Watching Kal's departing back, Brynden furrowed his brows, weighed down by heavy thoughts.
"Ser Brynden… was what Lord Kal Stone said true?"
"Did someone really poison me?"
Only after Kal had gone did little Robin dare to speak, peering up at Brynden with timid caution.
"Then why didn't Mother tell me? Are those bad people keeping it from her too?"
Hearing the boy's innocent words, Ser Brynden Tully recalled all that had transpired recently in the Eyrie.
The shadows in his heart grew only darker.
"I do not know. Perhaps… perhaps we should trust Lord Kal Stone."
Brynden could not give Robert Arryn a real answer, so he offered only this vague reply.
Hearing Ser Brynden's words, Robert nodded slowly, half-understanding.
When he asked no further questions, Brynden let out a faint breath of relief. For the moment, he chose to set aside Kal's troubling words.
Looking at the two bottles Kal had left in his care, he pondered for a long time. Then, imitating Kal's gesture, he lifted each to his lips and drank a small swallow.
Carefully setting the bottles back down, he then picked up little Robin, laid him gently on the bed again, and tucked the soft bearskin quilt around him.
As for the words Kal had spoken before leaving—Brynden understood their meaning.
But just as Kal had said, he did not wish to involve himself in such matters.
He trusted that Kal Stone knew how to keep the balance.
And Brynden himself had no desire to take part in affairs of that sort.
Having secured Robert Arryn's "consent," Kal rose early the next morning, mustering a force of two hundred. Dividing them into four detachments, he led them in turn into the Mountains of the Moon.
Kal had no fear of losing his way or failing to find his quarry.
Such foolishness would never happen to him.
After a week of drilling, the elite troops now proved most effective in his hands.
By late afternoon, with the sky darkening toward dusk, Kal had already located one of the mountain clans' settlements.
He swiftly dealt with the sentries on the outskirts.
Then, concealed high within a tree's crown, Kal watched the tribe intently.
It was not a large clan settlement—at most some three hundred souls, men, women, and children alike. What surprised Kal was that, at a glance, nearly half of them were young men in their prime.
That gave him pause, though only for a moment.
Leaping down from the tree crown, he beckoned several squad leaders over, the glow of sunset at his back.
"I've heard that conflicts between these clans usually end in blood," Kal said casually. "But don't they also tend to use violence to settle even personal disputes?"
The question seemed to open a floodgate.
At once the dozen Vale warriors began speaking at once, indignation flashing across their faces.
"It's true, my lord. We've had dealings with them before—though not many," one admitted.
"More often than not, we're left cleaning up after them. These bastards are a threat to the Vale's smallfolk!" another added heatedly.
"My lord, I say we kill them all—wipe them out completely!" a third declared, his expression savage.
At those words, the group nearly broke into an uproar. Kal quickly raised his hand, pressing their voices down.
And in that moment, he understood just what these mountain clans, hidden away in the Mountains of the Moon, truly meant for the Vale.
"Enough!"
His voice cut through their clamor, his eyes flashing with stern command.
"Listen, men—I do not care what you have suffered at their hands."
"But now, things will proceed according to my will!" Kal's tone dropped, heavy with authority.
Soldiers nearby, though not directly summoned, all held their breath, straining to hear every word.
"I order you to scatter them—but you are not to slaughter women and children."
"As for their warriors—you will defeat them, capture them."
"If any resist, then kill them."
"Let their blood be the end of their futile defiance!"
...
The shriek of a signal arrow split the air, tearing open a war that came suddenly—yet had long been prepared.
The whistling shaft carved through the sky, its piercing screech ending as it smashed into the skull of a tribesman standing atop a tree-tower.
The shriek cut off at once.
What followed immediately after was the thunderous roar of the Vale knights, who had already slipped into the surrounding woods, silently eliminating the lookouts and waiting in ambush for this very moment.
Their blades were already drawn. The scrape of steel on armor and the rasp of branches against iron became the accompaniment to their battle cries.
