Eddard watched as the port of White Harbor drew closer, the sight a familiar one as the deck rolled gently beneath his feet, the afternoon sun casting a pleasant glow. Many times now had he travelled between the Eyrie and Winterfell, though it was the first time that his return to his homeland would not bring him joy.

A warm body pressed into his back, arms going around his waist, and he felt his lips twitch into a smile. It was also the first time he would return home with a wife.

“Ashara,” he murmured, taking one hand off the ship’s rail to place over her clasped hands.

“Ned,” she said, affectionate as she rested her head against the fur of his mantle. “You were frowning.”

“Was I?” he asked, still looking out over the water.

“I could see it in your shoulders,” she said, squeezing him slightly.

His smile grew as he felt the slight bump of her belly against his back. It fell a moment later, however, as he remembered that he would not be present to witness the birth of his first child.

“Ned,” Ashara said, chiding now.

He was beginning to suspect that she could read his thoughts. “We should dock and disembark within the hour,” Ned said. “House Manderly may follow the Seven, but they are Northerners true. They will host us tonight, and we will depart in the morning.”

Ashara nodded. “And your cousins will likely be there. Do we expect them to travel with us to Winterfell?”

“No. They lean to matters of mercantilism, rather than war,” Ned said. He did not begrudge them this, and their connections had aided his House in lean times. His foster-father’s distaste for his Gulltown relatives was still something that he did not understand.

A cold wind swept over the ship, spilling from the sails, and Ashara shivered. “I will be glad to arrive. The cold is not so bad, but the wind…”

“Are you sure you do not wish to stay in White Harbor?” Ned asked. He turned, taking his wife in his arms. Her head came just up to his chin, and she tucked it underneath. “It is a livelier place than Winterfell, for all that I love my home.”

“Yes. I want to meet your mother,” Ashara said. She nestled deeper into him. “Perhaps she will share with me the secret of surviving the cold before the next winter arrives.”

“We can visit the tailors before we leave,” Ned said instantly. “Our craftsmen make many fine outfits of velvet and ermine.”

“I won’t have my first action in the North be to demand finery,” Ashara said. “I know the North is not the richest kingdom. My trousseau is more than enough; I simply have to grow used to the weather.”

“We are frugal, not poor,” Ned told her. “But you speak sense. There are those who would look for any reason to disdain a southerner.”

“They can disdain me all they like,” Ashara told him. “I have already won.” She looked up at him with a gaze that made Ned again curse the thin walls of their ship cabin.

The captain was starting to give orders to his crew, making the final preparations for their approach, but Ned’s mind was elsewhere. There would surely be time to relax before the feast that night, their first time to themselves since their departure from Gulltown.

Ashara tweaked his nose in his distraction, smirking at whatever she read on his face. “And Elia was surprised by the swiftness of our marriage.”

Ned gave her a look, silently apportioning her the lion’s share of the blame. Just as silently, a brow was raised in response, disagreeing and suggesting the reverse. The second son of Winterfell could not help but smile, one hand going to the swell of his wife’s belly, wishing to feel the movement of his child, but knowing that he never would.

X

The Great Hall of Winterfell was filled to bursting, every table full and men lining the walls. Grey light filtered down through the high windows, and low murmurs rose to meet it as the last of the Stark bannermen arrived. A pair of guards worked to close the solid doors of oak and iron at the end of the room, and the heavy thud they made brought about an expectant silence.

Eddard looked over the hall, taking in the crowds of faces that watched him. Some he knew, many he didn’t, and as he took their measure he was measured in turn from his position on the dais. The stone seat that had served as the throne for the Kings of Winter was behind him, but he sat on a simple chair of wood before and beside it. The greatsword Ice sat on the throne, edge bared in a silent statement and reminder.

“My lords,” he said, his voice quiet but still commanding the attention of the hall. “House Stark has called, and you have answered.” It was said as a foregone conclusion, like it was something as certain as the snowfall, but Ned knew well that his family had not ruled the North for eight thousand years by taking loyalty for granted. “We will remember.”

Quiet pride, solemn acknowledgement, cocksure eagerness, he saw it all on the faces of his father’s bannermen, from lords minor to mighty. There were those he could not read, like large Lord Manderly, who had travelled with them from White Harbor, and slender Lord Bolton, who had slipped into Winterfell amongst the last of the arrivals, but then was not the time to consider two of the more powerful Stark vassals.

“You have heard the news. You know what Aerys has done.”

Ill muttering rose, many of the men scowling now. To make hostages of guests was to spit in the eye of guest rights, something that would stir every true Northerner to fury, to say nothing of the slaughter of northern sons and the abduction of a northern daughter.

“The Vale has subdued their royalists, and Lord Arryn’s men have entered the Riverlands, giving Lord Tully a decisive advantage over his own disloyal vassals,” Ned told the hall. “In the Stormlands, Lord Baratheon marches west into the Reach, but their fields feed many men and should they send an army north, we will be outnumbered. It is upon us to tilt the balance back in our favour.”

