The hot sun hung high in the sky as the soldiers pushed the bound and gagged Grayne toward the hangman’s structure. The soldiers in their heavy armor sweated under the heat of the intense summer sun. As they forced him up the stairs and toward the opening through which many men had dropped to their deaths, Grayne frantically looked for an escape. With a furious eye, he searched the guards desperately and struggled against his bonds. His efforts were useless as his restraints were too strong and the guards too well armed for any escape.

As the guards and their prisoner stopped at the top of the stairs, Grayne took in the scene before him with horror. Where once was a rope attached to the roof of the structure there were now cruel jagged hooks attached to sturdy chains. The rusty links waited unmoving.

“Do you like the modifications I made?” came a familiar voice from the yard below. The silver plate mail of Farzan was blazing in the midday sun and Grayne squinted against the reflection.

The guards removed the northerner’s gag. He defiantly spat in Farzan’s direction. “You are a twisted man, Farzan! You can do whatever you want; you won’t get anything from me,” he said with less determination.

“I’m glad. It gives me the opportunity to test my new apparatus. I dare say this torture device will be copied by all the kingdoms soon enough. You have the pleasure of being the first test subject. Unless you wish to spare yourself the ignominy of this fate.” The cruel knight paused, and when Grayne was silent he simply said, “Very well.” With a nod of acknowledgement to his men, they roughly forced Grayne to the edge of the pit and as he was struggling they began viciously inserting the hooks into his flesh. One hook pierced the flesh of his back, two sliced into his armpits, two more into the soles of his feet and the final one was jammed into the tender meat between his balls and his ass. The men laughed roughly while Grayne shrieked. And without another word the men pushed him into the wooden opening.Grayne plummeted, but before he hit the ground, his descent halted as the hooks and chains did their job. His weight slammed into the hooks as the chains reached their limits and Grayne howled louder than he thought possible. Even the men who seconds before had laughed cruelly at the helpless man winced at Grayne’s torment as he swayed and writhed in agony at the end of the chains.

“Let’s see how a few days swinging in the hot summer breeze affects his mood,” the cruel knight said, but there wasn’t anyone who could possibly hear him over Grayne’s howls of pure agony that pieced the air.

 

“Look at the teeth, boy,” Grayne’s father said with awe ringing in his voice. From their concealed location on a rocky overhang, the boy and his father had an excellent view of the slaughter. Even though they had a higher position and were upwind of the dire wolf, Grayne wondered if they should move away before beast finished her meal.

The ten-year-old boy and his father had been on the trail of the pair of cows that had wandered from the herd. This was an unspoken lesson to the boy that although there was strength in numbers there wasn’t much in the seven kingdoms that could stop a dire wolf.

“What do we do?” he whispered. The boy had learned much from his father in ten years. The man was cautious, but never afraid. The strength and wisdom of the gigantic man was enough to banish any trepidation from the boy’s heart and mind.

“Nothing we can do. That cow is dead and I’m not gonna risk our lives to avenge its death,” his father said through a forest of red whiskers. “Though, a dire wolf pelt would fetch many coins.” He seemed to consider the idea for a few seconds and shook his head vigorously to clear the notion from his skull. “We’ll go back and tell old man Rynyn that his cows are dire wolf food, and I’ll begin work on a stronger fence.”

Grayne could not take his eyes of the monster feasting on the not-quite-dead cow. Its powerful jaws took great bites out of the wounded animal. The boy blanched as the salty fetid aroma of the poor beast’s blood and entrails wafted into his nose. He turned away trying to hide his reaction from his father. He tried not to feel sorry for the poor creature as he heard the wolf’s jaws rip the juicy flesh from its bones.

“C’mon, boy. Let’s go before she decides to make us dessert.” Grayne’s father pulled him to his feet and the two moved hurriedly away from the grisly feast.

They ran through the forest for many minutes until Grayne’s father slowed and Grayne was more easily able to match his speed. “Let that be a lesson to you, son.”

“Sir?” Grayne looked up questioningly at his father.

“You’re never too young to learn this knowledge.” His father looked down at him and said, “Though she may be beautiful, never forget that the female of the species is alway more dangerous.”

“Yes, sir,” Grayne agreed as his father tousled his hair.

With the mystery of the missing cows solved, father and son walked quickly and quietly through the leafless late-autumn forest. Grayne soon forgot the scene of death behind them and became entranced by the sights and smells of the wilderness. He was wondering silently where all the animals were when a “Wssst” from his father stopped him mid-stride. He turned slowly to see the big man a few dozen meters behind him. The man seemed paralyzed, frozen in place scanning the forest for something unseen and deadly.

“Grayne. Run!”

The boy didn’t hesitate. He spun and sprinted as fast as his legs woud carry him. Dry branches and leaves cracked and snapped furiously as Grayne trampled over them in a tremendous flurry. He didn’t dare turn to check if his father was behind him, but the man made enough noise stomping through the forest that Grayne knew he was catching up.

