Disclaimer: I don't own any part of Game of Thrones or A Song of Ice and Fire. Thank you for all of your reviews! Brienne and Pod, and their adventures in the Riverlands are up now. Then I'm thinking Tyrion, and then either Arya or Jon. Let me know which one you'd rather have first.
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Brienne
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Brienne and Pod crouched behind a small grouping of gorse bushes and peered through the brambles, down the steadily sloping land, to the Twins, the ancestral home of House Frey of the crossing. An imposing fortification striding both sides of the Green Fork of the Trident, its ramparts and towers commanded a complete view of the entire surrounding countryside for a distance of slightly more than 10 leagues.
This far south, no snow had fallen yet, and Brienne was silently grateful that her teeth were no longer chattering. Pod had been going on and on about the blessed lack of snow for days now, and Brienne was valiantly restraining herself from clotting him on the ear with her armored hand. She could not help but wonder how her lady, Sansa, was faring now. Although Brienne had left Lady Stark surrounded by her brother, a direwolf, and at least several loyal men, she knew how quickly fortunes changed, and the Starks were being hunted now across all Seven Realms.
Brienne had sworn to Lady Catelyn that she would protect her daughters, and she had failed Arya Stark. She had been too stupid to realize the girl would have no reason to trust an armored woman with a southern accent and who bore a Lannister sword.
But it did not matter now. What mattered in this moment was that Brienne keep faith with Lady Sansa, and her plans to take back the North for House Stark. From Lady Catelyn's stories of her, Brienne would never have dreamed that the timid, gentle, naïve girl would grow to be such a determined and stern woman, but there was still a kindness, a goodness, to Sansa Stark and it made Brienne believe that here was someone else she could serve with both loyalty and gladness.
Pod silently nudged her and then pointed out the mid-afternoon patrol. The Twins were lightly guarded, which Brienne would have found suspicious if she had not heard from every house they passed, that old Walder Frey and most of his extended brood were encamped around the walls of Riverrun far to the south. Like a vulture, Walder Frey was waiting for the Lannister host to storm the ancient fortress of the Tullys, drive out the Blackfish and his remaining men, and then claim the ruling seat of the Riverlands for himself.
Brienne had also heard rumors that Jaime Lannister, the Kingslayer, the Queen's brother, was en route to take command of the siege. She had travelled throughout the war-torn Riverlands with the golden haired Kingsguard, first as an enemy and then as an ally, but Brienne could not say what it was she was feeling now. Jaime Lannister was a traitor, an amoral, incestuous oathbreaker, but he had kept his word to Lady Catelyn, he had saved Brienne's life several times, and he had gifted her with part of Ned Stark's sword in order that she might use it to protect his daughters.
Brienne had felt hollow leaving him behind in King's Landing, and she had worried what would happen to him now that he was back with his family. Brienne was her father's only child, and she knew that he loved her, but she also understood Lord Tywin Lannister had been a ruthless, uncompromising man, and that he demand absolute loyalty, even over oaths and love, from his children.
Brienne turned her attention back to the Twins. They were aptly named; two identical stone castles, square and plain, with high, straight walls, deep moats and with a barbican and portcullis in each, which faced the riverbanks.
The Twins, as a whole, was a squat, rather dull fortification. Although imposing, there was no majesty in its creation, no attempt to alleviate its plain, straight, serviceable walls with either ornamentation or ingenuity. Beside its deep moat and the natural protection offered by the Trident itself, the towers of the Twins lacked effective deterrents for those intent on getting in or out. The Lords of the Crossing had probably imagined they wouldn't need more than the river.
The guard was poorly trained and sparse, there were too many windows too low to the ground, too many entrances at the water level for flat barges and skiffs to unload people and cargo. There were too few embrasures in the walls themselves, for no army could camp beneath the walls, and they had been deemed superfluous. The Lords of the Crossing were not warriors, they were toll men. Brienne found it child's play to spot multiple places to enter or leave wither tower of the Twins unseen and unnoticed.
As Pod had noticed yesterday, when they counted the Frey guard and timed their patrols, the ones left behind at the Twins were new recruits, the ones not trusted to hold their position in a battle line, and those two old to do much fighting. They were also not expecting much in the way of an attack. The combined Northern army under Robb Stark had been all but eviscerated at the Red Wedding. Those that had escaped had fled to Riverrun under the commander of Ser Brynden Tully, Lady Catelyn's uncle, or they had become little more than brigands and murderers in the wild.
