THE CROWNLESS
Each day's ride through the Gift was relentless.
They always started with something the Canadians called 'reveille' at dawn, a loud droning horn blast to wake all. Jon didn't think he could hate a horn so much, and it was obvious from every face that even the wildlings felt the same way.
Tents would be struck and packs loaded onto the horses, ponies and unicorns. A light breakfast would be had, for both men and mounts. The Canadians would then get inside their metal beast with Rowan Umber and it would take them away at great speed down the Kingsroad. From that point, three chieftains were in charge, though they often argued with the princess called Val. Two were called Ygritte and Ryk, the third was unknown to Jon.
Next came riding for every daylight hour. The wildling families and their herds moving south got off the road to allow passage of the column, while others dispersed into the countryside to settle.
This monotony was broken up with regular stops to rest, but they never seemed long enough to truly recover before the march resumed.
By command of Michael Duquesne, Jon rode with Val and her escort in the centre. Ygritte, the chieftain of the Laughing Tree tribe, rode at the front with the strange banners, and 'Longspear' Ryk, her second, rode at the back. At the pauses, Jon wondered if this was to prevent either him or the princess from riding away easily, or if it was to keep their own men and spearwives in line.
By the time the sun was getting low, the column had caught up with the Canadian machine, which travelled a steady rate each day. The foreigners from another world spent most of their time waiting for the riders to catch up, Jon quickly understood. The combination of their ease and his fatigue from the march made him feel resentment towards them, though he knew it was childish and born of his own pain.
The camp was usually complete with corral and palisades made from large stakes by the time the unicorn riders caught up at sunset. They rode in their own column to the rear.
The larger shaggy mounts were misliked by the horses, and were slower to move. They could also carry more, could move for longer without rest, and could eat plants and roots the horses could not. In fact, the evening feed for the horses was carried by these creatures in large saddlebags or in chariot-like carts. The unicorns themselves preferred stripping the local plant cover bare to eating grain.
Superior to horses in every way, one tribesman from another clan said to another, Except that they smell like cowshit fermented in sweat. Jon thought that description was insufficient, and thanked the gods the creatures slept downwind at all times. The foreigners must've had the same thought.
A meal followed by deep sleep was the way for most; all were exhausted after the exertions of the day, and it was the Canadians kept the night watch. Jon slept in his own simple tent made of hide nearby them; the wildlings were polite but no friends of his, that much was sure. The whole mass of them got just enough sleep before it all started again. Jon awoke each morning to find Ghost had joined him in the night.
After three days of that pace, there was a rest day. The Canadians did not want to stop, but the chieftains convinced them otherwise. Jon felt the exchange was very strange. Of course they do not know when horses need rest days, he mused to himself, They don't need horses to move about their realm at all. That such a people could exist had been beyond his comprehension only a few weeks earlier.
By coincidence and their excellent pace, the rest day fell just as they had reached the northern border of his father's lands, or near enough.
To the west of the road was the Wolfswood, to the east was the fallowlands of the Gift, the plains. Both directions had visible 'Free Folk' camps besides his own, these particular wildlings wanting to be as far south at possible without breaking trust with their King, or the Canadians that had just arrived.
There were also warning signs in runes carved on standing stones, telling travellers they were now in the Gift and so subject to the laws of the Night's Watch and the judgment of its Lord Commander. Jon had remembered seeing them on the way to Castle Black. I'm going home, he thought numbly as he walked over to one to investigate. Ghost padded after him, not having disappeared into the woods for once
"Subject to the laws of King Mance, now," said a woman's voice from behind.
Annoyance simmering up at the remark, Jon turned to find the princess standing behind him. Her bright blue eyes were looking directly at him, for her height was akin to his, and her blonde hair tied up in a long braid shook as she approached still closer. Gods, she is pretty. He bowed his head without thinking. "Princess… Apologies, I didn't hear you approach."
The princess let out a rumbling, mocking laugh that sent the blood straight to Jon's face in anger and embarrassment. She idled up beside Ghost and began stroking him behind the ear. "Still haven't learned after all our talk, Lord Snow? I'm no southron. Even if I'm to carry the name Umber for this journey. My sister is Queen. That does not make me a princess. My name is Val."
You've got the Umber mannerism of saying whatever you want, Jon thought with a frown, before looking away. "I was simply being courteous. It is a habit of mine. You can expect such courtesies when we arrive at Winterfell."
