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The King in the North
The clash of men was a crescendo roar, the clang of metal on metal, the impacts of arrow rain, the battlecries and the yelling, the sounds of dying men and horses.
The sickening noise of steel parting meat. The music of war was much alike a continuous scream of pain.
As his bannermen surged around him and pushed back the howling footmen that made up the enemy frontline, Jon took a brief respite to catch his breath. He stood there heaving, in the mud and the blood, then wiped the grime from his eyes and surveyed the field.
It was hellish.
As with many things, it had gone much smoother on the map, where men were wooden markers and actions were still plans.
Ser Medrick put down the final lions-head piece that represented the Lannister forces, some ten to fifteen-thousand footmen and an addition five-thousand knights. The enemy were arrayed in a rough claw shape, their left and right flank swollen with numbers.
Jon and his two commanders stood around the large wooden table in the king's tent, upon which rested a large map of the surrounding area, its corners weighed down by stones.
Robett snorted. "The Lannister fucks aren't being very subtle, are they?" Medrick nodded his assent, tracing the map along the path of the predicted Lannister assault.
"They're setting up to pincer us, crush our soldiers under the weight of their larger numbers and superior calvary. The Westerlander knights will attempt to funnel us in between them and grind us to dust with their men-at-arms and peasant levies in the center." spoke the young Manderly knight. His Glover compatriot sneered.
"Weak-kneed southroun fish-lords are quick to offer up men to fight against their own allies. Not so long ago, most of those foot soldiers and a few of those knights marched with us against the Lannisters." growled Robett.
Jon frowned at him. "Keep in mind, my lord, that we failed to do our duty as allies to the Riverlands when the North lost the war and ceded these lands."
"Aye, but the war isn't yet over. We let the Lions rest easy for these past years, but now we're back to finish what they started." the Glover man met Jon's gaze with steady determination. He didn't hold the stare long. Jon knew his eyes unsettled even the most hardened men.
Medrick glanced between the two of them, chewing his lip. He stabbed at the map again with a finger. "If we spread our battle lines out wide, they'll have a harder time herding us together, and-"
"No." said Jon. "We won't play to their strategy. They think their knights invincible, their army's flank secure. The Others and the wights will break the left and right wings, and once the force is scattered the men will move in as a group to finish them." The Manderly knight looked unconvinced.
"Your Grace, you are so sure that the enemy will break formation?"
"This will be the first time these men face the Army of the Dead. They will break and flee." he said, bitterly. Medrick accepted his surety and didn't question the source of it.
Even if places as far south as White Harbor had not seen the wights, all in the North knew the story of the War for the Dawn, which- to their shame- had been fought mostly by Free Folk and Watchers on the Wall.
Robett looked nonplussed by Jon's stratagem. The Glover lord rummaged through one of the wooden chests in the makeshift war room until he pulled out a faded looking scroll that he spread out over the table. It was a map detailing a larger section of the Riverlands than just the local woodlands, and he drew their attention to the Trident.
"There's a reason why they gave us Oldstones and Fairmarket without so much as a whimper. They want to shove us back into the Blue Fork- mounted horsemen can trample us once our backs are to a river. I say once we break them, we hit their left flank hard and drive them south, into the Red Fork."
Jon scanned the map, humming, before nodding his assent to the idea. He placed both hands onto the solid oaken table, meeting the eyes of his two commanders.
"My lords, this is a sound battleplan. Ser Medrick, I grant you command of the mounted units and the giants, assuming you can get Captain Wun to listen. Lord Glover, you will command the main body of bannermen and the archery squadrons."
"And you, my King? Where shall you be?"
"At the frontlines. How will my men fight for me, if I do not fight for them?"
A northern footman offered him a leather waterskin, and Jon took it gratefully. He drained it empty, and the drink felt so divine on his tongue he couldn't tell if it was water or mead. Even the briefest of battles seemed to sap all the liquid from a man, leaving him exhausted and parched. The lines of combat had closed when the sun hung low in the sky, and now nightfall was setting in. Soon it would be dark, and then the fighting would turn truly vicious.
