Chapter Text
Prologue
The King Who Lost The North
He couldn’t think. He could hardly even breathe.
Talisa soaked in blood, her stomach shredded apart as though something had been torn from directly inside of it.
His eyes were wide and glassy – his blue stare completely vacant.
Blood, blood, so much blood. The distressed shouts of his bannermen; the gargles they made as their throats were slit. So, so, so much blood. They were drowning in it.
One step. Two step. His body moved slowly and mechanically, as though he wasn’t truly there. The stench of fire and death filled his nostrils.
Grey Wind’s head impaled upon the body of another.
There was laughter around him, but it sounded thick and distant, as though he was underwater. He couldn’t register anything. Was he really alive?
Mother.
A shaky gasp ripped its way from the Young Wolf’s throat and he dropped to his knees.
---
It had been days since the massacre. Days since he had been forced to stand and watch as his future was torn away from him in mere moments, by the hands of a man that would sleep easy that night. Mother was gone. Grey Wind was gone. His sweet Talisa was gone. The child he would never get to meet was gone. How could one person endure such loss, let alone process it properly? How could anyone survive something so atrocious?
Robb wasn’t sure that he knew, though he wasn’t sure of anything anymore. When he recalled the way in which his mother – his brave, brave, oh so fiercely brave mother – had used her final moments to beg and plead for Robb’s life, the tears finally came, and the anguish came crashing down on him like a ferocious wave. Walder was not a merciful man, and Robb had not wanted to leave despite his mother’s begging. He had not wanted anything in that moment, his mind was too far away to allow for any rational thinking; he had been too overwhelmed. A grief of an overwhelming magnitude had claimed him and forbade any sense of rationality – he had been ready to die in that moment.
He still wasn’t entirely sure what had happened. For a moment he had been standing there, his whole body punctured with arrows as he sought out his mother’s face. For a moment he had been dying.
Then the Blackfish was there – his great-uncle Brynden was there, along with some other men. Everything had been moving slowly and strangely, as though he were in a dream, and there had been so many hands on him – so many hands grabbing, pulling, dragging, him away. His uncle had been shouting something, though his words were incomprehensible. He remembered reaching for his mother, face contorted in panic as he tried to force his way back to her. She had been smiling at him as the Frey bastard slit her throat. Brynden was upon the man in seconds, cutting through him with a fury that blazed like wildfire, and then suddenly Robb was outside.
He could recall being flanked on either side by two men whose names he didn’t know. He didn’t know their faces either. Ahead of him, Grey Wind’s severed head was being mounted upon the body of some dead man – one of the Manderlys, perhaps? – and the stench of blood filled the air. The next thing he knew, he was on his knees as the world turned black.
Robb’s entire body shook as his mind was wracked with the memories, and the tears poured freely down his cheeks. He should’ve died with them.
Currently, he was resting beneath a bundle of blankets in a makeshift bed somewhere. His injuries had all been bandaged well and it was a miracle that he had been able to heal at all, given the circumstances, but all physical injuries felt like nothing compared to the unbearable agony of what he had lost. He had lost his family, his future, and everything that he had been fighting for. His rebellion was defeated and his war was lost. He had failed both the North and his father, and now every soldier that had died on the battlefield for him had died in vain.
They should’ve just let me die, Robb thought bitterly to himself as another tear rolled down his freckled cheek. This life is no mercy.
He remained like that for some time, slowly trying to piece together some kind of understanding as to what had happened and why he had survived. Did Brynden still live? What had become of House Tully now? So many questions, so many painful thoughts. Beneath the anguish, there was an ever-growing anger that hissed and snarled as it coiled within him, like a predator preparing to lurch. Anger at the Freys for what they had done to him. Anger at the Blackfish for endangering himself on Robb’s behalf. Anger at himself for not being coherent enough to save anyone or do anything. Anger at the bastards that had butchered his direwolf, anger at the men who had been laughing and celebrating as Grey Wind’s head was mounted atop the corpse of a soldier that he had once known.
