For Advance/Early Chapters:
patreon.com/Shadownarch_
The night air was a choking slurry of soot, grease-smoke, and the copper tang of fresh blood.
Fires surged upward in the Free Folk camp, fed by the dry pine of the surrounding forest and the resinous tents of the tribes. Aided by a predatory wind, the heat waves scorched everything in their path. Varamyr Sixskins felt the heat through the skin of his white bear, but the rage in his soul was hotter. He somewhat regretted inciting this riot with Harma Doghead, but the hatred was a living thing, impossible to cage.
When Varamyr had taken over the eagle of the late warg Orell, their souls had fused in a jagged weld of resentment. Orell had died at the hands of the Night's Watch, at Jon Snow's hands and that memory burned in Varamyr's mind like a brand. He could not accept a future as a neighbor to the Crows. Alongside Harma, he had lit the first torches, turning the camp into a tinderbox.
Barbarism was the keynote of the Free Folk; once the sparks flew, the tribes reverted to ancient blood-feuds. Without Mance Rayder there to sing them into order, the host was a drowning beast, thrashing in its own terror.
Varamyr, possessing the massive snow bear, swatted a Thenn soldier aside, the man's bronze scale-mail crumpling like dry leaves. The bear roared, a sound that vibrated the very ice of the Wall, and charged toward Styr. The Magnar was slumped in the snow, his gilded axe just out of reach. Varamyr intended to feast on the leader of the Thenns before the fires claimed them all.
But then, a new sound cut through the screams.
It wasn't the wild, discordant hooting of a Wildling horn. It was a deep, rhythmic blare, a mighty river of sound that heralded the arrival of a machine.
Woo-woo-woooo!
From the shadows of the Wall's base, a steel torrent poured forth. Neatly arranged ranks of heavy cavalry surged out of the gate. In the firelight, their silver-white plate armor gleamed like falling stars. Their mounts were draped in black mantles, their hooves churning the bloody snow into a frozen slurry. Leading them was the Sunburst banner of the Crossing.
"LAY DOWN YOUR WEAPONS! STOP FIGHTING!"
The command was echoed by seven hundred throats. Those Free Folk who had a shred of sanity left instinctively threw themselves into the snow, intimidated by the sheer momentum of the iron-clad horses. Those who raised their bone-spears in defiance were simply erased, trampled into the mud by the weight of the Karstark destriers.
Varamyr, still within the bear, let out a piercing shriek of mental agony.
[System Notification: Active Skill 'Animal Friend' triggered.]
[Target: Great Snow Bear (Varamyr's Vessel).]
[Status: Soul Collision detected. Overwriting Host Control...]
It felt like an avalanche had buried his mind. Varamyr's soul was expelled from the white bear's body with a violence that left him reeling. He snapped back into his original, frail human body, hidden behind a weirwood tree. His alpha wolf, One-Eye, snarled beside him, but the rest of his pack was already gone. His youngest wolf, Sneak, lay crushed beneath a bear's paw, and Sly Wolf was pinned to the earth by a Valyrian steel blade that smoked in the cold.
"NO!" Varamyr shrieked, his voice a pathetic rasp.
Eddard Karstark reined in his horse, leaning down to retrieve Heartbreaker from the wolf's corpse. His grey-blue eyes locked onto the tree where Varamyr hid. "Kill Varamyr," Eddard commanded, his voice cold and flat. "Kill his wolves. Spare any Free Folk who kneel to the Thenns."
The snow bear, now freed from Varamyr's hateful grip and bound to Eddard's will, turned its blood-red eyes toward its former master. The beast charged. One-Eye tried to defend his brother, lunging for the bear's throat, but the massive white paw slammed down with a force that broke the wolf's jaw instantly.
Varamyr saw the gaping maw descending. He felt a dizzying sensation as his neck snapped.
In the instant of his death, Varamyr's soul fled into the weirwood tree. Through the carved eyes, he saw the silver-white banner fluttering over a sea of kneeling savages. Rage and greed flared in his ghostly mind. He saw Eddard Karstark sitting on his horse, young, powerful, and brimming with life.
