Chapter 17: Chapter 15
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***
Damian Blackheart.
At our king's hunt, where Lord Stark was present and I was trailing behind, I did get a pretty good idea how and where I should recruit recruits.
There are plenty of bastards and third, fourth, and so on sons in the north who are not needed here. Even though kinship ties are even more developed here than in other regions of the Seven Kingdoms, and only the Dornish can argue with that, but still the role of a man of the whole lord is flattering to some. And first of all I am attracted to the hunters of the mountain clans, they are not bad fighters on axes. But, for example, the individual clans that Gerda told me about are very good marksmen, who train from childhood and live in the forests. They make good scouts, trackers and just hardy boys. Not like those peasants in the Riverlands, whose stamina we trained with Varik until we were blue in the face. The former peasants are a lot of trouble, but they can make good infantrymen if you want to and if you train them properly.
With the Northmen in this regard is a little easier, although we will have to, as Gerda says, accustom them to our discipline, but it is not terrible.
The main thing is, how many Northerners will join me?
After all, to them I'm Walder Frey's former bastard. A knight, but still a man of a bloodline not favoured here. However, it will not be me who will negotiate and travel around the clans, but Daren and John, who volunteered to be a guide. Not that he travelled much in the North, but he did visit the clans.
He'd agreed just as I was hunting, and he'd accompanied me as my official squire, along with Ollie, who seemed to have hit it off.
Robert had a rich haul, and he drank more, which made Stark frown more than usual. He even told Robert a couple of times that he could do with a little less drinking, but Baratheon sent him back to the Others.
And then we returned to Winterfell and learnt of a rather sad event. Bran Stark had fallen out the window of the old tower. I didn't really give a shit about it.
Relatively fucked!
After all, the fall and what the boy saw there played a part in the events that led to the War of the Five Kings, which I needed to rise further in the hierarchy of this world. But of course, I mournfully condoled with Lord Stark and his wife about the tragedy, while I closed myself in my room afterwards, rubbing my hands together contentedly and making a plan for the near future. Soon Stark would go to the South, and my men and I and those we could recruit here would go to White Harbour and get to Sorrowful by sea.
My boys, under the careful guidance of Varik Sokol, should have reached my fiefdom by now.
As if reading my thoughts, Rex knocked at my room and handed me a message that had been delivered by a raven from Sorrowful.
The message read as follows:
"We made it to the Sorrowful. Everyone is safe, but there was a conflict with Renly Baratheon's men. His man and a handful of men tried to take out all the taxes that were collected for you as Keeper of the Stormlands. We drove them off, but it seems more of the Storm Lord's men are coming here soon. A master over the Mourner's weapons named Donald and all the men under his hand didn't seem to resent it all too much. There won't be any trouble with them."
Not to say that pleased me, but it didn't upset me either. In any case, this back-driver would not live long, and I was not going to swear an oath to him in the future. He'll do without me and my men. Renly won't start a war over Mourningtown. He has no actual reason to. He might turn his own men on my men, for instance, but no more. But in any case, we should back up and poke Robert Baratheon's brains out about his little brother. He loves Ned Stark more as his brother than he loves two blooded younger men. Everyone knows that, but they keep quiet. So, as the saying goes, "You don't get hit for asking."
That said, Rex decided to visit our grandfather and share the latest news with him. Although he had been in touch with him from time to time during our journey. But this time he promised to wrangle some help or something of value out of the old man and his other "fellow popes". I informed him that it would be a good idea to recruit a large mounted troop from Essos with a good reputation and experience. War is coming soon after all, so we could use them.
Robert did as I expected. He confirmed that everything in and around the town is my property and that Renly can go to the woods. And then he went off to hastily fondle some servant girl's roundness.
I was off on business again.
Given Jon's affection for his cousin Brandon, it'll be hard for him to leave the boy in such a state. And he won't want to scour the clans of the North looking for recruits for a lord they've never met. We only have a week and a half until the King and his new Hand leave for King's Landing. So something had to be done.
- John. - I called out to him as he came out of the donjon into the courtyard.
- Lord Blackheart? Good afternoon. - He smiled faintly. - Did you need me for something?
- You could say that. - I wanted to offer my condolences again for your family's grief, John.
