A Rest of Swords

Part nine

I'm gonna be honest with you: I didn't like writing the first half of this. I was slightly unmotivated...I knew I had to write something about the fight now, but I can't, I'm not good at it, and I still hate it but anyway, it's not going to get better so here we are.

Blood. There was blood everywhere. Blood pounding in his ears, blood dripping from the wound on his right arm, blood seeping from the dead that lay all around them, the red liquid that had once been the essence of their life leaving their bodies to water the grounds of Winterfell.
Jaime had no idea how long they were already standing here, fighting against and slaying down one wight after the next, the unstoppable flow too fast and too strong to even give them time to breathe or think. Brienne was pressed against the wall beside him, just as sweaty and blood-stained as he certainly looked himself, but he knew it was not her own blood as she stabbed the enemies with the skill and strength that distinguished her as the knight she was - a determination shining from her eyes every time he dared to throw a quick glance at her that made him feel equally proud and unreasonably confident. If there was a chance for someone to survive this, it would be her.

The noise around Jaime was overpowering. His own heartbeat, the clashing of steel on steel, sword on sword. He had liked this sound. Once. Before he became who he was now. Before he lost his hand. Before he met Brienne. It had been like a song to him, the fight like a dance, everything a game and one that he was skilled in playing and never lost.
Now, the sound of the swords was accompanied by the painful screams of those who were hit. People fell at every side, wounded, dead. He didn't know where to look first, where to turn, who -or what- to concentrate on. He drove his sword through another one of the cold dead bodies that had come only to kill them, impossible to tell how many.
How many men have you killed, M'lord?, Qyburn had asked once.
Countless. Even just in the last few hours, provided that these things could still be called men after all. Countless. Countless. Countless.

He and Brienne had stood side by side before the battle had started, waiting. Jaime had taken her hand and when she looked at him, he saw the same mixture of fear and resolution in her eyes that he felt himself.
Remember what we spoke of, he had said. No heroic feats. Brienne had just nodded.
Now he saw her fighting with two wights at once, every time she managed to drive back one of them, the other would rush forward to attack again. Jaime wanted to help her just as he was distracted by a third that came towards him from the side, but he made short shift of it and turned his attention back to Brienne. She seemed to finally get ahead of them, Oathkeeper sirring through the air faster than Jaime could look and forcing one wight back far enough so she had time to finish the other. After that, the second all on his own wasn't so much of a bother for her skills. Panting, she started pulling her sword out of the body - a second of rest, as it seemed...

And that was the second Jaime's heart stopped. There was another, approaching Brienne from behind, without her noticing. He called her, but his voice disappeared in the muddle of other sounds surrounding them. Funnily, all the noise seemed to vanish for Jaime himself, everything but his own heartbeat filling his ears. He didn't even know that he had started to move when he was already running, the world around him standing still.
Then he reached her just as she turned around, but he had already thrown himself between her and the wight's sword, the only thing he could think of at this moment that he needed to prevent its blade from touching her. The sword glided along his shoulder, if it cut him he couldn't tell. There was no pain, but he knew that was no proof that he hadn't been hurt. The flow of a fight. The exertion. The adrenaline. All preventing him from any sensation.
He felt how his side hit the ground, but still managed to make the wight fall down as well. He heard Brienne gasp in shock behind him when the dead creature crawled over him, he tried to fight it off, but it had pinned his left arm to the ground - the right useless as ever, pressing against the cold body in vain. The smell of decomposition filled Jaime's nose, almost making him retch. The sharp scent stang in his eyes and he was sure that he would have felt the wight's breath on his face if the thing would still have been breathing.
He tried to keep a clear head, but then, before he even knew what had happened, the pain his body had held back before suddenly hit him.
"Jaime!", he heard a familiar voice, the voice of a woman.
Brienne, his head managed to identify. He had to stay awake, had to stay with her, to protect her, but he was so incredibly tired...
The world went still and silent around him when he felt a weight pulled off of his chest and a blurred head with dirty blonde hair appeared in his sight for a moment.
"Jaime!", he heard again. He liked that voice. And the name. Not "Kingslayer". Jaime.
He could be glad it was the last thing he heard before the world went black.