POV: Anders Yronwood
The Dornish marches held many things within themselves treacherous mountain passes, deep river valleys, and rugged foothills running red against the foothills of the Red Mountains. It had not rained here since before the dragons came, and some said it had not rained much before that either. But the grass had grown all the same, it grew on the blood of fallen here.
He sat outside his tent pavilion with a cup of Dornish red, watching the fires of the camp stretch away across the flattened grass. Thousand tents at least, just of his own along the eastern edge. A large host for Dorne. He was not sure such a number had been assembled since the Conquest, not even during the Usurper's Rebellion had Dorne marched in such force.
The tents of the Fowlers were nearest, Lord Franklyn's men. Beyond them he could make out the banner of House Manwoody by the way that golden crown on the black field caught the firelight, a white skull grinning down from the topmost stake. He had known that sigil since childhood. Further away were the Martell tents, orange field with a gold spear piercing a red sun, and beside it the lesser banners of Dalt, Drinkwater, Santagar. They would have had men from the Daynes of High Hermitage too, if not for Gerold's foolishness.
It was a large host for a king he did not like. Anders poured the rest of the wine into the dirt.
"You are being wasteful," said a voice at his side. Lord Franklyn Fowler had never been his friend, and House Fowler had been no friend to House Yronwood since before either of them were old enough to understand what that meant. Franklyn's face had creases from thirty years of squinting into the Dornish sun, but his eyes were still the quick, sharp things they had been when he and Anders were boys quarrelling in the dust, just as their fathers had quarrelled before them.
He settled himself onto the camp stool with a quiet ease that had always irritated Anders "I would waste twice as much if it got rid of the taste," Anders said.
"And what taste is that."
"Kneeling to a dragon."
Franklyn looked out at the fires. He said nothing for a moment. "There are worse men to kneel," he said at last. "And worse men to follow."
"We're not following a man," Anders said. "We're following a dragon."
"One often follows the other."
"Not always." Anders looked down at the empty cup. "Many Targaryen's had a dragon and they spent it badly."
Franklyn gave a grunt, someone who agreed with the point and resented it at the same time. "He is not some excuse of a Targaryen."
"No." Anders set the cup down. "He is not." That much he had the honesty to admit. "The Red Viper was going to die in that city," he said.
"And yet." Franklyn said.
Anders turned the thought. "And yet the Targaryen saved him," he agreed.
That was why they had marched. Not for the king who was not yet a king, not for the dream of Targaryen restoration, not for some treaty terms that Doran Martell might have made with the King. They had marched because Doran had bent the knee, and Doran did not bend to things idly. They had marched because the Red Viper was alive, and that meant Tywin had much shit to clean.
For now, that was enough. Almost.
Franklyn rose, brushing dust from his breeches. "Get some sleep, Anders. The ridge won't look better for your staring at the dark."
"I never sleep before a march."
"I know." Franklyn paused at the edge of the firelight. "That's why you always look the way you do now, fuck'n shit."
He walked away laughing before Anders could answer, which was a habit of Franklyn Fowler's that Anders had hated for forty years.
The war council convened in the evening, when the heat had fallen enough to make the tent bearable. They gathered in Prince Oberyn's pavilion because he had the largest one.
Lord Beric Dondarrion was already there when Anders arrived. Anders had heard stories of the lightning lord before this campaign, the man had fought by the King's side from the very beginning.
"My lords." Prince Oberyn spread his hands over the map table as they settled. He had a habit of standing while others sat. With Oberyn it was hard to say whether that was confidence or aggression, and Anders had long since stopped trying. "We are twenty miles from Storm's End. The question before us is what to do about that.
"What we do," said Lord Toland, "is sit and wait for the King to return as was asked by Prince Doran. He asked us to wait for Dragon's arrival before joining in the fray."
"We sit," Lord Dagos Manwoody said plainly, "and Stafford Lannister's and Ser Forley Prestor's column finishes joining with the Reach men." He said it with emphasis on the coming of Westerland forces.
"How many are we speaking of," Franklyn Fowler asked any who had answers.
"My rangers put Westerland march three days east of the Stormlands. The Reach lords like Tyrells, Fossoway, Ashford, Crane, Caswell, Oakheart are already with Renly." Beric looked at Franklyn directly. "Together with Stafford and Prester? Five thousand. Perhaps more. The Reach lords have brought at least fifteen thousand of then own. And then there's Stormland Lords who support Renly so atleast ten of their too. Give or Take we are against thirty thousand."
