Chapter 4

Lordsport was the largest settlement on the Iron Islands and the only one that could be called a city, though compared to the cities of the mainland it was only a large village with an excellent port and a harbor protected by a breakwater. On a hill nearby sat Botley Castle, not the most imposing of structures made of clay and timbers.

The town met the king's reinforcements with ruin and ruin - it was set on fire during the takeover, as was the castle. Only a few houses remained relatively intact, and some streets had been razed to the ground completely, despite the fact that all the houses were stone.

Outside the city was the king's military camp, stretched along the entire mountain road that led to Pike, the last rebel stronghold on the island. Not far from Pike itself was the siege camp itself, where the engineers were assembling the guns. The stone-throwing catapults were ineffective. There were not many places suitable for firing them to place enough catapults to break through the wall.

Some places could be fired by archers directly from the castle towers. Engineers had to collect trebuchets, they can be placed further away from the castle, where there is more free space. And they can penetrate the walls much better thanks to their power. We had to wait for enough wood from the mainland to build them. Lord Tywin gave two disassembled ones for further assembly near the walls, but, as practice showed, unloading them from the ships, including delivery through the ruins of the city and two camps along the mountain path to the castle, is too thankless. Not to mention the fact that they had to be manufactured in Lannisport and loaded onto ships there. It was easier to ship the materials and build the guns from scratch.

***

The ship on which John arrived finally docked in the harbor. Jorah Mormont was waiting for John and Dacey at the dock. He warmly embraced his cousin and said hello to the bastard, then they made their way toward Lord Stark's tent.

Inside, in addition to his father, were the king and his guards, Lord Arryn, Lord Bolton, the lord Snow had argued with about whores (he was Hoster Tully), and several other lords whom Jon didn't even know by sight, but could easily name from the crests on their clothes, jewelry, and weapons.

- The bastard of Winterfell has arrived," came a jokingly solemn voice behind him.

Jon turned around. Standing near the entrance to the tent was one of the king's guards, young, handsome, and muscular, with curly golden hair and emerald eyes. Wearing expensive, ornate armor with a white cloak. The stranger smiled echidnously and looked down at John.

"You want to play, go ahead," Jon thought to himself. Snow used all his charm mixed with childlike directness and naiveté. He took Dacey's hand, his eyes widening in ill-concealed delight. He jumped on the spot and shouted throughout the tent.

- Dacey, look-the Kingslayer! Kingslayer! - Lannister's eye twitched at the audacity of it. The King burst into laughter. - What a sword he has! May I see it?

- Jon, it's rude, you must address this man as Ser Jaime and no other. Do you understand?

- Yes, Father," Jon lowered his head, continuing the game.

- Don't expect him to call you by your name, either," the king said through his laughter, not hard to make him laugh.

- It would be unusual," John muttered.

- Why not?" the king asked with interest.

- Until I was five, I thought my name was 'nasty bastard,'" Tully looked in Hoster's direction. The king burst into laughter again, and Ned and Jon Arryn rubbed the bridge of their nose. The Riverlands Keeper didn't appreciate the bastard's stiletto in his family's direction, but he restrained himself and kept silent. The King sympathizes too much with the Starks, even the little bastard, and he apparently realizes it too.

Lord Stark put his arm around Jon:

- How are you, son?

- The experience of war has proven to be quite interesting and entertaining.

- Why is that?

- 'Our ship was attacked by islanders,' Dacey answered for him.

- Was it true? - Eddard asked in horror.

- You've heard about it?

- Well, we have heard rumors," the Hand of the King muttered.

- The little wolf cub was fighting squid? How many did you kill? - The king asked excitedly.

- I'm sure the bastard's exploits are not embellished," Lannister said sarcastically. - It's good that our wagon is so well protected," he said with a touch of arrogance.

- Four.

- What? Lord Stark didn't understand.

- I killed four with my bow. I finished off two more who were knocked down.

- He set the islanders' lines on fire with oil, Daisy said. - But I threw the pots," the girl added as importantly.

- They jumped overboard themselves," John said with deliberate seriousness. A new laugh from the king broke the silence in the tent.

