"When the chroniclers write of this moment, they will say that I objected to your suicide," Daryn muttered, breaking the silence of the chill day.
"You already objected yesterday," Tristan replied.
"No I objected yesterday," Domeric said.
"I thought you objected the day before?"
"That was me," Cley said.
"Oh, so you all objected," he shot a forced look of hurt at Daryn, "I thought at least you would understand."
"I understand why you're doing this. I just think you're being stupid."
Cley nodded. "Tristan, the Brotherhood are rebels, they should not be treated like honoured foes."
Tristan loved his friends, but he tired of their objections to this. "Already by doing this I am closer to the Handless than I have been since we started this hunt. No thanks to your men Dom."
"I won't apologise, I wish they hadn't hesitated."
It had been Bolton men who had at last found an emisary sent by the Handless, agreeing to Tristan's proposal for a meeting. They had almost hanged the messengers in disbelief before their heads cooled and they decided to bring them to Tristan instead.
They had passed on their message from the Handless, he was prepared to meet with Tristan to discuss terms, they would meet in this field, on this date. Tristan may bring a small escort, no armies or else the deal was off. Despite the objections of all of his friends, Tristan had agreed. Robb was in talks to end the war with the Lannisters, now he would do the same here. Or so he hoped.
"They said they would be here at dawn." Daryn said.
"They are," Cley replied, pointing out to the east where a clouded sun shone behind the hills.
Tristan raised his claw to shield his eyes from the glare. Sure enough, a wagon was approaching down the lane. "Get ready, just in case," Tristan said.
"Finally, some sense," Daryn replied, using his battleaxe to push himself to his feet.
The wagon trundled closer and none of his friends or guards said a word. Shield lay docile at Tristan's feet, and that reassured him more than all the blades of his guard.
When the wagon pulled up, four men leapt out in mismatched armour, clutching various types of polearm and advanced towards them.
"You Prince Tristan?" One of them asked him.
"I am, are you the Handless?"
He shook his head. "The Handless isn't here."
Tristan's hand curled. "It was agreed that I would meet him here." Instinctively his eyes scanned the open terrain around them. There was nowhere to hide, but still he worried.
"No, it was agreed if you came here with guards only, as you have done, that you could meet him. But not here."
"What are you talking about?" Tristan demanded.
The soldier pointed at the wagon. "Get in, and we will take you to him. Alone."
Daryn stepped forward. "You're mad if you think we'll let you take our prince away like that."
"If he wants to meet the Handless, then this is the condition."
"Daryn," Tristan said calmly.
Dom whirled on him from the other side. "You cannot seriously be considering this?"
"They'll kill you."
"If they wanted to do that they would have filled that wagon with crossbowmen and filled me with quarrels by now."
"They know we'd kill them before they got a second shot off if they did that," Cley said.
"They've sold their lives before for less," Tristan reminded them. "And the Handless is smart, he's outfoxed me before. He knew that I would be here, he does not know that I would accompany his men to a different place where they could kill me more easily. That's a strange gamble to take. Besides, everyone knows I go to negotiate with him. To kill me under that premise is an evil that everyone will recognise."
"You cannot know that," Dom said.
"No I can't. But I choose to believe it." He turned back to the brotherhood. "I accept your terms."
"Tris!" Cley and Daryn said together. Dom pressed his lips into a thin line.
Tristan turned to them. "I'll be fine," he promised them, before kneeling beside Shield. He ran his fingers through his wolf's fur. The animal cocked his head to one side and looked back at him earnestly. "If I need you," Tristan said again to his friends, looking up at them, "Shield will bring you to me."
Shield growled affectionately and Tristan hugged each of his friends before leaving with the brotherhood.
One of them held out their hand to him once Tristan was sat down. "Your sword."
Tristan shook his head. "No."
"But-"
"No."
The man met his gaze, backed down then withdrew his hand. "Very well."
The four men of the brotherhood sat opposite him, clutching their weapons tightly. All of them glanced at his sword repeatedly, two of them were sweating uncomfortably. The sight made Tristan relax as the wagon set off.
He tried to focus on the path the wagons were taking so he could retrace his steps if he was somehow able to escape an attempt to murder him. But he couldn't do that and keep an eye on the members of the brotherhood in the wagon with him, and they were the more immediate threat. If it came to an ambush in the camp, he would just have to pick a direction and run.