The tent went quiet. Anders did the arithmetic he knew everyone else was doing. Their host was fifteen thousand Dornish. Beric had brought four thousand of his own hedge knights, marches men, men of the Stormlands who had followed him rather than bend the knee to Lannister gold, and a few who followed him for reasons no one had asked and he had not offered.
Twenty thousand against thirty, if Lannister's arrived before they moved.
"We should attack them before Prester completes his march," Ser Deziel Dalt said. He was young, and he said it with straight boldness.
"Against Reach with Westerland men rushing at our back" Beric shook his head, in a small, careful gesture. "Stafford is not a competent commander but he is smart enough to bury the arrows at out back."
"Then we don't attack the men holding siege at Storms End," said Oberyn. He moved around the table and set one finger on the map. "We cut off the reinforcements."
"In three days Prester and Stafford arrives," Dagos Manwoody said in dry tone.
"And in three days the King would arrive." Oberyn said with a smile.
The difference in those two sentences sat in the tent.
"You are certain of that," Anders said.
"I am certain of nothing. I am very hopeful." Oberyn said softly. "Hope has generally served me better than anything else."
Beric was looking at the map. "If we take the reinforcement before they meet with the column of Reach Lords." He traced the ground with one finger. "I can send outriders against the Tyrells hold siege of Storms End and try to harass their supply chains. My men know this region greatly, I will take care of this alone, no offense to lords present."
"None taken," said Fowler, though Anders thought the offence was fairly taken and kept that to himself.
"My riders can hold the approach long enough for the main body to advance and anchor." Beric looked up. "I have men who sleep on that ridge. They know which rocks are which."
Lord Trebor Jordayne is the Lord of the Tor and the head of House Jordayne leaned forward. "The Stormlands lords on Renly's side. There are men in that castle who knelt to Lannisters. They bent the knee to Joffrey out of fear, some of them at the very least, not love."
It was the right question. Anders had not expected it from him.
Beric and Oberyn exchanged a look.
"Some," Beric said carefully. "Some of those men will remember what the Targaryen banner with us mean when we ride. The Grandison men, if any are there, the Fell men, they would rather not fight for Lannister. Whether fear of the men standing in front of them outweighs hope of the man approaching is the question."
"Fear almost always wins that," Anders said.
"Almost," said Beric.
"What we need," Oberyn said, "is for the man approaching to arrive." He picked up his wine. He looked into it without drinking. "Aemon burned the Eyrie of the Arryns in the Vale." He glanced around the table. "Some of you have reservations. I know men's face."
No one answered.
"You can say it," Oberyn said. "This is a war council, not a throne room."
Anders decided he had as much right as anyone to say it. "He is young. He has a dragon, which is a great deal of power in one instrument, but dragons have died before. And we do not truly know him. We know what he has done. We do not know what he will do with it."
"He is a boy of fifteen," Dagos added.
"Robert Baratheon was nineteen at the Trident," Beric said, "and he ended a dynasty with a hammer."
"Robert Baratheon did not end the dynasty," Franklyn said. "The dynasty had ended itself with its actions."
A pause. "He will come," Beric said.
"You speak as though you know him well," Ser Deziel Dalt said.
"I have ridden under his since we met." Beric looked at his hands on the table. "Before that I served the king who used to sit on the throne. That is a story I prefer not to tell at length. But I know the difference between best men and whoremongers." He looked up.
The tent held that.
"Then we take out the reinforcements," Anders said. "And then we tighten the choke on the Tyrells."
They agreed on the attack before the wine was finished.
The roar came next and it was a sound he could describe. They rushed out of the tent to see the source of the sound. Anders had heard a great many things in his years and he had never heard this.
Every man in the camp was outside. They stood still because there was nothing they could do while the sound was happening.
Franklyn Fowler appeared at his side. "Where is it," Franklyn said, and his voice was low and it carried hint of fear in them.
"South." Anders was already looking south. There was nothing in the sky to the south, only the sky. Then he noticed the shadow in the sky moving toward them.
She came in low, lower than he would have guessed a thing of that size could fly. The stories said Balerion the Black Dread blotted out the sun. This dragon was not Balerion but those tales were no story either.
She was red, the color of blood and rubies and she was large. His mind refused to accept the size even while his eyes were viewing it. Her wings caught the sunlight as she banked and for an instant the shadow that fell across the camp was covered in shade.
She circled once, a long banking turn that took her over the full length of the camp, and then she came down.