She regarded him for a moment. With pity, to his horror.
"Aye, I'm sure many such things were beaten into you there," Val said, "My mother told me many things of the South. Mance more still. No doubt your fine lords will think me a bastard too. The gods be thanked I am not a child to bend so easily to such notions."
"I was never beaten."
"You can beat someone down without a touch, Jon Snow."
Jon looked at her again, and saw sincerity. His resentment rose. Does she know her fate? "My brother is going to like you, my lady."
It was Val's turn to frown. "Why would that matter?"
"I was brought up in a noble household. I know why you asked me about him and my family. I know what Mance is trying to propose by sending you. A king or a lord does not send a young unmarried woman to another's keep with anything else in mind."
Val's face hardened, the frown disappearing behind a mask, from which only her eyes were a clue as to her thoughts. She was examining him. "Keep your tongue still about it."
Not a request, Jon thought, glancing at her belt where a sword and knife hung in easy reach. The movement of his gaze seemed to break the mask.
"I've gelded bigger men than you, Lord Snow, for trying to sneak into my tent," Val said, as a matter of fact, "Though none carried Valyrian steel. Perhaps you will best me. But do not count on it."
Realising what she meant, Jon blushed furiously for second time, though this was not out of anger. She thought I was looking at something other than her weapons.
Rescue came in the form of the thump of horse hooves, causing both Jon and Val to turn towards their source. The chieftain Ygritte was riding up towards them atop a jet black horse. The young woman was wearing a Canadian helmet with its strange protrusion for speaking to others over distance by radio, her bright red hair leaking out of the bottom of it. Her necklace of the strange brass tubes that somehow fed the Canadian weapons jingled slightly as she got nearer, a reminder of to whom she owed allegiance.
What does she want? Jon thought wearily.
"Michael Duquesne needs both of you further up the road," the chieftain said.
"Why?" Val demanded.
Ygritte wheeled her horse around them. "Trouble ahead. Someone has hung one of the boys that came south at an inn. And since both Eddard Stark's son and Dalla's sister is here, Duquesne thinks you can do something about it."
The chieftain rode off back the way she came, without further elaboration. Jon did not require any. He knew where to go.
"An inn?" Val asked, "What inn?"
"The Last Inn," Jon replied, "Only place to sleep in a bed on the Kingsroad between here and Mole's Town, unless you want to break into the homes of the smallfolk. It is usually hunters from the Umber lands that stay there, or so my uncle Benjen told me."
The fur-clothed body swung from the upper arch of a gateway, the rope slipping inside the hood to choke it. From the colour of the skin at the hand, the hanged man could not have breathed his last more than half a day before.
Gods, Jon prayed on seeing it up close, He is of an age with me. Clearly, this was one of the 'boys' that had been allowed through the Wall by virtue of the strange customs of the Canadians, who did not consider those below the age of eighteen years to be grown men.
The gates themselves were wide open to reveal the inn itself within; a high roofed, stout structure of ironwood with its doors and shutters closed tight, large enough for a whole herd of cattle or horses. Jon had stayed there when travelling to Castle Black, but only for a few hours.
His uncle Benjen had said it was made out of an old barn, by men who preferred the lower, poorly-collected taxes of the Night's Watch to those of the Umbers. Not a chance they will open their doors to me now.
The Canadians were nowhere to be found. Their horseless cart was not to be found in the yard of the inn, nor by the side of the Kingsroad. The tracks on the road told that they had been there before, and not long ago. Following the tracks into the distance with his eyes, Jon saw the unnatural beast off beside the nearest camp of Free Folk families.
"This means trouble," he thought aloud, hand going to his sword as he brought his horse to a stop.
"You don't need to be wise to see that," Val replied, riding closer to inspect the body, "One of Gerrick Kingsblood's tribe, or I'm a Thenn. No wonder he thought he could take what he wanted. Gerrick is haughty, and so are those that follow him."
She looked towards the camp. "They must have moved like the Others had breached the Wall to make it this far south so quickly."
"Right into the hands of the lords of the North," Jon stated, "They'll be the first caught by your cousins' men. And a hanging is the least they can expect."
"We will not allow it," Val replied, voice as cold as a north wind, "This is not like the times before when we have invaded the South, Jon Snow."
