ASOIAF 6

Carl and Lyanna landed in the wizarding tent that he had set up prior to taking them into the Time Pearl. He looked over as Lyanna took a big breath of air, and dashed outside, laughing at finally being back home. Carl followed a bit more sedately, enjoying her enthusiasm.

He sent out his profound senses, and followed her profound senses as she spread her awareness around and simply exulted in being back home, and being in control of her fate. Finding out that the Prince she thought would take her away from her loveless arranged marriage had only planned on using her as a broodmare and sacrifice for a prophecy had really hurt her. She had worked hard at her training, almost like she was possessed, so great was her determination to get strong so she could control her own fate.

Carl also spread out his senses beyond what Lyanna was capable of at the moment to examine the surroundings and found that there hadn't been any changes while they were inside time dilation. They had only been gone for a night on the outside, so not much could have changed, really.

There was still not anyone in the immediate vicinity. The wards he had set up around the tent would insure that no one would be able to approach, or even see the tent. So Carl pulled out a couple Petes that would see to the feeding and care of their three prisoners for the next week. He and Lyanna were going to travel to the shattered peninsula that used to be Valyria for the next several days to avoid time travel shenanigans.

They had already discussed what to do with the Prince when they finished their training, but that would wait for a few days. During their time in training Carl had explained to Lyanna all about how he had traveled back in time, and how they needed to not disturb how thing had gone so that the time loop would remain stable.

She wasn't particularly happy about how she couldn't stop the Mad King from killing the analogs that would be in place of her father and brother to prevent them from having to watch their deaths. But in the end, since they were going to prevent those deaths, she was at least content with what they could do.

"Carl! What are we waiting for? Let's go!" Lyanna called out excitedly.

Carl chuckled and swooped in, embracing Lyanna for a kiss. While distracting her with a kiss, he pulled out her battlecruiser sneakily. It didn't work, since her senses "saw" the ship as soon as he pulled it out. Her amused laughter as she broke away from him was a good enough reaction that Carl just chuckled as he followed her into her ship, which she had named Dauntless.

They swiftly traveled along the halls of the ship, Lyanna smiling proudly at her ship that she kept touching and caressing in passing. Like the rest of the people he trained, he didn't gift her the ship until the very end of her training, so she was still very excited about having her own ship.

They arrived on the bridge, where Lyanna took the Captain's seat, bouncing up and down in the chair excitedly. She pulled up the hologram interface, and did a quick look through of the systems. There were any number of ways they could control and interface with their ships. Voice commands, mentally through the interface chairs, profound energy transmission, hologram interface, or the old school: keyboard interaction.

Carl sat back for the moment, enjoying watching Lyanna discover and enjoy the experience. Currently they were concerned about affecting the time line, so they would stealthily depart the local area to avoid the temptation to meddle too much and spend some time inspecting the ruins of Valyria to see what they could discover.

They would return in time to prevent certain deaths, replacing them with lifelike HFRs that would convincingly fake the deaths of the originals. Carl once more paid attention to his surroundings when Lyanna engaged the ship's cloak and brought them up into orbit.

He looked over Lyanna's shoulder as she brought up the scans on the ruins of Valyria. It was once a whole peninsula, but now it had been shattered into dozens of islands that no one could penetrate by sailing in. Anyone who sailed a ship close to the cursed islands was never heard from again.

"Look at the amount of poison gas that is just sitting in the area." Lyanna commented while she continued to read the scans. "No wonder no one can explore the ruins."

From the ship's scans, Carl saw that a big reason no one could get close to the ruined land was because of the incredible amount of volcanic activity. Poison gasses were continually vented from the ground and water, which would make it deadly for anyone to venture near without some kind of breathing aid or protection.

"Look at those energy readings." Carl pointed at a particular report. "It looks like there is also plenty of lingering dark magics from whatever the Valyrians did to cause the Doom." Carl frowned in thought. "A cursed land indeed."

Lyanna looked up at Carl in question. While she had learned quite a bit about magic, she was nowhere near the expert Carl was. "Is it going to be a problem for us while we explore?"