Anger at the world for allowing this to happen, and anger at himself for surviving it.
He wanted to be angry with Brynden for failing to save Catelyn, but that simply wasn’t fair. The Blackfish had done more than Robb to try and protect her, but Robb hadn’t done a damn thing to help anyone that night. Too busy cradling Talisa; too busy mourning a life with her that he would never get to know. An ugly wave of self-loathing rose up within him like a kraken’s twisting tentacles, taking hold of anything that he had ever valued about himself and replacing it with a cold, empty anger. In what world was it fair that he should live while the others had all perished? What audacity did he have? More rage surged through him, directed at his great-uncle Brynden again. By what right did Brynden save him? Why on earth did he have to do something so careless, so stupid, so… brave. So loyal; so unrelentingly right. The Blackfish had been all the things that Robb had failed to be in those moments, despite his mother’s begging. Perhaps she would’ve been alive if he had bothered to try and get her out of the hall as she pleaded with the cunt Walder for his life.
Family, Duty, Honour.
Robb was no Tully. He was barely even a Stark now – not after he had lost the North with his own selfish decision to dishonour the Late Lord Frey. A few days ago he had been a king, winning a war against those that had dared to harm his family, and now he was simply a craven joke with no living family to speak of.
Thoughts of his bannermen flashed through his mind. The men who had believed in him, trusted him, raised their swords for him, and died fighting at his side. Robb let out another choked sound of despair as his body became wracked with another sob of anguish. If someone were to ask him what their sacrifice had been for, Robb did not think he would possibly be able to give them an answer. So many lives had been lost just so that Robb Stark could eventually become known as the King Who Lost The North.
---
Robb was awoken by the sound of wood creaking and someone fumbling with something. It took a moment for his eyes to adjust but when they did, he saw himself faced with a young woman who was carefully placing a tray down on the only piece of furniture in the room: a rickety old chest of drawers. She was carrying a candle, which provided the only source of light against the darkness, and distantly, Robb realised that he had no idea what time it was. He had eventually fallen asleep after working himself into a state of emotional exhaustion earlier, and the room had been much lighter then, so he could not begin to imagine how much time had passed. Was it even the same day?
His watchful blue eyes squinted against the darkness as he kept his gaze trained on the young woman. He had been staying here a few days and could vaguely recall having seen her face a few times during his brief moments of consciousness. At one point she had washed him with a cold cloth, and he could faintly remember drinking milk of the poppy from a cup she had offered him while his torso was still full of arrows. The memory made his wounds sting. She seemed to be rearranging something on the tray, though from this angle he could not see what it was. When she turned to look at him, she gasped.
“Oh, you’re awake!”
“Where am I?” he managed to croak. His voice sounded raspy from lack of use, but his earlier crying hadn’t helped. By the way that she looked at him, he suspected that she could see that he had been upset. His eyes still felt puffy, but hopefully the room’s darkness would conceal some of the redness.
“In the Riverlands, Your Grace.”
Robb’s stomach sank at the address, and an unpleasant coldness rolled through him. He did not deserve that title, and he was no longer a king.
“Where in the Riverlands? Who are you?” he demanded, his voice coming out a little harsher than he had intended. He tried to push himself into a sitting position, but the pain in his torso flared up and caused him to grimace and wince.
The young woman was by his side in an instant, worried hands immediately dallying around his shoulders as she tried to ease him.
“Please don’t force yourself to move! You’ve been injured very badly, and you don’t want to risk opening the wounds.”
“I’m fine,” he replied gruffly, though he offered no resistance as she gently set him back down on the makeshift bed. “Who are you?” he asked again.
“My name is Violet, Your Grace. I was coming to bring you some food and water for when you awoke,” she said as she stood.
No surname, and named for a flower? Given the lowly state of the room, it seemed likely that they were in a peasant’s property, and it was possible that Violet was the peasant to which the residence belonged. Robb frowned at her. There had been no women protecting him during the escape from The Twins, and there certainly would not have been any smallfolk present at the wedding.