Jon opened his mouth to state otherwise… but found he had no argument against that. There were wights within sight at that very moment, tied and trussed up under furs, but still there. They gurgle in the night, sometimes. "You're right," he said, taking his hand off his sword, "It isn't."
Val's eyes flickered to him. "Lord Snow, I wonder," she said, "If you were kneeler-lord of Winterfell, what would you do?"
"I can never be lord of Winterfell," Jon replied bitterly, "It is not my place."
His reward was narrowed eyes of impatience and a flick of her long braid as her head moved. "Imagine the gods make it so, as they brought the Canadians. Remembering all that has happened, what would you do?"
What would Father do? Jon thought, his mind wandering to the details of a possible answer before he could notice, Can I answer honestly? He decided there was no point in hiding it. The Free Folk seemed adept at detecting a lie.
"I would do my duty as Warden of the North. I would gather my banners and fight you as quickly as I could," he said, "I would guard against my men committing excesses against your women and children. Once I had inflicted a large enough defeat, or captured your King, then I would make alliance against the Others and turn south to deal with the Lannisters." I would make you bend the knee.
Val breathed out a sigh, and read him like an open tome. "You would make us bend the knee, then. Why would you do that? You know what we face. Every man and spearwife you kill is one that cannot fight against the Others."
"Because someone needs to be in charge," Jon replied, before pointing at the hung boy of fifteen years, "Even if my brother agrees to let you live in the Gift, the agreement will be tested again and again until it breaks. We might both be blood of the First Men, but we live differently. Who will decide whether hanging this boy was justice or murder?"
A continuous roar in the distance announced the approach of the Canadians. Jon could see their machine moving around the Free Folk camp now in a slow arc. Horse riders followed in its wake, including the chieftain Ygritte, easily identified by her helmet.
When he looked back, he saw that Val's gaze had softened again, and a small smile spread across her lips. "So you do know something," she said, "My father often said to win a fight, you think about what your enemy would do. Now I know what you will do."
"Am I your enemy?" Jon asked.
"You are a Crow," Val said, as if that explained everything, "What will your brother do? Will he ride north to destroy us? Or will he do what you would do and leave us alive to fight wights?"
The memory of Robb and Catelyn when last he saw them flashed into Jon's mind from memory. Both standing together, waving goodbye, one sad to see her husband and daughters go, the other including him in his sadness. Their hair and eyes identical in colour. Tully colours.
Ghost nudged Jon's nose with his nose, causing the horse to shift uncomfortably. Jon understood what the wolf was doing. The lump in his throat that he hadn't even noticed melted away. "My brother can't ride north," he admitted, "Not unless you were to attack further south, and even then, Robb could not move with the strength needed to end a war with the wil… Free Folk quickly."
"Why not?"
"His mother is from the Riverlands, even further south. She married my father for an alliance, and her homeland is being raided. And my father is a prisoner of the same lords who have attacked it. Honour demands that Robb and his host must move further south, not north. The riverlords would not understand or accept anything less."
"So he will agree to our terms?"
"It will depend on the terms…" Jon answered. And if the lords accept you as an Umber and Lady of Winterfell out of desperation. "But it is not impossible."
The Canadians in their green armour, black boots and white coats finally arrived, and dismounted from their machine quickly. Rowan Umber descended too, helped by the one called Sayer. She was old, particularly for the Free Folk, and was tall too.
"Cut him down," commanded Duquesne to O'Neill, pointing at the hanged man.
"Yes, sir," the Sergeant replied with enthusiasm, pulling a steel knife from a sheath on the front of his armour. "You in the inn! I'm cutting the kid down. You don't like it? Shove it up yer hole!" No reply came and the man moved to the rope.
The Canadian leader looked to Jon and Val, as Zheng hovered behind, her weapon in hand. There is definitely going to be trouble, Jon thought.
"Mister Stark, dismount and get your magic sword out," Duquesne said to Jon, "The rest day you insisted upon isn't going to be restful."
Jon complied, getting out of his saddle and tying up his horse, before returning sword-in-hand. Val dismounted too, though she kept her knife and sword away. "What happened?" he asked.
"Negotiations failed," Duquesne said, "The innkeepers can't just hang people and put them on display. Eventually someone is going to take offence to that. It looks like the local clan want to teach the inhabitants some manners. We need to prevent it."