- Thank you, my lord.
- I think we'll be leaving Winterfell soon. Most of us. Still, it would be nice to have some Northerners to volunteer for my guard. But I can't do it personally. So I'm going to leave you here with Tom of Seven Creeks and Daren. I'll leave you a good deal of money and you'll take the sea from White Harbour to Mourning Town as we did. I, alas, am running out of time. I seem to have a little conflict with my neighbours, so I want to leave early.
- Understood, my lord. - John's a little cheerful. - We'll do what we need to do.
- Take your time, John. Time is of the essence. Spend time with those you care about.
- Thank you for everything, my lord. - John's words caught up with me as I was walking away from him.
- Just because I have a black heart doesn't mean I don't have one.
So I walked off into the sunset, or rather into a brothel. After all, local prostitute Roz is worth her money. It's nice to take advantage of the North's hospitality.
***
Ten days after I spoke to Jon, King Robert and his household and court, as well as Eddard Stark and both his daughters, left Winterfell for the South. And I went with my boys to White Harbour.
We didn't stay long, but I was able to make some connections. I even met a couple of young Freys, including Oliver, Robb Stark's loyal and good squire in canon. The old man was doing well, even had fewer backstabbers. A couple of bastards and one elderly relative decided to go to serve in the Night's Watch, and a couple more died, either at a tournament or on a hunt. They were here as companions of our father's vassal. He was negotiating something to do with the new marriages, I believe. Though I have a feeling Lord Manderly will culturally fuck my father.
We had some good ale in the tavern and immediately found trouble on Gerda's very firm and tantalising spot. Anyway, a knight from the Vale liked our Valkyrie, but she gave him the heave-ho. He tried to take her by force right on the table where Gerda was sitting, and she deftly snatched a dagger and cut off her fingers and the household of the unsuccessful suitor.
This could not be tolerated by his companions, and in the end we had the blood of ten more corpses on our hands in White Harbour. We, as they say, got off with a slight fright and a couple of wounds, but not heavy ones. Though Gerda and I and Rex's boys did most of the work, the rest of us didn't even have time to take part in this "contest".
Then there was a showdown with the guards. Eyewitnesses confirmed that those killed were problem guys and that we were defending ourselves. In the end, to get us released quickly, I gave the sergeant a pawing and he quickly hushed up the case. We were about to leave town, but as soon as we got to our ship, we got a call from a Dornian. Drunk out of his mind and wanting to get to know Gerda better....
If to describe that day briefly, this "Dartan in a skirt" managed to kill two simple mercenaries in addition to this Dornian, and then, when we were already at sea, to slaughter a sailor who tried to rape her at night. And most importantly, besides her, there were six other good women in our squad. But for some reason they only tried to touch her.
She ended up sharing a cabin with me and Ollie all the following nights. It was the only way to avoid a reduction in the number of sailors on the ship.
What's got into all these corpses? I don't know, it's like there's an epidemic of Barley molestation.
We made several stops at the Three Sisters, at the Fingers, at Gull City, at Saltworks, at a fishing village on the Split Claw, and at Dusk Dome, and after that, without making many stops, only a short one at Storm's End to replenish our supplies of provisions and fresh water, we travelled on to Sorrowful.
In all, it took us twelve days to reach my domain by sea.
Sorrowful was a fairly large town, almost ten thousand people in population. Relatively clean, if of course compared to King's Landing or most of the other towns and castles of the local lords. I even think it was much cleaner than Riverrun. Though not surprisingly so. After all, it was quite close to Dorne and the Free Cities. And it had a lively trade.
The harbour was the same size as the Twilight Dome. There was a wide variety of ships, most from Dorne, the Stormlands, and Spaceland, if you counted the Seven Kingdoms, but most from Essos were from Braavos, Pentos, Tyrosh, Myr, and Lys. Though I even saw, apparently, ships from Qarth and even Slaver's Bay.
The captain of the ship told me a little about the town, that it had a port, a harbour market, a town market, which was a little smaller but still quite decent, a whole quarter of artisans' street on which there were several brothels and "private women" working there, and also a separate quarter where the richest and most respected inhabitants of the town lived.
