Took me longer than I thought it would! Writing is hard, sorry... Also, I've been a bit sad, or something, that I'm coming up on the end. The story has been in my mind for so long and I don't think I've ever finished a project before so it's startling to see the end in sight.

This one is some narrative/world-building. But next chapter, pure SanSan!

CHAPTER 42

BLACKFISH

"Bloody Wildlings!"

The Blackfish and a small party of ten fighting men huddled in a grove of the overgrown forest that surrounded the Dreadfort. That dark and cursed castle could be seen through the gaps in the trees; its spiked merlons pointed to the cold gray sky and its jet black arrow slits peered as deadly eyes out from thick stone walls. But here, all the warriors' attentions lay on the bloodied Karstark man centered between them. An ironwood arrow protruded from his shoulder, fresh blood pooling through his surcoat and a look of betrayal on his face as he eyed the fletching poking from his chest. He had been shot as they approached the Dreadfort.

As the others prepared to pull out the arrow and staunch the bleeding, Podrick pulled the Blackfish aside. "Do you really think the Wildlings have taken the castle from Her Grace? Is that why they shot at us? Mayhaps they don't realize who we are out here."

"They know." An irascible look crossed his face as Brynden Tully turned to look at the Dreadfort. His niece had sent him here, where she had no control or presence, to be her envoy and ensure this new Wildling establishment had some sense of Westerosi values. It was not going well. Far from receiving the warm welcome they expected, he and his band of motley Northmen were just out of range of arrows that threatened their lives.

"Gyeaarrgh!" the Karstark man squealed as the arrow was pulled through his back. His brothers-in-arms hurriedly uncovered his chest and tied ripped cloth into a makeshift bandage. He would not die from this wound, but the cold wind would kill them all if they stayed outside in the elements for much longer. The mood was tense. Being trapped outside their destination meant they were as good as dead.

The oldest among them, a grizzled elder from the mountain clans, tended to the fallen while two young men from Sheepshead Hills, Finnus and Willem, built a fire. A third, Lyle, pulled a cot from their ox-cart and lifted the wounded man onto it from his place in the pink snow. The Blackfish motioned to Pod and the remaining three fighters to follow him as he scouted closer through the woods.

The Dreadfort's outer walls were ominously silent. He kept an eye out for the archers that had shot at them when they announced their presence at the gate, but it was impossible to clarify anything of the ramparts' silhouette against the night sky. Those shadows might be crenelations or crouching patrollers, he could not tell, so he led his men as quietly as he could in search of a weak point along the outer wall.

"The Wildlings are extraordinarily undisciplined," said Clev, a seasoned strong man from Last Hearth who had spent most of his life as a woodcutter before being dragged into the War of the Five Kings. "Those archers may have fired on us out of ignorance or haste, not because the Dreadfort's been compromised."

"Or they got orders to do so from higher up." This came from Skager, an upjumped sellsword from Hornwood Sansa had pardoned for fighting with the Boltons. "They have their own princess in there, the Wildlings. Who's to say Val's friendship with Sansa wasn't just for show?"

"Can we even be sure she holds the castle?" Bennot had been just a boy in White Harbor when the war started, and the high casualties meant that many never returned. He'd been forced to mature quickly as one of the few males left in the homeland, and stuck close to Pod as one does to an older brother.

"Either way, our position is the same," the Blackfish responded. "We have to break in."

He was met with quiet acquiescence. None among them relished the idea of somehow breaking through the Dreadfort's defenses with only ten men, but there was no alternative. Their exhausted oxen would not survive exposure to the harsh winter elements for much longer, and neither could they make it the distance to any friendly castle. Their mission was to ensure that the Wildlings held the Dreadfort as vassals of House Stark, and that's what they had to do.

Skager knew something of the layout inside, and they shared the plan with the rest back at camp. "There's a gangway, here," he said, pointing to a poor-scale model scratched in the snow. "We can cross to the inner keep."

"Once in, Podrick and I will form a defensive front in our heavy armor," the Blackfish added. "The rest will cover us."

The boys from the Sheepshead Hills exchanged a worried look, and Brynden was glad the wounded man by the fire slept deeply and could not voice any skepticism to increase their doubt. "But Ser," the braver one ventured, though perhaps he was just more concerned for his own skin, "Do you really think we can make it inside?"

The Blackfish nodded. "The Wildlings are not used to living in castles or defending them. There is a blind part on the outer wall, here, and if we can avoid any patrollers along the ramparts, we can scale it easily. One of you," he eyed the boys beneath a furrowed brow, "will stand watch just outside the pines, to signal if we're spotted."