“We’ll do more than that!” came a call from the side. Heads craned to see who had interrupted the Stark, and they saw a face that they should have expected. “By the time we’re done, no southern fuck will dare to look twice at any northern girl!”

Ned inclined his head to the man many called the Greatjon, even as fists and hands were pounded and slapped against tables and walls in a cheer. He was larger even than Old Nan’s children and grandchildren, although Walder was almost as broad, with growing yet to do.

“What of the Westerlands?” another lord called out. This one was close to the front, and the white sunburst on his back made clear his identity, even half hidden by grey hair as it was. Lord Karstark’s lip curled as he spoke. “Do they still hold to the Targaryens?”

“We do not know,” Ned told them. “The Lannisters have not declared for either side, but like the Martells, they have family in Aerys’ grasp.” The Dornish were no allies of the North, and Princess Elia hardly a ‘guest’ as the others were, but he would not ignore any chance to guide attitudes that might impact his wife.

Karstark made a noise of disgust, and he was not the only one. “Cravens!” someone shouted. “Excuses!” called another. “Self-serving wretches!” “Fuck the Tyrells!”

Ned raised one hand from where it sat on his knee. It was a small gesture, but it allayed much of the shouting, quieting the hall to murmurs once more.

“What do we seek to gain from this rebellion?” The speaker’s voice had a way of silencing any who would speak over him, for all he swallowed afterwards, as if making himself heard had taxed him, and pale eyes watched Ned for his answer.

“By my father’s word, Lord Bolton, Aerys’ reign will not survive the war. Should Lyanna be harmed, neither will he.”

Ill temper was replaced by an almost gleeful anticipation. Even now, nearly three hundred years since Aegon’s Conquest, there were none in the North who loved the Targaryens, and many who disdained them.

“I presume that as victor, Lord Stark will make arrangements to benefit the North entire,” Lord Manderly said, his hands folded over the bulk of his stomach.

“He shall,” Ned said, “and I know he will seek the counsel of his lords in doing so.”

“What has he told you?” an eager young lord asked. This was not a man like the others to speak, not a man with thousands of spears to his name or who had been hosted in a private audience before the gathering. “Does he mean to make them pay to rebuild Cailin?” His enthusiasm was sincere, for all that he didn’t appear to have noted the stature of the other men to speak.

“Moat Cailin was not discussed,” Ned said, a touch slower this time, “however…my father did make mention of his regret that the Red Keep lacked a true heart tree.”

“Yessss! Red on its face, and red on its boughs!” Greatjon rumbled, and his bassy voice was only the first to rise up. The slow retreat of godswoods in the south was another sore point, and the thought of clawing that back in the same city as Baelor’s Sept stirred northern spirits.

Soon, it was clear that the audience had moved beyond announcements, and Ned rose from his seat. “We ride in three days, my lords! For Lyanna, and the North!”

“Lyanna and the North!” was the answering roar, and then they had their heads, discussing and gossiping what they knew and what they thought might come. Ned took the time to meet the gazes of the lords who had asked the questions he needed of them. They had done their parts, even if the Greatjon had brought greater enthusiasm to the task than was needed.

That enthusiasm would be needed when they reached the battles to the south, but as he surveyed the gathering, he had a feeling that it would not be in short supply.

X

The Northern army arrived in a Riverlands at war with itself. At the crossing of the Green Fork they saw remnants of a skirmish, a Frey tabard left tattered in the dirt, and at the crossroads where the king, high, and river roads met there was a village whose marketplace had been touched by fire. The old warriors with them claimed it had not the look of a proper war, but it was clear that there had been conflict nonetheless. After Eddard led the vanguard across the Trident and towards Darry, they caught their first glimpse of the fighting.

Perhaps two thousand men fought and died in a dry riverbed. Ned and the men with him, five hundred cavalry scouting in force, had been drawn by horn calls, and they came to a stop on a nearby rise. The young Stark picked the northmen fighting immediately, and a quick command had the rest of his host hold where they were, still out of sight.

“Who fights?” Theo Wull asked, a big mountain clansman with arms near as thick as most men’s thighs. “I see Rivermen, and Kingsmen.”

“There are Darry colours on the pike tabards,” the old Lord Cerwyn said, “but that’s a Buckwell banner.”

“And a direwolf,” a younger man murmured, Lord Hornwood taking a moment longer to realise what others already had as he squinted at the battle. His eyes widened as he realised who he was looking at. “That’s Lord Stark!” Steel rasped free from its sheath, and he levelled it at the battle, his horse almost rearing under him. “We can-”

“No,” Ned said, his eyes elsewhere. Many amongst the lead riders looked at him sideways for it.

“No?” Hornwood asked, robbed of his building battle-cheer. “That’s your lord father down there!”

“Look to the hill, amongst the trees,” Ned said. In the river, the northmen were slowly pushing the royalists back, but there was something they couldn’t see. Between the scouting force and the battle there was a small hillock, and on the leeward side there was a force of riders. If the northmen continued to push back their foes, they would be left vulnerable. Had winter not been so recently left behind, perhaps the riders would have been concealed in truth.