He smiled reassuringly at her, confident in their ability to protect themselves. "I'll have to craft some special wards for us, but it should be fine. I'll get started on that if you want to come up with a plan for what and where we explore?"

Lyanna smiled at him, kissing him enthusiastically before pushing him off her bridge so he would get started sooner. Chuckling, Carl made his way to one of the labs and crafting stations where he began working.

Carl spent the next couple of hours working on a computer to design the wards he needed to counter whatever lingering magics were infecting the land around Valyria. With the calculating power of the advanced computers, it didn't take very long at all for Carl to design and begin crafting the needed wards.

His time in the Stargate Universe had certainly been well spent. Carl thought back to when he had been breaking into Slytherin's vault, and how it had taken him years of effort to do the calculations by hand. But with the computer those calculations took barely any of his time. And it only took so long because he didn't have enough useful information on blood magics.

He had gathered what books he could from the Harry Potter world that dealt with the Dark Arts, but that by no means meant he knew everything there was to know on the subject. From what he could gather from the Harry Potter world's history there had been any number of busy body wizards that had gone on crusades for the Light to destroy knowledge of Dark and Fel magics.

Carl couldn't even really fault those people for their desire to fight against evil practices like human sacrifice, torture, murder, and many more dark practices. But he thought they were short sighted in many ways. How could they be sure they had destroyed all knowledge of the dark arts? Wizards by nature were a secretive lot, so it wouldn't be surprising if they had many stashes of their books hidden away, specifically to ensure they survived.

A few generations after the book burning took place, a dark wizard could pull out one of those hidden books and use the magic they learned inside to go on a rampage. The wizarding police would have no idea how to counter those dark arts found by ambitious Dark Lords precisely because there was no record of those arts. Which would make the job of countering the wannabe dark lords so much more difficult.

Carl shrugged the issue out of his mind. Ultimately, it wasn't his problem. And the society in that world had continued to run, more or less unconquered by Dark Lords. So their actions in burning those Dark Art books must have had some effect in the end. Who was he to say for sure they were wrong in their actions, even if he was frustrated from not having more knowledge?

Once Carl had finished building the ward necklaces, he commed Lyanna and joined her in the armory where they both put on hardsuits for their exploration of Valyria. The hardsuits were a combination armor and space suit that ensured they had their own air supply and protected them from various contaminations as well as bullets, knives, swords, and energy weapons. Carl may or may not have cheated by adding in expanded spaces where Potentia were used to power the defenses of the suit.

The specially designed ward necklaces may not actually be needed for their excursion, but Carl wanted to be doubly sure they didn't get cursed by any remnants of the Valyrian's magic. A little extra protection never hurt.

After suiting up, Lyanna had her ship fly down to land on the outskirts of the Valyria Freehold Capital. As the two of them exited, they finally laid eyes on the ruins of the city. It was a different feeling to see the ruins in person, compared to watching video feed from satellites.

Despite the incredible damage done from the Doom to the land, most of the buildings in the city itself were still standing, even though superficial damage was done. Most likely it was a result of the protective and foundational magic used to construct the city that allowed the buildings to survive the Doom.

Carl looked over the city architecture that made liberal use of towers, bridges, and parapets. The buildings were designed to exhibit the owner's grand powers and great wealth. Despite being covered in great amounts of ash and being damaged and empty of people, Carl could picture in his head the majestic look the city would have had several hundreds of years ago at the height of its power and civilization.

Dragons would have flown over the city, finding plenty of perches. The slaves would have been busy working in the streets and running errands for their masters. And the great amounts of goods and people that daily flowed into the city would have been a great sign of wealth and power.

Carl's magical senses also told him that there was a great deal of blood sacrifice magic still lingering in the very stone that made up the streets. For the traces to still be there after nearly four hundred years, and the great disaster, meant that the amount of lives sacrificed wasn't small.

The discovery of remnant blood magic lingering in the roads, more than anything, told Carl about the Valyrian Freehold. Power was the most important thing in their society. If one didn't have power, their lives were only a cheap commodity. The best they could hope for was to live as a slave, because otherwise their life's blood may even have been used as a blood magic sacrifice in order to build a better class of paved roads.

