A Game of Thrones ÔÇö Jon III
Castle Black hardens Jon; he turns the recruits who hated him into something like brothers, and Benjen rides north on a ranging without him.
The chapter retold
At Castle Black, Jon discovers the Night's Watch is nothing like the songs promised ÔÇö a garrison of thieves, poachers and debtors doing time rather than storied heroes holding a legendary line ÔÇö and his first instinct, wounded pride at being lumped in with criminals, curdles into something better when Ser Alliser Thorne, the master-at-arms, singles him out for cruelty in the training yard. Jon starts quietly teaching the recruits who hate him ÔÇö Pyp, Grenn and the rest ÔÇö the swordcraft his highborn education gave him for free, turning resentment into something closer to brotherhood. In the same stretch, his uncle Benjen Stark rides out on a ranging beyond the Wall without taking Jon along, a rejection Jon feels more sharply than he lets anyone see.
The chapter does the quiet work of building Jon's found family before the plot needs it ÔÇö Sam Tarly hasn't arrived yet, but the recruits Jon wins over here will matter for the rest of his story. It also plants Benjen's ranging as an open thread: rangers who go beyond the Wall in this book do not always come back on schedule, and the uncle who might have explained Jon's parentage rides off into the one place no letter can follow him.
This movement: The Road South
- A catspaw with a Valyrian dagger comes for the sleeping Bran; Catelyn's hands and Summer's teeth stop him.
- On the kingsroad, Joffrey's cruelty costs Mycah his life, Sansa her wolf, and Arya her innocence.
- Jon takes the black and finds the Watch is boys and broken men; Tyrion goes along to piss off the edge of the world.
- Catelyn rides south in secret with the dagger ÔÇö and in a crossroads inn, arrests Tyrion Lannister.