He looks very modest,
He is neither tough nor reckless...
(c) Cross Ace
Both Lionel and Arya liked to hide their titles, passing through the world as people, not as family crests, and now they were even sorry to part with the squad of future rangers, among whom they felt as they had during their walks in King's Harbour before their departure. Sansa decided to play along, although she would have noticed sooner than they did that they were being mistaken not only for who they were, but for who they did not want to be. But the morning was just beginning, and it began with six horsemen emerging from the forest a quarter of a mile from the camp, whom Yoren recognised with his keen eye as deserters, if not already on the wrong path, then certainly heading in that direction.
"No sorrow," muttered Yorin, spitting out his bloody sour leaf. He had been in many dangerous situations, most of which he had escaped thanks to his black guard's uniform and his sharp tongue, and in thirty years of travelling, he had only failed to get three recruits to the Wall. "Tesak, Murkh, grab your axes and stand quietly while I talk to the guests."
But Yoren's time-tested tactics were not to be used, because behind him, metal clanged: the young king had also recognised the deserters and decided to deal with them himself. The deserters were a dangerous but despised tribe. The king fastened his armour, put on his helmet and gauntlets, and jumped into the saddle, confident that if these cowards disobeyed him, it would be enough to chop up the most insolent one. Almost immediately, Sansa and Arya set off after him: children of great lords, born to command men, fearless before their first battles, and Arya, though she had learned a little caution during her lonely wanderings around the Trident and King's Landing, had no intention of leaving Leo alone.
"I'm telling you, it's a guy," insisted Lommie Greenhands, whom Arya rushed past and who still didn't understand what was going on. "Look, he's wearing chain mail and has a sword on his belt.""And the redhead has a crossbow in her hand," objected Pirozhok, unable to notice the light armour against the background of her jacket of the same colour, but at that moment they both received a good slap on the back of the head.
"Hold your tongues, orphans," advised the old mercenary Preyd, who had seen battle and therefore knew the value of armour and the lords who wore it. "I don't know who they are, but I can promise you that you'll be speechless when you find out whose children they are." That's how I opened my mouth when I saw Lord Tully's brother in the civil war. Black chain mail without a coat of arms, no gold on the hilt, no precious stones on the harness — and when he appeared, no one even asked who he was or why he was in command. And to tell the truth, without him, we would have been slaughtered.
"If only I had a good lord," said Gerren, who had been driven to prison and to the Wall by poverty. "One of those who can be seen without a coat of arms."
Meanwhile, Lomm and Pirozhok really did open their mouths, because a quarter of a mile ahead, one of the six horsemen jumped off his horse and knelt before Sansa.
"We were defeated at Jester's Ford, milady," said the kneeling man. "There were several hundred of them, all on horseback. Lord Dondarrion was killed almost immediately, then Lord Lothar fell, and our Alin beside him..."
"You don't look like a man who has just come out of a fierce battle," the young king interrupted him harshly. "You are too healthy for that. And I would say too alive.
"I am ready to serve, milady," continued the northern deserter, who did not recognise the king but shuddered at his words as if struck. "Yes, I ran, but we will have to run now — these beasts are killing everyone in their path. We passed through burned villages where no inhabitants remained, saw the charred corpses of children and pregnant women with their bellies ripped open..."
"I know," Sansa interrupted him: she had once wanted to see the Iron Throne and her father sitting on it, and, as if in punishment for her curiosity and vanity, she had heard all about the crimes of the Mountain of Clegane.
"We must ride north without delay," the deserter shared his thoughts. "They are also heading east, but we rode faster, and you have good horses."
"There are thirty more of us," said Lionel resolutely, turning to the camp of future scouts. "Our people have no horses, and instead of weapons, they have axes and pitchforks.
"They won't touch the sentries, sir," objected the deserter, who wanted to get away from Clyngean Mountain as quickly as possible, and the opportunity to help Lord Eddard's daughters gave him hope of forgiveness.
