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Christen's fierce assault delivered a brutal lesson to Joffrey Baratheon, who had always carried himself with a syrup-thick confidence.
It showed him one undeniable truth: without strength, a king is nothing at all. He is not even as useful as a single well-forged sword.
After the boy king, dagger in hand, had staged that absurd performance as though he meant to slash his own throat before the very men sworn to protect him, eight hundred guards had been watching over him. Of these, six hundred were peeled away and thrown into the force already locked in combat with Christen's troops.
Yet the reinforcement achieved little.
For by that point, with Lord Damon Marbrand taken captive, the western battle line had lost its commander and was already beginning to collapse. The six hundred fresh soldiers had barely reached the front before they were swept up and scattered by their own fleeing comrades.
Christen was not the kind of commander to let such a chance slip through his fingers. He seized upon the moment instantly, eyes sharp and predatory, and drove forward. With one decisive thrust, he tore a gap open in the crumbling Westerlands formation and pushed his cavalry straight through the chaos.
Once he broke past, his eyes caught sight of them. Not far away, a huddled knot of Westerlands soldiers stood frozen in place, panic written plainly across their faces. At their center, heavily guarded, stood a single boy.
In that instant, Christen heard voices rising from the other side.
They were shouting:
"Protect His Grace!"
His Grace…
His Grace?
His Grace!
Christen was certain he had not misheard. At once, his gaze, sharp as a wolf's and burning with hunger, locked onto the boy who so clearly stood apart from the others. As for the woman beside him, Cersei Lannister, Christen dismissed her from his mind entirely.
Could it be… could that boy truly be Joffrey Baratheon?
Here? At this very front?
For a heartbeat he could hardly believe it. Then a feverish light blazed to life in his eyes. A rush of wild excitement, fiercer than any wound or exhaustion, surged through him. It felt as though a colossal triumph had suddenly risen before him, stretching out its hand in promise. If he could seize that boy, if he could drag the kingling from his horse, then perhaps this damned war might finally end here, in this very charge.
He twisted in the saddle and glanced back at the remnants of his riders. Barely more than a hundred cavalry still clung to him, their armor split and scarred, their bodies streaked with blood, their chests heaving as they fought for breath. Yet even in such a broken state, they lifted their heads at his cry when he bellowed with all the fire that still burned in his chest:
"Up ahead! The Lannister bastard king is right there before us! This is our chance!"
"Brothers! Do you want Lord Clay himself to knight you with his own hand? Do you long to hold land of your own, to see men bow and call you Ser?"
Christen leveled his longsword at the terrified boy surrounded by guards, and laughter thundered from him, half wild, half triumphant.
"Cut your way through! Take the false king alive… and all of that will be yours!"
"Soldiers! With me… CHARGE!"
He tore the last dregs of magic from his body, forcing what little strength remained into a single Quen Shield. The spell shimmered faintly around him, weak and imperfect, but enough to let him ignore the crippling weakness gnawing at his limbs from magical exhaustion.
Christen dug his spurs viciously into the flanks of his warhorse.
The stallion screamed, rearing with furious strength, then surged forward like a thunderbolt. Behind him, a band of men who had nothing left but their dreams, their last grasp at honor and survival, lowered their lances and howled as one. Together, they hurled themselves toward Joffrey Baratheon, toward that pale, frightened face contorted in a ghastly attempt at a smile.
At this moment, the war reached its fevered climax!
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Clay, of course, had no idea what Christen intended. Even if he had, there was no way he could break through the battlefield in time to aid him now.
He had only just finished beating the lords of the Riverlands into line, forcing obedience from their proud heads. Now, with the full command of twenty thousand soldiers firmly in his grasp, he was already setting out the next phase of the campaign.
For the great battle had unfolded in a manner no one had foreseen, and any commander worth the name was forced to adapt with quick and ruthless decisions.
"Lord Tytos Blackwood."
Clay spoke the first name aloud. The man was indeed of the Riverlands, but at least he was one of the few lords who could be reasoned with. Clay had been working alongside him all the way here, and that cooperation gave him a measure of trust.
The Lord of Raventree Hall rose from his round oak stool, his voice quiet but steady as he replied, "Yes, Lord Clay?"
Clay cast him a single glance, then delivered his command without pause:
"You will personally select commanders fit to fight. I am giving you five thousand infantry. Take them at once and press toward Harrenhal's north gate. The latest reports say that Christen has already thrown their northern camp into disarray ahead of us."
"Your task is to seize that camp before the Westerlanders can rally back to defend it."
"Once it is taken, you are not to sally out again. All you need do is use the fortifications they built with their own hands, and hold fast against whatever counterattack they throw at you."
The moment Clay finished, Lord Tytos Blackwood bowed his head in assent.
"Your will, Lord Clay."
Clay nodded, then added in a warning tone,
"Be cautious. The old lion's golden banner is flying near the north gate. If he learns you mean to snatch his camp, he will not let you succeed so easily."
Lord Tytos Blackwood inclined his head once more, accepting the weight of the command.
There was no time for further words. With those five thousand infantry now sent off, Clay was left with thirteen thousand men under his direct hand. Apart from the two thousand cavalry riding with Brynden Tully, who was either harrying the enemy at the flanks or perhaps idling somewhere out of sight for all Clay knew, that was the full measure of the strength immediately at his disposal.
