The thick, greasy smoke from the pyres rose like black fingers to choke the winter sky, dyeing the clouds a sullen, oppressive grey.
Samwell Tarly watched from the wooden gantry of the King's Tower as Stannis Baratheon's men-at-arms, their breastplates emblazoned with the fiery red heart, dragged the captured Ironborn reavers from their wooden cages. One by one, the prisoners were bound to the makeshift pine altars. They didn't beg; they cursed, their rough salt-tongues spitting defiance until the wood was lit.
A fierce, unnatural heat rose from the pyres, the hot air ascending with the smoke to pierce the freezing draft. Surrounding the flames, the Queen's Men stood with their hands clasped, their voices joining in a rhythmic, skin-crawling chant to the Lord of Light. Nearby, the Free Folk and the non-combatant women and children huddled together, their eyes wide with a mixture of raw terror and superstitious awe.
Aside from the newly formed Knights of the Sunburst guarding the rear, very few men in Castle Black truly believed in R'hllor. Most of the garrison held to the Old Gods of the weirwoods or the Southern Seven. But in the shadow of a seven-hundred-foot Wall of ice, with the dead marching at their doorstep, even the most stubborn septon held his tongue.
Melisandre of Asshai spun in her scarlet silk robes, her coppery hair wild in the wind. The ruby at her throat sipped the firelight, pulsing like a living heart. She raised her arms, her voice rising to a high-pitched, echoing shriek.
"R'hllor! We are in darkness! Descend upon us!" she cried. "We offer these servants of false gods to you. Take their blood, and grant us your light! For the night is dark and full of terrors."
"For the night is dark and full of terrors," the Queen's Men chanted in response.
Samwell watched the flames lick the sky, the black smoke swirling into eerie, tormented shapes. He took a breath, the cold air biting his lungs, and looked north.
High above the Haunted Forest, the pitch-black clouds of the Great Other seemed to ignite. In a heartbeat, the creeping darkness receded, transforming into a magnificent, rolling storm of fire-red vapor. The freezing wind died, replaced by a sudden, warm rain that dripped from the burning sky.
Where the raindrops fell, the wights suffered a physical shock. The blue fire in their eyes flickered and died, and the reanimated corpses collapsed like hollow wood. The great grey-and-white beasts, the undead bears and giant elks fell into the slush, their frozen limbs locking as the magic that animated them evaporated.
The immediate pressure on the Wall vanished.
"FORWARD!" Prince Oberyn Martell's voice cut through the steam. "PLUG THE GAPS!"
The Dornish spearmen and the Stormlands infantry capitalized on the reprieve, rushing into the first and second breaches with their dragonglass-tipped spears. The Knights of the Reach, led by Randyll Tarly, moved to secure the third gap.
"Build the low walls!" officers screamed through the mist. "Roll the pitch! Get the Wildfire up from the vaults!"
Under the direction of the builders, the courtyard became a hive of frantic construction. Boulders and shattered ice were piled into a jagged barricade. Iron-bound casks of pitch were rolled down the wooden ramps, and the green jars of Wildfire, packed in sand-filled wooden crates to prevent accidental explosion were carted to the front lines.
High above, Viserion descended. The silver dragon flapped his wings awkwardly, his golden wings encrusted with patches of solid ice from the suicide dives of the undead ice-birds. He landed with a heavy, pained thud in the courtyard, his golden eyes dull with exhaustion. The magical cold of the Haunted Forest had suppressed his fire, and his cream-colored hide was torn in multiple places.
Eddard Karstark slid down from the dragon's neck, his bald head gleaming with sweat despite the cold. His heart was heavy. He had intended to fly deep into the forest to locate the Others' altar, hoping to destroy it with dragonfire. But the aerial defenses of the dead were too absolute; the sky-rot birds had swarmed Viserion like a storm of knives, forcing a retreat.
If that magical hurricane were allowed to blow indefinitely, even an allied host of 120,000 men would eventually freeze to death behind their low walls.
A war of attrition is a grave for the living, Eddard thought. We need a decapitation strike.
The day grew slowly brighter as the red clouds pushed the darkness back to the tree line. The dead, hating the sun, retreated into the shadows of the pines. But Eddard knew this was merely a temporary truce a half-time break. The moment the sun dipped below the ice, the dead would rise again.
Inside the Shield Hall, the fire in the great hearths did little to ease the tension.
Stannis Baratheon paced the length of the dais, his jaw grinding with a rhythmic, stone-cracking sound. "My men have taken 10% casualties in a single afternoon!" the King growled, his grey-blue eyes fixed on Eddard. "They are exhausted. They have seen their own comrades rise from the mud with blue eyes. They cannot fight another battle tonight without breaking!"
Stannis was a man of iron, but he was a realist. He saw the terror in his veterans' eyes. They could face knights and spearmen, but they could not face the grave.
"My Northern warriors will take the watch tonight, Your Grace," Lord Rickard Karstark said, his voice steady. "The cold does not frighten us, and the Greatjon's men are eager for a fight. But the magic... Eddard, can we withstand another blizzard?"
"The blizzard is suppressed," Melisandre said, stepping from the shadows. Her face looked pale, and for the first time, Eddard saw fine, deep wrinkles around her eyes. The ritual had taken a heavy toll on her vitality. "The Lord of Light has broken the cold god's grip on the clouds. For tonight, there will be no magical gales."
Jon Snow looked at Oberyn Martell. "The Night's Watch and the Free Folk can relieve your spearmen, Prince Oberyn. You should rest your lines."
"Dornishmen don't rest while there is steel to be swung, Lord Commander," Oberyn replied with a fierce, prideful grin. "We fought dragons in our sands; we won't be frightened by a few cold bones."
Oberyn leaned over the table, his finger tracing the map of the breaches. "But we need to change our defense. I want to use the melting ice. We use the iron pots to boil water, pour it over the rubble, and create a glassy ice-ramp at the gaps. The dead have no cleats; they will slip and tumble to the bottom. Then, we fill the bottleneck with pitch and Wildfire."
"A sound plan," Eddard agreed, a spark of appreciation in his eyes. "It turns their momentum against them."
"My archers will support you, Prince Oberyn," Stannis said. "They have been rested. They will hold the ramp."
"The Reach requires the same setup," Randyll Tarly said, his voice a cold rasp. "My pikes can hold the bottleneck, but we need the fire to clear the pile."
"The North will take the third," Rickard Karstark agreed.
As the lords bickered over the distribution of the dragonglass and the Wildfire jars, Melisandre's red eyes locked onto Eddard.
"The defense is a shield, My Lords," the priestess whispered, her voice cutting through the din of the hall. "But a shield only delays the blow. Who will take the sword? Who will go into the dark and destroy the altar of the Great Other?"
[System Notification: The Battle of the Black Gate: Phase 1 Concluded.]
Plz Drop Some Power Stones.