New chapter! Thanks for all the support!
x
Splash, splash!
The clear, swift waters of the Tumblestone rushed from west to east just north of Riverrun.
On an open stretch upstream, opposite Riverrun, more than two thousand Lannister cavalry were doing their best to control their horses and keep their formation orderly.
Most of Kevan's nearly fifteen thousand troops were infantry. Aside from the cavalry Addam had led back west, these were the only riders they had left.
Across the front half of those Lannister horses were thick iron chains, each as wide as a man's wrist, linked together.
Ahead of them stood nearly three thousand Lannister infantry. Groups of them held the front ends of the iron chains, while three or four hundred small fishing boats of different makes waited beside them.
To the west were eight thousand elite Lannister infantry. To the south was the combined army of the other Westerlands houses, fifteen thousand men in total. Apart from two thousand or so rear troops left to hold the camp, the remaining five thousand were all here.
The commander of this Lannister force was Lord Leo Lefford of the Golden Tooth. House Lefford had mined gold for House Lannister for centuries.
They could hold a rich, important stronghold like the Golden Tooth without drawing Lannister suspicion. Their status in the Westerlands needed no explanation.
That was why Tywin had entrusted the most important task to the vassal he now considered most reliable.
Ooooh, ooooh!
A horn with a specific signal sounded. Lord Leo, dressed in a suit of splendid, finely made armor and carrying a sharpened axe, lifted the weapon toward Riverrun across the river and shouted, "Attack!"
After giving the order, he personally led his guards in lifting one of the fishing boats toward the water. The other three thousand Lannister infantry immediately lifted the small boats beside them and launched them.
Splash, splash!
Once the boats entered the water, eight or nine Lannister infantrymen climbed into each, picked up the oars prepared inside, and rowed hard toward the opposite bank of the Tumblestone.
Riverrun's northern and eastern sides had neither battlements nor defending soldiers.
When Lord Axel Tully first built Riverrun, he had believed no one could stand in the swift currents of the Tumblestone and the Red Fork to climb the castle walls.
And the facts proved him right.
Even though the Lannister infantry rowed with all their strength, the rushing current still kept them from moving straight ahead. Instead, it carried them diagonally downstream.
But this location was one the Lannisters had tested in advance. They had started upstream from the start. By the time they neared Riverrun on the far side, they had been carried directly toward the northern wall.
On Riverrun's northern side stood a high tower. Its surface was covered in ivy, and in its middle turned a huge waterwheel.
The waterwheel was driven by the rushing Tumblestone. Each turn brought water into Riverrun through the water gate.
And that water gate was the target of the Lannister infantry.
Over the last two months, both Kevan's army and the Mountain's men had captured many prisoners, commoners as well as noble descendants. After inhuman interrogations, they had learned many of Riverrun's small secrets.
This water gate was one of them.
The first few small fishing boats approached Riverrun's northern wall, but before they could grab onto anything, the swift current carried them straight downstream.
Yet with three or four hundred fishing boats in the water, one boat finally managed to approach the water gate beneath Riverrun's northern wall, a passage wide enough for boats to enter.
The water gate had a fairly broad arched opening. Inside it was an iron portcullis made of thick, hard iron bars crossed in X shapes.
Perhaps because it had been soaked in water for years, the lower half of the gate was covered in red rust.
Lord Leo, who had not let his guards row at full strength until now, immediately ordered them to give everything once he saw the water gate. His small boat quickly moved toward it.
When their boat reached the water gate, Lord Leo, who had long been prepared, fastened the iron chain aboard to the heavy iron portcullis.
Clatter!
Once the chain was secure, the Lannister cavalry on the opposite bank pulled it taut with all their strength.
The iron chain stretched diagonally across the Tumblestone. The other boats that had not managed to approach the water gate in time seized the chance to grab the chain, steady themselves, and move toward the gate.
Clang, clang, clang!
The first chain had been hard to secure, but the ones after it were much easier. Before long, dozens of iron chains were firmly fastened to the water gate's iron portcullis.
"Send the signal. Have them pull!"
Seeing that there were enough chains, Lord Leo gave the order, and his boat withdrew slightly along the chains.
The Lannister cavalry across the river received the command and immediately pulled on their reins, turning their horses away from the river and riding back.
