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It was a fortnight from White Harbor to Winterfell, assuming fresh horses and good weather. Davos had neither; he needed nearly two full turns to make the journey, riding through tough winds and driving rains, avoiding brigands by skirting both the river and the road. His mount collapsed on the southern fringes of the Wolfswood, the same day his store of food ran dry, more skin and bone than muscle and barely worth the effort of skinning. He took the final leagues on foot, sleeping under hedges and stretching the horse meat with berries and roots; it reminded him of his early years in Flea Bottom, before Marya or his berth on the Cobblecat, when he'd bedded down in store houses and haylofts, eating what little he could steal from unattended merchant carts.

The sun was setting when Davos finally spotted the castle, its towers black hulks against a reddish-grey sky, but Davos pressed on, unwilling to shiver through another night outdoors within the sight of stone walls. Winterfell was more than half a ruin, scorched in some places and crumbling in others, the courtyards strewn with rubble and the gardens trampled into sweeps of mud. Two guards stood at the butchered front gate, dressed in furs sewn with thistles on yellow, and Davos approached them carefully, mindful of keeping his hand away from his sword. He looked like a brigand himself, with his travel-stained clothes and his beard brushing his chest, and there was a chance Stannis had already returned to the Wall.

"Hold," the shorter guard said, a man with brown hair and crooked teeth. "What is your business here?"

"I need to see the king," Davos said, his voice rusty with disuse. "I am Lord Seaworth, his Hand."

The taller guard spit. "A jape, and a poor one at that. Davos Seaworth is long dead."

I should have brought the boy. These are Norrey men; they might have known him, or at least recognized his wolf. "I have -- "

Another man stepped out of the shadows behind the gate, and his grey eyes and long face struck Davos into silence. He could have been looking at Eddard Stark -- not the man who'd died as Robert's Hand, but the man who'd lifted the siege at Storm's End nearly seventeen years ago. He had Stark's bearing as well, the same broad shoulders and firm set of jaw; he studied Davos openly, his eyes narrowing at the sight of Davos' gloved left hand, then gestured for the guards to stand down.

"Lord Snow?"

"Let him pass, Brandon," he said, nodding for Davos to come through. "King Stannis is in his solar."

Snow is a bastard's name. Stark hadn't seemed the type, but the evidence was written over the young man's face. He led Davos across the main yard, to what looked to be the only tower still standing, then through the charred doors and up two sets of stairs, each step throbbing through Davos' ankles and knees after a sennight of travel over hard lands on foot. It was far warmer inside the castle than it had been without, but Davos' clothes were still damp from rains the evening before, and he shivered as Snow opened the door and Stannis' gruff voice rumbled out into the hall.

"I told you I did not wish to be disturbed."

"You did, Your Grace. But I felt this could not wait."

Stannis was seated before the hearth, the fire washing his face in shades of yellow and orange. His eyes widened as Davos came into the solar, relief easing the furrows in his brow and the lines around his mouth, and Davos swallowed past the knot burning in his throat, a sour mixture of sadness and shame. He grieved me as dead. All the unhappiness he has known, and I gave him another sorrow to bear. They stared at each other for a moment, Stannis still startled and Davos unsure of what to say; Stannis looked away suddenly, lifting a hand to gesture to Snow, but Snow was already moving, carrying a chair across the room and placing it at Stannis' right. Davos sat slowly, wincing as he bent, every muscle in his legs and back twinging with complaint.

"You missed supper by an hour, Lord Seaworth, but I think there is still some fish stew left."

"No, thank you," Davos said. After a sennight of acorns and berries, a heavy meal would only sicken his stomach. "I could do with some spiced wine and a heel of brown bread."

"I'll have it sent up."

"Just take your leave, Snow."

Snow's mouth almost twitched at the corners. "Yes, Your Grace."

"Stark's bastard?" Davos asked, once Snow was gone and the door was closed. He thought he remembered hearing of one now -- now that his wits were returning from two turns of solitude and want -- but he'd also heard he'd been sent off somewhere, to a distant fosterage or the ranks of the Night's Watch.

"Would that Stark had kept his trews on. The boy is a constant annoyance."

