Brother John hailed from the Riverlands, the eldest son of a village carpenter near the Gods Eye.
At seventeen, his father had taken him to repair the roof of a local sept. His steady hands and keen eye for joinery were seen as a blessing from the Smith. Recommended by an old Septon who saw more than just a craftsman in the boy, John joined the order as a sworn Brother serving the aspect of the Smith.
When the Andals had invaded Westeros thousands of years ago, they brought the Faith of the Seven from the hills of Andalos in Essos. The Faith taught that there were seven aspects of a single deity: the Father for judgment, the Mother for mercy, the Smith for labor, the Maiden for innocence, the Warrior for strength, the Crone for wisdom, and the Stranger for death.
These aspects governed every facet of human existence, binding the Faith to the very marrow of Andal law and society. South of the Neck, the Seven had almost entirely supplanted the Old Gods.
However, in Aldric's modern view, the Faith felt like a religion in a clumsy transition between polytheism and a true singular godhead. There was plenty of room for "improvement," though he kept that heretical thought to himself.
During his years in the sept, John had learned to read, write, and heal. On top of his carpentry, he had picked up the basics of smithing and masonry. But life inside the stone walls also exposed him to the rot—Brothers who used the Mother's mercy as a cloak for greed and Septons who grew fat on the tithes of the starving. His faith had wavered.
Following the path of his mentor, Brother Greller, John had embarked on a pilgrimage. He had spent four years walking the realm, hoping to find the gods in the dirt and the sweat of the smallfolk rather than in gilded halls.
Winterfell was his next stop. Though the North kept the Old Gods, the capital of the North hosted a significant community of Southrons—knights, merchants, and noble ladies like Catelyn Stark who had brought their faith with them. John intended to offer them guidance and serve the Smith in the shadow of the Direwolf.
"But can you survive on the charity of a few Southron guards?" Aldric asked as they rode.
John tapped the small iron hammer hanging from his neck. "The Smith provides. I am a carpenter before I am a priest."
During Aldric's recovery, John hadn't just prayed. He had repaired the farmer's barn doors and fixed a broken wagon wheel for a passing trader, earning enough coppers for grain and salt.
After John agreed to travel with them, Aldric had insisted on buying him a donkey. A sturdy beast cost five silver stags—a pittance to Aldric, but a fortune to John. The monk accepted it, realizing it would keep him from dragging down the pace of the horses.
With a mount, the journey quickened, but John's conscience began to ache.
When traveling alone, he would stop at every hamlet to work and preach. But Aldric was a man on a mission. His eyes were fixed on the northern horizon.
At night, Aldric refused to sleep in the mud. If a town was within reach, he demanded a tavern with a hot hearth and a real bed. Even in the smallest thorp, he made John find the most prosperous farmer and paid for a roof.
Crucially, Aldric never let John sit in the corner with a crust of bread. He insisted the monk sit at their table. "A man doesn't feast while his brother starves," Aldric would say, sliding a plate of roast mutton toward him.
By the sixth night of comfort, guilt gnawed at John's soul. He was on a pilgrimage of suffering. How had it turned into a tour of the North's best inns? He worried that if they didn't part ways, he would end up like the pampered Septons of King's Landing, more concerned with the vintage of his wine than the state of his soul.
After a particularly hearty dinner of venison stew, John wiped the grease from his chin and tentatively suggested they go their separate ways.
Aldric, leaning back with a cup of ale and listening to a bard sing a raunchy tune about a knight and a lusty tavern wench, looked baffled. "Split up? Why?"
He laughed, raising his cup. "Suffering is a test, John. But isn't comfort a test too? Are you so fragile that a soft bed will make you forget your gods?"
John bristled. "Hardship is how we prove our devotion. What does a foreign sellsword know of spiritual trials?"
Since learning John was barely a year older than him—his bald head made him look a decade older—Aldric felt a genuine kinship with the man. His fever had broken the last of his detachment; he felt like a part of this world now, for better or worse.
The bard finished his set, and the tavern hummed with the low drone of conversation. Aldric leaned forward, his eyes glinting in the firelight.
"Don't know about trials? Heh. Let me tell you a story from my homeland."
