With Kal's arrival, the Vale soldiers locked in combat with the resisting wildlings pulled back at their captains' command, withdrawing from the fight with practiced ease.
Seeing their enemies suddenly halt their assault, the wildlings—snatched from the jaws of death—finally had a chance to look about and see what was happening.
From the ring of soldiers, a passage opened. Through it rode a young man, towering as if a steel tower himself. His face was hidden, but he wore only a fine robe utterly out of place in the rugged mountains. Seated on a white warhorse, he appeared before their eyes.
"Who is the leader here?"
Kal showed not the slightest trace of fear. He rode his horse directly into the midst of the clansmen, reined it in, and stopped before them.
The clansmen, freshly escaped from death's shadow, felt the hot breath of the warhorse blowing against their faces.
Nervously, someone swallowed hard.
Then, almost instinctively, eyes turned toward a young man within the crowd—the one with only a single eye.
Seeing someone "give up" their leader, Kal also shifted his gaze in that direction.
"You are their leader?"
"Tell me your name, clansmen."
Kal's voice was neither loud nor soft, his expression calm, betraying no clear intent.
Standing in the contracted ring of warriors, the one-eyed youth of the Burned Men, Red Hand Timett, looked at the man who had halted the battle just as it began, riding his horse straight into their midst.
At the same time, he realized that this was the commander of the army before him.
Drawing a deep breath, a glimmer flashed in his lone eye. He lifted his chin, and without the slightest trace of fear, stepped out from the crowd.
"I am the war chief of this clan. They call me Red Hand." Timett stood tall before Kal, lifting his head to look up at the rider.
"Red Hand?"
Hearing the title, Kal's eyes settled on the scars that marred the man's face. He glanced again at the others in the clan and noticed similar marks, and in that instant understood which clan he was facing.
"You are the Burned Men?" Kal's gaze lingered on the blood staining Timett's face as he looked down from horseback. "Tell me your name, clansman."
"Shouldn't I know who has attacked us first?"
Yet Timett, facing Kal's lofty bearing, replied without servility, without arrogance.
"You stand before the newly appointed Warden of the East, savage. You will show respect."
Kal himself did not speak.
Instead, Hall instinctively stepped forward, giving Kal's title—but shrewdly avoiding his name.
"Warden of the East?!"
The words startled Timett. As far as he knew, the previous Warden of the East—the King's Hand, Jon Arryn, Lord of the Eyrie—had only just died. The new Lord of the Eyrie was still a child, and had never been named Warden.
That was precisely why the mountain clans had once again grown bold.
But now, the young man who had defeated them, sitting high on horseback, claimed that very title.
Surprise flickered in Timett's eye as he looked once more at Kal's youthful face, then let his gaze shift to the warriors encircling them.
On armor and surcoats alike, he saw the azure field: the sigil of House Arryn, a sky-blue falcon soaring against the backdrop of a white crescent moon.
Now that he knew who had struck them, the last shred of hope in Red Hand's heart slipped away.
"What is it you want—do you mean to kill us?" Timett raised his head, meeting the young man's downward gaze, asking bluntly without a hint of fear.
"Yes, and no. You still haven't told me your name."
Kal's interest deepened at this display, and he pressed again.
"My name is Timett, son of Timett, Warden of the East."
"Perhaps you should tell me your name as well."
Noticing that the young Warden of the East did not seem intent on wiping out his people, Timett felt a flicker of hope rise within him.
Yet his face remained as proud as ever.
Seeing that Timett wanted to know his name, Kal merely smiled faintly.
"My name is Kal Stone."
"According to your customs, I am the son of Robert Baratheon the First—King on the Iron Throne, Ruler of the Seven Kingdoms, Protector of the Realm, King of the Andals, the Rhoynar, and the First Men."
"I hope this deepens the impression you have of me."
As Kal spoke, his face showed a trace of amusement. Leaning forward in his saddle, he gazed down at the solemn, arrogant youth.
Though nothing of that expression could be read on Timett's face.
But with Kal's declaration of identity, the name and titles that followed shocked every clansman of the Burned Men clan present.
They all knew what that meant.
Even the Vale knights who had come with Kal turned their heads in surprise at the calm, measured voice.
Aside from a few who already knew his background, most of the knights had no idea that their Warden of the East—the boy who had been raised for years in the Eyrie as little more than a stable lad, and who had left at the age of thirteen—was in fact the bastard son Robert Baratheon had fathered here in his youth.
Timett's jaw dropped at Kal's lineage. But almost immediately, he reacted to the implication of the name Kal Stone.
"Stone? You are a bastard?"
"A mongrel can be Warden of the East?!"
