Chapter 42; Our wars rage;

Characters of the chapter

Brandon Stark, also known as the Three Eyed Raven, mage advisor to the court of King Jon

Gerald, Soldier in the Orlesian Imperial Navy

Jeremy Maester of Bear Island

Jocelyn Soldier of the Orlesian Empire

Kieran, Agent of the Inquisition, mage advisor to the court of King Jon

Lyanna Mormont, Lady of Bear Island

Nicolas Soldier of the Orlesian Empire

Ser Caleb Threestones, Knight of Westeros,Second to Lyanna Mormont

Cursive/Bold text is in Orlesian

At Winterfell…

"Are you sure you wish to keep on doing this?" Kieran asked, concerned.

"I must. The others require all the aid that can be given them." Bran answered, seated in his wheelchair.

"Its killing you, My Lord." Kieran protested.

"It is not I that does the dying." Bran countered, his voice even as always.

"And yet you feel it each time. How many times can one person die and still remain sane?" Kieran said.

"My body remains unharmed, and my mind is more resilient than you believe. I appreciate your concern my friend, but I will be fine." Bran said.

"Go now. You have tasks of you own to accomplish in this battle." He added, not interested in hearing any more arguments. Kieran paused, then gave a bow of his head and left Bran's rooms. Bran closed his eyes and began to concentrate. His mind departed his body, moving beyond Winterfell, past the Orlesian encampment and into the woods nearby. It took some time, but eventually he managed to locate something suitable for his purposes. A wolf this time. It was part of a pack, a pack of hundreds of wolves strong. Bran was fully aware which pack this was, but that did not deter him. This had to be.

The wolf trembled as he moved into the creature's mind, its eyes rolling over for a few seconds. The wolf fought back as it sensed the intrusion into its mind, but was soon overcome by Bran's superior will. As he took control his senses changed to those of the wolf. The other members of the pack moved away and snarled at him, sensing the change within their fellow wolf. This included the female wolf the size of a horse, the leader of the pack. Bran directed the wolf he was inside to flee before the pack would decide to attack, disappearing into the night. He needed this wolf alive, for now at least.

"Forgive me Nymeria. I have stolen from your pack. I have wronged you, and not for the first time either. If my need was not dire this crime would have been left uncommitted. I would make this up to you, but what service can the race of men provide that is of value to wolves, other than the promise to leave them in peace? Alas, I require strong beasts to aid in the defense of Winterfell, and your pack has many." Bran thought as he sped through the forest in the body of the wolf.

Several times already he had taken over a wolf from this pack as it had fortunately happened to be wandering close enough to Winterfell for his purposes. This would not last. The pack had had enough. Unwilling to lose more of their number to this plague that Bran had become to them, they had begun to move away from Winterfell, to new places to hunt in. There was no upper limit to his ability to take over the minds of creatures, of course, but the further away the pack got the longer it took to bring the wolf back to where he needed it. And right now time was of the essence. So he would leave the pack be from now on and use other creatures in their stead. Surely such creatures could be found, given enough effort.

The trees began to thin as he approached the edge of the forest. Between the trunks the lights of the Orlesian encampment could be seen in the distance. The mind of the wolf recoiled at this. It could smell and hear what resided here. A vast, monstrous pack of humans lingered here, with their hardskins, their sharp metal claws, their fires. This was no place for a wolf to be, especially a wolf alone. The wolf could sense Bran's intentions and like any sane living thing would it resisted, struggling twice as hard as before. But Bran smashed aside the wolf's will with ease, forcing its consciousness to the background, then advanced towards the Imperial encampment, leaving the woods behind.

He moved forward cautiously, avoiding spots of light created by torches and the eyes of the Imperial sentries. No reason to give himself away just yet. The barricade the Orlesians had raised around their encampment did give him some pause. But the thing was not fully complete yet, and soon he was able to find his way inside the camp through one of the unfinished sections. He sneaked between the tents, avoiding patrols until he came across two soldiers out of their armor, looking to be dicing.