They led him through a copse of trees, where he thought they would drop him off, and out the other side down the path towards a broken mill that was clearly their destination. Other wagons and warriors waited around it, many more than Tristan had expected. They rolled to a stop near the mill's entrance, the door hanging off it's hinges.
The soldiers got out before him, keeping their crossbows levelled at him. "Out, slowly," one of them said.
He obeyed, jumping down and walking slowly around the wagon towards the mill entrance. He paused and turned, making the brotherhood take a step back. "You want me to go inside, I assume?"
"Slowly."
He nodded at the crossbowman and, slowly, entered the mill.
The inside of the mill was dusty and creaky. Grindstones sat still, like they wouldn't move again. The stairs twisted up the far side of the mill, but the banister had broken in several places, the remains littering the floor.
In the middle of the ground floor stood a table, set for two. On the other side of it a thin man sat in a mail shirt that was a little too big for him, a thick cloak making him look almost like a child. Stood well back from him were another two crossbowmen, their weapons levelled at him.
"Greetings I a-" he was silenced af he crossed the threshold by the door slamming behind him and two sharp objects jabbing into his back. He raised his hands, showing he was unarmed.
"We know who you are," the small man at the table said. "Please, take a seat. There's no need for that," he added, speaking to whoever was behind him. The sharp points withdrew. Tristan glanced over his shoulder. A spearman stood either side of the door. They looked to be standing at rest, but Tristan could see the tension in their muscles and the grips on their spear shafts.
"I was surprised you accepted my request for talks," Tristan said.
"And I was surprised you made it," the little man replied. "Even more that you agreed to my conditions."
"I wanted to speak with you. It is you, isn't it. The Handless?"
The little man sat forward. "Not a name I would have chosen." He rested his elbows on the table, arms pointed straight up. "But apt, none-the-less." His long sleeves rolled down to reveal the stumps at the end of his arms. Not a deformity of birth, he recognised the treated stumps of a severed wrist well enough.
"Who did that to you?" Tristan asked.
"The lords of westeros."
"Which lord."
"All of them."
"That can't be true."
"Or it can," the Handless lay his arms down on the table, letting the long sleeves roll back over the stumps of his wrist.
"Only one gave the order," Tristan pointed out.
"And he would not remember giving that order. Yet all would recognise what has happened to me at once."
"What did you do to deserve it?"
"Nothing, by my reckoning."
"He wouldn't have done it without good cause."
"He did."
"But you would have had to give him a reason."
"Would I?"
"The fact that you haven't denied it tells me you did."
The Handless shrugged. "Perhaps I did. I wouldn't know. They didn't deign to explain why I lost my hand, not in words a child could understand at any least."
A child? "Your parents didn't explain to you?" He asked.
"They lost their heads the day I lost my hands. And the first person to take pity on a starving, handless child was a wandering septon. He took me in, but he didn't know why I had lost my hands either."
"When was this, and where? I could ask around, find out why-"
"I know why." The Handless interupted. "Because you could. Just the same way that you fight in our homes, burning them in your war. Because you could."
"We fought because Joffrey murdered our father."
"We didn't."
"And I didn't burn your homes, that was the Lannisters."
The Handless gave a mirthless smile. "I've heard what you did to the Reach."
Tristan sat up straight. "What I did to the Reach was cruel. An act of war, but cruel, I won't deny. But I am not responsible for defending the people of the Reach."
"And where were the people pledge to defend us when armies flying the lion banner came to burn us." Or when armies under the wolf or the trout came to burn them out again."
"If you are asking me to find a kind way to wage a war, you'll be waiting until the breaking of the world for your answer. But I have burned no towns while I've been here and put no villages to the sword."
The Handless nodded. "That's right, and it surprised me. When I heard that you were being sent back, that's what I thought you would do." He gestured with an arm, "bring us some drinks."
One of the brotherhood set a wooden cup on the table in front of each of them. Tristan took a swig, pausing to watch as the Handless did the same, curious about how he would do it with no hands. But without much difficulty, he took the cup between the stumps of his arms and lifted it to his mouth, taking a slow draft. "Food is more difficult," he said, setting the cup down again.
"I imagine many things are."
"I learned to manage."
"You did more than that," Tristan said. "You raised an army out of peasants, when you have no banners to call your own. You armed them, taught them to defeat knights and armoured riders. You nearly defeated me in battle and took several castles. Whatever your reasoning, your skills cannot be denied."
