Chapter 24: The Howl of Winter's Wrath
The journey from Winterfell to Moat Cailin was a brutal overture to the campaign that lay ahead. Winter had sunk its teeth deep into the North, and the land was a vast, frozen expanse of white. Snow fell relentlessly, sometimes in gentle, muffling blankets, other times in blinding, wind-driven blizzards that scoured the landscape and chilled men to the bone. Ciel Phantomhive, Lord Cregan Stark, rode at the head of his Winterfell contingent – a core of five hundred veterans from the Southern wars and a thousand newly levied men, their youthful faces already pinched with cold and a dawning understanding of the harsh realities of a winter march.
He pushed them relentlessly, demanding speed and discipline. There were grumbles, of course, particularly from the greener recruits, but the veterans, who had seen their young lord's capabilities in the fiery crucible of the Riverlands and Harrenhal, enforced his will with grim efficiency. Sarx, his direwolf, ranged ahead, a grey shadow against the snow, his warg-link with Ciel providing invaluable reconnaissance, scouting for sheltered paths and warning of treacherous ice or hidden drifts. Sebastian Michaelis, an incongruous figure of immaculate black against the stark white landscape, rode beside Ciel, seemingly impervious to the biting cold, his presence a silent, unnerving testament to his master's iron will.
Moat Cailin, when they finally reached it, was a grim, frost-encrusted sentinel. Its three remaining towers – the Gatehouse Tower, the Children's Tower, and the Drunkard's Tower – loomed over the frozen marshes of the Neck, their black stones seeming to absorb what little light penetrated the heavy winter sky. The ancient fortress was already bustling. Despite the brutal weather, the Northern lords were answering their Warden's summons.
Columns of men, their banners identifying Houses Umber, Karstark, Glover, Mormont, Flint, and a dozen lesser houses, were converging on the Moat, their supply wagons struggling through the snow-choked causeway. The air was thick with the smoke of a thousand campfires, the ring of hammers from makeshift smithies, and the gruff shouts of men in various Northern dialects. It was a testament to the North's resilience and its ingrained loyalty to House Stark that so many had answered the call, so swiftly, in the heart of winter.
Ciel spent the next fortnight transforming this disparate collection of levies and lords' retinues into an army. He was a whirlwind of activity, inspecting units, conferring with his lords, overseeing the distribution of the limited supplies they had managed to gather. The new Northern host numbered close to eighteen thousand men – shy of the twenty thousand he had demanded, but a formidable force nonetheless, especially given the season. It was a mixed bag: a core of hardened veterans from the previous campaign, their eyes haunted but their skills honed; a larger contingent of older garrison troops and household guards who had not marched south before; and thousands of raw recruits, many of whom had never held a spear, let alone faced an enemy in battle.
Lord Wyman Manderly, who had returned from Harrenhal briefly to muster his White Harbor forces, arrived with a strong contingent of well-equipped knights and men-at-arms, his presence a significant boost to morale. Lord Torrhen Karstark, his grief for his son now a burning ember of vengeful fury, brought a thousand wild, fierce warriors from the east. Lady Lynesse Mormont herself led her small but formidable band of Bear Islanders, axe-wielding women among them, their expressions as fierce as any man's.
There were, of course, challenges. Old feuds between houses simmered beneath the surface. Disputes arose over rations, over precedence in the line of march, over the quality of arms. Ciel dealt with these with a swift, often brutal, impartiality that left no doubt as to who was in command. A quarrel between a Hornwood captain and a Cerwyn lieutenant over foraging rights, which threatened to escalate into bloodshed, was settled by Ciel ordering both men to spend a night guarding the latrine pits in the freezing wind. The lesson was learned quickly.
Sebastian, during this period, was Ciel's silent enforcer and logistical miracle worker. When a vital convoy of arrows from the Rills was reported snowbound and unlikely to arrive, Sebastian vanished for a day and a night, reappearing just as Ciel was about to dispatch a frustrated raven, with the arrow shipment miraculously following close behind, its guardsmen speaking in awed, terrified whispers of a "dark spirit of the storm" that had cleared their path. When a minor lord hinted at withholding his promised grain tribute due to "unexpected spoilage," Sebastian paid him a private visit; the grain arrived the next day, pristine and plentiful.
"The Northmen are… commendably direct in their motivations, my Lord," Sebastian observed one evening, as he meticulously sharpened Dark Sister by the light of a flickering oil lamp in Ciel's spartan chambers within the Gatehouse Tower. "Fear of their lord, fear of winter, fear of dishonor. And a rather touching, if primitive, belief in your… almost divine right to lead them into certain peril."
"Their belief, however founded, is a weapon, Sebastian," Ciel replied, studying a crudely drawn map of the Neck. "And we will need every weapon at our disposal."
His greensight, in the ancient, brooding atmosphere of Moat Cailin, a place soaked in the blood of centuries, became sharper, more insistent. One night, as he stood on the battlements, the wind howling around him, a vision seized him with breathtaking clarity. He saw his army struggling through a blizzard, not in the Neck, but further south, in rolling hills he did not recognize. He saw them ambushed, caught between a force of knights bearing the crowned stag of Baratheon and another, shadowy host whose banners he could not discern. He saw dragonfire, not Vhagar's bronze, nor Caraxes's blood-red, but a brilliant, searing blue – Tessarion, Daeron Targaryen's mount. And he saw himself, standing alone on a snow-covered hill, Dark Sister in hand, facing down the blue dragon, Sarx a grey fury at his side. The vision ended with an overwhelming sense of cold, of sacrifice, and a single, clear word whispered on the wind – the same word from the Winterfell godswood, its meaning still tantalizingly out of reach.
He shared the essence of the vision – the ambush, the Baratheon stag, the blue dragon – with no one but Sebastian.