Up ahead of him, the battlefield surged as a wedge of men in red tunics shoved hard against the men in grey, and the northern line buckled inwards. If the Lannister forces pushed through the center before the Others and their dead legion reached them, it would spell total disaster. The greater enemy numbers would roll over his much smaller force. They had to hold. He sheathed the steel longsword that he had been using in battle until now, and drew on the cold font of his power.
Jon summoned Blizzard, near five feet of wicked true ice, and pointed its tip to the sky.
"For Winterfell!" He called, and the northmen around him roared in return, rallying around him. Jon dropped the point of his sword and charged the Lion banners with a wordless and feral cry. His men rushed with him, but Jon pulled ahead, bounding forth with Other-worldly strength. He kept his frozen greatsword braced against the shoulder pauldron of his half plate, and his free arm pumped as he covered ground with frightening speed.
As he approached the knot of Lannister soldiers, their leader pointed at Jon and screamed at his men, whipping them into a flurry of motion as they raised shields and lowered spears and halberds, bracing for the charge.
When Jon passed the last of the Stark bannermen between he and the formation of Westerlanders, he kicked off the ground and launched himself straight at them, holding his left hand before him.
Right before he made contact, the air in front of Jon shimmered and crystallized into a curved wall of true ice, near ten feet in each direction. The ever-changing ice shattered every weapon that it touched before smashing into the group of enemy footmen- and either bowled them over or sent them flying like ragdolls.
Mere moments later, his men who had followed behind joined the fray, tearing into the stunned and wounded enemy like a pack of wolves. Blades rose and and fell, and scarlet lifeblood sprayed across the mire that was the ground below.
The Lannister soldiers to either direction closed ranks on Jon and the men that had charged in with him. Jon soon found himself beset on all sides, grim faced men-at-arms and grounded knights looking to claim the head of a king, confident he would fall to their numbers.
They were mistaken.
He ducked and lunged, swung his sword in wide, slashing arcs that took a terrible toll on the soldiers who had surrounded him. Blizzard sang a dreadful song of blue ice and white wind, of blood and of death.
Jon watched with a cold detachment as his true ice blade cut a lion knight's enameled armor, passing through steel, muscle, and bone with what felt like no resistance. The corpse fell to the ground in two pieces, bisected metal armor already frosting over.
The thundering of hooves behind him prompted Jon to twist around with frightening alacrity, narrowly avoiding a lance in the back. He countered with lightning speed, the frozen edge of Blizzard flashing up, decapitating the horse and slicing through the waist of it's rider.
His ears picked up on faint whistle of fletchings through air above, and a frozen barrier snapped into place overhead, fast as thought. A moment later, Jon heard the thunk-thunk-thunk of a volley of arrows impacting his wintry bulwark.
Wave after wave of men crashed upon Jon and the front line of the main body of northmen. Men on both sides died in droves, but still they held.
Jon's men. His soldiers, his people.
They held.
They fought like wolves, they screamed, they bled, they died.
But they held.
We arrive.
Farsight's sharp eyes confirmed it. Twin trails of destruction marked the Other's progress through the wings of the Lannister host. They were fast approaching Jon's position at the center of the battle, and left behind them chaos. Wights were tearing through the enemy like wildfire, and the roars of rage were fast turning into shrieks of terror. The Lion's battle lines were irreparably disrupted.
Man was not well suited to face that which lurked in the night.
"White Walkers!"
Jon's sight refocused into his own eyes just in time to shatter a sword thrust towards his breast. He also managed to catch the sight of the first group of Others that reached him. The first Walker burst in from Jon's left, leaping clear over the wall of Lannister soldiers, flanked by two of it's eerie brethren. Jon recognized the leader as one of the two he had brought with him to capture Daenerys Targaryen, and had been present when he forged his sword of ice.
