Hello again. I will try to keep updating the story on a regular basis, but right now i am studying for my final exams, so i cannot guarantee anything. I hope you enjoy the chapter.

Chapter 4 - Confusion and Terror

Third person Robb

"That wasn't real." was the first clear thought in Robb's head while he was walking out of the forest. "This is insanity" he thought. "Just as I was losing the war, a man that could change everything appeared." It was ridiculous, insane, that this completely unknown stranger appeared out of nowhere, and lay claim the iron throne. Truly laughable, except this man wielded a being powerful enough to bring a continent to its knees.

Robb had never seen a dragon before but that beast seemed far greater than he ever imagined anything could be, even a dragon. He paused for a second to entertain another idea.

Maybe this was all a trick. Maybe the sorcerer had cast a spell on him, making him see things. Maybe there was no dragon. The dragon had appeared out of nowhere. Wait, that wasn't true. The weird shadow behind him had been there before he walked into the clearing. No. He could not take the risk of assuming it was fake, he would trust what he saw. He shuttered at the thought of the dragon releasing its might upon his people. "No matter what I do, I must prevent that at all cost. Even if I have to sacrifice everything else, I will not let it happen." Thoughts on what to do was racing in his mind, while he approached the edge of the forest.

As he cleared the trees, the sight of a redheaded figure greeted him, "I had forgotten about mother" he thought to himself. "Robb!" she exclaimed, with a worried expression on her face. She looked at him for moment in relief before regaining her composure and asking; "So, did you gain anything from this little adventure of yours?" she asked. Robb merely looked at her and nodded absentmindedly.

This upset the older woman, "Are you alright? Did something happen to you? What happened in there?" a barrage of questions assaulted him. Robb regained his senses before answering "I am fine. Nothing happened to me, but it seems everything we planned must change."

"Why? Did you meet the person who left the message?"

"Aye. I met him." Robb answered in a monotone voice as he started walking towards the castle.

"What did he say? Can he help us? Please Robb you have to stop and tell me!"

Robb stopped and looked back at her, "He can certainly help us. But I fear it will come at a price. It doesn't matter though. We have no choice."

"What do you mean? Is he forcing you to do this? And what price are we going to pay?" Answered his mother in a rather upset tone.

Robb sighed and said "He isn't forcing us to do anything, in fact, we should thank the gods. It is very lucky he came to us first. It doesn't matter anyway, we don't have a choice."

This only upset his mother more and she ran up and grabbed his arm, forcing him to finally look her in the eyes.

She had composed herself now because all the distress in her expression was replaced with seriousness.

"Robb! Why don't we have a choice?" She said each word slowly, whilst gripping his arm even further, locking his gaze with hers.

Robb looked dejected, but he answered: "Because. Even if we decline, he will surely just take this offer to the Tyrells, or the Lannister's or anyone else with an army. If my own eyes didn't deceive me, then we don't have to worry about the wars to come any longer. As for the price..." After a long pause the former king answered, "That would be my crown."

The rest of the night Robbs mother barraged him with question after question on what he happened and why he was no longer a king, but Robb remained steadfast. No matter what, he would not risk the wrath of the man in that forest. If he wanted his dragon to remain a secret, then Robb was going to make damn sure it would be so.

Just as he was preparing to finally join his wife in bed, a commotion sounded outside his door and several guards entered his room. "Your grace please come with us". Without bothering to question why, Robb followed.

They lead him into one of the larger rooms in the castle. At the center of the room, two boys were lain atop a leather skin. Dead. "The Lannister boys" realized Robb as he shifted his gaze in confusion to the guards.

One of them cleared his throat and spoke "Your grace. 15 minutes ago, a group of men lead by lord Karstark broke into the prison cells and killed the two Lannister prisoners. We have them detained outside."

Completely overwhelmed by all that had happened today, Robb sighed and spoke "Bring them ind".

Lord Karstark and 4 other men were hauled into the room. As Robb saw the men entering the room a feeling of disgust welled up inside him, "It took 5 of you to murder two unarmed boys?"

