AUTHOR'S NOTE: Back with another chapter! This time, we're on the road to Winterfell. Some more Tyrion/Arthas/Jon bonding Also, progressing the plot a bit.
Let me know what you guys think and if anything catches your eye! Next chapter, we're going to land in Castle Black to learn what exactly are those "dark tidings".
"A king may give the name, but only danger gives it weight."
On the road to the Wall, North of Winterfell, The North, 298 AC
The wind was cold on my face, making my blonde hair trail behind me.
The road out of Winterfell went on forever. We had left the castle a day ago and had ridden as hard as we could manage, given the supply train we were escorting. The King's escort was riding ahead in the van, alongside the King and the Starks'. In the middle of the convoy came the supply wagons, the pack mules and the wagons containing the recruits destined for the Wall. In the back, guarding the rear, we had the Stark men.
Our pace was middling.
Ahead of us, through the press of mounted men and swaying poles, I heard the king bellowing. He was riding like a man who believed all roads belonged to him, which was true in a way. Lord Stark rode beside him, straight-backed and grim, his cloak moving little despite the wind. Benjen Stark rode near them both, always scanning the horizon. I could see why he had been made First Ranger. A little farther back, escorting the King, was Ser Mandon Moore and Ser Meryn Trant, both looking grimmer than usual. All men from the royal party had been accustomed to the southern weather. I could see the cold didn't sit well with them. They were wearing furs over their armor, and still they were drawing them closer. I could see Ser Meryn Trant's beard had been frozen over, giving him the appearance of an old man.
In the rear, we had the Stark men, being led by none other than Jory Cassel. He had approached me before we had left Winterfell and taken a long look at my sword. Then he had told me that since I'd managed to defeat all the knights who challenged me in Winterfell, Lord Stark had commanded that I had a free pick from the armory for a weapon to use on the ride to the Wall. I had respectfully disagreed at first, but he had insisted. No doubt the King had something to do with it.
He had led me into a room where I could smell the iron, oil and leather. It was a cramped room, with a low ceiling and little light. I had walked around it, taking in the weapons displayed on racks, but my eyes had lingered on a piece that was larger than the rest.
"We placed some bets on this, you know?", he had said, coming near me.
I had snorted. "And did you lose?"
"No," he had laughed, clapping my back. "I've already taken your measure."
In the end, I had picked a warhammer. It was a brutal thing, large, meant to be wielded two-handed, with a black head that ended in an iron beak. The other face was a flat thing meant to crush. The handle was large and plain, with leather wrapped around it for a better grip.
Now, it sat secured to Invincible's saddle, in a place that would be easy to reach.
"Well," I heard Tyrion to my left. I turned around and saw him enclosed by his furs, looking like a small bear. "We have ridden for two days and no one has carried you off in chains, yet. I suppose that means you still have time to change your mind, Jon. You're certain the Wall is your higher calling?"
I shot him a raised eyebrow, but he merely smiled at me.
On my right, I could see Jon standing on the side of a wagon, with a strip of beef jerky in his mouth. His jaw was working while his grey eyes were taking in the empty expanses.
Jon's mouth twitched slightly. "I've not changed my mind."
"No?" asked Tyrion with exaggerated surprise. "Curious. I always imagined a life of freezing wind, bad food, old wool, and criminals with knives would lose some of its poetry once a man had to smell it."
Jon kept his eyes on the road ahead. "I am not going for poetry."
"No," Tyrion said dryly. "That, at least, is plain enough."
Jon took the jab without flinching. "A man should have a place," he said after a moment, "Something that is by his own doing. At Winterfell I had honor enough so long as I remembered what I was. Lady Catelyn made sure of that. At the Wall it will make no matter. A man serves. That is all."
The answer was simple, but there was iron in it.
"There is honor in that," I said, at last. "To bind oneself to service, not for profit, inheritance, or ease, but because the thing must be done..." The reins creaked beneath my glove. "There is a kind of sanctity in it."
That made Tyrion snort beside me. "Sanctity?" he asked, one brow arching. "Seven save us. Have the snows turned you into a septon at last, cousin?"
I ignored the jab, thinking back on my memory. I had known paladins who could display envy, or pride. No man was perfect. It was by overcoming those imperfections that made a man great, and a paladin even greater. The Order had not been perfect, in the way no order of men could be perfect. But in the shape of it, there had been something pure. Men taking up the burden because somebody has to stand against the Darkness and rage against the dying of the Light.
