Chapter 11: The Siege of Last Hearth and the First Taste of True Night
The march to the Last Hearth was a descent into a frozen hell. The unnatural blizzard that had swallowed the Umber lands was a living entity, its winds howling like tormented spirits, its snow a suffocating white shroud that blinded and bit with an unnatural, soul-deepening chill. Visibility was often reduced to mere feet, and the Winter Guard, despite their hardened resolve and Torrhen's specially treated gear, struggled against the sheer malevolence of the storm. Ghost, his white fur making him an almost spectral presence, ranged ahead, his superior senses a vital guide, while Lyanna, riding beside Torrhen, her face pale and drawn but her eyes burning with concentration, constantly murmured updates gleaned from the shrieking chaos of the weirwood network – fragmented images of movement, of unnatural cold spots, of a vast, encroaching darkness.
They arrived not a moment too soon. The Last Hearth, a grim, grey fortress squatting defiantly amidst the swirling snow, was already a scene of desperate, nightmarish battle. The outer timber palisades were breached in several places, burning fitfully despite the blizzard, the flames casting a flickering, demonic light on the scenes within. The air thrummed with a cacophony of screams – the guttural roars of the Umber defenders, the high-pitched, unearthly shrieks of their attackers, and a pervasive, low moan that seemed to emanate from the very ice and snow around them.
Wights, hundreds of them, perhaps thousands, swarmed against the stone walls of the main keep like a tide of frozen death. These were not just fallen wildlings; Torrhen saw with a sickening lurch the bloated, grey forms of what had once been Umber villagers, their eyes glowing with the same terrifying blue light, their movements jerky but relentless. They clawed at the walls, heedless of injury, their numbers seemingly endless. Small pockets of Umber men, their faces contorted with terror and desperate courage, fought from the ramparts, their swords and axes often skittering uselessly off frozen limbs, their torches sputtering against the icy wind.
And leading them, visible even through the driving snow, were the Others.
Torrhen had seen them in his visions, in the dying echoes of his scouts' minds. But to behold them in the flesh – or rather, in the shimmering, translucent ice that seemed to form their bodies – was a new dimension of horror. Three of them, tall and gaunt, clad in armor that looked like spun moonlight and frozen shadow, their features sharp and cruel, their eyes burning with an incandescent blue malice that promised eternal winter. They moved with an unnatural grace, untouched by the blizzard, their mere presence radiating an aura of absolute cold that made Torrhen's teeth ache and his spirit quail. One of them wielded a blade of pale, translucent ice, so thin it was almost invisible, yet it sliced through an Umber shield and the arm behind it with horrifying ease. They did not engage directly in the swarming chaos of the wights, but directed them with subtle gestures, their chilling power a palpable force.
"Gods preserve us," Lord Glover, who rode beside Torrhen, breathed, his normally ruddy face ashen.
"The gods help those who help themselves, my lord," Torrhen bit out, his mind already dissecting the battlefield, the assassin's tactical acuity taking over. "Winter Guard, First Cohort – with me! We punch through to the main gate! Archers, target the wights on the walls – aim for the head or dismemberment! Firelances, prepare to clear breaches! Lyanna, stay close. Tell me what you sense, where their main thrusts are coming from!"
Ghost let out a bone-chilling howl, a challenge to the unnatural storm, and lunged forward, a white streak of fury against the grey tide of the dead. He tore into the nearest group of wights, his massive jaws snapping, frozen limbs flying.
Torrhen drew Ice, its Valyrian steel humming faintly in the unnatural cold, and spurred his horse forward, the First Cohort thundering behind him. They crashed into the flank of the wight horde besieging the main gate, their dragonglass-tipped spears finding purchase where ordinary steel failed. A wight, its face a rictus of frozen agony, lunged at Torrhen, its clawed hands outstretched. He parried its clumsy attack, Ice shearing through its arm, the limb falling to the snow with a dull thud, yet the creature kept coming. He brought the ancient sword down in a two-handed blow, cleaving its skull. The blue light in its eyes died, and it collapsed, finally still.