"There. Those two would make for a good start in today's efforts." He thought. Without so much as a pause he darted forward and jumped at the closest one, closing his jaws around his throat, tasting blood. The other soldier screamed and jumped to his feet, trying to flee, his weapon nowhere in sight. Before he could Bran closed the gap between them and bit the soldier's ankle, dragging him to the ground. In a heartbeat Bran walked on the back of the soldier and broke his opponent's neck. With both of his foes dead Bran could hear running steps, people alerted to the noise. He fled from them, moving quickly between the tents as before. It was not long before he came across another soldier, this one in full armor, carrying a torch. The soldier roared at him, waving her torch. Such a display would have likely driven away a normal wolf, but this was not what she was dealing with. Instead Bran ignored the torch charged once again, Knocking the Orlesian to the ground. He tried to bite at whatever parts of her that were not covered in metal armor, but the soldier managed to catch hold of the wolf's face, his jaws gnashing only inches away from her belly. He was then interrupted by a sharp feeling of pain across his back. Turning around he saw that another soldier had managed to catch up, his sword drawn and coated in blood. Bran growled at the man and thought to attack him, but the wound he had sustained was more severe than he had realized. He managed to do little more than stumble forward, almost falling over from the effort. The enemy soldier stepped forth put the sword through the wolf's body and twisted. Collapsing to the ground, Bran felt an icy coldness spreading from where the sword had pierced him, all the strength from the body he was occupying disappearing. Then an impenetrable darkness swallowed him as the world retreated from his senses…

He snapped back into awareness with a loud gasp, the walls of his room around him once again. He took several shuddering breaths, his brow coated in cold sweat.

"That is never going to get any more pleasant, no matter how many times I do it. But why should death feel pleasant, particularly one inflicted through violence?" He thought.

"Two kills. Not a bad result but it could still be better." He pondered. Now that Nymeria's pack was no longer an option, he would have to think on what animal he could warg into next. If he looked hard enough perhaps the would find a bear. That would allow much more damage to be done to the enemy. Even if not, hopefully there would be a sufficiently potent creature for him to use close by. That was a necessary component of his efforts. Briefly he considered if he should try to warg directly into the enemy soldiers. As the Three Eyed Raven he could most likely win the contest of wills that would result from such an attempt. Humans were resourceful and had access to a broad variety of usable tools. And since he would be using their own numbers against them he wouldn't have to worry about running out of candidates to warg into. But almost as soon as the thought occurred to him he rejected it, chiding himself for even considering it. The morality of forcibly taking over the body of an animal to use it as a weapon was already an act that was questionable at best. Doing the same to a creature as capable of reasoning as people were would be utterly abhorrent. Such a thing had been forbidden since the first Three Eyed Ravens among the Children of the forest. And given what he had inadvertently done to Hodor he understood full well why such a thing was wrong. There was no justification for doing that. Even the death of everyone in this castle, including him, was a better alternative than resorting to that.

Then another possibility occurred to him: Their horses. The enemy had brought many with them. Horses were big, powerful animals, particularly the ones that had been bred for use in war. Powerful enough to potentially kill a human. Horses weren't naturally very aggressive, but if their bodies were to be used by him to attack the enemy… something to consider. He wanted to try to find a bear first though. With that thought he departed his body once again, in search of another target to warg into. He intended to make many more assaults on the Orlesians before the night was done. During daytime it would be almost impossible to sneak into the camp without being spotted and killed, so then he would have to relent and use the downtime to recover his strength. But that was one more reason to consider using horses, since they were already inside the camp. That way he would have a chance of causing chaos and disruption among the Imperials even as they were seeking to assault the defenses of Winterfell. Yes, the more he thought about it the more he liked the idea…

He did not look forward to feeling himself dying again, but such was the sacrifice that was required of him. He was hardly the only one who had to sacrifice in this battle, even if his contribution was rather more unusual than that of most. In some ways others were sacrificing more than he was, for other defenders of Winterfell were dying in truth, without ever having a chance to experience life again. If there was any way he could lessen that pain for them, he would do so gladly, even if it meant discomfort for him.