As he traversed a small hill, Grayne lost his footing and slid painfully face-first into a steep wet valley. Branches and stones slowed his decent as he came to an undignified halt. Slowing only slightly, his gigantic father scooped him up with one arm and continued his rapid downward decent. Jumping over downed branches and stumps, the man barreled the forsest down. Although the two were in incredible danger, Grayne was never afraid for he knew there was nothing alive, man nor beast, his father couldn’t handle.

From his perch on his father’s shoulder, Grayne craned his neck upward and looked at their path of destruction into the ravine. Deep cuts in the earth where his father slid and jumped were alongside his own smaller openings. There were no signs of pursuit.

Suddenly he saw her and his heart stopped.

At the top of the hill stood a magnificent beast. The monstrous she-wolf that had killed the cow hours ago stood sniffing the air, seeming to see their trail with her nose. Then she lowered her head and looked directly at him.

His father lifted him from his shoulder and suddenly Grayne was face to face with a tree limb. His father commanded, “Grab it, boy. Climb! As far as you can! Climb!” Grayne grappled the jutting tree limb with his arms and legs frantically.

By the time he swung around and looked down at his father, the big man had unslung his axe from his back and stood ready. The mighty two-handed chopping axe looked small compared to his giant of a father and pathetic compared to the female dire wolf that was just beginning her rampaging descent toward the two.

The big man did not look away from the she-beast. “Grayne, climb as far as you can. Do not look down! Do not stop climbing!”

Grayne scrambled to find branches to raise himself up, desperate to follow his father’s orders. He panicked when a branch snapped under his weight, but he lashed out and grabbed hold of another stronger branch, narrowly avoiding crashing to the ground.

He risked a glance and saw the she-beast leaping catlike from stone to open ground and to a rocky outcropping as she combined her jumps with coordinated running to speedily and safely make her way toward her prey. She was grace and power incarnate. Grayne swallowed hard and kept climbing.

In a moment in which time stood still and the forest was silent, Grayne heard his father’s final words. The forest was quiet, and even the monster seemed to slow and hold her breath.

The forsest was hushed as Grayne heard his father say, “I love you, son.”

The monstrous juggernaut slammed snarling into the man with the force of a runaway boulder. The two rolled along the forest floor in a chaotic pile of snarling teeth and violent curses. In moments, the fight was over. The outcome was never in doubt for any concerned as Grayne heard his father’s final moan seep from his already-dead lips. The crunching of bone was mixed with the boy’s flood of emotion as the creature shook the last bit of life from his father with her blood-filled jaws. He wept uncontrollably from his perch.

The dire wolf released her kill and looked up at Grayne with cold blue eyes. Grayne stopped sobbing as her gaze calmed him with its piercing fury. Fresh from the hunt and the kill, her eyes were alive with joy. She left the dead man as she moved toward the tree, but let out a shrieking whimper as she took her first step. Grayne could see her right front leg was crippled, smashed apart with his father’s axe. Now with the energy of battle gone, the reality of her wounds hit her.

Confused and hurt, the beast dragged herself a few paces away from the dead man and the treed boy. Blood still dripping from her jaws, she paused on the snowy ground and licked her wound. The man’s blood mingled with her own as she began the fruitless task of caring for her mangled leg.

His father lay there, looking like a bag of meat, no longer the man of power and wisdom Grayne had idolized for all of his short life. Anger filled his stomach giving fuel to his emotion. The embers of sadness and grief turned to a firestorm of rage in his gut as Grayne began to climb down the tree. He moved quickly and heedless of his own safety or the scrapes and bruises he sustained as he clambored down. He dropped the last few feet and landed on all fours next to his father. Blood was still pouring from the man’s open neck.

The boy’s face was blank and did not show the sickening heat in his stomach as he picked up his father’s bloody axe. The axe was only meant for chopping wood and not intended for battle, yet it looked enormous in the hands of the boy barely more than four feet tall. He found the strength to lift it, however. Unwavering, he carried the axe over to the wounded wolf. Her eyes looked at him and their power was gone. Once a mighty killing instrument, she was now weak and feeble.

The boy’s grey eyes returned her stare with cold determination. Grayne raised the axe, and with strength that belied his size and age brought it down on the once-ferocious wolf. With a single blow he split her skull in two and ended her suffering.

He turned away from the dead creature and toward his own dead father. He dragged the axe, which was suddenly made of lead, to his father’s body and set about the task of burying the man deep enough in the cold ground as not to be unearthed by anything or anyone.

The ten-year-old boy had ended the suffering of the wounded dire wolf, but his had only just begun.

 A Game of Thrones story

“Can we stop? I want to hear the story,” the boy said, looking up expectantly at his father. The six-year old child looked minuscule compared to the gigantic bear of a man. The boy turned and he saw the look on the man’s face, hidden as it was under a scraggly red beard. It was a look that said that they were in a hurry. He was ready, though, and the happy ear-to-ear smile on his face was enough to shatter his father’s grim demeanor. The big man let out a grunt and with his giant paw tousled the boy’s already messy brown curly hair. “Okay, Grayne, but let’s not diddle-doddle. Your mother is waiting.”