"There is," I murmured. "Or there was."
Tyrion shook his head and gave me another snort. "A higher cause." he said, tasting the words. "A noble brotherhood. Brave service. Fine vows." He shifted in his saddle and twisted about to look down the length of the column. "Look behind us, cousin, and tell me what holy brotherhood you see."
Jon and I both turned.
The road snaked behind us all the way to Winterfell, broken at intervals by wagons, mounted men, mules and all the human refuse the realm had decided to shovel north and call recruitment. The black brothers rode among them with grim faces, some of them looking bored and some of them having the look of killers forced to change their skin. They looked downtrodden, the blacks of their cloaks weather-eaten, greying at the seams, gone shiny with age, and patched more times than one could count.
Among the recruits there was no glory to be found. One of the wagons held three men in iron and each of them was more ugly than the last. One of them had the flat, dead eyes of Ser Mandon Moore, with a scar over his mouth that made his mouth curl in a vicious grin every time he talked. Another had cheeks gone hollow from hunger and looked more like a rat than a man, twitching at every jolt of the cart. The third had a broken nose. He was looking outside the cage with a pensive look, fist clenching and unclenching at random intervals.
Nearby, I could see others riding along. Young boys too thin for the cloaks on their backs, no doubt sent to the Wall for lack of food, old men sent north to spare the noose, most likely poachers caught in the act. Farther up the line I could spy two brothers walking together, thieves from King's Landing. They were skinny things, keeping to themselves, always watching and always listening.
I grimaced.
No, Tyrion was right. There was no shining host in our wake. No proud brotherhood. This realm had taken to perverting everything it could. Even the Night's Watch, an order that should have stood as the Bulwark against the Darkness, had been corrupted beyond measure. Rotted from the inside out. All done by design.
I wondered for a moment if this was not some grand conspiracy that aided the coming Darkness. Then I merely remembered human nature.
Tyrion followed our gaze, before gesturing.
"There is your higher cause," he said. "Thieves, rapers, poachers, debtors, boys no one wanted fed through another winter, and the occasional fool who mistakes misery for meaning."
Jon looked longer than me. I could see the truth settling in his face, as he was taking on the scene. The Wall had been an honorable thing in his imagination. Like his uncle, Benjen. He had thought all Night's Brothers to have as much spine as him. Now, that he was looking over the real brothers he would find there, he looked disappointed.
But Jon Snow did not strike me as a man who backed down.
I could see his jaw tightening and his back stiffening.
"Then it will be my place all the same," he said. "The Wall is what it is. I mean to take the black, not choose the men beside me."
I saw Tyrion studying him for a moment, pausing. At length he sighed through his nose and pulled his fur tighter around his shoulders.
"A grievous inconvenience, your pride," he murmured. "I had half-hoped to corrupt you before we arrived."
I laughed at that.
"The boy has more spine than half the men dragging north behind us, Tyrion" I said. "The Wall will have need of men such as him."
Jon's face gave little away, yet he sat straighter for it.
I turned forward again. The road was narrowing. Great pines of the wolfswood pressed closer on either side, black-barked and thick-limbed, their roots shouldering up through the earth while the light beneath them thinned to a cold green gloom.
Tyrion followed my gaze. "I take it we shall be making camp in the woods tonight."
"Aye," I said. "Bad ground for it."
He gave me a sidelong look. "Because there are trees?"
"Because there is enough cover to hide a hundred men and little room to see ten of them before they are on you," I said. "No field of view. No room for horses to spread. Too many blind angles."
Tyrion's mouth thinned. Jon turned where he stood on the wagon and looked first into the trees, then back along the convoy, and said nothing at all.
On the road to the Wall, Wolfswood, The North, 298 AC
We had made camp three nights already and came to no harm.
Men already knew where to go. The wagons were drawn in where the ground allowed, the mules were seen to, the horses picketed and the fires laid and lit. The recruits were shoved together near the wagon holding the cage with the more dangerous recruits, while the black brothers moved among them with hard faces and even harder tempers. I had seen several beatings take place, no doubt to improve morale.
The Stark men worked in a quiet, dignified way, compared to the King's. The men from the south grumbled more, having stiff backs and even stiffer hands. The cold was not at all agreeable, I thought.
"Fill it," a voice interrupted my thoughts.
I turned my gaze towards the King and took the cup.