A slave's life and blood weren't even worth the paved roads. Power and wealth determined status. That in a nutshell was the old Valyrian Freehold Empire.

As Carl and Lyanna easily strolled and leaped over the fallen rocks and cracked streets, pointing out thing to each other while they trudged through the volcanic ash, and made their way from building to building along Lyanna's planned route, Carl really couldn't find it in himself to mourn the fallen empire. An empire that was so steeped in blood sacrifice that just walking down a normal street caused a reaction in his bones due to the remnant blood magic couldn't elicit much sympathy from Carl. He certainly wouldn't want to raise a family in such an environment.

The day passed by swiftly as Carl and Lyanna made their way from building to building, exploring and looting. From desolate mansions to public markets to guild halls. Carl was somewhat surprised to find many books still intact in various private libraries around the city. The magic in the libraries and books kept them from decaying in the toxic and poisonous air. It was a pleasant surprise.

While Carl didn't especially want to reproduce the civilization of Valyria, he was interested in learning what he could from the dead people. He and Lyanna packed up all the libraries so they could study later. They also found hoards of gold, gems, and various precious metals, including Valyrian Steel.

When Carl later went through the libraries he found, he would discover the secrets to producing Valyrian Steel. He would also learn that there were various grades of the quality for the precious metal. All the various Valyrian Steel swords in the Kingdom Westeros were actually of the lowest grade of the metal, surprisingly enough. The lords of Valyria had been jealous in guarding their power and privileges.

Unsurprisingly the secret to crafting the metal was blood and fire. Dragonfire, specifically. But surprisingly enough, the method to craft the highest rated Valyrian Steel wasn't by sacrificing other people's blood and lives. It was necessary for a lord to voluntarily give their own blood. They would continually donate blood to their swords. The magic imbued in their blood would soak into the sword so that as time went on, the sword would continue to grow stronger as the magical bond between the lord and sword grew.

These methods were naturally kept secret from outsiders so they could only buy, at great expense, the cheapest and weakest forms of Valyrian Steel.

When Carl learned those secrets, he began to ponder whether or not he could use his own blood on Blue Orchid to enhance the blade with a blood link. He had made the purchase at the beginning of the jump to integrate his sword with Valyrian Steel, after all. It was something he would look into after a great deal of study. It wouldn't do to jump into unknown magic before he fully understood it.

But all that was something that Carl learned much later, after the time Carl and Lyanna spent ransacking the city. The other item of note that Carl obtained in the city was dragon eggs that were still viable to be hatched. The dozens of eggs were maintained in spell warded rooms that kept them safe from the destruction of the various Lordly houses.

Carl wasn't surprised that the secrets of the dragons were being kept by the various lords of the Freehold, since that kind of power, control over dragons, was likely what had made the Lords as powerful as they were in the first place. It wasn't something they would easily share.

As the two explored the city, Carl came to the realization that many people of the Freehold had survived the initial disaster. They had been in the various protected areas, the libraries and dragon egg hatcheries for example. Most of those people were slaves, as evidenced by the collars and slave magic still lingering in their bones.

They had been in the warded areas, performing their daily duties, when the disaster had struck. They had watched while the volcanic activity and outpouring of poisonous gasses had enveloped the city and killed nearly everyone.

Carl had no idea how long they had stayed inside the warded areas, protected from the gasses. But eventually a lack of food and water would have meant their deaths in any case. So they tried to leave and were overwhelmed mere feet from the warded areas.

Only after seeing the same scene repeated three times had Carl come to the realization of just how the skeletons that were lying, curled up on their sides, a few feet from the warded areas had met their end. When Carl had shared his theory with Lyanna, she had been horrified on behalf of how those slaves met their end. The fear and despair must have been nigh unbearable. So the two of them gathered up the remains of the slaves and buried them, hoping that their afterlife was much better than their lives had been.

A few days later Carl and Lyanna left the city in the Dauntless to carry out their plans. After the first day of exploring the ruined city, when Carl had a good idea of how to handle the lingering protections and various materials, he had unleashed the Petes to continue the work of exploring and looting, gathering everything into cargo containers that would be picked up later. There was just too much in the city for two people to finish gathering everything in the few days they had before Carl caught up with his time.

