To Alaric, the second Battle of the Trident had seemed every bit as bloody as the first.
The river was once again filled with corpses, from the hulking carcasses of elephants to the broken bodies of men. The banks and lands around them were no better, blankets of pure white snow reduced to slops mud and blood. Arrows peppered the ground, stuck in bodies or shields or the dirt, their colorful fletching a stark contrast to the dull brown of mud and white of still-falling snow.
To the Lord of the Brindlewood's mind, the two battles fought nearly two decades apart had many parallels. A suicide charge had been made from the south bank towards the north, the attackers decimated after they had struck. The bodies were thick enough in the ford to walk between banks without ever touching the water. Once the two sides had engaged there had been no organization, the battle turning into a bloody brawl.
A Targaryen king had died.
But history hadn't fully
No, not everything was the same. But one detail, devastating and heartbreaking, was shared by both battles.
Aelor Targaryen wept.
Alaric had been by the Prince's side through his highest peaks and his lowest valleys. He'd been there when Aelor had won his first victories at Bronzegate and Drakesgrave, been beside him when they'd ridden at a canter through the streets of King's Landing. He'd been there at the first Trident, the Lighting of the Lions and the Siege of Casterly Rock; at the devastation of House Rogers and the birth of Dragon of Duskendale's eldest child.
And Alaric was here now, as Aelor cradled that child's limp body and sobbed.
Renlor Targaryen had fought valiantly, all would agree. He had slain an officer of the Golden Company and tens of lesser members, had thrown himself into the fray with a vicious abandon reminiscent of his father. But unlike his father, Renlor didn't possess the knack for survival.
He had been separated from King Aegon and the Kingsguard, but such was the way during the chaos of battle. No one knew how he had ended up on the royalist left, just as no one knew how it was that had felled him. One peasant claimed it was Loras Tyrell, though the Knight of Flowers had been fighting in the center and was therefore unlikely to be the culprit. A man-at-arms claimed Renly Baratheon, and a third man Viserys himself.
Alaric supposed they'd never know just who it had been, be it a knight of renown or some faceless levy. But it didn't truly matter; dead was dead, and Renlor's armor was caved in on the right side of his breastplate and his throat was slit.
Myrcella would be devastated; his beloved daughter fancied herself in love with the boy whose violet eyes now stared upwards. Alaric was pained as well, for despite his concerns over Ren's intent towards Myrcella Alaric almost saw him as a son. He'd seen the boy grow alongside his own children, helped teach him to swing a sword. Barristan, Alaric's youngest son at five, had asked if he could someday squire for the gregarious Targaryen. Yes, Ren's death would affect him and his daughter terribly. But neither of them, he nor 'Cella, could imagine the pain in Aelor Targaryen's heart.
The White Dragon sat in the mud and gore, leaning against the back of a dead horse. His helm with its signature white flames lay discarded on the ground, thrown off when Aelor had found his son under a light covering of the ever-falling snow. He held his child's upper body in his lap, clutching Ren's head to his chest. The Dragon of Duskendale, considered by many to be a ruthless monster, openly cried, his tears falling onto his son's lifeless face.
A ring of men stood around him, simultaneously being there for him in his grief and shielding him from the eyes of the common men of the army. King Aegon Targaryen, the sixth of his name, stood with his helm under his right arm, the three-headed dragon banner of the true Targaryens billowing behind him. The King had taken an arrow in his left shoulder when he attempted to lead the pursuit of the withdrawing Golden Company, the broken shaft still protruding out form the armor. Aegon had refused any maester tend to him before the more severely wounded were cared for. His eyes were grim, peering at the face of his dead cousin and friend.
Two of his Kingsguard stood with him, Sers Barristan Selmy and Arthur Dayne. Rolland Storm, he who had removed Viserys' head from his shoulders, had been severely wounded in the fighting that followed, ribs shattered by a hammer-wielding Volantene. Oswell Whent was dead, slain by the Knight of Flowers before Tyrell had in turn been slain by the Sword of the Morning in a vicious duel that had lasted half the battle. Balon Swann was leading a party of scouts sent to keep track of the retreating Golden Company.