Perhaps this is a trick, he thought, Perhaps I have been captured by the Freys after all and they’re trying to lull me into a false sense of security.
“Where are we?” Robb spoke again, the words sounding less scratchy this time.
“The Riverlands, Your Gra—”
“Where in the Riverlands?”
Silence. Violet smoothed her hands against the front of her plain cotton dress, a look of discomfort flickering across her features. She had even more freckles than he did, but her hair was long and black, and it was braided in a neat tumble over one shoulder.
“I don’t think I’m the one who should be explaining this, Your Grace,” Violet said after a moment, appearing to be a mixture of apologetic and upset, “Please eat and have some water. I’ll be back in a moment or two, and you can have your questions answered then.”
Robb eyed her suspiciously but he remained silent as she reached for the tray and set it down beside him. The plate contained a few small cuts of meat and a hunk of bread that looked as though it was freshly baked. Beside it there was half an apple. Though it was a very humble meal, the addition of the meat seemed to show that perhaps Violet (or whoever owned the property) had some money to spare, if they could afford to waste meat on a man who may not even have been conscious to eat it.
This really is a trap after all, he thought as Violet left the room, leaving the door slightly ajar behind her.
Robb did not think he had eaten properly since the wedding, though if he thought hard enough, he could recall having a watery soup fed to him while he clung to consciousness some nights ago. The sight of food made his stomach growl angrily, though he was not sure how he would be able to eat without sitting upright. There was also the possibility that the food was poisoned, of course, but perhaps dying would be better than living with the pain of his loss anyway?
Don’t think like that, he snarled at himself, After what Brynden did for you, don’t you dare think like that.
Thankfully, he was not alone with his thoughts for very long. The sound of hushed voices and hurried footsteps immediately caused him to tense – to brace himself for whatever fate awaited him. The door swung open and a tall, square-shouldered man with wavy sand-coloured hair came striding in with Violet by his side. Another man followed quickly behind them, and Robb immediately recognised them both. They were the pair that had taken him from the wedding feast while Brynden and some others had attempted to save himself and his mother, though he was sure he had seen them prior to that. Neither of them were Northern, but the second man in particular bore the russet coloured hair of a true Riverman.
“Your Grace,” the first man spoke, clasping a fist over his chest as he dropped to one knee in front of him, “It is a relief to know that you are awake, my liege.”
The sudden formality took Robb by surprise, and he again felt uncomfortable by being referred to as though he were still the King in the North. However, the man’s stormy blue eyes and the tone of his voice stirred a new layer of recognition in him.
“Edmyn Piper,” Robb said slowly as he stared at the man before him.
Edmyn was one of Lord Clement Piper’s nephews, and he bore the same handsomeness of Clement’s heir, Lord Marq Piper. Robb’s heart began to flutter – House Piper had always been loyal to House Tully, and Marq had been a very good friend of Robb’s own uncle. If Edmyn was here, perhaps more of his forces still lived?
“It’s good to see that your brain still works,” someone said gruffly, and both Robb and Edmyn turned to look at the other man in the room. He was much taller than both of them, and his dark russet coloured hair fell to his chin in an unruly mass of waves. Ragged stubble covered the man’s jaw and cheeks in uneven patches, and his eyes were so dark that they were almost black. Faintly, Robb noticed that the man’s hand was covered in bandages, and three of his fingers appeared to be missing.
“Do not –” Edmyn began, but the other man intercepted at once.
“Don’t tell me what to do, boy. I helped save him just as much as you did,” he drawled flatly before turning his attention to Robb. “Do you remember me, Your Grace?”
Robb studied him for a moment and then gave a small nod. “You’re one of the Vance men. Lord Norbert is your uncle,” he murmured slowly.
“Yes, Jonos Vance. This is my natural born daughter, Violet Rivers, and we’ve been holed up here in her home since the wedding.”
The wedding.