The ship's holds were already full of treasure, which Lyanna was most pleased with. The Petes were busy scanning the books into the database, which Carl was pleased with. And the Tully and Stark youths were on their way to Kings Landing to replace and save certain family members who were recklessly charging in to a dangerous situation.

XX

Carl and Lyanna watched the video feed from the spybot inside the throne room as the Mad King sentenced the HFRs of Rickard and Brandon Stark to death. They watched the replacements for the Stark guards being slaughtered. Carl made sure that all the people they saved would have the footage from the spybots imputed into their memories so they would know the fate they avoided. It would keep them from foolishly charging in once more.

Carl could see that the scene hit Lyanna hard. Even though she knew it wasn't really her family suffering in the video, the HFRs were very accurate and lifelike. She had to work hard to force herself to not to flinch from it. Even though she still flinched from the scene, she seemed to have a need to see the gruesome scene; to remind herself that if it wasn't for Carl, then that would have been the fate of her father and brother. And she would have been taken by Rhaegar to be impregnated and held captive in order to fulfill his gods be damned prophecy. She couldn't forget what fate would have had in store for her.

With his arm around Lyanna's shoulder, Carl could feel her tremble in reaction at watching the scene.

"I've finally made up my mind what to do with Rhaegar for manufacturing this fate for my family." Lyanna whispered, her eyes bloodshot, tears leaking from her eyes. She had been debating for some time between putting the slave seal on Rhaegar to make him suffer more, or simply replacing him with an HFR and sentencing him to death for what he had planned and done.

"He was planning on causing a war for his prophecy. He planned on causing my family's death." Her eyes didn't waver from the grizzly scene on the screen in front of her while she talked to Carl. "And I'm sure that once I had finished my usefulness, he would have disposed of me too. But not before he tortured me for a year to make sure his Promised Prince would be born in 'Smoke and Salt'." She gritted her teeth, hate for Rhaegar evident in her face.

Carl didn't interrupt Lyanna. He knew she needed to get it out of her system. He simply offered his support. He still didn't know what madness possessed Rhaegar to believe he could seek out prophecies to fulfill. More often than not, those who sought out prophecies to fulfill ended up being run over and destroyed by them. Prophecies were fulfilled despite the actions of people like Rhaegar, not because of them.

"At first I was planning on just killing him and replacing him with an HFR. But not now. I want him to be alive and suffer. I want him to be locked in his mind like he would have locked me up in that tower. I want him to see that his prophecy will never come to pass. I want him to realize that he won't be the big hero saving the kingdom by sacrificing everyone but himself. And after a few years, when we've shown him how useless he is, how pointless everything he did was, I want him to die an ignoble death with the realization that nothing he did mattered in the end." Lyanna finished.

A phrase came to Carl's mind right then, as he listened to Lyanna's desire to torment Rhaegar for his part in trying to kill her family. "Kindness to the enemy, is cruelty to the innocent." But a more appropriate quote to describe Lyanna mindset might be "Heav'n has no Rage, like Love to Hatred turn'd, Nor Hell a Fury, like a Woman scorn'd".

Being softhearted to the Mad King and not putting him down would just lead to many more deaths of innocent people as his paranoia ran rampant. He would just continue to attack and kill people because of the madness of paranoia in his mind. And his unstableness would lead to many schemes by people seeing an opportunity to seek power in the chaos, which would lead to more deaths and misery among the people.

Allowing Rhaegar his freedom so he could enact his plan would see many decent men being killed in the war he started for some damned prophecy. Plunging the realm into a war just to have the conditions to give birth to some supposed prophesied child.

Carl knew that the opposite corollary wasn't necessarily true. Being cruel to the enemy wasn't necessarily being kind to the innocent, but he still found he couldn't find it in himself to be sympathetic to Rhaegar's fate. He had no desire to try to convince Lyanna to change her mind so that she would offer Rhaegar a swift death instead of slavery.

Because while Rhaegar would never again be free to act on the lesson he was about to learn, using a cruel method to punish him would help Lyanna vent her feelings and get past the psychological shadow on her heart that was a result of Rhaegar's betrayal.