The king's fire was a large affair, bigger than any of the others in camp. Someone had ringed it round with stones dragged up from the roadside, and the ground about it was thick with crushed pine needles, mud, and old ash. A spit had been set above the flames on forked stakes, with a haunch of venison turning slow over the coals while fat dripped from it. It hissed and crackled when it struck the flames.
One of the king's grooms worked the spit by hand, sullen-faced from smoke and heat, while another servant crouched near a low camp table with a knife, trenchers, salt, and a half-wheel of hard cheese laid out beside two open flagons of wine. The king's tent stood a little behind the fire, broad and dark in the trees, with its ropes staked hard into the ground and a pair of lanterns hanging low by the entrance.
Ser Mandon Moore and Ser Meryn Trant stood near enough to Robert to be at hand. Ned Stark sat across from the king on a folding stool, his cloak drawn close, while Robert sprawled on a thicker camp chair.
Robert tore a strip of meat from a skewer and pointed his meaty finger at Ned.
"I'm telling you, Ned, he looked surprised," he said. "That was the finest part of it. Prince Rhaegar in all his rubies and silver, looking like some painted maiden's dream, and then my hammer came through and he looked surprised."
Ned drank and said nothing.
Robert laughed at his own tale. "Gods, but I hit him hard. I felt that blow up my arms and into my teeth. Best blow I ever struck."
"You have said so four times since the fires were lit," Ned said.
"Then hear it a fifth." Robert leaned forward, grinning like a man twenty years younger. "He came at me as if the Warrior himself had put him in the saddle, and I caved his breast in all the same. You saw it."
"I saw the river," Ned said. "The rest grows finer each time you tell it."
Robert barked a laugh at that and shoved the empty cup back at me. "Wine."
I filled it again and let my mind wander.
The King had been in a boisterous mood ever since leaving Winterfell. It looked as if the stories from beyond the Wall had stirred something of the old Warrior in him. He still drank himself to sleep every night, but his energy during the day was different. He was more sharp, more energetic and more determined to reach the Wall, than I had seen him with anything since becoming his squire.
When he had heard of the wildling threat I had seen him stiffen, before grinning. Something had reminded him of the Demon, and he wished to let it loose.
A shadow outside the fire drew my eye towards the outer camp.
The fires were smaller out there and placed where the dark began. Stark men held most of those points, with a few black brothers talking low with them. Farther down the camp I could see more of them being manned by the King's men. The division was not strange.
What did strike me as strange were the woods themselves.
Ever since we had entered the wolfswood, we could hear the shouts of fox, deer, owls later in the night. Now, there was only an eerie quiet. The wood was too large and too old to be so empty.
The King was still going on about the Trident.
"I smashed him into the river, Ned. Gods, the splash of it. Rubies everywhere. Looked like the bloody water itself had broken into jewels."
Ned shook his head. "If you keep at it, by morning you'll have slain him with one hand and mounted a wolf with the other."
King Robert choked on his wine. "Seven bloody hells," he gasped, laughing. "There's a man in you still. I'd almost forgotten it."
He drank, wiped his mouth with the back of his hand, and grunted. "Gods, but this place is a cursed one. Mud, pines, bad roads, and no women worth naming. If the Wall's half so miserable as the road to it, I'll have words with your black brothers, Ned."
Ned gave him a look over his cup. "I am sure they wait in dread of it."
"They bloody should." King Robert said, pointing a skewer at him. "If there's wildlings enough to trouble your northmen, I'd see it with my own eyes. Gods know there's precious little else worth looking at out here save trees and your long face."
"My face has served me well enough." Lord Stark replied, a tug at his lips.
"Aye, to sour wine and frighten horses!" roared the King.
That won a few chuckles from the men near the fire. Ned only shook his head and drank again. There was a little more warmth in him than before, though.
King Robert tore off one last strip of venison, chewed, swallowed, and gave a long breath through his nose. The wine had him now. I could see it settling into his limbs, dragging at him. He was fighting it still, but badly.
"To sleep," he muttered. "Before this fucking cold freezes my prick off."
The King barked a laugh loud enough to startle one of the horses, then pushed himself upright with a grunt and a curse. He swayed once, caught himself, and jabbed a finger at me.
Mandon Moore and Meryn Trant moved in when he took his first step away from the fire. King Robert shrugged Meryn off at once.
"I can walk, damn you."
"As Your Grace says," Meryn murmured.
Robert cast one last look at Ned. "Try not to freeze before dawn."