The battle for the gate was a brutal, close-quarters affair. The Winter Guard, trained in Torrhen's unconventional methods, fought with a grim efficiency, their dragonglass weapons proving devastatingly effective when wielded with precision. But the sheer number of wights was overwhelming. For every one they put down, two more seemed to take its place, crawling over their fallen comrades, their dead eyes fixed on the living.
"Firelances!" Torrhen roared, spotting a dense concentration of wights trying to force open a damaged section of the gate. "Now!"
A dozen soldiers from the Winter Guard, their faces set in determined lines beneath their helms, stepped forward, their long, spear-like weapons aimed. At their officer's command, they struck the ignition runes at the base of their alchemical charges. With a whoosh and a roar, jets of incredibly hot, clinging fire erupted from the tips of the lances, engulfing the packed wights in a searing inferno. The unnatural shrieks of the burning dead were horrifying, but the effect was undeniable. A significant section of the attacking force was reduced to charred, twitching ruin, the blue light in their eyes extinguished by the alchemical flames. The stench of burning flesh, even frozen flesh, filled the air.
The momentary reprieve allowed them to reach the main gate. Lord Jon Umber, 'Greatjon's' formidable ancestor, a giant of a man wielding a massive, bloodied axe, roared a welcome from the ramparts above. "Stark! By the Old Gods, you're a sight for sore eyes! Open the gate! Let the wolves in!"
The heavy oak gates groaned open, and Torrhen led his cohort into the relative safety of the Last Hearth's courtyard, which was itself a scene of carnage. Wounded Umber men lay groaning, while others desperately fought small groups of wights that had managed to scale the walls or pour through earlier breaches.
"Lyanna, what do you see?" Torrhen demanded, dismounting, Ice still in hand. His breath plumed in the frigid air. The cold here, within the castle walls but closer to the Others, was even more intense, a palpable weight.
Lyanna, her eyes wide and unfocused, swayed slightly. Ghost pressed against her, a warm, steadying presence. "They… they are concentrating on the northern wall, brother. One of them… the tallest one with the ice sword… he is directing them. He feels… like the heart of the cold." She shivered violently. "And there are more coming from the east, through the blizzard. A huge wave."
"The firelances bought us time, but not enough," Torrhen assessed grimly. "Lord Umber!" he called up to the giant on the wall. "How long can your men hold?"
"We're bleeding, Stark!" Umber bellowed back, lopping the head off a wight that clawed at the crenellations. "But we'll hold 'til the last man! This is the Last Hearth! It does not fall while an Umber draws breath!"
"It won't fall at all if I have anything to say about it," Torrhen muttered. He turned to Ser Mark Ryswell. "Take the Second Cohort. Reinforce Lord Umber on the northern wall. Use the dragonglass arrows. Aim for the Others if you can get a clear shot, but prioritize thinning the wights swarming the base. We need to reduce their numbers."
He then grabbed a handful of his elite Winter Guard, men and women he had personally trained in his deadliest assassin techniques, armed with dragonglass daggers and short swords. "With me. We're going hunting." He looked at Lyanna. "Guide us, sister. To the one with the ice sword."
If they could take down one of the Others, perhaps it would disrupt their control over the wights, buy them a more significant reprieve. It was a desperate gamble. Flamel's texts had little on combating such beings directly, only vague allusions to creatures of pure elemental cold being vulnerable to concentrated elemental fire or energies that disrupted their cohesion. His firelances were one attempt. Direct confrontation was another, far riskier one.
Led by Lyanna's fragmented directions and Ghost's preternatural senses, Torrhen and his small strike team moved through the chaos of the besieged keep. The battle raged around them, a symphony of steel, screams, and the chilling moan of the Others' magic. The unnatural cold intensified as they neared the northern wall, the very stones seeming to weep frost.
