The green firelight washed over the red figure and gave her an almost inhuman glow.
Then her red eyes turned straight toward him.
Across the burning river, through the storm of arrows, across hundreds of feet, she locked onto his exact position.
She saw him.
A chill shot straight up Joffrey's spine.
Was she even human? Or…
The answer came fast.
She was human.
Several crossbow bolts punched clean through her body.
The red woman never made a sound. She simply toppled backward and slammed onto the deck with a heavy thud.
Soldiers rushed in, raised shields painted with the flaming heart, and dragged her quickly into the cabin behind them.
"Look at the river!" Tyrion's shout yanked Joffrey's eyes back.
Even though the fire ships had detonated early, the wildfire was still burning across the water.
It flowed with the current, racing toward the ships that hadn't pulled back in time.
The first victim was a Lysene pirate galley.
The second the green slick touched the hull, it came alive. In a heartbeat it swallowed the entire side of the ship.
Sailors beat at the flames like madmen.
Cloaks used to smother it caught fire instead. Hands that slapped at it burned too.
One big fool dropped his pants and tried to piss out the fire spreading at his feet.
The flames raced up and set his cock ablaze.
He dove into the water. The fire kept burning even underwater.
Inhuman screams started echoing across the Blackwater.
"Trebuchets! Keep firing!"
This time it wasn't ordinary pots.
Green jars burst across enemy decks, seeping into every crack.
Fire arrows followed right behind.
Flames raced down the rigging from the masts like fiery snakes chasing screaming sailors.
The enemy horns changed pitch.
Ships that hadn't been touched yet began rowing backward frantically, trying to escape the burning stretch of river.
The plan to burn the fleet directly had failed, but the blazing wrecks still formed a deadly barrier.
Charred masts jutted from the water like broken teeth. Sunken hulls blocked the channel.
Stannis's fleet could advance no farther.
But the enemy refused to quit.
Since the big ships couldn't get close, they lowered the small boats.
Oarsmen rowed with gritted teeth through the death zone, carrying fully armed soldiers toward shore.
The first wave hit the mudflats.
They flipped their boats overhead as shields and advanced on the Mud Gate, carrying an iron-headed battering ram underneath.
They crossed the pitted ground—then stopped dead.
A deep trench yawned right at the base of the wall.
After Joffrey and Eddard talked it over, they'd agreed there was no point sallying out. Once the riverside buildings were cleared, they put the smallfolk to work through the night, digging a continuous defensive ditch starting at the Mud Gate and running along the wall.
The first attackers had nowhere to hide. They huddled under their overturned boats, trapped between advance and retreat.
Soon the second wave landed.
Under a hail of arrows they dragged planks ripped from their own ships and tried to bridge the trench.
Arrows fell like locusts. Men dropped every second.
The living stepped on the corpses of the dead and kept pushing forward.
Finally a crude, crooked path was laid across the ditch.
Boom—boom—boom—
Heavy blows rang against the gate.
Crack!
A sharp sound split the air.
The men below cheered, thinking the bar had broken, and pressed in tighter.
They rammed harder, more frantically.
But the gate stood firm.
Because behind it the entrance had been packed solid with crates, sandbags, and stones. Even if they tore the gates off their hinges, they'd still face a new wall thicker than the outer one.
Several jars of wildfire smashed down from above.
Dozens of burning men rolled and screamed on the ground like living torches before curling into blackened corpses.
Stannis's soldiers began to fall back, regrouping out of range and exchanging frightened looks.
The third wave came ashore carrying long ladders and spread out along the wall.
Instead of focusing on the Mud Gate they searched for climbable sections and began raising ladder after ladder.
Then came the fourth wave.
These were the heavy infantry—men in full plate.
But King's Landing's walls stood over thirty feet high, taller than most small castles. Getting such ladders up was hard enough. Climbing them under fire was near suicide.
Most climbed with shields held overhead, inching upward step by step.
Some were simply mad.
A Lysene climbed like a spider, short sword clenched in his teeth, hands and feet flying up the rungs.
He reached the top in moments.
A triumphant grin spread across his face as he prepared to vault over—only for a spear waiting on the other side to ram straight through his face.
The point punched into one eye socket and out the back of his skull, trailing red and white matter.
The corpse toppled backward and smashed into the base of the wall.
Alarm bells rang everywhere. Runners sprinted back and forth.
Eddard issued calm, steady orders, sending reinforcements wherever men had reached the parapet.
"Crossbowmen! Concentrate on the men holding the ladders!"
Rolling logs and stones crashed down. Boiling water and hot oil poured over the sides.
Strong soldiers with poleaxes and pikes shoved against unstable ladders, toppling them one by one.
Stannis then brought up his own archers, trying to suppress the defenders on the wall.
But the trebuchets quickly shifted targets. Massive stones screamed down on the enemy formations.
Soon, few men were still willing to climb. The handful who did make it over the battlements were met by waiting swords and cut down immediately.
Stannis's troops fell back once more.
Clever tricks could only do so much.
In the end, victory would be decided by raw strength.
The battlefield fell into an eerie silence.
Burning ships crackled on the river. The stench of charred flesh and wood filled the air. Wounded men groaned from both sides of the wall.
Sweat pooled inside Joffrey's gauntlets.
"King's Landing!"
"Baratheon!"
"Long live King Joffrey!"
Even though the battle wasn't over, knights began leading cheers to raise morale.
The sound of running feet came from below the gatehouse.
"Your Grace, the Iron Gate is in a bad way."
Ser Barristan was holding the northern sector.
The gates there were stronger and the walls higher, but Stannis had prepared siege towers and battering rams. He was now attacking from both land and sea at once.
The real decisive battle might only just be beginning.
In that brief breathing space, Joffrey's eyes flicked toward the south bank of the Blackwater.
There, the previously still banners had begun to move.
Renly's army was on the march.