It had taken them weeks longer than Loren had hoped for, but in the end they had been able to cross the Mander. His scouts had identified a suitably narrow part of the river, with a good field on the other side, and then he had began his distraction. His army marched up and down the Mander, like a sting being waved before the eyes of a child. Stannis' host matched them step for step. Every time Loren passed the ideal spot, a small portion of his army would split off and head into the meadows and hills behind his army under cover of darkness, while the rest continued their marches. Those that had split off spent time building four portable bridges, Hacking down trees for most of the wood, but some of it came from the supply carts that had been empited already. That worried Loren. Despite his supply train that had come from the capital, they were already wearing it down. He would have to commit to battle soon.
His army kept up their distraction as more and more battalions were siphoned away to help with the bridges. They marched up and down, feinting for bridges and crossing points to keep Stannis guessing as to his motives. The bridges were ready a week before he used them, but he had to wait for the right cycle of the moon. It had to be completely dark for him to achieve the success he needed. Finally, on the night the moon looked away, Loren moved. His bridge detachment, now comprising nearly a quarter of his army, dragged the portable bridges to the river and hauled them across the breadth of the Mander. By next dawn, they were across and had a strong foothold on the other side. Nevertheless it was a nail-biting wait as they held their position, waiting to see who would arrive first, his army to cross the river and support them, or Stannis' to drive them back into it. Thankfully his army moved first, taking a night march to arrive at the bridge hours before Stannis and begin crossing it. When his army was gathered, they marched after Stannis, hoping to catch him before he noticed that Loren was across, but Stannis' light horsmen kept Loren's vanguard at bay for the next day as Stannis marched south, not trying to turn and face him and instead escaping for another day. When darkness fell, Loren called his men back to make camp and rest after the night march.
They couldn't rest the next day and marched south. Loren could feel his men were worn and tired after the night march, but the bridges they had built may have been secure for men and horses, but wagonloads of supplies were another matter. Part of his army recrossed the bridges and then they marched down either flank of the river until they came to the Bitterbridge. Stannis had left a guard force of perhaps two hundred to watch the river. That was enough to hold from one side, but from both sides it was easily routed, and the Bitterbridge was secured to bring his supplies across safely.
They rested there that night, the army camped on the stretching floodplains that had already been drenched in blood.
Gerold found him wandering the ruins of the northern village a dead dog at his feet. Half the houses had been gutted by fire, casting ash onto the other half. The hound had been the only living thing here nose to the ground, ribs jutting out against a thin layer of skin.
His faithful knight, who had opposed kings for him, didn't say anything, only stared at the dog with his one good eye. Loren wiped his bloody sword clean. "It was starving," he explained, "with a taste for human flesh, it seems." He slid his sword back into it's jeweled scabbard. "You didn't need to come here, Gerold," he said. This had been the village where his knight had opposed the Young Wolf, where he'd lost most of his command.
"Actually I did," Gerold said. "You were here, and I needed to find you."
Loren nodded, ever was his time demanded. He dropped the rag he'd used to clean his sword. It had been red before he cleaned the blade. Taken from a femur protruding from the ground like a bleached white root. One of his soldiers from the last battle.
"What is it?"
"The scouts we sent south are encountering resistance from Stannis' rearguard. It's strong, but it would seem that Stannis is still pulling further away."
"He wants us to follow him," Loren said. He wanted to fight on ground of his choosing, just as Loren did. But only one of them could.
"So what will we do?" Gerold asked.
Loren gritted his teeth. "Follow him," he said. "We still need to open the road, and for that, we need to fight him."
Gerold nodded. He had already known, but he'd needed to hear it from Loren in person, because he didn't want it to be true, because he knew what it would mean in a way so many other didn't. "When do we go?"
"Tomorrow." There was nothing to be gained from waiting.
His knight didn't reply at first, hoping that Loren would say more. But there was nothing more to say, they needed to fight Stannis, and for that, they needed to follow him. "I see," Gerold said.
The death silence between them hung heavy. Loren sat down on the rim of the well. In the quiet, he could hear the lapping of groundwater down the shaft.
"Are you alright, my lord?"
Loren cradled his head in his hand. "I'm tired, Gerold."
"Tired?" Loren nodded. "We could wait another day, my lord, we have enough supplies."
"No, it's not that. I'm tired. I'm tired of all of this."
Gerold was silent for a moment, thinking. "So what will you do about it. If rest will not help, what will?"
"Reckoning," Loren replied. "When this is over, there will be a reckoning in King's Landing. What's been happening cannot continue."
"What kind of reckoning?"
"I don't know. But my family and I will be caught up in it as we always have."
