Lysa stood on the battlements, a cold wave of dread washing over her. The small dust cloud she had dismissed as a passing wagon was now a vast, swirling monument of the King's might. The sun caught the glint of steel, and the sound of a thousand drums, low and menacing, carried on the wind. The general was coming, and he was not going to give them a moment to prepare.
Her brother, Ren, a boy who had been a squire just weeks ago, stood beside her, his face a mask of youthful innocence that was now cracking with fear. "It's a full army," he whispered, his voice trembling. "They're not... they're not supposed to be here."
Lysa didn't answer. She ran from the battlements, her mind racing. She found their few hundred wounded men, still resting and recovering from the last battle, in the castle's courtyard. She saw their faces, a mix of relief and exhaustion, and she knew they were not ready for this. The old garrison of fifty men, who had been patching the walls with a leisurely pace, now moved with a frantic, desperate energy.
"To the walls!" she screamed, her voice echoing off the ancient stone. "To the walls, every man! We are under siege!"
The castle, built for comfort and beauty, was not a fortress. Its walls were thin, its towers were old, and its gates were worn. There was no moat, no outer defenses. The men, a motley crew of wounded soldiers and elderly guards, scrambled to their positions, their movements slow and desperate. Lysa watched as her small, broken force took to the walls, a few hundred men trying to hold a castle meant to house a few thousand.
"We need a message to Damon," Ren said, his hand on his sword hilt, a useless gesture of defiance. "He must know. He must help us."
"There is no time," Lysa said, her voice hard. "They will be at our gates by nightfall. They will not wait. They are here for us."
A few miles away, the King's general rode at the head of his forces, a grim smile on his face. The scar above his eye was a thin, white line, a constant reminder of the furious young man who had dared to stand against him. His hand, still bandaged, throbbed with a dull ache. He had not lost his eye, but he had lost his dignity, and he was here to reclaim it.
He looked at the castle of House Galen. It was a pathetic sight, a beautiful but defenseless relic. He saw no banners of a defiant army, no signs of a prepared defense. He saw a family that had dared to stand against the King, and now he was here to make them pay for their insolence.
"The girl is there," he said to his second-in-command, a brutish, scarred captain named Joris. "And the boy. I want them both. I want them brought to me alive, and I want them to see what happens to a house that defies the King."
"And the men, general?" Joris asked, his voice a low growl.
"The men are of no consequence," the general replied, his eyes fixed on the castle walls. "Kill them. All of them. Leave no one to tell the tale. Let this castle be a tomb, a monument to the price of rebellion."
The first of the siege engines, a massive stone-throwing trebuchet, was already being assembled. The battering ram was being prepared. The men were being organized into their attacking formations. The siege had begun.