At White Harbor…

"Make ready to disembark!" Gerald shouted as they boat neared their target. Before them was the Harbor of the city they were to take. Around them other boats were advancing as well. Overhead rocks and balls of fire were flying, hammering the city mercilessly.

Along the way they had to negotiate their way past half sunken wrecks, left there from their first attempt to storm this place. In their first attack they had managed to take out the chain blocking access to the port, allowing the imperial warships to break through. The remaining ships of House Manderly had been eradicated next, their capture already deemed unnecessary. They had been so confident back then, sinking the enemy ships one by one through artillery, ramming, or boarding and setting them ablaze. But then their assault had carried on to the city itself, and the Orlesians had realized they had entered a quagmire of defenses manned by determined northerner soldiers. After a long, bitter battle that left a lot of people dead on both sides the Orlesian assault had been thrown back. Today was their second attempt to take the city, and this time they knew what kind of nightmare they were about to enter.

As they paddled furiously onwards a boat just near his own came under concentrated arrow fire, the passengers slain in a matter of moments. In his boat Jocelyn made her best guess as to where the arrows were coming from and sent an arrow flying there. A number of archers on the other boats did the same. But under these conditions it was not possible for them to organize volley fire and they had no idea what they were shooting at. Gerald rather doubted any of those arrows would hit anything useful. Moments later a rock propelled by a hidden trebuchet smashed asunder another boat, leaving its surviving passengers splashing in the water.

Moments later their boat finally got to where they were going.

"Out! Out! Everybody ashore!" Gerald shouted, drawing his sword as the troops carried by the boat spilled to one of the many wharfs of this ports city. His squad moved forward quickly, nearing the edge of the city proper, followed closely by other imperial soldiers that had made it ashore. While fire continued to hammer away at the boats still approaching, so far no enemy soldiers were challenging those that had already reached solid ground.

Gerald cursed as another rock hit the water, lifting up a small geyser. "Come on, we need to find those stone throwers and take them out, clear the way for the rest of our forces." He told the rest of his troops. Cautiously the Imperials made their way into the city, numbering around thirty soldiers. Strangely there still were no enemy troops in sight. Gerald could not shake the feeling that they were being allowed to advance this far.

As they rounded a street corner a window on one of the buildings creaked open a fraction. Gerald turned his head at the noise, but before he had a chance to say or do anything a crossbow bolt flew through the air and impaled one of his soldiers through the back of his head.

"Fuck!" Gerald cursed. "There! In the windows! Shoot! Shoot!" He shouted, pointing. The archers among the Orlesians responded, but the window closed again, and the arrows only struck the wooden shutters.

"Damn these people. They fight us like animals!" Jocelyn cursed, kneeling beside the dead man.

"You there! Get in there and clear that building! Burn them out if you have to! The rest of us will move forward." Gerald told the nearest five of his soldiers. The rest of the Orlesians were about to set off again when they were stopped by sounds of shouting and running coming from further away.

"Here they come!" Jocelyn shouted. She took aim and dropped the first enemy to round the corner. More Manderly soldiers streamed in after him, their white and turquoise shields displaying the merman of their House. A quick estimation told Gerald that there were more enemies than there were Orlesians.

"Attack them! Stand together!" Gereld nonetheless shouted, drawing his sword and charging. He managed to knock aside the sword of the first man he attacked, then hacked off his opponents hand at the wrist. One stab though the enemy's flank and his opponent was no more. He turned around and plunged his sword through the back of a northerner engaging one of his soldier. He was looking for his next opponent as a runner came to him, shouting all the while:

"Ser, ser! Thank the Maker I found you! More enemy troops attacking our forces in the port! Your troops are needed back to reinforce us!"