Whatever hope Robb may have felt regarding his allies’ survival immediately died as a bitter taste formed in his mouth at the memory of the wedding. No matter who had or hadn’t survived, their chances of winning the war were all but none – and none of that even mattered now anyway. Not after what the Freys had done to his wife, his mother, and his unborn son. Robb tried to sit up again, and Edmyn hurried to help him. The throbbing in his torso did not subside, but after a few moments of struggling, he was able to sit comfortably enough.
“Eat,” Edmyn urged him quietly as he placed the tray of food across his lap, “You need your strength.”
“Will the Freys find us here?” Robb asked with a scowl as he looked down at his meal.
“No, the only person who knows of Violet’s existence is myself. My wife Lynora is a sweet woman, and I never told her about Violet’s birth,” Jonos told him.
How kind of you, Robb thought dryly.
“Do you remember what happened?” Edmyn asked tentatively.
Robb’s eyes narrowed a fraction but he didn’t look up from his plate. Instead, he chose to pick at the apple slices, as anything would be preferable to having to face any of the three pairs of eyes that were burning into him. Of course he remembered. He had been looking directly at his mother as they butchered her like a pig.
“Your Gra—”
“I am not your king!” Robb snapped, lifting his head to glare at Edmyn, “Stop talking to me as though I am.”
Edmyn appeared to be taken aback, and his lips parted slightly, though no words came. Violet shifted uncomfortably beside him, then excused herself to go retrieve more candles.
“The Blackfish died for you,” Jonos said flatly after a few moments of silence.
Robb froze.
“That man risked his life, my life, Edmyn’s life, and the lives of several others because he understood what was happening and he wasn’t going to sit by while Walder fucking Frey butchered his family. Do you understand that, boy? I watched as one of my nephews got hamstrung at that wedding. I watched as my friends and family died around me at that wedding. I –”
“So did I!” Robb cut in, silently kicking himself as his eyes began to swim with tears. There had been so much blood.
“I am not finished,” Jonos spat, his black eyes blazing. “Men died for you. Men who believed in you are rotting in the ground now, do you understand? You don’t get to give up and wallow in self-pity just because you lost something, boy. We all lost something. I did not endanger my daughter and risk everything for your safety, only to have you give up the second you open your eyes.”
Robb’s heart was pounding, and a painful knot had formed in the back of his throat. Jonos was blaming him, he realised.
He’s right to blame me. Had I honoured my engagement to the Frey girl, none of this would’ve happened.
The memory of Brynden rushing to his aid was still fresh in Robb’s mind. Brynden the Blackfish had died for him… Robb swallowed thickly, but a tear rolled down his cheek, unbidden.
“We are not Northerners,” Edmyn began slowly, his voice sounding much softer and calmer than Jonos’ angry ranting, “You know this. We are Tully men, and we will always be Tully men. We loved your family long before The War of Five Kings, and we will continue to love them after that.”
Robb could scarcely look at him.
“Let us serve you. The Freys were not alone in their actions, in fact there is talk that House Lannister and House Bolton helped them to orchestrate the whole thing. That is not something that can be ignored, and you should not give up now. Something like this demands an answer, doesn’t it?”
“Almost the entirety of my allies are dead, and my enemies will be hunting me like dogs. It’s over,” Robb replied hollowly.
Neither Jonos nor Edmyn replied. Robb began to nibble at his food again when neither of them spoke, though he no longer had an appetite. Eventually, Jonos heaved a sigh.
“Next time don’t be so quick to bend the damn knee, fool,” he muttered, and Robb looked up in time to see Edmyn blush.
“Shut up,” he scowled, then turned to look at Robb. “What would you like us to address you as, my Lord?”
Robb frowned. He was not a king, and didn’t even feel like a lord anymore. He had betrayed the Tully words when he did not attempt to protect his mother, and he had given up the right to be a Stark after he had lost the North. Countless Tully men and countless Stark men had died for him, yet now he got to live while their deaths were rendered useless because of one reckless, stupid decision that he had made. He didn’t deserve to be known as a Stark, and he certainly didn’t deserve to be known as a Tully.
“Just Robb,” he muttered.
Edmyn appeared confused – possibly even uncomfortable. Jonos remained unmoved.