In his shock, the Red Hand of the Burned Men clan blurted the words from his heart.
The moment Hall—who had followed at Kal's back—heard this one-eyed savage insult his lord, he instantly drew his sword, thrusting it straight toward Timett's lone eye.
As he stabbed, he shouted furiously: "How dare you! To insult my lord!"
But just as Hall spurred his horse two steps forward, ready to finish the fool with one stroke, Kal reached out two fingers and caught the thin blade aimed at Timett.
Seeing the sharp steel caught so close, held fast between just two fingers, Timett's pupil involuntarily contracted.
The shadow of death snapped him awake, and the Red Hand of the Burned Men clan realized only then what he had just said.
As one born to a clan that had dwelled in the Mountains of the Moon since ancient times, Timett himself made little distinction between bastard and trueborn.
But as someone who lived within the Seven Kingdoms, he had absorbed some of the prejudice from outside.
So when he spat out "bastard," it was less an insult than a habit of speech—hardly even intended as an offense.
Even so, it could not excuse the affront he had given Kal.
Thus, after Kal released Hall's sword, the smile vanished from his face, replaced by stern gravity.
No longer leaning forward in his saddle, he straightened tall once more, eyes blazing as he fixed his gaze on the clansmen who now stood as his captives.
"Just now, your Red Hand asked me what I wanted to do."
"I came only to ask you one question."
"What question?" Timett, realizing he had offended the young man before him, hastily asked.
At his words, Kal lowered his eyes, staring coldly at him.
"Those who submit to me—live!"
"Those who defy me—die!"
Kal's voice struck like iron. When it fell, the only sounds left were the crackle of flames and the evening wind rising with the setting sun—alongside the harsh, heavy breathing of the clansmen.
They exchanged glances, strange and complicated expressions flickering in their eyes.
At last, every gaze turned toward their war leader, Red Hand.
Feeling the weight of all those eyes, Timett's expression grew solemn once more, hard as stone.
"Perhaps this lord does not truly understand us mountain clans."
"Since the days of the Andal invasion, we have never bowed. We do not acknowledge the Eyrie's rule over the Mountains of the Moon."
"And you think, just by bringing these men here, you can threaten us?"
"Better you cut off our heads now, rather than waste time with empty words!"
Orcs never—no, more precisely, the mountain clans would never bow as slaves.
Even under the threat of death, they held their heads high, unafraid, gazes calm as they looked straight at their leader, Timett.
At that moment, Kal's ears seemed to echo with a line he had once thought long forgotten.
"Even if it means losing your life for it?" Kal asked, his tone even.
In the face of the Warden of the East's question, Timett only closed his eyes, raised his chin, and bared his neck.
His silence was his answer.
Seeing such unyielding resolve, Kal turned his gaze upon the clansmen now encircled by the knights of the Vale.
But what met his eyes were only weapons gripped tighter, and gazes all the more steadfast.
"I understand."
Kal nodded, swung down from his warhorse.
Hall, Jon, and the others followed suit, dismounting one after another.
Handing his reins to Jon, Kal pulled off his gloves as he strode toward Timett.
Yet he did not stop before him. Like a gust of wind, he passed by, brushing his shoulder as he walked ahead.
Puzzled, Timett opened his eye to see the young Warden of the East standing before a firepit of piled stones.
The meal was long finished, leaving only glowing coals and half-burned logs still smoldering.
Firelight painted Kal's face in shades of red, and from where Timett stood, he could only see the young man's profile.
He could not fathom his intent.
Not killing him, not speaking, merely crouching before the fire—
And while both the mountain clansmen and the knights of the Vale alike wondered what Kal meant to do—
The Warden of the East drew a dagger from his belt.
Pinched between three fingers, he held the dragonbone-hilted dagger Robert had once granted him, and with a flick of his wrist, used its blade to stir the coals.
Prodding at the embers, he spoke: "Did you know? I grew up in the Vale, at the Eyrie."
Timett narrowed his one good eye. "I could tell from your name."
"I know a bit about your people," Kal smiled, "and some of your customs as well—like the scar across your brow, and the eye you lost."
"This is our honor," Timett replied, "a tradition of our Burned Men."
"You said I knew nothing of you, that I ought to just strike off your heads?" Kal continued to stir the embers, "But as you see, I am not entirely ignorant of who you are."
Hearing the weight beneath his words, Timett cast a glance at Jon Snow and the others, who had not followed the young Warden into the clansmen's midst. His gaze shifted, and he stepped closer, coming to stand by Kal's side.
Watching the dagger, glowing red as Kal wielded it like a poker in the fire, a faint smile tugged at Timett's lips.
"If you think this alone will conquer us," he said, "then you're chasing a fool's dream."
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