Morning came thick with fog, the kind that hung low over the hills and dulled sound. The snow had turned to a wet crust, crunching underfoot. Garran rose before the first bell, pulling on a wool tunic stiff with frost and belting his sword at his hip. The hearth in his chamber was long dead, but the cold no longer surprised him. It only reminded him he was alive.
Outside, the yard was quiet save for the soft scrape of shovels as a pair of men cleared the gate track. Garran found Mera by the stables, saddling her mare. She worked with swift, sure movements, face red with cold.
"You sure of this place?" Garran asked.
Mera glanced up. "I passed the track once, years ago. It's a small steading. Goat pens and root pits. No more than a day's ride east."
"Good enough."
He sent word for Jorik and Ser Bram. Both arrived in short order, bundled in heavy cloaks and stiff with sleep.
"We ride to the east ridge," Garran told them. "Steading there. We'll demand levy, not loot. A tenth of their stores. No torches. No dead men unless they force our hand."
Bram frowned. "Half my men are still green with us. You want them sworn to your name, best you let them strike first blood."
"This isn't about blood," Garran said. "It's about holding this land. Those people pay us, or they pay the next warband that comes through. Better it be us."
Jorik grunted, chewing a strip of dried meat. "And if they bar the doors?"
"Then we show them what it means to stand against Thornholt."
By midmorning, the small company was assembled. A dozen riders, four with lances, the rest carrying axes or swords at the saddle. Garran led them out through the north gate, the sound of hooves muffled by the snow.
The land east of Thornholt was all frost-clad fields and bare trees, old farmsteads long abandoned or gutted by raiders. Smoke hung in the distance, thin wisps marking where a few scattered families clung to what little they had.
No banners flew. No watchfires burned.
They passed a frozen stream, where half a dozen black crows picked at the remains of a deer. The birds scattered at their approach, leaving only bone and dark feathers.
"Hard land," Bram muttered.
"All the better," Jorik answered. "Hard men rise from hard land."
By the time the sun reached its pale noontide, they found the steading.
A half-dozen timber huts ringed a stone-walled yard, with a goat pen near the far side and a small watch platform overlooking the road. Smoke curled from one chimney. No men stood at the gate, though Garran noted the tracks in the snow and the shuttered windows.
He raised a hand. The company halted.
"Standard approach," he ordered. "Mera and I ride forward. The rest hold until called."
Mera eased her mare beside him as they approached. The gate was little more than rough-hewn logs lashed together with rawhide. Garran raised his voice.
"Open in the name of Thornholt."
For a long moment, nothing moved.
Then a figure appeared at the gate. An older man, wrapped in a patched cloak, gray hair unkempt, a wood axe gripped in his hands.
"Who are you to call that name here?" the man demanded.
"I am Garran of Thornholt," he replied. "This land belongs to those who hold it, and we hold it now. By law of levy, you'll render tribute. A tenth of your grain, livestock, and stores. Keep the rest and our protection besides."
The old man spat in the snow. "You and your kind protect nothing. Last men through here left two boys dead and a barn burnt."
"Those weren't my men," Garran said evenly. "You pay us, no one else comes. That's my word."
Another figure appeared by the gate. A woman this time, younger, with a narrow face and sharp eyes. She spoke low to the old man. He hesitated, then stepped back.
The gate creaked open.
Garran and Mera rode through.
Inside, a handful of families gathered in the yard, clutching what weapons they could find. Spears, sickles, an old hunting bow. Hunger showed in their faces, but so did the kind of stubbornness Garran respected.
The woman stepped forward. "We have little. The raiders took most before the snows."
"Then you give what you can. No blood need be shed here."
They brought out what they had. Three scrawny goats, a sack of onions, two bushels of grain, and a pair of rusted spears. Garran took it, counting it light, but enough to keep men from starving for a day or two longer.
Before leaving, he spoke to the gathered villagers.
"No man will come for you while Thornholt stands. If they do, you send word. We'll answer."
Some met his gaze. Some did not. But no one spoke against him.
By nightfall, the company returned through the trees, snow heavier now, with the tribute strapped to the packhorses. The men were weary, but no blood had been spilled. Garran called that a kind of victory.
Back at Thornholt, Mera handed him a skin of watered wine by the gate.
"That'll hold us for another two days," she said.
"Then we'll find more."
"It never ends, does it?"
"Not if you mean to build something."
She gave a half-smile. "Good. I'd hate to grow soft."
They shared a drink in the cold, watching the snow fall. The walls of Thornholt rose around them, scarred but standing.
And the fire inside still burned.