Gojo stood in the cold wind, his thoughts weighed down by the questions that gnawed at him. The child had been returned to his mother, and the warmth of her grateful embrace did nothing to thaw the chill in his heart. The mothers had begged him to stay, to share their warmth, their gratitude, but Gojo had declined without hesitation. There was no room for such comforts in his mind now. He was a man driven by a singular purpose, and warmth was something he could not afford to indulge in.
As he walked away from the mother and child, a lingering thought haunted him—something that had been quietly brewing in the back of his mind ever since his journey began.
The bastard children...
Snow, Sands, Waters, Rivers, Hill, Pyke, Flowers. The names of bastards were always tied to nature, places of the world. It was a chilling realization that slowly unfurled in Gojo's mind. Were these children—these abandoned souls—being used for something darker?
"Snow," he muttered to himself, the weight of the name heavy on his tongue. A bastard's name is Snow... Snow. Just like the child he had rescued. Just like many others, left out in the cold, exposed to the elements, waiting to be claimed by fate.
But now Gojo wondered if this was no accident. Was it part of something far more sinister?
The Children of the Forest—their ancient rituals, their bloodthirsty pact with the cursed weirwood trees. He had already seen the horrors they could create. The monsters they birthed. And now, Gojo couldn't help but ask: Were bastards just left in nature so the Children of the Forest could sacrifice them?
It was an ugly thought, but the more he mulled over it, the more likely it seemed. He remembered the wells he had heard of—the deep pits that the nobles had used for centuries, where the bastards were discarded like refuse, left to rot in the darkness. He thought of Old Nan, who had disappeared into one of those wells. Her secretive nature. What had she been up to? The answer felt so obvious now, and yet, so grotesque.
"Was the right of First Night just a method to produce as many royal bastards as possible?" Gojo thought darkly. A system to make sacrifices.
The brutality of it all made his blood run cold. This system, this world—it was all designed to feed the cursed spirits and the cursed trees. The human suffering was a means to an end for something far more ancient and far more dangerous.
It was a system he could no longer ignore, no longer be a part of.
Gojo had already seen too much. The world needed to be cleansed, purged of the rot that had taken root here. These Children of the Forest, these White Walkers—they were all symptoms of something far worse, something deeper, and Gojo would not rest until they were wiped from existence.
His thoughts were interrupted by an unexpected touch.
One of Caster's wives had approached him, her fingers brushing against his skin in a way that made his stomach turn. Gojo stiffened, his eyes narrowing as he realized what was happening. She was trying to seduce him, her hands moving too familiarly, too carelessly.
For a brief moment, Gojo felt anger stir within him. He had no interest in the women of Caster's keep. He had no interest in anything that was not part of his mission. But as quickly as the anger rose, it was extinguished. He pulled away from her without a word, his face impassive as he turned away, leaving the keep behind him.
The touch still lingered in his mind, but it was insignificant. The true weight of his task—his purpose—was too great to be distracted by such petty things. Gojo's eyes darkened as he made his way away from Caster's keep, back into the frozen landscape. There was work to be done.
The Children of the Forest, the White Walkers, the accursed system that fed off human suffering—they were all linked. And Gojo would be the one to end it.
----------------------------------
To read 20 advanced chapters you can visit my Patreon:"https://patreon.com/ThePromoter"