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The cold wind shrieked along the crest of the Wall, swirling up large, jagged patches of frost and snow that had clung to the ice for centuries. Eddard Karstark gripped the iron railing, his black woolen cloak whipping violently against his silver plate armor. The chill was no longer just a weather condition; it was a physical weight that seemed to seep into his very marrow. Behind him, the King's Tower looked like a toy castle, its flickering torches reduced to tiny, dying sparks in the vast, vertical desert of ice.
Mance Rayder messed up.
Logically, it made little sense. The King-Beyond-the-Wall had spent years stitching the tribes together with songs and steel. Even if the Thenns or the Hornfoots were dissatisfied with Eddard's terms, they should have simply withdrawn back to the Frostfangs. Large-scale infighting on the doorstep of their only salvation was a suicidal move.
Is it a ruse? Eddard wondered. A distraction to lure us out so the giants can rush the gate?
Mance was cunning enough to play such a game, but the flames currently licking the horizon suggested a reality far more visceral and uncontrolled. Half the sky was dyed a bruised, bloody red. A mile away, the sprawling Free Folk camp was a sea of towering infernos. The smoke was so dense it looked like a wall of grey stone rising to meet the clouds.
Eddard pulled out his brass telescope and adjusted the lens.
The magnified view was a nightmare. A group of male raiders, brandishing bone spears and rusted longswords, were galloping through the slush, hunting down unarmed women and children from a rival tribe. They were intercepted by a phalanx of "spearwives" who met them with a wall of sharpened wood and a scream of fury. Warm blood sprayed across the drifts, melting the snow into a slushy pink before the wind instantly turned it to red ice.
He panned the telescope. A Magnar in bronze scales was shouting for his men to save the grain stores when a ghostly shadowcat lunged from the darkness. The beast's teeth tore through his throat in a wet blur. A heartbeat later, a heavy bronze spear whistled through the air, pinning the cat to the dirt. Styr, the Thenn leader, strode into view, his bald head reflecting the firelight. He didn't look for the cat's master; he simply raised the golden-hilted great-axe Eddard had gifted him and charged a white snow-bear that was mauling his scouts.
The chaos was total. War chariots made of walrus bone, pulled by dogs as large as wolves, careened through the tents. Mammoths, agitated by the heat and the scent of blood, had begun to stampede. These massive titans cleared everything in their path - humans, horses, and trees were crushed into the mud, leaving only flattened, unrecognizable remains in their wake.
In the center of the carnage, Eddard spotted Tormund Giantsbane. The man was a whirlwind of white hair and fury, standing beside Mag the Mighty, trying to scream orders over the trumpeting of the mammoths.
Eddard lowered the telescope. His face was a mask of cold granite.
"Karas," Eddard commanded, his voice cutting through the wind. "Assemble the men. Heavy armor for the cavalry. Two horses per man. We're going out."
"Yes, My Lord." Karas Snow didn't ask questions. He signaled to the guards and headed for the zigzagging stairs toward the barracks.
"You're going to fight them?" Jon Snow asked, his voice full of disbelief.
Jon had been standing by Maester Aemon's Myr lens, watching the same slaughter. His face was pale, his knuckles white as he gripped the tripod. "Ned, look at them. They're killing each other! Are you going to take this chance to finish what the fire started? To slaughter them all?"
Eddard turned a searing look on the young Lord Commander. "Jon, do the brothers of the Night's Watch tell stories of my bloodlust when they can't sleep? Is that what you think of me?"
"You rode into ten thousand men to take Tarly," Jon retorted, his Northern stubbornness flaring. "You beheaded six of your own vassals and smashed a castle for a parley. By every account I have, you aren't a man of mercy, Ned."
"I am a man of survival," Eddard corrected, his tone dropping to a dangerous low. "Those hundred thousand people out there are dandelions in a storm. If this fire scatters them, they will hide in caves and die in the woods. And when they die, the Others will find them. They'll pull them up, give them blue eyes, and march them back to this Wall. I'm not going out to slaughter them, Jon. I'm going out to save my future labor force from becoming my future enemies."