Aging Donnel Buckwell had died, slain in one of the hails of arrows. His grandson Aelor Rykker, the Lord of Hollard Hall, stood to Alaric's right, tears slipping down his broad face. Bronn's customary smirk was nowhere to be found, the sellsword standing on the other side of the dead stallion from the Prince. Beside him were two others members of Aelor's retinue, men Alaric recognized the face of but couldn't name. Dickon Tarly, holding the banner, was looking anywhere but at the crying Prince he had long idolized. His father Lord Randyll was organizing the wounded, doing as he had done two decades earlier by taking command of the situation while Aelor grieved. The Lord of the Westmarch was keeping the looting to a minimum, organizing alongside Jon Arryn a defensive perimeter on the off chance the Golden Company decided they weren't finished with war for the day.
And then there was Baelon.
Aelor's third son said nothing, face reminiscent of a stone. He was red, from his cheeks were blood had splashed through the ventilation holes in his helm all the way down to his armored boots. Alaric had been on the right among the elephants, but even in the short time since the battle had ended stories were abounding about the young Targaryen. He had been the Warrior himself, carving a path into Loras Tyrell's charge far ahead of King Aegon and his Kingsguard. He'd also gone completely unhinged, the always-silent dragonlord screaming at the top of his lungs as he killed, snarling like a mad dog. Aelor had long ago confided in Alaric his concerns for Baelon's sanity, and they had never been more warranted than they were now. Men from his own side eyed him warily, as if afraid he would snap all over again. Alaric occasionally glanced at him as well, for Baelon's left hand was clenched, right still gripping the hilt of his sheathed sword while the rest of his body was as stock-still as a statue.
Lord William Dustin, commander of the northerner's, stepped in close to Aegon's ear from behind. Alaric heard him anyway, even over Aelor's sobs. "What of the Golden Company's wounded, Your Grace?"
Aegon said nothing for a long while, his eyes still locked on another's lifeless ones. Lord Dustin waited, focusing intently on the King's helm, eyes not straying towards the father holding his dead son. When Aegon finally spoke his voice was rough and grim, and as hard as Valyrian steel. "Traitors and usurper's. Find a team of hard-hearted men and kill them all. We take no prisoners today." Baelon had come to life at the word 'kill', whirling and drawing his sword as he started to wade back into the ocean of corpses.
All of them watched him go, no one moving to stop him. Barristan, eyes showing his pain for Aelor, shook his head. "He's going to have a few difficulties, Your Grace. It is going to be very hard for one such as him to come down from the mindset of battle."
Alaric started to move, the old wound in his leg aching from both the cold and his exertion during the battle, following Aelor's surviving son. "I will keep an eye on him." Alaric hesitated just a moment by his king's side. "Stay with him, Your Grace. And if I may make a suggestion…" He cast one last glance towards the broken man that had been his mentor. "I advise you write for Alysanne."
They brought with them the smell of rot and droves of snow.
Two hundred men and women had remained at Winterfell, a mixture of Black Brothers, wildlings, southerners and northerners. Each had taken only enough provisions out of Winterfell's stocks for a sprint south, the rest sent on with those fleeing weeks earlier. Less than one hundred horses—shaggy, northern garrons—were saddled with those supplies, the message clear; Winterfell was only to be abandoned when all else was lost, and that would only be when most of them were dead.
After they'd taken as many down with them as they could.
Three trenches had been dug north of the castle, filled with wood that teams drug in from the Wolfswood, the snow buildup cleaned out of them daily. Barrels of lantern oil stood at the end of each, ready to be poured into the trenches and set alight. The men and spearwives had spent the weeks beforehand crafting arrows, wrapping oil-soaked cloth just above their heads. Braziers lined the walls, their flames continuously stoked, ready for archers to dip the arrows into the flames, lit the cloth, and then fire on whatever descended from the north. There were only two craftsmen among them, one a northerner and the other from Harrenhal, so many of the arrows were crudely made, but they would fly well enough. Each man and woman had been equipped with the best steel in Winterfell, many of the wildlings having been in genuine awe of the finely crafted weapons they were given. Longbows and crossbows alike lined the walls, ready to be taken up at a moment's notice. Rangers of the Watch warned that the wights couldn't be stopped by blows that would normally kill a human; they needed to be beheaded or crushed, dismembered and burnt. Everyone present had driven the mantra into their minds. Yes, they were as ready for what was coming as they ever could be.