Watching the Others lay waste to the enemy footmen reminded Jon why the Free Folk called them cold gods. They were pale blurs on the field of battle, turning groups of footmen and knights into mincemeat. Some of the Lannister men around them simply stopped and stared. They died with expressions of disbelief on their faces.
The trio of Others fought not only with their crystal swords, but also with the elements. They unseated riders and froze whole swathes of soldiers with blasts of freezing white wind, and impaled men on great spikes of ever-changing ice. The leader cut down ten men in half as many seconds, before turning and meeting Jon's blue eyes with it's own glowing azure orbs.
We have disrupted them.
The Others moved so fast they preceded the pandemonium they had caused on their bloody path here. The fear hit like a shockwave, spreading from the back ranks of the Lannister men in view towards where they were in the center of the field. Jon witnessed as the enemy's orderly lines of battle collapsed into disarray, some fleeing outright and the rest spitting into small knots of soldiers- all desperately defending against the sudden swarm of howling, shrieking wights.
A massive raven soared over the carnage. Many of his smaller brethren were already flocking in the sky, hungry for the fresh meat. Farsight's eyes picked out the details of the battle below him, and the images were etched into the mind of the man who was warged into him. The Lion banners were swamped by the Army of the Dead. Their strong and prideful wings were snapped, and now was the time to swing the killing blow.
The raven winged down towards the the northern edge of the battle, seeking to land on a particular knight of the Merman, as was the prearranged signal.
Jon was suddenly pulled back into his own body, as a Stark bannerman yanked him out of the way of a spear thrust, and promptly took a steel spearhead in the eye as morbid penance. Jon stabbed out with Blizzard, and the tip of the greatsword cut through the spearman's gorget and into his throat.
Damn it all to hell, he'd sunken too deep into the mind of the raven again. A fatal mistake in the midst of combat, and now one of his men had to pay that deadly price. He could now only hope that Farsight reached Medrick before the Lannisters reformed ranks.
The King of Winter, his loyal northmen, the blue-eyed Walkers and their wailing undead host shoved hard against the nearly broken men of the Westerlands. Jon cleaved through the lines of chainmail, armor, and red tunic, and soon he was so covered head-to-toe in filth he had to regularly wipe his eyes on the rough leather of his vambraces. The fighting reached a fervor pitch, and some battle-sense deep within Jon told him that the Northern army was slowly gaining the upper hand. Despite the Lion's greater numbers, his servants and their horde of wights had shifted the battle in Jon's favor. Soon, the perfect moment would arrive, the optimal time to strike the hammerblow that would shatter the enemy. He could feel it his bones.
A trumpeting cry split the battlefield. Unbidden, Jon felt a grim smile stretch across his face.
The earth rumbled beneath the feet of the combatants, and suddenly the adversaries to the north of Jon lurched southward, as an unyielding wave of steel and flesh crashed into them. Ser Medrick Manderly, resplendent in the blue and white of his House, leading the charge of a over a hundred mounted men as they cut a swath through the panicking Lannister men. The full force of the cavalry charge was a fearsome sight, as the Manderly knights drove their horses in a tight wedge, lancing or trampling every poor sod unfortunate enough to be in their path. And yet, the knights were merely harbingers of the true storm.
"By the Gods!" screamed a man, right before he was gored by the steel-covered tusk of a charging bull mammoth. The rest of his unit barely had time to raise up wooden shields before they were smashed by an oversized sledgehammer, with grisly results. The giants had entered the field.
Captain Wun Weg Wun Dar Wun lead twenty of his people on an unstoppable advance through the enemy. The giants lashed out with hammers and clubs, sending men, horses, and wights flying through the air or squashing them into a bloody paste onto the ground. Their fourteen-foot captain stamped forth and laid waste all around him with a giant-sized greatsword, the enormous weapon's bulk crushing anything it hit just as often as it cut with it's edge.