She landed at the south end where there was open ground, and the impact was felt in the feet of every man standing. She folded her wings and stood there, red and breathing, her chest moving with a slow heaviness, and on her back were two figures.
The first was the King. No one had seen him before except for Oberyn and Beric. He wore no crown. He wore the black leathers but he had classic Valyrian features that Anders had heard of. A sword with ruby held in its pommel shined when sunlight touched it and he climbed down from the dragon's neck with the ease of a man dismounting a horse.
"Seven hells," Franklyn said quietly.
The second figure was a woman. Tall, taller than most men in the camp and built like an ox. She wore a travelling cloak that did not hide the sword at her hip. She looked at the assembled host of almost twenty thousand Dornish men and adjusted her hand to the sword in warning.
"Who is she," Franklyn asked him softly.
"I don't know."
Lord Beric was already moving towards them, crossing the open ground between the camp and the dragon's landing, his stride long and unhesitating. Prince Oberyn was ten paces behind him at the same speed. The rest of them followed behind them.
He kept one eye on the dragon and he knew she was watching them come. She was very still for a thing so large. Her eyes were molten copper, lit from somewhere behind them, and she tracked the approaching men with a patience that was more unsettling than any display of aggression would have been.
The King waited for them to come to him. Oberyn moved next after the King conveyed his words to Lord Beric privately.
"Your Grace," Oberyn said kneeling on the ground.
"Prince Oberyn." The word came easily. "You look well."
"I have been told." Oberyn glanced at the tall woman. "And this."
"Ser Brienne of Tarth," the King said. "She killed invaders marching to Starfall, many Ironborn and mercenary of Golden Company died by her hands. I knighted her for that deed and soon she is to take white cloak."
He said it simply, as if knighting a woman was common occurrence.
The lords exchanged looks. Anders watched the woman instead. She was looking at no one in particular, her attention solely at the king, guarding his back.
Then Lord Beric Dondarrion, a fellow noble of her from Stormland, said, "You have best wishes from me, Ser Brienne." He said it directly, without any kind of performance that other men would have produced, and she looked at him and gave a small nod, and that was all.
"My lords." The King looked at the assembled men. "Tell me what we are up against."
So they walked with him back through the camp, Oberyn on his left and Beric on his right, and they spoke as they walked. Beric covered the siege of Tyrells on Storms End and his plan of harassing their back with fast riders. Oberyn gave details of Stafford and Prester's march and their plan to attack them first and then riding back against Reach men.
Anders watched him. He had expected something more, though he could not have said what more would have looked like. Some arrogance that would have made him extraordinary, riding a dragon as big as that should have done that but there was none. What he observed was a boy of fifteen in black leathers, covered in road dust, listening to other men speak with complete attention, interrupting only when he had something worth the interruption.
When they reached the command tent and gathered around the table, the King sat and looked at the map.
"Westerland joins in three days, while Tyrells lay siege on Storms End." he laid out what he now knew.
"We can send our outriders to harass their supply lines," Beric said. "They can hold until rest of our men arrive with massive force after dealing with Westerlands."
He studied the map. "Disturbing the supply line has its merit, but not attacking Prester before he reaches Storm's End. Fighting a war with fresh number and low tiredness may serve us bett-"
He did not finish the sentence.
"The outriders will move out today and will begin their plan." He concluded as he realized something. "The scouts will search for a place near Tyrell camps but far enough to not get intercepted by them until the day Westerland arrives."
Deziel Dalt was working himself up to say something. Anders caught his eye and held it until the moment passed.
"Your Grace." Lord Dagos Manwoody spoke carefully. "Storm's End has never fallen to siege, will Stannis really come out for an open war against Reach and Lannisters when staying inside keeps him safe."
"You are half right Lord Dagos, Stannis Baratheon held it for a year against loyalist last time against Reach men during the rebellion," the King said, without looking up from the map. "But there are men in that castle who owe their loyalty to Renly even if that man now marches under Lannister flag." He looked up. "Skirmish are bound to happen inside the castle., not many would be happy to suffer a lockdown when they could live better under someone else."
"Will Westerland support to Reach be damaging to us." Lord Toland asked.
"Stafford Lannister is not a better commander than Lord Mace." Beric said, not to argue, only to mark it.
"I'm afraid, I have met neither of the fearsome men." The King said which brought out chuckles in the tent and then folded the map with unhurried care. "But we have enough standing to bring the Reach men down without much of bloodshed, as for Westerland, they will face death once they join fray at Storms End."
