Bleap

CHP 45: Blood & Honor

Robb put a hand on the long table before him, and calmly looked into the crimson eyes of his greatest ally, and perhaps the greatest present threat to the Seven Kingdoms. The flecks of gold seemed to spiral with unkempt mischief as his mother reassuringly squeezed his hand under the table.

He'd have to be a great fool to not notice the sudden shift hanging about the air. A greater fool still to not notice that when Karl spoke, ALL of the River Lords lowered their gazes and listened with...

CHP 44: A Ruler's Wisdom

The next day started with an oddly beautiful morning.

The grey clouds and light rain that had become par for the course over the previous week had faded away during the night, revealing a clear blue sky flecked with puffy white clouds. Birds of prey sang as they left their nests and down below, I could see squires rushing about in the Northern camp, helping wherever they could while food was rushed out of the keep to the pavilions of the many lords and knights presents.

It almost ...

CHP 43: The Starks of Winterfell

Unsurprisingly, my suspicions about the two very different peoples clashing rang true right the next day after the northmen settled in.

"So you really slept with half the maidservants at Riverrun?"

"Half? No man, al-"

I'd been drinking with Greatjon, Jonos Bracken and Roose Bolton in the gatehouse when the steward ran in, hesitant and meek as he steadied himself against the door.

"Well." Greatjon put his tankard of mead down, face tinted, "Spit it out, boy."

"How...

CHP 42: First Men

Robb opened his mouth to say something but the older woman that had rode in with me moved first. Quietly, she approached the Stark and asked something I didn't care to listen to before she turned to me. 

"Ah."

It was her glassy blue eyes, and the similar scent that confirmed my guess.

She was Catelyn Stark, Eddard's wife, Edmure's older sister, and the mother of the direwolf litter.

Covering the distance between us with trembling steps, she looked up at me as her ...

CHP 41: A Cheeky Reunion

(A/N: Minor grammar edits, no need to reread it if you have already.)

I sat alone on one of Riverrun's battlements, back against the wall, curiously tugging at the strings of a harp I'd 'borrowed' from a travelling singer after helping the soldiers check the ditch near the castle.

Down below, past a window, I could see Petyr Baelish pacing around his room.

The little man had run himself ragged and reeked of alcohol I could smell even from where I was. He'd approached me agai...

CHP 40: Monster

Petyr Baelish looked at the giant of a man before in silent apprehension, hiding his sweating hands behind his back as his gaze flickered between Karl and the laughably confused Edmure Tully. The Knights of the Vale, the best among the kingdoms, stood behind him.

Their hands had moved to their swords quickly enough.

Petyr Baelish had never claimed to be the strongest man, never claimed to be the greatest warrior... He was aware more than any of his weaknesses, and of his strengths...

CHP 39: The Northern March

Robb Stark watched with steely eyes as men sworn to his father, now him, marched from beside the road. The North was home to a hardy and fierce people who'd grown accustomed to the terribly harsh weather, the treacherous terrain and the savage wildlife that walked about in the ancient forests sprawling across the kingdom.

There wasn't much that shook his people, but even Robb, inexperienced as he was, could very well see the jitter in their tread, their wandering eyes, and their hands o...

CHP 38: Serpentine Rival

I felt something prick at my mind and my natural reaction to that was whipping around and tearing down the tree... but, I stopped myself just before I could.

Whatever had tried to affect me wasn't invasive in nature, not an attack. It was closer to a vision than an attack.

So, out of curiosity, I allowed it to show me what it wanted.

My answer came in the form of a sequence of events that flashed one after the other.

In the blink of an eye, I saw an endless sea of ice ...

CHP 37: Mightiest Foe

Edmure Tully led me through a long winded corridor, with windows  past lords of high and low birth and dozens of knights talking amongst themselves. Some among them made light of just how much threat the Lannister hosts posed, while others were grim and contemplative, casting subdued glances as we passed them by.

A few among them offered hesitant words of gratitude.

From their history, I'd learnt that the ones in power at the moment were a smart bunch of thugs, even if they h...

CHP 36: The Young Trout

"What do you think, Jonos? Are all the rivermen here?" I asked curiously, steadying the increasingly stand-offish Roach as I turned to look at my companion.

The River Lord scratched his thin beard and cast a glance at the forest behind us, where dark trees reached out with twisted limbs made of cracked wood. He looked at the two men in front of us, hoisting the crimson stallion banner of House Bracken, then cocked his head, "I don't think so. The pavilions would be stretching to the for...

