“There is time enough for talk on the morrow.”  When the morrow came, most of the morning was given over to talk of grains and greens and salting meat. Once the maesters in their Citadel¹ had proclaimed the first of autumn, wise men put away a portion of each harvest... though how large a portion was a matter that seemed to require much talk. Lady Hornwood was storing a fifth of her harvest. At Maester Luwin’s suggestion, she vowed² to increase that to a quarter.  “Bolton’s bastard⁴ is massing men at the Dreadfort,” she warned them. “I hope he means to take them south to join his father at the Twins, but when I sent to ask his intent, he told me that no Bolton would be questioned by a woman. As if he were trueborn and had a right to that name.”  “Lord Bolton has never acknowledged the boy, so far as I know,” Ser Rodrik said. “I confess, I do not know him.”  “Few do,” she replied. “He lived with his mother until two years past, when young Domeric died and left Bolton without an heir. That was when he brought his bastard to the Dreadfort. The boy is a sly creature by all accounts, and he has a servant who is almost as cruel as he is. Reek⁵, they call the man. It’s said he never bathes. They hunt together, the Bastard and this Reek, and  not for deer. I’ve heard tales, things I can scarce believe, even of a Bolton. And now that my lord husband and my sweet son have gone to the gods, the Bastard looks at my lands hungrily.”  Bran wanted to give the lady a hundred men to defend her rights, but Ser Rodrik only said, “He may look, but should he do more I promise you there will be dire⁶ retribution. You will be safe enough, my lady... though perhaps in time, when your grief is passed, you may find it prudent⁷ to wed³ again.”  “I am past my childbearing years, what beauty I had long fled,” she replied with a tired half smile, “yet men come

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