The giants helped too.
They had come south three days after the refugees had fled, five of them in total, led by Mag the Mighty. They were hulking and brutish, only able to stay in Winterfell's courtyard, but they had each remained behind to help hold back the coming waves.
Other men and women had straggled in, some remaining to help fight while others followed the others south. Jaime Lannister was among them, leading a band of twenty black brothers through Winterfell's gates as Catelyn Stark led the refugees out of them. Queensgate had been crushed by the debris, Lannister and his men alive only because they had been scouting to assure no Wildlings had climbed over in the immediate vicinity.
Robb Stark wasn't among them, a fact that weighed on them all.
The wait had seemed endless, but soon enough they arrived.
Ghost had woken him, hackles raised and teeth bared. Jaehaerys had untangled himself from Val, the wildling princess waking in his efforts, dressing herself before assisting the prince who had become her lover into his armor. Jaehaerys normally would have felt shame; he had always been uncomfortable with the dalliances Ren and Aelor Rykker had so often participated in, his only attempt to enter that world having been more embarrassing to the Prince than pleasurable. But this was different, as Jaehaerys and Val were both fully aware they were likely to die, and thusly Jaehaerys had no moral qualms. It had been natural to them both to enjoy the other while they could, and others throughout the beleaguered garrison had taken the same notion.
Jaehaerys had questioned why Val had stayed; she was a wildling and thusly knew how to fight, and her aim with a bow was excellent, but he had assumed she would follow Dalla and her nephew. The wildling Princess had never given him an answer other than a kiss to the lips and a cryptic 'someone had too'. Whatever her reasons and despite his concern for her—the two of them had led a band of dying children through snows and starvation, and a bond had risen out of that shared hardship—he was glad she had remained behind, for reasons other than the physical ones. She'd been the warm spot in weeks of cold, figuratively and literally.
And now it was time for that cold to end, either in death or arrows of fire or both.
A runner had been sent to ring the sentry bell, Val having rushed to wake Lord Stark as Jaehaerys walked from the warmth of the chambers to the frigid cold of the snow filled skies. Ghost continued to growl, staring northward, and after a few minutes Jaehaerys could smell it too, the stench of death and decay. Men and women rushed out of where they had been bivouacking to their assigned duties; some saddled and geared horses, several teams rode out to pour the oil over the snow in the trenches, and most others rushed to the walls to take up bows. The giants, rising to their impressive heights from where they had slept in the relative warmth of the stables—they were too massive to enter Winterfell proper—made an imposing line of five south of the gates, standing shoulder to shoulder as they awaited their turn.
The Prince didn't know how they intended to escape, as there were no horses they could ride and they had brought no mammoths with them, or if they even intended to escape at all. All he knew was that no living man would ever wish to face down that line, and he wished that these undead ones could feel that same fear.
Jaehaerys took a place on the parapets just as the men from the trenches were returning. His sword was at his side, a shield—not his original one, for it had been lost at the Wall—tied to his left forearm. Though he had once been a proficient archer, that skill had been lost to him alongside three of his fingers and his thumb. Jaehaerys would have to wait, watching the battle unfold from above before joining the defensive lines below. In the meantime he would serve as a runner, resupplying the archers from the stacks of quivers behind him. Val took a position next to him, dressed in her all-white furs, longbow in her hands.
She looked beautiful, as beautiful as a different, redheaded wildling ever had. Jaehaerys silently prayed he wouldn't end up to be the death of Val, as he had been of Ygritte.
They came as a horde, fighting through the deep snows, stumbling into and through the trenches. Winterfell became silent save for the wind, its defenders holding their collective breaths. All of the archers had arrows knocked, huddling around braziers, waiting for the orders. It came as the wights reached the second trench, a woman's voice cutting through the howl of the wind. "Light." The heads of dozens of arrows burst into flame, their wielders hustling back to line the walls. "Draw." Bows creaked as strings were pulled back, archers bending their bodies to angles that pointed their fiery payload to the falling snowflakes. There was a heartbeat of pause as the archers steadied their aim, Jaehaerys unconsciously holding his breath, before the voice spoke a final time. "Loose."