"I'll do my best," Ned said.
The king went off toward his tent with the Kingsguard at his heels, his boots crunching over the pine needles and frost-hardened ground. The fire seemed smaller once he was gone.
I waited a moment longer and then slipped away.
Benjen Stark was where I expected him to be, near the edge of the camp, where the light thinned and the dark began. A small fire burned there. Jory Cassel was sharing the fire, saying something in a low voice. When they saw me coming, Jory nodded once and went off toward the horse-lines.
Benjen turned around towards me. "Anything the matter?"
"The wood," I said, looking around. "There's nothing in it."
He looked as if he wanted to say something, but I continued.
"Ever since entering the Wolfswood, we've been hearing the sounds of the forest. Now, there's nothing but the camp and the wind."
Benjen glanced towards the fires dotting the woods and then back to me. "Aye."
I looked out into the darkness. The fires only reach so far into the darkness. Beyond them I could see trunks, black and straight with the brush between them. Enough cover to hide an ambush.
"Wolves?" I asked. "Or worse?"
"May be wolves. May be the weather." He held his hands over the fire for a moment, before following my gaze. "May be men."
I looked at him then. "Has the watch been changed? Fortified?"
He raised an eyebrow and I could see a smile tugging at the corner of his lips.
"Two more men on the outer ring. Jory's looking to the horse-lines. If there's trouble, we'll know it." he said.
I nodded.
Before I could leave, he continued. "I've seldom seen a squire take such interest in a camp." I've been hearing bold tales about you, boy, and I must admit some of them ring true,"
I looked at him. "Vigilance guards what strength alone cannot."
He laughed then. "That it does. Well, go on now. I know my nephew and the dwarf are waiting for you down the line."
I left him behind and crossed back through the camp.
Tyrion had claimed a place by one of the middle fires, near enough to the wagons to keep out some of the wind. He sat on a folded blanket with a book in his hand and a cup by his boot. Jon was with him, sitting on an upturned crate with his cloak wrapped close, Ghost sprawled pale at his feet. The direwolf lifted his head when I came near, watched me a heartbeat, then set it down again.
Tyrion glanced up from the page. "Has His Grace at last succumbed to wine and memory?"
"For the night," I said, sitting down near the fire. "Though I think memory put up the poorer fight."
Jon snorted at that.
Tyrion shut the book over one finger. "A pity. I'd hoped the cask might do the realm a service."
"What are you reading?" Jon asked.
"A history," Tyrion said.
Jon looked at the book, then at him. "On the road?"
"Especially on the road." Tyrion took up the cup and drank. "Some men travel with swords. I prefer something I know I can lift."
"There are worse weapons," I said.
Tyrion grinned. "Aye. There are prettier ones too, but fewer are better suited for me."
Jon's eyes stayed on the book. "And that's enough?"
"For what?" Tyrion asked, raising an eyebrow.
"To keep a man safe." Jon replied.
Tyrion huffed through his nose. "No. But it helps me know when I ought run, flatter, lie, or stand behind someone large and well-armed. In this world, that is near enough the same thing."
I stretched my hands toward the fire. "Steel, wit, strength. None of them means much in foolish hands."
Tyrion threw me a look. "And there's the septon again."
"Holy Light save me from that." I grimaced.
I saw Jon smile a little.
"Again with that," Tyrion said, pointing a tiny finger at me. "I haven't seen you pray in some days, cousin. I had begun to hope the cold had made you forget your piety."
Jon was quiet nearby, before he asked. "This Holy Light," he said. "What is it?"
I shrugged. "A thing I heard of when I was young. Stories at first. Old vows, old tales, the sort men tell boys so they grow into something better than their fathers."
Tyrion snorted. "Strange. We grew up together, cousin. I don't recall hearing any of this."
"You were listening to other things." I replied, grinning.
He narrowed his eyes at that, but I continued.
"There were churches for it. Cathedrals. Priests, orders, books. That never made it theirs." I said, reaching for the fire again. "A man could find his Light in a chapel, in battle, or alone with his oath. The priests were not needed for that."
Jon frowned slightly. "Like the old gods?"
"Nearer to that than the Seven, in that respect. A man can face it alone. He does not need a septon to speak for him. But it is no spirit in a tree either." I turned the stick in the fire and watched the end glow. "It is simpler than that. Order. Strength should guard, not prey. Vows matter. That a man who means to rule needs to first rule himself."