"But… the stone throwers! We could still get to them!" Gerald tried to protest.

"No! Too many enemies in between! They'll stop you before you ever reach them! Stay here and you will be cut off and massacred! We need to regroup and gather up our numbers so we have a chance of punching through! Those are your orders!" The runner said.

"I need to head back. You are needed, so get a move on!" He said, then ran off in the direction he had come from.

"Damn!" Gerald cursed. He knew getting this far had been too easy.

"Alright, change of plans people! A fighting retreat back to the docks! Fall back by squads!" He shouted to his soldiers. He helped his troops fight the enemy off as one squad at a time the Orlesians retreated towards the docks. More enemy archers were appearing in the widows, slaying a good dozen Orlesians as they fled. It was obvious now that this had been a trap all along. The enemy had wanted them to come this far inside the city so they could destroy them while they were separated from the rest of their forces. It was Gerald's job now to ensure no more of his troops would fall to this trickery.

When his unit reached the docks again they were met with a devastating sight. There were hundreds of enemy soldiers in the port now. With their own troops still on their way the Orlesian forces were off balance, struggling to keep the footholds they had in the docks. Gerald's people moved in and did what they could to aid in their side in the battle, but it soon became obvious that the battle was going poorly for the Imperials. A wharf was overrun by Manderly soldiers, then another. Gerald realized that the position his troops were defending was now the only Orlesian pocket of resistance in the city. Furthermore no more reinforcements were arriving. Instead the Orlesian boats were turning around and heading back to the fleet. They had given up on the battle it seemed. And without them there was no way for them to win this battle.

"Fall back! Back to the boats!" He shouted, realizing that the battle was lost. To their credit his people did not panic at the order or the now crushing numerical superiority of the enemy. Instead they covered each other's retreat as best they could as they evacuated to the boats one at a time. Soon it was only the squad he had arrived with that was on the wharf, a veritable horde of Manderly troops converging on their position. Their boat was still where they had left.

"Go! Get to the boat!" He shouted as he cut a diagonal line across the chest of the nearest enemy. He and his squad turned around and ran to the boat, the enemy right at their heel. He was just about to enter the boat after his squad when a Manderly fighter reached them. Gerald was able to see him coming just in time, block his attack and put his sword through his middle. But more were coming, some of them carrying him bows. He realized then that his squad would never make it out of here alive. The enemy archers would butcher them all in their boat. Unless...

"I'll hold them off, give you some time. Get yourselves out of range as quickly as you can!" He said, making a quick decision.

"Wait, what?" Jocelyn said.

"Go!" He said, and charged towards the enemy before anyone had a chance to protest. The enemy had not anticipated him to attack them all on his own. That worked to his advantage as he charged past the Manderly soldiers, hastily parrying the blows they tried to land on him as he passed them by, making his way to the archers gathering at the edge of the wharf.

His squad had departed, rowing furiously to reach open water. Now he just had to make sure they made it. He knew in his heart that his crew had been reluctant to leave him behind, but they knew that staying to wait for him would be certain doom for them. He had chosen to give his life to save theirs, and they respected him enough to make good on his sacrifice.

Apparently the fleet had also realized that their people were retreating, and had begun adjusting their supporting fire of their trebuchets to cover their retreat. Shots were now hammering the port, hitting the waterline and the buildings at the edge of town. Most of the Manderlys were unwilling to remain in the open with such a barrage, and were now fleeing to better cover inside the city. It appeared that the good admiral had his back, even if she did not know it. This barrage left only the ones that would refuse to leave and still were in a position to threaten his crew.

Just as one of the enemy archers drew his bow, taking aim at the boat he reached them. That one and another archer died before they could even react to him. The others turned their attention to him, most of them drawing swords. One trained his bow on him, only to get a blue feathered arrow through his throat. Turning his head to see where the arrow had come from, Gerald saw Jocelyn standing on the boat, sending arrow after arrow at the Manderly soldiers.

