Inside Game Of Thrones

Episode 16

Bran knows that both of the men are black brothers, or at least, were black brothers. Now they are just deserters. And Bran’s father had told him that, since a deserter knew that his life was forfeit once he was caught, there was no crime he wouldn’t deign to commit.

Bran is scared out of his wits of the four of them, who recognize him by his clothing as a son of Lord Stark and discuss either kidnapping him for ransom and taking his horse and clothes, or taking him back beyond the Wall to Mance Rayder, the infamous king of the wildlings. His only saving grace is that Robb finds him just in time and gallops across the river, dead game slung across the rear of his horse, and two demons in the shape of direwolves at his back.

Robb unleashes hell on the first man with his sword, while the direwolves go after the other man and the shorter woman, dragging one into the river, tearing open their flesh and gutting them alive, making their blood run into the water and turn it red.
When the taller man whom Robb had been fighting sees what the direwolves are capable of, he drags Bran down off his horse and holds a knife to his throat, telling him to call off his two wolves, one of whom is creeping toward the cowering tall woman, threatening to kill Bran if he doesn’t.
The man is still talking when an arrow tip sprouts from his chest, and he falls face first, letting Bran go. He has been shot from behind by Theon, who had finally caught up with them along with the other men. They arrive to see the nasty work of Grey Wind and Summer, two dead people with their entrails leaking out and blood splattered everywhere.
The tall woman, whose name is Osha, pleads with Robb to spare her, which is what the young lord does, taking her captive. The gesture is merciful, because even Robb’s men pled with him to kill her, because wildling women aren’t like other women of the seven kingdoms. They’re just as wild and dangerous as the men.
And more word comes back from the South. This one is says that the King is dead, and that Lord Eddard Stark, Bran’s father, has been accused of treason and conspiring against the throne by plotting to deny Joffery Baratheon, Robert’s firstborn son, of his right of ascent to the Iron Throne. Their father has been detained and is awaiting trial for his crimes.
The word of the death of their father’s men as well as the outrageous imprisonment of Lord Stark reaches reaches his bannermen, and one by one they begin arriving Winterfell in all their strength.
Lord Glover with his mailed fist sigil, Lord Cerwyn and his battleaxe, the white sunburst of the Karstarks, the giant in chains of the Umbers, the flayed man of the Boltons of the Dreadfort, the bear of the Mormonts, and many more, tens of thousands of men in all. Day by day they arrive, high lords and ladies and their sons and daughters and retainers, their knights and men-at-arms and squires and all, marching proudly over the drawbridge and into Winterfell.
There is a town outside Winterfell called the Winter Town, a town that has been deserted for most of Bran’s life. Their father has always mentioned about how the town would come alive during times of war when Northmen would camp outside the castle, and Bran has always wanted to see that day. Now that the day has come, however, Robb has forbidden him to go into the winter town. Being among men like these is dangerous, his elder brother insists, and not without cause. On the first night of their stay in the small town outside the castle walls, the men have already had a tavern fight in which at least one person was killed.
But command or no, Bran would have still gone into the town to see for himself. There were times when he would have been able to climb the stone buildings out there, jumping from rooftop to rooftop without being spotted by anyone.Would have,because he is now a cripple, able to move about only in the basket on Hodor’s back.
And it’s not just in the wintertown where there are men. Thousands of men are also encamped on the flats outside the city walls.
Robb, the Lord of Winterfell, has to talk with each lord, because their father has always said that a good lord should know his men. So his brother holds a feast each night, and each time with a different one of his lords bannermen in the place of honor by his side. Bran also sits in on all the feasts as due the brother of the Lord of Winterfell.
On one such nights, particularly the one when Robb feasts the Greatjon, Lord Umber, the large, loud man subtly implies that he might not be able to risk his men to march on the Lannisters. Robb only strokes Grey Wind’s head and calmly replies that if he stays behind, he and his men will go and fight without Lord Umber. And that when he wins, he will return and execute him for a traitor.
The Greatjon roars in anger at that and jumps to his feet, drawing his sword as he does and screaming obscenities at Robb. One of their father’s men jumps at him, a full-grown man in his own right, but Lord Umber tosses him aside as one would a rag. Bran is scared witless, knowing that his fourteen-year-old elder brother has no chance against a man that big, a man older even than their father.
But no sooner has the man gotten to his feet than Robb’s big direwolf bounds across the room and pounces on him, and both of them fall on the floor, struggling with each other. When the Greatjon finally regains his feet, everyone seated at table can see that he is missing two fingers.