Shipbreaker Bay | 278 AC
The sky over the bay was a mass of hail and darkness. The wind howled against the immense circular walls of Storm's End, tearing pieces of tile from the smaller towers and forcing the black sea to rise in lethal columns of salt foam.
On the upper battlements, Robert gripped the grey stone parapet with both hands. His knuckles stood white with the force. Rainwater ran down his black hair plastered against his broad face, soaking through the drenched doublet. Beside him, Stannis held his posture straight and unreadable. The boy locked his jaw, pressing his eyes against the force of the storm.
In the violent water below, the Pride of the Wind fought the abyss.
Lord Steffon Baratheon had sent a letter from Essos days earlier. The parchment reported the failure to find a suitable Valyrian bride for Prince Rhaegar, but announced the purchase of an exceptional court fool, full of tricks and songs, capable of drawing a laugh even from Stannis.
The three-masted galley crossed the outer rocks and entered the brothers' line of sight. A wall of seawater, as tall as the secondary towers, lifted the hull of the vessel. The timbers groaned loud. The mainmast snapped, hurling pine splinters into the air.
The wave came down with crushing force.
The vessel struck sideways against the sharp rocks hidden beneath the foam of the bay. The impact's crash swallowed the thunder in the leaden sky. The hull split from end to end. Cold water swallowed the deck in seconds, dragging Lord Steffon, Lady Cassana, and dozens of sailors against the sharp reefs.
The Pride of the Wind sank into the darkness before the wide eyes of Robert and the frozen expression of Stannis. There was no time for cries of help.
Three days later, the sea returned what remained. Splintered planks, torn cloth, and blue bodies chewed by crabs fouled the wet sand.
Near a pile of rotted ropes, a small body coughed.
Salt water poured from the mouth along with seaweed. The man rolled face-down in the sand. The bald, gaunt skin displayed dozens of red and green square tattoos covering the face and skull down to the nape. The jester's bell hat was crushed, hanging over one torn ear. Patches sat up on the beach, hugging his thin knees. He stared at the murderous sea with hollow eyes. He opened his bruised mouth and started to laugh. The drawn-out, disconnected, raving sound echoed across the empty beach.
King's Landing | Red Keep | 278 AC
Grand Maester Pycelle walked with short, shuffling steps through the dark corridors. The dozens of chains at his neck clinked with each loose movement. He carried a parchment stained with salt water, the Baratheon seal crushed flat.
The throne room smelled of old wax smoke and mold.
Aerys II Targaryen stood before the mountain of rusted swords that formed the Iron Throne. The king paced in small circles, muttering to himself. The thin silver hair fell over his shoulders in dirty knots. His long, yellow, cracked nails scraped the side of his own neck in a continuous motion, peeling flakes of old skin.
"Your Grace." Pycelle bent his aching back. "An urgent raven from Storm's End."
Aerys stopped abruptly. The king's wide, bloodshot eyes pinned the old maester.
"What does the damned letter say?", the king demanded, rubbing his index finger and thumb together with compulsive speed.
"The ship Pride of the Wind foundered in the bay, Your Grace. Lord Steffon and Lady Cassana drowned against the rocks. The sea swallowed the entire vessel."
The king went still. His mouth opened, revealing pale gums. He blinked his dry eyes three times in a row.
"Drowned", Aerys whispered. He turned his thin body and pointed a long, dirty finger toward the massive doors of the council chamber. "Tywin Lannister. That fattened lion."
Pycelle raised his head. "Your Grace, the storm was natural. The winds on the Narrow Sea..."
"Silence, old fool!", Aerys shouted, his voice spraying saliva across his own lips. He moved toward Pycelle, fists clenched. "He guessed. The Lannister sniffed out my intentions. He knew I was going to make Steffon my new Hand."
Aerys drove his nails into his own cheek. A bead of fresh blood ran down through the sparse beard to the pointed chin.
"He sank the bloody ship. Magic, bribed assassins, treason!", the king screamed, gesturing wildly. He looked at the Iron Throne and hugged his own thin shoulders, shaking with fury and dread. "He killed the Lord of Storm's End to keep me chained. If I strip him of the Hand of the King now, the damned man will kill me too. He will poison my cup or cut my throat in the shadows."