"If what you say about the burned villages is true, I wouldn't count on it," interrupted the king. "But let them cross our path, and I'll see what they can say to their king!"
And, to the even greater surprise of Lomm and Pirozhka, who had not heard the conversation, the rest of the horsemen also dismounted and knelt before the young monarch.
The decision to use his title in such a situation was both correct and courageous, but Yiken Hgar, sent after the horse, was still dragging himself along the Golden Road, inconspicuous, unremarkable, dangerous and evil, while Lord Tywin had long understood the order of succession and that the soft and weak-willed Prince Tommen, exiled to Essos by his harsh right hand along with Lord Tywin's older children, would be a much more convenient king than the honest and stubborn Lionel, whose heart was already attached to the Starks. "If your child disobeys you, wipe him off the face of the earth," Lord Tywin said to himself with regret, as if he were making a huge sacrifice, and shortly after the king's disappearance from King's Landing, a raven flew to Gregor Clegane, who had retreated to the Keys on the border of the Westerlands, with orders to ensure that the young king's journey ended in the Riverlands.
Therefore, even the fact that Yoren's party and the soldiers accompanying them had reached the King's Road did not save them from an encounter with Clegane's men, and Ser Amory Lorch refused to recognise his king.
"King Lionel is in King's Landing," Amory Lorch said bluntly to Lionel. "I don't know you, lad, but it seems to me that my men and I have come on this campaign to hang more like you.
"Perhaps you can prove your point in single combat?" suggested Lionel. He was furious and would have killed Lorch on the spot, but he already understood what it meant to refuse to recognise the king. "If you win, my soldiers will surrender to you; if I win, your soldiers will lay down their arms."
Amori Lorch grinned, and from behind his soldiers rode a huge horseman who was hard to miss.
"Duel," Gor muttered from under his helmet, dismounting but remaining almost as tall as the horseman. "Without lances and horses is even better."
"That's why good lords don't live long," Gerren muttered gloomily when the place for the duel was chosen and Yorren's squad set up camp opposite Lorch and Gora's soldiers, realizing that the young king, trying to save them from an unequal fight, was going into a hopeless duel. Yoren wanted to try to lead his men past, because the Watch does not take part in wars on either side, but the poachers Kurtz and Koss blocked his way.
"We're not rangers yet, old man," said Kurtz, playing with a long butcher's knife. "And you're not our commander, you're a guide and nothing more. We'd rather die in the green forest for the king and his girls than rot away in twenty years behind your icy Wall.
"All right, we'll wait," agreed Yorren, who never got into a fight unless he had to. "The Mountain isn't immortal either."
"And you, peasant," meanwhile, the northern deserter, who had knightly honour and oaths, instructed Gerren, "don't meet the sword with the handle of your pitchfork, parry it to the side. I don't know about you, but I'm not going to surrender to anyone.
Lionel had brought several flasks of fortified wine with him for just such an occasion, and before the fight he methodically got drunk, trying to awaken the beast within him. Arya tried silently to stop him, fearing that he would lose his saving agility in battle, but Lionel firmly pushed her hand away and raised the flask again.
"You've seen me drunk," Lionel said, his face already pale and angry. "Nothing good, right? Right now, nothing good is needed."
Sansa was just as afraid for Lionel, but she said nothing to him, and only when he stepped into the circle did she kiss him, unashamed, hotly and passionately, as if he were her lover. Sansa was haunted by phrases she had overheard, phrases that should have offended the ears of an innocent girl and that such a girl should have forgotten immediately. But Sansa remembered what she had heard during King Robert's visit to Winterfell: "Men live only in battle and in bed," and Rodrik Cassel's angry words, not meant for her ears: "It is not the sword that kills, but the hard heart." and these timely phrases prompted her to say nothing, neither touching nor desperate, but to kiss him with animal passion, let him go and kill, for her or for himself, let him feel alive and angry.
