Rick spat and cursed at the prickly tall grass.
It had been a long and arduous march to Riverrun, though they arrived just in time to witness the beginning of the siege. Now the Alexandrian vanguard lay just beyond the Lannister camp, waiting for the Brave Companions to prepare themselves north of the Tumblestone. Sunset was not far away, and the Alexandrians were tired, but soon the Lannisters would wonder about their scouts who failed to return. The battle had to be today.
A soldier crept up beside Rick. The young man held an amulet carved in the shape of a black goat's head. "The Brave Companions are ready, mi'lord. Lord Hoat says he will begin the attack if the Alexandrians are in place."
"My men are ready. Go back north of the river and tell him to attack. Does he still have the watch I lent him?"
"The wrist-clock?".
Rick nodded. "He starts attacking at three - if he forgets, remind him that's when the short clock-hand is pointing straight towards his own hand, and the long hand's pointing north to the short hand's east."
Dwight crawled to Rick's side when the messenger was out of earshot. "The Brave Companions have been useful guides, but something still feels a bit off about them. I won't mind if they fuck off to Easteros or whatever once we've popped a few Lannisters."
"Yeah. Can't trust them. Not after what they did to their septon," Rick sighed. Utt's violent demise had been firmly etched in his mind. The dawn after that first battle, Rick had stumbled across Vargo and two Companions forcing the septon to kneel over a tree stump, mouth stuffed with a filthy rag as he struggled. Utt's face had been a mish-mash of black and purple, swollen like an inflated airbag. Trickles of blood had dribbled down the poor man's forehead, like streaks of red wine.
Before Rick had even been able to shout, Vargo's sharp axe had swung down. It hadn't been much larger than Rick's small hatchet, but it had been enough to send the head rolling off the wooden block, bouncing twice before thudding onto the grass.
"Goddammit!" Rick had shouted. He had run over and shook Vargo like a small child shaking a piggy bank. "What did you do that for?"
Vargo had stepped back from the Alexandrian. "We haf disofered that thif one... ith of a horrible nature and haf killed him for his crimeth. We mutht uphold Juthtice, my lord."
"What crimes? What crime deserves THIS?" Rick had snarled.
"Crimeth for which the punifment ith death, Lord Rickard," the Goat had explained. "Ithn that not obviouf?"
"No! This isn't who we are, or what we should do. We've all had to kill, and still do, but we've gone past that already. We're supposed to be civilized! We're supposed to build a better world!" Rick had placed his one good hand upon his face. It had felt hotter than the sun.
"Utt attempted rape, Lord Rickard." Urswyck had kicked the now lifeless body. "What if the victim had been your own son? What would you have us do then?"
"I..." Rick's lips could still taste the metallic twang of blood, blood from a man whose group attempted to defile Carl on a dark and terrible night when they were ambushed on the road. Rick and his small band of survivors were fleeing towards Washington DC on a journey twice as far as Riverrun was now from Alexandria, hungry, thirsty, and having seen every form of depravity known to man along the way. It had been years since Rick ripped out that… creature's jugular, but Rick often felt as if it happened only yesterday. A savage bite, no better than the walkers Rick's group had put down as regularly as clockwork.
"Fay you thifilize your men, Grimes, and I will difipline mine," Vargo had suggested.
There conversation had been interrupted then by Dwight coming up from behind. "Rick," he whispered, "A horseman from a nearby castle wants to see you. Just you. He's from the North - straight from King Robb." Rick took his leave, heading off to be shocked by news of what men later began calling the Red Wedding.
And now, Dwight was whispering in his ear again. "Still hung up about the execution?" the Saviors' new leader asked. "How can you expect them to agree with you when not even all of us do? And there," Dwight pointed across the river. "It has begun."
Faint clashing of steel against steel drifted across the Tumblestone, followed by battle cries as the Black Goat of Qohor pounced upon the twin towers of Frey. Through his binoculars, Rick saw faint streaks of grey smoke rise from burning stockades, darkening by the second.
Rick gently pulled on Dwight's shoulder. No. Not yet.
Small rafts dotted the river, struggling against the swift and churning currents. They largely kept their distance away from Riverrun itself, yet time and time again rocks and darts would crash into the water, creating waves that jostled those rickety vessels, or outright slam into an unfortunate raft, killing its occupants. Squinting his eyes, Rick could barely make out the gold-and-crimson banners of Lannister as they headed north to help their beleaguered allies.
A red ball of light shot up, up towards the sky, blazing like a small sun before arcing back towards the ground.