The North | 278 to 280 AC
The snow melted into mud and the ice hardened the dirt roads again. The North bled in small, continuous hemorrhages along its edges, and we entered the open veins.
For two years, the starlit sky and the leaking roofs of taverns served as camp. We hunted what fled from the long justice of Winterfell. Outlaws who tried to toll merchants lost their hands to Perseu's sword. Ragged deserters from the Wall ended with ropes tight around their necks.
With each nest of raiders erased, the gates and bridges of the lords unlocked. The Karstarks served barrels of dark ale and carved boar at the tables of Karhold. The Umbers roared their approval at the hearths of Last Hearth.
Younger sons and heirs of the great Houses of the North began to ride with us. They left the comfort of their stone walls to share the front line on patrol, sleeping in the mud for entire moons before returning to their homes. Where we left ashes of camps and dead scum on the ground, we planted a wooden post carrying a heavy banner. The dark cloth displayed the symbol of Yggdrasil woven in grey thread. The repetition of the standard marked the territory.
The fame crossed the Neck and spread through the Seven Kingdoms. In camps, taverns, and stone halls, the people and the lords gave our group a name without being asked. We came to be called the Wolfpack. The name did not come only from our tactics. Fenrir had grown to the size of a draft pony, a mass of entirely black fur with red eyes that glowed like embers in the dark of the forest. Beside him, Hela moved like a liquid shadow, a shadowcat with disproportionate fangs that tore throats without making a prior sound. The image of the two beasts marching in our vanguard froze the blood of raiders long before the clash of steel.
Throughout all of this, I did not set foot in Winterfell's courtyard. My father sent ravens ordering my return, but my answers always reported an unfinished hunt. The reach of my physical absence was covered by ink. The parchments exchanged with Eldric carried coded reports. He had consolidated the roots of our information web. Attentive ears and quick eyes were spread through every important castle in Westeros. In the great strongholds and the alleys of the port cities, the spymaster had pawns positioned. Beyond that, I had instructed him to keep his focus on Bolton lands. Eldric had spent the last two years covertly collecting and documenting evidence of the continuous flayings and abuses orchestrated by Roose Bolton across his territory.
Rhoslyn also sent frequent ravens. The letters confirmed the weight of the steel Sigurd had begun to raise on his shoulders and the lethal agility Astrid had developed with short blades. The funds I had left her to manage multiplied into heavy profits. In response, I drafted parchments with precise formulas detailing the boiling and preparation of soaps and hygiene extracts. Rhoslyn built workshops. Moons later, she opened a shop selling articles that drained the silver and gold of lords and ladies accustomed to expensive perfumes covering the smell of sweat, while distributing the rougher, more effective bars in the common markets.
In the west, near the frozen rivers of the Stony Shore, salt water soaked into the boiled leather of our armor. The Ironborn landed on the rocks in rust-stained chainmail with the brainless certainty of those who worship drowning.
The black smoke rising from the coastal village guided our gallop.
We entered the small bay of mud and gravel at the end of the day. A dozen Ironborn were felling ancient pines at the edge of the slope, stacking the wood to carry onto the ships anchored at the rocks.
In the center of the mud circle, the corpse of a villager lay face down. The skull, split in half, leaked fresh blood into the earth. A few meters from the pool of blood, three ironborn had a weeping woman pinned against a felled trunk, tearing at the thick fabric of her dress. Further on, a girl of no more than fourteen screamed as a warrior with massive shoulders crushed her wrists against the snow with one hand and worked at his belt buckle with the other.
The Valyrian steel left my scabbard with a sharp sound.
Kevin's bowstring snapped beside me. The arrow with its dark steel point passed through the side of the man's neck above the girl, the tip coming out clean through the front of his throat. The warrior gurgled, eyes rolling back as the heavy body collapsed into the salt mud.
"Kill them", I ordered.
The Ironborn dropped their prey and raised shields and boarding axes.
Perseu struck the enemy formation's flank like a boulder falling. The heavy blade of his greatsword split the top of the first oak shield and drove deep into the defender's collarbone, shattering the bone with a crack. Morghaz spun his short spear and skewered the second aggressor's gut with the efficiency of an Unsullied soldier.