Tyrion turned his cup in his hand. "A poor faith for most of the realm."
"Aye," I said. "And poorer still for the men who sit atop it. Once holy words start filling bellies and purses, the thing is already rotten."
"No shortage of that in King's Landing," Tyrion said, grinning.
"Nor anywhere else, I wager," I said slowly, looking pensively at the flames. "The hungry can be preached at for a long while. They can be taxed and beaten longer. But when the men above gorge themselves and call it sacred, sooner or later someone below decides fire is sacred too."
The flames were guttering low. I stared into them long enough that the light began to play tricks, or so I told myself. Whatever shape I thought I glimpsed lasted no longer than a moment before the coals fell in and the fire became only fire.
Jon was quiet after that. Tyrion as well, though only for a moment.
"Well," he said at last, "that is a livelier sort of piety than I'm used to."
For a time we sat without speaking much. Around us the camp was settling into itself. Men finished eating and scraped trenchers clean with bread. Someone cursed softly while trying to get a stubborn mule to lie down. A horse stamped. Farther off, one of the recruits started muttering some song to himself until a black brother told him to shut his mouth or lose teeth.
Ghost lifted his head then and looked out toward the dark.
All three of us followed his gaze.
Nothing moved.
"I do not like this place." Tyrion said, pulling his furs tighter.
I thought about that for a moment. "Neither do I," I replied.
"I've first watch." Jon said, rising.
"Do try not to let the darkness swallow you before morning." Tyrion replied, looking at Jon.
Jon's mouth twitched in a smile. "I'll do my best."
I watched him go off into the dark with Ghost beside him, the direwolf pale even in that meager light, until both were swallowed up between the fires.
Tyrion opened his book again, while I stayed by the blaze a little longer, saying nothing.
On the road to the Wall, Wolfswood, The North, 298 AC
A shout woke me up.
"Ambush!"
I shot up as more cries broke through the dark.
"To the King!"
"They're coming out of the forest!"
"Move!"
"Wildlings!"
I went to my feet a moment later and looked around. The camp was in disarray.
I had slept in my boots, padded jack and mail shirt, the ominous feeling from before having never left me. The warhammer was sitting nearby, leaning on the wagon after I had polished it.
Light, save me.
Before I moved, an arrow came hissing out of the dark and buried itself into the wagon, above Tyrion's head. Another punched into the bedroll to my left where a man had been sleeping a moment before. I heard a wet scream and then a sound like a man trying to breathe through a throat full of mud.
With the corner of my eye, I could see Tyrion moving. He got half up, blinking stupidly, and looked around.
"Down," I snarled, running to him and taking him by the arm.
I pushed him beneath the wagon and turned for my warhammer. A second arrow struck the wheel-rim just above Tyrion and quivered there.
I grimaced while taking the warhammer in both hands. "Stay there. Do not come out unless I'm the one to drag you out."
"Cousin.." he began.
"Stay there." I ground out, then turned around.
I let my eyes wander, looking for Jon. I could only see firelight, shadows and men blundering half-armored through smoke. A whinny drew my attention and I saw a horse tearing through the camp, followed by shapes that looked more beast than man.
Jon was nowhere. The King, then.
I threw one more look at Tyrion, who was sitting on his belly under the wagon, staring at me with wide eyes. He was worried.
I gave him a nod then turned around.
Running deeper into the camp, I could see men were dying before they were even ready to fight. I saw one of the king's household knights stumble from his bedroll bareheaded with only one vambrace fastened, before a long spear took him in the side. He folded around it and went down like a sack of oats. The next moment, three wildlings wearing pelts adorned with bones went down with him, knives of stone and bronze in hand. I saw one of them go straight under the arm, where the mail gave way.
Beyond that, I could see more shapes pouring in from the tree line. They moved between the fires, the flames lighting up their features. I could see scarred faces with filed teeth. Shaved heads and wild beards. They were stained with mud and other things. One of them was wearing the skin of some mountain cat with blood crusted down the front of it, another with a beard adorned with round bits of fingerbone. Their armor was a patchwork of rawhide, bad iron, hide shields and bronze.
All of them looked unclean.
They were screaming as they came out of the forests. A guttural sound that reverberated. I could see the hatred in their eyes. They wanted us all dead, gutted to the last man.
An arrow struck me then.
I felt it enter my left shoulder, piercing the mail and hitting my bone, deep enough to spin me half around. I felt the impact all the way to my teeth.
