Nerd In the North 5-22 (Patreon)

The first dying scream was a wet, choked-off thing, cut short before it could properly curdle the air.

Greg didn’t need to see who it belonged to; the sound already too familiar. The gold-cloaked guards hit their whole group like a breaking wave, an ugly snarling tsunami of steel and leather that slammed into the market square with the sole purpose of drowning them. “For the King! Kill the traitors!” 

Fuck no. A pale fist snapped out and struck a charging chest. A vendor’s cart, laden with clay pots, exploded into a thousand dusty shards as Greg’s blow launched a guard clean through it, his body crumpling before the pottery even finished shattering.

“Guts! Clear us a path!” Not waiting for an answer, the blond lord was already moving, as he dodged a spear-tip aimed for his gut. 

The sixteen-year-old pivoted on his heel, the movement fluid as he let the spear’s momentum carry the man past him. With a grunt, he slammed his pommel hard on the back of the guard’s un-helmed head. The thump of steel on skull was sickening, a crack sounding out with it, and the man dropped like a sack of grain without another sound.

Beside him, Guts’s answering grin was a terrifying slash of white in the gloom of the street. 

“Been a while since I stretched my legs!” he roared, the sound more beast than man. He drew the Dragonslayer from his back as he unhunched, standing proud at his full height of 6 feet and at least five inches.

The second wave of gold-cloaked guards hesitated at the sight of him, their professional bravado cracking. It was a fatal mistake. Guts stepped forward, and the Dragonslayer descended. 

The first two guards in its path simply ceased to be whole, their bodies separating at the waist in a grotesque spray of red. Their screams were swallowed by the sound of the greatsword cleaving through the air.

The square devolved into a meat grinder. Steel rang against steel, a frantic, discordant symphony punctuated by the wet, messy beats of blades finding flesh. Men screamed, their voices sharp with agony before being abruptly silenced.

Greg cut through two guards with a single, sweeping arc of his sword, the white blade he’d been forced to listen to nonstop songs about carving through mail and leather both. He felt the give of flesh and bone, the warm spray of blood against his armor, blue eyes unflinching as he pushed his way forward.

“There’s too many of them!” A voice cracked beside him, Lobb panicked as he cut an arm free in a spray of blood. The boy’s enchanted sword, a gift from Greg, glowed with a faint silver light, each parry and riposte unnaturally fast. It was the only thing keeping him alive. “M’lord, we can’t hold them!”

He didn’t want to admit his squire had a point but Greg was already knee-deep in shit and smelling it too. If that wasn’t bad enough, for every single guy he and Guts put down, more seemed to pour in from the surrounding streets, their gold cloaks a suffocating tide. 

It was like the whole City Watch was pouring down on them.

All of it.To his left, a Stark soldier, a man named Harys with a barmaid he fancied in Wintertown, took a spear to the throat. He dropped his shield, hands flying to the wound, a look of shocked betrayal on his face before he collapsed. To Greg’s right, another Northerner went down, a crossbow bolt sprouting from his eye. 

The cobblestones were slick with blood, smallfolk falling to the ground in front of and around them, only making things worse.

We're not winning this, He didn’t like the thought, but it was true. Packed in like sardines, having to fight around a screaming crowd in this tight street, there was barely any room to move. We're just dying slower.

“Igniaris!” The word was a guttural roar, anger and frustration forcing more heat and power into both word and spell. He shoved his left hand forward, and fire—not the simple jet of Igni, but something more potent, more destructive—bloomed from his palm. Three distinct bolts of bright blue flame, each as thick as his arm, shot across the square.

Each impact wasn’t just a burn; it was explosive. Three guards went flying; mail rings vaporized, breastplates buckled inward, each of them without a doubt dead as they shattered the market stall behind them. 

The use of overt, powerful magic had the desired effect. The Gold Cloaks recoiled, their disciplined advance faltering as shouts of alarm replaced war cries.

“Sorcery! By the Seven, it’s a sorcerer!”

“Black magic! Get back!”

But the awe helped just as much as it hurt.

