Capítulo 21: A Very Petty Winter
Mid 273 Winter
"What are you doing?" Alysa shouted as she found me performing my morning ritual for when I'm at home.
"Trying to be a bear." I answered and continued crawling around on the floor naked under the massive white snow bear pelt.
"What? Why?" she cried out as our daughter on her hips started crying.
"All this magic that's happened to me in the last year. I deserve to be able to transform into a four thousand pound snow bear." I told her then growled a bit while pretending to claw at the floor.
"You've lost your mind." Alysa accused and I got up off the ground and stood up straight, crossing my arms thick over my barrel chest.
"A man does not have to lose his mind to want to transform into a gigantic bear." I declared and just like that the argument was won.
Not because I'd managed to use my words to win her over, but more due to the fact that by nineteen years old my supernatural hormone profile had done its best attempt at magically transforming me into a man shaped warhorse. And I'm not making some kind of crude joke about simple minded females who are overwhelmed by the sight of my awesome penis, there is a solid three to four seconds when I see myself naked where my mind repeats, 'that's photoshopped' over and over until my brain meat can finally understand that it's flesh temple can body shame the statue of Heracles.
As such I blame no one when they need some time to collect themselves after seeing me in the nude, and I am happy to weaponize my appearance to make a point seem more impactful. I quickly made tracks before Alysa.exe rebooted, granting me the last word and thus the moral victory. As I got ready for the day I considered the last year.
I'd worked my sailors and ships hard after my magical walk about delayed our schedules and the rapidly shifting season of fall to winter put the fear of the Others into me. Fall only lasted half a year, making us all afraid that the coming winter would be unusually cold and harsh. This was not the case. The weather remained quite warm, comparatively speaking, and the Bay of Ice only froze along the northern shoreline.
Despite the warmth, production suffered heavily from the regular freeze thaw cycle as night and day shifted back and forth, creating very icy conditions making overland travel quite the hassle. During the warm seasons, my ship yards reached a production rate of three seventy oar oak longships a year, but winter had us down to just one, and accidents and injuries were far more frequent. This contraction occurs across the board in the industries of Far Harbor, and my sailors were fearful of leaving port due to the high frequency of winter storms battering the island and coast.
With so much slowdown and available workers I did the only sensible thing and began a complete renovation of Mormont Keep. I live in a hole in the ground primarily because of how much I hated growing up in Mormont Keep, but after nearly a decade away I came to realize that I only hated the keep with half my heart. The other half hated living in the same building as Maege.
As such, I chose to take revenge on her by invading her home with a three hundred man work force looking to level up their spackling game during the most uncomfortable season to be outside. Despite spending most of her time training with men, Maege only tolerates the gruffer sex for what they can do for her. This tolerance doesn't last long when she feels that men are imposing on her, and also doesn't extend to boys. So to further punish Maege during this winter season I extended invitations to one hundred boys, the sons of the men who served me best on my ships and on campaign, and offered to train them along side my own sons daily at the Mormont Keep training yard for the entire winter.
Checkmate, you cantankerous harridan.
The boys she beat in the yard each day to relieve her frustrations didn't feel it, but this is victory. Petty victory.
I made it up to them by teaching them to ride horses. The boys worked with my well tempered garrons, the staple horse of the more rugged and mountainous regions of the North, while I worked with the largest destriers I could find in Old Town. They hated the cold weather, but needed the exercise.
One day I hoped to breed the perfect horse for me, but in my first attempt at the noble art of horse breeding I wound up creating more beasts fit for the butcher's block than worth living to attempt the next generation. Still, a handful of yearlings were showing promise, specifically the mix of Ryswell Courser stallion to Reach Draft Horse mare. About a third of those yearlings were showing good size, cardio, and cold resistance. We'd see in the future if any of this pays off, but for now I can simply enjoy sending my small folk to wrangle my horny horses. It's the kind of amusing pastime that is also befitting my station in life, so it's really a two birds one stone kind of thing.
Plus I get to eat the failures, and horse meat is pretty good, making it three birds.
Speaking of three birds, I'd gone on many trips into the wilderness this winter, not to slay bears, but to tempt the wildlife into my service. With my developing skin changing powers, I needed to build up my roster of animal companions. Dogs and horses are beyond easy, and incredibly useful, but I wanted some avian friends and struck gold in a hungry breeding pair of golden eagles. I tempted them with fresh kills over the course of several weeks, and as they built that expectation of food from the sight of me they opened themselves up to be snared by my magic. They paired well with the eagle owl I got by throwing mice and rats into the snow at night.
