Serena's hands paused for a fraction of a second. She remembered the subtle tension Lyra had mentioned the night before.
"Perhaps they are just staying close to the hearth fires at Castle Black," Serena replied smoothly, handing over a wrapped parcel of meat. "Keep warm, Maeve. Send my regards to your husband."
"Will do, dear. And you keep an eye out in that fog," Maeve replied warmly, taking her goods and heading back out into the biting cold.
As the day passed, Serena noticed the ledger was lighter than usual. There were significantly fewer customers than yesterday, especially absent were the usual Night's Watch brothers looking for cheap gear.
It's understandable, Serena thought practically as she took a brief lunch break, eating a piece of salted bread with Silas. The people are likely adjusting to this sudden cold snap. No one wants to get out when the fog is this thick.
She had no idea that the lack of Night's Watchmen was actually due to Bowen Marsh locking down Castle Black for his treason investigation.
Meanwhile, deep underground, in a lavish but suffocatingly humid office attached to the Mole's Hole brothel, a very different sort of planning was taking place.
The familiar, bulbous form of Lord Gared sat behind a heavy mahogany desk, sweating profusely despite the cold draft coming from the tunnels. Standing in front of him were three men. They did not look like the usual drunken thugs of Mole's Town. They wore dark boiled leather, their faces scarred and hardened, armed with high-quality steel shortswords and throwing knives. They were skilled mercenaries, hired from a passing ship at White Harbor for a small fortune.
"…then you trail them after she leaves the shop," Gared instructed, his wet, piggy eyes gleaming with a mixture of malice and paranoia. "Do not attack hastily in the open street. Just silently track them through the fog. Wait until they reach their home at the edge of the woods. Then... you guys start the plan. Burn the hut, and kill whoever runs out."
One of the mercenaries, a lean man with a missing ear, laughed slightly, tossing a copper coin in the air and catching it.
"You pay a considerable bounty, Lord Gared," the mercenary commented, a condescending smirk on his face. "But how is it that for such a trivial task—killing a washerwoman and two brats—you need us to be so cautious? We could just walk into the shop and slit her throat at noon."
Gared bristled, his face turning a blotchy red. He had spent a considerable amount of his wildling gold to hire these men specifically because every local thug in Mole's Town would instantly deny the job out of sheer terror of the woman and her demon child.
"You don't understand," Gared said, his voice dropping to a resentful growl. "For a long time, I let her breathe because she played a very dangerous game. She claimed to be under the personal protection of the First Ranger, Benjen Stark. The town whispers she's a Stark bastard herself."
The mercenary with the missing ear stopped tossing his coin, raising a scarred eyebrow. "Benjen Stark? That's a heavy name to cross, boss. The Night's Watch would hunt us down."
"It's a lie!" Gared spat, slamming his fat fist onto the mahogany desk. "A complete bluff! More than two years have passed since she arrived in this frozen wasteland. And still, no sign of Benjen Stark! Not a single visit, not a single raven! That witch talks of ghosts to keep me scared."
He leaned back, a nasty, confident smile spreading across his multiple chins.
"The rumors of her being a protected Stark woman are completely baseless," Gared continued, waving his hand dismissively. "And even if she has some Northern blood, the Starks have clearly abandoned her and those pups here in the dirt. It doesn't matter to Winterfell or the Night's Watch if they live or die. They are completely alone."
The mercenaries exchanged greedy glances, satisfied that they wouldn't be hunted by the high command.
"Hmm..." Gared grunted, resting his hands on his belly. "So, do what we agreed on, exactly as I said. If you pull this off quietly, with the amount I'm paying you, I can also guarantee you free nights with my best girls every time you visit this miserable town."
The mercenaries' eyes gleamed with lecherous excitement at the prospect of free whores and heavy coin.
Another mercenary, a brute with a thick black beard, rubbed his chin. "I hear that woman is a rare beauty, right? Red hair, southern curves. It would be too boring to just burn her in the hut. Can we enjoy her a bit before killing them?"
Standing in the corner of the office, acting as a guard, Orik—the thug whose thigh Yoriichi had impaled a year ago—felt a sudden, violent chill run through his body. He looked at the confident mercenaries and thought, Why does this feel so familiar? I pray for their luck. For some reason, Orik felt absolutely zero confidence that these expensive killers would survive the night.
Gared waved his hand dismissively. "Fine, fine. Have your fun if you catch her alive. But I also tell you to bring your four other men from the tavern to surround the hut. And I... I will watch from afar, near the tree line. I want to see this succeed with my own eyes. Understood?"
The mercenaries nodded, patting their sword hilts. "Consider it done, boss."
Gared exhaled a shaky breath as the killers left his office to prepare.
He was incredibly frustrated. Up till now, Serena had kept her word; she still had not meddled in his smuggling work, and she had taken her cut silently. But Gared was a paranoid man. He felt like she was a venomous snake sleeping under his bed—a snake that could strike at any moment of disadvantage.
Furthermore, her reputation in the town was slowly building in a good way, while his terrible reputation remained. He hated the respect she commanded. Recently, feeling overly confident, Gared had started swapping the pig iron in much larger quantities, trading heavily with the wildlings for rare relics and gold. His wealth had exploded over the past year.
After long, agonizing thoughts, he had decided it was finally time to reclaim what was his.
But Gared, drowning in his own arrogance and greed, did not know that his grand assassination plot was entirely redundant. He did not know that his own patron at Eastwatch, Officer Glendon, had already branded him a dead man and dispatched his own assassins.
A quiet knock on the office door broke Gared's thoughts.
Pete entered, shivering and covered in frozen mud. He looked terrified but forced a smile.
"Boss," Pete stammered, wiping his nose. "I tracked them to the shop like you asked. They are settling into their routine."
Gared smiled, a nasty, victorious grin stretching across his fat face.
"Excellent," Gared purred, rubbing his hands together. "Let's see how things fold tonight. The Shadow Queen is finally going to burn."