The boys gulped. Clearly, neither relished either choice—breaking into the Dreadfort or standing just outside it waving a flag—but Brynden had no patience for the fear green men brought to battle. He ignored it. "I'll stay here, watch the camp, and tend the wounded," the old mountain clansman chimed in. "The rest of you, make haste! We made it this far, and my old bones can't stand this cold much longer."

The men prepared—the Blackfish and Pod armored from helmet to greaves, each with a greatsword; Clev in boiled leather and wielding a great axe nearly as tall as himself; Skager with shortsword and crossbow; Bennot with a spear and dagger; Finnus and Lyle, with hatchets, bows, and one quiver between them; and "brave" Willem, who opted to stay by the pines with nothing but the signaling flag.

When the moon rose high they approached the Dreadfort. Willem broke off to where he was just within eyesight of the group and crouched low, holding the flag against his body so that he appeared to be a waving shadow. The rest scrambled from their hiding spot in the trees to the castle's outer wall, an opportune spot where they could only be seen if someone looked down on them directly from above. Skager and Bennot held a freshly constructed scaling ladder between them, hoisting it against the wall as soon as they came to its edge. It reached only partway. Clev braced the bottom as Skager balanced at the top and threw a grappling hook around a crenelation. He pulled himself up, Bennot right behind him, and the two worked quickly to secure the ropes for a safer climb for the men below.

Clev and Finnus tied the ropes around Brynden in some fashion of a harness. Climbing was more difficult and dangerous for him since he couldn't pull himself up by his own strength—the armor was just too heavy. Brynden wrapped the ropes around his bracers several times before mounting the ladder. At the top, he nearly lost his balance, but leaned back, confident that the harness and hooks would hold him. The Blackfish planted his feet against the castle's outer wall and left the ladder behind.

Brynden's joints creaked, protesting at having to pull up his own weight and the added weight of the armor. He was as good as blind in his helmet, too, with only a thin slit to see through, but he concentrated on a red star in the sky above and kept moving—one small, fully vertical step in front of another—until he felt the men at the top pulling him over the stone rampart. Dizziness overtook him as he was brought upright but then lost his balance, tipping forward and rolling over. Brynden lay on his back, panting, and struggled to catch his breath after the exertion.

Clev pulled himself up quickly, one rope in each hand and the huge great axe swinging precariously behind him. Finnus followed, quick as a rat. Pod was next, strapped in the ropes as Lyle helped him find his footing on the ladder and the men prepared to pull him the rest of the way up once he got to the top.

"Shit! They're coming along the wall walk." Skager yelled and Brynden's eyes went immediately to Willem in the field. The boy was waving the flag, making himself an easy target. He spun it afore a volley of arrows and charged back into the woods, apparently unscathed.

"Slippery little one, isn't he?" Clev came to stand next to Brynden, great axe in hand. The archers who had spotted him were shouting to one another about the scout and spotted the rest of the party on the wall in the span of a few breaths. The Blackfish pushed his way in front of his men just as arrows tinged against his armor.

"With me!" Brynden motioned to Clev and they closed the distance between the Wildlings, who knelt as they fired another volley of arrows. There was a thunderous clang behind them as Pod was finally hoisted over the wall, and a shriek as one of the arrows struck Finnus.

Brynden poked into the group of archers with his sword and they scattered like birds. One fell to a wide swing of Clev's great axe, but the rest scrambled into the darkness.

At that moment there was a blood-curling yell. Brynden wheeled around—the tower wall, which had served them to form the blind spot they'd scaled behind, was the jumping-off point for a berserker wildling. He flew down from his hiding place, spear in hand aimed at Clev. There was no time for the big woodcutter to turn and swing his axe and defend himself. But there was no need—the Wildling's scream turned to a squeal as a crossbow bolt hit him in the back. Skager stood framed on the other side of the tower, weapon in hand.

"Good shot, man!" Clev raised his axe in triumph, but their elation was short-lived. Behind Skager, the boys were raising Finnus against the wall to check his wound. Pod, still dizzy, swayed unsteadily on his feet.

"You'll be all right," Bennot told his friend. "We made it up here." But at that moment, a spear went through the back of his head and came out his eye.

"Coward!" Pod shouted and charged towards the spear's source. A muscled Wildling with stringy black hair lunged at from the corner of the wall walk, but he didn't make it far before Pod crashed into him and the two tumbled into the bailey below.