"And if they don't?" Franklyn asked to which the King Aemon gave a confused stare and the man clarified. "What if Lords of Reach don't surrender."
"Then I will make it easy for all of us." The King said in his soft voice.
He did not gesture toward the dragon outside the tent. He did not need to, for the roar sounded from outside that stilled everyone's chest.
"At dawn," the King said. "Get your men fed, watered, and rested. The march is short but we will need a better place to lay dormant until the war day."
Soon many many began to move towards the tent exit but Oberyn and Beric lingered. He stood at the corner of the table with his cup and looked at the folded map the King had settled.
"Lord Yronwood," said the King.
He looked up. The others had gone, or nearly so.
"You have a question," the King said.
He considered denying it, then decided against it but then it would have been a waste of both their time. "You burned the Ironborn fleet at the Torentine," he asked, for he wanted to know what happened there.
"Yes."
"You killed Gerold Dayne."
"With help."
He turned the cup in his hands. "The Daynes of High Hermitage are my kin by marriage. Not close kin, but we shared blood nonetheless." He set the cup down. "I am not asking for clemency. Gerold was a problem, what I am asking-" He stopped.
"You want to know if I enjoy it," the King said.
He said nothing.
"I do not enjoy it." The King looked at the tent wall as though he could see through it, looking out to maybe where the dragon stood somewhere in that direction. "But Meleys does. She makes sound of contentment when she kills my enemies. I am still learning to tell the difference between what she feels for me and what she feels for herself." He looked back at him. "Lord Gerold died by my hand and his death was much merciful that what Meleys would have granted, and let me assure you Euron's death by her hand was not easy. Does that answer your question?"
He thought about it. "Partly," he said.
The King almost smiled. "Get some sleep, my lord."
And he went.
Outside, Anders stood in the gap between tent rows and watched the southern sky. Franklyn Fowler found him there, which Franklyn had a gift for, appearing at his elbow in the dark as though he had been there all along.
"Well did you find out." Franklyn said.
"Yes," Anders said.
"He is young."
"That he is." Anders looked toward the place where the dragon had landed, where she still stood in the light, red and enormous, and where Ser Brienne of Tarth stood at a respectful distance from her with her hand not quite on her sword. "But does not feel young."
Franklyn was quiet for a moment. "Oberyn's face," Franklyn said finally.
"What about it."
"When he looked at the boy, there was something in it." Franklyn shook his head slowly. "Not just relief but something like gratitude."
Anders had seen it too. He had chosen not to say so.
"I've served many in my life," Franklyn said. "And I have seen men feigning fealty. I know what the faces of loyal men look like. What Oberyn's face looked like was not mummery." He paused. "It was loyalty, there's a difference."
"There is."
Franklyn turned away. "Get some sleep."
"I never sleep before a march."
The Riverlands
POV Randyll Tarly
The camp of Lord Randyll Tarly and Lord Mathias Rowan sat on the north of Riverrun in the forest lands of Whispering Wood, just twenty miles from the bend where the river Red Fork changed its direction to flow into Riverrun, blended deeply in forests to stay away from Stark and Tully scouts.
Randyll had kept his camp well making sure none of them carry that moral degraded behavior and the men under him would rise or fall by the standard they show. The latrines were properly dug and positioned. The horse lines were clean. The supply wagons were parked in the order of what would be needed first.
He was not a kind man, the world was not and so he had never tried to be. Kindness was not the thing that kept men alive on a march or steady in a line, and the men who loved Randyll Tarly were, in his experience, men who had come to love him after he had saved their lives by being harsh when the moment required it. He could live with that kind of love. The other love born of being soft and comfortable kind built on shared cups and easy words got men killed.
That was the reason he didn't want Samwell to inherit his legacy, that boy was weak. He would not have been able to held his own men in reigns and their enemies would have devoured them all, just like they did with Tytos Lannister. Thank the Seven that Dickon had inherited his best.
He sat inside his command tent with Mathis Rowan across the table from him, two cups of wine between them, the map spread under the lamp. The evening sun had gone down and now it was dark.
"Ned Stark is not a green boy like his son, he would not take the bait." Rowan said.
"He will try something else." Tarly said.
"You think he'll see through it."
"I think he'll probe it first. Ned Stark did not survive the rebellion by running at every door that looked open." Tarly moved his finger along the river line. "He'll probe here, and here. If the probe produces nothing then he will send scouts south along the Red Fork going south. If he finds Lannister lacking in defense then he will attack."