Those who had been wounded and captured at the Red Wedding itself, Smalljon Umber, Edmure Tully, Lord Patrek Mallister, Ser Marq Piper, Ser Wylis Manderly, Lady Maege Mormont, who's eldest daughter and heir had been killed at the Feast, a Cerwyn, two Glovers and a Tallhart, had been locked within the bowels of one or both of the castles. Brienne believed most of them had yet to be moved or killed. The Freys and Boltons were holding them for good behavior from their houses, but rumor had it that Ser Kevan Lannister had demanded Edmure Tully as his own personal hostage. Another rumor claimed that the Greatjon, who had been captured by Bolton and Karstark men while fighting in the East, had been moved to the Twins several weeks ago.
Brienne hoped this one was true. The Greatjon was rumored to be a fearsome fighter, and to be absolutely loyal to the Starks.
She narrowed her eyes and watched Pod's finger as he pointed out another patrol. They were always punctual and always perfunctory. The main fighting in the Riverlands had been all but ended the past several months. Lord Tywin had been ruthless in his suppression of the marauding bands, and the houses still loyal to the Tullys, and most of the fighting had taken place to the south and east and north, leaving the Twins all but untouched.
Brienne waited until the nearest Patrol had passed before turning to Pod. "The sooner we do this, the less chance we take of being found out, by the Freys or by any of the smallfolk around here who are loyal to them."
Pod nodded. He looked scared but determined. "Lady Sansa will have called the banners by now, right?"
Brienne did not know for sure. "The faster she moves, the less time the Boltons will have to prepare. The faster we move, the more time chaos we create in the Riverlands and hopefully, the more allies we give her."
Pod swallowed, and crawled after Brienne as the two of them backtracked through the low-lying scrub back to their camp. There would be no fire tonight – the same as the previous several days as they entered Frey territory – and they would take turns sleeping high in the bows of the trees, away from any prowling hounds or errant guardsmen.
Brienne tore off a piece of the dried mutton they had carried with them from the last inn. She chewed on it thoughtfully before taking out her dirk and beginning to sharpen it. Her valyrian steel sword, Oathkeeper, needed no such attention.
She thought over the path and timing of the patrols, she contemplated the two castles, the crossbowmen on the battlements, the carts and wagons crossing the bridge at dawn, midday, and dusk, and she thought about what a spiteful, vindictive old man like Walder Frey would do.
"Lord Tyrion would have split all the captives up. He would have executed the most troublesome as an example to the rest," Pod offered.
Brienne hummed under her breath. "That's because Tyrion Lannister was a cunning man," she returned. Jaime had told her that his dwarf brother took after their father in his ability to maneuver the ever changing political structure of Westeros. "Walder Frey is none of those things, or he would not have let his House take the fall for the Red Wedding. The Riverlands will never truly follow him, and the North is just biding their time."
Pod pulled out a small square of hard goat's cheese and offered half to her. "How are we getting in, milady?" he asked her.
Brienne leaned back against her saddlebags and stared up at the late afternoon sun shining through the trees. The foliage had turned from the deep greens of summer to the golds and russets of autumn. A carpet of yellow leaves and acorns made up the forest floor. Sooner rather than later the snows would come here too.
Winter is Coming. The Stark words echoed through Brienne's head. She had seen the Wall, and the fear on the faces of the Night's Watch. Knights should be gathering to march north to the true war, but all the true Knights were dead, and the men who were left were scrambling after small bits of power, bleeding the realm dry.
"How do you think we're going to get in, Pod?" Brienne challenged him, and had to suppress a grin at the small grimace which crossed the boy's face.
Pod pondered this for a moment. "Well," he said at last. "We can't go in as one of the smallfolk, because we don't have anything to sell or transport, and someone would give us away. Plus, our accents mark us as nobility. We have no way of scaling the walls, our armor is too heavy to swim the moat, and we can't go in as ourselves."
"Aptly summarized, Pod," Brienne said drily. "Do you have anything of use to contribute?" Even a month ago Pod would have taken her brusque words to heart and sunk into despondency that he had failed her. Now he gave her a slightly exasperated look, but applied himself to the task at hand.
"We're going to have to go in as ourselves…but not ourselves," he concluded.
Brienne sighed.
The next morning Brienne, in her black armor with the visor drawn down, stood before the castellan of the Twins. Lord Ambrose Butterwell sat in his lord's chair, a huge monstrosity carved of black oat, and squinted suspiciously down at the strange armor-clad warrior. Pod stepped forward nervously.
