Titt son of Titt's chest heaved like a wounded bear. He stood amidst the carnage of the failed raid, his breath rasping in the cold air.
"How many Burned n are left?" he demanded. "How many in all the tribes?"
A warrior with a face charred into a mask of lted scar tissue bowed his head. "Titt son of Titt... we have barely a hundred Burned n. All tribes together... less than six hundred."
"Six hundred!" Titt ground his teeth. Yesterday, they were over a thousand. The great coalition was breaking, but Titt could not fail. Not as the Red Hand. He had earned his na by gouging out his own eye with a white-hot knife; if he retreated now without plunder or the castle, his legend would die with him.
"Charge!" Titt growled. "Send everyone!"
"Titt son of Titt! What are you saying?" the warrior gasped.
Titt grabbed him by the throat, his single red eye burning with a frantic madness. "Do not make Titt son of Titt repeat himself! Everyone! Charge the walls! Take the stone house! Kill every Lowlander inside! Leave no one alive! KILL!!"
The tribes obeyed, surging toward the stone walls in a final, desperate wave. Titt didn't notice Shagga son of Dolf and the Stone Crows quietly slipping away into the woods, nor did he see Chella of the Black Ears watching him with a knowing, creepy smile.
On the walls of Deepden, Lord Lover stared with bloodshot eyes at the sea of wildlings. The corpses at the base of the wall were piled high enough to serve as a ramp, and the stench of rot was suffocating. His soldiers were exhausted, starving, and out of arrows. They had torn down the stables and the smithy for throwing stones, and now even the rubble was gone.
"They are coming again," Lord Lover croaked. He turned to his son, Ser Harrold. "Where is Solomon of Mirekeep? Where are the reinforcents?"
"That coward!" Ser Harrold spat over the battlent. "House Mirekeep has no honor! He's hiding in the woods with his three hundred peasants!"
Lord Lover laughed bitterly. "Lady Roslin sent him here to die. Three hundred farrs? It's a token gesture so she can say she tried. If we die, he dies too. I just hope he burns in the Seven Hells with us!"
"Father! Father! They're swarming the walls!!" Ser Harrold scread.
The wildlings were charging in a human tsunami.
"Stations!" Lord Lover roared, drawing his chipped sword. "Fight! Fight or die! If anyone holds back, I will hang him! I will hang his whole family!!"
The assault began in earnest. Ladders slamd against stone, and wildlings sward up like ants. Without rocks or arrows to stop them, the defenders were forced into brutal hand-to-hand combat on the ramparts. Below, the main gate shook under the blows of a massive ram.
Suddenly, a Burned Man vaulted over the parapet. Lord Lover's heart turned to ice; once the wall was lost, his tired levies would be slaughtered. He saw his n falling, the breach widening.
Then, he froze.
The wildlings stopped climbing. The soldiers stopped stabbing. Everyone heard it—a horn. Long, clear, and piercing. It wasn't the crude bone horn of a savage; it was the brazen, tallic call of a war trumpet.
Boooo-oooo-oooo-m!
It cut through the screams of the dying like a knife.
Boooo-oooo-oooo-m!
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