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Men along the walls were pale with fear, their breaths ragged clouds as the gate groaned beneath the pounding of the wights. The cries of the living mingled with the screeches of the dead. Then the forest lit up.
The great shadow in the sky arrived, and it came without warning wings vast as the night itself. The first blast of heat struck the dead head on, melting the ice along the ramparts, turning snow to steam in a violent hiss. Men staggered, some dropping their bows, others crying out as the heat licked their cheeks through their helms.
Abyssal flame, black shot with violet poured forth in a torrent that turned the night to nightmare. The trees became torches in an instant, the horde of the dead shrieking as the dark fire consumed them. It did not burn like common flame it devoured, clinging to corpses, spreading in patches of shadowed hellfire.
On the walls, men shielded their faces, their armor and weapons growing hot to the touch.
"Seven save us!" one shouted, dragging his cloak across his face. "It burns through the bloody snow!"
"Take cover! Take cover, gods damn you!" roared another. "This bloody heat!"
The dragon wheeled above, its wings churning the blizzard into mad spirals. Each pass brought another jet of that dark, consuming breath, tearing through the ranks of the Night King's army. Dead things scattered in their masses those that could not burn were torn apart by the shockwave of the dragon's dive.
From the courtyard below, Lord Karstark stood, his fur-lined cloak whipping about him, the pale light of the abyssal fire reflecting in his eyes. For the first time that night, his mouth did not grimace with despair, but twisted into something grimly hopeful.
"Aye…" he muttered, half to himself, half to the Dornish prince beside him. "King Robb… I mean, Lord Stark, knew when and for whom to bend the knee. well he did the right thing, it seems. I was starting to think we were naught but corpses here waiting to fall. Now…" He let out a steaming breath, teeth flashing in the dark. "Now we might just live through this."
Beside him, Doran Martell had pushed himself despite the cold and chaos, his guards steadying his chair. His dark eyes followed the shadow in the sky the vast, shadow dragon whose flame could blacken winter itself and the lone rider upon its neck, cloak snapping in the gale.
"It has been a long while," Doran whispered, almost to himself, "since I have seen a king fight. But this…" His hand gripped the arm of his chair, knuckles white. "I do not think any man living has seen one fight from the back of a dragon.. and not any dragon…"
The Cannibal roared again, a sound that rattled the stones beneath their feet. Its shadow swept the wall, and on its back sat Aeron Grim. His eyes scanned the battlefield wights tearing at the gates, the forest burning, the snow hissing under the assault of his dragon's breath.
"They marched south faster than I reckoned," he muttered into the freezing gale, voice lost to all but the wind. "But the bastard can shift his army as he pleases… he is here now, the next he is there. He teleports using this blizzard.."
His gaze turned skyward, narrowing at the churning clouds above. "I need that dragon dead first… strip him of his skies, and he is nothing but a crawling corpse with little tricks."
The Cannibal shifted beneath him, a low rumble building in its chest as it stared into the blizzard above, where the faintest ripple of unnatural cold stirred.
Aeron's fingers tightened on the ridged spine before him. "I see him too. Hiding up there like a crow."
The Cannibal loosed a bellow that split the night, a roar of challenge and fury that sent the nearest wights scattering as their frozen bones rattled in its wake.
"Go," Aeron commanded, his voice sharp as the wind. "He will not freeze you again. Not while I'm here."
The ancient dragon surged, wings carving the storm as it shot upward into the shrouded sky, the snowstorm twisting in its wake. Below, men craned their necks to watch it vanish into the blizzard half in awe, half in terror as the dark fire still licked the forest and the gates held fast for one more breath.
One heartbeat the sky was a white void silent, cold, endless and in the next, two shadows collided in the firmament, so high they seemed to tear open the heavens themselves.
The Cannibal's jaws snapped shut with a sound like mountains breaking, teeth sinking into pale, frozen being. Shards of splintered ice cascaded in a glittering storm as the ice dragon shrieked, roaring. The night flared with black flame and ghostly frost as the two titans clashed, their wings beating against the storm with such force that the snow itself parted.
On the ice dragon's back, the Night King stood unmoving, his gaze blue. His hand drew back, forming a spear of purest ice long, and with inhuman calm, he hurled it toward the Cannibal's chest.
"Not this time," Aeron's voice thundered, cold and sharp. His palm swept through the air, fingers clawing the storm and the spear veered away as if swatted by an invisible giant, spinning harmlessly into the dark.
"Stop bullying my dragon, would you?" Aeron spat, his cloak lashing and his eyes flared with violet light.
The Night King said nothing, but his head tilted a fraction, those dead, blue eyes narrowing in faint recognition of an enemy that would not bend, not flee, and certainly would not break easily.
Aeron's fingers curled, and the air shuddered. The ice dragon's massive wing mirrored in size and shape to the Cannibal's own cracked with a deafening snap as Ruler's Authority broke through it. A great chunk of ice tore away, spiraling into the storm below.
The creature roared, titling sideways, its balance lost for a moment and in that instance, the Cannibal struck.
Wings folded, jaws wide, the shadow dragon slammed into its twin of frost, and the sky became a storm of war. Abyssal fire cascaded downward, torrents of night-black and violet flame searing through the clouds. The ice dragon answered in kind, spewing a river of pure frost that crystallized the air itself, shards hissing as they struck the burning ground below.
On the walls of Karhold, men and lords alike could only stare. Helm-clad heads craned back, eyes wide, faces lit by the duel of gods above. The heat of the Cannibal's breath reached them even here, steam rising from the stones, snow turning to rivulets that ran like tears down the battlements.
"Mother… merciful mother," one Karstark bannerman whispered, his hands gripping the frozen wall as the sky was torn in two. "I can't believe what I'm witnessing."
"Keep your wits, boy!" barked another, loosing an arrow into the wights still clawing at the gate. "Gods war above us and corpses climb below. Shoot!"
Lord Karstark himself stood on the parapet, jaw tight, frost gathering in his beard, his hand white-knuckled on his sword hilt. Yet his eyes… they burned with something fierce and almost mad.
"That's him…" he muttered, more to the storm than to his men. "That's the Shadow King alright!. I thought I'd seen war enough, but this… this is the sort of battle songs cannot hold!"
Doran Martell, in his wheeled chair, his guards crouched around him with shields raised against the falling embers and shards of frost. His dark gaze tracked the dragons as they tangled, black flame and white frost raking the sky.
"It has been a lifetime, since dragons were a reality.. I've seen the Queen's dragons but this.." he murmured, his voice low with awe, "No man in Dorne, nor the Reach, nor the Vale has seen such a thing. Not in a thousand years."
One of his retainers crossed himself in the southern manner, muttering, "No man should see such things, my prince."
"Perhaps," Doran said, "but here we are."
The men around him flinched as another wave of the Cannibal's heat washed over the wall, the stones steaming, the iron grating like wet parchment.
"Hold your line!" Lord Karstark bellowed over the thunderous clash above. "They'll break or burn or freeze before we do! Archers, keep firing! Every wight felled is one less claw at our gates! And the damn Spearmen! Use the bloody Dragonglass!"
All the while, the sky writhed black flame tearing holes through the storm, frost spears raining on the ground, two colossal forms locked in a death dance.
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If you Like this story! Check out my other stories! Shadow Monarch in DC
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