Chapter Twenty-Five
**Catelyn Stark's POV**
Cat was exhausted but uncommonly content.
Only months before, Cat had felt her entire world falling apart around her. Now she was certain of her new path, Lady Granger had asked for her help in negotiating with the Giants. Mostly Cat was there to help explain myths and legends told to her by her husband over the years. She surprised herself with just how much she remembered. All those hours listening to Ned talk, the stories of his people, the stories Old Nan told to naughty boys and girls to make them mind their manners. Lady Granger asked a great deal of questions mostly about the different Houses their allegiances, who was still alive to her knowledge, she asked about Bran and his condition.
"Oh, don't go off into the woods, the Grumpkins, Snarks, and Giants will eat you." She remembered hearing these stories as a young girl, she of course had dismissed it, now thou she was paying far more attention than she had in her life.
The strange Elf creature was pleasant enough if not a bit unsettling, translating the Giants for Cat's sake whispering the low enough not to interrupt proceedings, which she did appreciate. It seemed Giants were more likely to trust females than males of any species, which was another reason she and not Rob had been invited. Cat had found herself representing House Stark in service of her son to these enormous people, and she felt the weight of it settle on her shoulders. *Was this the way it felt for Ned when he was still alive* she just didn't know.
She had watched as Lady Granger use magic to create an absurdly large glass lantern. The strangest thing was the glass candle at its center. Lady Granger simply held it in her hand for a moment and closed her eyes. The candle lit immediately.
"Impressive," she murmured to herself, turning the little glass candle over in her hands and admiring it from every angle. "It gets brighter the darker the environment around it and lasts up to a century without a recharge." A small smile crossed her face. "So that's how it was done." She finished her examination and placed the lit candle into its enchanted lantern, sealing it shut with a gesture.
Cat could see what Lady Granger had meant about magic being able to create beautiful things as easily as horrible ones. That it was the character of the caster that determined how it was used, much like, as the young woman herself had once said bluntly, "any moron swinging a sword." Cat was well aware that a sword could kill just as easily as magic, just far slower.
What should have been maybe an hour-long conversation had taken almost two days, during which there were 6 breaks for the Giants to talk among themselves. Watching the interaction between the two parties was most definitely a study in patience. On the second day Lady Granger created an enormous magic bow for the Giant King as another gift, and the reaction in the camp was something Cat would not soon forget.
At the beginning of the last day, Cat had seen the full breadth of the Wildling camp for the first time and gasped.
There had to be close to one hundred thousand souls in this sea of people. Every single person currently in camp comprising the entirety of the far north, all of them carrying what little they had, all of them with the same look behind their eyes. Cat had seen that look before, during her sons war with the Lannister's, the Mountain that rides would raid, slaughter and pillage the local villages and every single one of them had this same look. Close to three quarters of them were women and children.
This was no invading army, these people were fleeing, these poor people were refugees.
"What could drive so many people from their homes?" she quietly asked to herself. She took time for one last moment, taking in the sight before her, of so many lost souls in need of help.
Lady Granger had gone ahead to speak to the King Beyond the Wall. Cat watched her go and hoped she would come back with an answer to help these poor people.
---
**Hermione's POV**
The camp was enormous; people were everywhere trying to stay as close to the camp as possible to keep warm.
Tens of thousands of people stretched out across the snow, and as Hermione walked through the outer edges she was already counting and cataloguing. The few meager processions apparent with supplies running thin and no real way to resupply. The people still held fire in their eyes, they had not given up hope just yet.
She probably ought to drop the Soulfyre shield, she thought in retrospect.
It did make her seem rather more supernatural than she preferred for a first meeting, but this cold was different from any cold she had felt before, even accounting for years of Scottish Highlands winters. It was an almost magical cold, and everything her senses told her about the magic in the air around her made her want no part of it touching her skin. It felt like Rot, not decay an almost cloying feeling, but something older and more deliberate the feeling of it making the hairs on her neck stand on end.
The Soulfyre adjusted for it as it always did, purifying whatever came near her before it could make contact. The unfortunate side effect being that it also cleared the snow in a path around her feet, coaxing long dormant plant life up through the frost as she walked. Grass and small winter flowers bloomed in a neat trail behind her through the middle of the camp.
She could see exactly where she had come from, as children were playing in the thawed trail she had left, some were even picking a few of the flowers that had popped up. The entire thing was rather embarrassing, but she kept her head held high and continued.
The people backed away or made small signs to themselves as she passed, she understood, if she were in their position she might even do the same, being uneducated in the goings on of magic these people just didn't understand she wasn't doing anything particularly wonderous, so she just kept walking until they made it to the Command tent.
Rakharo stayed outside as she had asked, she had given her word she would meet the man alone and she didn't want to be seen as a liar. She needed this conversation without an audience distracting her.