"Tessarion and Daeron Targaryen, my Lord," Sebastian mused, his crimson eyes thoughtful. "And Lord Borros Baratheon. A formidable combination. It seems your path south will not be… uneventful."
"Forewarned is forearmed, Sebastian," Ciel said grimly. "We will adjust our route, increase our scouting. And we will be prepared."
Finally, after weeks of relentless preparation, the new Northern army was as ready as it could be. Eighteen thousand strong, they were a motley host, but united by their loyalty to the Wolf Lord and a grim determination to see this war through. Ciel gathered his principal lords and their commanders in the windswept main courtyard of Moat Cailin.
He stood before them, a slight, black-clad figure against the backdrop of the ancient, crumbling towers, Sarx a massive, silent presence at his feet. The wind whipped his dark hair, and his single blue eye, cold and piercing as a shard of winter ice, swept over their grim, bearded faces.
"Lords and warriors of the North!" Ciel's voice, amplified by the strange acoustics of the Moat, cut through the biting wind. "You have answered the call! In the heart of winter, when lesser men huddle by their fires, you have come! You have left your homes, your families, to march south into the fire and blood of a war not of our making, but one we are sworn to finish!"
He paused, letting his words sink in. "The Southron lords, they mock us. They call us savages, ice-lickers, worshippers of trees and stones. They think us slow, ponderous, easily broken by their knights and their dragons. They do not understand the North. They do not understand us."
A low growl of assent rumbled through the assembled host.
"They do not understand that winter is our ally, not our enemy!" Ciel declared, his voice rising. "They do not understand that the cold hardens our resolve, that the snows sharpen our senses! We are the wolves of winter, and this winter, we bring our fury south! We march for Queen Rhaenyra, our rightful Queen! We march to honor the Pact of Ice and Fire! We march to avenge our fallen kin, to secure our lands, our ancient rights! We march to remind these arrogant Southroners that the North remembers!"
His voice reached a crescendo. "Let them feel the bite of Northern steel! Let them hear the howl of winter's wrath! For Winterfell! For the North! For Queen Rhaenyra!"
A deafening roar erupted from eighteen thousand throats, a primal, savage sound that seemed to shake the very foundations of Moat Cailin. Banners were raised, swords and axes brandished. The new Northern army, forged in winter's chill and their young lord's iron will, was ready.
The march south from Moat Cailin, through the treacherous, frozen swamps of the Neck, was an ordeal that would test the limits of even Northern endurance. Blizzards descended with little warning, reducing visibility to near zero, burying trails, and freezing men in their tracks if they were not vigilant. The causeway, in many places, was a sheet of treacherous ice, horses slipped, wagons broke down. Rations dwindled, and the cold was a constant, gnawing enemy.
Ciel led from the front, sharing the hardships, his own slight frame seemingly impervious to the brutal conditions. He pushed his men, and himself, relentlessly. Sebastian was always at his side, a silent, black figure who seemed to glide over the snow and ice, his presence a source of both reassurance and profound unease for the men. He would often disappear into the blizzards, only to reappear with fresh game for Ciel's mess, or with news of a clear path ahead, his methods, as always, unexplained.
Ciel used Sarx extensively, his warg-bond a vital lifeline. The direwolf, at home in the snow and ice, scouted ahead, finding sheltered encampments, warning of treacherous bogs hidden beneath the snow, even, on one occasion, leading a lost foraging party back to the main column. Ciel also sent out his "raven scouts," using his warging ability to gain an aerial perspective of their arduous path.
The crannogmen, the elusive people of the swamps, remained largely unseen, though Ciel occasionally sensed their eyes watching from the reedbeds, their presence more curious than hostile. He had sent word ahead, as before, of his peaceful passage and his allegiance to Queen Rhaenyra. No aid was offered, but neither was there any hindrance. Perhaps they, too, respected the sheer audacity of a Northern army marching south in the depths of winter.
After what felt like an eternity of struggle, they finally emerged from the frozen hell of the Neck, south of the ruins of Greywater Watch. The landscape began to change, the snows less deep, the air marginally less biting. They had made it. They had brought a Northern winter into the Riverlands.
The first scouts they encountered were Tully men, their faces grim but relieved to see the Stark banners. They brought urgent news. Prince Daemon, they reported, was besieged at Maidenpool by Lord Borros Baratheon's massive Green host. The Stormlanders, fresh and well-supplied, were pressing the attack hard. Daemon and his dragons, Caraxes and a still-recovering Meleys (Rhaenys having joined him), were inflicting terrible losses, but they were outnumbered and running low on supplies. Jacaerys and Vermax were harrying Baratheon's flanks but could not break the siege. The Black cause in the Riverlands was on the brink of collapse.
Ciel listened to the reports, his face a mask of cold composure. His greensight vision of the crowned stag and the blue dragon flashed in his mind. Borros Baratheon. And Daeron Targaryen, with Tessarion, could not be far behind.
"Maidenpool," Ciel said, his voice flat. He looked at his assembled lords, their faces grim but resolute, their army weary but unbroken by their passage through the Neck. "It seems our first engagement has found us. Prince Daemon requires relief. Lord Borros Baratheon requires a lesson in Northern steel."
He turned to his new army, the Wolfpack he had forged in winter's heart. "We march on Maidenpool. We will break this siege. We will remind the Stormlanders why they should fear the winter's howl."
The new Northern army, eighteen thousand strong, a tide of grey steel and white fur cloaks, turned eastward, their breath misting in the cold Riverland air. They were an army born of winter, led by a boy lord with the eyes of an ancient soul and a demon at his side. And they were about to fall upon the unsuspecting forces of Lord Borros Baratheon like an avalanche. The Dance of the Dragons was about to enter a new, even more brutal, phase.