To save time is to lengthen life.

Jon prowled around Satin in a slow circle, sword in hand, forcing him to turn. “Get your shield up,” he said. “It’s too heavy,” the Oldtown boy complained. “It’s as heavy as it needs to be to stop a sword,” Jon said. “Now get it up.” He stepped forward, slashing. Satin jerked the shield up in time to catch the sword on its rim, and swung his own blade at Jon’s ribs. “Good,” Jon said, when he felt the impact on his own shield. “That was good. But you need to put your body into it. Get your weight behind the steel and you’ll do more damage than with arm strength alone. Come, try it again, drive at me, but keep the shield up or I’ll ring your head like a bell...” Instead Satin took a step backward and raised his visor. “Jon,” he said, in an anxious voice. When he turned, she was standing behind him, with half a dozen queen’s men around her. Small wonder the yard grew so quiet. He had glimpsed Melisandre at her nightfires, and coming and going about the castle, but never so close. She’s beautiful, he thought... but there was something more than a little unsettling about red eyes. “my lady.”

“The king would speak with you, Jon Snow.” was forswear his vows again. And this time it would not be a ruse. To claim his father’s castle, he must turn against his father’s gods. King Stannis gazed off north again, his gold cloak streaming from his shoulders. “It may be that I am mistaken in you, J

on Snow. We both know the things that are said of bastards. You may lack your father’s honor, or your brother’s skill in arms. But you are the weapon the Lord has given me. I have found you here, as you found the cache of dragonglass beneath the Fist, and I mean to make use of you. Even Azor Ahai did not win his war alone. I killed a thousand wildlings, took another thousand captive, and scattered the rest, but we both know they will return. Melisandre has seen that in her fires. Thisre-forming them even now, and planning some new assault. And , the weaker we shall all be when the real enemy falls upon us.” Jon had come to that same realization. “As you say, Your Grace.” He wondered where this king was going. “Whilst your brothers have been struggling to decide who shall lead them, I have been speaking with this Mance Rayder.” He ground his teeth. “A stubborn man, that one, and prideful. He will leave me no choice but to give him to the flames.