Jon moved so he could see the wildling camp past the foreign machine. Several dozen figures were mustering for a fight, spears, shields and axes collected from tents and packs. The skull of a stag with full antlers was visible atop one spear, the standard of this particular tribe. There'll be a battle.
"Should it not be certain Free Folk taught some manners?" Jon asked, gently, "The men inside did not hang this boy for nothing, it's not their way. We can't stay here protecting the inn forever."
"Already have an idea about that," Zheng replied, her black eyes peering at Jon over a smirking smile, "We weren't born yesterday."
"What idea?" Val asked.
"First thing is first, your Highness," Duquesnse said, watching as O'Neill finally lowered the boy's corpse to the ground, "The cavalry is en route now."
A long, drawn out horn blast sounded from the north, a sound that made Jon curl inside as it was the same as the reveille. Down the Kingsroad at a trot, the unicorns and their riders came, helmets on. Their barge-pole lances were held ready for the tilt towards the sky, the Laughing Tree banner carried on the foremost.
"Zheng, take Sayer, mount up and move to an enfilade position down the road," Duquesne commanded, "Let's not screw up this little gaomilaksir, no shooting before I command it."
The woman gave the strange salute of the Canadians by bringing her hand to her helmeted head, and pulled Sayer into the machine again, before it roared off again southwards down the road some hundred paces. It turned in a great ring like a snake, so its 'head' faced towards the camp where the wildling warriors gathered. Zheng and Sayer reappeared in the roof of the machine, their strange weapons ready.
What must war be like on their world? Jon wondered, Do they duel atop hundreds of such machines charging at each other, like knights?
Duquesne approached, wary of the direwolf at Jon's side. "Jon Stark, I have a legal question. Not sure if you're the person to ask but you're the only option I have."
Jon nodded. "I have often attended my father when he deals with such matters."
The Canadian made a strange gesture with his fingers, creating a loop between his thumb and forefinger with the others straight. "What are the punishments for killing an intruder and mutilation of a corpse?"
Jon saw why he was asking immediately. "Intruders in your home or place of commerce can be killed freely, though you must declare it so that no one can accuse you of breaking guest right. If you don't declare it, you can be accused of murder."
Duquesne nodded, though his eyes were on the unicorn riders. They had formed a rough line to charge across the open field at the other wildlings. I would not like to be in front of those lances and horns, Jon thought, Not even with a thousand pikemen.
"And mutilation?" the Canadian asked.
Jon frowned. He couldn't recall a time his father had ever dealt with such a matter. And he hadn't received the same teachings on the law that Robb had. "I am not sure, but it would be a lesser offence. Flogging and exile, or payment to the family, I should think. If it's a bad case, they might be mutilated themselves."
Both Duquense and O'Neill grimaced at the word flogging, an expression that only got worse when mutilation-in-turn was mentioned. They had an exchange in their own language, a look of resignation soon fell over both their faces.
"It might come to that more than once," O'Neill said, returning to the Common tongue, "They used to call it the English vice, back when Napoleon was kicking about."
"It might," Duquense agreed, before he took his weapon in hand.
The wildlings had left their camp and were advancing across the field slowly, wary of the unicorn cavalry more than the Canadian machine. They haven't seen the Canadian weapons work in person, Jon realised, hoping they wouldn't need to. The little warband was made up mostly of young women and boys, led on by their elder women. They didn't need to die.
"Princess," O'Neill asked, "If that inn was across the border in Umber lands, would the Kingsblood clan stay away?"
"Yes," Val stated with certainty, "They swore oaths. Gerrick would not forgive them who broke one. And they know Mance would be angry."
Another exchange between the Canadians in their own tongue followed the answer.
"Ah yeah," O'Neill nodded at last, "He did seem like he had a stick up his arse. Descendant of a King Beyond the Wall and all that shite."
Val let out a little laughter. "Aye, that's Gerrick. He tried to steal me once by arguing his bloodline, the fool."
O'Neill joined in the laugh. Jon felt a clutch in his chest at the sight of them both laughing, unable to identify where it came from.
"All to our advantage now, Princess," Duquense intoned, "Let's begin."
The two remaining Canadians struck out at a march towards the wildling warband, whispering orders over their radios, and bringing their weapons to their shoulders. Jon quickly followed, as did Val.
When they were about halfway between the Kingsroad and the warband, the foreigners stopped dead. Duquesne gave a single command. "Now."
