Carliene Stark

III Chapter 12

Carliene

I still can't completely remember how it all happened. All I knew was that it happed too fast and that I had not time to think about what I was doing. Maybe that was a good thing. Because when faced with an impossible decision, how could you ever hope to make the right one? I still don't know if it was the right one. Seven hells, I don't even know if I truly and consciously made a decision or if all my actions were based on instinct alone. I think either way I would have regretted my actions for the rest of eternity. Or so I tell myself. To make myself feel better. Maybe if the red priest had not stood there, holding that valyrian sword, or if what was left of the woman that I once recognised as my mother had not been in my way..

All I know is that I saw the Kingslayer sink into his noose, swaying and struggling, against the backdrop of his dead companions in the tree lines behind him. The light of dawn was making them more visible, the red of their cloaks like flags in the wind. Exposing their position, as they dangled there for all the world to see. 

The ravens in the tree above leaped from the branches, filling the sky with screams and black wings. Time had run out. There was no more space for words. 

My hand closed around the hilt of the sword easily enough and before the red priest could protest I had drawn it, leaving him the decorated scabbard. The sword melted into the weight of my arm as if it had been made for it. As though the hilt never had any other purpose but to fit in the grasp of my fingers and the dark red blade was a long lost extension of my arm. 

The man clad in red tried to protest, tried to disarm me, but when he saw how easily the sharp edge cut through the morning air and pointed at his sunken face, he was quickly discouraged. The ravens were still screaming as they circled above us. I moved away from the priest and closer to the tree. The Kingslayer was still squirming, his bound hands moving to his throat as though his gloved fingers could accomplish some form of relief. 

I swung the blade, driving back the men that had not yet grasped what was happening, many distracted by the strange behaviour of the birds above. But mother did not move. She turned in time to watch me approach. Her red gaze threatening to erase every ounce of courage I had managed to work up. Though her stare was unnatural and extreme, I remembered what it may have looked like when she was alive. That disapproving gaze that erased all my confidence and composure and made me feel like a lost little girl again, who too afraid to return to the castle, because she knew what the mud on her dress would mean. 

But I could not falter to that now. I don't think I meant to slay her. I just wanted to get past her. I just needed her to move. I needed to escape her judging glare. And one thing lead to another. 

The valyrian sword was in my hand, and it moved so easily. I needed to get to the Kingslayer in time. And she would not move out of my way. I don't know if it was the fact that her body had been in the river for a couple of days or the incredible sharpness of the valyrian blade, but it moved through her flesh almost too easily. From her right collar bone to her left hip. The slash was deep and the rotting flesh opened up almost immediately, causing grey and green entrails to spill from it. I was glad for whatever power I had conjured up to move me, because I would surely have faltered at the sight of it, had I been collected and lever-headed. 

The thing gave a wheeze as she tried to speak or scream through her torn throat. She stumbled forward, long yellow nails reaching out for me. The second strike was more deliberate. I knew I wanted it to be over. I knew I could not leave her like this. 

It's not mother, I told myself as I grabbed the sword with both hands and drove the tip right through her chest. She went limp surprisingly quickly. I had no idea how undead creatures were supposed to function, but somehow I had expected they would be harder to kill. But she slumped back, her eyes almost softening as the glow faded from them. The hilt of the sword slipped from my trembling fingers as the weapon remained stuck in Lady Stark's chest.