- It is good that your bastard has arrived, at least some cure for boredom.

***

A week and a half later, enough trebuchets had been assembled, and a couple more days were spent shooting at them. The islanders knew the enemy was ready the moment one of the two Greyjoy Guardsmen talking to each other on the castle wall turned into a red puddle after being hit by a projectile weighing almost a centimeter.

Meanwhile, on the "makeshift" stone throne, Baelon Greyjoy, the self-proclaimed King of the Iron Islands, sat in all his glory and majesty. Two men stood before him: his eldest son Maron and the priest of the Drowned God. Behind one of the pillars, the youngest children of House Greyjoy were hiding in order to eavesdrop on their father's conversation with his brother.

- You wanted to see me, Father? - Maron approached.

- Yes, I want you to gather a hundred of the best men in the castle and prepare them for a raid.

- A raid?

- Under cover of night, you will sneak out of the castle and set fire to the siege guns so that the usurper cannot fire on them.

- The usurper's soldiers won't just stand by and watch us burn their guns.

- That's why there's a hundred of you coming, but twenty men will do, asshole! Most of you will attack the siege camp, and the rest will set fire to the trebuchets under your supervision.

- What about the sentries? - Baelon chuckled nastily.

- There are whores from Lordsport who have been in the camp for a long time, some of them are loyal to us and will make sure the sentries don't see you.

- Is there any point in risking so many men?

- We could gain two weeks to a month. In that time, Rodrik Harlow's fleet will arrive at Pike. I've already sent him a raven. He's sent the fewest soldiers and he has the most warriors on the islands right now. He will defeat the fucking stag's fleet and the usurper will be trapped on the island with the rest of the lords, the war will be won.

- Will it work? - Maron asked skeptically. Baelon shifted his gaze to the priest.

- The Drowned God has given me a vision of our victory; the enemy will be defeated, and the Ironborn will be restored to their former glory. What is dead cannot die!

- What is dead cannot die! - repeated the king and his son almost in one voice.

- Go, prepare yourself," the king said to his son.

- Father," he bowed and left the hall.

A moment later the priest left the hall, and Baelon was alone with his thoughts, something inside him screaming desperately for danger, but he assured himself that it was coming from the besiegers' camp and that it would stop as soon as the trebuchets were burned. He did not yet know that Harlow had bowed the knee and surrendered his island without a fight. The silence in the hall, which had become oppressive, was broken by the loud cawing of a raven.

***

In the great hall of Pike's Great Castle, the warriors of the Ironborn were lined up. A hundred of the finest men and women who would decide the outcome of the war tonight, or at least delay their defeat. All dressed in leather armor with no ringlets or any other metallic protections that might give them away with noise. Short swords and spears, boarding axes and square shaped shields. Those were all the weapons.

Maron gave his soldiers his last instructions before the sortie:

- Our task is to burn the guns and nothing else. Kill only those who get in our way, do not chase after us, even if the usurper's soldiers are running in panic. The second squad will attack the camp and divert their attention, burn the tents too.

- And afterward? - One of the soldiers asked.

- Hold the position and cover the first squad. The fleeing soldiers are spreading panic, let's not prevent them from doing so. Do not kill them under any circumstances, only those who have already joined the fight. When I give the signal, retreat to the gate. What is dead cannot die! - exclaimed Maron.

- What is dead cannot die! - echoed the soldiers.

...

They left the castle gates quietly, without any noise. The secret exit, hidden in one of the walls, helped a lot. It is built in such a way that with its help you can leave the castle and go down along the wall, and then jump or descend on a rope to the steep cliff of the island. From the island the passage is not even visible, and it is impossible to climb from the cliff to the castle wall and not fall into the sea.

The islanders crawled to the positions of the siege guns. The gun crews were drinking and arguing loudly about something, which even helped to keep the noise down. The sentries were asleep, leaning on the shafts of their spears, apparently the whores had done their job and put something in their drink or food. The sortie split into two squads as agreed.

Maron's squad waited. No sabotage could be started until the first squad had engaged. He watched as the eighty ironborn approached the camp. The tension in the air was almost palpable, the moment of truth was about to come. The first squad rose to their feet thirty paces from the first tents and rushed into battle with a thunderous battle cry.