Fenrir and Hela moved as lethal blurs. Fenrir leapt onto a fully mailed man, his jaws breaking the forearm that held the steel. Hela tore the throat of an archer who was reaching for his second arrow.
I walked in a straight line toward the camp's leader. He wore fish-scale armor and wielded a curved axe in both hands. His face had dry ash marking the pale cheeks.
He roared in my direction and swung the weapon in a wide arc. I turned my torso to the right, letting the heavy blade cut only cold air. The weapon's weight pulled his balance forward. My dark dagger cut the tendon of his right knee with a clean twist of the wrist. The man shouted and buckled, dropping into the mud. I drove my steel boot with crushing force into the side of his face, snapping the jawbone and throwing him onto his back.
The fight did not last a full minute. Eleven bodies bled dead across the ruined camp.
The woman crawled through the earth, sobbing without stop, and grabbed the girl, pulling rags of cloth to cover the frightened daughter's bare skin. Belzakar stopped near them, turned his back to the two, and lowered his spear into a silent defensive perimeter.
I looked at the fallen leader. He tried to drag himself on his elbows, choking on the blood rising from the broken jaw. Perseu grabbed him by the scale armor and hauled him to the widest pine trunk at the edge of the bay, forcing him to sit with his back against the thick wood.
"Remove the coat and his shirt", I said, sheathing the longsword and keeping the dagger in hand. "Tie his wrists up high."
Kevin and Perseu used thick ropes to bind the man's arms wide against firm branches, stretching the flesh until the shoulder joints pulled taut. The wet, bare skin of his back lay completely stretched and exposed.
The ironborn leader spat in my direction, blood staining his own lips. "The Drowned God awaits me. You can cut."
"I am not sending you to the bottom of the sea", I said, moving behind him. "This is not a judgment. It is a sacrifice to the forest blood you spilled."
I pressed the fine tip of the Valyrian steel against the bare nape of his neck. I drew the blade down, splitting the skin and thick muscle along every cervical vertebra. The flesh opened with the ease of paper. The warm blood poured down the long incision, soaking his leather waistband. The man contracted the muscles of his back, drawing air in through clenched teeth.
I continued the line of the sharp cut along the entire spine, down to the rigid base of the lumbar. I switched the dagger to my right hand and sank my rigid fingers between the cut flesh and the bony base of his back, feeling the ribs connected to the spine.
With the blade seated exactly at the junction of the first lower rib, I applied brute pressure. The Valyrian steel cut through the bone with a hollow snap. The cartilage split.
The Ironborn released the first sharp howl of extreme torment.
I repeated the motion on the other ribs. The sound of the bones separating from the dorsal spine under the dagger recalled pieces of dry stick breaking under heavy boots. His chest cavity gave way and the lungs began to expand in a chaotic pattern. I opened the bone connections on the other side of the back and folded the hard skeletal structure outward with both hands, exposing the rear vital organs. The warrior groaned loose, his eyes rolling in their sockets as the pain flooded the brain's function.
I put the dagger away. I reached my bare hands through the hot, spinal gap of the chest cavity and gripped the wet, spongy base of both lungs. I pulled the vital organs outward with a jerk of pure force.
The internal tissue stretched, accommodating the two pulmonary lobes over the frame of the ribs folded back, forming the symmetrical shape of two large, bloody wings of flesh on the man's back. The final gasp of shock inflated the hanging lungs one last time before emptying completely. The head fell forward, the chin pressing against the bloodied chest. Life left its moorings.
The stench of relaxed entrails and heavy copper stained the base of the pine.
I walked to an untouched bank of fresh snow, plunged both hands into the white ice, and scrubbed my fingers until the freezing water stripped every layer of thick clots and loose cartilage from my skin.
Barrowton | 279 AC
The smell of burning black peat and damp hay dominated the central yard of Barrowton. The Dustin house had a noisy castle. Draft horses whinnied near the long stables and the sound of hammers against steel anvils filled the conversations of the day.