Aldric cleared his throat, pitching his voice to carry.
"Many centuries ago, in the empires of the East, there was a monk named Brother Xuan. When he was an infant, bandits murdered his father. To save his life, his mother placed him in a reed basket and set him adrift on a great river."
"He was found and raised by a high abbot. As he grew, Xuan asked questions about the heavens that no book could answer. So, he resolved to walk to the Holy Lands at the edge of the world to find the true scriptures."
"The road was thousands of leagues long. On his journey, three powerful, cursed warriors—monsters in their own right—were moved by his iron will and became his guardians."
"One day, they reached a kingdom deep in the jade-jungles, a land where no man was permitted to tread: the Kingdom of the Sun-Queens. The Queen was young, beautiful beyond words, and she offered Xuan her hand, her throne, and all the riches of her realm if he would only stay."
"Then came the Shadow-binder of the wastes, a woman as dangerous as she was lovely, who tried to ensnare his heart with sorcery."
Aldric paused, taking a slow sip of ale.
"In the end, Brother Xuan packed his bags, called his guardians, and walked away without a single backward glance. He knew that no earthly throne or silken bed compared to the light of his path."
Aldric looked John in the eye. "And that was only one of the eighty-one trials he faced. You worry that a bowl of stew will shake your faith? If a Queen offered you the world, could you still walk?"
John sat in stunned silence.
At the next table, a bearded man let out a boisterous shout. "I couldn't! A beautiful queen and a mountain of gold? Any man with a pulse stays! Who needs old scrolls?!"
The tavern erupted in laughter. Aldric realized the entire room had gone quiet to listen. Even the bard had moved his stool closer to their table.
The bard strummed a soft, inquisitive chord on his harp. "A fine tale, Ser. Masterfully told."
"Thanks," Aldric nodded.
"Might we speak?" the bard asked.
"After the next round."
The bard returned to the stage, playing a few popular foot-stompers to keep the crowd distracted while John processed the story.
"It is a compelling parable," John said finally, his voice low. "But it is a folk tale. There is no river water that makes men pregnant, and no kingdoms of only women in the world I know."
"Perhaps not here," Aldric said seriously. "But Xuan truly existed in my history. He traveled alone across deserts that swallow armies and mountains that touch the stars. He spent seventeen years among foreigners, enduring hardships that killed every man sent to aid him, and he returned a saint. He didn't find his strength in a cell, John. He found it on the road."
John fell silent again, pondering. Seventeen years. To a pilgrim, that was a number that commanded respect.
As the night deepened and the locals drifted home, the bard packed his harp and approached.
"Brother," the bard said to John, doffing his blue pointed hat and making a sign of the Seven. "May a humble seeker of beauty sit with you?"
John smiled. "Please, sit."
The bard sat, his eyes fixed on Aldric. "Ser, that story... the cadence, the structure. It has a charm I've not heard in the Seven Kingdoms. What is it called?"
"It's part of a longer cycle," Aldric said. "The Records of the Western Journey."
"Western Journey..." the bard whispered. "I am Rennel Voss, of the Westerlands. I have wandered from Lannisport to the Wall, and I have never heard of this Xuan."
Aldric grinned. "He's from a long way off, Rennel."
Rennel leaned in, his professional instincts screaming. "You said there were eighty-one trials. Does that mean there are eighty other stories like that one?"
"Give or take. Reaching the Holy Land is a lot of work."
Rennel's fingers twitched. He could hear the potential—an exotic, high-stakes epic with monsters, warriors, and a holy man. If he could learn these stories and adapt them to the local tongue, he would be invited to perform at the Manderly's New Castle, perhaps even the Red Keep itself.
"Ser Aldric," the bard said, his voice trembling with excitement. "A story like that... it's a treasure. Can you sell the full account to me?"
Aldric looked conflicted. "Sell it? I don't have a book for you, Rennel."
"Then tell them to me! Write them down! I will pay you every copper I earn this moon!"
"Even if I wrote them," Aldric sighed, "you couldn't read them. I don't know your script yet. And my own... well, it wouldn't look like anything you've ever seen."