They found their quarry on a shattered section of the rampart, overlooking the swirling tide of wights below. The Other stood like a frozen demigod, its ice sword occasionally flicking out to direct the assault, each movement precise and deadly. Its presence was an oppressive weight, a psychic chill that sought to extinguish hope and courage.
"Now," Torrhen breathed, drawing a specially prepared dragonglass dagger, its surface etched with faint, heat-inducing runes. He had coated it with a refined version of the fire-salt paste he'd used in the firelances.
They attacked from multiple angles, a flurry of grey-clad figures erupting from the shadows of a crumbling watchtower. Ghost was a white blur, aiming for the Other's legs, trying to unbalance it. Torrhen lunged for its sword arm, his runed dagger aimed at what he hoped was a vulnerable joint in its icy armor.
The Other moved with blinding speed, its pale sword a streak of deadly light. It parried Torrhen's strike, the impact sending a jarring shock up his arm, the cold of its blade stealing the warmth from his very bones. One of his men screamed as the ice sword sliced through his dragonglass-tipped spear and deep into his chest, freezing the wound instantly.
The fight was unlike anything Torrhen had ever experienced. The Other was immensely strong, incredibly fast, and its touch, its very proximity, was a weapon. Steel was useless against its armor. Only direct hits with dragonglass, empowered by fire or potent enchantments, seemed to have any effect. Ghost managed to score a deep gouge in its leg, and the Other hissed, a sound like glaciers cracking, a puff of icy vapor escaping its lips. It swatted the direwolf away with contemptuous ease, sending him tumbling across the rampart.
Torrhen pressed the attack, his assassin's training, his speed, his ability to read an opponent's moves, all pushed to their absolute limit. He ducked under a whistling cut from the ice sword, rolled, and came up lunging, his runed dagger seeking a gap in the Other's defenses. He felt the tip bite into something, not flesh, but a substance like densely packed ice. The Other shrieked, an unearthly sound that pierced the soul, and a wave of intense cold pulsed outwards, knocking Torrhen and his remaining men back. The runes on his dagger glowed briefly, fiercely hot, and a section of the Other's arm seemed to melt and sputter, like ice thrown onto a forge. It was wounded.
Before they could press their advantage, the Other raised its free hand, and the blizzard around them intensified, the snow swirling into a vortex of blinding white. When it cleared a moment later, the Other was gone, vanished back into the storm, though the pressure of its oppressive cold lingered. Below, the wight assault faltered slightly, becoming more disorganized, as if their guiding intelligence had momentarily withdrawn.
"Did we… did we kill it?" one of his surviving guards gasped, his face bleeding from a dozen shallow cuts made by flying ice shards.
"No," Torrhen said, shivering despite himself, his arm aching from the cold of the Other's blade. "But we hurt it. We made it bleed, if ice can bleed." He looked at the spot where it had stood. A faint, black, oily residue, rapidly freezing over, was all that remained where his dagger had struck. An idea sparked in his mind – a potential refinement for his weapons.
The temporary disarray among the wights gave the defenders a much-needed breather. Ser Mark Ryswell's archers, using their dragonglass arrows to devastating effect from the walls, managed to thin the ranks of the dead significantly. The firelances continued to create pockets of searing destruction. Lord Umber and his men, inspired by the Starks' arrival and the effectiveness of the new weapons, fought with renewed ferocity.
The battle raged for hours, a desperate, attritional struggle against an enemy that felt no pain and had no fear. Torrhen moved from section to section of the wall, directing the defense, his presence a rallying point. He saw acts of incredible bravery, and horrifying loss. He saw men dragged screaming from the walls, only to rise moments later, their eyes blazing with the same blue fire, turning on their former comrades.
Lyanna, though physically exhausted and psychically battered, remained a crucial asset. Her warnings allowed Torrhen to anticipate enemy thrusts, to reinforce threatened sections just in time. At one point, when a section of the wall was about to be overwhelmed, she cried out, her hands pressed against the ancient stones of the Last Hearth, her eyes glowing with a faint silver light. The attacking wights faltered, some even clawing at their own heads as if assailed by a painful noise, before the effect passed. It was a small thing, but it bought precious seconds. Her power was growing, responding to the desperate need.