“Tight, rocky,” Theo said, pulling a piece of jerky from a pouch at his hip. He chewed on it as he stared down at the hillock, apparently uncaring of the battle. “Wouldn’t want to fight ahorse there.”

“It was the only place to hide themselves,” another man said, playing at a scar over his lip. “If they lured Lord Stark into the riverbed…”

There were perhaps one hundred horsemen laying in wait, but Ned found his brow furrowing, his concerns elsewhere. What his father was doing out fighting in such a manner, he could not say. “Ser Mark,” he said to the last speaker. “Pick fifty men. We will approach the hill quietly, and then dismount to take the fight to them. As we near, Lord Cerwyn will lead the rest to envelop them and prevent escape.” When fighting clansmen in the Vale, Jon had always stressed leaving at least the appearance of a way out to foes, but here and now Ned found himself desiring to deprive the foe not just of their force, but of all news of their fate.

“I will go,” Theo said, hand going to check the claymore at his side.

Mark tapped one finger to his helm, turning his fine red mount to head back over the rise, calling out names and low commands.

“Surely we could split, and some of us could ride to Lord Stark,” Hornwood said, glancing about at the other lords nearby. He was not the only one who seemed more eager to ride to the battle proper, despite the lay of the land and the opportunity they would miss in doing so.

“No,” Ned said. The northmen in the riverbed were pushing the royalists back steadily, and once the ambushing force was defeated or destroyed the battle would be won in any case, but he did not care to take the time to explain the particulars of it to those who did not grasp that.

It did not take long for Ser Ryswell to return with the men, and Ned found himself looking at a touch more than fifty men, but by the eagerness on their faces he judged it could not be helped. Theo placed himself solidly at Ned’s left, bulling a young Flint man out of the way with a pat on the shoulder, and a small man in green and bronze slipped into place at his right. He shared a small smile with Howland as the man took his pronged spear from his back. It would be a messy fight, frantic, but he could think of few better to have at his side for it.

“We’ll do our part,” Lord Cerwyn promised him as they finished forming up.

Ned gave him a nod, expecting no less. “No war cries,” he reminded his men, and then they were off.

They kept to a canter as they went, riding down the slope of the rise, and there was only the thud of hooves on dirt and the faint clash of steel to fill the air. The moment stretched out, and at any instant it seemed certain that one of their foes would turn to see them approaching, but all too soon they were only a stone’s throw away, and then Ned was raising one fist and pulling his mount to a stop. They dismounted, some few staying with the horses, but the rest following Ned as he led the way towards the trees on the hillock.

A man at the rear of the group turned in his saddle, stretching, and he froze as he saw fifty grim northmen running at him in silence. He wheezed a warning, shock thinning his voice, but then he found it, shouting his alarm. Someone hushed him, but others turned to look, and dismay spread as they tried to react. They were too tightly packed to turn to face them, horses almost shoulder to shoulder where they weren’t separated by trees, but they tried all the same, and they suffered for it.

Ned dragged the man to spot them from his saddle, dagger finding his eye, and he was only the first to set about the bloody work. Howland took a man in the throat with his spear, and Theo put his sword through another’s spine, as the cavalrymen were set upon by infantry in a reverse of the usual.

A cry went up to ride free, but it was already too late. Fouled by their first reaction, now the rest of the scouting force rode to surround them, taking the sides of the copse and the top of the hillock. A roar went up from the Northmen in the river as they caught sight of Cerwyn banners, and Ned knew the skirmish was as good as won as he killed a man’s horse out from under him. Blood splattered his face, but he blinked it away, dragging another man down when they tried to swing at Theo. He might feel the fight won, but someone still had to tell the enemy that.

X

Not a man escaped them that day, though it took some effort on behalf of the riders to catch those few who escaped the cordon, and by the canny mountain clansmen to catch those who tried to hide. Whoever had sent the thousand odd strong host would have only guesses as to what had happened to it, at least for a while.

Such work took precedence over reunions, however, and Ned was not able to do more than share a handful of words with his father before they were on the march. The news that Darry had been taken was welcome, but word that Lord Commander Gerold Hightower had established himself at Harrenhal was less so. Time for a detailed discussion of the war would come later though, and he found himself and his scouting force riding along with his father’s cavalry and the handful of noble prisoners. Their smallfolk captives had been sent away with the rest of the foot, towards Harroway’s Town to meet with the oncoming northern army, but Rickard was leading them somewhere else.

Their destination was not far. Within an hour of hard riding they reached it, a stretch of woods a short ways off one of the back roads, the kind of place that saw little traffic and that only locals would be aware of. They were not the first to arrive; a cluster of riderless horses had been given leave to graze by the treeline, watched over by squires and soldiers. The direwolf banner he spied said that one belonged to Brandon , but he was nowhere to be seen. Ned and his men took their cues from his father and his retinue, dismounting by the woods and seemingly preparing to enter them. There was some confusion, questions being asked that few seemed willing to answer, but Ned was of a mind to demand some when he was diverted.