After seeing Carl's look of concern at her pronouncement, Lyanna knew what Carl's concerns for her were. They had talked it over the past couple years enough. Lyanna gave Carl a reassuring but faint smile while explaining. "Just him. I need Rhaegar to suffer for his plan so I can get past this issue. I won't be going torture happy anytime soon." She promised with a small laugh that Carl joined in on.

Carl didn't belabor the point, they were already on the same page. Before the end of their training, they had already talked about the topics of revenge and justice, and the effects of letting certain feelings fester inside. He had already said what needed to be said, and he had long decided to trust that his girl could vent the hate she had and not dwell on and grow the poison inside her.

"I know you won't let yourself get swept away in bitterness and hate. You're so much better than that." Instead Carl offered support while hugging Lyanna in comfort. "And we can influence how his innocent siblings and children grow, so hopefully they don't fall into the same craziness that he and his father fell into." Carl offered, which caused Lyanna's face to break out into a much more sincere smile.

A day later, after monitoring the situation in Riverrun, Carl put all his technology and satellites that he had deployed into sleep mode. He didn't want to chance accidentally notifying the past Carl about his presence. Just as Carl felt a pulse of energy radiate from Riverrun, his passive scanners notified Carl of a figure that flew up in the air above Riverrun, hovering there for some time before he Apparated away.

Carl kept an eye on the time, and just as expected the past version of him reappeared and launched the Yamato II into orbit before flying off towards Kings Landing. Carl didn't relax until his systems registered the signal from his past self cutting off, indicating that the past version of him had just time turned.

Carl let out a sigh of relief. It appeared as though the time loop had been implemented smoothly. "I'm going to go shut down the clone backup and store the Yamato II." Carl and Lyanna had made their plans, but it never hurt to communicate instead of assuming the other side knew what he was doing. "I'll drop your father and brother off in the morning, and I should be back in Harrenhal in just a couple days to pick you up."

"If you delay anymore than a couple days, who knows what I'll be bored enough to go find to occupy my time with?" Lyanna suggestively said. "I might just go find some trouble to get into."

Carl just laughed as he planted a kiss on his playful girl. "Well, if you get bored and feel the sudden urge to teleport all the slave masters of Pentos onto the bottom the ocean on a whim, for example, I wouldn't be too terribly hurt that you didn't wait for me." He joked back at Lyanna. "As long as you record it, of course."

"Of course." Lyanna smirked a bit, her grey eyes dancing in mirth as she once more pushed him off her bridge, apparently eager to get started on whatever she was planning while Carl was gone.

Carl simply shook his head resignedly at her playful ways before Apparating down to Riverrun to start his part of the plan.

XX

A day later, Carl had already guided Lord Stark and Brandon Stark back to Riverrun, and now he was on his way to Harrenhal with his guards. His father thought he was going to try to convince Prince Rhaegar to join them and rebel against the King. But that didn't need any work on his part, really, to accomplish. A few seals, a bit of energy, and the Prince would never naysay his plans.

As Carl galloped on his horse with his troop of guards as they approached the area around Harrenhal, he thought over what he had done over the past couple of days. He had "found" the Starks and brought them back to Riverrun, reuniting his sister with her soon-to-be husband.

And now he was about to reunite with Lyanna and bring Rhaegar and his two Kingsguard back with him to Riverrun. Carl figured there would be more than a bit of a reaction from Brandon when the Prince arrived, but he knew it wouldn't get too out of hand with him there.

Prince Rhaegar was already under the control of the slave seals, meaning that he would do what Carl and Lyanna told him in the future. Originally Carl was only going to memory charm Ser Dayne and Ser Whent of the Kingsguard to make them think nothing special had happened. But that was before he grew to care for Lyanna and before he found out what their part in Rhaegar's plan had been.

They would have been Lyanna's guards, insuring that even after the Prince left to win the civil war that he stirred up, that Lyanna would remain trapped at the Tower of Joy. The loyal dogs of the Prince had been willingly going along with the plan to kill Lyanna's family, start a war, keep her imprisoned while their prince raped her and made sure she was pregnant, depressed, miserable, and heartbroken while giving birth to the "Promised Prince". Those two dogs had certainly not deserved a simple memory charm. So they too were put under the slavery seal to ensure their compliance in the future.