The proud Rickard Karstark straightened his back and answered, "Not murder, your grace. Justice."

Robb didn't answer. He just stared at Rickard for a while before answering dispirited. "Lord Karstark. Any other day, but today I would have executed you for murder. But not today." Robb shifted so that he was addressing the entire room.

"All of you. Make sure to get a message to the remaining northen lords. Tomorrow, we assemble at dawn for a war counsel. We are marching as soon as possible. Let lord Karstark go. I will pardon his crimes for today. As for the future. Well, I suspect that will depend on your performance in the war, but I make no guaranties."

With that, before any of the people in the room had a chance to express their shock, Robb grabbed Talisa and left out the door. As he was walking up the stairs to his room, he could hear hurried footsteps pursuing behind him. A shout sounded "Robb!". He didn't turn as he answered "Mother."

"What is wrong with you Robb? What is happening? Please tell me, I beg of you!" You could see panic in lady Starks eyes as she was addressing her son. He didn't blame her. Yesterday he would have never shown a weak resolve like that, he would have never just pardoned a murder. No matter who was victim, no matter who was the murderer.

As she opened her mouth to speak again, Robb interrupted with the resolve of his usual self, "Mother. I am doing what is right." and then he kept walking. His mother stood behind, worry marring her worn but still beautiful features. But Robb didn't see. He didn't even look back once, for his head was muddled with concern for the meeting tomorrow.

To move an army was easier said than done. It was a huge task to break camp and for twenty thousand men to get in line and start marching on. It took almost two days before the whole army was ready, and the fact that the soldiers were terrified of what was to come, didn't help much either. Every single one of his 20.000 men knew that they were walking up the king's road, which meant they were walking towards a better equipped and several times larger army.

Robb could almost smile at the thought of how confused Tywin Lannister must be. Soon he would learn of the troop movements and wonder what was really going on, for a capable commander such as Robb, would surely never make such a suicidal move.

"He must have been expecting us to make use of the twins again" Robb thought, and they would have, had everything not changed. But in the end Robb knew that Tywin really didn't have a choice in the matter. Unless he wanted him to walk straight into kings landing then he would have to block him, though that should prove rather easy considering the difference in military strength.

Days passed as they marched. Every day the lords would come and express their concerns for his course of action, and everyday Robb would dismiss them. He had not heard from the sorcerer since that night in the village. He was even considering the possibility that he was a conjurer hired by Tywin to cost him the war. But he had decided to trust himself and trust his senses.

After another 3 days of marching the scouts finally came back with a report on the Lannister army. It seemed to be in full force and was marching straight towards them. Robb immediately assembled the other lords for an emergency counsel.

It took quite a bit of convincing and quite a bit of reminding everyone who was king, but Robb succeeded. It didn't help either, that Robb insisted on having the lords tell their men, that no matter what happened, unless a retreat was sounded, they were not to move from their position. They had chosen an open field 3 miles from their position. The field tilted slightly to their advantage but most importantly, the fight would take place far from the tree line, as was instructed. This hardly gave them a significant advantage though, but it meant Robb was absolutely sure that Tywin would meet him there.

After a few hours of marching, the army reached the designated battlefield. The northern lords did what they could with the terrain. They started organizing the men in the best way possible.

For the first time in a week, Robb started acting like himself. Confidently and intelligently dictating the various positions and functions of the different military units. But it was quite clear to every one of the men in the command tent, that no matter how good they placed the archers and no matter how effectively they used the cavalry, this was a lost cause. 70.000 was just a much bigger number than 20.000. Still. It didn't matter because it was too late to change anything now. All Robb could do was hope.

Shortly after the various delegations were in position, a panicking scout was racing across the field on his horse. 20 minutes later, the Lannister army could be seen coming out of the trees in full force.

