They encountered the first corpse a mile from the crossroads.
The man hung from the blackened limb of a lightning-struck oak. Scavenging crows had already claimed his eyes and cheeks; wolves had feasted on his calves, leaving nothing below the knee but splintered bone, ragged wool, and a single chewed boot half-buried in the mud.
"What's in his mouth?" Podrick asked, his voice trembling.
Brienne steadied her breathing before looking. The corpse's face was a mottled, sickly gray-green, the jaw forced wide. Someone had jammed a jagged white stone between the teeth. Or perhaps...
"Salt," Septon Meribald whispered.
Five yards further, they found the second. Scavengers had torn him down, scattering his remains beneath a frayed hemp noose that still dangled from an elm branch. Brienne would have ridden past if Dog hadn't caught the scent and plunged into the brush.
"What did you find, Dog?" Ser Hyle Hunt dismounted and followed. He returned carrying a dented half-helm. A skull still rattled inside, accompanied by a frantic swarm of worms and beetles.
"Good steel," Hyle declared, "even if the Lannister lion-crest is sheared off. Want a helm, Pod? It'll keep your wits in."
"Not that one. It has bugs."
"Bugs wash out, lad. Don't be as fussy as a highborn maid."
Brienne frowned. "It's too large for him."
"He'll grow," Hyle shrugged, tossing the rusted lion-helm back into the weeds. Dog let out a bark, trotted to the elm, and lifted a leg.
Every hundred yards brought another sentry of the dead. They hung from ash, alder, beech, and willow. Every neck wore a noose; every mouth was stuffed with salt. They wore faded robes of blue, gray, and crimson, the sigils on their chests a map of the realm's failure: axes, arrows, salmon, a boar's head, a pine tree, and the six tridents of House Riverrun.
"Broken men," Brienne realized. "The dregs of the Great Houses, cast aside to rot."
The corpses swayed in the thin rain. Brienne remembered a verse from the Seven-Pointed Star: "On the Day of Judgment, King and Beggar shall be weighed as equals." Here, they weren't being weighed by scales, but by hempen rope.
"These are the ones who sacked Saltpans," Ser Hyle noted.
"May the Father judge them harshly," Meribald added.
To Brienne, the who mattered less than the how. Hanging was the commoner's justice. If these men were being strung up systematically, Sandor Clegane's hand was likely nearby.
As the trees thinned into a muddy plain, the "gallows" became more frequent. Crows rose in screaming black clouds as the travelers passed, only to settle back onto their grisly feasts.
Podrick asked about their destination. Meribald, eager to distract the boy from the roadside horrors, launched into the history of the Inn at the Crossroads.
"Some call it the Old Inn. There has been a hearth here for centuries, but the current timber was raised in the time of King Jaehaerys the Conciliator. They say he and Queen Alysanne slept there. For a time, it was the 'Two Crowns.' Then a master built a bell tower, and it became the 'Bellringer.' Later, a crippled knight named Long Jon Heddle took it. He was a smith in his dotage and forged a new sign—a three-headed dragon of black iron. It was so vast it required a dozen iron plates, and it clanked so loudly in the wind that men called it the 'Clanking Dragon'."
"Is the dragon still there?" Podrick asked.
"No," Meribald said. "When the Blackfyres rose, the Lord Darry of that time saw the black dragon and took it for a rebel sigil. He hacked down the post and threw the dragon into the river. Years later, one of the heads washed up on the Quiet Isle, red with rust. People forgot the dragon and called it the 'River Inn.' Back then, the Trident flowed right past the back door. You could fish from your bedroom window."
"The river is a mile away now," Brienne noted.
"The Trident is a restless mistress, My Lady. It shifted eighty years ago, in Masha Heddle's grandfather's time. Masha was a good woman—loved sourleaf and honey cakes. If the rooms were full, she'd let me sleep by the hearth and send me off with extra bread. But the Lions of the West hanged her. I do not know who holds the keys now, but with the Hound stationed there, we may at least find a roof."