"And by then our rear will finish them." Rowan remarked.
"If the timing holds."
The timing was always the thing. Armies moved slowly enough to plan around, which was their one virtue over battles. The Stark host had been held in Riverrun for far too long. And with news of men like Prester and Stafford riding away from Riverland to join a force in the Stormlands will act like a bait for the Starks.
Tywin had played a game, he thought, it was coming sooner or later. Taking Riverland houses into his fold and the deal with Roose was a clever tactic.
Rowan drank lightly by his side, he was a careful man, Mathis Rowan. He was not a man without ambition but had enough patience and loyalty to strive for it.
"If we spring the trap and destroy the Stark's column-"
"We do not destroy it," Tarly said.
Rowan stopped.
"We bleed them, we will leave them bloody. But not before dealing with cunning traitors laid within the Stark and Tully's fold." He picked up his wine and set it down again without drinking. "We do not destroy it because we need the Stark host intact enough to be useful for the future."
"Useful to whom." Mathias asked in confusion.
"Useful to the realm." Tarly looked at him. "A destroyed Northern host creates a hollow ditch for power. A vacuum in the North, with the Watch barely holding the Wall and wilding attack once every century, we need a Stark to hold position of Warden, weak but not dead."
Rowan looked back at the map. They both were a bannerman of the Reach, of Highgarden, of Mace Tyrell. However his alliance with the Lannisters had cracked their relation. And the wall finally broke when the King himself arrived in his solar, asking for his fealty to crown dragons back.
He had now made the calculation of coming war that he would fight in mummery.
"Randyll," Mathias started. "Do you believe-"
Something moved at the tent entrance and Tarly's hand went to his sword.
One of his guards pulled the flap back. "My lord, a raven is standing outside the tent with parchment tied in its leg."
Randyll walked out and saw a raven sitting by the ground outside his tent that flew to his hand upon seeing him. The bird was a common black raven, unremarkable in every way. The parchment tied to its leg was sealed.
He broke it and read it once and then read it again, and walked inside the tent while the raven flew away.
It is time to show your true loyalty, Lord Tarly, Lord Rowan. House Hightower is on our side now. Act in manner you see fit against enemies of Rightful King, the King believes in your judgement.
He laid it flat on the table between them and Rowan read it. His eyes wide in disbelief.
"House Hightower," Rowan said in confirmation, his mouth not able to contain in the grin.
"Lord Leyton," Tarly said. "He has not descended from the tower in ten years. If he had decided to finally join in at such time then the message is not light."
"House Hightower is sworn to the Tyrells, moreover they are kin to them. Ollena had made Mace marry Alerie Hightower and this brought significant strength to her house." Rowan said trying to understand reasons behind Leyton's action.
"House Hightower is sworn to the Targaryen's more closely than any." Randyll looked at Rowan. "Maybe Lord Leyton remembered it, something House Tyrell had forgotten. He knows what the realm was before Robert Baratheon sat a chair of swords. He knows what it could be again."
Rowan was quiet, turning the thought. He stared at the parchment. A night bird called twice outside and went silent.
"How many will not follow," Rowan said. "When we turn."
"Some, not many, I have no idea." Tarly stood and moved to the tent entrance, looking out at the camp, the low fire, the rows of tents in the forest at uneven distance. "I have been watching them since we marched. I don't know if they will surrender to us or will it need dragon to bend their knees."
"That is a dangerous thing, Randyll."
"All of it has been dangerous." He turned back. "The question is not whether it is dangerous, the question is which danger is worth carrying." He looked at Rowan with the directness that had always been his manner, the thing that men either respected or could not stand, and rarely found a middle ground for it. "You are a Reach men just like me, and we could have both sat our halls and done nothing and waited to see which king survived and then knelt to him. You did not and neither did Ashford and nor did I. We chose. We knelt to a before we knew that he had a dragon, before Vale, and now before the Storm's End." He let that sit. "That means we do not get to be frightened now, when it is actually working."
Rowan said nothing for a moment and then asked, "What do we do tonight."
"Tonight we do nothing. We hold our position, and make sure that Lannister don't question are loyalty until the day of war." Tarly took the parchment from the table and folded it inside his tunic. "And then we wait for the King to arrive."
"Let's hope then that our King get an overwhelming victory." Rowan said raising his cup. "For Storm's End."
"For Storm's End." Tarly echoed behind him.
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