The town itself was walled with a wall of dark grey stone five metres high and two metres wide, there was a small moat, and a castle, which had a double wall and was located on a mountain in the north-eastern part of the town. It had a donjon and a couple of towers, the tallest being the Tower of Mourning, which once housed the body of Deiron the First, who had perished in the Dornish War. He was mourned here by the whole town, and even by Westeros. From this, the old name of the town changed to Mourning, as did the tower that housed the body of their king.
I was met at the dock by Varick, Sigurd, and Donald, the master of the Mourner's weapons. He had served the previous lord here, who had vanished five years ago, and all this time the town had been unable to find its "rightful" owner. As a result, he'll be serving me now. He was a middle-aged man with a thick black beard and the same baldness as the book Stannis, dressed in wide black trousers, a grey doublet and girded with a bastard sword, though he also held a halberd. Behind them were a dozen of my old boys and, as it turned out, some new subordinates who were guards.
- My lord!" Donald saluted. - A mourner at your service.
- Stand up, Ser Donald.
- I am not sire. - he corrected me. - Just Donald Long.
- Well, all right. - I took note of that. - Are the townsfolk and your men ready to swear in the new lord?
- Yes, My Lord. - and then there was a moment's hesitation. - Only the vassals.
- What about my new vassals?
Varick answered for him.
- "If you'll allow me," he said with a smile. - I'll tell you verbatim: "Let that Freyev bastard go to the seventh hell! We won't swear an oath to him. "He's just a pathetic bastard who got his arse handed to him so he could get his dick shoved up it. That's verbatim what I've been told by almost all but a few of your vassals. Only the Horps and the Musgoods simply wouldn't let me into their forts, where they dwelled with their households.
- I see. - I smiled. - A riot, then? Well, after the city and my new warriors are sworn in, I'll deal with the rebels.
- It's not that simple. - Varick grimaced. - It's much more... it's complicated!
I grimaced at the girlish fourteen-year-old's Vkontakte status of marital status from a world past. What else had happened there?
- Varick? - I gave him a testy look.
- It seems about a thousand of Renly Baratheon's soldiers have entered Wrathful Cape, and our neighbours have also gone rogue and stolen your peasants from two villages. Lord Casper Wylde tried to raid the third, but my men and I repelled the raid and they left with nothing, we lost a dozen and a half killed and a dozen more wounded so far. The rest have recovered. Merchants who have sailed to us or come by have said that almost all the lords of Cape Wrath are beginning to gather their men. They seem to want to take this land by force, and they don't give a damn about the king's will.
Well, most of the lords here haven't cared about the king's will in recent years. At first it was only the former Targaryen vassals and their loyal men who didn't care, then the Western Lords didn't care, as long as Tywin Lannister was happy with them. And now the King's little brother can't stand to have a tidbit of the Stormlands snatched away from him.
And now a few thousand snouts are coming here to burn and pillage. And I need this dealt with as quickly as possible.
- I need a crow watcher. And a map of Cape Wrath, and men to show me my lands, as well as guides to neighbouring lands. Varick, Sigurd, take Theo Frey as well, you're coming with me on a little outing. I want you to explore the area as well. Gerda, Olli and Marik, you're also coming with us.
- What are we going to do? - Gerda asked.
- Fight in the darkness that is formed by the clouds of arrows of the enemy. - I smiled at her and went forward. - By the way, do you know any counting rhymes?
- What? - general chorus.
- I see, I'll teach you!
Willam of the Yellow Pears.
The fate of a squire is hard.
Willam had a very hard time with Ser Dir of the Red Shield. The young knight was a stingy, grumpy man. Willam wore rags, which he himself had darned more than once, he had no weapons of his own, only a dagger, a one and a half sword of bad steel and an old spear and shield, which served him as a weapon when he clashed with someone. He'd barely begged his sire for the right to take one trophy helmet from an old battlefield with some brigands. They were not yet in the service of Lord Casper Wylde. The young lord, fortunately for Willam, fed his men well, even the squires, so he was lucky here. They, along with Ser Dir, served Lord Wylde for a second month before their first serious business came their way.
