housing.
Mira scrambled to her feet and rushed toward him. She grabbed his hand, the clean one, and pressed it between both of hers.
"You saved me," she gasped through her tears. "You saved my life. He was going to kill me, he said he was going to cut me open and watch me bleed, he said..."
"You're safe now." Jon said with a calming voice. "You're safe."
I saved her...It didn't happen this time...I hope you are watching over me, Mother.
He looked at one of his soldiers, a man named Rodrik who had been with Lord Anden for twenty years.
"Take her to Ross. Get her somewhere quiet. Have someone tend to that cut."
Rodrik nodded and guided Mira toward the door. She went with him, still crying, still clutching at herself as if trying to hold herself together.
The room emptied. Just Jon and the corpse and the smell of blood.
Jon crouched beside the body.
Something had caught his eye. Something on the back of the killer's neck, visible now that the hood had fallen away.
Jon reached out and pushed the lank, colorless hair aside.
A scar dominated the nape of the neck. Raised. Weeping, as if it had never fully healed. A violent vertical gouge split the center, deep enough that Jon could see the ridge of scar tissue even in the dim light. A pair of jagged, diamond-shaped cuts flared out from the middle, folding back inward to scar the base of the skull.
Not a wound from battle.
This had been carved.
A brand. A mark. A symbol.
Jon stared at it. He didn't know what it meant. He didn't know who had put it there or why.
But he knew it meant something.
He stood slowly. His soldiers had gathered in the doorway again, watching him, waiting for orders.
"No one speaks of the blade," Jon ordered. "To anyone. Understood?"
They nodded.
Jon looked down at the corpse one more time. At the blood still spreading across the floor. At the pale skin already going gray.
The hunt was over.
But he had a feeling there was more to this. "Take the corpse to Winterfell, but make sure to not damage the scar. I want Maester Luwin to look at it."