Mance was alone as agreed, the tent rather warm and inviting, the soft glow of embers in the fire giving off welcoming heat. Hermione walked in with confidence and sat down in the chair across from him, making sure to keep eye contact.
"The Giants say you can help my people?" he asked, blunt and straight to the point his eyes narrowed. He had a look of curiosity
"Possibly," Hermione said, the Giants had said good things about Mance, and he had organized this camp, but she needed to set a few things straight.
"I'll give it to you straight; your people are very proud and very stubborn and are not very good with rules." She watched his face. He nodded, accepting it, also good.
"That will not be tolerated, for a society to function, some rules and laws must be in place. If your people wish to be children about it, complaining that the rules are unfair or that no one tells them what to do, then I can't help you." She kept her voice level and pleasant. "Life is not fair. But I will not put innocent people in harm's way because your people want something that isn't theirs, and I will not stand by while they murder simply to take it. If that is the kind of people you wish to be, I might as well wipe you and your people from existence entirely and take the ones willing to grow the hell up."
She had not raised her voice once.
The temperature in the tent dropped. The light from every corner seemed to pull back from her as the very shadows seemed to reach for Mance grasping out searching. Mance was physically struggling to remain upright in his chair as gravity seemed to have increased as he watched the shadows coming ever closer and closer, Mance opened his mouth to speak but no words would escape, something was pressing him down into the seat with steady and increasing weight, the light of the world started to fade.
Then everything went back to normal, as if nothing had taken place to begin with.
Hermione was still sitting across from him with a pleasant smile on her face, not having moved a muscle, hands still resting in her lap as she studied him silently.
"I believe we understand each other now, correct?" she asked with one raised eyebrow as Mance could see sparks dancing on her fingertips just ready to unleash hell at a moment's notice.
Mance, was breathing hard as he took large gasps of air getting that final relief as air filled his lungs, helping to calm his ever faster beating heart. His eyes were wide as his lower lip trembled, he didn't dare argue with this person, so he simple nodded his head in deference finally understanding just what this person was, after talking to the Giants he didn't believe but now, he did.
"Good." Hermione looked him in the eyes. "Now if you would be so kind as to tell me everything you know about the Night's Watch, then explain to me what your people are running from and why. But first, and more importantly," the smile stayed exactly where it was but somehow seemed even more deadly than before, "where is Jon Snow?"
---
The conversation lasted just over an hour, each side asking questions of the other in a very Amiable way.
At the end, Hermione looked at him steadily and asked, "Can you and your people reach Castle Black within three days?"
Mance took a moment to think, "If we push it, yes, but to what end? Without the Giants the gates will never open."
Hermione looked at him and said simply, "The gates will open for me." She stood. "I need you to show me what kind of leader you can be Mance Rayder, you will lead your people to Castle Black, there you will pick three fellow leaders and accompany me inside, unarmed. The rest of your people will await further orders, outside the wall until I or you come and get them." She turned to leave and then stopped. "Keep your people in line, do as I have said, and we will save them, I believe you are a good man prove me right."
Grabbed her guard on the way out she disappeared with a *POP*.
---
Back in the Giants' camp Hermione stood very still and reorganized her thoughts.
She had been wrong, not entirely wrong, but not completely correct either, which in some ways was worse.
She had assumed the explosion four hundred years ago had opened a small, localized rift, that if she was correct in what was currently infesting this planet had come through then. But whatever this thing was, it was ancient. Far older than four hundred years, the Giants didn't even have a name for it, the people called them White Walkers, she needed more information, and the only place containing what she needed was Castle Black.
Her more immediate problem was the army waiting for them back at Meereen. She had no more time to be playing nice, she needed Dany to know the truth, but it had been fear, that had been keeping her from saying it. Would she understand? Would she forgive her? The problem was she had no time left to worry about it. Something had driven one hundred thousand people from their homes, and these were not people that were frightened easily. These were Wildlings, they did not run, and they did not kneel, such a headache.
But that was a problem for three days from now.
For the next few hours, she set herself to creating a Portkey apiece for every Giant and every Mammoth. Then using her newly mastered large-scale Transfiguration and permanence charms she reworked the Giants existing equipment into something that would actually serve them in a fight.
By the time she was done her hands were shaking a bit as a golden glow started to surround her, her magic was running thinner than she liked and that problem was rearing its ugly head as she pulled out the emergency pendant and put it on.
She stopped, closed her eyes, breathed in slowly and out slowly until the noise in her head settled, she drew in deep, the saved power hidden inside the newly repaired locket she had finally managed to repair.
Three days to Castle Black, she would put the black brothers on notice and end this stupid war for good. But before that she would sit down with Dany and tell her the truth, all of it, and whatever happened after that would happen.
One thing at a time.