Clatter!
Creak, creak!
As dozens of iron chains tightened, the thick iron bars of the portcullis gave off an ugly sound under the strain.
At first, there was only noise. Gradually, the iron bars began to twist, clearly unable to bear the force.
One lower-quality iron bar was the first to fail. It snapped directly in two and fell into the Tumblestone.
Thud, thud, thud!
That iron bar was like the last straw breaking a camel's back. As it snapped and dropped into the river, the other iron bars on the gate began falling one after another.
"Enough. Signal them to stop!"
Seeing that enough bars had fallen to let boats pass, and worried that if all the chains dropped they would have nothing left to hold onto, Lord Leo hurriedly ordered his guards to signal the opposite bank.
When Lord Leo's force had only just set out by boat, the left section of Riverrun's southern wall had already begun suffering the consequences of Lord Piper's wounded retreat.
That portion of the wall now lacked a commander to coordinate the defense. Worse still, Lord Piper's shouting before he left had been heard by the defending soldiers, filling their minds with speculation.
The Westerlands soldiers focused on the assault would not care about any of that. They were like hyenas. The moment they sensed weakness, they attacked it viciously.
Quite a few Westerlands soldiers had already climbed onto the left section of the wall through siege towers and scaling ladders. Once they gained a foothold, the troops below clearly began gathering toward that part of the wall.
Lord Tytos noticed it as well. He could clearly feel that the pressure on the right section was slowly weakening, yet the enemy had not sounded a retreat.
He snatched a one-handed shield from a nearby defender, raised it, and moved to the battlements to look down.
He saw many Westerlands assault troops gathering toward the left side of the wall.
'Bad.'
The moment Tytos saw the situation beneath the wall, his heart sank.
He withdrew behind the battlements, returned the shield to the soldier, then tore off the splendid cloak of raven feathers from his back, revealing bright red armor bearing the Blackwood sigil of ravens surrounding a dead weirwood.
Tytos drew the sword at his waist and said to the defenders on the right wall, "Brothers, hold the wall. Those Westerlands bastards will not last long before they retreat.
"Men of House Blackwood, two hundred of you with me. We are going to reinforce the other wall!"
At his call, more than two hundred defenders on the right section immediately stepped out and followed Tytos toward the left wall.
Rip!
Tap, tap, tap!
Edmure had just cut a Westerlands soldier's throat with his sword. Hot blood splashed across his face, and as he wiped it with the back of his hand, he heard a rush of footsteps from the right wall.
He looked up and saw Lord Tytos leading a group of men toward him. Edmure, who had been lost in the pleasure of killing, had no idea what had happened. His first thought was that Tytos had brought men to reinforce him.
A little displeased, Edmure immediately called out, "Lord Tytos, why have you left your defensive area? If the wall falls because you left, can you bear that responsibility?"
"Lord Edmure, as you just said, if I do not take men to reinforce the left wall, the wall really will fall.
"If you do not believe me, look beneath the wall and see where the enemy is moving!"
Hearing Edmure's tone, Lord Tytos frowned and directly explained the danger.
"Look beneath the wall?"
Edmure, guarded by his personal men, moved to the battlements and looked down. Sure enough, just as Tytos said, a dark mass of Westerlands troops was gathering steadily toward the left side.
"Hendry, take five hundred men with Lord Tytos and reinforce Lord Piper."
Edmure was no fool. Seeing the situation below, he immediately gave the order to one of his guards.
The central wall had the most men to begin with, and the pressure there had clearly weakened. Edmure had more troops he could draw away.
"Yes, my lord!"
The young, sturdy guard nodded and answered at once.
After Edmure gave the order, Lord Tytos wasted no more words. He saluted, crossed the central wall at a brisk pace, and headed for the left section.
Kill!
The moment he reached the round tower that blocked his view, Lord Tytos heard screams and battle cries from the other side.
Once he passed the obstructing tower, he saw the brutal state of the left wall.
The Westerlands soldiers had gained firm footing in three places along the wall. They were trading lives with the defenders in vicious close combat.
At the two spots closer to Tytos, there were not many enemies, only around fifty or sixty Westerlands soldiers at each.
At the farthest point, nearly a hundred Westerlands soldiers had climbed onto the wall. They had already occupied a small stretch of the far left side.