The Light is my strength, I intoned.
I felt the furnace in me beginning to stir.
I reached up and took the arrow out. The tip had not been a broadhead, but a sharp point, piercing through the mails of my shirt with ease.
Before I could start moving again, a wildling rushed me from the side. He had a hide shield and a simple axe. I met him high with the haft, while lashing out with a vicious kick. His knee collapsed, folding in the wrong direction, and the man went down screaming.
Another one came roaring at me. His hands were gripping a spear so tightly his knuckles had turned white. Looking towards his face I could see a wild, frenzied look with a bushy beard, adorned with bone motifs.
I turned towards him and took his strike on the haft, guiding it past me. The momentum took him forward, while I pivoted and struck him in the spine with the warhammer. I heard the bones crack underneath the blow and the man went down sprawling with a shrilling sound.
When no one came, I ran towards the king's fire once more.
The outer fires had been overrun. I could see one of the wagons ablaze where a torch or flaming arrow had caught its side. The recruits were all panicked, most of them trying to run, some crawling beneath the carts, some armed with rocks and tent pegs and whatever they found. A black brother with half his face blackened by soot was shouting them into something resembling order when an arrow took him in the neck. I saw him bring his hands to the wound, all the while blood was pouring out of his mouth. He gurgled and fell forward, making the recruits scatter.
A riderless horse thundered past me to my right, dragging a half cut rope and with a post stuck to it. Its eyes were white in the dark and its mouth was foaming. On the other side I could see another horse had gone down, upturning the cauldron used for the stew. Hot grease and liquid had doused the beast and the floor. I could see it trying to stand, but its forelegs were broken. Beside it a king's man slipped in the mud and landed with his back in the hot liquid. I could hear his screams, before a wildling landed on him with a seax in hand.
Light, give me strength, I intoned.
Before the wildling could finish the job, I crossed the distance in five strides, while I swung my hammer. The flat side took the wildling in the front, shattering his entire face and bursting red and grey-white matter from the other side of his head.
I dragged the downed man clear of the muck, while he thanked me each step.
A bellow made me turn my head.
Running, I followed the roaring and found the King.
He had made it to his feet and found steel, not his old warhammer, but a longsword in one hand and a round shield in the other. He was half-armored and red-faced, shouting at the top of his lungs.
Ser Mandon Moore and Ser Meryn Trant were at his sides, white cloaks against the dark, holding the rush against the king. Ned Stark was there as well, with the greatsword Ice drawn and a face gone as dark as winter. A knot of Stark men and King's men were trying to gather around them while the whole right side of the camp buckled inward from the wildling assault.
"Back to the wagons!" I heard Benjen Stark shouting through the smoke. "Leave the other fires! Back to the wagons!"
Before I could move further a man in King's colours stumbled into my path from behind a tree, followed closely by three spearsheads driving at him. I grabbed one of the spears and yanked it forward while swinging with my warhammer. The blow connected with the face of a wildling and I felt the bone give. His nose burst. One eye came loose in blood. He went down twitching.
The second man tried to thrust low for my belly. I turned the blow on my sword-belt, took the scrape of it through leather and cloth, and brought the beak of the hammer down through his collarbone. It went in with sickening ease. He made a bubbling noise and fell to his knees, trying to hold himself together.
The furnace was roaring now.
I straightened and saw the King's man had engaged the wildling spear. He turned two thrusts around and by the third stepped close and opened the wildling's belly. I saw guts spilling out, steaming in the cold.
"Here!" someone shouted from up ahead.
I ran towards the sound and finally reached the King.
"Seven hells, boy," Robert roared when he saw me. "About time!"
Then there was no time for words. They came in from every side.
I glanced around and saw the position we had taken. The wagon gap nearest the horse-line. It was where the camp narrowed. Wagons, bedrolls, loose beasts, overturned gear, all of it put up in a way that created choke points and confusion.
I watched the wildlings drive long spears through the knot, making space, before throwing bodies into the press. One king's man went down with a spear through the thigh and another through the belly before he hit the mud.
I thought about that for a moment.
These wildlings looked prepared. Organized. They had come in the cover of night, before the break of dawn. They had opened with arrows and sown confusion. They had brought numbers. They had brought tactics. Long spears to drive the knights into the mud. Pin them there and overwhelm them. Find the gaps and bleed the plate.
Light, give me the strength to save our men.
Before they could finish gutting the downed man, I stepped into them.