"My lord," he began, his voice wavering. Brienne wished he would acquire a bit more courage from somewhere, but he was all she had so he would have to do. "May I present to you Ser Duncan of the Stoney Step."
"Never heard of him," Lord Ambrose snapped peevishly.
Pod looked even more hesitant. "He was knight by King Joffrey Baratheon after the Battle of the Blackwater, my lord," he explained, upon which the old castellan snorted.
"One of those knights," he muttered darkly. Brienne and Pod had been counting on this reaction. After the Battle of the Blackwater, when Stannis Baratheon had attempted to conquer King's Landing, King Joffrey had knighted ever man who had claimed to commit any act of valor. Knights were created from every baseborn fighter and thief, oathbreaking younger son, or foreigner who had played a part, or claimed to play a part, in the affair.
There was no way to trace whether any of these stories, or any of these knights, were who they said they were. Brienne had a suit of armor and a well-made sword and a horse; that made her a knight if she claimed to be one.
Brienne remained silent.
"Why doesn't he remove his helmet, or lift his visor, and offer his services himself?" Lord Ambrose asked suspiciously.
Brienne hadn't liked this part, but Pod had convinced her that as she wouldn't be saying a word, she would not actually be offering her honor and her sword to the service of House Frey. Brienne had no desire to be foresworn.
"Ser Duncan has taken a vow of silence, my lord," Pod explained hurriedly. "He was bound in silence by the High Sparrow himself, until a year and a day had passed."
This story seemed to pique the castellan's interest. Several other lords and ladies in the hall also seemed to look reluctantly intrigued. News of the High Sparrow's ascent in power at King's Landing had spread through the southern lands of the realm like wildfire. Even people in the Riverlands had heard about it. The bards were singing tales of the Queen's walk of shame, and the ruin of House Tyrell, whenever they were out of earshot of men loyal to the Lannisters. At one of the inns they had been in on their way south, a very upstanding place called The Stinking Goose, Pod and Brienne had listened with fascination to a bard singing of the fat lord of White Harbor, far to the north, and how he had offered his Frey guests pies made from their own kinsmen. The story had been hushed quickly, but a murmuring had gone through the common room and Brienne had been sure that the story would spread throughout the town like wildfire.
"Is it true?" Pod had asked her later, but Brienne had not known. Lady Catelyn had spoken of Lord Wyman Manderly with great respect and warmth, and Brienne had met his second son, a fat man named Wendel, but she did not know if the Manderlys were still loyal to their Stark overlords, or had switched to Roose Boltons banner.
"I don't think it matters if it is true or not," she'd told him. "I think it only matters because people believe it could be true." The Freys had betrayed their sworn lord, had slaughtered men and women in their Halls who were under guest right. The Riverlands seethed with uneasiness, and there were probably very few people who would say they trusted their new overlords.
"Why would he be bound in silence?" Lord Ambrose asked now.
Pod held a paper in his hands, signed by Brienne in a scrawl that could conceivably be the name 'Ser Duncan' if you squinted hard enough, but could also be any other name that she chose. He walked slowly up the dais to Lord Ambrose and hand the parchment to him.
The old man squinted even more. "'I, Ser Duncan of the Stoney Step, seek to serve the Gods and the smallfolk of the Seven Kingdoms. For a year and a day, I shall remain silent and serve, until I know their will.'"
Lord Ambrose handed the parchment back. He chewed on his lip, snorted, took a sip of ale, and at last said, "Why House Frey?"
This part would be the easiest, Brienne had thought; it was fairly self-explanatory. Indeed, Pod seemed to grow in courage as he wasn't threatened with imminent death from Lord Ambrose Butterwell.
"Ser Duncan was born in the Riverlands, my lord. He has watched his land be torn apart in pointless wars against the Crown. He wishes to aid his liege lord in rebuilding and re-strengthening his homeland. He only asks for a position where he can serve."
When Lord Ambrose said, "Well, let's see how he fights, first," Brienne knew that she was in.
The next few days were the hardest. Brienne could not speak, she could not bathe where anyone could see her, and she could not remove her helmet. Occasionally she kept her visor up, so that the men and women in the Twins could see her eyes, two pools of blue, beneath the black armor. Pod explained away her refusal to remove her armor as an idiosyncrasy due to the violence she had seen, and the battles she had been in, and this was mostly accepted.