"Well that is what happens when you're the richest family in Westeros."
"I don't mean my House," Loren replied. "I mean my family. Aly and my children."
"Perhaps that is true, but what reckonings can be for good or ill," Gerold pointed out. "Why do you believe that this will be an ill reckoning for your family?"
Loren gestured to the ruined village around them. "How many times can we do this to villages across the Kingdoms?" He lamented.
"That was not you," Gerold insisted firmly. "Your father put the torch to the Riverlands, the Starks did this," he gestured to the burned village.
Loren nodded. "And all because I fight to defend Joffrey's rights to his father's inheritance," he muttered. "Why did that boy have to make it so bloody difficult for us."
"He's a boy," Gerold replied. "And a spoiled one at that who learned too much at his mother's side."
"And soon he'll be a man, without a regency to control his actions."
"Well, then it's best that we win this war before then," Gerold said firmly. "For which we need you."
Loren smiled and took Gerold's hand, who pulled him to his feet. "You trust me to win this?"
"Of course, I didn't commit treason for a weakling."
"No you didn't," Loren agreed. "Let's go then."
They marched the next day, retracing the steps he had taken when he brought the supply convoy back from Highgarden. All the while his outriders clashed with Stannis' men as they marched south. They kept up the dance for three days until news came from behind them that made Loren call a halt to the march.
"You're certain?" He asked the scout.
The scout nodded. "I saw it myself, my lord. Bitterbridge castle burned, the timber parts collapsed, Stannis' men hold the east side of the Bitterbridge itself."
"How did this happen?" Ser Addam demanded.
"The enemy were waiting out to the north of our position, perhaps three thousand in all, they waited until we were so far south that we couldn't interfere, and then attacked the castle."
"How did you see it?"
"I probably wouldn't have, my lord, if I hadn't been chasing down a Baratheon outrider, we went further than I should have done."
"I see." Loren said simply. "Go and rest now, unless you have other news." The scout bowed and left. It was good that he had gone further, if not the first that Loren might have known about the fall of Bitterbridge was when his supplies stopped coming in.
"What do we do now?" Gerold asked, turn back and retake the bridge?"
"And go through this whole song and dance again?" Addam asked. "Stannis has several thousand of his men detached from his army, better to strike his main force now, my lord."
"There's merit to that, but Stannis can keep out of reach until we run out of supplies," Lord Florent said. "I'd rather not charge after him if we'll eat ourselves dry doing so."
"We won't," Loren said. "There are two ends to this supply chain. If Stannis has cut us off from one end, let us move towards the other."
"Highgarden, but my lord, Stannis blocks the way."
"Only along the road, and now we don't need our supply lines to follow us, there is no need for us to follow it either." He turned and pointed directly west. "We march inland, circle around and join Highgarden, rally the southern armies of the Reach and push north to face Stannis that way."
"Even in the relatively flat Reach, going across country will be slower than the road," Lord Florent pointed out.
"Perhaps, but Stannis won't be waiting for us there."
"And if he moves to block us?" Addam asked.
Loren shrugged. "Then we fight. But I would rather fight on ground that the two of us chanced upon than terrain Stannis has controlled and prepared in his favour. Give the order, we turn west."
And so the army turned from the path Stannis was leading them down and cut to the west across open country of the Reach.
But even out here, far from the main arteries of travel, they came across burned villages, some were empty, others had seen their people return, although they ran quickly at Loren's approach.
For the first day, they marched freely, at the end of the second his scouts reported fresh clashes with Stannis's men whenever they probed south. On the the third, the reports came thick and fast. His outriders were keeping Stannis' army at bay, but Stannis kept pushing against them. On the fourth day, the scouts to his east were also meeting with Baratheon outriders. Loren suspected it was at least some of the force that had taken Bitterbridge. "He's drawing a net around us," he muttered softly. But there was still nothing to his west, so he could break out of this.
They kept marching, and at noon on the fifth day, they stopped. Their path blocked. "What is that?" Loren demanded, pointing out ahead of them.
"It must be Marrenmarsh," Lord Florent muttered. "I didn't think we were so far north to have come across it."
Loren looked up and down. The great expanse of brown and green marshland stretched miles in each direction. "Which way is best, south or north?" Loren asked.
Lord Florent shook his head. "I only saw it from a distance, and from the other side, when I went to visit Lady Oakheart. This is on her land."
Loren spat. "Send riders up and down the army, bring me anyone from House Oakheart's armies, now!"
"My lord," Ser Addam said, riding up beside him as knights and messengers hurried up the coloumn, seeking anyone who would know Marrenmarsh. "Perhaps it would be best to turn and fight."