Dozens of arrows were shot into the dark sky, leaving paths of light in their wake as they travelled up and up before beginning down at an angle. They fell all around the trenches, some embedding themselves into the bodies of the undead, setting them aflame, others hitting the ground, their shafts burning. Most of them, however, hit the trenches, and lines of fire cut through the white of the world as the oil ignited in scores of places, burning towards the other flames until three distinct lines of orange and red were visible. Even at this distance Jaehaerys could see undead burst into flames, some stumbling into the pits of fire, other having been trapped on the spies left in the trenches and unable to climb out before the fires took them.
There were no shouts of elation, no cries of victory. The archers simply began firing at will, focusing now on the wights that had escaped the fires. Some were trapped between trenches, others working their way around them, and still more had managed to traverse all three. Jaehaerys moved to bring quivers of arrows when called for, watching the wights grow closer and closer, more of them skirting around the flaming trenches. The bowmen were soon firing at almost point blank range, leaning out over the parapets to fire down on the massing horde of undead as they soon pressed heavy against the walls. Boiling oil was dropped on those at the gate, the smell of burning flesh mixing with the stench of decay, but more and more of them took the places of those burnt and boiled.
They were in the furs of wildlings and the leathers of the Night's Watch, gripping swords or axes or just swinging their clawed hands. Some didn't even have hands, missing one or more limbs, some dead so long that the flesh had decayed from their bodies, leaving only skeletons in halfhelms rushing the walls.
It was terrifying beyond anything Jaehaerys had ever seen, so horrible to witness that it felt surreal. Jaehaerys felt like screaming in terror, retching in revulsion or both. Instead he ran arrows where they were needed, and when the mass of undead outnumbered the arrows flying in to incinerate them, their numbers shaking the gates of Winterfell soundly, he stretched his shoulders and prepared. The cold wind buffeted his face, his helm lost alongside his shield in the collapse of the Wall, but Jaehaerys didn't mind it. He may be half dragon, but he was also half wolf, and wolves were of the cold.
The prince sprinted towards the stairs off of the parapets, as down below the giants braced and men and women formed defensive lines. Archers still fired, some shouting warnings that the creatures were trying to climb the walls. The gates rocked violently; Jaehaerys heard wood cracking and creaking, the hinges rocked violently by the press of bodies. So this is how it ends, surrounded by the sound of splintering wood and snarling dead and the smell of burning flesh. My mother will never forgive me.
He made one stop just shy of the stairs, using his good hand to reach out and grab her arm. Val was still firing, her latest quiver close to empty. Jaehaerys yelled over the noise, placing his lips directly next to her ear. "Go, Val! You can do no more good!"
She didn't argue, instead placing one hand against his armored chest. "Come with me."
Jaehaerys shook his head. "You've done your part, now I do mine. Go while you can."
The princess gripped the back of his neck suddenly, smashing her lips to his in a desperate kiss. Jaehaerys returned it, allowing himself that one moment of sweetness before he disentangled himself. He met her eyes, Stark grey and brilliant blue, and gave her a small, sad smile. "Go."
The Targaryen Prince left her there, drawing his sword and taking the steps two at a time to the courtyard. Lord Stark, tall and regal, gripping the two-handed Valyrian steel blade the Starks had carried for hundreds of years, stood at the forefront, his hard face as calm as ever. Mag the Mighty, the leader of the last of the giants, focused his great eyes on the gates, ready to smash whatever crossed through the threshold. Jaehaerys took his place beside Lord Stark and one of the end giants, the one called Wun Weg Wun Dar Wun, and drew his blade.
They came over the gates first, climbing the heaped bodies of the others to leap down on the defenders. Giants roared, smashing them aside like annoying flies, men and women cutting them apart. Many carried torches in one hand and a weapon in the other, igniting the wights as soon as they fell to the ground. Jaehaerys swatted aside the blade of a one-armed dead man with half a face, disemboweling him to let black and rotted guts fall to the snow before stabbing him through the remaining eye.
The gates finally gave some time later, after enough wights had climbed over the walls to fully engage the lines of remaining defenders and the archers who had remained. When they did the giants surged forward, crashing into them with shouts and roars, crushing them with mighty clubs and stomps or picking them up to tear them apart in large hands. But they could only stop so much, and dozens more spilled around them to attack the flesh of man.
