Anything but Ordinary

Only Alden and the Faceless Man remained on the grass now, along with the albino shadowcat cub.

"I still do not know what to call you," Alden said, turning toward him.

"My old name was offered to the Many-Faced God along with my old face." The Faceless Man drew the hood of his cloak back over his head. "You may call me Bovo. That is my new name."

Alden tested the ground carefully. "Can you tell me what happened between you, Joel, and Vortimer?"

Bovo shook his head. "There is nothing worth telling. Those things are past, and once I leave this time, I should not return. You need not worry about anything."

The Faceless Man had clearly misunderstood something, but Alden did not keep probing. Instead, he pointed to the wound on Bovo's chest. "Do you need help? With an injury like that, and in this weather, you may not make it out of the forest."

"Spark's potions can fairly be called miracles." As Bovo spoke, he deliberately opened his shirt and showed Alden the gash across his chest.

The wound that should have been torn flesh had already healed. Only a faint scar remained, so light that no one would have known a mortal injury had been there unless they looked closely.

Alden found the effect almost impossible to believe. Just as Bovo had said, the potion was practically miraculous. For someone like him, someone who would inevitably spend much of his future on battlefields, such medicine could save his life.

The thought made him glance toward the place where Spark's mound and tree-house had been. He began weighing how he might win her favor and build a connection with her so that he could obtain some of that medicine.

"No use looking," Bovo said, seeming to know what Alden was thinking. "Spark has already gone. Her tree-house can move underground. She never remains long in one place, especially once humans have found it."

It sounded unbelievable, yet Alden could feel that the Faceless Man was not lying. "Then how do you contact her?"

"My method would be of no use to you, and even if I used it now, it might not work." Bovo's answer cut off Alden's hope, though he soon changed tack. "Still, from what I saw just now, Spark seems to appreciate you. Otherwise she would not have let you keep the shadowcat cub. Perhaps she will come to you of her own accord one day."

Alden looked down at the cub curled in his arms, and a relieved smile returned to his face. Potion or no potion, this trip had already brought him more than enough. There was no need to cling to what he could not have. Better to let things take their course.

The Faceless Man saw that smile and understood that Alden had let the matter go. It surprised him. In his experience, boys of fifteen or sixteen did not usually possess that sort of breadth of mind. He expected it from grown men seasoned by life, or old men who had already seen through the world's vanities, not from a youth.

Curiosity tugged at Alden again. "Spark's abilities are very different from the children of the forest I have heard about in stories. I have never heard of any child of the forest carrying her home through the earth wherever she pleases."

As he said it, the image that rose in his mind was still the image from the tale he remembered from his former world. The difference between that image and the Spark he had just met was like the difference between a beggar and a noblewoman, so vast they hardly seemed the same race.

After another thought, he felt the difference might simply be the gap between story and reality. Perhaps the true children of the forest in this world were more like Spark after all.

"Spark is special," Bovo said. He clearly had no wish to speak more about her. "She is one of the rare children of nature among her people."

After that brief answer, he seemed ready to end the conversation. He wrapped himself fully in his cloak, looked at the shadowcat cub in Alden's arms, and said, "A warning. However close that cub is to you, it is still a wild beast. Find a rope and keep it tied, or it will hurt someone. If it hurts an ordinary man, that is one thing. If it hurts one of your noble lords, Garlan Tyrell for example, your end may look much like mine."

He did not wait for Alden to answer. He turned, walked into the trees, and soon vanished from sight.

Alden did not stop him. Nor did he intend to chase down the clues hidden in Bovo's words and dig into his identity. He could sense goodwill from the Faceless Man, even if that goodwill might have come from someone else.

One thing Bovo had said was right. Alden had indeed planned to raise the cub in a loose, free-ranging way, especially to keep its hunting instincts active. Thinking it over now, that plan was too dangerous. The shadowcat needed a lead.

Reconsidering how to raise it, Alden lifted the cub with both hands and held it before him. The kitten-like thing thought he was playing. It gave soft, milky cries and waved all four limbs, its padded paws flexing as though it wanted to grab his face.

Alden smiled at the sight, tucked the cub inside his clothes, settled it against his chest, and started back toward the Howling Wood waystation.

Inside the waystation hall, the Tyrell servants had set up a small tent for Garlan so that he could sleep alone rather than mix with everyone outside.

Garlan had objected at first. Compared with sitting alone in a tent, he preferred to stay with the Tyrell nobles and knights. If not for the rain, he might even have sat outside with the soldiers and listened to their stories.

Maester Selick, however, had talked him out of it. Some of the soldiers had fallen ill. If it was merely a chill, that was one matter; if it was some catching sickness, then the more Garlan mingled with others, the greater the danger.

After hearing the maester's reasoning, Garlan stopped insisting. He ordered his servant to take several medicines from his private chest and give them to Vortimer for the sick soldiers. He did not know whether the medicine would help, but at least he had done what he could.

Back in the tent, Garlan picked up a book about the adventures of Ser Duncan the Tall and Aegon the Fifth when they traveled as hedge knight and squire. This was already the fifth version of the Dunk and Egg stories he had read. Beyond the tales everyone knew, every collection had a few new ones.