My birds were gorgeous and gave me incredible eyes in the sky day or night. And the bird became a mainstay attraction at Mormont Keep as I moved their nests into save nooks upon the huge building. The boys I trained love looking at them during break periods. The boys focused on weapon drills and wrestling, the latter of which is the far harder training as my the memories of my own abusive training in Pittsburgh were burnt into my mind, and I had no problem passing down that intense passion for grappling to the next generation.
When not inflicting mental damage on preteens I work on myself. My own training with my horses starts with me shouting, 'Boy!' at Ulfric and getting him to help me into my jousting armor. I favored the heavier set of the two I ordered, a full Stechzeug tournament set with a broad crested shoulder shield pauldron, lacquered helmet to sabatons dark green and enameled with images of bears mauling and sodomizing Ironborn and Wildings. Crowned with a crest of gold and wax preserved weirwood leaves. It was armor, it was fashion, it was philosophy. Artistic and tasteful, even if in bad taste. A perfect suit that made a statement, 'Hello, my name is Jorah, and you will get down or lay down.'
The frogmouth helmet cut off a great deal of vision, but it didn't matter after I mounted my horse and felt myself slipping into its skin, taking control of the both of us to move as one single unit. Before my encounter with the Three Eyed Crow my horsemanship was very mid, but the powerful skin changing magic demanding expression quickly linked me to the horses I frequently rode and cared for.
The involuntary use of this power thrust my consciousness into contact with Bloodraven's, or at least what was left of Bloodraven. At first I thought the man playing sly with the fragmentary and fading nature of the imprint within the skin changing magic, but as time progressed and Bloodraven never rallied to possess me despite the fading away of his spirit, I became more comfortable using what he'd given me.
Along with the magic came memories of Bloodraven's life and his feelings, all of this was as stated fragmented and fading, and I believe this to be due to the nature of his imprisonment. One night of directly feeling the pain I inflicted onto others was enough to drive me into a delirious state of rage. Bloodraven has experienced over a hundred years of roots desiccating his body and forcing him to live as they tunnel through his flesh. He lives in darkness and pain constantly.
I only found a few useful memories as the vast majority of the imprint is Bloodraven's relationship with Shiera Seastar, their most intimate moments rather than their pursuits of sorcery. Bloodraven barely clung to any of his memories of skinchanging and other magics, letting them fade far faster than his more emotional remembrances, so I only got about half the cliff notes version of his abilities rather than a full text, but he remembered vividly killing Daemon Blackfyre with his longbow and his duels with Bittersteel. My skill as an archer greatly increased after I lived Bloodraven's remembrance of the Battle of Redgrass.
Now a year later, it was hard for me to find even the memory of Bloodraven nailing the Seastar for the first time, his most preciously held by far. I choose to believe the man is just so stealthy that he can hide himself in my soul perfectly and has faked his spiritual demise. It's safer that way even if it doesn't feel likely.
I didn't get the automatic boost to Thousand and Two Eyes, but can now put seven shafts into a man at three hundred yards. Farther even considering the construction of my bow is heavier than that used by Bloodraven. It's pretty awesome to spend some sit down time meditating one day and get back up the best archer in the North. I finally have the skill to match my horn and weirwood longbow. Good thing I have so many enemies. It'd be a shame to just use them to ring the register at archery competitions
With skinchanging, I could run my jousting drills while standing on my saddle and singing, my equestrian talents jumping straight to supernatural. I trained each day just to burn the reps into my body, transitioning from instinct and talent into well practiced experience. I just couldn't wait for the chance to get out on the tournament scene, I knew with my strength, speed, and skill I'd be cleaning house in jousts, melees, and archery contests. A medieval triple crown athlete.
That excitement is why winter lasting three years hurt my soul.
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Up next is the tournament people have been waiting for. I'll do each event, and we'll see if I have the attention to detail to pull it off. I was fairly bothered by the weapons used in the melee for HotD. You can't make a flail safe, the same way you cant make a mace or hammer safe, for tournament use. Tournaments are supposed to be sporting events. So are melees in Planetos just blood sport were people are expected to pull their punches, but murder is just boys being boys?