I will take him! Varamyr's soul surged through the cold wind, a spectral parasite aiming for the boy-lord's heart. He had driven out wargs before. He would live again as a Karstark!
SNAP.
It was the sound of a glass bottle being shattered by a hammer.
[System Notification: Possession Attempt Blocked.]
[Passive Shield: 'Lord's Mantle' active.]
[Target 'Varamyr Sixskins' Soul: Dissipated.]
Eddard felt a momentary flicker in his magical armor, a brief, tragic wail in his ear that vanished as quickly as it came. He didn't even look back at the tree. He dismounted, approaching the white bear that was now nuzzling his gauntlet.
"Karas, take the men and round up the stragglers," Eddard ordered. "Tell them the North offers bread and walls, or the Others offer a grave. If they run, let them go. The cold will do our work for us."
Eddard reached out and stroked the bear's scarred head. It was a female, her eyes no longer wild with Varg-madness, but calm under the influence of the System.
During the duration of the spell, Eddard intended to use this beast as a symbol. The Free Folk revered and feared wargs; to see a Southern Lord riding the most powerful beast of the legendary Sixskins was a demonstration of power more effective than any speech.
He swung himself onto the bear's back and rode slowly toward Mance Rayder's central tent. Styr and the Thenns fell in beside him, their bronze armor catching the light. Thousands of Free Folk watched in stunned silence as the "Winter Wizard" approached, their weapons abandoned in the snow.
"It seems you've become the new King-Beyond-the-Wall, Karstark," Tormund Giantsbane said, his voice booming as Eddard reached the center of the camp. Tormund stood beside Mag the Mighty, his expression a mix of awe and grim amusement.
"There is no King-Beyond-the-Wall, Tormund," Eddard replied, sliding off the bear's back. He patted the beast's head, signaling it to return to the forest. If the bond held after the spell, he'd keep it. If not, she deserved her freedom.
"Where is Mance?" Eddard asked, his eyes scanning the ruins of the royal tent.
"Dead," Tormund sighed, rubbing his messy white hair. "Harma Doghead felt he betrayed the tribes with your terms. She put a dagger through his heart from behind while the fires started. Styr and I were too late to stop it. Harma is gone, and Varamyr with her, until you dealt with him."
Tormund looked at the ground, a genuine sadness in his eyes. "A tragedy. Dalla is in labor in the birthing tent, and she had to see her King slaughtered like a pig."
Eddard's face remained a mask of iron. "What's done is done. The deal stands. Lead your people through the gate, Tormund. We move south at dawn."
"I'm with you, Eddard," Tormund said. "But Mag the Mighty... he's not so sure. He followed Mance for the songs. Now the singer is dead, and the giants want to go back to the mountains."
Eddard looked up at the giant, who stood over three meters tall, leaning on a club the size of a tree trunk. The Others would love a hundred giant wights.
"What do I have to do to keep them, Tormund?"
Tormund spoke a few resonant sentences in the Old Tongue to the giant. Mag responded with a voice like shifting tectonic plates.
"He says," Tormund translated with a strange, nervous grin, "that you have to defeat him in a one-on-one fight. No horses. No bear. Just you and him. If you win, and promise his kin won't go hungry, the giants are yours."
Eddard raised an eyebrow, his hand resting on the hilt of Heartbreaker. "Did Mance fight him?"
"No," Tormund laughed. "Mance sang to them. Unless you know the song of the Last of the Giants, you're going to have to do this the hard way."
"I'm not a singer, Tormund," Eddard said, stepping forward into the circle of firelight. "Tell him I won't hold back."
Tormund's eyes went wide. He burst into a boisterous laugh that echoed through the camp. "This is going to be a show. This is going to be a show!"
[System Notification: Challenge Issued: The King of the Giants.]
[Objective: Defeat Mag the Mighty in Single Combat.]
[Restraint: No Ranged Magic / No Mounts.]
[Reward: Command over House Giant / High Soul Essence.]
Drop Some Power Stones Plz.