Solomon led his column on a forced march.
His strategy was simple now: hit and run. Strike hard, strike fast, then vanish.
After every skirmish, they sanitized the battlefield. Clan bodies were burned or buried deep. No traces were left. To the Mountain Clans, their raiding parties weren't being defeated; they were simply disappearing into thin air.
This psychological warfare was as effective as the steel.
Solomon rode at the front on his white destrier. He appreciated the agility of a small force. Without a baggage train, they moved like the wind. No infantry army in the Vale could catch them.
But his eyes kept drifting back to the rear of the column.
To the sixty Riverland captives.
There had been over a hundred. But his volley of spears and arrows had thinned their numbers drastically.
Only the young and strong remained. The old and the children had already been butchered by the clansmen because they were "useless mouths."
Solomon sighed. This is war.
He didn't blame himself. If he hadn't attacked, their fate would have been worse. The women would have become breeding stock for the clans, living in squalor and rape. The men would have been worked to death as slaves in the high peaks.
He had saved them from hell, even if he had sent some of them to heaven in the process.
Solomon slowed his horse and let the captives catch up.
They huddled together like a flock of frightened sheep. Their clothes were rags. Their faces were masks of soot, blood, and tears. Their eyes were hollow—bodies moving without souls.
They looked up at the man on the white horse. They knew who he was. Solomon. The commander who had killed their captors... and their friends.
"People of the Riverlands," Solomon said. His voice was low, steady, devoid of emotion.
"I am the commander of this army. Ser Solomon of Mirekeep."
He needed to know where they stood. These people could be assets, or they could be liabilities. If they hated him, he would have to deal with them differently.
But he saw no hate. Only weeping.
"I gave the order to loose arrows," Solomon stated clearly. "I gave the order to throw spears."
"I could not risk the lives of my soldiers to save you."
He didn't make excuses. He didn't hide.
"I saw them fall," he continued, his gaze sweeping over their downtrodden faces. "Forty of your kin died by my command."
Then, he said something that stunned them into silence.
"I offer you my apology."
He bowed his head slightly.
"For those who died in the chaos. And for you, who survived it."
The crowd remained silent. Until a man, about thirty years old, stepped forward. His face was etched with a lifetime of suffering.
He was shaking, tears streaming down his face like rain. But when he looked at Solomon, there was no anger. Only gratitude.
"My Lord," he rasped. "You do not need to apologize."
He looked at the survivors around him, then back at Solomon.
"My father... my three children... the wildlings killed them. Because they couldn't walk fast enough."
"My wife and I watched them smash our baby against a rock."
The man fell to his knees, sobbing uncontrollably, but he forced the words out.
"My wife died in your volley. A spear took her. Right in front of me."
"But I will never... never blame you, my Lord!"
"You gave her freedom!"
He looked up, his eyes burning with a terrible intensity.
"If she had lived... the savages would have taken her. They would have used her. She would have borne the children of the monsters who killed our baby!"
"I would have had to watch it! Helpless!"
"That pain... is worse than death!"
"You saved us! You saved her!"
The man bowed his head to the ground, his body racking with sobs.
Behind him, the other survivors dropped to their knees. They wept not for those who died by Solomon's arrows, but for the mercy of death compared to the horror of life under the clans.
Solomon watched them. He saw the raw material of a different kind of army.
"I can send an escort to take you to my lands on Mirekeep," Solomon said softly. "I will give you land. I will give you food. You can start a new life."
"Or..."
He looked at the men in the group. The ones who had lost everything.
"You can follow me. Pick up a weapon."
"I, Ser Solomon, will give you food. I will give you armor. I will give you steel."
He leaned down from his saddle, his voice dropping to a whisper that echoed like a demon's promise in their ears.
"Do you want to treat them... exactly as they treated you?"
"Do you want to give them the same fate?"
Solomon knew his words were sparks landing on dry tinder.
One by one, the men stopped crying.
They stood up.
They had no homes. No wives. No children. They were ghosts walking the earth. They had nothing to lose but their pain.
They didn't need gold.
They had something stronger.
They had hate.