“Ned,” a familiar voice said.

Ned turned, and almost smiled as he saw Elbert Arryn approaching him, a squire tending to his horse. “Elbert,” he began, but then something in his friend’s face made him pause.

“You need to talk to your father,” Elbert said, grim and quiet. “Your brother won’t do it, and he won’t listen to anyone else.”

Ned did not speak, only frowning with a question in his gaze.

“I understand why, but this can’t continue,” he said. “What Aerys did was foul, but he is a madman born of incest. If you speak with-”

“What did he do.” A chill crawled up his spine as his imagination conjured up fell deeds that might have his father react in such a way as to have Elbert so out of sorts.

“You don’t- shit.” Elbert closed his eyes for a moment. “You should speak to Lord Rickard. Quickly, before it starts.”

Around them, men were already moving deeper into the woods, the prisoners amongst them, many starting to pale and sweat. It was the nobles that led the way, though whatever was about to happen had them of mixed minds, men of the North, the Riverlands, and the Vale a mix of eager, solemn, disquieted, and angry.

Ned walked on, angling to catch up before whatever this was could start. The trees grew thicker, causing men to slow as they grew more congested, but every man he made to move past was quick to step aside when they saw the wolf on his breast. Something in their bearing made him think it wasn’t because he was Lord Stark’s second son. He had just about reached his father when they arrived at their goal.

The sight of a young heart tree amidst a clearing slowed his step, white trunk and red leaves a comforting sight. It could not yet be two centuries old, but it seemed to be thriving here in the south, hidden away as it was, and its face seemed to smirk at them. He almost missed Brandon standing beside it, and another group of men already present with their own small group of prisoners, nobles all, but then the clearing was beginning to fill, men surrounding the heart tree. The usual quiet hush of a godswood was present, but it was not due to respect this time. It was something else, something weightier. He took a spot at the front of the crowd, meeting his brother’s gaze briefly, but there were no answers to be found there.

Rickard Stark surveyed the crowd before him. The clearing was packed, save for a space around the heart tree where the Stark lord and his heir stood, and though the watchers spilled out into the woods, space had been found for all their captives.

“A moon’s turn ago,” Rickard started, looking at the face on the heart tree, “I was sent a message.” His voice was as low as it always was, but it could not be called quiet now, not with the tightly leashed embers of rage deep within it. His fist was clenched around the neck of a cloth bag.

Ethan Glover stepped up, newly scarred across his brow, and placed a tall stump by Rickard’s side before stepping back. The Stark lord placed his bag upon it, and then undid the knot holding it closed. A ripple went through the crowd as its contents were revealed, some men grimacing as they looked away, others shaking their heads, some silently raging. Brandon was the worst of them, his face a rictus of fury as he snarled, his fists clenching at his sides.

A cushion of black and red sat upon the sump, and on it was a severed foot.

It had been lathered in some concoction to ward off the rot, but still there was an unpleasant stench, though perhaps that was just due to a prisoner pissing his breeches, and Ned’s face went blank as he understood what he was looking at. Elbert shifted at his side, but he had no mind for anything but the foot of his sister on display before the heart tree.

“Aerys has forgotten. I mean to remind him,” Rickard said. He looked to the nearest of the captives, and the man shrank back, before swallowing, girding himself. He raised his chin in defiance, but it seemed to have no impact on the grim lord before the heart tree, as if he was not truly seeing him. “You will all choose something to give up this day. Your oaths to Aerys, or your foot. I do not care which. But you will choose.”

Two Stark men pushed the chosen noble forward, and he almost stumbled before catching his balance. He swallowed, but stood tall.

“Choose,” Brandon demanded of him. There was a hatchet in his hand, and he seemed on the verge of making the choice for the man.

The noble swallowed again. He was a Riverlander, and his armour said he was of no great wealth or power, but he stood there all the same. “F-for perverting the laws of hospitality and for abusing a maiden in his care, I renounce my loyalty to King Aerys Targaryen.”

Brandon snarled, but a slight gesture from Rickard had him subsiding. A look saw the noble marched off out of sight, and another was pushed forward.

“Choose,” Rickard told him.

“I forsake the Targaryens forevermore,” he said quickly. “As they have treated their oaths to us, let mine to them be the same.”

He too was marched off, and the next noble pushed forward. He was just as quick to deny the king, as was the next man, and the next. A glance at the heart tree saw no evidence of severed feet, save the one on the cushion, and Ned was able to think past the cold anger to wonder if any lords captured before this had been so dedicated to Aerys as to choose the other. Then he remembered Elbert’s request, and he knew the answer.

Another noble was pushed forward, but this one did not have the look of the others, and the crowd seemed to lean forward, eager and repulsed in turn. None were so keen as Brandon, his brother wearing a sharp cut of a smile as the lord drew himself up to sneer at all around him.

