Life had become dull without my shadow.
My spite had grown to twice it's usual size with the lack of stimulation that the petty whores brought to my bed furs. I was not fond of boredom. Even the meetings with the council had grown tiring without the familiar sensation of her knelt between my legs. I couldn't focus. If I had my way I would lie in wait on the outskirts of the Wall for the battle to come. To claim her for my own once more and watch that stupid wolf boy die at my feet. I did not miss her being, only her body and that beautiful mind that twisted so pliantly under my hand. I had not realised the sweet release her daily servitude had brought unto me until I had sent her away. The thought of Jon Snow with his filthy fingers on her body made my eye twitch involuntarily. The thought of her luring him to me like the witch she was somewhat relaxed my ever soaring temper.
"Ramsay. Focus." My Father's sharp tone cut rudely into my musings. "Have you heard a single word uttered in this meeting? Have you any input on holding the rebellion that threatens to sweep from the North? The people are starving. It is your duty to act or you face losing your already questionable hold on the men that hoist our banners."
"So let them starve. Starving men cannot start a rebellion." I glowered at him, turning to the council with a flailing hand to dismiss the issue. "Next. Have you had word from the bastard?" Anticipation crept in as worried glances were exchanged between the council and my Father.
"We have not received word for her arrival. The rider insists she was left exactly as you instructed. Forget the girl, my son. She will be smitten with the men of the Night's Watch by now. Whores hold no loyalty. I will not remind you of the obvious again." He spat the words and held my gaze as no other man would.
"Do not dare open your mouth to slander my plans once more or I will have your tongue."
My Lord Father stiffened in his seat.
"You will die if you go anywhere near the Wall or the Wolf that guards it, boy. Move on."
"And how do you suppose they would possibly anticipate my arrival and prepare for the oncoming attack, Father? Are you still harping on about how the girl will betray me and fall into the arms of the enemy?! Did I not just make it perfectly clear that I wi-"
"They are aware of your plans, you simpleton!"
The statement hung heavily in the air, slowly sinking through the blackened paste that was a veil of tension until it dropped with a crack against open ears. The whore had truly done it. She had fucked the King and spilled her secrets to him and the men at this table had all sat mockingly as if entertaining a child of some wild fantasy while I beat on for days about her submission and my victory. The heavy rise and fall of my chest was enough to have the council begin to push back their chairs. I struck my blade in the table with a deft thud, freezing the council and watching the wood splinter and crack - the very same effect rippled painfully in my skull. "That filthy, gutless, treacherous little mongrel!"
I erupted like hellfire at the nearest man to my blade; plunging it relentlessly into his chest until the swift pull back began to shower the table with his innards and dark juices. I ran my hand through the waste and threw it accusingly at the quivering men that watched on in horror. Only my Father remained unflinching during my outburst. "How did you know? When did you hear word of her failure? How long did she last before outting me to the enemy?!" The steady rise of my voice now resembling a guttural roar and shook the walls - threatening to come down and kill every man that sat wide eyed and pleading in their seats.
"The girl is probably dead, Ramsay. Your intentions had been revealed even before her body left Winterfell." My Father's words did nothing to slow my hungry blade.
I spun wildly to the elderly advisor that had lived long before my reign in Winterfell, snatching him by the collar and running a blade across his throat. With yet another lifeless body clutched between blood-smothered palms I turned to my Father. "Traitors! Loyal only to the Starks and the bastard they raised!"
"None of the Stark's employment had anything to do with your exposure, son. Put away your blade." There he was again. Muttering riddled words that revealed little but implied all. I only liked games if I was the host. I did not take kindly to becoming a player in the dark. I turned slowly to his figure, taking note of the way his hand gripped readily at the sword at his hip. A holy man did not sweat under the eyes of the Gods. Only the sinful feared the redemption to come.
"If not the girl.." I took two steps closer, "and not the Starks," I leaned lower to face my maker, "then who, dear Father? Please, guide me with your wisdom and gaul me with your truth. I am just so excited to find out." My tongue ran tentatively over grinning teeth, bared broad at the uncomfortable receiver.
"You are a mad dog chasing an unreachable bone. You would never have killed the King. Only yourself. I sent a raven the moment your lunacy threatened to put this council at risk with reckless war games. The King would only accept our plea if the girl was to remain at the Wall. I assume he has strung her up and let the crows feast on what little meat they could find by now, my boy. That is, if she hadn't already let loose lips squeal of your oncoming assault. She is a twisted creature and I will sing songs of rejoice when you are free from this maddened obsession. It has gone too far."
Rigid words passed pursed lips and in his self incriminating admittance I steadied my breathing. Cold callous hands flexed at my sides as the beast within tore through muscle and bone, claiming what little sanity had survived in the barren wasteland some called a conscience. Maidens told ghost stories of skin walkers and beasts in the night, but never spoke the truth of the men that chose not to chain their demons. Like a stallion fuelled with the crack of a whip I bucked wildly and with a vengeance in the hall.
"I choose when she dies! Me! Only me! She is mine to kill! She belongs to me!"
My Father could not unsheathe his sword in time to flay off a calculated gouge at his eye socket. The handle of the dagger was all that remained; the blade now lodged within gore and guts as his solitary eyeball rolled up into his skull - the shock seizing his senses and ending his miserable existence.
Panic descended upon the room and I widened my arms to embrace the atmosphere that consumed my prey, marching steadily towards the oak door and wedging the wooden beam within its hinges. Like a fox in a hen house I smelt the air and moaned as the ever enticing screams turned to begs and the enthralling aroma of fear and fury filled the air in equal measure. I let carnal impulses lead my assault, moving with vicious precision as I maimed every man in the room as a butcher would chop the head of a pig - some of the dead even squealed the same as the pot bellied beasts they stuffed their faces with. I took no joy in such cuisines. This was my feast.
An insatiable bloodlust began to boil the bones beneath my skin, taking a once brittle structure and armouring it with rage. I had never felt so untouchable in all of my serial executions. As the walls and floors became lined with the organs of the fallen I stood like an unholy deity to the dead. Blood ran from the dregs of my hair and merged to a sweat slicked brow; entrails hung like a badge of honour earned only by the depraved and the fumes of shit and piss that emitted from bloody corpses washed over me in the feat of my massacre.
Jon Snow flashed like a blazing arrow through the darkness that had consumed frenzied thoughts and spurred my vessel to sail on in its peak. Ghost stood like a lone candle in my mind, her ivory skin burning bright and urgent even in the shadows. She would be the beacon that guided me to the Wall through the frost that lie ahead. If the girl lived, she should pray for ignorance in the treachery that had unfolded these days gone - else she fall victim to my rapture and suffer the tribulation.