The peasant woman knelt as if her shins were rooted into the cold earth. Her hair was a matted curtain of grease and straw, hiding a face that had known only sun and sorrow.
Solomon stood over her. He was not a tall man, nor particularly broad, but in the shadow of the keep, he looked like a titan to her fearful eyes.
"Why did you not come to the gate?" Solomon asked. His voice was stronger now, carrying a strange authority that surprised even him. "Why weep in the mud like a beaten dog?"
The woman shrank into herself, her voice a reedy whisper. "I... I dared not, m'lord. I feared to offend. I feared your wrath."
"Wrath?" Solomon frowned. "For what?"
She began to tremble violently, her forehead knocking against the dirt in a rhythm of abject terror. "For bothering you! For begging! My Harke... my Old Harke, he died at Seagard. He went with the Old Lord and never came back."
She sobbed, a dry, hacking sound.
"The larder is empty. The babes are starving. I thought... I thought to ask for a crumb of mercy. But when I saw the gate, my heart failed me. I am nothing. I cannot even fish. If I beg, I might anger you. If I anger you, you might take the hut. You might take our lives."
She choked on her own spit.
"I tried to leave! I swear it by the Mother! But my legs... my legs wouldn't move. I thought of my children's hollow bellies and I just... I couldn't walk away. I deserve death for my insolence! Mercy, Lord Solomon! Mercy!"
She babbled, her words tumbling over one another in a panic. She knew the way of the world. Lords were wolves; smallfolk were sheep. If a sheep bleated too loudly, the wolf snapped its neck. A bad mood, a sour wine, a rainy day—any of these were reason enough for a lord to whip a beggar to death.
Solomon watched her unravel.
This was the Westeros he remembered reading about. A land of ice and fire, yes, but mostly a land of boot and neck. For eight thousand years, the strong had crushed the weak into the dust.
He looked at her and realized his own fortune. Even as a lord of a stinking bog, inheriting a ruined tower and a debt of blood, he was still a god compared to ninety-nine percent of the souls in this realm.
"I will not punish you," Solomon said.
The woman froze. The words seemed alien to her, a language she did not speak.
"Nikken," Solomon said, turning to the steward. "Go to the granary. Give her two sacks of grain. And from the strongbox, give her three coppers."
Old Nikken blinked, his mouth opening and closing like a landed carp. "My... my lord?"
"You heard me."
"But... the granary is..." Nikken stammered, his eyes darting to the woman and back. "My lord, to let them live on the land is mercy enough! We have barely enough for the winter!"
"Do it," Solomon said. The tone brokered no argument.
Nikken sighed, a rattle in his chest, and bowed. "As you command, Lord Solomon." He shuffled away, muttering about madness and ruin.
Behind Solomon, Lauchlan and Lushen stood like statues carved from shock. They were peasant-born. They knew the rules. Lords took; they did not give. To give grain to a widow who offered no service, no coin, no labor? It was unheard of. It was madness.
And yet, looking at Solomon's straight back, something kindled in their eyes. A spark that had never been there before.
The woman slowly lifted her head. Disbelief warred with hope in her red-rimmed eyes. Then, she slammed her forehead into the mud again, harder this time.
"The Seven bless you! The Seven keep you! Long live House Bligh! Long live Lord Solomon!"
Her weeping changed. The terror was gone, replaced by a frantic, hysterical gratitude. Two sacks of grain and three coppers. It was a pittance to a merchant, but to her, it was life. It was the difference between drowning her children in the river to save them from starvation—a thought that had darkened her mind all morning—and seeing them live another season.
"Rise," Solomon said.
She scrambled up, swaying on numb legs, clutching her rags to her chest.
Solomon turned to his guards. "Lushen. Lauchlan."
"My lord!" They answered instantly, their spines snapping straight. The lethargy of the peasant was gone; they stood like men of the Kingsguard.
"The men who went with my father," Solomon said, his voice low and dangerous. "They died for this House. Their blood is in this mud."
He looked at Nikken, who was returning with the grain sacks, looking pained with every step.
"Nikken, listen to me well. I want three things done before the sun sets."
"My lord?"
"First," Solomon said, counting on his fingers. "I want a full inventory. Every grain of wheat, every rusty nail, every copper star. I want to know exactly what House Bligh owns, down to the last spoon."
"Second," he continued, his gaze hardening. "I want a list of every man who died at Seagard. I want to know who they left behind. Widows, mothers, children. If they have a man left to work the field, give them a small pension. If they are like Harke here—helpless, with only mouths to feed—give them double."
Nikken went pale. "Double? My lord, you will bankrupt us! This is... this is not the way! The smallfolk serve us! It is their duty to die if the lord calls! Why pay for dead tools?"
"Third," Solomon ignored the protest, turning to his guards. "Lushen, Lauchlan. You will arm yourselves. You will go with Nikken into the village. You will distribute this pension. And if anyone—anyone—tries to steal from these widows, or bully the orphans of my dead soldiers, you will take their hand. Nail it to the village tree."
The guards looked at each other, then at Solomon. There was a fierceness in their eyes now, a devotion that bordered on worship.
"We will do it, my lord," Lushen growled. "By the Warrior, we will do it."
Nikken stood frozen, clutching the grain sacks. He had served three generations of Blighs. He had seen cruelty, indifference, and incompetence. But he had never seen this. He thought it was folly. He thought it was suicide.
But Solomon knew better.
He looked out at the bleak horizon. The War of the Five Kings was coming. The Long Night was coming. He was a small lord in a small castle with no gold and no armies.
He could not buy sellswords. He could not marry a Tyrell.
But loyalty? Loyalty he could buy cheap, while the price was still low. He would build a fortress not of stone, but of men who would die before they let a wolf or a lion touch him.
"This is the foundation," Solomon whispered to himself.
"Go," he ordered them. "The winter is coming."