“You speak of oaths betrayed, and hospitality broken,” he said, the scorn on his face belied by the slight tremor in his leg. “But these are pretty lies to tell yourselves that you are not the ones without honour, turning your coat for these cold northern cunts-”

“It’s the foot, then?” Brandon asked, uncaring of his speech.

The lord, a Crownlander, did not respond with words, only spitting at Brandon’s feet. Brandon’s smile grew sharper, and he stepped forward as the two Stark men took the captive’s shoulders and forced him to the ground.

“Father,” Ned said, interrupting the scene. Elbert straightened beside him, giving an encouraging nod.

“Son,” Rickard said, grey eyes unreadable.

“I have a better way,” Ned said. He looked to his side, not to Elbert, but to the slight man at his left.

Howland knew what he wanted, and handed it over. The greatsword was taller than he was, but the decision to trust him to carry it was about strength of character, not strength of arm. Ned accepted Ice, and held it out to his lord father.

Rickard accepted his weapon, and Elbert sighed, but for all that he was a close companion, he was a man of the Vale, not the North. He did not understand. Theirs were the ways of Theon, of Cregan, and Aerys had taken a Stark daughter. The Boltons knew well what followed such a thing, and now the Targaryens would too.

There was nothing dignified about the way the defiant noble was stretched out, and he could not hold back the scream that was pried from his lips when Rickard took his foot off above the ankle. Footwear was discarded, and Brandon threw the severed part up into the heart tree, where it lodged between two boughs. Blood clung to the white wood as it trailed down the bark, slowly winding closer to the smirking face upon the trunk.

A gesture from Rickard had the white faced man dragged away, jaw clenched and still forcing back groans of anguish, and another was brought forward. The grim lord set the tip of his sword in the dirt, hands resting on its hilt. The watchers might have been split in their thoughts on what they were witnessing, but they followed his gaze all the same.

“Choose.”

X

At the end of the sixth month of the 282nd year after Aegon’s Conquest, two pieces of news reached the Starks. The first was that the White Bull had slipped another slew of raiding forces into the Riverlands, continuing his effort to prevent the rebels from consolidating and pushing into the Crownlands. The second was that Lady Lyarra Stark had passed in her sleep. It was a grim host that set out to intercept the raiders, one thousand strong and led by a man eager to drown his grief with the blood of his enemies. They would find their foe, guided by the smoke of a razed village, and Lord Stark was the first man into the fray.

The mood was ill as they returned to camp. Usually, a cunning victory over a tricky foe would have been cause for celebration, but there would be no cheer amongst the northmen while their lord was borne amongst them on a litter, pale and wounded. They had their blood, but there would be no visit to a heart tree until they had seen to the Stark. A swift ride and harsh words had a pimply young maester from a nearby castle brought to their camp, and with the aid of a barber and a serving woman known for her sewing, the bleeding was brought to a halt. Only time would tell if he would keep the leg, but those who had held their breath for him were assured that he would live through the night, and his tent was made ready and comfortable.

It was then that the third piece of news arrived, borne by a man in Tully colours. He carried a letter, and he refused to give it to any but Lord Stark, even after learning of his condition. His sons attended him as he read it, sheer will fending off the effects of the poppy he had been given, slowly making his way through the letter. When he reached the end, his strength fled him and it slipped from limp hands, his breathing slowing as his eyes closed.

Ned’s gaze swung to the messenger, and the man froze, but Brandon had already seized the letter and was reading it swiftly. A storm of expressions played out across his face from start to end, and when he was done he threw it at Ned. An angry jerk of his chin had the messenger hurrying from the tent, leaving the sons alone with their comatose father. Ned tilted the parchment to catch the afternoon sun, and read.

‘Rickard Stark, Hoster Tully, Jon Arryn, Robert Baratheon,

Lyanna Stark is untouched and unharmed. I have men in place to ensure she remains so, but my father’s paranoia is great and I know not where he hides her away. She is not in the Red Keep. From that alone I know the unkingly threat he made was false. In time I hope to gain knowledge of her location, but my father has taken much advice from Varys, and it was all I could do to ensure her guards had amongst them men loyal to me. I fear to act with haste lest I endanger Lady Lyanna further. Time is needed.

I have convinced Lord Tyrell to besiege Storm’s End, and to take his time doing so; the might of the Reach will not march north, and those within that redoubtable fortress are in little danger of anything but boredom. The men of Dorne will muster, but hold fast in the Prince’s Pass and the Boneway. There is still time for wisdom to temper rage.

I belabour the point. Time, again time. In time I will find her, but if Aerys feels threatened enough to carry out his monstrous deed in truth, I cannot guarantee my men will stop it. I do not presume to ask you to lay down your arms or return home. Instead I will presume to ask you to hold fast, to manoeuvre for the time I need to find Lyanna Stark. I ask for much, I know, but I still hope that this challenge can end in reason, and not in fire and blood.’

