It had been over a month since they had set off from the Gates, and in that month the dead mine in the ridges had blossomed anew. The weeds and overgrown grass on the roads had been trampled by a thousand thousand footsteps, the mold infested homes which had laid lifeless for years had been torn down, and on their foundations had been erected new homes, for new families and new stories not yet written.
Every time Jon laid eyes on the town or wandered through it, he could not help but feel pride swelling in his chest.
This is the result of the coin counting I so despise. W hat has my swordwork ever wrought?
My siblings' lives.He thought, remembering the wildling ambush. And the life and freedom of some nameless boy besides.
Mya's tradelines had also grown so efficient that they did not need to return to Willowbrook every day. Wagons of steel left for Willowbrook and the Gates once a week, and the gold from trade and their stipend would pay for food to feed the village and wood to build it.
Whatever issues the Gates had with steel have long been resolved. They might not need steel from the Iron Oaks anymore, even after the threat of the clansmen had put to bed.
A threat which had been slowly waning as Robar's band reached to every corner of the Vale like a cleansing flame. Every day they heard stories of another warband of clansman being trampled by the knights, soon they would all flee back to their mountains with their tails between their legs.
Which means Domeric will be leaving soon.Jon thought, it made him somewhat sullen, but such was life. They could still exchange letters and run into each other in tournaments or feasts at least. I should introduce him to Harrold, the calculated Bolton and the foolhardy Hardyng, like oil and water.
But as he wandered the town among the newly built houses, among men carting raw iron and wood, women cleaning clothes in the stream and children running and playing, he felt a set of eyes staring at him, and when he turned to meet them, ice ran down his spine.
It was a raven sitting atop one of the houses, a common enough bird, what set him on edge however, were its eyes; glazed white, and they were peering at him with humanlike malintent.
The eyes of a skinchanger, a warg.Just as the book Baldrick had given him had described. And the only skinchanger for hundreds of miles is supposed to be me.
Zephyr slammed into it from behind a moment later. There was a violent cawing and ripping of feathers, before the hawk wrapped its talons around the corvid's neck and snapped it, then dropped the lifeless bird at his feet.
"An ill omen." Mya said, coming up to stand beside him with a labored smile, one which died the moment she saw the grave look on his face. "Jon?"
"Go get Domeric." He said, though the other bastard stood frozen in place. "Mya, go get Domeric."
The girl gave him a look then quickly nodded at his words, while he unsheathed the greatsword from his back and cried out in a booming voice more clear than he had ever accomplished before.
"INSIDE!" He yelled, soon to be swarmed by a dozen different eyes. "EVERYONE INSIDE, NOW!"
Panic befell the town at his words, young men and women scurried towards any open door while mothers and fathers searched frantically for their children, grabbing or carrying them before running inside. Among them stood tall, armored bodies, the men at arms from the Gates, who moved calmly towards Jon, though their faces too wore looks of uneasiness.
The squire of the blackfish however, covered his eyes, then he soared the skies above the town. He scanned the lands beneath him, and his sharp eyes saw a band of thirty or so men galloping up the road from Willowbrook atop donkeys and beasts of burden.
Save for the men riding at the front of the band who wore heavy armor and rode stallions bred for war, he would have thought them knights, were it not for their filthy unkept hair and wild, scared faces. It is as Brynden told me, clansmen armed and armored with steel.
More ravens and crows flew ahead of the band towards the town, eyes of the skinchanger in their midst, but Zephyr would hunt them all.
He opened his eyes to see the town deserted once more, save for a few people still rushing towards their houses. He was surrounded by the men at arms, while Domeric and Mya stood to his right shaking him awake.
"Jon!" Domeric said, his voice was always calm, but now it was flustered. "What's the matter?"
"Clansmen." He said, then pointed up the road. "Thirty, all of them mounted and riding towards us."
"Thirty!?" One of the men at arms asked, his voice nearly breaking. "There's only nine of us! We must retreat to the Gates!"
"And leave the women and children at their mercy?" Jon said, his voice dripping with distain. "Have you spent the last month parading a protector to these people just to run away when the need arises?"