In his prime, Lionel's father could have measured his strength against the Mountain and even knocked him down with his fearsome hammer, but Lionel was not yet seventeen, his blade was light and thin, so he ran in wide circles, trying to confuse Kleigain, wear him down and make him strike at nothing again and again. The enraged Gregor Clegane chased after him, striking him, and after a couple of minutes, Lionel finally got him, immobilising his left arm with a well-aimed blow to the joint of his armour under his armpit. But even with one arm, Gregor Clegane with his huge sword was still too much for Lionel, and Lionel ran again. It may have been ugly and unchivalrous, and Kligein's soldiers roared and whistled, but Sansa, watching the fight from her saddle, wanted only for Lionel to survive, even if it meant throwing mud in Gregor's eyes or committing some other unsightly act. Drunk, angry and cruel, Lionel did just that, waving away someone who was trying to push him towards Clegane, and one of the soldiers fell to his knees, covered in blood. Lionel didn't just wave him away, he stabbed back to kill. The soldiers roared, closing in on the young king from behind, while Sansa calmly raised her crossbow in despair.
"Stop!" Clygan roared, lunging at his enemy, and then something unexpected happened: Lionel took his terrible blow on his blade, held it for a second, then dived under the carcass hanging over him, and Gregor lost his balance and could not get up: Lionel slipped past him and struck him under his armour with a long Valyrian dagger that had flown out of his sleeve, and as he retreated, he cut Gregor's tendons in his left leg with his sword. Now Cleigain lay on his back, covering himself with his sword and raising his head, but the young king did not offer him surrender: this was no longer a knightly duel, but a massacre in which all means were fair, and Lionel circled around his fallen enemy, seriously intending to strike and finish off the man who was lying on the ground. It had to be done quickly, before any of Hora's men decided to either stop the fight to save their commander or rush to his aid — and the ruthless beast living in Leo understood this. The beast awoke, cunning and bloodthirsty, and for a second it seemed that his thirst for blood had caused him to make a mistake: Lionel got too close, struck his enemy on the wrist, and the Mountain dropped his sword, but with his other arm, not yet completely exhausted, he managed to knock Lionel off his feet, pinned him down, clamped his jaws on the king's throat — and received a fatal blow from a Valyrian dagger under his helmet, which had opened in that position. And then something completely unprecedented happened: the mighty hands of the young Baratheon pried open the huge hands of the Mountain, who even in death could have crushed anyone's neck, and Lionel, blinded by the blood gushing over him, spread Gregor Clegane's arms apart, lifted him above himself and threw him away, so that the Mountain died on the trampled grass, gurgling through his pierced throat.The young king, covered in blood, jumped to his feet, even angrier than before, and his rage almost got him into trouble. Animal cunning advised him to invoke the will of the gods, which had just been revealed at the end of the duel, to grant royal pardon to all the enemy soldiers, and then lure Amory Lorch into negotiations and kill him with a treacherous blow, because it was unlikely that anyone else in the squad had been given orders to kill the king. But his ardent young heart, intoxicated by success, decided otherwise, and Lionel took his sword in his left hand, raised his enemy's huge sword and stepped forward, as if forgetting that there was a squad of 150 men in front of him, and behind him were six soldiers, an old man from the Night Watch, and about thirty poorly armed peasants and teenagers.
"On your knees, scum!" roared the king in a rage, and one swing of Clynge's huge sword cut the throats of two soldiers. "Hand over Amory Lorch and go to the Wall!"
Half of the soldiers standing before the king stumbled and fell, while the other half closed in on him, and Lionel, blinded by rage, rushed into another hopeless battle, knocking down three more, while a fourth fell beside him with a crossbow bolt sticking out of his throat.
King Lionel's hopeless battle would have been worthy of ballads, but it could have ended rather quickly and sadly, even though all the men with him who were capable of bearing arms rushed forward. They were saved only by the appearance in the clearing of a small cavalry squadron, led by the helmetless, slain Lord Dondarrion. The soldiers of Clegane and Lorch did not have time to reach their horses and form a line, and the sight of the dead lord striking out in all directions frightened them even more than the death of their invincible commander, and a hundred and fifty soldiers faltered before two dozen horsemen and a small crowd of peasants.