Rhaegar Targaryen’

Ned looked to his brother, the parchment crumpling in his fist.

“He is addled,” Brandon said, visibly fighting the urge to pace, “if he thinks we will sit and wait for him to make right the crime of his father.”

“Hightower still raids the Riverlands,” Ned said, his mind elsewhere. “Rhaegar lacks either the power or the desire to stop it.”

“You think it a trick? A way to let him cut at us as he holds out for reinforcement?” Brandon asked.

“Maybe,” Ned said, “though it does not sit right. He would not be so eager to prevent us from besieging Harrenhal if a Reach army was marching north.” If Tyrell were to bring the bulk of his strength to join the fight, the royalist cause would only benefit by having the rebels extended so.

“The last word is still that Baratheon marched into the Reach a month past,” Brandon said. “Could be he’s giving them some trouble.”

Ned sat in one of the chairs on the side of his father’s tent, turning the situation over in his mind. He had no doubt that Robert was giving them all sorts of trouble, to say the least. “Hightower is a Kingsguard,” he said, leaning on his knees. “A lord might delay or mishear, but a Kingsguard will follow the orders of the king as intended.”

“Then we’re back to the worth of Rhaegar’s word,” Brandon said. He gave in to the urge to pace, though each time he turned he did so in such a way as to avoid looking at their father, pale and wan. “These southern schemes…” he grimaced as he trailed off.

“I do not think it matters,” Ned said as his thoughts came together. “Hightower and his Riverlords raid the Riverlands so that we are forced to defend it,” he said. “He is a skilled leader of men, so it follows that he feels he would be disadvantaged were we to push south. Whether the cause is Rhaegar or a slow muster, his reinforcements must not be near.”

“Then true or false, our course is the same,” Brandon said. “If Rhaegar desires a Great Council, returning Lyanna to us will serve him better than the threat of that army anyway.” His pacing eased, and so did some of the tension in him. “Another month, and we will be on our way.”

“So long as our preparations are uninterrupted,” Ned reminded him. “By rights, we were to be halfway to King’s Landing by now.”

Brandon’s mood was brought down again. “Fucking Darrys. Fucking Mootons. Fucking disloyal Riverlords.”

“Those are your wife’s people,” Ned said, sitting back in his chair now.

“And when I share a camp with Hoster Tully, I will hold my tongue,” Brandon told him, “but while he is perched at Darry, and so long as they keep guiding Crownlanders along goat paths to strike at their neighbours, I will call them all cunts.”

Ned only shook his head. He knew well how his brother could fall into a mood. The sun was beginning to set, the light that had lit up the tent walls starting to fade. “You should ride for Riverrun, and try for an heir again.” But his words went unheard.

“The sooner we string Aerys up and return to the North, the better,” Brandon said. His annoyance was gone, replaced by something more sombre. “I was not made for the south.”

The Stark heir looked to their father, and stepped towards the bed, reaching out. But it was not their father he reached for. It was Ice, the blade still unsheathed, yet to be cleaned from the battle and resting against the bed. He took it up, and gave Ned a look.

Ned returned it, nodding once. The war was yet young.

X

The White Bull did not sit and wait as the rebels gathered supplies and consolidated forces. For every small group sent to raid and raze, there were also loyalists who sought to fire grain houses, put holes in river barges, and spy on noble correspondence. It was a war of a kind that had not been seen since before the time of their fathers and grandfathers, since the ambitions of the Blackfyres had near on torn the realm in twain. Even when servants of taken castles were turned out and replaced, there were still those who sought to act in the interests of their royalist overlords. Even so, such things could only delay the rebel push, and Hightower knew it. That did not mean he meant to make it easy on them.

From the top of a hill, Ned watched as a skirmish played out, laying on his belly with a telescope held to his eye. It was borrowed from his brother, but Brandon hardly needed it at the time, hard pressed and surrounded as he was. He watched as his older brother cleaved a man’s head from his shoulders, grinning widely as he said something to Walder, even as the giant caught two men upon his tower shield and threw them back. The northmen were apparently pinned against a ridge, hunters turned to hunted.

“You were right,” the man laying beside him said. He had no far-eye of his own, and he squinted down at the knot of several hundred men. Once auburn hair was greying, but still thick. “Jon will be at the Saltpans by now, and if my brother isn’t dealing with more of this I’ll marry a Frey.”

The force they had intercepted was only one of several across the lands that the Northmen had been entrusted with, and other lords took men to greet them. There were those who had been sure that such things would begin to slow as Hightower spent more and more men in dribs and drabs to slow them, but Ned was not one of them. When word had come from Wickenden of ships bearing Crownland sigils sailing down the Bay of Crabs, he had counselled Brandon to stand ready. When a fresh wave of raiding groups had sought to slip past their watch, they had not been caught off guard.

“I am surprised he had the numbers,” Ned said, still watching the fight. The Northmen were holding, but only that. “They must have stripped the southern garrisons to be able to send and spend so many while maintaining Harrenhal.”