"Aye, grow a spine, craven." Another one said, spitting at his feet, he looked young, though still older than Jon. "Each one of us is worth five of them, we will face them head on."
"That is idiocy." Jon said, he had trained with these men enough to know they stood no chance so gravely outnumbered against a mounted force. "We will have someone on roofs harassing them with arrows the moment they ride into the town, once they're distracted and unmounted, the rest will spring out from hiding and ambush them, that will even the numbers."
"There is no honor in that!" The young men at arms said.
"This is no children game, this is life and death, war with a hundred souls hanging in the balance." Jon said, remembering the words Brynden told at the Gates. "There is no honor in war."
"But—"
"Jon speaks true." Domeric said, there was a sinister edge to his tone that Jon had never heard before, but one he appreciated all the same. "And even if he did not, none of you are to question him, orders are orders, gentlemen, and you willobey them."
"In that same vein, your orders are to stay alive." Jon said, drawing unsettled eyes back to him. "For every one of you who falls, we will be more severely outnumbered, do not seek out duels, if you fight around me and keep them off my back, you will live to see the sunset."
Once he got nods of approval from all of them, his posture relaxed, until one of the men at arms raised his arm.
"I am a good shot, ser." The man said.
"Anyone else?" Jon asked, when he received no more volunteers, he pointed to a nearby roof of a house still under construction. "Get a bow and get on top of there, aim for the armored men at the helm of the band, everyone else, get your swords and shields ."
The men quickly scattered at his words, and Jon allowed the pit of unease to dig into in his chest as his mind was filled with visions of blood and slaughter. Then he caught sight of Mya, her eyes were fearful and her arms crossed, but she still stood straight.
"Neither of you die." She said, her eyes darting between them. "I can't even imagine it, please, live."
"I will not die here." Jon said.
"And I will not let him die here." Domeric said
That was all the assurance she needed, she wrapped her arms around their necks, then gave them one last look before running off to one of the houses where the townsfolk took shelter.
Sometime later, clopping echoed through the town, it was then followed by the prattling of their riders, their accents and dialects near incompressible to Jon's ears, but their voices were numerous and fearles, and there was no mistaking the clanging of steel of their gear.
Soon he heard the countless footfalls as most of them unmounted and spread out throughout the village like a miasma of choas. A band of raiders had arrived at their nascent town, with no intent other than to stain its dirt with blood and ash.
For as long as I draw breath, it will not come to pass.
But then he heard footsteps nearing them and readied his sword, a moment later a band of three clansmen rounded the corner to where Jon and the men at arms were hiding behind the houses. Domeric grabbed one from behind and ran a dagger across the man's throat, the same dagger he had won in the race, another had been overpowered by four men at arms and disemboweled, the last man barely had time to widen his eyes, let alone scream out before Jon's greatsword pierced his heart.
It had been years since he killed his first man, all the way back in the wolfswood, decades of life, memories and dreams extinguished by his hand as life left his eyes, all because the wildling had dared threatened his family. Now it was no different, and the wild spray of blood that coated his hands sent a familiar battle lust blazing in his veins.
"Ulf? Strag?" A voice called out, but then he heard an arrow whiz through the air, followed by a heavy thud against the dirt, as though an armored man had crashed to the ground.
He struck true.
Ulf and Strag had then been forgotten, and the clansmen raged and stampeded towards the half-built house atop which the sharpshooter rained more arrows down on them.
At that, Jon gave the signal, and they began to creep out from behind their houses. It was at that moment that they caught sight of the sheer number of men they were to face. A few of the man at arms hesitated, their knees quivering and their boots gluing to the ground, but Jon kept forging ahead and soon, so they did they.
They crept up behind the clansmen, slow and low to ground at first, as silent as the passing breeze, their footsteps swallowed by the neighing of their horses and mules and the screaming of the clansmen. Then, once they were close enough, he rushed forward and buried his greatsword into a man's back, beside him half a dozen blades accomplished the same and the ground was littered with warm corpses.
He tore his blade from the man's back and swung it at another before he could turn. The clansman tried to raise his shield to block it, but he was too slow, and the tip of Jon's blade sliced his neck with a wild spray of blood. He took the axe from the man's hand before he fell to the ground and threw it toward another clansman, it traveled through the air in a perfect arc before burying itself in his skull.