"I will not fight Stannis Baratheon with my back against a marsh unless there is no other choice," Loren said. "Keep the army in marching formation for now. But I need you to command the rear, Ser Addam, keep the outriders alert."
"At once, my lord." Ser Addam rode hard to take up his new command.
The rest was an agonising wait as battalions of infantry marched past him, heading towards the bogs ahead of them. But eventually, one of his messengers returned with a young knight not twenty years old in tow. "My Lord," the knight introduced himself. "My name is Ser Everett Allaway, I was a knight in House Oakheart's service."
Loren beckoned him up. "You know the Marrenmarsh?"
Ser Everett nodded. "Yes my lord, I earned my spurs after Lady Oakheard sent us to clear brigands from the swamps."
"Good, now tell me, is it faster for us to go around the Marsh to the north or ths south?"
Ser Everett examined the marsh, looking around them for landmarks. "From here, I'm not sure, we're probably in the middle."
"Fuck!" Loren cursed. North would probably be best then, his scouts to the north hadn't yet come across-
"But why go around, Lord Marshall?"
He whipped his head around to look at Everett. "What do you mean?"
"You can go through, my lord, there are paths."
Loren's breath caught for just a moment. "And you know these paths?"
"Yes my lord." He was confident at least, but confident did not always mean correct.
"How certain are you?"
"We spent months going through these marshes, traversing the paths. I know them, my lord."
Loren stared into Everett's eyes, but the boy did not back down. So Loren chose to trust him. "Then you can lead us through them to the far western side?"
That was where Everett's confidence was dented. "I… can try, my lord."
"Now you're not so certain," Loren said.
"It's not a question of me knowing the way lord. I can guide you, but the paths are narrow and the going is slow. We would be in there for some time, and I don't know that the horses could take it."
"How narrow are the paths?"
"Single file in some places, although most are wide enough for two mounted abreast, three on foot."
Gerold nudged his horse a little closer. "My lord, we can't bring all our horses in their, we'd lose perhaps half of them. And besides, if we have the thin out to single file like we did at the Bitterbridge-"
"I remember," Loren replied quietly. He growled under his breath. "Ser Everett, how far north is it to get around these marshes?"
"A day, perhaps two, depending on how fast you ride."
Loren nodded, then it was decided. "I will take the infantry through the Marrenmarsh," he declared. "Gerold, you will command the horse, ride north and circle around the Marsh, meet us on the other side."
"My Lord?" Gerold asked, alarmed.
"It's the only way, the infantry can make it through the marsh, I wil go afoot with a dozen guards, the rest of the men and horses will ride with you. Without the infantry to slow you down, you can outpace Stannis' army."
"If we can find you," Gerold pointed out.
"We're an army, we will not be hard to find. Everett, I want every landmark you can think of on the western side memorised by Gerold, you will find us at one of them if we are not at the exit."
Gerold protested, but Loren insisted as the march into the Marrenmarsh began, battalions thinned out to fit down the first path they found. Loren ordered each battalion to have two lamps, one to hold at the front, one to hold at the back, to guide each other if the marshes got too gloamy. Loren mounted his horse once he was sure the orders were clear and given. He wanted to be near the head of the column so he could begin organising it as they emerged. Lord Florent would come with him, Ser Addam would hold the rearguard until the last of the foot had entered the marsh and then join Gerold heading north.
Just before he entered, Gerold approached Loren one last time. "My lord, give Ser Addam the command, I should be at your side."
"Not this time, old friend," Loren said. "You're the only one I can trust to find me on the other side."
"But the lords won't follow me, I am just a knight!" Gerold protested, determined to come with Loren.
Loren was moved by the emotion in Gerold's voice, but he needed Gerold to do this. Other commanders might take matters into their own hands if they needed to. Freedom to act was good most of the time, but not when the two wings of his army were separate, they needed to rejoin above all else on the other side of the marsh. "The army followed you at King's Landing."
"I mutiny," Gerold hissed the word. "That doesn't make lords inclined to obey."
"They will," Loren said.
"Why?"
"Because you have my authority." Loren unhooked his Marshall's badge of office and pinned it to Gerold's cloak so it gleamed at his throat.
"That is your badge, my lord."
"And it shows you have my favour."
"My lord… Loren, I can't accept this."
"You must for now," he said. Loren reached over and clapped Gerold on the shoulder. "It weighs more than it looks, but you'll bear it while I'm gone."
"And if I cant?"
"You can, I believe in you. And if it makes you uncomfortable, all the better," Loren said as he turned his horse to the Marrenmarsh. "It gives you all the more incentive to return it to me as fast as you can."