“Could be mercenaries,” Brynden Tully said, giving up on squinting down. He rubbed at his eyes. “Aerys has rich vaults.”

An interruption came before any response could be given. “Lord Ned,” said the man on his other side. “Will we not ride to Lord Brandon’s aid?”

“Not yet, Lord Mollen,” Ned said. He turned his far-eye to a dark line of trees beyond the fight, behind the royalists, checking that all was as it needed to be.

“Your brother is in peril,” the middle aged man pressed. A minor lord sworn directly to the Starks, he had been amongst the men to accompany his father to King’s Landing.

“He is,” Ned said.

“He may be wounded, or worse,” Mollen said, as if making sure Ned was aware.

Ned ignored him. His brother had put himself in greater danger on more foolish larks before. Below, the fighting grew fiercer, as Brandon and Walder suddenly began to carve into the dragonmen, threatening a wedge. A bellowing cry went up as his men saw and followed, forming a wedge in truth and beginning to cut their way free of the press. They were almost free when a horn rang out.

From the treeline that Ned had been watching, a group of riders emerged, perhaps fifty strong. They rode hard, swords and axes held ready, as they made to cut off any chance of escape. They were no knights, but they would savage any infantry they came upon all the same.

“Lord Eddard,” Mollen said, almost plaintive.

“No,” Ned said.

“Even if some escape, the risk-”

“We will hold.”

As Ned spoke, there was movement on the ridge that Brandon’s men had been pinned against. Men rose up, bows at the ready, and amongst them was a clansman drawing back a goldenheart bow. It had pained him to hand it over, having grown attached to the gift as he practised with it, but his role in the fight was elsewhere.

The archers, hidden all through the skirmish so far, did not fire into the packed foes beneath them. Instead, they loosed at the approaching cavalry, wounding the lightly armoured riders and killing a number of horses. A second volley only added to the blood on the field. Brandon and Walder continued to carve and bull their way free from envelopment.

Another horn blew, and more cavalry emerged from the trees. This time came the knights, fifty of them, as well as another fifty free riders with them. They split, some aiming to support their fellows against the infantry, others seeking to get around the ridge to ride down the archers.

“Now we go,” Ned said, collapsing his far-eye and scrambling back from the top of the hill. His companions joined him, and they hurried for their mounts, joining the three hundred riders already mounted and waiting in the lee of the hill. Vale knights in their steel, Riverland outriders in their leathers, and Northern clansmen painted with battle boasts, all fell in behind him as he pointed his sword up and over the hill in an unspoken command. Hooves beat at the dirt as they spilled over the rise in a canter, and then a charge. The enemy cavalry had enough time to realise they had been had, and then they were upon them.

He was not deaf to the mutterings that at times spread amongst lords and men, but he had little time for epithets. If coldness was what saw summer knights outmanoeuvred and overcome as they inched closer to his sister, he would bring all the snows of the North with him.

X

The tent that Brandon had taken for his command was growing crowded now that the demands of the war were changing. The knights and nobles who had been sent to join the Starks tended to the younger side, but that was by design. Their elders weren’t about to let a little thing like rebellion and war get in the way of forming bonds between their heirs. For the most part it was working, as hard work and duty forged camaraderie and even cheer. Some days, however, there was no ignoring the grim presence of war.

“Share the news,” Brandon ordered his friend, holding court in the crowded tent.

“We’ve word from Briarwhite,” Jeffory Mallister told the room. His face still bore the fading remnants of a bruise from the rim of a shield. “A royal host is marching south around the Gods Eye.”

They had no table large enough for all of them, so they sat and stood in a rough circle. With few elder relatives around, there was little ceremony to stand on, and more than a few of them swore at the news.

“How many?” Elbert Arryn asked, arms crossed and one of those seated in a chair.

“Was a shepherd's boy that saw them, and they’re moving at night,” Jeffory said. “A Ninepenny veteran took a look at the trail and said more than three thousand, less than eight.”

“Fuckers,” Willam Dustin said, speaking the feelings of many. The Northman had a pair of fresh thin scars on one cheek. “How did the Bull sneak them past our eyes on Harrenhal?”

“Might’ve pulled something clever with their patrols, leaving a few men each time,” Brynden said, blue eyes narrowed. “If it’s that, this has been in the works for a while.” He was one of the oldest in the tent, and his reputation saw that his words were heeded.

“Forget how, where is he getting the men?,” Mark Ryswell said, standing by the side of his good-brother, Willam. “The garrison at Harrenhal must be growing thin, surely.”

“More mercenaries? Levies?” Elbert suggested. “Either here, or there.”

“Did this shepherd’s boy see any banners?” Brynden asked.

“None that he could describe,” Jeffory said.

Brynden gave an irritated grunt. Confirmation that the force to sail on the Saltpans had been mercenaries of Essos had sat ill with all to hear it.

“Don’t suppose it matters either way,” Elbert said. “What are we going to do?”

“We kill them,” Brandon said, causing a scattering of dark chuckles.