CHP 35: The Little Man

I'd come to realise that I'd severely overestimated the pace human armies moved at when I noticed Addam had started growing something of a beard, it was scraggly and thin at best but still... Robb Stark and the Northern host was nowhere to be seen.

At the same time, I couldn't say it was too long.

A human babe could be born, live for nearly a century and it would still be an ostensibly short time in my eyes... The few respites from this worldview came in the form of fleeting amuse...

CHP 34: Small Council Meeting - III

(A/N: I did some minor grammar edits, you don't need to read it again if you already have..)

The first thing Cersei noticed when she set foot into the Small Council chamber was a momentous shift in the air. The heavily decorated room felt tense, to the point where it was suffocating, in a way, even though nothing had really changed.

And the Queen Dowager knew the cause very well.

The seat of the Hand wasn't empty as before, instead occupied by man well into the later years o...

CHP 33: A Mountain To A Dragon?

I dismounted Roach slowly and cast a wayward glance at the burning settlement outside the main castle as I made my way past the raised portcullis, hand atop the hilt of the broadsword I'd pried off the corpse of some dead soldier on the way.

Immediately, I noticed the number of corpses was odd.

I narrowed my eyes, "Hmm..."

It was mostly soldiers, and men, not elderly, women or children.

Maybe Lewys had urged them all into the keep for safety, which was smart, but at th...

CHP 32: Human Heart

The so-called Brotherhood without Banners had made its home in a wet cave inside the forest and as I'd come to notice, was little more than a band of angry common folk who'd lost someone to the horrors of war and deserter soldiers from all over the Kingdom, generally from skirmishes with the Mountain That Rides.

I didn't believe they stood much of a chance but I wouldn't know.

From a human perspective, the effectiveness of guerilla tactics was often either greatly underestimated o...

CHP 31: Gods of Men

As I rode back to Pinkmaiden, all around me seemed to blur as I pondered over my actions with the Lannister Host.

I had routed them... but not wiped them out in the same total fashion as all else in the Lands Between. I hadn't crushed them, destroyed all resistance and forced them into submission like Lord Godfrey... nor had I utterly hunted them down to every last man, woman and child like Messmer the Impaler, the demigod who led the crusade and genocide of the Hornsent under Marika's ...

CHP 30: Side Quest - Battle At Blackwater Rush

Tywin Lannister was the Warden of the West, the Shield of Casterly Rock, and the Head of House Lannister... and as all knew, he was not one for humor, not one for forgiveness and not one for loss.

The nature of his son's defeat at the pass was odd and impossible but he was not the sort of fool to deny reality and force willful ignorance upon his mind to calm his heart. He accepted it as fact, and changed his plans accordingly to account for the sorcerer that had driven the pass to ruin....

CHP 29: Nature of War

My map grew increasingly extensive with each stop I made to figure out what my general location was. 

This was often because I didn't use any of the roads or paths on my journey.

Instead, I opted to cut straight through the hills and plains in a bid to cut off the Lannister forces before they could cause any extensive damage... well, more than they already had.

Assuming that they'd crossed at the same time, or perhaps, earlier than Jaime Lannister, the Lannister host un...

CHP 28: Trouble in the South

Pinkmaiden received us with open arms once they learned of my connection with their liege lord, the steward led me to a room in one of the keep's towers, and it was... good enough for a night's stay.

I'd learnt not to have high expectations from a medieval society, a soft mattress to rest and a warm fire to sleep by was more than enough, even if the effects of weather were superficial at best and mildly annoying at worst.

In the morning, the same steward from the day before led me...

CHP 27: Aged Heart

Upon some inquiry, I found out there was no definite location or trace to follow to track down this so-called Mountain That Rides, a title I found to be metal as all hell, save for a trail of pillaging and rape as he'd been ordered to lay waste to the Riverlands to divide their forces.

But, this didn't dissuade me, instead it gave me an opportunity to explore this ancient Kingdom of hills and rivers to my heart's content.

The sky was a cloudy grey, which I'd noted was the typical ...

CHP 26: Small Council Meeting - II

Cersei Lannister once again found herself seated in the Small Council chambers, smelling of rich perfumes, with the grace of a Queen.

Furnished with fine carpets from Myr, intricate tapestries from the Free Cities of Norvos, Qohor and Lys from across the Narrow Sea.

A carved screen kept watch over them.

Yet, what may have sounded like a story-like luxury to the common man was but briefly considered by the Queen Dowager before her green eyes found themselves studying the memb...