The signal arrow also startled the tribe ahead. At the same time, with war cries echoing from all directions, the wildlings of the mountain clans—who had only just finished their supper around the bonfire—were roused at last.
The instant they realized they were surrounded, these warriors—long accustomed to the sight of blood—snatched up whatever weapons lay closest at hand.
As for the few elders, women, and children of the tribe, they shrank into the protective ring of the warriors.
Some of the younger, sturdier women also seized weapons, feral light flashing in their eyes as they stood shoulder to shoulder with the men.
In the forest, daylight always faded too soon. Even though the sun had not yet set, the village hidden among the trees was lit only by the glow of the bonfire.
Thus, when they finally saw their enemies clearly, the knights were already upon them.
Clad in full iron, weapons gleaming, their foes looked like monsters of steel. The sight shattered the nerves of some younger tribesmen.
They had thought another clan had come raiding.
Never had they imagined their enemy would be knights of the Vale—armed to the teeth, equipped to perfection, and silent enough to slip right to their doorstep.
In the darkness, they could not see how many encircled them. All they had were the roars closing in from every side, their heartbeats racing in time with the crackling of the flames.
When the two sides finally met, the war began—heralded by the dull thud of blades biting into flesh and the heart-rending screams that followed.
In the firelight, swords flashed white again and again, dazzling and terrifying.
Steel drove savagely into flesh, blood spraying high.
The scene dissolved into chaos.
Within the dense woods, Kal lowered his longbow, his gaze steady as he watched the Vale knights charge into the tribe.
"Not bad," he remarked with a smile, clearly pleased by the sight before him. Then he handed the bow to the plump man mounted beside him.
Samwell Tarly, face round and sweating, fumbled to take the longbow from the Warden of the East, wiping the hot sweat from his brow with trembling hands.
This time, Kal did not fight at the forefront, as he had when he clashed with the Lannister host in the Riverlands.
He held the rear line, commanding and directing.
At the same time, he wanted to test just how formidable these Eyrie knights of House Arryn truly were.
And the result left him well satisfied.
Dismounted, clad in heavy armor, fighting through the dense woods against the foe, these knights showed not the slightest fear.
Groups of three to five stood together, armed with spears, shields, and swords.
Active striking against passive defense, calculation against unpreparedness—the mountain clan tribe, struck by this sudden assault, had no chance to fight back.
Before they could even inflict a single casualty on Kal's forces, their hastily-formed battle line had already been shattered.
Yet the tribe did show something remarkable. At its core, their resistance was unexpectedly stubborn. After enduring the first wave of chaos, they even began to steady their footing.
Noticing this, curiosity stirred within Kal.
This tribe's makeup of warriors and people was strange enough, but their fighting strength also exceeded his expectations.
Seeing two or three dozen of them fall in the blink of an eye, Kal decided not to let the slaughter go unchecked.
"Come on. It's our turn now—otherwise, I fear these men will be butchered to the last."
With just a quick glance, he had already reached his conclusion. At once he urged his horse down the mountain path, bringing with him Samwell, Jon, Hall, and the others who likewise had no kin in this battlefield.
By the time Kal reached the field, the wildlings—though scattered and broken—had, under the shouts of a few among them, regrouped into a tighter circle of defense. For the moment, they held their ground.
The battle, just like that, fell into a sudden stalemate.
Within the tribe, a young man of the Burned Men clan, his face splattered with his comrade's blood—the spray from when a youth's throat was slashed—stood grim-faced.
He too was young, yet his visage was terrifying. He bore only one eye, with a deep scar left by a burn marring the empty socket where his left eye had once been, now nothing but a black hollow.
At that moment, he wore a heavy expression, and in his heart despair swelled as he looked upon the Vale knights who had encircled them.
Kal reached the edge of the circle. Seeing that the Vale knights were not lost to bloodlust but had carried out his orders precisely, his satisfaction with them grew all the more.
'I'll have to borrow some men from Robert Arryn. Otherwise, when the time comes for me to hold my own lands, raising a proper army may prove troublesome.'
So he thought, already planning ahead.
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