Rick dropped his binoculars and clumsily drew his revolver with his one good hand. The rugged Colt 'Peacemaker' was a prized heirloom, from his great-great-great-grandfather who died shortly after Custer's infamous last stand at the Little Bighorn, or so the family tale went. Yet the cavalryman survived just long enough to hand his revolver to his fellow trooper, his son, who brought it all the way back to Kentucky, and it was thus passed down the generations. And now Rick found himself warring on an unfamiliar frontier, just like his ancestors more than a hundred years ago.
Now's the time.
"It's our turn!" Dwight shouted. "Go!"
The Alexandrians hurled up their stars and stripes flag, followed by the Stark direwolf. They started forward, east towards the golden lion's camps, east in two winding lines. Dwight led the charge, proudly holding a baseball bat wrapped in barbed wire high in the air. It had been a symbol of oppression, once. Negan had named the weapon Lucille and used it to claim many innocent lives before Rick himself finally vanquished Negan in single combat and unified all the communities under his leadership.
Rick had been swifter back in those days. His broken leg, courtesy of Negan, had never set properly, and Rick thought he had seen most of his fighting days put behind him by the time All-out War ended. This war had been an unwelcome surprise. Rickard's Rebellion, the Brave Companions had begun calling it, a play on 'Robert's Rebellion.' There had only been three 'kingdoms' instead of four, the war had ended outside a wooden palisade rather than inside brick walls, and the tyrant chose to do battle himself rather than send his own heir. Though when you put it like that, the wars hadn't been very like at all, had they? Dwight had already defected to Rick's militia by the time they took down Negan, and Carl had never, ever bowed down to Negan.
Carl. This war is for Carl, and all the other little Alexandrian children.
Finally the gunfire began, far off in the distance. And so did the screaming, lives brutally cut short as men raced out of their tents during the sudden commotion, only to be riddled with bullets as they clambered over the wooden palisade, or sallied out of the makeshift gate.
But there were so many men. More than the hordes of 'walkers' Rick faced, more than Negan's seemingly endless armies, more than the Mountain's host which was so effortlessly demolished near Darry. And the Westermen kept coming, wave after wave, swordsmen and spearmen treading over the bodies of their fallen brothers-at-arms. For every one that fell or fled, three more took his place.
Then, from behind the camps, the Lannister cavalry charged.
Steel horseshoes thundered on the grassy plains as hundreds of horses galloped towards the Alexandrian lines, a loose wedge formation threatening to impale all in its path. Horse after horse fell, and riders abruptly tumbled off their steeds, yet even the Alexandrian rifles' buzz-buzz-buzz, wavering after minutes of combat, were unable to completely silence their foes. And the Alexandrian formation parted, men and women scrambling out of the horses' way as the now shrunken wedge raced towards their newfound opening to freedom.
Rick turned towards his horsemen, face grey as ash. "What are you waiting for?"
The Westermen's steeds were swift, but the Alexandrian cavalry's bullets were swifter, and Rick's horsemen were rested, freshly provisioned, and above all not surprised by this sudden onslaught.
"I yield, I yield!" the enemy captain shouted as he dismounted and threw down his sword, the remaining half of his knights following his lead. Even that hot-blooded man finally realised that going up against the Starks' new allies was a fool's errand.
"Your name?"
"Ser Daven Lannister," the shaggy-haired captain answered. "Here to deal with the remaining traitors who stand against the Iron Throne."
"But here you are. Defeated by people who swore no oath to whatever throne you guys have over there."
"That is true, aye, and Lord Tywin will pay good coin for my safe return. But your knees will bend, whoever you are. Bend, or be broken."
"You already know that isn't gonna happen. But do excuse me. I still have a battle to fight." Rick waved his hand. Two well-built Alexandrians escorted the hapless captain away.
As the Alexandrian horsemen swarmed around their Westermen counterparts, Rick's binoculars were once again pointed towards the happenings near Riverrun. Dwight's lines were now closing in, mercilessly scything down all those who still harbored delusions of escape. Unlike their Frey allies to the north, none of Ser Daven's Westermen would flee from Riverrun's environs today. Alexandria's guns were now trained upon the Tumblestone and its rafts, faint circles of red beginning to spread all over the river.
"What's the meaning of this?" Rick leapt off his horse before he even reached Dwight, grimacing as he limped towards his second-in-command.
"You need to stop jumping off horses. Don't tell me you want your other leg busted too," Dwight retorted.
Unfazed, Rick pointed at the small flimsy rafts. "Cut out your bullshit. Why are our men still firing on them?"