Skager and Clev ran over to see what happened, and the Blackfish paused near the boys to see what had become of them. Bennot was dead, Finnus shivering and quiet from his wound, and Lyle nowhere to be found.

"You killed him!" Skager shouted to Pod. He turned to Brynden behind them. "Pod's crushed him below."

Through his helm's eye slit, Brynden could just make out Pod in the snow above the dead Wildling, but the Wildlings' bloodied face as well as back made him think maybe Pod had finished the fight after they landed. "Can you get down to him? We'll see if we can meet up on the other side. Clev and I will take the gangway."

It was slow-going over the thin walkway, but Clev helped guide his large form across it. The Blackfish thought it odd that through the breath in his ears he could hear the distant sounds of revelry growing closer. When they crossed to the inner walls, Skager and Pod were already waiting for them in the courtyard below. "We found a passageway," he explained quickly. "Can you see anything from up there? We think there's some kind of party."

"Did you see anyone?" The Blackfish called down to them.

"No one. It seems like everyone is inside," Skager answered.

"Come up here!" The Blackfish instructed, then turned to Clev. "Look around. We need to find the source of the sound."

"There's a small overhang this way . . . It looks like a window. I see light!"

The four men crouched by the opening and looked through into the loft of the Dreadfort's Main Hall. Light from torches and oil lamps cast long shadows on the wall of flickering figures jumping and dancing to tribal music. The contrast between the celebratory figures and the men's somber mood proved unnerving.

"What are they doing down there?" Pod said, wincing and dizzy from his wounds. Brynden felt some pity for the boy, blind as he was beneath his own helmet, so he took his off and told Pod to do the same.

"We're going to find out," he said. It was with some trouble that Clev and Skager guided the two armored knights through the window. Once inside, the men crawled to the edge of the loft and peered below.

Indeed, the Wildlings were having a grand feast. The long tables of the Dreadfort's Main Hall were set with field dishes, roast fish and hunter's pies, and food from the winter storeroom like wheels of cheese and jugs of wine and mead. The food and drink flowed freely to the mouths of the reveling Wildlings, who danced and sang with each other to the tune of animal-skin drums and reed instruments, seemingly without program or order. Most startling of all was that the Wildlings kept dangerous animals inside like pets. Brynden gazed in astonishment upon an enormous white bear, but there was also a shaggy boar and what Brynden took to be a she-wolf nursing a pup. The "pup" turned and stretched out on his back—and was not a pup at all, but a near-fully grown boy with shaggy black hair down the center of his back. Cuddled next to his wolf-friend, the boy did seem more animal than human.

"Animals feasting with men!" Pod spat in disbelief, but the northerners trembled.

"There's magic here," said Clev.

Brynden would not let his surviving men break over fears of witchcraft. Not with at least two dead already. "Aye, looks to be the same magic as commanded by my sweet niece." The Blackfish had never held himself much to belief in magic, and he had heard enough talk of the Wild Wedding that he was not startled by what he saw now. "We've nothing to fear here. Let's go."

The men followed, dutifully, if fearfully, behind him, but Brynden was not afraid. He would rather meet his end here, in some grand battle against the animals, than suffer the cold outside until death found him. Still, he could not stop the pounding heartbeat in his ears. He and his men were not far down the stairs before the Wildlings saw them. The room got quiet as many jostled and poked each other to hush and stare at the newcomers. Brynden kept up his approach until he reached the front of the dais, where a woman rose to meet him.

The Wildling princess. She was beautiful, tall and blonde with her braid slung over one shoulder and all the grace in her movement and disposition as that of a real princess. She was clad in white, a fur-trimmed leather dress, cape, and boots that made her look like a silver moonbeam come to earth. "Blackfish Tully," she said, giving a deep curtsy, "My honored guest."

Brynden knew well the wiles of women, and would not be distracted by this one's beauty and sweet words. "Some Honor, Val! Men lay dead outside, yours and mine. How do you claim to hold this castle in the name of your liege, Sansa Stark, when I, her uncle, am nearly killed coming to it? Mark your words carefully, or you will pay."

Some flicker of emotion passed over Val's face, but what it meant Brynden did not know. "The men on the outer walls are dead, then?"

"Their blood stains the snow alongside the blood of my own. What say you for yourself?" He drew his sword, and the Wildlings filled the room with whoops and catcalls.