A moment later, the skirmish would begin in earnest, and the clashing of steel and tearing of flesh would play out as it had countless times before across kingdoms and eons, and in this, Jon had no equal.
Two men charged him, they were big and unarmored, perhaps their blinding strength and savage war cries would have scared away some, but his limbs did not carry an ounce of unease as he disemboweled one and cleaved open the skull of the other.
A sword came flying at his side, but one of the men at arms parried it for him, then slit the clansman's throat, Jon gave him a thankful nod, then turned his attention back to the bloody work at hand.
And bloody it would be, he was a fury unstoppable, faster, stronger and simply betterat the business of death than any of these men, these raiders and ravagers who knew only death could ever hope to be. Their only recourse would have been to drown him in blood and bury him in bodies. And in that, they would get close, for his will was bent wholly on carving a path through the unarmored clansmen towards the armored men leading them, men who too seemed intent on clashing blades with him. It was the last folly the Stranger would allow them.
The three armored men beset him at once, one was wielding two axes, the other a sword and shield and the third a claymore that dwarfed even Jon's sword in size. All bore down on him, intent on killing him where he stood, but his blade danced, and men died.
He backstepped and avoided the shield bash of the first, then in the same movement swung his sword to batter aside the rampaging twin axes. All the while, the last clansmen screamed a bloody war cry, he raised his claymore over his head and swung it down with the force of a dozen men, it would have carved any man in half, but Jon brought his sword up in a perfect parry and effortlessly matched the savage's strength.
The twin axed man would charge him once more, but it would be the last time he raised his axes. Jon brought his sword to his side, then slashed out twice, so fast he could sever a man in quarters were he not wearing heavy plate armor, so instead, Jon carved off the man's hands with unnatural precision.
He saw the man's eyes widen with unbridled pain and terror, then he stared at his newly formed stumps and screamed as a mother giving birth. It would not be long before a man at arms at Jon's side would bury a spear in his open mouth and shut him up for good, but by then Jon's attention was already back on the two men remaining.
He deflected another blow from the claymore, then he sidestepped a lunge by the shield bearer, were the man trained in a castle, with footwork drilled to perfection, he would have never fallen victim to the trip Jon employed. But what this man knew of discipline and form could fit on a rose petal, and he went tumbling to the ground, to be trampled and eventually slain by the men at arms behind Jon.
And then there was one…
The most fearsome of the bunch to be sure, his claymore could have cut a swath through the men at arms were Jon not here to match him, and his plate armor protected him from many of the stabs and slashes Jon had landed on his torso and arms.
Eventually however, Jon would swing his sword and the man's posture would simply break, his grip on his sword flattering as his stamina and strength were found wanting. Jon reached and grabbed him by the front of his armor, pulling him down then slipped his greatsword into the man's neck and down to the front of his chest, before pulling it out with a red mist and spray that showered him in blood.
As the clansman's body hit the ground, the rest faltered, then eventually bolted, but like a demon wrought from the Seven Hells, he would chase and gut them, not a single one would ever leave the town they had come to plunder.
He knew well enough that they would come to haunt him in his sleep, just as the wildling had done for weeks after Jon had butchered him. The terror in their eyes and the blood on his hands would not leave him, but the town had remained unburned and its people unmolested, and that was worth any number of foul dreams.
When he was done the roads once overrun with smiling maidens and happy children had now turned into a sight of nightmares with corpse after corpse littered the ground. Almost all were the clansmen, but he saw one of the men at arms among them, another man at arms sat and tore off his mail to examine a deep, ugly gash in his shoulder, Domeric took a seat next to him, Jon had thought it was to have a look at the man's shoulder, then he noticed the broken spear in the Bolton's thigh.
"Domeric!" Jon cried, rushing over to kneel at the boy's side, he was wincing in pain and clutching his thigh, though Jon slapped his hands away. "Careful, has it struck an artery?"
"How the fuck would I know!?" he screamed, the first time Jon had heard him swear.