"They are escaping, not surrendering. We don't need them to come back another day."
Rick's hand brushed against his revolver holster. "Don't make me ask you again."
"Fine." "Save your bullets!" Dwight hollered. "For fuck's sake! Bullets don't grow on trees!" Several more crisp shots later, the Alexandrian lines fell silent.
"How did we do?" Rick asked. "Did we lose anyone? And how about the Brave Companions?"
"No. But quite a few were hurt fleeing from that cavalry charge, cuts and scrapes and all that. We'll need two stretchers, two of our guys got bone fractures. The Brave Companions though… they lost nearly fifty men, and most of them are injured. Some of those who're badly wounded won't last much longer."
Rick gently shook his head. The Brave Companions could certainly be trouble down the line, especially after that little spat near Castle Darry. But they had been useful guides, had shared stories around the campfire, and now half of them were dead and the other half injured. "What about the Goat?"
"He was knocked out during the battle, but he'll live," Dwight replied.
"Our ammo?"
Dwight's hands fidgeted near his ammunition pouch. "I haven't counted yet, but there we don't have much ammunition left. Some of our men have already run out. I got about thirty bullets myself. We can fight one more battle before refilling at Alexandria. Any more, and we're fucked."
Rick let out a garbled cry. Every night on the way to Riverrun, the various commanders squabbled for hours as to whether they would next march west and occupy the Golden Tooth, or north to chastise House Frey at The Twins, but now the issue was rendered completely moot. "Don't let the natives know," Rick ordered. "Any good news?"
"The Brave Companions found Edmure Tully in the Frey camp. There - the Tullys are probably gonna bring him back into the castle now."
Riverrun's riverside portcullis slowly rose and several trout-headed boats emerged into the open water. The hostages and injured were ferried in first, followed by the Brave Companions, and then the Alexandrians. On the open fields, Lannister and Frey prisoners collected scattered gear and dug graves under the watchful eye of Tully men, who were in turn ferried out from the confines of their fortress.
The moated castle was no Harrenhal, Rick noted as he and Dwight took the last boat in. But Riverrun was still big enough, and better maintained, with plenty of space for the Alexandrians to rest comfortably in the godswood. "The Tullys send bread and salt, m'lords," a trout-helmed soldier arrived with a tray of much-needed nourishment. "But he bids you wait for a while. There is much healing to do, and the Great Hall needs to be prepared for tonight's feast."
"Talk to the Tullys if you can," Rick instructed Dwight. I'll check on our own wounded before the next feast." Rick looked around to make sure none of Tully's men were nearby. "Why do they feast all the time? That amount of food could be used to feed at least thrice as many people."
Rick and his companions entered Riverrun's Great Hall several hours later. "Lord Rickard Grimes," a voice boomed. "You are in the presence of Edmure Tully, Lord of Riverrun, and Ser Brynden Tully the 'Blackfish', Castellan of Riverrun."
A burly noble stood up with wine glass in hand, auburn hair matched by his fiery beard and his red doublet embroidered with silver trout. "To the Young Wolf that was. He was barely more than a pup, but a good king nevertheless. And to our next King or Queen, whoever he or she may be."
All around the hall, hundreds of men raised their glasses in silence.
"And to Lord Rickard Grimes. They say you are the lord whose people come from another world, even further than Asshai-in-the-East, whose weapons that can throw darts several leagues away. Others say you come from beyond the Sunset Sea, from a land where the dead rise to eat the living. But to us, you are the lord who relieved Riverrun at its hour of need, and for that you have our unwavering gratitude. A toast from the Lord of Riverrun, to the health of Lord Rickard Grimes of Alexandria!"
The glasses were raised again in unison, this time accompanied by cheers. "Grimes! Grimes!" the Tully men shouted, as Rick walked down the Great Hall.
Rick was seated at the table on the dais. The old knight, face weathered but steely, began making small talk as similarly small tarts were served. "My uncle the Blackfish," Lord Edmure whispered.
"A splendid performance, Lord Rickard, and the strength of your arms cannot be doubted. But few of your men wear any armor at all," the Blackfish observed.
"Most of our soldiers don't wear armor," Rick insisted. "What we do have, we save for our horsemen. Wearing armor will also give our soldiers a false sense of protection and encourage them to take unnecessary risks. Our guns outrange our foes' swords and bows. That's all the protection we need."
The Westerosi were barely able to conceal their mirth. "Did your men wear armor when facing your 'walkers'?" Ser Brynden asked.