The war mammoths trampled over any soldier in their path, and at the head of the great stampede was a the same juggernaut of a bull that had announced their arrival. The massive male trumpeted once again, raising his forelegs into the air, and then bringing them down onto a knot of Lannister spearmen that had been threatening him. Jon dived into his mind and was almost immediately thrown back into his own body by the pulsing red rage and pain that clouded the animal's senses. But Jon had been in control of the mammoth for long enough to leave just one message.
Go South.
The charging wall of meat and furs crashed through the right flank into the enemy's left, the giants following right behind and driving all the Westerlander soldiers before them like macabre shepherds. As Wun Wun crossed the field, the giant turned and spotted Jon, his hefty metal greathelm nodding up and down. "Snow." Jon heard his deep rumble even over the din of battle. A particularly brave footman saw the opening and ran up to sink his blade into Captain Wun's boot. The captain turned and kicked the offender with his other leg, and Jon heard the sickening thwack as the man was wrapped around the metal greave covering Wun Wun's shin.
The Giants stamped through the battlefield, and their long strides covered ground nearly as fast as the horsemen who had preceded them. In what felt like seconds after their entrance, they swept all the enemy before them southward, as the Lannisters broke and fled before these fantastical and horrifying new adversaries that none of them had ever faced before. Soon, all that was left on the battlefield near Jon was him and his shocked men, along with a few stragglers.
He turned and looked at his own army, and took in their expressions of astonishment.
"Well, what are you gaping at? After them!" he bellowed. The Army of the North raised swords into the sky as one and roared back, before turning and rushing southwards hot on the heels of their enemies.
Jon sprinted forward, his blood pumping. Blizzard filled his veins with icy vigor, and the cold font of power within him swirled like a snowstorm. Once again, he quickly outpaced his army. Well, most of his army. The three Others kept pace with him easily, bounding over the ground with the same supernatural speed and strength that he did. The leader, now familiar to Jon, pulled ahead to match his stride.
They sprinted over the muddy ground, following the tracks of earth crushed under giant and mammoth feet, as well as the clear trail of corpses.
Jon traded looks with the ancient creature, as a servant of his now- just has it had been a servant of the terrible Great Other that had once seeked to dominate all the realms of men. Despite how they were all nearly similar, something about this particular Other seemed to set it apart, beyond way the others seemed to defer to it. There was a light in it's glowing eyes that communicated age, even wisdom. Jon felt that this one was long in the tooth, if even a creature that was everlasting could be considered elderly. Jon suppressed a sudden laugh that tried to climb out of his breast. It was as good a name as any.
"I'll call you Longtooth." he proclaimed. The Other's expression was changeless.
For what purpose.
"As a name. It's how I'm going to call to you as from now on." Jon drew inspiration from Bran's naming of his raven. It was more than just a jest, it was a reminder: that just like his old sword, Longtooth was a weapon.
A name is as pointless as the primitive method you use to communicate it. You still do not understand the eternal.
Jon snorted. "Aye, but I understand it enough to do this, don't I?" raising Blizzard in his right fist, before pouring on more cold power into his body and sprinting ahead. Soon, he and the Others heard the screams of warfare once again and cleared a small rise to see the sprawling Red Fork and the scene that played out on it's northern bank.
The Lannister host had been greatly reduced, Jon judged it to be perhaps half its original number, if not less. The bannermen were cornered, caught between the hammer of the giants and the anvil of the third river of the Trident. Hemmed in by at least five thousand wights, the Westerlander force had nowhere to flee as the giants and dead men carved into them with gruesome furor. But, as Jon continued to watch, a detachment of knights and mounted men-at-arms managed to break through the western side of the encirclement.
If those men escaped, they would flee into the Whispering Woods and make their way back to Riverrun, bringing with them news of Jon's numbers, his Giants, and his Army of the Dead. He couldn't let that happen.
Jon angled towards the breach, his loping gait eating up the distance as he accelerated towards the escaping horsemen. He felt his cold servants right behind him, and with that same uncanny timing all four of them leapt up into the air, before hitting the side of the group of riders like a thunderbolt.