Corpses had begun piling up on the left wall, and sticky blood made the stone slabs slippery. One careless step could send a man falling.
And on a battlefield like this, anyone who fell usually had no chance to rise again.
"Hendry, take your men and drive those two groups of Westerlands bastards off the wall. I will deal with the one farthest in!"
Seeing no sign of Lord Piper or his guards, Lord Tytos did not dwell on it. He gave Hendry his order directly.
"No problem!"
Hendry agreed crisply and led his men toward the two nearer groups of Westerlands soldiers.
Lord Tytos looked tall and thin, more like a commander than a warrior. In fact, he was a veteran fighter with rich experience.
Charging at the front, Tytos saw a Westerlands soldier kill one of the defenders and immediately moved to meet him.
When the enemy chopped at him, Tytos gripped his sword in both hands and blocked with the rear half of the blade.
After stopping the blow, he used his sword's crossguard to catch the enemy's weapon, then twisted hard with both hands. The Westerlands soldier's sword fell to the ground.
Spurt, spurt!
Seeing his weapon drop, the Westerlands soldier lifted his right hand as if to speak. Tytos cut horizontally, severing the man's right hand while the sword tip sliced across his throat. Blood immediately sprayed outward.
"We will deal with the enemies on the wall. Archers, suppress them. Infantry, use the forked poles and push their ladders down!"
With fresh troops joining the fight and Lord Tytos personally commanding and leading them, the defenders on the left wall instantly found their backbone.
They followed Tytos's commands one after another, each man doing the duty he should.
Ah!
As the defenders fought in orderly fashion, scaling ladders were pushed off the wall one after another amid screams.
After that, the planks from the siege towers were also forcibly shoved away. Without a steady stream of reinforcements, the Westerlands soldiers on the left wall began dwindling, and the situation gradually returned to Riverrun's control.
At the center of the southern wall, Edmure lost his mood for killing after Tytos's interruption.
He remembered that as Riverrun's acting lord, he had not yet asked about the situation on the western wall. So he assigned one of his personal guards to ask after Brynden's battle.
Before long, the exhausted guard ran back to Edmure and reported in broken gasps, "Lord... Lord Edmure, Lord Brynden is... is not on the western wall."
'Not there? Where had he gone?'
Hearing the report, Edmure looked surprised and lowered his head in thought.
Lord Leo was riding his boat through the damp, dark passage of the water gate. As they entered Riverrun's interior, the view before them suddenly opened.
This was Riverrun's water stair. Several Riverrun boats were still tied nearby to iron rings set into the surrounding walls.
'Mm. This must be the escape route House Tully left for itself. Even if Riverrun falls, they can still quietly board ships here and flee by water.'
'They simply never imagined we would enter from here.'
Looking at the quiet water stair, Lord Leo began forming his own guess.
As more boats entered, nearly a hundred Lannister soldiers had gathered in the area.
Seeing that he had enough men, Lord Leo led them outward, preparing to open Riverrun from the inside.
Boom!
Lord Leo had only taken a few steps when a streak of red flashed through his vision. At the same time, he heard the sound of an arrow tearing through the air.
Then an explosion came from behind him. Caught off guard, he was thrown forward by the blast and slammed heavily to the ground.
Clatter! Clatter!
The explosion had occurred above the water gate passage. Stones began falling constantly, blocking the entire passage.
Some unlucky Lannister soldiers behind Lord Leo had been directly beneath the explosion and were buried under the rubble.
The other soldiers were also knocked down by the blast, sprawling across the ground.
Lord Leo shook his head, which was ringing and swollen with pain. When he finally stood, he saw a weathered man in black fish-scale armor, gray-haired and blue-eyed beneath thick brows, leading more than a hundred archers who were aiming at him.
Lord Leo glanced at the passage blocked by rubble behind him, then at the dozens of Lannister soldiers around him, most still lying on the ground with injuries of varying severity.
Sensibly, he threw down the sharpened axe in his hand and said to the man before him, "I surrender. Do not harm me! House Lefford will pay a generous ransom for my freedom!"
x
x
x
If you're enjoying the story so far, consider supporting me on Patreon ❤️
You'll get weekly early access to chapters, along with some exclusive content:
https://www.patreon.com/cw/TheDevotedReader