Carl thought if there really was a thing such as Karma, then Rhaegar, Dayne, and Whent were certainly suffering it due to their despicable plans and actions. They were now imprisoned in their own mind, being "raped" of their free will. It was already a more gentle end than Carl would normally plan for rapists, even if the mental trauma and punishment would continue for many years to come.

And with Rhaegar under his control, once the rebellion was cleaned up, and the reign of the Mad King Aerys II was ended, Carl could easily direct the kingdom through the future king. So there was absolutely no need for Carl himself to take on the role of leader. He could enjoy the next 10 years exploring the world with Lyanna while his puppet made sure the kingdom ran properly.

It might take some time to get the rebellion cleared up, but within a few days of Rhaegar joining the Tully's, the whole kingdom would know that the rebellion wasn't just some of the Lords rebelling against their rightful King. It was the rightful Heir who was taking a stand to depose his mad father from the throne before he could do anymore damage to the Kingdom. Carl was quite pleased with his ability to ensure that the rumors he wanted were spread. It should help them sway opinions in the coming conflict.

Popular opinion was always important to legitimacy in ruling, maybe even more so in a society where each of the Lords had so much individual power over the lands they ruled and the people on their lands. Each Lord could be a power in their own right, and many of them had their own ambitions. Lord Lannister for example was a wildly ambitious man who had tried to marry off his daughter to Prince Rhaegar so he could have legitimacy to the throne through his grandchildren.

The previous day as Carl had been riding, he had watched through his satellites as the battle at Gulltown had occurred. Gulltown was an important port town in The Vale, formerly controlled by Lord Marq Grafton.

When the Mad King had passed orders to Lord Jon Arryn that Eddard Stark and Robert Baratheon were to be executed for treason due to their relations with House Stark, Lord Arryn had refused to comply with the order to execute the young men he had fostered for so many years. Lord Arryn had called his bannermen to prepare for war, since he refused to accept the Mad King's orders. The only way to survive directly defying the King was through battle.

But not all of the Lord's who owed fealty to Lord Arryn agreed with him, and Lord Grafton had rallied together a number of them and their men to prevent Eddard Stark and Robert Baratheon from using the port to escape The Vale back to their own lands where they would rally their bannermen for the coming war.

It was an attempt to end the rebellion before it began.

So while Eddard Stark snuck in and started sailing North in a fishing vessel, Robert had joined Lord Arryn in attacking the Lord's men gathered at Gulltown. After hours of desperate fighting, Robert managed to gain the wall and slew Lord Grafton, which signaled the end for those who opposed Lord Arryn.

Jon Arryn then spent his time consolidating his hold on The Vale, convincing the various Lords to follow his lead, while Robert sailed south to go to The Stormlands so he could rally his own men to fight.

Carl's mind was a little distracted thinking of the battle he had just watched the previous day, and testing ideas for future plans, so he was a little unprepared to be suddenly attacked just as he dismounted outside the camp he and Lyanna had prepared.

The first Carl knew of the attack was when a pair of soft lips pressed against his own, and a very familiar body pressed herself against him.

'Looks like Lyanna had a change of plans.' Carl ruefully thought as his guards were wolf whistling behind him. 'I guess she wanted it established in front of witnesses who she chose, and who she didn't.' Carl thought as his senses caught the three under the fate of being slaves greeting the Tully guards.

'And I suppose she wants her family and Robert to realize at the earliest opportunity that she won't be fulfilling the betrothal with Robert.' Carl realized. He thought the idea was probably a good one, since it would likely give Robert a chance to get used to the idea long before Carl was forced to beat the idea out of him.

"Well, I too am happy to see you again, my wild wolf." Carl teasingly said when the kiss finally ended. He enjoyed the laughter of his men as evidence that he was well liked among them. And that they would soon be spreading word of his relationship with Lyanna to everyone, in accordance with Lyanna's plan. Bored guards tended to gossip worse than housewives, after all. And guard duty was very boring.