“D-demons of the North!” The screams and yells drew even more attention and Greg screamed out a curse of his own, the sound of blaring horns drowning him out before he could audibly insult anybody’s mother. He could hear the thunder of more armored boots on stone, all of them rushing their way, and undoubtedly armed to the teeth.

“They’re advancing!” Daeric shouted, appearing at Greg’s shoulder. An arrow was already nocked in his bow, sharp eyes scanning the rooftops. “M’lord, we have to go! Now!”

Guts was already moving, voice still a roar. “Move! Get to the alley!” 

Dragonslayer whirled, the thing acting like the too-thick too-wide helicopter blade it already looked like. Guts may have never seen a helicopter but it didn’t stop the big guy from moving like one, carving a bloody path through the guards, creating a corridor of carnage for the others to follow. He wasn’t just killing them; he was butchering them, sheer brutality making the dying screams of grown men fill the air and sending others running back.

Greg shifted tactics, covering the retreat. “Go! I’ve got you!” he yelled to Lobb and the few remaining Stark men. “暗闇縄!” Shadow tendrils, thick as ropes, lashed out from his free hand, wrapping around the ankles of pursuing guards and yanking them off their feet. “Gelid!” He switched elements, his right hand frosting over a blue-white rune flickered to life above his ring, middle, and pointer finger. A split-second later, shards of ice, sharp as daggers, shot from those three fingertips, peppering the advancing line and forcing them to raise their shields.

“Come on, come on, just a few more seconds.” Seconds would have been a godsend but Greg had already told the gods to fuck off just a few nights ago. 

A young Stark soldier, his face a mask of terror, turned to run for the alley and a spearman saw his chance.  The weapon flew, catching the boy between the shoulder blades. He let out a choked gasp and fell, his fingers scraping uselessly at the cobblestones, dying just feet from the safety of the alleyway.

Six left. No, four. Fuck meeee.

That last death shattered what little discipline the remaining Stark soldiers had as terror took their senses. “Wait! Stay together!” They broke, scattering in four different directions, ignoring Greg’s desperate shouts, as they left Lobb, Guts and Daeric behind.

“FUCK!”His decision was made in a heartbeat, the only choice he had left, the only choice he could even make. This isn’t over.

The mission was fucked, royally fucked, but it was far from over.

“Guts!” Greg called out, his voice clear and commanding over the din. The giant turned his head  just enough to meet Greg’s eyes across the blood-soaked square. “Get them out of here! Lobb, Daeric—with him! Keep those guys from getting killed!”Words of agreement… well, noises of agreement met him. That was good enough for him. “I’m going forward alone!”

A silent understanding passed between them. Guts didn’t question the order. He knew the tactical reality in front of him, no real experience but common sense making it clear anyway: a small, broken group was a loud liability. 

A single guy with stealth magic was a ghost. 

“Don’t die, tiny lord.” The words were a low rumble, but they carried across the chaos.

Greg didn’t answer, a hiss bursting out of his throat as he turned and found the path blocked by another set of guards. He didn’t have words for this. 

Not English, at least.

Both hands came together, palms cupped tight as he drew them to his side. Teeth grit together, his brain slapped together what he knew of his Signs and the other vague magical knowledge he knew by instinct, a rune set forming on the edge of his thoughts.

Without waiting another moment, he threw his hands out, a sigil flickering in front of them for an instant as a single shouted word left his lips. “Aardum!”The air rippled.

A shockwave burst out, a fan of force rippling out in a semi-circle. Thirty feet in front of him, guards went flying, armor and all, thrown in a sprawl of bodies, trader carts and shrapnel-laden debris.  

“For the North!” That last part was unnecessary, he knew it, but he had men that needed morale boosts and he wasn’t gonna leave them without one. Casting aside his cloak, Greg burst off in  a blur or motion, sprinting toward a different, narrower alley away from the group. Shadow magic coiled around him, not as a weapon this time, but as a tight cloak. His form blurred, colors desaturating as he melted into the city's gloom. 

Back to Plan A. 

Stealth op.

A few guards pursued after him, but even with the crowd slowing him down, they lost him quickly in the twisting streets, their shouts fading behind him. His magic made him nearly invisible, his movements silent as smoke. Advantage of working alone—smaller target.