It was a large field. Large enough to easily hold the almost 100.000 men that was currently standing on it. The sky was cloudy but it didn't look like it was about to rain. The two armies where standing motionlessly, starring at each other. Suddenly a horn sounded from the Lannister side. It was tradition that in planned battles like this, the commanders would meet each other before hand, but it seemed like Tywin thought that a waste of time. After the horn sounded, the Lannister infantry started marching.

"Reasonable" Robb thought. The warden of the west must have assumed that assassinating him might have been the reason for this suicidal course. Lord Umber signaled that it was time to launch the attack but Robb dismissed his request. He would wait. If a dragon suddenly appeared in the sky then he would want his men as far away from that as possible. If not, then he would signal for an organized retreat, consequences be dammed.

The even sound of trained Lannister marching was the only thing, that could be heard in the beginning. Then slowly a sound of shaking armor, light sobbing and the occasional whelp could be heard. The air was thick with fear as the seemingly endless wave of red armored men where drawing closer and closer.

Soon they were within arrow distance and the Lannister archers nooked and drew their bows, ready to fire. The northen lords gave Robb almost pleading looks as they were desperate for him to call for action, but he didn't move. Their archers didn't draw but for some reason the Lannister archers didn't fire either.

Robb could see Lord Tywin on his horse in the back, his arm raised above his head. Should he drop it, a wall of arrows would be unleashed by the Lannister army, but he hesitated. Robb could not make out his face but his confusion was evident. This simply made no sense.

It didn't seem real. Like something was wrong. The northern lords had completely stopped trying to figure out what was going on. He could hear the lords discussing the strange situation in low voices "It could be that Robb had made a deal Tywin. If he released no arrows then Tywin would not either? That would surely favor the northern side."

The confusion was spreading to the men as well, both northerners and Lannister men alike. Despite the confusion though they continued marching forward at an even pace.

Before long the Lannister army were less than 25 meters away and Robb was moments away from sounding the retreat but then suddenly, every man in the field looked to the sky.

Something that could only be described as the sound of destruction itself, ripped through the air.

Everything froze. The Lannister army stopped marching, the northmen stopped shaking. Everyone just looked at the sky towards where that horrible sound had come from. Then the source of the noise revealed itself.

Above the northern army, out of cloud cover burst out an enormous, black dragon. As it became visible it let out another roar and this time, people reacted. Many of the northmen panicked and started deserting their post, but most of them just stood frozen in place, as they could tell the dragon wasn't headed for them.

The Lanniser army was a different story. They screamed and dropped their shields and weapons just to run faster, but it didn't matter. There was way too many soldiers crammed together, and people were falling over each other, blocking the way. Then it happened.

The great dragon opened its mouth and out poured an enormous pillar of flames. The pillar hit the ground, and the flames spread like a tsunami to all sides. It was almost too bright to look directly at it. The flames spread outwards and swallowed everything up. The sound of the flames hitting the earth was like reality itself being ripped apart while the ground violently shook around them.

Hundreds died every few seconds and the flames kept pouring out of the beast. It was like an image from hell. Everywhere he looked Lannister men were burning or screaming though he could not hear anything, for the sound of the flames crashing into the ground was so loud, everything else was drowned out. A massive crater could be traced in the ground wherever the fire had hit.

Luckily the flames stopped after a few minutes and the beast landed instead, somewhere behind the Lannister lines. Then the sound of screams finally penetrated the air. The Lannister forces where running everywhere to get away from the fire. A large chunk of them had even run to the northern army and Robb started screaming for his Lords to attack. They looked at him in a daze as if they could not comprehend what had happened. Pure desperation gripped Robb as he shouted with everything he had "ATTACK! DO YOU WANT IT TO TURN TO US!?"

This seemed to have woken the northern lords from their stupor. They started relaying the message to their surrounding officers, and soon the northen army started killing Lannister soldiers like they were plagued men trying to infect them.

They didn't even have to move as there was a steady stream of them running from the flames towards them constantly. Any resemblance of sympathy or pity was gone. The only thing left was fear. Right now they would do anything it took to keep that beast away.