I'll let you decide all decide.
You can support me and my family at
ko - fi . com / jmanm
Capítulo 22: Riding High In April
Mid 275 Spring
If anything my battlefield plate armor is even heavier than my jousting armor, and even more ornate. My armet helm is gilded as if a bear pelt is hanging off me, an effect that continues down my back and over my arms and legs. The parts not covered in extra gold plating are once again lacquered dark green and enameled with an image of a naked woman draped in a bear skin with a mace in one hand and a babe in the other, the image emblazoned on the gates of Mormont Keep. She stands next to a weirwood tree of enameled ivory and leaves of ground garnet that stretches down my cuirass with roots decorating my faulds and grieves.
Many knights tried to damage my foppish armor in the last forty minutes of melee action, and they all failed. The crowd cheered as I spun and my blunt broadsword connected with the helmet of a man attacking me from behind - not very sporting of him, but tactically sound, ten stars for the battlefield, no stars for the melee, get pwned you scrub - knocking him off his feet and out of the contest.
My performance looked like the stuff of legend, but in truth my sword skills are only expert in quality. I cheated. I cheated. I cheated some more. My pair of eagles were perched atop the stands, and shared their fields of view with me, essentially giving me a third person action game perspective of the combat. Three years of training this ability showed true in this tournament as I easily managed distance and never failed to see an attack coming.
A biting head ache was a small price to pay for a purse of two hundred dragons sponsored by the Hightowers in celebration of the birthday of the four year old Lynesse.
It felt incredibly weird fighting in the 'name-day' tourney of a four year old canon Jorah would someday marry. I'm twenty two. I don't particularly care about men in their mid thirties marrying eighteen year olds. In fact, I commend the Hightowers for keeping their daughter off the market for so long and marrying her to someone that seemed like a love match. It's just weird that she's four right now.
I don't spend any time thinking about the top tier slam pieces from canon, and I don't like thinking about it now. Conveniently, the final knight from some noble house here in the Reach came into my range and after a brutal parry I knocked him off his feet by punching him with the steel rim of my shield and pressed the tip of my blunt sword to his chest to secure the victory in the first of the main events in this multi day tourney.
This afternoon I would partake in the archery contest for another two hundred dragons, and tomorrow the joust, aiming for tournament champion and the four hundred dragon prize. Plus crowning Alysa the Queen of Love and Beauty in front of more people than she's ever seen before in the oldest and one of the most wealthy cities of Westeros sounds like the kind of thing that stands out among life's happiest moments for the woman.
I'd brought Alysa and our six children on this trip. She'd officially closed down shop on the baby making after the birth of our second daughter, the now three year old Njada. We'd left Bear Island in the cruel clutches of Maege, partially because she's the obvious candidate and partially so that people will appreciate us more after dealing with the old crone.
Helga served as a fine steward for Rockhall, and over the last three years she'd been a godsend for breaking the salt wives I took from the third great raid into obedient little deer like Ysolt. I almost loved her for it, and promised to see her children provided for over those of the other Salt Wives. Of the two daughters she brought into our union, the older, Astrid, already joined my stable of Salt Wives and was the first woman to birth me multiples, twin boys in 274, and a little girl this year. These children too, I would reward for the service of their grandmother. I'm multigenerational with my generosity like that.
"That was awesome!" Screamed Galmar as I strode over to the viewing area.
"You're welcome." I nodded to the boy and continued to the seating area of Lord Hightower to be pronounced the victor and receive my spoils, a rosewood chest with four pounds of gold coins in it. I took the chest back to my walled tent located near the tourney grounds.
The space soon became filled with my family as Ulfric helped me remove my plate armor and put it away carefully.
"That was the most thrilling spectacle I've seen since you rode out and put the Drumms to the sword." Alysa complimented me as she kept an hand wrapped around Njada to keep the three year old from running off to look at things, "Are they always this exciting."
"No." I answered, "Maybe two or three tournaments a year are this large in Lannisport, and only one bigger. I believe this tournament won't even make the top ten this year for those held in the Reach."
"A two hundred dragon prize and there are ten tournaments to be held bigger than this?" my wife scoffed, "Some people have far too much money on their hands."
