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Jon having made up his mind, Domeric rose and gave his shoulder a light pat.
"My Lonely Hills domain happens to need young men of promise like you. If you ever change your mind, you can come to me at any time."
"Thank you, Ser Domeric."
Having finally spoken the secret that had been weighing on him, Jon felt much lighter—no longer forced to suffer every hour in wavering indecision.
Then he realized the entire table had fallen silent at some point. Everyone was staring at him. They must have heard what he'd said.
He regretted, suddenly and bitterly, how loud his voice had been. And with it came the old humiliations—years of them, endured because of one word: bastard—now laid bare before others. Tears welled despite him.
"Forgive me. I… I should take my leave," Jon said with the last scraps of his dignity, and before anyone could see the tears fall, he fled like a gust of wind.
He had drunk too much. His legs felt knotted. He collided hard with a serving girl, sending a jug of spiced wine splashing across the floor. Laughter erupted from all sides.
Hot tears rolled down Jon's cheeks, carrying with them more than a decade of swallowed grievance.
Someone reached to steady him, but he flung off the well-meant hand. Half blind to the ground beneath his feet, he kept running for the doors and vanished into the lowering night.
Domeric watched it all in silence and thought:
The boy truly has had it hard.
…
The night had deepened until almost nothing could be seen.
Yet the lords' feast continued.
Domeric stepped out for air. He looked around: the castle lay drowned in darkness, steeped in solitude, as if only the great stones remained to murmur of what they had witnessed in ages past.
The empty yard was unnaturally quiet. Along the inner wall's crenellations a lone guard hunched in a corner, cloak drawn tight against the cold. He looked old—curled in on himself, suffering beneath the chill.
And just one wall away, music and laughter spilled from an open window behind Domeric—exactly the sort of soft decadence he least wished to hear.
A roaring feast. An old soldier freezing.
So it was true: human joys and sorrows rarely share the same measure.
Domeric shrugged off his own cloak and draped it over the guard's shoulders, then turned away.
…
At that moment, an urgent shout rose behind him.
"My lord Domeric—disaster!"
Someone called him back. Domeric turned. It was his chief knight, Ser Wendell—the bald, heavyset man—now panting with haste.
"What is it? Why the commotion?"
"A raven—news by raven. The mining district in the Lonely Hills has been attacked. We've lost men."
"Seven hells…"
The curse tore from Domeric before he could stop it. Of course. The very thing he feared.
He had no choice but to return to the feast at once and make his farewells to House Stark. Before he left, he pressed a light kiss to Sansa's brow.
If Lady Catelyn truly meant to marry Sansa to him, Domeric could afford to play along—for now.
Then Domeric mounted a fresh horse and, with Ser Wendell and his guards as escort, rode hard for the Lonely Hills.
Winterfell was not far from his lands, but travel in Westeros was wretched. Beyond the Kingsroad and a few main arteries, most paths were little better than goat tracks—raw, rutted, and treacherous.
Even at speed, he would not reach his domain in fewer than several days.
…
The Lonely Hills
Administrative Hall
Jorah Mormont, the castellan, could not sit still.
He was a broad-shouldered man in his middle years—dark-skinned, thick-haired, powerfully built. Though his hairline had begun to retreat, the strength in him remained unmistakable.
The moment he saw Domeric, he came forward at once. "My lord Domeric!"
"How bad is it?"
Domeric studied his castellan. Jorah had once been an exiled knight—a former lord of Bear Island, once head of House Mormont, and son to Jeor Mormont, the Old Bear, Lord Commander of the Night's Watch.
In the tale most men would have expected, Jorah first served the Targaryens across the narrow sea and became one of Daenerys Targaryen's most trusted men.
But two years ago, Domeric had taken him into his own service instead.
Truth be told, Jorah Mormont was a man haunted by women.
After his first wife died in childbirth, he fell hard at a tourney for Lynesse Hightower of Oldtown—a woman he was never meant to afford.
Lynesse had been raised in the splendor of House Hightower, accustomed to the rich, bustling life of the Reach. Bear Island—harsh, remote, and poor—was misery to her.
Compared to Oldtown, Bear Island barely rose above a wilderness fishing village.
To please her, Jorah bought luxuries, bled his coffers dry, and ended with nothing.
To pay his debts, he broke the laws of the Seven Kingdoms and began selling poachers to the Tyroshi as slaves.
When it came to light, his liege lord—Eddard Stark, Warden of the North, famed for stern justice—condemned him to death.
Yet when Lord Stark arrived on Bear Island, Jorah was already gone.
He did not take the black. He did not stay to die. He fled with Lynesse across the narrow sea to Braavos.
He sold his ship to survive. In half a year they spent what little remained. To live, Jorah became a sellsword.
And while he fought and bled to keep them fed, Lynesse took a rich man's bed and became his favored mistress.
Broken, the "Great Bear" wandered thereafter—living among the Free Cities, spending time with the Dothraki, even learning their tongue and ways.
A lord ruined by love—that had been Domeric's first judgment of him.
He had originally brought Jorah back for one reason: to build a friendly channel to the Night's Watch through the Old Bear, so that one day Castle Black might become, effectively, a Bolton bulwark—standing hard against wildlings and the Others.
To that end, Domeric paid a fortune in gold and spent heavily in King's Landing to secure a royal pardon.
King Robert's pardon forgave Jorah's crimes—but stripped him of his lordship.
Domeric chose to finish what he started. He took Jorah into his own service, granted him land, and made him a knight in fact if not in title.
In time, Domeric learned Jorah was more than a sword-arm. He knew war, understood command, and could govern besides—rare qualities in one man.
So Domeric had set him over the Lonely Hills as castellan.
"It's bad," Jorah said. "The northern mines have collapsed. We've lost many… but by good fortune, we caught the culprit."
"Oh?" Domeric nodded once. "Bring him to me at once. I will pass judgment myself."
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🏰 Game of Thrones: Secrets Beneath the Dreadfort
📢 Dark Secrets Await in the North! 📢
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