From the machine in the distance, a thunder erupted from the large weapon atop it. The bullets zipped and cracked through the air, over the heads of the warband. That stopped the warriors in their tracks, but the Canadians did not stop there. Duquesne and O'Neill both raised their own rifles and shot three times in succession, again aiming above the warriors. The warband stopped, took a knee and raised their shields.
Duquesne nodded to O'Neill, as both lowered their weapons.
"Now that we have your attention!" O'Neill shouted, "Send out people to talk! We won't ask twice!"
Seemingly without hesitation, an old woman pushed her way through the shieldwall and walked towards them, pieces of antler hanging from threads all over her furs. Brave, Jon thought, And not because the Canadians might kill her. The warriors she had pushed through did not look pleased that she had left them.
"Who are you Canadians to tell us what to do?" the woman said, addressing O'Neill rather than Duquesne, "We are the Kingsblood."
"I'm the guy with the gun," O'Neill replied, shaking his rifle by its handle.
The old woman scoffed. "Your sorcery doesn't scare me, Canadian. Justice must be had for the boy those kneelers killed. The gods see the right of it."
Jon wanted to laugh. It wasn't the first time he had heard someone justify themselves like that. He had watched his father take their heads. "The laws of the gods do not say you can kill a person for defending their home," he said, "And they also say you don't disrespect a dead man's body. Both you and the innkeepers have wronged each other."
"The Stark speaks rightly," Val added, "You cannot kill a village because one of your boys failed to steal a wife. This is against our own laws."
The old woman grumbled to herself, knowing it to be true. "Our laws don't speak to kneelers."
"They speak wherever we of the Free Folk stand," Val said, "You are about to break your oath to Mance and the gods."
The old woman eyed the King's goodsister with an evil eye. "We break no oaths, Val of Snow's End."
Thinking fast, Jon saw what the Canadians had intended all along and what Val had caught onto. I hope the Lord Commander will agree with what I do.
He flourished and pointed Longclaw at the inn. "That place is not the Gift," he said, "As an officer of the Night's Watch, I declare it the land of the Umbers, who are sworn to my father, Eddard Stark. Your oath was to not settle beyond the Gift or raid the kneelers."
"And Mance will accept it as Umber land," Val agreed, "As King of the Gift, he will see a raid on the inn as breaking your oath. And even if you kill us all, he will find out."
The old woman scoffed, pointing a gnarled finger at Val. "This Stark-blooded Crow's words come out of your mouth. What of the boy killed! The kneelers didn't swear an oath, can they can kill us freely and hang our bodies like Ice River savages?"
"The innkeepers will be punished," Duquesne said, "According to the custom of this land."
"And what will that punishment be, I wonder?" the old woman sighed, "Perhaps a reward of silver for killing a 'wildling'? Is that not the custom of this land?"
It is, Jon's mind thought, his memory of the wildlings trying to take his brother strong in his mind, Father would have rewarded smallfolk for stopping those wildlings.
"Flogging," Duquesne stated, his previous discomfort with the word well hidden, "For hanging the body. The killing was justified by self defence."
The old woman's eyes widened. She hadn't expected that answer. "You would flog the men who hung the boy?"
Duquesne hesitated. Do they not flog men where he is from? "No, I'm not a lord here," he said, "But I would not stop you doing it, under the supervision of Jon as an officer of the Watch and Val as the King's representative."
"And what if the inn men want revenge?" the old woman asked.
"You have the right to self defence as much as they do," Jon replied.
Another horn blast sounded, higher and more shrill than before. The whole group turned to see a pair of riders moving at the gallop down and towards them. Ryk and Ygritte.
"Michael Duquesne!" 'Longspear' hollered, "The wargs have spotted a kneeler host coming up the Kingsroad!"
AUTHOR'S NOTE: Hello again
As stated in the last chapter, this story has been nominated for the Turtledove Awards for best story in ASOIAF, and the voting is ongoing.
If you have an account or are willing to create one, I would invite you all to go to the Alternate History forums or Google '2023 Turtledoves - Best Timeline Based on ASOIAF Poll' to find the place and vote, hopefully for this story. You can vote for multiple stories in this round too, and I would heartily recommend you also drop one for Sunrise by Wings, A Song of Coin and Lamellar by Von Adler, The Weirwood Queen by redwolf17, and A Brother By Choice by GeekyOwl.
Voting ends on March 6th.
Thank you for reading and reviewing