After leaving the workshop, Galon wasted no time and headed straight for the inner keep to check on Newgate's departure preparations.
Once the rations were ready and he had personally seen them off from Deepwood Motte, it was already afternoon.
The selection of the Steel Fist captains began.
As Galon had expected, both groups chose their captains in the most Northern way possible—by combat.
Pairs fought one another with wooden swords, and it took the entire afternoon before two captains were finally chosen.
One team was led by Ron Glover.
The other result surprised even Galon: Jon Snow.
Relying on the training he had done with Galon back in Winterfell, Jon managed to stand out from the crowd.
Seeing that the selection was finished and night was already approaching, Galon simply dismissed them.
He then returned to the inner keep with Lawrence.
Galon ate dinner with Robert's family, chatted for a while, and afterward planned to bathe and rest.
After all, Westeros lacked the rich nightlife of the modern world.
Even for nobles, evenings consisted of little beyond intimate affairs. For someone like Galon, still unmarried, there was basically nothing to do except sleep.
Before long, Galon returned to his bedchamber.
Since the inner keep of Deepwood Motte was built atop a hill, space was used very efficiently.
Still, as the lord, Galon naturally had the largest bedchamber and a private bath of his own.
The bedchamber and bath were connected by a hidden door.
Galon gently pushed open the concealed door on the right wall of his bedchamber and stepped inside the bath.
The room was empty. The servants all knew that Galon disliked being attended while bathing.
He stripped off his clothes and stepped into the tub.
The scalding hot water instantly reddened his skin, raising goosebumps all over.
Galon narrowed his eyes and leaned back against the wooden tub, letting out a lazy sigh of comfort.
As he soaked, he considered his plans for the coming days.
'Besides training the Steel Fist, I still need to visit the four clans of Forest, Tree, Trunk, and Branch.'
'And scouts need to be arranged at Sea Dragon Point as soon as possible…'
He pondered quietly. Only when his fingers had soaked until pale did he finally stand up from the tub.
Before leaving, the servants had already prepared towels and a robe.
Galon dried himself, wrapped the robe around his body, and returned to the bedchamber through the hidden door.
He walked to the window, opened the shutters, and gazed toward the snow-capped mountains in the distance.
The moon was nearly full, and the night sky was clear.
The distant peaks reflected pale moonlight like jagged white fangs, while the foothills and lower ridges lay hidden in shadow.
That was the territory of the mountain clans, who also swore loyalty to House Stark.
Galon watched quietly for a while, then shifted his gaze to the godswood in the courtyard.
When his eyes fell upon the heart tree, he again recalled his encounter with the Three-Eyed Raven at Winterfell.
'Even Maester Beckman knows nothing about any promise between House Glover and the old gods.'
'Uncle Robett doesn't know either.'
Galon closed the shutters, blew out the candle, and lay down on the bed.
"What exactly is the prophecy?"
He could not make sense of it.
The old gods were more like an animistic belief, without clear individual identities like the Lord of Light or the god of cold.
No matter how hard Galon thought, he could not imagine what kind of promise his ancestors might have made with the old gods.
'Do I have to go beyond the Wall someday and search for the Three-Eyed Raven myself?'
'That raven should be entering Bran's dreams now, preparing to awaken him…'
His thoughts drifted further.
He wondered whether Bran would suffer brief memory loss after waking, just like in the original story.
What would Catelyn do then? Would she still go south to King's Landing in search of Ned?
Countless tangled thoughts churned in his mind.
Before long, Galon grew drowsy and slipped into sleep.
He had no idea how much time passed.
When he awoke again, he thought dawn had come and instinctively tried to rise from bed.
But he found he could not move his body at all. Galon immediately realized something was wrong and instinctively looked down.
In his lowered field of vision—
A gray-white trunk, pale as bone, filled his sight.
He instinctively tried to move, and a leaf the color of congealed blood fell without any wind.
'How did I turn into a tree?'
'Did I transmigrate again?'
His heart tightened as he hurriedly examined his surroundings. Though he could not move his body, his perception was strangely vivid.
He could both control the eyes carved into the heart tree's face and sense the surroundings through its branches.
In his vision—
A wooden tower stood before him, and behind it he could vaguely see a brightly lit hall.
After a brief moment of thought, Galon realized where he was.
'The godswood!'
'I became the heart tree in the courtyard godswood?'
'How did this happen? And how do I return to my body?'
Shocked, Galon struggled, trying to break his consciousness free from the heart tree.
As his will to escape grew stronger, he actually broke free from the binding of the heart tree at Deepwood Motte.
Whoosh—
His perspective shifted.
Galon felt his consciousness rise upward, then soar through the sky.
Hovering above the Wolfswood, he could sense the presence of every nearby heart tree.
It felt as though, with a single thought, he could inhabit any one of them.
Galon focused his mind, chose a heart tree, and entered it.
In an instant.
Space and perception shifted, and his consciousness appeared in a godswood belonging to a mountain clan.
A group of elderly mountain clansmen knelt before the heart tree, praying silently.
They were preparing to set out on a final hunt.
Listening to their prayers, Galon understood—they intended to seek death so as not to burden their clan.
'What's the point of this?'
After the mountain clansmen left, Galon observed his surroundings in silence. He realized he still could not do anything.
His consciousness withdrew once more.
Again and again, it entered heart trees throughout the Wolfswood.
As this continued, Galon gradually understood what this ability was.
'Isn't this skinchanging?'
He inhabited a heart tree closest to Winterfell's godswood and finally grasped the truth.
But where others skinchanged into animals—House Stark into wolves, and the Three-Eyed Raven into ravens—
Galon skinchanged into heart trees.
'Others can move as animals. Even Bran can skinchange into Hodor and run freely.'
'What use is skinchanging into a heart tree? I can't move, can't speak, can only watch?'
He felt deeply frustrated and instinctively scanned his surroundings. 'And how am I supposed to return to my body?'
Galon withdrew his consciousness again, preparing to return to the heart tree at Deepwood Motte and search for a way back.
But at that moment, a warm, intimate call came from the godswood of Winterfell.
His consciousness hovered in the air as he looked toward Winterfell's godswood.
After a brief hesitation, he entered the heart tree there.
A familiar figure appeared before his eyes.
It was Sansa Stark.
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