“Hoster can’t pursue without being suckerpunched by Hightower,” Brynden said, “and Jon will still be on his way back from Saltpans. It’ll have to be us.”

“What if Hoster feigned his pursuit, lured Hightower in?” Kyle Royce asked. “If he thinks the way is open to strike him, that we are drawn away…”

Some men liked that idea, but Brynden was shaking his head. “Too many risks. He has men with him who know these lands almost as well as I do.”

He was not the only one to mislike it. “Lannister still makes no sign of stirring from his rock,” Ned said, “but if we were to shave men from the western garrisons to meet this chevauchée in our place, that would be the time for him to strike.”

Jeffory had been frowning in thought as they spoke. “Stoney Sept, do you think?” he asked of Brynden.

“My gut says no,” Brynden said, frowning. “They could likely take it, but not easily, and they’ll want to burn as much as they can, pulling men away from the assault on Harrenhal, but there are many towns and villages without their walls.”

“Aye. They’ll split once they round the Gods Eye,” Ned said. He did not know the Riverlands as well as he knew the North, or the Vale, but he knew enough. “Split, raid, then regroup to threaten us.”

“I’ll have their guts decorating the trees before I let them burn my wife’s homeland,” Brandon said. “Ned, what’s to be done?”

Ned glanced at Brynden, but the old soldier only raised a brow at him, a glimmer of amusement in his eye. “Two thousand men to ride south. When they split, we defeat them in detail.” They would split into three at the least, and even in the worst case two thousand would be enough.

“Take your pick of men,” Brandon said. “I’ll follow with another two thousand and catch any fleeing you.” He grinned, and there was nothing pleasant about it. “If they’re Riverland royalists, I leave their punishment to Brynden. If they’re foreign mercenaries, kill them all.”

A slow nod was his answer. He would see it done.

Over the next days, Ned chose his men to lead a host of three thousand south. The camp they left behind was not quite the size of the force he had departed Winterfell with, for those men were spread from the tip of the Gods Eye to the Saltpans, but it was still greater than any they had made during the early days of their defence of the Riverlands. It would remain so even after Brandon followed him south. The younger Stark found his mood buoyed to be on the march again after two months of rushing to and fro to respond to raids, even if their task now was the same writ large.

As the seventh month passed into the eighth, Eddard led his host south around the Gods Eye, sweeping west to avoid the feeder rivers. Brynden Tulley rode at his right, and Roose Bolton at his left. Their progress was swift, and morale was high, as were hopes that they would intercept the enemy before they could spread fire and ruin. All was going well, until it was not.

They had been lucky to receive word of the foe’s movements at all, even if the estimate of their numbers was unreliable. It was a rude shock to find out just how unreliable, however. An entire extra host had crossed the Gods Eye River heading west, marching under cover of night. Daring scouting revealed thirteen thousand men, a mix of Riverland and Crownlanders, supplemented by mercenaries and angling for the soft underbelly of the Riverlands.

There was no time to cry foul or to find answers as to where the soldiers had come from. Their only advantage was that their presence was unknown to the foe, and Ned meant to wring it for every scrap he could. As expected, they split, but that meant less when each still numbered thousands strong.

The largest turned north towards the lake, their target clear. Three thousand men marched for the town that sat on the lakeshore with violent intent, and Ned did not mean to stand idle. A field was found, an awkward bit of land by the river that would let them take the foe on equal footing. Ned did not like battles of equal footing.

Night marching may have let the foe almost sneak by them, but it also left them sluggish of a morning as they readjusted to daytime travel. Come the chosen day, Ned watched them scramble into formation as his troops bore down on them, his cavalry waiting in the wings. A dozen lords watched with him, waiting for the right moment to join their forces.

“Lord Eddard!”

The scout’s call and hurried pace diverted his attention as the battle became inevitable, and a dread came over him.

“Report,” Ned told the man. He was one of Brynden’s.

“There’s another force approaching from the south,” the man said, confirming his fears.

“How many?” he demanded. Had they been found out? Was the march on the lake town a lure? If the foe was less than a thousand, he could delay them with cavalry, but if it was more, the battle was already lost.

“Less than five hundred,” the scout said, finding his breath. “Cavalry all.”

The number jarred at him, both too high and too low. He frowned. “Whose banner?”

“I don’t know,” he said. “It was a white star on blue, five pointed.”

A heartbeat passed, and worry slipped away. Ned found himself smiling, and the scout swallowed.

“Lord Bolton, bring your cavalry about to join the charge from the north,” he ordered. “We will drive them to the south.”

Roose did as ordered without comment, riding off to join his men and give them their new orders.

“You know the banner?” Willam asked, his red stallion stamping the earth. “Who is it?”

“A friend,” Ned said. His men made contact with the enemy, and the crash of battle reached him a moment later. “One that will not like what our foes intended.” He drew his sword.

There was little happiness to be found on a battlefield, no joyous day was this, but as he rode to join his lance of riders, he found the smile lingering on his face all the same.