My first blow splintered a spear at the haft, before I lashed out with a brutal backswing that put the beak through a wildling's face. The skull caved inwardly in a shower of blood. Before his allies could recover, I swung my mace in a wide arc, taking another in his ribs. I could feel his entire ribcage shatter and grind itself, while the man was sent sprawling to the ground.
A spear came at me, then, before I could fully turn. The blow skidded past my mail, opening it and the shirt below, drawing blood. I grabbed the spear and yanked the wielder forward, while my head shot forward in a brutal headbutt. I could feel the blow cave in cartilage and collapse the cheek alongside the eyes.
More were coming.
The furnace was overflowing then.
Blood was pouring out of me, but I could feel no pain. I could afford no hesitation.
Or we would die.
I lost track of time while fighting in the press. My hammer rose and fell, shattering men beneath it. I could feel the tiny chinks I was accumulating. A spearhead slid across my ribs, and opened me. A knife cut my forearm to the bone.
The King was roaring behind me. I could hear Lord Stark barking orders, alongside Benjen Stark. I glanced behind me and saw them secure behind a line of men.
Turning around and looking in the distance I saw Jon. Alive.
He was down near the broken horse-line with his sword in hand, Ghost beside him, fur white and red from all the blood. Jon was cutting and turning in short, hard motions, not wasting any movement.
I moved towards him but a wildling came at me from the side, eyes looking crazed. He crashed his shield into me, making me stumble forward.
An arrow thudded into the meat of my thigh, burying itself to the bone.
For a moment, I felt nothing. Then lancing white pain.
My leg convulsed and my right knee gave, making my whole world tilt. I went down to one knee, while the wildling aimed his axe for my head. My hand shot forward and grasped his wrist, squeezing until I could feel the bones grinding. He dropped the axe, and I dragged him down into the mud.
The first punch to the face destroyed his nose and teeth.
The second punch broke everything else.
The third punch caved in the skull.
The fourth turned the rest into paste.
A kick sent me sprawling in the mud. I turned around and saw three spearheads pointed at me. Then Jon was there. His blade flashed across the face of a man and split him from ear to mouth. Ghost took another of them low and went to the ground with him.
I rose to my feet. The furnace in me had gone white-hot.
I pulled the arrow from my leg. It came out with a small squirt of blood. Still no broadheads, I thought.
"Back!" I heard Benjen shouting. "Close it! Close the gap!"
I looked at Jon and nodded grimly towards the line. We both ran towards it while more wildlings came pouring from behind us. They did not care how many died as long as they advanced.
I saw bronze spearheads in the front rank and men behind them stepping where they were told. This was no common rabble, I thought.
Three thoughts. That's all I had time for before they pressed on us again.
I saw a household knight across the line go down to a knee before four of them were on him. Knives flashed in the dark and I saw the knight arch, choke, before his visor darkened from within.
For all the work I did, the line was still buckling.
The wagon gap had become a pit of mud, ash, blood and screaming horses. I stepped in something soft and human and my wounded leg folded more than it should have. A spear slammed into my chest and struck the mail, but not before driving the breath out of me. A second one came in force and slammed into my shoulder, making me fall on my back.
Then, they were on me. Like animals. I saw them slip from behind the spears, edging forwards, low, with knives at the ready. Coming to gut me. I caught the first wrist and twisted hard enough to feel the bone break before I shoved him away. The second one came from the other side and angled the blade toward my arm. I turned and kicked him in the chest, sending him flying backwards. The third came in with a slash towards my throat, but I moved. He missed and instead opened my chest. The slash was wide, but shallow, going from shoulder to shoulder.
He tried to straddle me and stab his knife into my neck, but I caught his wrist and held. I could feel his strength ebbing by the moment.
The heat inside of me was radiant. I wondered if he could feel it.
I turned his wrist around and started pushing towards him. He resisted for a moment before the blade went into his chest. He gasped, widening his eyes at me, before letting out a sigh.
I pushed him off and rolled hard before the next spear could find me.
My hand found the hammer by pure luck. I came up to a knee and swung low. The flat face took a wildling in the ankle and crushed the joint to nothing before he could even cry out. He went down shrieking before I took the second on the backswing. Bone gave in his forearm with a wet crack. His seax dropped from numb fingers. I caught him across the jaw a moment later and sent teeth and blood spraying in the dark.