Sansa stopped Arya from rushing to Lionel's rescue at first, pointing to his horse, which Arya was holding by the reins. Their role was to carry Lionel out of the battle if he was wounded and knocked off his feet, and his men could at least cover him from the enemies for a moment, or their she-wolves would decide to come to his aid. Fortunately, this was not necessary, but they had to take care of themselves: two horsemen fleeing the battlefield were about to take the hostages with them, and Arya and Sansa, eager to get closer to the struggling Lionel, found themselves too close to the battle. Sansa managed to knock only one of them off his horse, while Arya killed the second by throwing her hand with her thin blade far forward, which was a mistake — the horse was running too fast and knocked Arya out of the saddle, dragging her along behind the blade stuck in its eye socket. However, the rider who tried to grab Arya missed and also ended up on the ground not far from her. Arya jumped to her feet, the horseman rising beside her growled, clutching the crossbow bolt in his neck, and Arya heard a short cry and a few words that came from the heart, which she remembered for the rest of her life and never quarrelled with her sister again.
"I could have killed you!" Sansa cried in horror, seeing her sister in the line of fire too late. Fortunately, Sansa had not missed, but she was no less frightened than when the Mountain had knocked Lionel to the ground.
Meanwhile, the battle was over: a couple of dozen of Lorch's frightened soldiers were on their knees, Dondarrion's horsemen were chasing and killing those who were running away, some of the young criminals heading for the Wall finished off the wounded and robbed the dead, a Northern deserter died of his wounds among the corpses of his enemies, and the commanders of the victorious forces met on the battlefield.
"Who's got what, noble sers?" asked Thoros, always the first to recover from the heat of battle. "Well, Beric's obvious, he's got a spear in his chest and an axe in his skull, medicine is useless.
"I wish I'd stayed there," spat Dondarrion, and Sansa, seeing him, was surprised at how tired and old his handsome young face had become since she had seen him in King's Landing just a month ago. "You won't get away from me now with that spear."
"You could have done better," Toros suggested to his friend. "So you've been to the other world. You didn't even learn anything. My left arm is acting up again, sers."
"Amateurs," Beric replied, looking a little more like his former self. "All they want is to hit something.
"That's it," Toros approved.
"I'm fine," Lionel looked at himself. "Nothing to brag about."
"Nice sword," said Thoros, recognising the huge sword of the Mountain in Lionel's hand.
"It was lying here under a bush," Lionel waved it away, gradually withdrawing from the fight and becoming his old self, so that Arya, who had approached him, was surprised at how he was dismissing his victory.
"No one else was lying under the bush?" Beric asked with interest, having been pierced through by the Mountain at the Fools' Ford.
"Some pig," Lionel replied just as dismissively.
"You need to get your hands dirty," Arya advised Thoros. She was quick-witted and couldn't hold her tongue, while Sansa simply hugged Lionel's bruised right arm and buried her forehead in it."You need to chop, not stab," replied Toros, who had seen the fugitives rush towards Arya and Sansa and even wanted to follow them to fight off the girls. "Otherwise, you'll keep flying out of the saddle. And forget about the earth, the wound can't get dirty." You might as well offer me jelly made from mould.
"You were standing too close, milady," Beric said to Sansa with a slight reproach and a charming smile — the presence of young girls made him seem younger and more cheerful, otherwise, hanging around with Toros in the harsh company of men, he would become a one-eyed man of no age. "You only had one shot, and it's very good that you hit your target so well.
Sansa said nothing, only pointed to Lionel with her eyes: it was because of him that they had taken the risk, he had been on the brink of death — which meant that they had been too; the family wins together and dies together.
"You're such a softie!" Toros exclaimed, surprising himself. How could he refrain from incoherent exclamations and labored cries when two huge she-wolves appeared on the battlefield, as if specifically to feast on sweet human flesh? It would be a shame to let all that good meat go to waste, especially after all the effort that had gone into cutting it up. "I apologise to the ladies for my theological terms.
***
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