Oh you sweet summer child. Once the big boy Bobby B gets his ass on the throne tourney prizes are going to be huge. We're fighting for peanuts these days by comparison.
"Aye." I agreed, "That's why I do my best to take it from theirs and put it in ours."
"Go on then husband." Alysa chuckled as she pointed to my long bow, a beautiful composite of horn and weirwood, "Your tools are ready, go out and bring me more gold to sleep atop. I'm not satisfied being the richest wife in the North. There can always be more."
Technically, I had more liquid wealth than the other lords of the North, but other lords greatly outstrip my lands, natural resources, buildings, and manpower. Still nice to have the most gold, as all that other stuff is mostly rotting assets in the hands of my contemporaries and thus not contributing to their influence the same way my gold and its buying power contributes to my influence.
After lunch I tied a black bandana around my head to keep my hair out of my eyes before I took up my quiver and long bow to go stand around for two hours and occasionally shoot an arrow. Second place failed at two hundred yards, meaning I was still a hundred yards from actually trying by the time I earned my next rosewood chest full of gold.
For the feasting that evening my family was seated with the Hightowers due to my performance. The idea that a minor lord from the North would sit at the side of Leyton Hightower, one of the most powerful and wealthiest lords in Westeros, at his own feast was a completely ridiculous idea. But it happened.
Like me, Lord Leyton was a breeder, with ten children spread out over four wives, his youngest boy still suckling the teat. His oldest son Baelor, was a year older than me and freshly married. I got my usual laugh when he heard my age and started doing the math backward. I just turned twenty one. My oldest boy is nine. I saw the exact moment his brain went WTF on his face.
He told me he'd go easy on me as it was my first time in the joust, and our names were on the first match on the lists, opening up the hundred and twenty eight man seven round single elimination tourney.
I thanked him for his consideration and knocked him from his horse on the third pass, the first thunderous crack of my lance likely took his brain back to WTF in the form of 'what the fuck was that?', then the second was 'where the fuck am I?'. The final lance had the man asking, 'did I win?' after the standby team revived him with the smelling salts. Baelor would have no recollection of our match, but he at least got to spectate the awesome display of domination I put on that day.
Beating an experienced and highborn knight on my first tourney tilt got people pumped for my next appearance, and Baelor's performance soon turned out to be an excellent showing as my next three tilts resulted in three unhorsed knights as the men proved to feeble to hold up under the thunder I bring. Each got the hard shaft and left the field totally wrecked.
No one actually made it to the third pass again until my fellow finalist in the seventh round went three lances with me despite being far more battered and bruised from his come up on the other side of the bracket. The tough knight from the Horn Hill took a pounding, but proved he was something more as he grit his teeth and clenched his butt cheeks to endure another. Though three poundings was more than he could take, the knight of the Horn Hill hobbled off the field we shared with my respect, and the adulation of the crowd for such a display of endurance.
Getting a third rosewood chest, this time with eight pounds of gold in it, felt absolutely splendid, but Alysa's face when I put the wreath of flowers that declared her the Queen of Love and Beauty was a rare treat. Pure joy.
We were friends, my wife and I, best friends even. No one would ever sing songs about the intensity of our love, but we might get a folk song about how much we loved to make love. Despite that I'd say our marriage is better than ninety percent of the relationships in either Westeros or back on Earth. Ten years, six healthy kids, and a rocket ship of a startup business maturing into a regional trade powerhouse. Two backwoods hillbillies at the high table of the best parties. The subjects of salacious gossip, but in truth; everyone wanted to be us. Young and rising up the world fast. The world was ours for the taking.
I should have known it was more than just the Southern heat making me so warm and fatigued when we boarded The Thunderer and set off for home. The biggest collection of certified doctors in the world have their training center down the way from the docks, and I just sailed on like nothing was wrong.
Franky was right. Riding high in April...
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Interestingly enough, spell check caught no misspelled words on this when I finished the draft, all the red underlines were names and words the checker didn't know.
I caught up on The Dragonwolf yesterday on Fanfiction . net and in the new chapter Baelor Hightower ordered every tree to be cut down among other things for his vengeance against the Iron Islands. I've done it lads, effected the collective unconscious to the point that others now see that the trees are party to the heinous actions of whoever lives nearby. They must share in the punishment for they share in the sin.
I am inevitable.
You can support me and my family at
ko - fi . com / jmanm
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