"Alright, close your eyes and try to steady your breathing for me." Jon said, the two were soon swarmed by the rest of the men at arms, soon even the townsfolk would come pouring out of their houses, relieved and joyful, a few would come to surround them. One helped the man at arms next to them dress and bandage his shoulder, while Jon placed a hand on the Bolton's chest and glued his gaze to the wound, trying to remember the hours he spent helping the maester treat the wounded at the Gates.
If the bleeding is pulsing with the heartbeat, then an artery was struck and death is minutes away.
"Jon! Dom!" He heard the familiar voice of Mya crying out to them, then coming to their side, hey eyes widened when she saw Jon caked in blood then nearly fell out of their sockets when she saw Domeric's injury.
There was a pregnant pause that hung as all held their breath and the foul smell of the corpses almost overwhelmed them, until Jon finally broke it.
"He'll live." he said, sighing with relief. "No pulse on the wound, no rhythmic bleeding and it's not drowning us in blood, the spear missed his artery."
The crowd nearly exclaimed at his words, but Jon waved them silent.
"Your life still hangs in the balance however, I'll leave the choice to you." Jon said, rising to his feet. "We can pull out the spear now, I attempt to stemming the bleeding and cauterizing the wound, I've never done it before of course, but I'd be willing to try it to save your life."
"Or?"
"Or the spear stays in and stops bleeding and infection while you're taken to the Gates, Baldrick makes for a hundred times the physician I do, but the ride at the back of a wagon would be long and very painful."
He closed his eyes and took a few pained pants while the crowd around stood holding their breath, Jon eventually waved them away, ordering them to gather their valuables.
"I will endure any pain, I'll take the ride to the Gates." Domeric finally said, Jon and Mya shared a look before she rushed off to prepare a wagon.
Five minutes later, Jon emerged from his rooms having cleaned off most of the blood and dirt from his face, but now he was clad in the same black plate armor he had bought a year ago at the tourney. Zephyr landed on his shoulder, it's claws and beak stained with blood, and around it's ankle he tied a quickly scribbled letter, and the hawk set off again. It would scout the road to the Gates and have that letter in the blackfish's hands in no time.
Once outside again, he helped load Domeric on to the back of the wagon. The heir would not be leaving alone, traveling with the wagon would be a long caravan as the men and women of the town who would take turns on the back of the ponies and beasts of burden until they reached Gates. The town would be abandoned once more, though this time, only temporarily.
"Right, keep dressing his wounds like I showed you." Jon told woman who would nursing Domeric's wound along the way, Mya looked over to them from the driver's seat, her eyes filled worry. "And most importantly of all, make sure his leg is secured, and that the spear does not move. Mya this better be the smoothest wagon you've ever led; one unlucky bump is all it would take for it to find his artery."
"Of course, of course." Mya said, nodding to herself. "Can you not nurse his leg yourself?"
"I am not coming with you." Jon said. "Willowbrook has fallen, but it's people yet live."
"What!?" the woman next to Domeric asked, her tone turning terrified. She had family in Willowbrook if he had to guess. "How do you know?"
I have a magic bird."The spear in his thigh, it belonged to Willowbrook's militia, I would recognize the make anywhere."
"Stop." Domeric said from the floor of the wagon. "You're doing it again."
"What am I doing again?"
"Rushing headfirst into something without stopping to think it through." Domeric said. "You did it when we were meant to start this mine and I stopped you, you did it when you took those refugees in and I allowed it, let me stop now, please, if Willowbrook is overrun with clansman, this is folly beyond compare."
"You have a point," Jon said, allowing himself a small smile then moving to kneel by the man. "Some situations do demand more patience than I am capable of, and I have paid the price for my recklessness many a time before.
"But in other cases, every second of indecision is paid for with a pound of flesh." Jon said, rising to his feet once more and taking a step off the carriage to go find Grey.
"Jon." Mya called out behind him, her pleading. "Please don't, come with us."
"I cannot." He said, his smile slowly dying as he imagined the fates of every person who'd crossed his path in willowbrook, the innkeeper and the seamstress, Lady Eleanor and Tristan, even Gilbert and Stewart. "I cannot. See you at the Gates, you two."