A spear glanced off my mail and opened another line across my ribs. I heard Jon shouting somewhere to my right and he pointed towards a wagon. I could see a wildling climbing over the wagon, preparing to jump. I hefted the warhammer and met him halfway through his jump driving the hammer with two hands into his face and caving in his skull.
Another grabbed my hair and yanked my head backwards. I drove an elbow into his throat, feeling cartilage collapse, then kicked his knee so hard I heard the bone snap. He went down gurgling.
I could see them giving me wary glances now.
I glanced around and saw the line had straightened. The press had lessened. The wildlings were starting to second guess themselves. They had spent men freely for a chance at the king. But now, they were beaten back. I could see the rest of the knights pushing them back, slipping through the gaps in the spear wall. Some of the wildlings simply dropped them, turned and ran.
Then their line broke. By the time I heard the first shout of retreat, their entire backline had already slinked back into the woods.
I could feel my grip slipping. Blood from my hand and sweat from my hands made the leather slick. I shortened the hold on my hammer.
I glanced at the cut on my forearm and frowned. I had thought it worse a moment before. Perhaps it was only the dark and blood.
Before I could think any more, I heard a voice from behind me.
"Gods, man," Robert said. "Look at you."
I looked at myself.
I was bloodied from shoulder to boots. My mail was split in two places and black-wet in three more. The cut across my chest had soaked the front of my jack, and my right leg was still leaking. The hammer in my hand was soaked red, looking like something dragged from a butcher's block.
Around us, dawn was arriving. The trees stood black and straight beyond the wreck of the camp. Men moved among the dead and wounded with slow, careful steps. Further up ahead, I could see a horse laying on its side shivering and trying to rise, eyes rolled white and foam at the mouth.
On the other side, I saw Jory Cassel making the count, alongside a black brother with half his cloak ripped away. He had a nasty cut on his forehead that was painting his face red. Benjen Stark was kneeling beside one of the King's men, both hands pressed over a wound in the man's belly.
Lord Stark was standing behind the King, a few paces away, sword still bare. His face was grey with dirt and his hair was matted by sweat, but his gaze was intent and focused. He was looking at me.
I wiped blood from my brow with the back of my wrist and only made it worse.
Robert let out a breath that was half laugh, half disbelief. "Seven bloody hells. You look like you crawled out of the Stranger's own arse."
"I've had better nights, Your Grace," I replied.
"Ha!" he bellowed, clapping my back hard enough to make me wince. "Now that's a fight, boy. I knew you had the guts for it. The way you were shattering those wildling bastards, I near thought I was seeing my own ugly face in the old days. Give me your arm at the Trident and we'd have smashed the whole bloody war flat inside a month."
He looked at me for a moment before grunting and turning around. His face changed when he took in the destruction around us. Some of the old king returned.
"You all saw it," he roared. "The boy stood where the fight was thickest and never gave a step. Took enough blood for three men and still kept swinging. Seven hells, I've seen knights do less and call it glory."
Nearby men were looking at us now. Stark men. Black brothers. King's men. The Two Kingsguard. Jon was watching, too, with a pensive look.
Robert thrust his hand out to the side. Ser Mandon Moore approached and placed a sword in it.
"Your Grace," Ned said.
Robert ignored him and watched me intently.
"Kneel, boy,"
I looked at him for a moment before kneeling. Robert sat the flat of the blade on my right shoulder, while a memory stirred in me.
"In the name of the Warrior, I charge you to be brave."
"Do you vow to walk in the grace of the Light and spread its wisdom to your fellow man?"
"I do."
"In the name of the Father, I charge you to be just."
"Do you vow to vanquish evil wherever it be found, and protect the innocent with your very life?"
"By my blood and honor, I do."
"Rise, Ser Arthas Lannister."
"Arise, Arthas Menethil, paladin defender of Lordaeron. Welcome to the Order of the Silver Hand."
The men around us exploded into cheering then. Some of them crashed their sword against their shields, while others brought their fists to their breastplate.
Robert looked at the hammer still in my hand, then at the dawn shining through the trees. "Gods," he said. "Held till dawn with a hammer."
He gave another short laugh. "Dawnhammer, then. Ser Arthas Lannister, the Dawnhammer."
I smiled, knowing Tyrion would never let me forget that.
The King clapped my shoulder again, nearly sending me back into the mud. "You're my man now, boy. No wriggling free of it. Not with a warhammer in hand."
"Your Grace," I said, inclining my head.