Brienne fought better than almost all the men there, she was strong and tireless and uncomplaining. The men at the Twins tolerated her presence even if they looked at her cross-eyed occasionally. Pod himself was more easily accepted. As her squire he was seen everywhere in both castles of the Twins, fetching water and food, having her weapons and armor cleaned and sharpened, delivering requests and messages, and his presence wasn't even remarked upon.
It was Pod who found where the northern lords were being held first.
"The western castle," he told her quietly, as he bent over her at the mess table to place a flagon of wine before her. Brienne pulled her visor up. She had heard several men commenting on her lack of facial hair, but she didn't think her chin was particularly feminine looking, so she didn't worry about it too much.
She gave him a look over her shoulder.
"The guard with the keys is on duty just down the hallway in the guardroom. Two other men are stationed with him at all times." He left her side and Brienne ate her supper of dark bread and fish stew quickly. She didn't want to wait. Every day they delayed was one more day she could be discovered. Also, her scalp was itching from being stuck inside her helm for so long.
That night Brienne stood her watch as usual. When her turn came to be relieved, she calmly slit the throat of the guardsman sent to take her place, dumped his body into the Trident, and met Pod at the barbican to the western castle. Together they walked down to the dungeons.
The keeper of the keys looked up from his game of dice. When he saw her he frowned. "Who are you?" he demanded, just before Brienne ran him through with her sword. Pod brained the other one with a heavy wooden flagon sitting on the table, and Brienne drove her dirk through the eye of the third.
Pod grabbed the keys, they slipped down the hall, and they opened the door to the cell where the northern lords were kept.
Walder Frey had decided to keep all of his enemies in and thirty by forty foot cell. At first, this might seem spacious, but a dozen noblemen and women, most of them wounded, and all locked away together for months and months on ends, well it was a minor miracle of the gods that none of them had killed the rest, or gone crazy.
They blinked at Brienne and Pod in the torchlight. The biggest of them, a huge older man with a magnificent white beard, got slowly to his feet. He was chained to the wall and his face was covered in fading bruises, a motley of yellow and green and deep purple. "The scum you call lord finally found his balls and is going to execute us?" he asked belligerently.
Brienne pulled off her helm.
"Another bloody woman," she heard one of the northern lords swear.
"Mind your tongue," snapped the voice of what must be old Lady Mormont.
"I'm Brienne of Tarth, and this is Podrik Payne," Brienne explained quickly. She handed the torch to Pod and moved into the cell, sorting through the keys to find the correct one for the old man's chains. "This is a rescue, but we have to move quickly. Pod and I have a boat line up, so it will be harder for them to pursue us, but the quicker we move, the easier this will be."
Old Lady Mormont grabbed her arm to halt her when Brienne went to unchain her. "Who is rescuing us, lass?" she asked. "Our king is dead. House Stark has been destroyed. From what we hear the Boltons rule the North now."
Brienne smiled grimly. "Not for long," she promised them all. "I am sworn to Sansa Stark. She has called the banners, and the North will answer."
"Ned's eldest daughter?" Lady Mormont asked, sounding more speculative than questioning.
"That girl was married to a Lannister," the old man with the white beard growled. Brienne had a feeling that this was the Greatjon.
"She is currently married to Ramsay Bolton," Pod piped up from the doorway.
"Bolton?" questioned another.
"She's a woman," groaned another, "not a leader."
"She's a wee slip of a girl," cried yet a third.
"She is the Heir to the North," Brienne's voice cut through them like a whip. She had been dealing with men speaking of her in that same tone her entire life. She would not let them speak that way to her lady. "She is the Queen in the North. She has been through hell to return home, and she has sent me to free you all."
There was a brief moment of quiet as the lords and lady stumbled to their feet and began to slowly follow Brienne and Pod out into the flickering torchlight of the dungeon hallway.
"But she has no experience commanding men in battle," Lady Mormont hissed down the stone passageway. "Who will lead her army?"
"Assuming we can even muster one," someone else chimed in.
"I'll do it," the Greatjon volunteered instantly.
"What makes you think she'll choose you?" another lord asked, annoyed.
"Why wouldn't she?" the Greatjon was honestly surprised. "My loyalty is beyond question."
"No one was talking about your loyalty," someone else muttered.
As the Greatjon bristled indignantly, Pod started silently laughing at the look that was apparently growing like thunder across Brienne's face.