I rode into the yard on Sleipnir. A circle of men was shouting near the wide stone water troughs.
A tall young man with long dark hair plastered to his forehead and trousers dirty with wet mud had one heavy knee pressed against the chest of a garrison guard. The guard's arm was stretched backward in a dangerous close-combat lock.
"Yield!", the man shouted, the laugh ringing in the air with pure amusement. The guard hammered his free hand into the packed earth, choking. The young man loosened his grip, rose in a quick jump and extended his closed fist, pulling the guard upright with force. Sweat darkened the armpits of his shirt, and blood ran bright from a fresh cut splitting the lower lip.
Brandon Stark wiped his wrist across the blood at his mouth. The Wild Wolf turned his heels in the dust. The grey eyes locked onto the black plates of my armor and the two wolf-sized ponies at my side.
He shoved two lancers aside to open a path and crossed the yard with long, predatory strides.
Brandon grabbed the thick fabric at the shoulder of my armor and drove the front of his body against mine in a rough embrace that sounded like two mounts colliding. The smell of animal sweat, spilled strong ale, and old leather came from his pores.
"Arthur", he said, his hoarse voice muffled in the padding of my gorget.
He stepped back and gripped both my arms, taking in what he saw. The sharp eyes read the hardened dust on my boots, the deadly blades carried by the silent Unsullied Lancers behind me, and Kevin's still posture. The wild smile that defined his title stretched his cracked lips again.
"They tell it by the fires that you have been leaving heads and guts hanging from every damned pine from Winterfell to the waterline, brother", Brandon roared, slapping his heavy palm against the metal of my breastplate. "The smell of your ambushes has crossed leagues to reach here. Come. The Dustins brew a thick dark ale that bitters the tongue and drops the legs from a bear."
White Harbor | 280 AC
The cutting wind sweeping the open yards of White Harbor smelled of salt spray and fish guts in brine. Grey gulls cawed in circles around the tallest masts of the ships anchored at the dock. The walls of the New Castle displayed white stones polished by water, completely unlike the mud and black ice of the other northern strongholds.
I stepped onto the paved ground of the eastern courtyard. The plates of my armor clinked in a heavy rhythm.
I left the others tying the travel mounts near the stone water troughs. I walked toward the lines of straw training dummies kept by the garrison. The sound of solid wood cracking the air caught my attention.
A slender young man with brown hair tied tight at the base of his neck drove consecutive cuts of a heavy practice sword against the torn covering of a dummy. The loose linen shirt stuck to the wet skin of his back. He stepped firm with his right leg, rotated the torso against the ribs, and brought the blunt blade down across the motionless enemy's flank.
I stopped two steps from the training stakes.
He caught the approach at the corner of his eye and turned at the same speed as the last blow, raising the wooden hilt to chin level with both arms rigid and ready. His thin chest rose and fell, seeking air through a dry mouth. The grey eyes, hard and trained, read the size of the dagger fixed to my thigh and locked on my chin. The level of the wooden point dropped a few millimeters in hesitation.
"Arthur?", Benjen said, losing the breath on the last syllable.
His right hand opened. The rough sword struck the paved stone and rolled between his boots. The youngest of the brothers did not carry Brandon's mountain of muscle or Ned's impenetrable posture, but the quick instincts of the North already lived under his skin. Benjen closed the distance and locked both arms around my waist, pressing the side of his face against the iron buckles of my belt.
"Father sent word saying you crossed the Wall and the forgotten forts", Benjen said, his voice muffled against the leather. He broke the embrace and pulled his lean shoulders back, flicking the drops from his forehead with the back of his muddy wrist. "The whole castle bet coins you were going to take the vows of the Night's Watch."
"I crossed the snow and ice to honor a late promise, Benjen. I am not locking my boots to the ice battlements", I said.
I let my eyes drop to the mangled dummy on the wooden post. "The rotation axis of your ankles locked too wide on that last oblique cut. The straw of the dummy absorbs the impact because it has no hands to counter your blind side, but the curved tip of a mercenary's steel would have sliced the unprotected muscle of your thigh from end to end in the same breath it took for the blow."