A certain Lord Blackheart, as some people who served Lord Wylde said of him, had obtained money that belonged to the High Lord of the Stormlands, Renly Baratheon, by fraud. This insolent man dared to steal from the King's brother! And for that, the Lord of Storm's End decided to punish the scoundrel and sent a thousand men to take Mourningtown, and also instructed Lords Lester Morrigen, Casper Wylde, Donnel Swann, David Roger, and Lady Mary Mertins to help Ser Loras Tyrell punish Blackheart. It was rumoured that the Estermonts would also join the punitive force, but as support from the sea.
Loras Tyrell led this small army of nearly four thousand men.
Ser Dyr had told Willam that Blackheart was the bastard of the cowardly Frey and would want to sit back behind the walls of his town. And to besiege or storm such a town you need at least three times as many men. That's why they gathered so many warriors of the storm lords.
The gathering of all the lords, and even some of Blackheart's vassals who seemed to be on his side, took place near the Misty Forest, the Mertins' ancestral castle. Lady Mertins as it turned out did not want to march, but merely sent her master at arms and captain of the guard to help along with three hundred foot soldiers. Ser Dir Red Shield complained that this army had rather few mounted men and riflemen, mostly infantry. Although for Willam almost seven hundred mounted men and almost four hundred archers and crossbowmen is not bad.
Loras Tyrell had ordered a camp to be set up and organised forty miles southwest of the Misty Forest. Just at the exit of this Rain Forest.
Wllam listened to nothing but talk of imminent victory and jokes from everyone about this Blackheart.
At about midnight, Willam had barely dragged his mentor in the hard fate of knighthood back to their tent. He had had too much to drink and was now in no condition to go himself, though not only he, but many other noble knights and lords as well.
He himself fell asleep to the chanting of the knights of the Marocs, who remembered in ballads, poems and various simple songs the former warriors and kings who were famous for their feats of arms.
He had good dreams, he saw how he performed at a tournament in honour of a young beautiful maiden and defeated first all the royal guards, then Grigor Clegane, aka "The Mountain", Lina Corbray and many other strong knights, and then....
And then everything went out in front of his eyes and someone yelled at the top of their lungs:
- FIRE!!!
Willam woke up from that scream and realised that their tent was on fire. And next to him lying already on fire, but not shouting Ser Dir.
"How did I not wake up earlier? - wondered the squire without his master. - I could have died here."
After struggling to get up and run out of his tent, realising that the property and Ser Dir could no longer be saved, he tried to run away from the fire, but in doing so was immediately nearly trampled by dozens of riderless horses. And then, falling on his back in a relatively clean, spacious area of the camp, he realised that not only their tent was burning, but nearly half the camp. Everywhere were the shouts of men and the neighing of horses that had rushed out of the camp.
Not far away he heard the clang of steel and the shouting of foul language.
The half-clothed men of Lord Wylde, Rogers, and Baratheon swept by him. He picked up the first sword on the ground and hurried after them, not knowing what to do. It all seemed like a bad dream to him, someone could attack the camp of such a huge army at night, in Willam's opinion, and make a successful sabotage.
They came to a large fire through several tents, where they had recently been sitting, drinking and eating with the other warriors, and now there were about fifty of their dead brethren lying here, dead from burns, dashing arrows and bolts of the enemy, but not a single corpse of the enemy was visible.
- Where are our men? - asked one of the veterans.
- I think it's to the east, there's fighting there. Do you hear that? Let's go! We must teach those pigs a lesson for their insolence!
- Yeah!
Willam was a little braver and more cheerful. This was the first really big fight with the enemy.
But as soon as they ran out towards the enemy, all the courage of him and even his companions vanished. A terrible, and even terrifying picture appeared before them that he would never forget in his life.
In front of them in a circle was a small handful of knights and heavy infantrymen of the Stormlands, and around them were warriors in black, and with faces twisted with laughter. They were laughing madly, and their faces smeared in blood and something white made them look like demons, though Willam had never seen them before this moment. "Warriors in Black" surrounded their brethren and finished them off with arrows and something flammable that immediately ignited several warriors at a time. Those surrounded could not leave the circle because of the tight ring of rectangular shields with a white lion on them, and spears with swords that kept hitting the shields on purpose.
Moreover, the frozen newly arrived forces were also startled by a counting chant that would soon spread to other lands thanks to the survivors:
One, two, Blackheart is coming your way,
Three, four, knives out,
Five, six, keep your eyes open,
Seven, eight, don't mess with him,
Nine, ten, he's coming for you.