They heard the ringing of steel before they saw the gate. It was the sound of a desperate struggle—loud, violent, and echoing with the intent to kill.
"Careful! Steel is out!" Ser Hyle shouted. He drew his sword. Brienne and Podrick did the same, shielding Meribald as they moved toward the rear yard.
The yard was a mire of brown muck. Horses stood in the stables, shifting nervously. A derelict gallows stood in the center, where a small boy was swinging from the rusted chains.
Four girls stood on the porch, the smallest no more than two and naked as her Naming Day. The oldest, perhaps ten, held the toddler close.
"Children!" Hyle called out, sheathing his blade. "Fetch your mother."
The boy jumped from the chains and ran toward the stables. The girls remained, eyes wide with a cold, weary suspicion. "We have no mother," one said. "They killed her."
"I am Brienne," the Maid of Tarth said softly. "This is Septon Meribald. The boy is Podrick, and the knight is Ser Hyle. We seek shelter."
The sound of clashing blades in the yard stopped. Two young men in blackened mail emerged from the stables, dripping with sweat. One, older and sharper-eyed, looked Brienne over. "You don't look like common travelers."
"In this world, an honest man travels armed," Meribald said, stepping forward. He reached into his tunic and produced a Solar Mark—a piece of Sun-Steel embossed with his name. "Ser Greme of Saltpans told us warriors of the Golden Dawn held this crossroad. Are you the Light's men?"
The young soldiers relaxed instantly at the sight of the steel mark. "I am Vito, and this is Gaston. Captain Clegane is out tracking a band of outlaws. He'll return when the ropes are full. You may wait for him here."
The Inn was a hive of orphans. Brienne tried to count them, but they were a blur of movement—ragged boys crawling under the porch, girls peering through windows with cocked crossbows.
"The Crossbow Inn," Ser Hyle joked. The Orphan's Keep was more fitting, Brienne thought.
"Wot, mind the horses," a girl named Willow commanded with the authority of a queen. "Will, drop the stone, they aren't lions. Tansy, Pet, get wood for the hearth. Copper Jon, help the Septon with his bags."
They took three rooms. Brienne paid extra for firewood, desperate for the warmth.
"Do I sleep in your room or Ser Hyle's?" Podrick asked.
"This is not the Isle, Pod. You stay with me. We leave as soon as I speak with the Hound."
But Brienne's heart was heavy. Elder Perry had told her she was chasing the wrong wolf. Sandor had Arya, not Sansa. Arya was gone across the sea. Sansa was a ghost. Where do I go now? she wondered. She could follow the Kingsroad north to the Neck, west toward Riverrun where the Blackfish was besieged, or south back to the capital to admit failure to Jaime.
"Lady Brienne? I asked where we go next."
"To the hall, Pod. For dinner."
The common room was filled with the smell of horse-meat stew. Willow presided over the tables like a lady in a Great Hall, while the two soldiers, Vito and Gaston, ignored the chaos and played cards in the corner.
"You won't help the children?" Ser Hyle asked, pulling up a chair.
"We're guards, not nursemaids," Gaston grunted, throwing a card. "Willow has them handled. Sit and bet, if you've the coin."
The rain began to hammer against the roof—a deluge that made the warmth of the hearth feel like a blessing. But as Brienne swallowed her first spoonful of hot mash, Dog let out a frantic, lung-tearing bark.
"Someone's coming," Brienne said, standing.
"Just my brothers," Gaston said, bored.
"What brothers?" Brienne went to the door, peering through the sheets of rain.
A group of seven riders splashed into the yard. Their horses were blown, lathered in blood and foam. The leader was a young man with a face partially melted by fire—a jagged, raw scar that had blinded one eye. The others wore hoods pulled low to hide their faces from the storm.
Brienne's blood ran cold. She drew Oathkeeper, the Valyrian steel shimmering in the firelight.
"Gaston! Vito! To arms!" she hissed. "Those aren't your brothers. Those aren't anyone's brothers."
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