Blizzard was the leading edge of Jon's mighty leap, cleaving through a man and his mount before carving a furrow into the riverbank. As Jon landed onto the ground, he reversed his grip on his true ice armament, raising it up hilt-first, its icy tip pointed down. Jon drew hard on the power of Winter. He thought of the freezing cold of the True North, the bite of being caught in a blizzard at Castle Black, the immovable bulk of the glaciers in the Shivering Sea. He thought of the Wall.
Jon slammed his sword down, the blade sinking down into the hard-packed earth of the riverbank as if it were soft sand. From that point of origin burst forth the blue-white shimmering form of true ice, spreading out all around him and rising up behind him, snapping into place as solid barrier reaching twenty feet into the air, cutting off the path of retreat for the Lannister knights.
The enemy mounts reared and turned at the sudden appearance of the obstacle, some could not slow enough in time and crashed headlong into the wall of ice. As the men fell from their saddles and tumbled onto the ground, Longtooth and his compatriots quickly moved among the survivors and slew them. The trapped men managed to reorganize themselves into a defense formation, horses wrested back under control, swords and spears leveled at the abrupt threat.
One rider, cloaked in red fox-fur, advanced to the front of the group, despite the protests of his mount. The horse's eyes were rolling wildly in it's sockets, and it was stamping it's hooves in both fear and panic. Yet, the knight kept a firm grim on the reins and refused to let the animal flee. Jon presumed this man was some kind of officer, based on the brilliance of his enameled armor, shining a proud Lannister crimson, golden etchings and Lion crest gleaming through the mud and blood. Then Jon took note of how all the men in this group were bearing signs and seals of commanding nobility, and how they all still deferred to this golden knight.
Not just any officer then. The general of the Lannister army himself. The man raised a gauntleted hand up to his helm and pulled it off, revealing a mass of yellow locks, long and shaggy, and a huge bristly beard of golden hair, almost in the style of the Umbers. The man looked ridiculous, but Jon found no humour in the situation, because the general's face was flushed with red with rage, his hazel eyes shining with deadly intent.
"You stand before Daven Lannister, Lord of Casterly Rock, Warden of the West and commander of the armies of the Riverlands. I demand you name yourself, demon." his voice trembled with barely contained fury.
"Jon Snow."
Daven Lannister sneered. "The Bastard King in the North. And now you are a king of monsters as well." he gestured to the Others that flanked him. Longtooth took the opportunity to raise the freshly killed Lannister officers into wights. "The Seven damn you, Snow. You've betrayed mankind and sided with the beasts."
"Surrender now, Lord Daven, and I will spare your men." responded Jon, resting both gloved hands on the cold pommel of Blizzard.
The Lannister general merely chuckled, a harsh and bitter sound. "My men will not lay down arms to savages and northmen. Even if I ordered it so, they would rather die than be captive to monsters." he spat onto the ground. "Enough talk. I challenge you to single combat, to the death. I know you are no knight, but the law can go bugger itself. I haven't quenched my blade in nearly enough Northman blood to properly avenge my father."
Jon stared at Daven Lannister, his eyes glowing blue in the fading light. To his surprise, the other man held his stare without flinching.
We should slay and raise them.
No.
"I accept your challenge." Jon acknowledged the request by raising a fist into the air, and suddenly, the raging battle to the east began to die down.
The wights disengaged from the fighting, completely disregarding the desperate men who hacked at them as they reformed into the a half circle, trapping the remaining Lannister bannermen against the river. Wun Wun and the giants took the cue and broke off to stand near the little gathering of men by Jon's newly made wall. The two armies, living and dead, stood in sudden and wary ceasefire. Longtooth watched the occurrences before turning and staring at Jon, his cold whisper ringing in Jon's head.
This is a mistake. These actions are the least effective in killing the enemy.