The troops from Lord Harroway's town would not arrive for another day, so for the moment they could not be counted upon.
"Lord Jason Mallister."
Clay called another name.
The Lord of Seagard rose at once. It was he who had cooperated with Clay earlier to crush the two thousand unlucky Vale knights caught and surrounded, and so Clay knew him to be a man of action, one he could rely upon.
"Yes, Lord Clay?"
Clay did not waste a single word. His command was given straight and clear, his voice ringing sharp as steel.
"You will take command of two thousand infantry and one thousand light cavalry. March east, toward Harrenhal's eastern flank, and keep your eyes fixed on the Westerlanders' camp."
"So long as the Westerlanders there do not move to reinforce the battle at the north gate, your task will be complete."
"If they so much as stir, you are to send word back to me at once. And with your own force, you must throw everything you have into stopping them from moving toward the north gate battlefield. Do you understand?"
Lord Jason Mallister struck his gauntleted fist hard against the breastplate of his armor, the metallic boom echoing through the tent. "I understand, Lord Clay. I will stop them!"
Clay gave him a curt nod, then deliberately ignored the sullen faces of Edmure Tully and the other Riverlands nobles still seated around him.
"As for the remaining ten thousand, three thousand cavalry and more than six thousand infantry, you will form up at once. We march directly upon the host of Tywin Lannister, who even now presses the siege. This order is to be carried out without delay!"
It was a plan of war wrought with ruthless precision, every step laid to deny the enemy any path of escape or reprieve.
First of all, Lord Tytos Blackwood's five thousand. With Christen having already churned the northern camp into chaos, their task of seizing it would not bear too heavy a burden.
And once that camp fell, the Westerlanders would face a cruel dilemma. If they wanted to fight a long campaign, they would have no choice but to win it back, for that captured camp would stand right in front of their eyes, blocking the road to endurance.
This was no gentle summer. In summer, a man might lie down on bare ground, sleep in his clothes, and rise the next morning weary but alive.
Now, though, winter was creeping ever closer. Even as the battle below raged hot with blood and steel, snowflakes drifted stubbornly from the sky, settling on helmets, banners, and shoulders.
It meant that once the Westerlanders lost their camp, they would not even have the means to last a single night. Unless, of course, they wished to freeze to death where they lay.
But if they tried to reclaim the camp they had built with their own sweat, they would find themselves gnawing on a bitter truth.
Damn it… those very fortifications they had raised to guard against sorties from Harrenhal, they would now taste for themselves.
The double ring of palisade walls, the deep pits and sharpened stakes… all of it would turn upon them, making them curse the moment they ever ordered it built.
That was the first step.
The second: send three thousand to pin down the forces at the eastern camp, keeping them from rushing north to reinforce. That move alone would strip away one more element of uncertainty from the coming clash.
Through his scouts, Clay had already learned that the Old Lion had stationed around ten thousand men at both the eastern and northern camps.
Thus, at the north gate, in this limited battlefield, Clay Manderly could ensure superiority in numbers.
But those ten thousand were the Westerlands' core troops, Tywin's blooded, battle-hardened elite. Their discipline, their steel, their sheer killing power far outmatched the Riverlands levies standing at Clay's back.
If not for his edge in numbers, and the chance to seize the enemy's camp right under their noses, Clay might well have chosen to wait. Another day, perhaps. Wait until Lord Rickard Karstark's host arrived, and then launch the great battle with every advantage.
But now, he had no intention of waiting.
While Clay busied himself arranging his pieces, Tywin Lannister on the other side of the field was suddenly faced with what every grown man dreads: the impossible choice, the kind with no good answer.
Christen's strike had come too swiftly. Tywin had hurled his horsemen thundering after him, yet even at full gallop they could not close the gap. Just as they were about to catch their quarry, a breathless rider came racing up with tidings that froze Tywin in his saddle. His grandson, the boy who wore a crown, his so-called king, was directly in the path of the Northern assault.
What then?
What else could he do? He had to save him. There was no other answer.
It didn't matter that Tywin Lannister had long since given up hope in Joffrey, saw him as a reckless, witless boy unworthy of the throne. That crown still sat on his head, and for that crown's sake Tywin was bound to act.
And then, almost in the same moment, another messenger came riding hard, mud and snow clinging to his cloak. Harrenhal's north gate, after relentless assaults, had finally collapsed. The Westerland vanguard had stormed through, taken full control of the gate, and slaughtered more than eight hundred defenders to the last man.
And so the question fell into Tywin's lap, heavy as a block of iron.
Do they enter the fortress?
Was that even a question?
Tywin Lannister had bled and cursed and beaten himself against these walls for weeks, had ground down the last of the Northerners within, had at last battered open a gate. To stop now, to leave that breach untouched, would choke him on his own pride. He would never be able to swallow it.
But what of the other side?
Which way could he turn?
Could he simply abandon his grandson to the Northerners' spears?
Or could he watch, powerless, as the gate he had just won with fire and blood was retaken by the enemy?
Tywin's hand clenched and unclenched, fingers biting deep into his palm.
He understood then.
He wanted it all!
He would take it all!
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[Chapter End's]
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