In his mind Gerald offered silent thanks to Jocelyn for her assistance, and fought on. Now that the enemy had their swords out his situation had shifted. He was quickly getting himself surrounded, the northerners converging on this last point of resistance in their city. Jocelyn's arrows were throwing a wrench in the efforts of the enemy though, dropping many of those who were careless enough to forget about them and giving Gerald some room to maneuver. He kept his attention focused on those of the enemy who carried bows while trying to stay away from the rest, although moment by moment this was getting harder. Most of the time he was desperately parrying the blows the enemy were trying to land on him, but now and then he managed to sneak an attack of his own. Most of those were successfully blocked by the enemy soldiers, but not all of them. With one such attack he buried his sword in the skull of a Manderly soldier. But in that brief moment when his sword was buried in the soldier's skull another one moved past his comrade and stabbed Gerald, sinking his blade in the Orlesian man up to its hilt.

Gerald wheezed, tasting blood in his mouth. Fighting through the pain he freed his sword and put it through the body of his killer. Then a throng of Manderly's were on him at once, taking hold of his arms and piercing his body repeatedly. A flaming jar impacted the ground nearby moments later, scaring away the northerners. His body riddled with wounds, Gerald fell to the ground. With his last strength he raised his head, seeing that he had succeeded. His efforts had bought just enough time for his crew to get to safety. They would live to fight another day.

With that final thought his life left him, a smile on his lips as he died there, so far from his home.

In the marshlands of the Neck…

Nicolas waited patiently, motionlessly, letting the fog of the marsh conceal him from the enemy. Seen from the road they were watching he and his fellows probably looked much like the low mounds of mud and grass so ubiquitous to this part of Westeros. They had been here the whole day, waiting for something worth their time to cross their path. Now it seemed their waiting had come to an end. Along the road twelve soldiers dressed in chainmail and partial plate, armed with spears and shields painted with the three headed dragon. They marched in good order, two abreast. Behind them came a wagon flanked by four more soldiers, then another twelve soldiers. Rank and file troops of the South Kingdom he figured. Supplies and reinforcements heading for the Queen. They would never get to their destination now though.

Keeping his movements slow so as to not be spotted, he placed an arrow on the string of his bow. He took aim at the wagon. His arrow was no ordinary arrow. As it struck home the side of the wagon exploded outwards, taking out the two closest soldiers. The wagon tilted to it's side as a wheel broke off. As the enemy reacted to the sudden commotion two more arrows exploded in their midst, killing several. After the explosions Nicolas and the others continued attacking with normal arrows. The enemy tried to group together and lock their shields to protect themselves from the arrows, but more began hitting them from the other side of the road, dividing their attentions. The driver of the wagon and two Targaryen soldiers tried to flee along the road, the rest broke formation, moving against one group of Orlesians or the other. As soon as they left the road the Targaryen advance slowed to a crawl, wading through knee high mud, their gear weighing them down. One by one they were picked off by arrows, not one of them reaching the Imperials. The ones that tried to run away fared little better, shot in the back.

The fight was over, having only lasted for a few bloody minutes. Nicolas smiled. This had been a rather good day's work for him and his squad. More than twice their number of enemies now lay dead, along with an entire wagonload of supplies. A minor achievement in the larger scheme of things of course, but it was all towards winning the war, and more than enough for now considering the small number of his team.

"Loot the wagon. Take anything of value small enough to be carried. Then burn it." He told his soldiers. The moved towards the wagon, but just as they made it to the road they were stopped by a roar coming from overhead. Filled with terror they turned their heads towards the sky, seeing a large shadow passing before the sun.

"The dragon! It has found us! Fall back! RUN! RUN AWAY!" He shouted as the creature dove into attack.

Before any of them could so much as move a muscle a column of fire swept down, engulfing them in flame.