Brienne hissed back to the quarreling northern lords. "Her commander will be her brother, Jon Snow, the Lord Commander of the Night's Watch."
That halted their bickering effectively until they were well away from the Twins. As the distant lights grew dimmer behind them, shouting came to them over the water, as well as the sound of a bell tolling. Soon the banks on either side of the Trident, both north and south, would be flooded with Frey soldiers and supporters, hoping to catch the errant northern lords for whatever bounty Lord Ambrose Butterwell would set.
There was silence in the two boats Brienne and Pod had procured. There was just the wind, the lapping of the waves against the wood hulls, and the sound of the oars dipping in and out, in and out. And the sound of the shouting in the distance.
One of northerners was digging around in the boats, looking through the provisions Pod had spent the past week pilfering. He tossed pieces of black bread to the others. Then he turned to Brienne. Conversationally he said, "The odds are not in our favor of getting out of the Riverlands alive, let alone to wherever Lady Stark is."
Brienne, who was manning one of the oars, gave a grunt. "We just have to get to Greywater Watch. Lord Snow and Lady Stark said that Lord Reed would be an ally."
"Those bogmen?" someone else sneered.
Lady Mormont frowned. "The swamps of the crannogmen are all but impassable to outsiders. There's no way we'll make it there if we can't use the King's Road."
"We have to try," Brienne told her, and everyone seemed to accept that statement as final. Although the Riverlands had been brought into some semblance of order with the end of the War of the Five Kings, it was still a place with roaming companies of mercenaries and cutthroats. The sooner Brienne and her charges were north of Moat Cailin, the safer she would feel.
However, they were only one day out from the Twins when they were captured. Snuck up upon during the night, the lone sentry of their party had been taken while nipping behind a tree to take a quick leak. By the time Brienne knew what was going on, she was being forcibly manhandled towards a horse, blindfolded and with her hands held tight behind her back until they could secure ropes around them.
Then they tied her to a horse and they travelled for what felt like hours. Brienne tried to keep track of their direction, but it was hopeless as the old nag she was strapped to went up and down numerous hills, through gorges and streams, and underneath the dripping trees of countless woods and forests.
As the day moved inexorably towards evening, the finally arrived at their destination. The blindfold was ripped from her eyes as she was hauled down from the horse, and Brienne blinked in the dim, rainy grey light which was still too bright after the darkness of the blindfold. Brienne, Pod and the northern lords found themselves in a forest clearing, with the high branches above them festooned with yellow leaves, which gently rained down upon them. The carpet of red, yellow, and brown leaves beneath their feet muffled the tread of their boots and the clomp of the horses' hooves. Rain dripped steadily off the branches with a faintly melancholy sound.
There was a hush amidst the clearing. Brienne almost wanted to call it reverence, but looking at the faces of the men who surrounded them, their worn, grim visages, their dead or cruel-looking eyes, Brienne knew it was something darker. These men had seen too much of war, too much of death; there was too little of them left.
They came around a bend in the clearing and saw several men waiting for them. Grim faced though they were, they looked almost impassive as they gazed at their newest captives, but it was not the men who gave Brienne pause. At their center stood a single woman, veiled and utterly still, who watched them with black, shadowed eyes as they approached. Brienne and her companions were spread out in a line before the woman, and forced roughly to their knees in the mud and leaves.
No one spoke, not even to jeer, and that made Brienne most nervous of all. The silent woman, dressed head to toe in mourning colors of black, grey and dark purple, glided slowly forward until she stood directly before and above Brienne. The men watched her with expectation and Brienne tried to peer through the veil to no avail. At last, the Greatjon appeared to grow impatient.
"Speak lass, and tell us what you want. Or cut our heads off and have done with it." The silence changed imperceptibly but Brienne could not say how.
The woman lifted up her veil and Brienne's eyes grew wide, her breath catching in horror. One of the northern lords swore, and Pod let out a quickly-strangled gasp. Underneath the veil was the pale, dead, rotted face of Lady Catelyn Stark.
"Lady Catelyn," rumbled the Greatjon, his voice filled with shock and pity, and faint disgust.
The woman who had been Catelyn Stark snapped her head over in his direction. There was nothing human or alive about that head turn, or about the eyes which stared at her dead son's loyal bannerman. Lady Catelyn's eyes were filled with madness and rage and the impersonal nature of the dead. A knife appeared from beneath her long sleeves as she glided toward Lord Umber, as five of her men descended upon the huge bear of a northerner, seeking to hold him down for her pleasure. His son attempted to throw himself in the way of the knife, shouting.