Jaehaerys lost all true senses. His world had come down to slaying those who should have already been slain, smashing skeletons to scattered bones with his shield and slashing legs and arms and heads, most of them so rotted that they gave way to his blade like water to the bow of a boat. It was hell on earth, battling these creatures that defeated all ideas man had for reality. The courtyard became home to dozens of fires as torchbearers set the fallen wights alight, yet no matter how many they slew more took their place. Ghost snarled and growled, tearing apart wight after wight. The first child to attack Jaehaerys should have stopped him dead in his tracks, but he was so overwhelmed by the horror of it all that he merely sliced off the small arm carrying the dagger and cleaved the skull in two. Only a small, insignificant part of his mind recognized the child as one who had frozen to death following Jaehaerys south of the wall.
It was if someone else was doing it; Jaehaerys Targaryen was only an observer as another being in the skin and armor of Jaehaerys Targaryen fought back the spawn of a cold hell.
They fought that way, wading through waves of enemies that never seemed to end, for hours or days or seconds. Jaehaerys would stop one only to be attacked by two more, the smell of decaying and burning flesh prevalent over it all. It was a mindless, bitter struggle, one he was both horribly intertwined with and absolutely separated from.
The first time he saw one it was shearing through a giant's leg as if it was made of butter, sending the giant form crashing to the ground, crushing many of its minions beneath it. It was dressed almost like a brother of the Night's Watch, covered in black leathers and armor of studded steel. Its weapon was an odd thing, a long handle twice the length of a man's forearm capped with a twisted, white blade that seemed of ice. Its hair was as white as the falling snow, its skin wrinkled and bluish and looked for all the world like it was made of ice.
And it's eyes. Its eyes were blue, hauntingly blue, glowing and utterly bright.
Jaehaerys was amidst an army of undead trying to kill him, his body instinctually going through the motion of parry, parry, kill, but his eyes watched the being that could only be a White Walker. It cut through defenders like nothing. Jaehaerys watched in terrified amazement as weapon after weapon, be it rusty wildling iron or castle-forged Winterfell steel, shattered when it came in contact with that icy blade. Jaehaerys heard the shouts to retreat, to flee south, but all he could do was watch the being carve through the battlefield.
And then its eyes locked on Jaehaerys'.
The Other was upon him before he could truly comprehend, that blade slashing in. He drove his sword to meet it out of instinct, crying out when the steel shattered and the pommel was wretched from his hands. The Other angled its odd weapon, what the Targaryen Prince swore to be a smile on its icy lips, as it drove forward to make the kill.
And then shattered into a thousand slivers of ice.
Jaehaerys blinked thrice before he realized he wasn't dead. In front of him, where once there had been an ice demon about to cleave him in half, stood Eddard Stark, face equally surprised. Ice, its Valyrian steel blade smoking, was thrust out from his body, occupying the space the Other's torso had been.
The Lord of Winterfell and the Prince of the Iron Throne locked gazes, and both of their eyes lit with understanding.
Eddard spoke, voice rough. "Go. Rally those south, tell them off this." The Lord of the North whirled and sliced a charging wight in half, actions one smooth motion, before he offered his nephew one last parting phrase. "Tell them winter has come."
The Lord Paramount of the North waded back into the fray. There were other White Walkers, eyes icy blue and hair white as snow, striding through the gates of Winterfell as if they were conquering kings. Jaehaerys watched his uncle make for one, greatsword flashing, for only a moment.
Then he turned and ran, Ghost appearing at his side, the white direwolf red and black with old and new blood.
The waiting horses were gone by the time he arrived there, the picket lines cleaned save for one being on top a garron, firing arrows from horseback. Val saw him, her horse near prancing, and kicked the garron to his side, tossing the bow aside as Jaehaerys let his shield fall to the ground. Jaehaerys climbed behind her, wrapping his bloody arms around her middle as she kicked the shaggy horse into a sprint through Winterfell's southern gates, Ghost loping along beside them.
The two said nothing as they left the crackling of fire and roar of battle behind them, said nothing as they rode deeper into the snowy night. There were no words to be said that could summarize any of what had just occurred, nothing horrible and terrifying enough to give it the levity it needed.
Only one thing echoed in Jaehaerys' addled mind, spoke in his uncle's haunting baritone.
Winter had come.