"You know us wolves, we do like the taste of trout." Lyanna zinged him back. Carl barked a laugh, before giving some orders to his guard to help break the camp down so they could depart and return to Riverrun.

Within a half hour they were on the road, making their way back home. Lyanna sat her horse next to Carl, and they occasionally chatted about various things aloud for the benefit of his men. Behind him rode Rhaegar, Dayne, and Whent. And following behind them was the dozen guards of House Tully, keeping an eye out for any ambush or attack.

They traveled swiftly that day, making good time on the roads. Not many people were traveling at this time. Word had already spread around that war was looming. That kind of atmosphere was bad for traveling carefreely. Once was likely to be accosted on the flimsiest excuse.

Speaking of which, Carl faintly frowned at seeing the eight horses tied up outside the inn they were planning to spend the night at. The horses were adorned in House Darry colors.

House Darry's seat of power was at Castle Darry, just south and east of where the Trident split into the Red, Green, and Blue Forks. As a result of their place along the Trident and the Kingsroad, House Darry was one of the houses of the Riverlands that were more prosperous than House Tully. House Darry barely concealed their contempt for House Tully and their ambitions to one day be named as Lord Paramount of the Trident. As a result, Carl didn't have any good feelings for the house that always opposed his.

House Darry was one of the Houses on his list to do something about in the future in order to ensure the security and prominence of House Tully in the Riverlands. The road wasn't narrow, but enemies were bound to meet anyway.

Carl mentally shrugged at seeing them there. They really shouldn't be much of a problem for them. Not only were his guardsmen more numerous, but he or Lyanna could take them all out solo. Since he wasn't worried about the danger the House Darry guards represented, he followed the plan to stay the night. He and Lyanna dismounted and passed their horses to their guards. Two of his guards came inside with Carl and Lyanna while Carl was meeting with the owner to arrange sleeping bunks for his men for the night.

The moment Carl looked on the Darry men drinking wine at their table, he knew they were up to no good. They were restless and looking for something exciting to do. Their leader, who Carl recognized as a cousin of the Darry's who had his knighthood, looked upon the beauty of Lyanna and Carl could see the desire tremble inside him. Carl sneered a little inside. This would give him the perfect excuse to do something about the man, when he pressed his luck with Lyanna.

"Hey there, beautiful." The man had greed all over his face as he looked at Lyanna. "The times, they aren't all that safe nowadays. Especially with such a small escort." The man, his name was something that started with a D, if Carl remembered right. "Why don't you join me and my men, and we'll protect you right nicely."

Lyanna rolled her eyes at the posturing git, but looked over to see how Carl would handle it when he sent her a message that he wanted to take the man down a peg.

"I can't quite seem to remember what – oh yeah, that's the name. Dunkel Darry. I remember you."

"That's Duncan!" The man growled at Carl, glaring.

"Pfft. Whatever you say Dinkel." Carl chuckled. Out of the corner of his eye Carl noticed that the Darry men continued their drinking, but they were paying a great deal of attention to what was happening between their leader and Carl. "Now, what is it you want, there, Dongle Darry?"

The man narrowed his eyes at Carl. "I know you."

"Congratulations. You must be proud to be so astute." Carl interrupted.

"You're the Tully heir." The man continued as if he hadn't been interrupted. Truly the dimwitted man was set on his path of destruction.

"And? What's it to you, Dimble Darry?" Carl asked. He was somewhat annoyed that the owner of the inn ducked away in the back when he saw the tension between the two men. He wanted to arrange their bedding for the night, and the Darry men were being a right annoyance in carrying out those plans.

Ah, well. Can't really blame non fighters for not wanting to stick around brewing trouble like this.

"Your family better make the smart decision in these troubled times. Rebellion. Men fighting against their rightful king. You know there is a lot of chaos in times like these. Who knows what might happen to an heir of a prominent family who only has two guards, wandering around with a beauty like this one." The Darry cousin said in what he thought as a menacing manner as the seven men behind him stood up, their hands on their swords.