But something happened that the eldest living son of Baelon had never expected. In an instant, crossbow bolts whizzed by, and a dozen men fell dead at once. The fabric of the nearest tents dropped, and with a battle cry a counterattack, led by the usurper himself, moved toward the islanders. He ran ahead, clad in his armor, along with his legendary horned helmet, his guardsmen following behind him. The saboteur squad froze in disbelief.

- Kill the squids! - Robert roared.

- For the king! - shouted Ser Barristan.

Ringed swordsmen with drop shields swiftly dispatched the ironborn, whose defense was skin. The crossbowmen, reloading, fired another volley, this time aimed, and five more islanders fell. Not all of them had fired: some might have hit their own. The heir's mind was spinning with a terrible thought: "We have been betrayed!". The "prince" was brought out of his stupor by a loud child's voice:

- Zalp! - and some of his companions fell, stabbed by arrows.

The sentries, as if they had not slept at all, ran towards his squad, few of whom could fight normally because of the oil pots carried on their backs. In a moment, two of the islanders were impaled on spears, and the others tried in vain to fight back.

- The seventh scorcher! Throw them down, we're past the point of setting fires! - shouted Maron, pointing at the pots.

- Fire! - To Maron's left, one of his close friends, with whom he had gone on many raids, fell dead.

The heir finally looked at the man who was screaming. He had never experienced such humiliation in his entire life. His men, including some of Pike's finest sons and daughters, had been nearly wiped out by cowardly archers from the green lands under the command of a child. He had no intention of enduring such humiliation.

Greyjoy dodged a fleeing sentry with a spear and smashed his skull with a single blow of his boarding axe. But apparently the defeated man was too hard-headed, the weapon lodged in his head. He snatched the sword from one of the dead men and ran at the archers, hacking two more of the usurper's soldiers with his sword, one of whom would die today.

A sharp pain in his shoulder cleared the prince's hot head. There was an arrow sticking out of his right shoulder, the insolent little twit smirked, making the young man even more enraged. Maron roared and leaped into the nearest line of archers. A broad, circular swing of his sword of incredible power, and two archers fell to the ground with varying degrees of wounds. Another swing and a third archer dies, the formation panics and falls apart. Taking advantage of this, he manages to stab two more before another arrow slams into his body. This time in his left palm. "Oh, he's playing with me!" the pirate thought. He had made up his mind. He would take this little fellow with him tonight.

Twenty paces separated them. Maron shortened the distance, but a new arrow pierced his leg. The boy drew his dagger and readied himself; he opened his mouth to shout something. The moment of truth came: they were less than two meters apart. Maron swung, and the small archer's words came out of his mouth:

- "Ti..." - John never got the word "Tiid" out before the end.

A sudden impact and Maron felt a sharp pain on his right side, as he was struck in the body by a shield, causing him to roll on the ground. The young man opened his eyes and looked up.

The last thing Maron Greyjoy saw in his life was a black-haired girl with a mace raised to attack. The battle was over.

***

The raid ended in disaster, which also undermined the islanders' morale. They began shelling the castle from the south side. The calculators fired three shots in an hour, the most skillful four. Engineers claimed that with continuous shelling with shells weighing sixty to one hundred and forty kilograms the wall would fall in five days. The castle was too strong.

The result was different, and on the night of the second to third day of shelling, the old south tower failed and collapsed along with a section of the wall, burying many of the besieged underneath. The king's troops immediately rushed to the attack... well, the bravest of them. Thoros of Myr ran ahead of them all, with his cousin Dacey only a few moments behind him.

The King and Lord Stark joined the main forces in battle. Jon and Dacey marched in the rearguard. All they had done during the assault was to drag off some badly wounded northerner and heal him with magic. They had to drain the reserve completely because the wounds were too severe. Dacey caught John's hand one night, and all he had to do was confess that he had healing magic. They seemed to grow closer after that. The fight was over in less than an hour.

When it was over, Lord Mormont and a couple of the first attackers were knighted, the wounded northerner's name was Tom - he was old Nan's grandson.