When Jon answered, he addressed both his Other servants and the men facing them. "Single combat follows the Old Way, and we will end this battle with honor." he watched as Daven dismounted and pulled a greatsword from the sheath strapped to his saddle. Jon lifted his hands off of Blizzard, allowing it dissipate into motes of crystalline ice. Instantly, he felt a flood of fatigue and pain wash over his body.
You are weakened without the True Ice.
Jon drew the simple steel longsword he had kept at his side. He stepped forth to meet Daven. "Surrender now, my lord, and you will spare yourself some injury." he stated.
"I will enjoy hacking your head from your shoulders, bastard." avowed the Lannister lord.
Lord Daven, in his gilded and painted armor, clad in fine fox-fur, stood in stark contrast to King Jon Snow, who wore simple steel half-plate over a ragged leather tunic and a tattered cloak. The two men met in the center of the impromptu arena with a clash of steel and wordless battlecries.
Daven hammered with a double-handed grip- using his greater height and longer reach, and the fine castle-forged greatsword, as richly made and golden as he, crushing down on Jon. The king's own shorter longsword deflected the blows with barely enough room to spare, and Jon felt the exhaustion set deeper into his limbs with each strike.
And yet, his blue eyes burned strong as they watched the movement of his opponent, and Jon marveled that the man could move so slow. He watched as the next strike fell onto him from above, moving as though the air was as thick as honey. Jon's own body screamed in protest but he had plenty of time to step out of the way, lashing out with his right arm to dig the point of his sword into a chink of the Lannister's armor.
Daven roared in pain and rage, slashing at Jon in wide swings to force him back and away after drawing blood. Despite his fury, the enemy knight still maintained form and control, single-mindedly trying to land a killing blow on the Northman. Jon found himself admiring the man's discipline, for not many could maintain a level head after injury- this Daven Lannister was a dangerous swordsman.
Jon saw the next attack coming, a horizontal swing that would bisect him if it landed. He leaned backwards out of the arc of the weapon as it passed before him, and then struck it hard near the crossguard with a vicious two handed swing- from lower right to upper left. Daven lost his grip on the handle of the weapon, and it hung loosely from his left hand only. Jon took a step in, bringing Daven into range of his longsword, and with slash from above severed the man's left arm at the elbow.
Daven Lannister screamed with agony as his armored limb and the greatsword crashed onto the riverbank. He fell to his knees and caught himself with the remaining arm, blood pouring out from the stump of his left. Jon leaned down and with his free hand sealed the wound shut with shifting ice.
"Surrender." he intoned. "You've lost."
"No." gasped Daven, forcing the words out through gritted teeth. "Never." He looks up at Jon and smiles through the blood and pain. "And so, it ends."
"No, my lord. It has only just begun."
The sound of the rest of his army approaching filled the air. The noise of more than a thousand men howling for blood. They joined the dead men and the giants at the banks of the Red Fork, crushing the remaining Westerlanders into the river.
And the rest was a slaughter.
Dragon Queen
"A letter, Your Grace." he spoke.
"From?" questioned Daenerys.
"The biggest bloody fucking raven I've ever seen."
She coughed, and Tyrion had the good grace to put on an apologetic expression. "It is marked with the direwolf seal of House Stark. A white wolf, the sigil of King Snow." he continued. Daenerys took the offered letter from the dwarf and opened it.
The letter was short, but she read it over multiple times regardless. Wordlessly, Daenerys handed the letter back to Tyrion, who also scanned it over.
"Impossible." he exclaimed.
"And yet." replied Daenerys. "It has been done."
"I heard whispers about this from a rider come in from Stoney Sept. I'd thought it either false or greatly exaggerated but… this is from King Jon himself. The bastard did it."
"The Riverlands will soon be freed, and the gates to the West thrown open. The foundation of Cersei's power." mused Daenerys.
"The minstrels have already named it: The Battle of the Bloody Fork. Or The Slaughter at the Trident. Not sure which one I like better." rejoined Tyrion.
Daenerys stood up from her seat inside the lavish royal tent, and strode towards the opening. "It seems we will have to make our way to the West sooner than expected."