Carl glanced dismissively at the Darry men at their table, before turning his attention back to the man standing in front of him. Carl was still only just inside the open tap room. A sharp whistle would bring the rest of his men inside to take care of the trash. But 12 versus 8 would make the melee quite chaotic, and he couldn't guarantee that his men wouldn't get stabbed to death before he could do anything for them, unless he used his magic in a very obvious way, which he was trying to avoid.

"You know what you and a dairy cow have in common, Dundle Darry?" Carl sarcastically asked. "Both of you produce an awful lot of shit. But at least the cow is useful for something." Carl could see the man was reaching his boiling point, especially when Lyanna laughed at him due to Carl's blatant insult-joke. "So, other than spewing shit from your nasty mouth, what good are you?"

Duncan's hand went for his sword, which was his last mistake. Without any fanfare, Carl rabbit punched him in the gut, causing him to collapse, unable to breathe for the moment. Carl left him for his guard to handle, as he pulled his sword and faced the seven other men. Lyanna pulled her own sword and was right next to him.

Carl could hear his guard piling into the inn behind him, but he was too busy playing with the men in front of him to pay too much attention. The inn's tap room's small size really didn't lend itself well to a fight between such numbers, so Carl was making use of the crowded conditions to have the Darry men trip all over each other.

A redirect of the sword here caused one man's sword to smash, flat of the blade first, into his neighbor's face. A sweep of the foot there caused one man to trip and roll into another man, causing the second to collapse on the first in a heap, arms and legs entangled so they couldn't get up easily.

The third man Carl faced left a really nasty taste in Carl's mouth. He could tell the man wasn't anything good, so he didn't waste effort on him and simply parried his overhand chop, and sliced his throat open. The blood spurted into the face of the fourth man, causing him to be blinded for a moment, enough for Carl to easily run his sword through his heart.

By that time Lyanna had finished the three men on her side. Each of them lay in a pool of blood as they died. Carl gave Lyanna a proud smile at her actions. The both of them had kept to slightly above normal human reaction speeds, which was sometimes really hard to do in a fight. But it kept their incredible abilities secret for the time being.

Carl had only kept the first two Darry men alive because he was interested in their answers as to exactly what a Darry man was doing here, so close to Riverrun. Carl could of course simply pull the memories out of the men's heads, but he wanted to have the men available for questioning back in Riverrun so his father, Hoster, could see what the Darry men were up to and that House Darry shouldn't be trusted in this Rebellion since they had designs to supplant House Tully.

As far as the deaths of the men, Carl didn't care one bit. He had long ago concluded that the idea of fair play when it came to life and death battles was ludicrous. The idea that he should handicap himself just because he was more powerful, in order to give the other side a chance to win was the epitome of stupid. In battle, the idea was to kill the enemy so his side wouldn't die.

This wasn't a sporting event where fair play was encouraged. These were people who wanted to kill his family and replace them as Lord Paramount of the Trident. Such people didn't get the benefit of fair play from Carl.

In the aftermath of the simple fight, Carl gave orders to his men to strip the equipment from the Darry dead before having the villagers take care of the bodies. The owner of the inn finally returned and Carl arranged lodgings for him and Lyanna, and his men and prisoners, and the three slaves. The guard duty was set, and dinner was served.

The food was bland and abysmal. Carl could see that Lyanna also barely tolerated it. Carl made a note to start up certain industries to improve living standards. Growing spices and establishing cooking schools seemed to be high on the list. At the end of the evening, Carl and Lyanna retired to their room together. His men's amused looks and joking didn't escape either his or Lyanna's notice, but he didn't care.

The next day they would return to Riverrun, Lyanna would reunite with her father and brother, and they would go North to call their bannermen and let them see that Lord Stark was still alive. A crow's message was one thing, but seeing him in person was another.

And while Lyanna's family was doing that, Carl would consolidate his family's hold on The Riverlands. First order of business was making sure that the greedy and bitter Lord Frey's hold on The Twins was broken. He really didn't like that bitter old man or his backstabbing ways. And since the North's Army would need passage over the Green Fork, it was only right for him to arrange it so that they didn't have to spend their valuable time negotiating with old Frey.

It was what a good host should do.