The King of Winters

Chapter-104

Barristan

The crown prince of the Seven Kingdoms was dead.

He had taken his last shuddering breath in a bleak black morning, as the cold river ran red with his blood when the son of Eddard Stark thrust his blue sword so hard that it punched through the steel of his gorget and mail and came through the back of his neck. The sky had wept in mourning for his loss as a cold shower drenched the earth soon after the battle. The rain had drowned the worst of the fires, but wisps of smoke still rose from the smoldering ruin that had been the watchtowers the prince of Dragonstone had put up for his sentries, and the reeds at the banks of the Trident where Rhaegal had wreaked havoc before his fall.

Perhaps the gods are just after all, Ser Barristan Selmy reflected as he watched those distant embers. He had seen the bloody bodies of Eddard Stark and Arthur Dayne when they had brought them out of the castle and threw them in a ditch. The Sword of the Morning's pale armour and cloak was drenched in blood and his breastplate was riddled with enough crossbow bolts to arm half a dozen men. The King in the North had made a far gruesome sight in just his Royal finery of leather and velvet doused in blood, his own and the foes he'd slain before being brought down. Barristan had been absent from the hall when it happened. It was said Dayne and Stark felled a hundred men between them and yielded only when they were told of the capture of the Lady of the Stars. The Sword of the Morning had been the first to fall after charging towards the King he had sworn to protect in a murderous rage where he slew a dozen more of the King's own honor guard and defeating his own sworn brothers in the process. The men said he'd come within a hair's breath away from the King before being brought down by a last round of crossbow bolts. By then all of the northern men has been dead or dying with only their King on his feet, his sword in hand. The fight had gone out of Stark when he learned about the fate of his wife and son however and was struck down by the biggest and mightiest of his enemies. Barristan Selmy would never forget the bloody corpses they had made of Eddard Stark and Ser Arthur Dayne. And now King Eddard's son had claimed the life of Aegon Targaryen, paying back in kind for what happened to his father at the hands of Aegon's father. The septons preached that the sins of the fathers will be visited upon the heads of the children and Barristan idly wondered if it was the gods' who willed for the death of Rhaegar Targaryen's son to have come at the hands of Eddard Stark's son.

He could still see the hulking dragon still damming the river. Andrew Stark's men had worked all day with horses and ropes and winches trying to pull the heavy corpse of the downed beast away from the water. He had seen them working through the rain a while ago, battling the lashing rain, mud, flowing river and the dead weight of the great green beast. The rain had put a pause in their efforts it seemed as most of them had abandoned the efforts and was struggling with taking the horses back inside from the muddy banks. He stood beside the bier where the silent sisters had placed Aegon Targaryen's body dressed in his finest clothes ready for his last ride. The wound at his side where a spear had opened a gash burned him as he kept his vigil the whole day. The maester advised him that he was not fit enough to sit let alone stand but Barristan Selmy would not listen. The death of his prince and his failure hurt him more than any of his wounds did.

I did all that I could do to protect him, Barristan thought. He even spoke against leaving the Prince's side when he had given him the command of one half of his army. Instead the Prince had smiled and said that he needed his presence at the head of his army more so than he did beside himself. 'No harm shall come to me so long as Rhaegal is by my side, Ser' he had said. 'However without a proper commander to lead my flank the battle would be doomed.' He even sent Ser Jon Darry away, Selmy remembered, to hold the fords to the south. Ever the dutiful son and shining heir, always striving more for the good of the realm even at the risk of his own safety. And now he was dead. Rhaegar Targaryen has lost a son and the Seven Kingdoms have lost a great man and would mourn the loss for all the years to come.