Val inclined her head submissively. "My remorse will not be enough, I know, though I offer it genuinely. Perhaps the loss can be softened by my pledge. I and all the Free Folk hold the Dreadfort in the name of Sansa Stark. By her decree, we are to settle the land of her enemies anew, as friends. My apologies, again, at the difficulty you faced in coming here." She looked up then, daring to face him sword-in-hand. "But this union of our cultures has not been easy. There were some who begrudge that we became vassals to the Starks. And a few of those who begrudge me even more, for marrying a Southron."

Brynden shook his head, annoyed. He wasn't much for the political intrigue of royals and was surprised this Wildling woman was. "I don't care who you're marrying. What I want to know is why your men attacked us."

"I speak plainly. Please, sheathe your sword. You are among friends, now, and tenants. The men outside did not want to become Westerosi. They took such issue with me marrying a Southron that they were willing to die to defend my hand. And yet, you have bested them all."

He was aware that she was looking at him coyly, as women who wanted him sometimes did, and he grew unnerved by her open seduction. "And had I fell? You would turn the Dreadfort over to one of them?"

She shrugged. "I can hardly be blamed for a coup within my own ranks. But I am glad you won. We need peace to survive this winter."

"Treason!" he barked at her. "A betrayal to Winterfell, in short order."

"Hardly," she tittered at him from behind a delicately gloved hand and moved closer, her cape dragging smoothly across the floor behind her. Brynden bristled, wondering if this was some trap and death was imminent. "We have customs in the North which I'm sure will seem strange to you. Tell me, Blackfish Tully. Have you heard of a northern marriage?

"I have no interest in it. I have not married yet, my lady, and I don't intend to."

"The man steals the woman he wants and drags her away to his own village. As I promised, I will hold the Dreadfort for Sansa Stark. But with my seat here, I can hardly be stolen away. How, then, can I marry?"

Are all women mad to tie themselves to a man?! Brynden seethed, but sheathed his sword. Val and the unarmed Wildlings were not a threat. He and his men had deposed of the threat outside—the Wildlings who would not bend the knee in any fashion. He reflected regretfully that women were obsessed with marriage, even one so beautiful and independent-minded as this gorgeous and spirited Wildling. His mind wandered to the dead, green boys, and he gave only a grunt in response to Val's question. Men fought, sacrificed, died, and women worried over trifling matters. He had no mind to such problems.

"But you have such strange customs in the South, as well. I have heard that whoever conquers a castle has the right to call it theirs, and so it was with our dear Sansa. Could it not be said, then, that you took this?" She motioned widely to the room around her, to all her people, and Brynden grew red-faced. "Are you not the rightful Lord of the Dreadfort?"

"I am not the Lord of anything! I gave my titles away, long ago."

Val peered at him beneath her long blonde eyelashes. "Are you not? I can hardly be carried away, so what better way to test my husband-to-be than lure him in? And if the Free Folk and House Tully are joined, the Dreadfort will be eternally bound to House Stark. Could our liege have found a more perfect arrangement for us, my lord?"

Brynden grew torn and angry as he realized the trap that had been set for him. Sansa had ordered him here knowing Val waited for him at the end. The two women had planned this in secret! Men had died for their games! But Sansa was not wrong. Val was not able to hold the Dreadfort by herself, unmarried, surrounded by strong warriors with no desire to assimilate into the Kingdom, and with no knowledge of Westerosi culture. And though he had never planned to marry, not even to the beautiful and firm-bodied woman half his age who beamed at him from the dais, he could hardly turn her away now. He and his men were stranded here for the winter.

Val took his hands and he stepped up on the dais with her. Behind him, Wildling women eyed his surviving men appraisingly, drawing closer like forest nymphs. "I believe this is another custom of yours," Val said, and two of her handmaids brought a banner between them. "I took the liberty to prepare us a new sigil."

Its embroidered emblem depicted a fish above a wall. Brynden sighed, resigned to the fact that he would spend the winter with this wild woman warming his bed. "All right, you mad woman," he said, pulling her to him suddenly and crushing her against his armor, "I'll marry you, as I'm a hostage in this damned castle."

The Wildlings hollered and whooped, striking up their raucous music and dancing again. That's what this is, he understood now, a wedding. She was only waiting for a man to claim rights as her husband. Val's eyes sparkled for him, and Brynden flushed boyishly from the realization that she held an attraction for him. "We have another custom in the South," he told her, untying the clasp around her neck and drawing off her cloak. "The bedding."