“As you wish,” Edmyn murmured with a polite dip of the head, “We will let you rest again shortly, but are there any questions you wish to ask?”
---
As it happened, Robb had a lot of questions. Fortunately for him, Jonos and Edmyn had answers.
Robb learned that almost the entirety of his men had not survived the wedding, and that the few survivors they’d encountered had been dying. During their escape from The Twins they had happened across a surviving Stark man – a Manderly bastard called William Snow. William had aided them on their journey, but he had an arrow to the leg that was slowing him down, so Jonos and Edmyn were forced to leave him behind in order to save Robb. By some miracle, the boy had managed to survive regardless and he was currently taking refuge in a nearby brothel. ‘He’s got a lover there,’ Edmyn had told him.
Apparently Robb’s uncle Edmure was being held captive, along with several other hostages that included Marq Piper. Roose Bolton had been named Warden of the North after Robb Stark was declared dead – apparently the Freys were lying, and they were using Grey Wind’s death as a way of providing false proof. Due to the casualties of the wedding being so high in number, very few people seemed to bother questioning them, though it was likely that the Lannisters were aware of the lie. Roose Bolton was not the sort of man who would lie to Tywin Lannister, after all, but there was no way for them to know for sure.
Several Northern houses had since pledged to House Bolton, and many blamed the Starks for the loss of their friends and family at their wedding. As far as they were concerned, Robb had doomed them all in his decision to wed Talisa instead of the Frey girl. Privately, Robb understood their anger, and he could not even argue with their reasoning.
He also learned that Jonos had lost three fingers from fending off a sword during the wedding while he had been unarmed, but that was neither here nor there.
“They’ll kill us all if they find us,” Edmyn said as the three of them sat together by the fire. It was the first time that Robb had left the bed since his arrival. “If there is to be no more battles, what are we to do?”
Jonos turned to Robb. “The plan was to get you to your aunt at The Vale as soon as you were able to ride. She’s the only living family you’ve got, and she has plenty of reason to detest the Lannisters. We could start by gathering support from the Knights of the Vale,” he spoke, his voice calm and level.
She’s the only living family you’ve got.
Robb released a shaky sigh. He was grieving for so many people in so many ways. The thought of planning revenge seemed impossible to him right now, and he felt almost nauseous at the mere suggestion. Edmyn was right, though – the Freys needed to answer for what they did. So did the Boltons, and the Lannisters. What could be done, though? He would need to start rebuilding his forces from the bottom up, but who would want to follow a man like him? Robb did not want to be a king, and he did not want to be a lord. He didn’t want to be anything really, he just longed for his mother and his dear wife.
“You will always have House Piper,” Edmyn murmured, trying to make eye contact. “The Lannisters burned my family’s home to the ground long before the Red Wedding happened.”
“The Red Wedding?” Robb echoed quietly.
“That’s what people are calling it,” Jonos sighed.
Red. There had been so, so much blood. Robb didn’t understand how he hadn’t drowned in it.
“It’s a fitting name,” he practically whispered.
---
Two days passed and Robb was deemed fit to travel. Violet and her mother – a dark-haired woman with mischievous green eyes and her daughter’s round face – had diligently helped disguise Robb’s famous Tully features by dyeing his hair a dark brown. They had also shaved him, so as to make him look younger and throw off any suspicion from those that knew of Robb’s beard. It was still painful for him to walk and move around, but staying in the Riverlands for much longer would be increasingly dangerous. Violet’s mother, Masha, provided the three men with new clothes that were far less likely to draw attention to them, as they were the garments of smallfolk rather than highborn men. Another thing Robb had learned was that Masha and Violet owned the local bakery, so it came as no surprise when Masha presented them with a neatly packed bundle of breads and pies.