"No," Rick answered. "And why should we? We have yet to see any evidence that armor actually helps - much effort, and for little reward. Armor takes effort and skill to maintain, and it's far too easily to do it badly."
The rest of the table erupted in roaring laughter.
Edmure raised his eyebrow. "Not even a gambeson?"
"If Lord Rickard were not well versed in strategy, we would not be feasting at Riverrun right now. Who," the Blackfish's voice boomed, "WHO are we to mock those who saved us? Rickard Grimes, your presence in Riverrun is more than welcome. Yet I hear you also hold Harrenhal, and last I heard you were no bannerman of the late King of the Trident."
Rick set down his glass of wine. "My men do hold Harrenhal, and we are not subjects of kings. All of us are equal. I lead my people because they respect and look up to me, not because of who my father was."
"And yet your son Carl will rule after you," the Blackfish pointed out.
"No." Rick picked at one of the tarts. "I've just said that I don't lead because of who my father was. Any future leaders will be the same."
"Then how will the next Lord of Alexandria be chosen?" Edmure asked.
"Whoever leads your peoples," the Blackfish elaborated when Rick struggled to come up with words in reply.
"I don't know," Rick finally answered. "I might choose. Or the leaders of each community gather to choose the next one. Or someone just happens to take up my place if anything happens to me. Or perhaps we vote, I don't know."
"Ah, just like the wildlings. A proposal then," the Blackfish offered. "Riverrun's swords shall be yours in the battles to come. When this war is over, your son Carl Grimes shall wed my niece Sansa Stark. Your line through Carl shall be King in the North and of the Trident, and receive the lands of Harrenhal and overlordship of Maidenpool. The lands east of the God's Eye and south of where Whitewalls once stood are yours, should you be able to take them, and ruled however you wish."
Rick pondered the Blackfish's proposal as the main course, an almond-crusted pike, was served. More Arbor gold, Edmure shouted as he rang the servants' bell.
"I will consider this offer. Though Harrenhal is already ours, Ser Brynden, and the Lannisters won't take it no matter how many people they send. You offer lands that you do not hold, and claim to be leader over people who haven't chosen you..."
"We can talk about lands and castles later. But what of the betrothal?" the Blackfish asked.
On one hand, the fate of the Alexandrians. And on the other, Carl's future. There were enough bullets for a few more battles in Alexandria, but Eugene's factory could only produce so many at a time, and the bullets' primers were an ever dwindling stock. Securing an alliance with the Northmen would do much to alleviate at least some of the resource shortages that still plagued Alexandria, but… it seemed wrong. How could he do this to Carl?
These were hard times, and hard times made hard men, Rick told himself. This pragmatic decision would have to be made sooner or later, and such a golden opportunity may not come up again. "Carl will marry your Northern princess when we get her back. But they must live in Alexandria, at least until Carl is old enough to make his own choices. Making him marry someone he hasn't even met is already hard enough as it is. I will not send my son to live in a frozen pile of rocks a few hundred miles away."
"That can be done," Brynden replied. "Catelyn said Sansa always preferred the South. And a castellan can be sent to rule Winterfell. It should not take too long for them to have their own heir-"
"And they will not be married right away. I do not want my children to be having their own children anytime soon." Rick's face turned beet red. "Engaged, yes, but they will not be married, or sleeping together until Carl turns eighteen."
"Eighteen? Your son will be a man grown for two years! And Sansa will be twenty, long after her flowering. The North and the Trident shall not wait six more years for an heir, my lord. Six years where this marriage can be annulled. The two are to be betrothed, and shall wed on Carl's sixteenth nameday. They will then share a bed if they so wish. This is my offer, Lord Grimes. Take it or leave it. Your people may have your weapons, and we are grateful for your aid in this dark hour. But you know little of these lands, and one day you may need our help as much as we need yours."
"We'd have to first get Sansa back anyway before we can discuss this any further. I'll sign, but then I'll keep this scrap of parchment. If things go the way they're supposed to, you will have it back, and we shall see to it that Carl and Sansa are engaged."
This would have to serve for now. The Alexandrians needed time, and manpower, to build the better world Rick wanted. He and Lori married for love, despite that love fading as the excitement of romance soon gave way to the mundaneness of married life, and even the birth of their son only delayed the drifting of their marriage by a few short years. But poor Carl would not even have the chance. There will be much grumbling back home, of course, but Carl would surely honor the deal and do what's best for Alexandria.
Ignoring the large bowls of fresh fruit for dessert, Rick picked up his pen and signed the hastily drafted parchment.