Benjen dropped his grey eyes to the stone floor, ran back through the body memory of his own movement, and looked back up at me. The boy stretched his leg, slipped the toe of his boot under the worn training hilt, and kicked the piece of wood into the air, catching the handle in the same motion. His knuckles tightened firm around the leather grip.
"Then take a shield and show me exactly where the distance is wrong", Benjen said, straightening his spine and raising the hilt to eye level.
King's Landing | Red Keep | 280 AC
The small council chamber smelled of thick, floral incense. A failed attempt to mask the smell of sour sweat and neglect that came off Aerys II Targaryen.
The king occupied the head of the oak table. His yellowed nails, the size of broken blades, scraped the polished wood in compulsive movements. His bloodshot eyes moved from one councillor to the next without blinking.
The discussion flowed over preparations for the great royal event.
"Princess Elia of Dorne will arrive with her retinue before the next moon, Your Grace", Grand Maester Pycelle reported, his hands resting on the heavy chains at his neck. "The provisions for the banquet are already being counted in the storerooms. It will be a wedding worthy of Prince Rhaegar's lineage."
Aerys stopped scratching the table. The king turned his bony face toward the maester, thin lips pulling back.
"Enough Dornish at my table", Aerys cut in, his voice hoarse and strained. "That permanent smell of strong pepper and red sand turns my stomach. As if what they bring on their ships were not enough. Halt the preparations until I say to resume."
The entire council fell into absolute silence. Pycelle swallowed his answer and lowered his head.
Aerys turned his pointed face toward Lord Varys's seat.
"Spider", the king called, pointing the long dirty finger. "What do your dark rats whisper? Give me something useful to clean my ears. The kingdom does not consist of arranged marriages and wasteful feasts."
Varys smiled, a contained and soft movement, joining his white, smooth hands in his lap.
"Your Grace", Varys's gentle voice slid across the chamber. "There was a land dispute between minor lords in the Reach, easily resolved by Lord Tyrell. There is an excess of mercenaries drinking in the streets of Oldtown, awaiting contracts. However, there is a far more interesting song rising from the frozen lands of the North of late."
Aerys stopped moving his hands. The king's attention fixed on the Master of Whisperers.
"They call themselves the Wolfpack, Your Grace", Varys continued, his shrewd little eyes brightening. "A small, lethally mounted group led by a young man called Arthur Snow, the bastard son of Lord Rickard Stark. They say the boy marches flanked by shadow beasts. His group has spent the last two years sweeping the forests, roads, and coasts of the entire North. Assassins, deserting mercenaries, and raiding Ironborn do not reach judgment in Winterfell. The Wolfpack condemns them on the roads with grotesque rituals of blood and blade."
Varys made a calculated pause, smoothing the silk of his own tunic.
"They plant standards wherever they pass. The North, at this exact moment, is pacified in a brutal and savage fashion. There is not a single road bandit or rapist who dares step onto the trails cutting between the castles of the region without losing his entrails."
Aerys blinked his dry eyelids. The king stopped picking at the crusts on his own neck. The silence extended in the council chamber. Slowly, a broken smile, showing diseased gums, split the gaunt face of Aerys Targaryen.
The king turned his bloodshot eyes to Symond Staunton, who had taken the post of Master of Laws following the Baratheon lord's death.
"Staunton", Aerys called, his voice vibrating with sudden, feverish enthusiasm. "Have you not spent the last entire moon at this same table whining and rubbing your eyes over that damned Brotherhood of the Kingswood? Thieves stealing my deer and my taxes at the door of my own capital?"
Symond Staunton straightened his spine, his pale skin pulling with nerves.
"Yes, Your Grace", Staunton said, stumbling slightly. "The City Watch has proven insufficient in the incursions into the forest. The outlaws hide like worms and..."
"Then send the ravens to Winterfell immediately", Aerys cut him off, slapping his palm on the wood and throwing his own body forward. The dirty grey hair swayed around his sharp face. "Call that lethal bastard. Call his Wolfpack of beasts."
The king let out a rasping laugh that rang off the stone ceiling.
"If they enjoy hunting scum in the ice so much, bring them here. Let us see up close how Lord Stark's wolves fare hunting inside my forest."