As a bruised and bloodied dawn finally began to break, painting the eastern sky with streaks of pale, watery light, the assault began to wane. The unnatural blizzard, while still present, lessened its intensity. The remaining wights, their numbers drastically reduced, began to retreat, melting back into the snow-shrouded forests, leaving behind a carpet of dismembered, burning, or simply stilled corpses. The three Others were nowhere to be seen.
A ragged cheer went up from the exhausted defenders of the Last Hearth. They had held. They had survived the night.
But the cost was terrible. The courtyard and the grounds around the keep were littered with the dead – both wight and human. Lord Umber had lost nearly half his men. Torrhen's Winter Guard had also suffered casualties, though fewer, thanks to their superior equipment and training.
Torrhen stood on the blood-soaked ramparts, Ice still in hand, surveying the grim aftermath. This was not a victory. It was a temporary reprieve, bought at a horrific price. They had hurt one Other, yes. They had learned that their dragonglass and firelances were effective. They had learned that focused leadership and disciplined tactics could hold back the tide, for a time. But they had also seen the sheer, overwhelming numbers of the enemy, their relentless nature, the terrifying power of their masters.
"They'll be back," Lord Umber said, joining him, his face grimed with soot and blood, his axe notched and battered. "This was just a taste."
"Aye," Torrhen agreed, his gaze sweeping the desolate, snow-covered landscape. "They were testing us. Probing our defenses." He knew, with a chilling certainty, that this was merely the opening salvo of a long and brutal war. The Long Night was not a single event, but a creeping, grinding siege against the world of the living.
He had learned much from this first major engagement. The firelances were potent but limited in ammunition. The dragonglass weapons worked, but required precise, often fatal, strikes. The Others were not invulnerable, but they were incredibly dangerous, their magic a potent force. And their ability to raise the newly dead meant that every fallen defender could become a new enemy.
"We need to send word to Winterfell," Torrhen said. "The eastern coast is vulnerable. And we need to know if Aegon…" He trailed off. He doubted the Dragon King's raven had even arrived, let alone elicited a helpful response.
As if summoned by his thoughts, a raven, exhausted and half-frozen, was brought to him. It bore the Stark direwolf. It was from Maester Walys in Winterfell.
"My lord," Walys had written, his script hurried and blotched. "A rider from White Harbor. Lord Leobald Manderly sends grave tidings. An unnatural fog has enveloped the coast south of the port. Ships are reporting… figures walking on the water where the sea has frozen miles from shore. He fears a major assault is imminent. He pleads for aid. And… another raven arrived from King's Landing, my lord. Short. Terse."
Torrhen's blood ran cold. The Others were not just probing. They were launching a multi-pronged invasion. He took the small, tightly sealed scroll that had come from the capital. He already knew what it would say.
Aegon Targaryen's reply was even more dismissive than the last. "Lord Stark. Cease these alarmist fantasies. The Iron Throne has actual wars to consider. Your Northern 'ice demons' are a matter for your own Wardenly duties. Do not plague us further. Secure your own lands."
Torrhen crushed the parchment in his gauntlet. The fury he felt was a white-hot inferno, momentarily eclipsing even the bone-chilling cold. He was truly, utterly alone in this fight, save for his own beleaguered people.
He looked at the weary, bloodied faces of the Umber men and his own Winter Guard. He looked at Lyanna, pale but resolute at his side. He looked at the desolation surrounding the Last Hearth.
"They are hitting us on multiple fronts," he said, his voice dangerously calm. "White Harbor is next. We held here. We will hold there." He knew, with a certainty that settled deep in his bones, that the fate of the North, and perhaps all of Westeros, rested squarely on his shoulders. The King Who Knelt would now become the King Who Fought, the King Who Endured, or the King Who Fell leading the last charge against the endless night.