Eleven, twelve, run faster!
Thirteen, who didn't hide, it's not his fault.....
These words instilled terror in their hearts.
Finally, they more or less woke up and were ready to fight, but they couldn't because of the arrows coming from the rear. Almost half of them went down at once. Willam was lucky and got pinned down by a couple of bodies. He couldn't get up because of the weight. And shortly after the second volley, several more massive bodies piled on top of him.
When he had more or less made room for himself to breathe and poke his head out from beneath the bodies, he caught a picture of only one thing chanting happily:
- Blackheart!!! Blackheart!!! Blackheart!!!
He recognised one tall figure in black, with long hair the colour of night. It was getting light and he could see a little of this man, whose hands were really up to his elbows in blood, as was his face with a devilish grin of madness and joy. And what frightened him most of all were the man's eyes as scarlet as blood.
An animal fear ran through the young squire and he dared not stick his head out. He pissed himself right there under the corpses and in the pool of blood of his fellow soldiers. He had no other choice.
A war horn blew not far away.
Blackheart's men began to form into battle formation. And more were coming. The tents were already burned out, and only in some places fires were visible. Now it was time for a fair fight.
But as soon as the two already small troops were in battle formation, Blackheart's warriors once again shouted their frightening chant:
One, two, Blackheart is coming your way,
Three, four, knives out,
Five, six, keep your eyes open,
Seven, eight, don't mess with him,
Nine, ten, he's coming for you.
Eleven, twelve, run faster!
Thirteen, who didn't hide, it's not his fault....
And once again he lost consciousness from fear.
The next time he woke up not under a mountain of bodies, but in a camp of prisoners. There were not so many of them compared to the size of the entire army that had originally been there. About six hundred bound prisoners. And there were about five times less guards around them. And not far from them were several hundred knights and common foot soldiers, shouting joyfully the name of their lord, who as Willam realised, had brought them victory and Loras Tyrell a crushing defeat.
- What had happened? - Willam asked himself absent-mindedly. - We were outnumbered. And we were defeated?
- What did you think? - a grey-haired soldier spat angrily. - That shithead Tyrell fucked up the whole army, and at the end, when the heat was on, he and some of his men managed to escape from Blackheart's cavalry when we thought we had the bastard surrounded. But it was a ruse. Blackheart had enough forces from the start. He just didn't put them all into the fight. He waited like a snake and tore our army to pieces like a lion to a hare. They chopped and burned many of us. Such a disgrace the Stormlands have not seen in a long time. - He sank his head.
- Aaaaaaaaaaah!" someone shouted not far away.
Willam turned his head in the opposite direction from the main mass of enemy soldiers and saw a horrible execution. Dozens of knights and lords suspended in the air on tree branches and with... wings (?).
- It's a "blood eagle". - the same old man informed him. - A long-standing execution that was in the North and the Iron Islands. These are his "vassals" hanging. The ones who turned against him.
- What's going to happen to us? - Willam squeaked fearfully.
- I don't know, I'm not sure of anything now.....
A little while later that boy Willam was pulled from the circle of prisoners and dragged straight towards the mighty and terrible figure of the half-dressed Damian Blackheart. He was covered in fresh blood, from Lady Mertins' executed or mutilated men, holding two bloody knives he approached him.
- So, what have we got here, bunny rabbit? А?! What's your name, my good man?
- W-w-w-w-willie-lam.
- Little Willie! Look what happened here. - He pointed to the bodies of the Mertins' men. - Trouble. Nobody wanted to give my message to slut Mary. I'm so hurt. - I heard the lord's men laughing. - They refused my request to pass the word on to the wretch who hid from my sacred and rightful punishment behind the walls with a certain shithead. Well, you know him, that handsome young man who was supposed to be your brave commander, but ended up hiding behind a woman's skirt. Well, it happens, I guess he finds it easier to hide behind skirts or walk around in them. Let's not judge him for that, heh-heh-heh. I seem to be distracted, are you going to pass on my message or what?
- Y-yes, yes, yes. I'll pass it on.
- Goody! - Blackheart patted the squire's cheeks with his knives. - Listen to me here...
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