After taking a look around and making sure that there were no other beasts around, I quickly climbed down and approached the dead stag. I closed my eyes and thanked the old gods in a whisper, before crouching and taking my knife out to field dress the prey, which meant that I cut it open and removed its guts and all other inedible parts inside.
After tying its legs with a small, I tried to carry it on my back but was unbalanced and fell down due to the stag being too heavy. Old mark silently appeared behind me and helped me carry the heavy beast on his back before he started walking toward the hut.
"You did a good job!" My teacher said with his back to me, "I am proud of you,"
A proud grin appeared on my face, Old mark was not a very emotional individual so he hardly gave praises which made the ones he gave all the more precious.
We made sure to be extra careful on the way back because of a couple of incidents that happened with us when predators like wolves or bears ambushed while walking back from a successful hunt with prey on their backs. The only thing to do in those sticky situations was to leave the game behind and climb a tree and pepper the predator with arrows hoping that it would go away.
It is said that most of the hunter's death happens while they are walking back toward their home with their prey. Fortunately, we arrived back safely without any hassle, but instead of going toward the lodge, we went straight to the merchant in town.
The merchant, who also happened to be Becca's father and Old mark's son-in-law, gave a huge smile when he looked at the size of the prey. The stag I had hunted was very large compared to Old Mark's usual prey, so its hide and antlers could be sold to the nobles in the south for them to brag.
He happily gave me 15 stags for the beast, which I tried to share with Old Mark, but he denied it with a wave. I wanted to thank my teacher in some way so I went back and had the butcher who worked for the merchant, cut me the tenderest and juiciest meat out.
I divided the meat into two portions, before giving half of it to old mark who didn't deny it this time. I said my farewell to Old Mark for the day and went toward Winterfell with a smile on my face while carrying back the meat from my first successful hunt.
Arriving at Winterfell I went straight toward the kitchen to give them the meat for them to prepare for dinner that night. There I found from a friendly maid that the whole Stark family was in the courtyard beside the stables.
All the way toward the stables, I felt like I had forgotten something important, but no matter how I thought about it I couldn't remember it.
It was only when I reached there and watched as Robb rode on his young horse, that I remembered that there was supposed to be a horse riding lesson today. I immediately ran toward the stable where my brand-new companion was.
"You're late," Lord Stark said from where he sat along with Sansa and Arya.
"Sorry," I shouted back before going toward pegasus, who had gotten a lot bigger since I had first seen him. While he was not big enough to carry a full-grown man, he could easily handle my weight.
Pegasus immediately stood up when he saw me coming and neighed at me in greeting. I started patting him as I said hello to him, before taking him out of there and toward where Robb's horse was being led around by the stable master.
I went toward the stable master's son standing on the edge of the courtyard who helped me mount pegasus before he started to run beside me as I rode pegasus toward Robb.
"Jon! You finally came," Robb shouted enthusiastically.
"Yeah, sorry I forgot,"
We rode our horses like that for a while before Robb pleaded with Father to let us ride unassisted as we were ready for it and I agreed with him.
After consulting with the stable master, Lord Stark allowed both of us to ride our respective horses without anyone holding the reins from the side.
At first, we started slow, just running slow circles in the courtyard, but before long Robb started to increase his speed gradually, which made me ride faster to keep up with him.
One thing led to another and ultimately we started a race on our horses with both of us neck to neck. I was a bit surprised by how good of a rider Robb was, while I had the advantage of being a warg and pegasus almost understanding my thoughts instinctually, he didn't have that but he still kept up with me.
There was no winner of the race as Lord Stark ultimately called us to a stop when we started going too fast, but both of us had wide grins on our faces so we didn't mind too much.
We dismounted and after placing our horses back into the stable before going toward where Eddard with Arya in his hands and Sansa standing beside him.
"You both were very good out there," Eddard said with a small smile.
"Yes, Jon! Robb!," Sansa chirped while jumping, "You were so awesome,"
Both of us exchanged a proud grin with each other at that before the littlest stark decided to share her opinion.
"Want Howsy!" Arya abruptly said.
"No, Arya," Eddard calmly said, "You are a little too young. Maybe when you are a bit older,"
"No! Want Howsy Now!" she said and when she didn't get her to wish she immediately started throwing a tantrum.
All of us were at a loss about what to do, and after brainstorming for a while I had a brilliant idea. The idea I had was so simple but if it panned out, it would be an incredible one.
"I'll get you a horse, Arya," I said while approaching her.
"Really, you pwomise," Arya said while looking at me with her large wet eyes.
"Yes, but it would take a while to get your horse so how about while waiting for that you use big brother horse," I said doing the only thing a brother could in this situation, and immediately put Arya on my back before I started crawling on my hand and knees.
"Go Howsy! GO!" Arya shouted delightedly while grabbing onto my hair.
Sansa looked enviously toward them before she turned her big blue eyes toward Robb who immediately crossed his hands and said, "No way, you are too big for that," But Sansa's eyes started watering which broke Robb's resistance quickly, "Alright fine," Robb said while getting on his fours.
Eddard looked with a gentle smile on his face as he watched his four children laugh and have the time of his life, he closed his eyes and prayed to the old god to never take those smiles away.
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pat reon. com/lazywizard —> To read ahead
Sirius Black SI —> My other fic