CHP 25: Hearts of Men

The rivermen wilted like grass as I walked back their way, their skittish eyes held doubt and fear, and none made any attempt to approach... or even comment on my actions.

Instead, they backed away like their steeds, and the local wildlife who seemed to crumple away in my presence out of instinct.

Truth be told, I couldn't blame them for their reactions, none could.

The closest thing this world seemed to possess to my kin were overgrown lizards who were only relatively large...

CHP 24: Gods Among Men

Robb Stark sat in silence, watching as Lords of great and small renown alike mingled about the Great Hall, shouting and japing while others came to near blows...

The Northern Host would soon begin its march, and reinforce his mother's family, the Tullys against the Lannister forces running amok in it... but before that, Robb had to settle matters among his men, to ensure that everything went as smoothly as possible.

One thing he didn't quite appreciate was the way many among those...

CHP 23: Memory of Home

Thankfully, my worries about Roach outright exploding if I blessed him turned out to be largely unfounded, instead, it made him go from a dark brown to a much lighter, his size increased exponentially and his already thick legs bulged with veins and muscles.

Another, less noticeable change, was the colour of his eyes which had gone from a dumb brown to a wiser red, with pupils shaped like a dragon. The MOST drastic change was in its teeth, which had changed into rows of sharp fan...

CHP 22: 'Good' Decision

"What did you do?" Jason Mallister asked me calmly, both hands on the wooden table between us... He studied my expression with narrowed grey eyes, as a lord would.

He'd called me to his solar as soon as I returned to Seagard, having made landfall at the Cape of Eagles where I'd dumped my clothes on the off chance that assuming Bayle's form ended up tearing them to shreds.

I shrugged, warming my hands before the fireplace across the room, "You didn't see?"

"There was a storm....

CHP 21: The Black Dread

In the ancient and gloom-filled great hall of his ancestral seat Pyke, Balon Greyjoy sat on the Seastone chair, hard black eyes wandering over the few captains and lords that had gathered, talking amongst themselves of little things that did not concern a man of his stature.

He was the ruler of the Iron Islands, all on it swore fealty to him and did as he wished, whenever he wished. His throne was the seastone chair, ancient blackstone fashioned into the likeness of a kraken in a time n...

CHP 20: Ancient Foe

I found myself standing on a sea of sand, the air lied still, and I smelled nothing...

Yet, overhead, a storm raged ceaselessly, dark clouds swirled and flame-coloured lightning struck in the distance, still failing to shift the sands that I stood on... A ways off, an entirely different storm took shape, one of grander magnitude yet reserved effects that didn't go beyond the occasional crack of thunder.

"Been a while." I commented off-handedly, sitting down in the sand to make mys...

CHP 19: Might Makes Right

My so-called ‘exchange of blows’ with Lord Jason Mallister had gone about as expected, with him in the dirt of his castle's training yard the moment he neared me, he took his loss with more grace than I'd expected from a noble and hurried off to send the letter, inviting me to roam around his castle.

But at the same time, a few of his men didn't appreciate the fact that the Lord of Seagard, a famed knight, had lost to a foreigner so I decided to spend my time exploring the town.

CHP 18: A Rare Bout of Reflection

I cast one final glance at my handiwork as I untied Roach from the tree I'd left him at.

"Impenetrable fortress, bah."

Most of the so-called Twins were just gone, though I'd made sure to leave enough of the bridge intact that it could still be used by the common folk while dismantling the castles and towers in a way that left them unsalvageable.

I didn't have much other thoughts on the matter besides the fact that they would probably end up occupied by some other lord after ...

CHP 17: Natural Order

Stevron Frey was the firstborn son of Lord Walder Frey, his mother was Lady Perra Royce, of the House Royce from the Vale of the Arryns, and the heir to the Twins that raised his house, House Frey, to their current glory and status.

Much like his aged father, Stevron also placed great importance on family, although he was a tad more amiable and understanding compared to the, as some might say... stingy, patriarch of the house.

Through the Twins, the Freys had placed tolls for the ...

CHP 16: To The Riverlands

Casting one last glance at the gradually disappearing towers of Winterfell, I patted the dark leather satchel at my side with a satisfied smile.

"Let's see now."

There were quite a few places I was interested in visiting on the small map I'd acquired for myself, and there were also a number of books on the whole of the realm to busy myself during the trip... and coin, a lot of coin, of course.

I didn't need to make stops or rest beyond what interested me, that was also a plu...