Another night fell, and Lynn realized the southern army was far more fragile than he had expected.
Their cavalry couldn't maneuver in the trees. Their heavy plate made every move clumsy. Their longbowmen were trained for massed volleys on open ground, not this kind of dirty skirmish.
Once darkness hit, the Nightrunners showed them what real fear felt like.
For two full days and nights the Free Folk warriors—risking wights the entire time—kept Stannis's host pinned along the Grey Stone River. Arrows and traps chipped away at them without mercy.
The wildlings had killed fewer than a hundred men outright, but the damage to morale was devastating.
Stannis's column had still looked disciplined the first day. By this evening the formation had completely fallen apart.
Exhausted soldiers made camp on a wide stretch of riverbank, chopping down every tree on both shores. The constant hit-and-run raids left them wired and jumpy.
The worst part was the rumor racing through the ranks: the fleet anchored at Hardhome had already been burned. No supplies, no escape.
The story had teeth. All day long the king's ravens had been launched one after another. Every single bird had been shot down by wildling arrows or snatched out of the sky by the dragon. Not one made it south.
The southerners weren't stupid. If the king wasn't desperate about his ships, he wouldn't have kept sending birds he knew would die.
The wildlings' frantic efforts to stop them only convinced the men that something very bad had already happened at Hardhome.
"Stannis never thought we'd chase him this hard," Lynn said from the back of a towering woolly mammoth, watching the enemy camp through Weeping Blood's eyes. "Heading into the Haunted Forest was a fatal mistake."
"Hunter" Harle craned his neck upward and agreed.
"Southerners figured one battle would break the Free Folk's spirit. Dream on. In these woods we're the hunters."
Harle was one of the few raider chiefs whose band hadn't been shredded at Shadow Tower, so he still had full strength. Right now he served as Lynn's advisor and second-in-command for the harassment operation.
His nickname said it all—he was a ghost in the trees.
"But our casualties are three times theirs," Lynn told him. "Get your people to rein in the Hardfoots. They're too reckless. A cornered beast is still a beast. You don't poke it just because you can."
Harle shrugged.
"The Hardfoots lost too many when the iron cans rode straight through their camp. Those barefoot little bastards never forget a grudge. I've seen their clan almost wiped out by the Nightrunners a couple of times. Not sure I can talk them down."
He paused, then added with a grin, "Might as well let them go. They breed like rabbits anyway—give 'em a few years and they'll have whole new litters running around…"
He caught Lynn staring down at him from the mammoth's back and wisely shut his mouth.
After the battle at the Wall, if the dragon hadn't scattered the cavalry with those two blasts of flame and rallied the Free Folk, at least half their people would have died under iron hooves and the panic that followed. What had once been respect for the Son of the Stars had now become something closer to worship. To most wildlings he was practically a god—or at least the god's chosen voice.
"Do it because I said so," Lynn told him quietly.
Harle didn't argue. He slid off his horse and went to pass the order.
Lynn turned his gaze back toward Stannis's camp. Dense bonfires lit up half the sky.
He felt torn.
He had brought three or four thousand Free Folk warriors to chase and bleed this southern army for one reason only: buy Tormund and the Walrus Folk enough time to reach Hardhome. Two days of constant harassment should have been plenty for Tormund to seize or burn the fleet.
But the southerners were cracking faster than he had hoped. If he kept pressing, the whole force might collapse on its own. And if Tormund somehow failed, wiping them out here in the endless forest would work just as well.
The image of that Hardfoot boy impaled on a lance flashed through his mind again.
Weeping Blood swept in on a cold rush of wind, a bloodied black raven feather still stuck to the corner of his mouth. The little dragon looked exhausted. Even a magical creature had limits after days of nonstop flying.
Tonight the southerners would probably get at least one raven through. The Nightrunners were good, but they couldn't watch both ground and sky at the same time—not with the numbers they had.
Either way, it was pointless to trade the Free Folk head-on against steel-armored professionals. They would wait until the southerners had nothing left.
Decision made, Lynn stopped second-guessing himself. He slid down the thick hemp rope lashed to the mammoth's saddle and ducked into the small hide tent to catch some sleep.
The Free Folk had the numbers to rotate watchers and raiders, but they refused to light fires. No one wanted to give away their position for a night raid. Two nights without heat had been brutal. Some men had already lost toes and ears to frostbite. A few had frozen to death outright.
Yet not one asked to pull back. Hate kept them going.
The frozen bodies still served a purpose. Lynn checked them every morning. If any rose as wights, it meant Others were close. The rule wasn't perfect, but it was better than nothing.
At first light the next morning Lynn woke to shouting and the thunder of hooves.
He scrambled out of the tent. The sound was moving downstream, away from them. Free Folk were already running toward it in a noisy mob.
For one heartbeat he thought Stannis had lost his mind and ordered a suicidal cavalry charge straight through the forest.
Then he realized the hoofbeats were heading downriver—getting farther away.
What the hell?
Had the king abandoned his foot soldiers and longbowmen and fled with only the cavalry?
Lynn grabbed the nearest Hardfoot sprinting past him and demanded answers.
The warrior flinched, then answered in a clear woman's voice.
"I don't know!"
Lynn let her go, momentarily speechless. Expecting wildlings to file reports first was clearly asking too much.