His voice lacked any true rancor, and Davos found himself smiling. Stannis is fond of him. I am glad he has not been alone. "Is he troublesome?"

"He is stubborn and insolent," Stannis said sourly. "He has his father's stiff neck but not his even temper. But he tells me the truth, and honesty has been in short supply of late." Stannis frowned at the fire for a moment, then said, "Wyman Manderly confessed his schemes once I put Bolton's head on a pike, but I assumed he was only feeding me more lies."

"I had no wish to deceive you, Your Grace, but secrecy seemed the best course. He swore to align with your cause if I fetched the Stark boy home."

"And did you?"

Davos nodded tiredly. "He is at White Harbor, with his wolf and the serving woman who helped him escape. Ser Marlon insisted the roads were unsafe."

"They are. Crawling with rapers and thieves," Stannis admitted, scratching at the beard shadowing his jaw. "Bolton cared little for law and order, and his bastard even less. It is another thing I must set to rights before I decide."

"Decide what, Your Grace?"

Stannis' mouth pulled into a tight line. He looked thinner than Davos remembered, hungry and older than his years. "If I march north or south. If I face the baseborn whelp sitting my throne or the terrors that await us beyond the Wall."

It was a question with no easy answer; Davos was spared from finding one by a knock at the door. It opened for a black-haired lad of ten or twelve, wearing a heavy cloak over First Flint colors, and Davos watched him cross the room and set the bread on the table with a sharp and desperate ache twisting into his chest. Devan. Where is Devan? Tell me I still have three healthy sons. The wine he carried smelled strongly of cinnamon and cloves, and Davos thanked him for it hoarsely, his tongue thick and his mouth dry.

"Your Grace, my -- "

"I left Devan at Castle Black," Stannis said, his gaze drifting from the fire to the window at its left. It was set high into the wall, and showed a heavy sky as purple as an old bruise. "Meeting Bolton on the field was a gamble. I did not care to wager another of your sons."

Davos sighed under his breath. My sons live, and so does my king. The wine was overly sweet to Davos' tastes, and hot enough that his lip beaded with sweat as he sipped it, but he was grateful for the warmth, which seemed to seep straight into his bones in a way the hearth did not. It eased the knots in his back, as well as the aching chill that had settled in his feet. Stannis was silent, but not in a manner that felt uncomfortable; they had passed many hours like this over the years, sitting together without any words.

Stannis made a soft noise Davos barely heard over the crackle of the fire, then carefully laid his hand over Davos' maimed one, where it rested on Davos' knee.

He had done this before, rarely, perhaps five or six times in all the years Davos had known him, and the gesture warmed Davos better than the fire. The yellowish light cast Stannis' face in profile, a sharp nose and squarely-cut jaw, but he turned away suddenly, as if he could feel Davos watching him, showing Davos the back of his head and the cord of his neck, the place behind his ear where his fringe of hair had grown long. Davos wished he could touch him; he wanted to stroke his fingers over the skin above Stannis' collar, trace the jut of Stannis' cheek with the pad of his thumb.

Such thoughts had troubled him when he was younger, the guilt sitting in his gut like a stone. He'd worried what Stannis would think if he knew, and what the gods would say it meant about his marriage, but now -- now that he was closer to fifty than forty, and mired to his throat in a third war -- he felt no shame in it. He loved Marya no less despite loving Stannis more, and he took small comfort in the notion that he was probably not alone. He turned back to the fire, watching as the flames danced against the hearth bricks. Stannis' hand was warm atop his, a sweet and solid weight, and Davos tried not to wish it would slide up his arm, to rest on his shoulder or curl at the back of his neck.

If wishes were wings, we would all of us turn our swine into dragons. Stannis would never ask it, not when he expected rejection at every turn and believed Davos would agree because of loyalty to his king. The last was a baseless fear, inconsistent with the measure of Davos' heart, but he understood it, because he carried fears of his own. Were he a braver man, he would make the offer himself, but the idea that Stannis would refuse him from nerves or honor or both was more than Davos could bear.

Davos stretched his legs, leaning closer to the fire, then slowly turned his hand over, curling his shortened fingers against Stannis' palm.