"I did what I had to to protect the people."
"Not many start life with such lofty goals."
"I didn't. I protected some, when people knew I could, they came to me for protection, and then I had a brotherhood. And I saw I could do something new, something different here. But then you came back with reinforcements to stop me."
Tristan sat back. "What would you have done?"
"Torn it down," the Handless said. "Ripped the lords from their castles and taken them for the people. Raised armies of loyal soldiers with proper weapons, not conscripts with sticks shoved into their hands. We would have turned the Riverlands from a collection of bickering nobles to a nation, one united in loyalty and devotion. Not a playground for the nobles of a continent to fight over so they don't ruin their own fields. We would have had government for all free men, armies raised and pledged to defend our borders. Kings would stop hurting us and the world would see us as a strong and independent power."
"But now you can't," Tristan said.
"I could, the blood price would be higher, but I could."
"So why don't you?"
"Perhaps I still will."
"And yet you speak to me. Why?"
"Because you asked to meet me. That surprised me, I didn't think you would bring yourself to the level of negotiating with a lowly rebel."
Tristan nodded, accepting the complaint. "There were those who suggested that I do not," he admitted.
"So why did you?"
"Because I want to end this war, and that can be done more quickly if you agree to lay down your arms."
"Why would I agree to do that?"
"To stop the dying, to save your people."
"They fight for a cause beyond your understanding."
"No, they fight for you, they die for you, and if you tell them to stop they will, I have seen what they will do for you." He remembered the night attacks, made without any expectation of survival, or the prisoner who sliced his throat open on Tristan's blade rather than give up his master.
"And if we do not?"
"Then we will hunt you down, all of you."
"Would you make another Corpseroad here?"
"No," Tristan said at once. "I will not do that to my people."
The Handless' expression was inscrutable. "You asked to meet me, I assume you have a proposal that you think will make us lay down our arms."
"I do," Tristan said, leaning forwards. "Amnesty."
"Amnesty?" The Handless asked, disbelief cracking through his iron tone.
"Amnesty. If you command your forces to lay down their arms and return to civilian life, then I will not hunt them any longer. They can come back and till the fields, sow the crops, make pottery for all I care. As long as the violence ends, there will be no reprisals."
The Handless considered for a long moment. "The villages," he asked suddenly, "why did you evacuate them?"
Tristan considered his answer, knowing that peace or war may ride upon it. "The people did not need to be caught in between us in this war. Better that they be safely removed until the matter between us is settled."
The Handless nodded. "What else?"
"Any who take up arms again after the peace is offered will be once again branded as criminals, and this offer will not be made again. And finally you. I cannot allow you to remain in my brother's realm as a former rebel, that gives you two choices. The first is the easiest, you are banished from the realm, never again to set foot in lands that call my brother King."
"And the second, death I assume?"
"No, to kill you would end any peace between you and us. The other option is you join us."
The Handless was shocked speachless at that. "Join you?"
"Yes, you are an able commander, and you have soldiers who would happily fight under you. Form yourselves into a company of soldiers and place yourself under my brother's command with my sponsorship. If you refuse both of these offers, then I am afraid the only option is indeed, death. For you and all your followers."
"Or death for you!" One of the spearmen said and started to raise his weapon.
"No!" Tristan and the Handless said together. "Put that thing down before you take someone's eye out," Tristan finished. He glared at the man until the spear was resting on the ground.
He turned back to the Handless. "So, what do you say?"
"He agreed to your terms?" Dom asked.
"He did," Tristan said. "He has given the command that all members of the brotherhood are to stand down immediately, I have given them a week to do so without breaching the agreement."
"And the Handless himself?" Daryn asked.
"Once the Brotherhood is disbanded, he will go into exile in the south." Tristan had hoped that maybe such a force could be added to the North's armies. But the Handless had said that he had never served a king and wouldn't start now. Fifty men were stationed with the Handless to guarantee his position. But Tristan believed him.
"So, what do we do then?" Cley asked.
"We wait to ensure the brotherhood disbands, and then," he drew out a map, "if my cartography is correct, we aren't too far from House Darry. We'll head over there to break up this fight between Houses Frey and Piper." Then they would go to Maidenpool to deal with the mercenaries there, and then they would go back to the west and the lands of House Mallister to help repel the longships there. One by one, as he had with the brotherhood, he would bind the wounds of Robb's kingdom until he returned to make them whole again.