Eddard stepped toward the iron cage that serviced the Wall's summit. "Without Mance to lead them, they won't burn their dead. They'll just run. And a running Wildling is a wight-in-waiting."
Jon went silent, the logic of the "Winter Wizard" chilling him more than the wind. He realized that Eddard didn't see the Free Folk as people, he saw them as a resource to be managed, or a threat to be neutralized.
"Hurry up and gather your rangers, Jon," Eddard said as the winch began to groan. "Now is the time to show them that the North has a longer reach than the dark."
Castle Black was a hive of frantic activity. Torches lined the training ground, illuminating seven hundred heavy cavalrymen. They were a vision of lethal discipline: double-layered plate over mail, black sheepskin cloaks, and lances tipped with polished steel. Beside them stood twice as many horses, their breath fogging the air as they stamped their hooves.
Outside the main gates, fifteen hundred infantry were forming up—a mix of Karstark veterans and the newly cowed vassals of the Crossing.
Eddard stood beneath the King's Tower, the golden sun on his breastplate shining like a beacon. He scanned his officers.
"Lando!"
"Here, My Lord!" Lando Merrick stepped forward. He had taken the name "Merrick", meaning resilient, when Eddard granted him the lordship of Morningwind Town. He was no longer a simple soldier; he was a Lord-In-Waiting.
"You take the infantry and the archers," Eddard commanded. "You hold the tunnel and the gate. Nothing passes you. Not a man, not a woman, not a dog. If an eagle tries to fly through that tunnel, I want it pinned to the stone. Do you understand?"
"On my life, My Lord," Lando replied.
Eddard looked at Ryan Hill, the heir of Water Mill Town. The boy was trembling slightly, his status as a "hostage-vassal" making him eager to please. "The Hill family will support Lando. This is your chance to earn your father's freedom, Ryan. Don't waste it."
Ryan bowed so low his helmet hit his chest. "I will not fail you, Lord."
Eddard turned to the cavalry officers. "The personal guard follows me. The rest of you will form centuries. We advance at a steady trot. Our goal is to break up the fighting. If they drop their weapons, leave them be. If they resist, crush them. If you find a large-scale battle, blow the horn of the Twins to call for support. We make the obedient ones safe, and we make the disobedient ones dead."
"DO YOU UNDERSTAND?!"
"YES, MY LORD!" the shout echoed off the ice.
Eddard took his reins from Karas and swung into the saddle. He saw Jon Snow nearby, leading three hundred black-robed rangers. Carter Pyke was grumbling loudly, complaining that they should just let the wildlings "finish the job" so the Watch could sleep.
"Slaughter is easy, Carter," Jon replied, his voice firming as he accepted his role. "Stopping a riot is what soldiers do. And I'd rather have them tilling the Gift than our brothers spending the winter burning their corpses."
Eddard rode to the front of the column. He looked at Jon and gave a short, sharp nod. "Let's go."
The massive iron-studded gates of the tunnel groaned open. Seven hundred Karstark riders and three hundred Night's Watchmen surged forward, a torrent of steel and fire entering the dark throat of the Wall.
To the thunder of a thousand hooves, Eddard was the first to emerge into the night of the far North. Ahead of him, the world was on fire. He gripped his reins, his eyes fixed on the distant golden flash of Styr's axe.
"FOR THE NORTH!" Eddard roared.
"FOR THE SUN!" his men answered.
The Winter Guard hit the snowy plain like a falling hammer, riding straight into the heart of the inferno.
[System Notification: Emergency Quest Triggered: The Great Quelling.]
[Objective: Neutralize the Tribal Insurrection.]
[Potential Reward: Absolute Authority over the Free Folk / High Soul Essence.]
[Active Perk: Night Vision (Animal Friend) - Blackfeather is providing overhead tactical data.]
Drop Some Power Stones Plz.