A Storm of Swords ÔÇö Bran IV

At the Nightfort the black gate opens for a brother's words; Sam the Slayer keeps Bran's secret and sends him north through the Wall to find the three-eyed crow.

The chapter retold

At the ancient, abandoned castle of the Nightfort, the long-sealed Black Gate ÔÇö older than the Wall's nineteen manned castles, older than the Watch's current memory of its own purpose ÔÇö opens for words only a scion of the First Men's old blood can speak. Bran Stark's party has reached it more by necessity than plan, and it is Samwell Tarly, of all people, who they find waiting there, having already puzzled out enough of the castle's secrets to know what Bran is and where he needs to go.

Sam keeps Bran's identity and his strange abilities secret from the rest of the Watch rather than reporting them, and instead helps send him north beyond the Wall to search for the three-eyed crow that has haunted his dreams since Winterfell fell. It is a quiet act of faith from a man who has spent the whole book doubting his own courage, choosing to trust a broken boy's unlikely destiny over any rule he is supposed to be enforcing ÔÇö and it sends Bran through the Wall's oldest gate into territory the story has, until now, only hinted at.

This movement: The Wall Holds

• Mance's host hits Castle Black from both sides; Donal Noye trades his life for a giant's in the gate.
• Jon commands the Wall with quips and a crossbow ÔÇö until the Watch arrests him for oath-breaking.
• Stannis lands at the Wall with the fury of the one king who answered the letters.
• In King's Landing, the realm dresses for a royal wedding no god intends to bless.