The sun emerged from the leaden clouds for a rare, clear afternoon, its pale light reflecting off the endless fields of snow with a brilliance that stung the eyes. Though the sky was open, the north wind remained a fierce, invisible predator, howling across the tundra. Beyond the Wall, the Haunted Forest stood like a jagged wall of black glass against the white horizon, exuding an aura of ancient, primordial dread. No one with a shred of sense looked into those lightless depths and wished to enter.
Eon Imett, a ranger from Eastwatch-by-the-Sea, sat atop his sturdy brown warhorse, looking like a black bear in the saddle. He was bundled in layers of thick linen, wool sweaters, and sheepskin, topped with a heavy bearskin cloak that caught the frost. Over it all, he wore a shirt of black chainmail. His gear was heavy with the "Wizard's Gift": a longbow of fir, a quiver of arrows tipped with jagged dragonglass shards, and a pine-wood shield reinforced with obsidian studs.
Against a man of the Reach, these weapons would be clumsy. But against the things that walked the night, they were the only currency that mattered.
A dozen rangers rode with him, their faces hidden behind black hoods. The sound of their horses crushing the ice crust was a rhythmic "crunch-crunch" that filled the silence.
"I say," a voice cracked the stillness, sharp and sardonic. "Our esteemed Lord Commander, are you certain these traitors are just sitting there waiting for us? If I'd murdered my betters, I'd be halfway to the Shivering Sea by now."
Imett looked back. The speaker was Bronn, the sellsword who had followed Tyrion to the Wall. He claimed to be a knight, but he looked more like a well-armed cutthroat, his eyes constantly scanning the tree line for profit or peril.
"They won't leave," Jon Snow replied, his voice as cold as the wind. "Craster's Keep has the only roof for fifty miles, and more importantly, it has his stores of food and firewood. The mutineers are cowards; they won't trade a warm hearth for a frozen death until every scrap of grain is gone."
"And the women," Dolorous Edd added with his usual gloom. "Craster had a dozen wives. Those traitors won't leave a warm bed until they've turned it into a grave."
"A safe keep, meat in the pot, and women in the bed," Bronn spat to the side. "By the gods, I'm almost jealous of the bastards."
"Don't be," Jon said, his hand tightening on the hilt of Longclaw. "We'll be sending them to the Seven Hells by nightfall."
They reached the abandoned village of Whitetree at dusk. In the center of the ruins stood a weirwood tree of monstrous proportions, its trunk eight feet wide and its pale branches spreading like the skeleton of a giant. The face carved into the bark had a mouth like an abyssal maw, seemingly capable of swallowing a man whole.
The horses suddenly began to whinny, their eyes rolling in terror.
"Whinny! Steady!" Imett hissed, his hand going to his short spear.
Suddenly, black figures erupted from the only intact stone house. They moved with a jerky, unnatural speed, their clothes in tatters. A foul stench hit the rangers, the sweet, cloying rot of dead flesh mixed with frozen excrement.
"That's Gared! Gared of Oldtown!" someone screamed.
Imett stared at the figure Gared pointed to. The creature had once been a brother of the Night's Watch, but its eyes were now twin pools of icy blue fire. A layer of shimmering white frost covered its black cotton robe, cracking audibly with every step. Its fingers had grown long, jagged ice spikes that looked like crystalline daggers.
"Bows! DRAW!" Jon Snow roared.
Imett's heart hammered - thump, thump, thump against his ribs. He had killed men, but how did one kill a corpse? He pulled an arrow from his quiver. This was Donal Noye's masterpiece: a dragonglass shard embedded in a cast-iron head.
"RELEASE!"
A dozen arrows hissed through the air. More than half missed in the buffeting wind, but Imett's arrow found its mark. The dragonglass struck the wight once known as Gared.
The effect was instantaneous. The white frost covering the creature shattered into dust. The blue fire in its eyes dimmed and vanished in a single breath. The corpse didn't just fall; it seemed to dissolve, wisps of white steam rising from the remains as if ice had been dropped onto a forge.
"It works! By the gods, the glass works!" the rangers cheered.
Jon Snow spurred his horse forward, Longclaw flashing in a silver arc that took the head of another wight. "Don't stop! Rapid fire!"
The skirmish was short. The thirty wights, mutineers and wildlings alike were reduced to piles of steaming rot. But as Jon rode back, carrying the frozen, sightless head of the mutineer Othor, the cheers died in their throats.
From behind the massive weirwood, more figures emerged. Hundreds. Then thousands.
Pale giants with blue eyes, snow bears with rotting fur, and mammoths that moved like mountains of ice. Behind them, standing on a ridge of black ice, were the Others—riders as thin as shadows and as cold as the stars.
"MOUNT UP!" Jon screamed. "RETREAT TO THE WALL! NOW!"
Back at Castle Black, the memory of that endless white tide haunted the council room.
"I will not waste more men on a rescue mission to Hardhome!" Bowen Marsh shouted, slamming his hand on the table. "Those are Free Folk, Jon! They've spent their lives trying to slit our throats. Let the Others have them!"
"If the Others have them, they become five thousand more soldiers for the Night King!" Jon countered. "Every woman and child we leave behind is an arrow in our own backs."
Tyrion Lannister, sitting on a high stool, toyed with a cup of wine. "Listen to the boy, Bowen. We have tons of dragonglass arriving from the South. We need fletchers, we need smith-helpers, and we need laborers to clear the snow. Free Folk women work harder than your best stewards, and they eat half as much. It's simple economics: save the labor, save the Wall."
The officers looked at the dwarf with grudging respect. Tyrion had a way of making the impossible sound like common sense.
"How do we get there?" Othell Yarwyck asked. "The sea is freezing, and the land is a death trap."
"I've written to Winterfell," Jon said. "Eddard Karstark has secured the Westerlands. He will persuade Lord Manderly to send twenty transport ships from White Harbor. We sail from Eastwatch and bring them back by sea."
The door burst open, and Samwell Tarly, now known as "The Slayer" stumbled in, his face pale. "Lannister," he wheezed. "Maester Aemon wants you. Now."
Tyrion hopped off his chair, grabbing his bearskin cloak. "What is it, Slayer? Has the old man finally found a secret in his books?"
"A letter," Sam whispered. "From the South."
Tyrion followed Sam to the library, with Bronn trailing behind like a shadow. Maester Aemon sat in the dim light of a dozen candles, a piece of parchment in his trembling hand.
"I have been on this Wall for many years, Lord Tyrion," Aemon said, his sightless eyes milky and white. "I have seen kings rise and fall, but I have never seen a bird carry news like this."
He handed the parchment to Tyrion.
Tyrion's mismatched eyes scanned the lines. He froze. His breath hitched. The parchment detailed the death of Tommen, the imprisonment of Cersei, and his own official pardon and appointment as Heir to Casterly Rock.
"Well," Tyrion whispered, his voice shaking with a mix of terror and triumph. "It seems my father has finally run out of children he actually likes."
[System Notification: The Great Rescue (Hardhome) initiated.]
[Unit Experience Gained: Night's Watch Rangers (Elite Training).]
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