***

The King sat on his throne in the castle hall of Pike Castle, the lords and their guardsmen gathered around him. Jon and Dacey stood off to the side not far from the northern lords present. Baelon Greyjoy was dragged into the hall in chains, along with his surviving children and the rest of the rebel lords.

- Rebel Lord Greyjoy," Jon Arryn announced. - 'Honored lords, we can begin the trial.

- Let's get this over with, and quickly," the king grumbled.

- Balon Greyjoy, you are charged with treason and rebellion against the crown, as well as numerous robberies, pillage, and slave trades that you condoned.

- The penalty for treason is death on the scaffold," Lord Stannis said dryly, and the others nodded in agreement. Jon watched with interest, waiting for the outcome.

- I am not a traitor! - Baelon said stubbornly but loudly.

- So breaking your oath of allegiance is not treason against the crown? - The Hand of the King asked dryly.

- You can't break an oath you didn't take, and I never swore fealty to the Baratheons, nor did any of the other Greyjoys.

The whole hall fell silent in anticipation of the denouement, an unheard of insolence. Jon expected the king to explode, but instead he laughed loudly.

- Then I give you a choice. You can swear allegiance to me right now, or you can kiss your head goodbye! - The hall erupted in outrage, but after a while the Hand, along with Lord Stark, managed to restore order.

Snow sighed disappointedly, for Robert Baratheon was very merciful, and he loved stubborn and strong-minded men. It would play tricks on him one day. But you can't undo what you've done. And you can't take back what you said. The oath has been taken.

- You will send your last son to Winterfell as a hostage, and all the slaves will go to the mainland," Baelon gritted his teeth and had to agree.

***

Pike's Island, evening of the same day.

The servants were busy preparing for the feast at the castle, bringing food from all over the island to the castle. The next evening the table would be bursting with food of all kinds. John sat in the tent that served as a storehouse and rested. Daisy was about to return and bring them both something to eat. Snow closed his eyes and was in a blissful slumber.

The entrance to the tent opened and someone came in. A crow cawed loudly and nastily, and the boy opened his eyes and looked at the man standing in front of him. It was a bandit-looking man in his forties, wearing the black clothes of a Riverlands warrior, clearly recognizable by the distinctive square-shaped "scales". He was holding a siege crossbow.

- Are you Jon Snow? - was the first thing the man asked. Something inside the boy roared danger.

- Uncle, is that a real siege crossbow you have? - Jon asked enthusiastically, standing up.

- Yes," the man raised the weapon.

- Is this the one whose bolt can tear your head to pieces? - John continued with equal enthusiasm.

- And I was told it was brazen and clever, yes, that's exactly the kind of crossbow.

- Treachery! - Crow cawed, the stranger aimed at John.

- Fus! - Snow exclaimed, his throat blazing with unbearable pain, and there was a brief flash of green in his left hand.

The man lost his balance, but managed to fire, the bolt striking the bastard in the shoulder, sending him tumbling to the ground. It was too powerful a hit. He should have lost his arm, but his armor, his birth under a lord's sigil, and the stone flesh spell he had cast at the right time all played in his favor. Blood spurted from the wound, a bright orange glow and a palm placed on the wound successfully stopped it.

- The seventh scorcher! Fucking sorcerer!

- Claw! - The raven attacked the man and pecked at his face, winning John a few moments. The boy got to his feet and drew his dagger.

- I'll finish you now, you bastard! - The man threw the crossbow away and took the falchion in his hand. A swing, and it was going to be over.

- Tiid! - John shouted.

Time around them slowed down, all the figures lost their clear outlines and began to float slowly. The bastard had a little over seven seconds. Seven seconds or twenty heartbeats later there were eleven bleeding holes in the uncomprehending man.

Snow sighed heavily and sat down on the ground, leaning against one of the crates, he slowly pulled the bolt out, writhing in pain, and healed the hole in his shoulder. When he came to, he would search the careless assassin and find a purse of gold. Every man wants to know the value of his life. Jon Snow's life was worth thirty gold dragons.

 Hi! Join my Patreon, there are many additional chapters here: patreon.com/fanfiction_TV