Robb stood outside the house, leaning heavily against the wooden crutch that he had been given to aid him with walking. After much talk, Jonos and Edmyn had agreed that they would try to get Robb to the Vale, where they would then take shelter after hopefully gaining Lysa Tully’s protection and support. Robb was not remotely pleased with this, however. He wanted to do nothing other than sleep until his death finally claimed him and he could return to the ones that he had lost. Of course he was angry with the Boltons and the Freys and the Lannisters, but anger was nothing compared to the immense feeling of loss and grief that hung over him like a dull cloud. He simply wasn’t ready to face the world just yet, and Robb knew for a fact that he would need a lot of time before he could truly think clearly enough to resume the war, but Jonos and Edmyn would not listen.
In the doorway, Jonos said his goodbyes to Masha and his daughter, and Edmyn thanked them all profusely. Violet was crying out of fear for her father’s safety, while Jonos smiled and assured her that all would be well.
Immediately, Robb found himself wondering whether his own child would have fretted over him in such a way. The thought made him scowl – Talisa was gone and he would never get to meet the child that they had created together.
“William is going to meet us on the outskirts,” Edmyn said quietly. Robb jumped slightly; he hadn’t even heard the man approach.
“William?”
Confusion flickered across Edmyn’s handsome features. “William Snow,” he replied patiently.
Robb merely stared at him for a moment before he remembered. Marlon Manderly’s bastard, who had been hoping to become a squire one day. An unachievable dream, for he was barely acknowledged by anybody – if he wanted to make something of himself, the best place for him was The Wall.
Jon is at the Wall, Robb thought distantly. What would you think of me now, I wonder? Would you be disappointed in me, brother?
A new wave of pain and longing washed over him, colder than any waterfall. Jon had been one of his closest friends in Winterfell, and the two had loved each other fiercely. Robb wondered what his brother would do if their situations were reversed: would he be full of righteous fury and a newfound sense of purpose, or would he feel just as lost and useless as Robb currently did? Robb found himself turning his head to stare northward. Jon was North. He imagined being able to see The Wall. In his mind, he could see Jon standing atop it in his Nights Watch garb, his dark hair blowing out around him as the cold winds nipped at his face. What would he look like now? Would his hair be longer? Shorter? Would he have a beard, or would he prefer to remain shaved?
Would he be with their Uncle Benjen?
Aunt Lysa isn’t the only one I have left, he realised slowly as his heart began to beat a little faster. I have Jon and Uncle Benjen. If I take the black, I can put this all behind me.
Oh, how sweet it would be to see them again. Robb’s lips twitched slightly, forming the ghost of a smile as he imagined reuniting with the pair of them. He and Jon had such a strong bond that he was sure it would feel like no time had passed; they would fall back into their old routine within minutes of seeing each other once more. Benjen could ruffle his hair the way that he had done back when he was a boy. Robb knew that life in the Nights Watch was difficult and immensely challenging, but perhaps he could make The Wall feel like home? With Jon and Benjen there, how would it possibly feel like anything else? They could even go ranging together. They could hunt for food together, and fight to protect the North together. It would be a hard life, but they could be happy.
Faintly, Robb became aware of the sensation of teardrops rolling slowly down his cheeks. Edmyn let out a soft noise of alarm, but Robb could only smile at him. It was an empty, broken smile filled with grief and longing.
“I want to go to The Wall,” he whispered.
“You can’t,” Edmyn replied instantly, his brow creasing.
“He’s right,” Jonos muttered gruffly as he joined them, “The Wall is too far away. With the state you’re in, it would be impossible. I also don’t like the thought of dragging you through the North while it’s crawling with enemies that are likely to recognise you. The Vale is close. Your aunt is there. That’s where we’re going.”
Robb’s smile wavered until it faded completely and he turned to look northward once more. Jonos was right and they all knew it. The sinking feeling in Robb’s stomach nearly knocked him off balance, as if he had been dealt a blow to the chest. The Wall was his only real chance to find a shred of relief now, but it was quite literally beyond his reach.
It’s not like Jon would want to see me anyway. Not after what I cost The North, Robb thought bitterly. I even lost Winterfell.
“Come on,” Jonos sighed, giving Robb a firm clap on the shoulder, “The Manderly kid has horses for us.”