Garlan understood very well that those new tales were invented, but he still loved reading them. He wanted to believe they were true. Often, while he read, he thought about how he was nearly the same age Aegon had been then. What would it be like if he met his own knight now and went adventuring across the Seven Kingdoms?

For reasons he could not quite explain, the knight who appeared in his thoughts was Alden, the broad-shouldered squire.

That thought made Garlan close the book. He picked up the little bell on the low table beside him and rang it. When a servant entered from outside the tent, he ordered, "Ask Lord Vortimer to come. I have something to ask him."

The servant withdrew. A short while later, Ser Vortimer Crane came in from outside, soaked through by rain.

Vortimer took the towel a servant offered, wiped the rain from himself, and asked Garlan, "My lord, you called for me?"

Garlan tried to sound casual. "Nothing important. I only wanted to ask how our Bear-Hunter is doing. Has he settled into the scouts?"

Vortimer thought back over the reports he had received from the scout captain, and a satisfied smile rose on his face before he could stop it. Then he reported everything he knew about Alden's work among the scouts.

After hearing it, Garlan looked disappointed. Alden's earlier behavior had nearly caused him great trouble, yet Garlan still liked the boy's bold, confident nature. Now that Alden had gone to the scouts, it felt as if something bright had been buried under dust. The boldness and confidence had vanished. All that remained was obedience to routine. The only thing unchanged was his almost severe self-discipline.

"Was I wrong to send him to the scouts?" Garlan asked uncertainly.

"No," Vortimer replied. "Your decision was correct."

Garlan frowned. "But I feel as if he became ordinary once he joined them."

"Ordinary?" Vortimer looked genuinely lost. He could not understand why Garlan would describe Alden's performance that way. In Vortimer's eyes, if he himself had been demoted to the scouts, he might not have done better.

At first, Vortimer had expected Alden to brood for several days after being reduced from squire to scout. Instead, Alden had shown no discouragement at all. By the second day, relying on the authority he had already built, he had effectively sidelined the scout captain. After that, he improved the scouts' methods for finding enemies and greatly increased their efficiency in scouting the road ahead.

Later, several guards had volunteered to join Alden's scouting unit. With Vortimer quietly allowing it, Alden smoothly chose suitable men from among the guards and built a scout party centered entirely on himself.

None of that looked ordinary. At the very least, in all Vortimer's experience, he had never seen a boy in his teens match Alden in adaptability or ability to get things done.

Garlan was only ten. No matter how excellent his education, parts of his thinking were still young, and he could not fully see how outstanding Alden's work in the scouts had been. He began to regret the punishment he had given at New Barrel and asked tentatively, "Should we transfer Alden back to your side? I worry that leaving him among the scouts will ruin a promising knight."

Vortimer paused, about to explain that Alden's performance was excellent and there was no danger of ruining him, when a burst of noise came from outside.

Garlan and Vortimer both grew serious at once. At Garlan's signal, Vortimer turned and lifted the tent flap. The two looked out.

In the hall, the knights and nobles were no longer sitting by the fires. They had all gathered at the entrance and were staring outside, as though some marvel had appeared there.

Then several scouts came into the hall carrying all sorts of game. They piled it in the middle of the floor, and before long the heap had become a small hill.

"That should be Alden's scouting party back from the hunt," Vortimer said, looking at the mound of game. "It seems they did well."

"Go. Bring the Bear-Hunter here. I want to know how he hunted so much in weather like this." Garlan's excitement was plain. He gave the order to the servant beside him, then added, "There is too much game. Keep one boar and one deer. Roast the rest and send it to the outer camp for our household guards."

"Yes, my lord." Garlan's personal attendant answered at once, then sent the other servants to deal with the game and found the scout party as they were preparing to leave the hall, passing on Garlan's order.

"Why is it you? Where is the Bear-Hunter?" Garlan waited in the tent for a while, only to see the scout captain enter with another scout behind him. He frowned. "Is he still angry that I sent him to the scouts, and unwilling to see me?"

"No, no." Before the scout captain could speak, the scout behind him answered first. "Lord Alden did not return with us."

"One of Alden's men?" Garlan looked at the speaker.

The scout captain hurried to answer. "Yes. His name is Raul. Alden chose him from the guards when the scouts were expanded. He is skilled, and he is now one of Lord Alden's useful men."

"Why did Alden not come back with you? Did he find some danger in the forest?" Garlan asked.

Raul answered immediately. "No, Lord Alden went after a shadowcat."

"A shadowcat?" Garlan and Vortimer both froze.

Raul quickly explained how they had encountered the shadowcat on the road. Along the way, he also repeated their guess that Alden meant to complete the ten hunting trials and become a legendary hunter.

After hearing it, excitement appeared on Garlan's face. Following ancient trials and becoming a living legend was something he had only read about in books. Now it seemed to be happening before his eyes. How could he not be thrilled?

Along with that excitement came a touch of embarrassment. A moment earlier, he had thought Alden had become ordinary in the scouts. Now Alden had caused such a stir that Garlan's judgment looked foolish and short-sighted.

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