“I used to fish a lot, when I was a boy. Down by the lake, with my father.” His bare feet crunching in the shingle. The light glistening on the water. His father’s smile, and his brother’s.

But the captain didn’t come over nostalgic. “Lake? Sea-fishing’s what we do, boy.”

“Sea-fishing, I’ve got to say, I’ve had no practice at.”

“Then why you wasting my bloody time? I can get plenty of Styrian fishers for my measure, the best hands, all with a dozen years at sea.” He waved at the idle men lining the dock, looked more like they’d spent a dozen years in an ale-cup. “Why should I give work to some Northern beggar?”

“I’ll work hard. Had some bad luck is all. I’m just asking for a chance.”

“So are we all, but I’m not hearing why I should be the one to give it you.”

“Just a chance is—”

“Away from my boat, you big pale bastard!” The captain snatched up a length of rough wood from the deck and had himself a step forwards, as if he was set to beat a dog. “Get off, and take your bad luck with you!”

“I may be no kind of fisher, but I’ve always had a talent for making men bleed. Best put that stick down before I make you fucking eat it.” Shivers gave a look to go with the warning. A killing look, straight out of the North. The captain faltered, stopped, stood there grumbling. Then he tossed his stick away and started shouting at one of his own people.

Shivers hunched his shoulders and didn’t look back. He trudged to the mouth of an alley, past the torn bills pasted on the walls, the words daubed over ’em. Into the shadows between the crowded buildings, and the sounds of the docks went muffled at his back. It had been the same story with the smiths, and with the bakers, and with every damn trade in this damn city. There’d even been a cobbler who’d looked like a good enough sort until he told Shivers to fuck himself.

Vossula had said there was work everywhere in Styria, all you had to do was ask. It seemed, for reasons he couldn’t fathom, that Vossula had been lying out of his arse the whole way. Shivers had asked him all kinds of questions. But it occurred to him now, as he sank down on a slimy doorstep with his worn-out boots in the gutter and some fish-heads for company, he hadn’t asked the one question he should’ve. The one question staring him in the face ever since he got here.

Tell me, Vossula—if Styria’s such a slice of wonder, why the hell are you up here in the North?

“Fucking Styria,” he hissed in Northern. He had that pain behind his nose meant he was close to weeping, and he was that far gone he was scarcely even shamed. Caul Shivers. Rattleneck’s son. A Named Man who’d faced death in all weathers. Who’d fought beside the biggest names in the North—Rudd Threetrees, Black Dow, the Dogman, Harding Grim. Who’d led the charge against the Union near the Cumnur. Who’d held the line against a thousand Shanka at Dunbrec. Who’d fought seven days of murder up in the High Places. He almost felt a smile tugging at his mouth to think of the wild, brave times he’d come out alive from. He knew he’d been shitting himself the whole way, but what happy days those seemed now. Least he hadn’t been alone.