"No," Brienne cried. "No!"
The dead Lady Catelyn did no heed her, but used all her strength to drive her blade deep into the Greatjon's left eye. He dropped like a stone to her feet, blood pooling and spreading rapidly around him.
There was an uproar from the northern lords which was silenced by the man who had stood next to Lady Catelyn saying calmly, dispassionately, "Lady Stoneheart does not go by that name anymore." He cleared his throat pompously as the sudden silence enabled his words to be heard clearly.
"She wishes you to know that you are all traitors, in league with the Freys and the Lannisters, and therefore you will die like the cowardly turncoats that you are." The man grinned now, his crack, toothless, black smile a rictus of malicious joy.
"My lady," Brienne called out, "my lady, we are not traitors! I come from your daughter, from Sansa Stark. She has raised the northern banners and is calling the lords of ever house to renew their vows of loyalty to House Stark. I serve her and have sworn to protect her, just as I promised you."
Lady Stoneheart's dead face turned slowly toward Brienne. Her throat had been slashed to the bone and the scar was still vividly visible. She didn't speak, but appeared to be listening. Brienne tried again.
"And I saw your daughter, Arya. She was alive as well. She did not want my help, but she still carried the sword her brother made for her. She was still fighting."
Lady Stoneheart paused for a long moment and Brienne held her breath, waiting. Lady Mormont shifted her old knees a bit, but the others waited silently as well. Then Brienne saw Lady Stoneheart's eyes fall on the valyrian steel sword Jaime Lannister had given her. It was made from one-half of the ancient blade, Ice, which had been wielded by Lord Eddard Stark before his murder.
Lady Stoneheart stared at the distinctive sheen of the blade and Brienne knew she saw the Lannister golden lions on its hilt. She made a motion with her hand and another man stepped forward, reading from a sheaf of parchment.
"As restitution for the crimes committed against her family, and for failing to protect her son and brother, Lady Stoneheart sentences you all to death." He raised his hand imperiously, looking like he had been trained at the Citadel to be a Maester, and waited for the uproar to subside. The men holding the northern lords beat and kicked them viciously until they quieted. Lady Mormont had a vice-like grip on the Smalljon's arm, likely to prevent him from immediately avenging his father's murder.
"Brienne of Tarth," the man turned to her. He was greasy and stained with mud and blood, his voice was as oily as the rest of him, and as curiously dead-sounding as the eyes of his companions. "Your oath to me has still to be fulfilled. You swore to honor and obey. Therefore, I charge you to keep your word, and to bring me the head of the Kingslayer, Jaime Lannister, who even now marches on Riverrun, the home of my childhood."
Although the words came from the man, Brienne heard Lady Catelyn's voice, and shivered as the dead woman's eyes fixed on her, madness shining from their depths.
"And you swore to not ask anything of me that would compromise my honor," Brienne cried, stung. "He kept his word to you, and so have I, now keep yours."
"The dead keep no promises with the living," came the answer, impassively. "In death there is only vengeance and darkness. He pushed my son, Bran, from a window and took away his legs. Now bring me his head."
Brienne looked full in the face of the woman who had once been Lady Catelyn Stark, the woman who had saved her life when Renly's Rainbow Guard would have struck her down where she stood. A breeze, cold and damp, blew sharply through the clearing as Brienne thought of Sansa Stark's beautiful, assessing face, and Jaime Lannister's mocking, dancing eyes.
'No matter what you do, you're betraying one oath or another,' he had said, and she had not believed him.
"What is dead should remain dead!" yelled one of the Flints now.
"Please," Brienne begged the unfeeling Lady Stoneheart. "Please don't make me do this."
There was a sudden shout from the back of the clearing. "My lady," a man yelled," the Freys are come upon us!"
In the ensuing chaos, no one paid any attention as Brienne cut her bonds on Oathkeeper's sharp blade. She could never go back now. Gripping her sword tightly, steeling herself, she cut through the men before her like a scythe through wheat. Then she took a deep breath, raised Ned Stark's blade, and swung.
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Jon or Tyrion is next. I have not decided. I suppose it all depends on how I feel when I sit down to write tomorrow. Let me know which one you'd be more interested to read at the moment. Also, so happy Jon Snow is back in Game of Thrones! Now all we need next episode is a Jon/Sansa hug!