Grayne let out a shriek of happiness, his troubles temporarily forgotten. He ran to sit in the crowd of boys and girls whose mothers stood around the perimeter. He found an open space and before he sat down he took a moment to find his father in the crowd so he could give him another toothy smile. His mother had told him many times, “Let him see all your teeth. He will never tell you no when he can see the back teeth.” Grayne saw the big man waiting. He stood at least a foot taller than the tallest woman in the crowd. With his arms crossed, and a grim countenance on his face, the women gave him extra space. Grayne looked past his father with dread at the horizon, for the grey clouds indicated a storm was coming. The boy was long ago weary of the many storms of a summer that was in its death throes, but had not accepted its own demise. The smell of dampness filled his nose.

Grayne smiled and made himself as comfortable as possible on the hard ground. A tall figure in tattered black robes stood on the flimsy stage. The boy could not determine the shadowy figure’s gender under its dark billowing robes. Even when it spoke, the voice was a whisper that carried on the wind and gave no indication of the gender of the speaker. A blast of cold wind suddenly stormed through the crowd stirring up dirt, dust and dead leaves on the ground and those not strong enough to hold onto the trees. The people collectively pulled their clothing closer against the storm’s windy harbinger that swept through them. The children gasped and shivered in response to the piercing gust. Only the black-robed performer seemed unaffected by the icy chill of the coming storm.

“Who can tell me of The Seven?” the robed, seemingly genderless storyteller asked the gathered throng of youngsters with only a whisper. “Can any of you name even one of the seven new gods who hold our destinies in their merciless hands?” the hooded storyteller asked as it pointed a long bony finger at a boy with blonde hair and a dirt- stained face. The boy let out a gasp and was silent.

Grayne’s father had many times told him of the new gods, and the boy was eager to show off his knowledge. The robed actor continued pointing at various children in the crowd until Grayne shouted, “The Maiden!” His voice wavered and cracked, but he made himself heard over the wind.

“Correct,” whispered the shadowy person. “What are the others?”

Grayne looked back at his father, hoping for some recognition for his correct answer, but instead saw the giant shifting uneasily from foot to foot. Grayne returned his attention to the performer. He listened as the children named each of the gods that made up The Seven. They named them all as the hooded storyteller coaxed the names from them; the Maiden, the Father, the Smith, the Warrior, the Crone, the Stranger, and the Mother. The mention of the Mother-Above caused the boy to think of his own mother. She had fallen ill and had lingered in a state of confusion for almost two weeks. Her body wasted while she seemed to have no concept of her surroundings. A medicine-man had taken her in, but each day she showed no signs of recovering from her mysterious languishing malady. Grayne felt helpless and wished the gods were real and that prayer could save his mother. “The Gods are cruel,” his father had always told him.

Grayne watched with nervous anticipation as the storyteller moved though the field of seated children, telling a story of the Seven. He half-listened, his thoughts were not where he was, but where he was going. Only when the storyteller neared Grayne did he return his attention to the performance. The grim entertainer strode over and around the seated children determinedly until he stood above Grayne. For an instant the cold wind seemed to die. He looked up, but all he saw were black robes of the tall storyteller. Suddenly, the boy was staring into the shadow-filled hood of the figure as it bent down before him. He let out a little squeak like an injured mouse as the hooded figure spoke to him with words that felt like sticky cobwebs, and breath the smelled like wet earth.

Grayne dizzily listened to the grim figure’s words for what seemed like hours, barely hearing the shrieks and screams that erupted from behind him. In a blur of motion and with a crack of bones, the cloaked figure was cast aside as if he had been smashed by a charging bull. His father was beside him and before Grayne could react he was thrown over the man’s massive shoulder. The big man crashed and stomped his way out of the crowd.

Only when they were safely from the crowd and what seemed like miles away did his father gently remove Grayne from his shoulder and set upon his feet. “Are you okay?” his father asked the pale and shaken child as cold raindrops began to fall.

Grayne nodded without a word. The wind had stopped, replaced with a hard rain that chilled them both to the core.

“What happened? What did he say to you!?” his father asked the shaken boy more demandingly than he intended. He closed his eyes and tried to console Grayne by saying, “It’s okay, son. Whenever you’re ready.”

Grayne licked his lips and looked silently at his feet.

“Boy, it’s okay,” his father said calmly. “You don’t have to say anything.”

The two walked in silence, hand in hand for several miles making their way from the small village to the darkening woods, before the boy spoke. “Father, the storyteller…said I was cursed.” Grayne paused to lick his dry lips and he continued. “My curse is my strength. I will outlive everyone I care for, and my true suffering will come not from the pain of my injuries but from my ability to endure them.” The sound of the rain pounding furiously through the trees was the only sound until Grayne asked, “What does that mean?”

His father’s grip tightened on his son’s hand. The man closed his eyes then sucked his lips in over his teeth as he took a deep breath. Quietly, the gargantuan man stopped at a hollow log. He pointed at the log and nodded at it, and the boy crawled inside without further questions.

His father stood outside as the torrent soaked him for many hours. Grayne fell asleep listening to the rain tapping against the bark of the log and dreamed of his mother.