At Bear Island…

Still half asleep Lyanna snuggled a bit closer to Caleb. Both of them were naked and in each other's arms, under the sheets in her tent. She was still asleep enough for thoughts to come slowly, but right now she was feeling very content. These quiet moment were the best part of her day. No fears, no worries, no life threatening battles. Just the two of them, in peace. She sought to continue sleeping but she stirred when she notice by sunlight coming through the flap of the tent. She sighed, then gently shook Caleb awake.

"Hi. It's morning. We ought to get up. We will be needed." She said to him.

Caleb sighed as well. "You know, kinda wish we didn't have to. Would be much nicer if we could just stay here the whole day."

She chuckled. "Right here, just cuddling? Well, cuddling when we weren't... As proposals go, that one is one of the more tempting ones. If only we could." She said, then leaned closer to kiss him.

"Maybe one day, when this is all over, we will get our chance. But for now, I think our war is not going to wait on anyone." She said when their lips parted again.

"Yeah. Unfortunately." Caleb said.

When they were dressed they exited the tent and sought out the Maester. Upon seeing the two of them approaching Jeremy bowed.

"My Lady, good morning to you. I have some news. I'm afraid they aren't very good though. The surviving scouts you sent to look for the camp where your people's children might have been kept returned to camp during the night.

"Surviving scouts?" She asked, already suspecting the worst.

"There… there was an incident. The scouts ran in to an enemy patrol on their way back. It was… a very difficult battle by all accounts." The Maester explained.

"H-how many made it back?" She asked.

"Two." The Maester said.

Lyanna covered her mouth with her hand, and sat down on a nearby stump. She had sent out ten.

"Have… have, uh, the scouts at least accomplished what we sent them out to do?" She asked.

"There was a camp at the location, but it had long since been abandoned. Whatever was there is gone. I am very sorry my lady." the Maester said.

She closed her eyes and bowed her head. That had been their best lead, the last one they had left. There was no denying it now. The children were lost to them. The promise she had made to her people could never be fulfilled.

Sensing that she wanted him to go, Jeremy bowed and departed. Caleb meanwhile moved to her side and placed a hand on her shoulder to console her.

"Eight. Eight more of us just… gone. For nothing, it turns out. Gods… I really had hoped Bern had been lying about this." She said.

"We all did." He said quietly.

She did not answer at once. "We are losing this fight Caleb. Little by little perhaps, but we are losing. The enemy is not running short on fresh bodies. We eventually will. The mainland meanwhile… they seem to have completely forgotten about us. They have their own war to fight, but it is not as if I want that much out of them. A single company of reinforcements. A platoon. A squad. Or just a few crates of supplies if that's all they can manage. Hell's, even a letter that says they are aware of the situation and are doing what they can about it would be enough. At least then we'd know they give a damn, or pretend to. But no. All we get from them is a damned silence." She said then, not hiding her bitterness.

"It's hard to say which would be worse. That they never got our messages, or that they have just abandoned us." He said in agreement. "But we have to keep the fight going. With or without reinforcements from the mainland."

"You're right. We have to. We don't have a way off the island, and surrendering means we get murdered or turned into lackeys of the Oxmen. But in the end we lack the means to fix this ourselves. And I'd rather not martyr myself to a people who didn't lift a finger to help us out. Nor do I want to ask that of my people." She said.

"Maybe you had a point earlier. Some bloody days it's just not worth getting up in the morning." She jested, making Caleb chuckle. Then she pinched the bridge of her nose.

"Look. Moping about isn't going to help matters. So let's be as positive as we can be about this, ok? Keep hoping for those reinforcements and make ourselves as productive as we can in the meantime?"

"Focus on the short term and let the rest sort itself out on its own? Can do." He said.

Lyanna smiled and nodded, then stood up. "Come on. We need to break the news to the others, then plan out where to put our focus next." She said with restored resolve.

She was not going to give up this fight. Not while she still had strength in her, and things to fight for. And damn the odds.