He could hear the sounds of fighting behind him—Guts buying time, the unmistakable, brutal clang of Dragonslayer meeting weak steel and weaker flesh. He'll be fine. 

Guts was pretty much a scaled-up version of him, at least physically, twice as strong and at least that much more durable. Greg knew that for a fact, considering he had tried to use Dragonslayer a couple times over the last six months.

Still… be safe, big guy.

The red walls of the keep loomed ahead, a monolithic presence against the twilight sky. It was massive, imposing, and crawling with guards. Great. Even still, he was committed. 

Robb’s sisters were in there and he’d given his word that he would get them back from the evil king. He was a hero, heroes saved princesses, and he was for sure gonna be the biggest damn hero Westeros had ever fucking seen.

Pep talk aside, the walls were higher than he’d expected, the red stone smooth and offering no obvious handholds. Guards with crossbows patrolled the ramparts above. Well, I knew the front door wasn’t an option anyway.

He skirted the base of the wall, moving from shadow to shadow, his eyes scanning for any weakness, any forgotten entrance. Drainage grates, crumbling masonry, anything.

There. 

A narrow opening, half-hidden by overgrown weeds, disappeared under the massive wall. It was meant for storm runoff, a dark, uninviting hole. It was also just wide enough for a teenage lord to squeeze through. 

Probably full of rats and shit. Literally, shit.

The stone opening gaped like a mouth that had been chewing garbage for centuries, weeds clinging around it like rotten teeth. Greg sucked in a breath that tasted like every mistake the city had ever made, the teenager doing a mental inventory of everything he had on him. Sword, check. Magic, check. Stubborn refusal to fail, double fucking check.

Stone scraped against plate as he squeezed through, rough edges catching on his enchanted armor. Cold water trickled down the wall and around his boots, murky and moving in ways he really did not like. If there weren't enough sprinkles on this sundae of suffering, the darkness was absolute, cave-deep, basement-of-a-serial-killer complete. Please don't let this be a sewer. Please don't let this be a sewer. Please don't—

The tunnel opened into something vast and silent and non-shitty; sure it was dark, but the fact that there was no sewage made him want to let out a sigh louder than an elephant. Thank you, god. 

Even if it was the wrong god for this world, gratitude was gratitude.

Greg creeped forward just in case, eyes tracking around as he took in nothing but barrels stacked to stone ceilings that disappeared into shadow. Wine storage, had to be, the air was thick with fermented grapes and aging wood and centuries of dust. Step one complete. 

"Northmen in the city, they say."

"Killed four and twenty good men down in the market square. Vanished like smoke."

Greg pressed flat against cold stone, one eyebrow raised as he listened. Four and twenty? We kill that many? He tilted his head to the side, Gut’s roar as Dragonslayer whistled through the air playing back in his thoughts. …yeah, we probably did.

This was it, almost there. Just gotta get past… oh, only a few hundred guards. Cake.

"Nothing? I do not care what you claim to have done, fools. Search every single room not belonging to the royal family," another voice commanded, sharp with authority that probably came with a fancy title and, more than likely, an even fancier sword. "Every cellar opened, every closet upturned. Move wardrobes if you can. Just…” the voice stumbled, something unsteady working its way into the man’s tone. “We must find something. The King demands heads on spikes by morning. If not theirs, then certainly one of ours..."

Oh, wow. Blue eyes went wide. Evil king is right.

Greg climbed faster, taking steps three at a time, movements a silent blur with his shadow magic making him less than air. Find the girls. Get out. Simple plan.

– o – o – o – o – o – o – o –​

Medieval Gear Solid (100 GP)ROLL: Protecting Divinity (400 GP) [Dark Souls: Covenants] {Benevolence}: You have a most holy task, the protection of the first daughter of the Great Lord Gwyn, and by the Flame nothing shall stop you. When it comes to protecting someone, there are few who could match you, ensuring that no matter what odds you face, your charge will not be so much as scratched so long as you stand. You can also be summoned in phantom form to their side whenever they are in danger.

Grimoire Points: 350 GP