The man with the spiked club stepped forward, chuckling darkly. "Feisty. I like that. The Lady said we only had to break the redhead's legs… but she didn't say we couldn't have a little fun with the rest of you first."
He looked at Serena, his eyes raking over her torn dress. "You're a pretty thing, aren't you? Let's see if you scream as loud as your brat."
Torra's face twisted in fury as she struggled against the man holding her. "Over my dead body!"
"That can be arranged," the club-wielder sneered, raising the heavy iron weapon.
Yoriichi was trying to stand, but his legs trembled violently. His chest burned with every shallow breath. He watched the scene unfold with a horrifying clarity. He saw the muscles in the club-wielder's arm tense for a swing. He saw the Knife Man recovering his grip on Torra, pressing his serrated blade closer to the old woman's neck with a murderous glint in his eye.
If I charge, I die, Yoriichi analyzed, his world narrowing down to vectors and timing. My body is too slow. And then Mother dies. And Lyra dies.
He needed a projectile. He needed to break their formation.
His hand brushed against the cold stone of the floor. There, lying amidst the spilled debris from the overturned table, was the kitchen knife Serena used to chop vegetables. It was dull, unbalanced, and small.
It was enough.
Yoriichi's breathing shifted. The air hissed through his teeth.
Total Concentration Breathing.
He forced oxygen into his screaming lungs, ignoring the searing pain of his cracked ribs. The world seemed to slow down into a frame-by-frame stillness. He could see the dust motes dancing in the firelight. He could see the blood vessels pulsing—fear and adrenaline—in the neck of the man holding Torra.
Torra screamed and lunged again, desperate to buy time. She grappled with the Knife Man, gripping his wrist with both shaking hands, but he was overpowering her, pushing the dirty blade inch by inch toward her throat.
"Die, hag!" the Knife Man spat, his focus entirely on overpowered the old woman.
The club-wielder raised his weapon higher, stepping past them toward Serena.
Now.
Yoriichi didn't stand. He didn't scream. From his knees, he whipped his arm forward with a speed that blurred in the dim light.
Thwack.
The kitchen knife flew across the room. It didn't aim for the chest or the head—Yoriichi knew his child's arm lacked the power to penetrate thick winter furs or bone.
He aimed for the weak point in the kinetic chain.
The blade buried itself deep into the soft tissue behind the club-wielder's knee—the popliteal artery.
"GRAAAH!"
The club-wielder howled, his leg buckling instantly under his own weight. He collapsed sideways, crashing to the floor, his heavy club swinging wildly as he fell.
The scream shattered the Knife Man's concentration. For a fraction of a second, his eyes darted toward his falling partner, his grip on Torra loosening just slightly in surprise.
A split second. That was all the She-Bear needed.
Summoning the last reserves of her strength, the strength of a woman who had survived winter after winter, Torra didn't try to push him away. She pulled him in.
She released the man's wrist and drove her own small skinning knife upward with a savage, guttural roar.
It wasn't a graceful strike. It was brutal and desperate.
The blade sank into the soft flesh under the Knife Man's jaw, piercing upward through the tongue and into the palette.
The man's eyes went wide, white with shock. He gurgled, a wet, choking sound, and his serrated dirk clattered to the floor. His body went limp, collapsing forward as dead weight on top of Torra.
But the fight wasn't over.
The first man—the one Yoriichi had crippled—was on the ground, thrashing in agony, but he was still armed with the heavy iron club. As he thrashed, blind with pain and rage, he saw Torra shoving the corpse of the Knife Man off her chest to breathe.
"DIEE!" the club-wielder screamed, swinging the mace horizontally from the floor in a blind arc.
"Torra! Move!" Yoriichi rasped, trying to scramble forward, reaching out a small hand.
But Torra was old, and she was exhausted from the kill. She turned, her eyes widening as the iron spikes whistled through the air toward her exposed flank.
CRACK.
The heavy iron head of the mace slammed into Torra's side.
The sound of shattering ribs echoed sickeningly in the small hut. Torra was lifted off her feet and thrown against the timber wall, sliding down in a crumpled, wheezing heap. Her skinning knife fell from her numb fingers.
The crippled club-wielder tried to crawl toward her to finish the job, dragging his useless, bleeding leg behind him. "I'll kill you... I'll kill all of you..."
But he never made it.
A shadow fell over him. Small. Silent.
Yoriichi stood over him. He had picked up the fallen serrated dirk from the dead Knife Man.
The boy's face was unrecognizable—gone was the innocent child who read history books. In the red glow of the embers, his crimson eyes looked like portals to a hell this man had never believed in.
The man looked up, fear suddenly replacing the pain in his eyes. "W-what are you—"
Yoriichi didn't speak. He didn't hesitate.
He drove the dirk down into the man's throat with surgical precision, severing the windpipe and the spine in one fluid motion.
The man twitched once, blood bubbling from his lips, and then lay still forever.
The hut fell silent, save for the whistling wind and the frantic, terrified sobbing of Lyra in the corner.
Yoriichi stood there for a second, his small chest heaving, his hands covered in hot, sticky blood. He looked at the two corpses—one with a knife in his jaw, the other with a slashed throat.
He felt the weight of the steel in his hand. It felt familiar. It felt right.
But then he looked at Torra, and the cold steel in his heart turned to ice.
"Torra!"
Serena's scream broke his trance.
Yoriichi dropped the knife and turned. Serena was crawling across the floor, ignoring the blood, pulling Torra's head into her lap.
Torra was pale, her skin turning waxy and grey in the firelight. Blood was bubbling from her lips with every ragged breath. The mace had crushed her internal organs; Yoriichi could see it with his transparent vision. Her life fire was flickering out.
"Torra… oh gods, Torra, please," Serena sobbed, stroking the older woman's hair. "Don't go. Look at me. We'll get a Maester. We'll…"
Torra coughed, a wet, rattling sound. She struggled to focus her eyes on Serena. A faint, bloody smile tugged at the corner of her mouth.
"No… Maester… for us," she wheezed. "Save… your coin… girl."
"Don't speak," Serena wept, rocking back and forth. "Just stay with me."
Torra's hand moved weakly, gripping Serena's wrist with surprising strength.
"Listen… to me," Torra gasped, her voice growing fainter. "The wolf… ate the sheep… today. You… you cannot be a sheep… Serena."
Torra's eyes drifted to Yoriichi, who was kneeling beside them, holding Lyra's hand. She looked at the boy—the boy who had killed a man to save them. She didn't look afraid. She looked relieved.
"He… has the fire," Torra whispered. "Let it… burn."
She looked back at Serena.
"Be… the wolf… now," she breathed. "Or… die."
The light faded from her eyes. The grip on Serena's wrist loosened, and her hand fell to the bloody floor with a soft thud.
"Torra?" Serena whispered. "Torra!"
A scream of pure, raw anguish tore from Serena's throat, louder than the wind, louder than the storm. She buried her face in her friend's chest, wailing into the dead woman's furs.
Yoriichi watched them. He felt a tear track through the blood on his cheek. It wasn't his past life's regret this time. It was a new pain. A fresh scar on a new soul.
He reached out and gently closed Torra's eyes.
Outside, the sound of galloping horses approached. Heavy hooves thudding in the snow. Men shouting commands.
Yoriichi looked at the door. He saw the Stark banner in his mind.
Father, Yoriichi thought, a cold, hard resolve settling over his heart like ice.
You are too late.