Gregor clutched the smoking, ruined stump of his right arm. He sank into the blood-soaked mud of the village square, his chest heaving. The agony finally pierced the mindless rage that had driven him his entire life. He looked up at me, his face twisted into pure unhinged hatred beneath his heavy iron helm.
He sucked in a ragged, wet breath, opening his mouth to bellow a curse, or perhaps to scream.
Without giving a second my jaws snapped shut over his head.
The scream died instantly in his throat, cut off before it could even reach the air. I wrenched my neck sharply to the side. The massive, headless body swayed for a fraction of a second, blood geysering from the torn gorget, before the body crashed heavily into the bloody mud.
I held the helm-encased head in my mouth for a long moment, tasting the blood of another madman. I unhinged my jaws and let it fall. It hit the ground with a heavy, hollow thud, rolling slowly until it bumped against the corpse of a slaughtered peasant.
The fire bleeding into my muscles began to cool, retreating deep into my chest, leaving behind the damp, biting chill of the Riverlands. The village was completely silent, save for the crackle of burning thatches and the hiss of rain hitting the dying embers.
I turned away from the butchery, ready to make the long run back to Riverrun, when a scent caught the edge of my senses.
Beneath the overwhelming stench of burnt bodies and burning wood, there was something else.
I followed the scent. I stepped over the bodies of peasants who had died clutching pitchforks and rocks, moving toward the edge of the tree line. A small wattle-and-daub hut stood half-swallowed by the shadows of the woods. Half of the peat roof had caved in from the fire, but the back wall still held against the rain.
I pushed my massive, blood-stained muzzle through the ruined doorway.
Three children huddled in the darkest corner of the dirt floor, buried beneath a pile of filthy, moth-eaten wool blankets. The oldest was a boy of perhaps eight or nine years. He stood in front of the others, his knees shaking so violently they knocked together. In his small, dirt-caked hands, he held a rusted harvesting sickle, pointing the curved blade toward the door. Behind him cowered a younger girl and a toddler no more than three winters old.
The moment my frame blocked the light of the doorway, the boy gasped, dropping the sickle. The girl shrieked, a high, piercing sound of absolute despair. They scrambled backward, kicking the dirt, pressing themselves completely flat against the rear wall. They wept in paralyzing terror. They had just watched men in armor butcher their mother and father, and now a towering strange beast dripping with fresh blood had come to eat them.
I didn't step forward. I stood in the doorway and let out a long, slow breath, blowing the smoke from my nostrils out into the rain.
I lowered my front legs, sinking my heavy chest onto the packed dirt floor. I folded my ears flat back against my skull and rested my chin on my paws. Slowly, deliberately, I swept my tail across the ground. A heavy thump. Then another.
I just watched them as I let the ambient warmth of my thick coat push back the cold dampness filling the ruined hut.
The girl's screaming turned into ragged, breathless sobbing. The boy kept his eyes fixed on my amber gaze, his chest heaving as he waited for their end.
Minutes dragged by like hours. The fire outside began to die down, smothered by the steady drizzle. The Riverlands chill crept into the hut, biting at the children's thin, threadbare tunics. They were orphans now. The winter was coming, the woods were full of scavengers, and the Lannister outriders would eventually return for the bodies. Leaving them here meant leaving them to starve or freeze.
I waited, perfectly still, offering nothing but warmth.
The toddler stopped crying first. He wiped a dirty hand across his runny nose and pointed a small finger at my tail, which was still giving a slow thump against the dirt. The older boy swallowed hard. He looked at the rusted sickle in the dirt, then back at me. He didn't pick the weapon back up.
The cold finally broke their paralyzing fear. The toddler took a clumsy step forward, drawn by the heat radiating from my fur. The boy tried to grab his brother's shirt, but his hands were too numb. The youngest child reached out and pressed his small palms against my thick, cream-colored mane.
He let out a soft, shuddering sigh as the warmth seeped into his freezing skin. The older boy and the girl finally crept forward, burying their faces in my coat, clinging to the only safe thing left in their ruined world.
....
The fog was rolling thick off the Tumblestone when I reached the Stark perimeter late that afternoon.
A Karstark man standing near the treeline raised his spear, peering into the dense mist. The weapon began to shake in his hands as my silhouette broke through the fog. The man opened his mouth to shout a warning, but the sound died in his throat. He stumbled backward over a thick tree root, landing hard in the mud, his eyes wide and unblinking.
I walked past him, into the heart of the Northern camp.
The three village children sat huddled on my broad back. Their small hands were buried deep in my mane, holding on tight as they stared down at the armored soldiers with exhausted, hollow eyes.
Held in my jaws was the severed head of Gregor.
The camp ground to an absolute halt.
The ringing of the blacksmith's hammer ceased. Men carrying firewood dropped their bundles into the mud. Knights pulling saddles onto their warhorses froze, the animals shying away and stamping their hooves nervously. The shouting and the idle curses died away, replaced by a sudden silence.
Men scrambled out of my path. They fell over each other to clear a wide avenue through the sea of grey and white banners, leaving me a straight line toward the center of the camp.
Ned Stark stood outside his large command pavilion. He wore a heavy dark cloak over his boiled leather, speaking quietly with Bolton and Robb. A map table was set up beneath the canvas awning.
Jon Umber saw me first. The massive lord was in the middle of a booming laugh, but the sound was severed instantly. He went completely still, his massive hand dropping away from the hilt of his greatsword. Robb turned to follow his gaze. The young lord's breath hitched visibly in the cold air.
Ned turned slowly.
He watched me approach, his face remained unreadable. His grey eyes swept up to the three shivering, mud-stained children perched safely on my back. Then, his gaze dropped to the yet massive, gory prize hanging from my teeth.
I stopped three paces from the Warden of the North.
As I opened my jaws. The Mountain's head hit the mud and rolled twice, stopping dead against the toe of Ned Stark's leather boot.
The flat-topped helm was crushed inward, warped by the sheer force of the bite. Blood pooled into the puddle beneath it. Through the dented visor, the dead, unseeing eyes of Tywin Lannister's greatest terror stared blankly at the Riverlands sky.
I lifted my head and met Ned Stark's gaze.
Silence stretched across the camp.
I hadn't just killed a Lannister raiding party. I had hunted down the monster who burned the Riverlands, and brought back the pieces.
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