Chapter 98 — Elton's Net

A fresh report on FireStorm’s completed rearmament reached Nightsong three days after the first companies finished their course. Elton dismissed the hall before questioning the spy, then made his steward repeat each fact against the previous report.

"Again," Elton said.

The man swallowed. "House Ashenblade is working the Blackstone Creek deposit. The ore is rich, my lord. The first two hundred Black Armor men have completed their training, more companies are forming, and new heavy plate has appeared in the armory. Better than most harness I have seen."

Elton's hand closed around the edge of the table. Blackstone Creek had irritated him when Renly granted the land. A functioning iron mine made the insult strategic.

"What else?"

"New land rules. Lower dues. Refugees are still going there from neighboring holdings. Their glass kilns and distillery are expanding, and Lord Symon has opened his market and port connections to Ashenblade trade."

At Symon's name, Elton stopped the steward's quill. "A signed agreement?"

"Access to contacts and ships, my lord. Nothing declaring against Nightsong."

"Then we cannot punish what he has not admitted."

Months earlier, FireStorm had been a failing marcher hold whose lord could barely feed a few dozen people. Elton had treated it as a piece of land that would eventually become available through debt, intimidation, or simple extinction.

Now Arlan held directly from Storm's End. He had a growing population, workshops, a mine, two hundred increasingly well-equipped infantry, and neighboring lords discovering that friendship with FireStorm might be profitable.

Each month Arlan survived brought FireStorm farther beyond Nightsong's reach. The mine supplied iron without a Caron market. Low dues drew labor, and sea contacts opened routes Elton's men could not bar.

"Traitor," Elton muttered.

Elton paced behind the desk. The prospect of Robert’s visit made another direct attack impossible. Renly had already investigated one sponsored invasion and publicly punished him for it; marching Caron banners toward FireStorm now would convert irritation at Storm's End into open defiance. The preparations for Robert's royal progress made the timing worse, because no lord wanted his private feud displayed as disorder precisely when the king entered the region. Elton therefore needed methods that looked commercial, criminal, or accidental rather than military.

He chose methods that did not require his banners to cross a boundary. Each pressure would travel through a different hand. No recipient would possess the rest of the design.

"Send orders to the houses that still understand where their interests lie," he told his steward. "No grain, ironware, livestock, or port access for FireStorm. Anyone who opens a route to Ashenblade trade chooses them over House Caron. Make sure they understand I will remember the choice."

The steward began writing. Elton named houses whose debts, marriages, or market access still tied them to Nightsong and ordered different wording for each message. Some would be threatened, some reminded of favors, and a few promised advantages if they helped isolate FireStorm. A single proclamation would have been easier to show Renly; quiet pressure was harder to prove.

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"Second, tighten every road and market checkpoint we control. Grain, salt, herbs, iron, or other strategic supplies bound for FireStorm are to be seized. Merchants who knowingly carry them lose the cargo and go into custody until I decide whether the goods were smuggling."

Renly had ordered specific illegal tolls removed. Elton could not simply put the same boards back under the same name, so the new blockade would hide inside inspections, licensing, pressure on merchants, and the cooperation of lesser houses.

It was less clean than the old method; it could still starve a growing holding if enough roads obeyed it. Salt and herbs mattered almost as much as grain, while imported steel and replacement tools still fed workshops that Blackstone Creek had not yet learned to supply on its own. Elton wanted shortages to arrive in different places at once. His written orders named the Rainwood and Nightsong checkpoints specifically, making seizure of those supplies a standing instruction rather than a guard captain's whim.

"Third," Elton said, "send men into the Red Mountains. Find bands willing to work for coin."

His steward's quill slowed.

"One silver stag for every FireStorm man they kill on the mine roads. One hundred gold dragons if they burn the Blackstone Creek workings badly enough to stop production."

The numbers came directly from anger, but the purpose was rational. Raiders did not need to conquer FireStorm. They needed to make ore carts expensive to escort, frighten miners away, and force Arlan to scatter his two hundred soldiers across roads and camps. One silver stag per dead FireStorm man encouraged repeated small attacks; the hundred-dragon reward made the mine itself a prize large enough to attract bands that would otherwise ignore the feud.

"And the fourth?" the steward asked quietly.

Elton looked toward the raven cage.

"Another letter to Ser Jaime Lannister. Include the mine, the armor, the growing household force, and the trade beyond the Narrow Sea. Repeat that Ashenblade has contacts tied to Targaryen remnants. Repeat the report concerning dragon eggs."

"We have no proof of eggs," the steward said.

Elton's stare ended the objection. "We need Robert to ask the question. Proof comes later."

The steward lowered his eyes and wrote.

The sealed letters mentioned only trade, toll law, or concern for the King's peace. The bounties passed by mouth through men who knew the mountain bands. Jaime received rumors without the names of the checkpoint keepers. Elton had learned what happened when one captured man could expose an entire attempt.

"If Renly asks?" the steward said.

"Renly is preparing Storm's End for his brother. He cannot inspect every wagon in the south while his household prepares the castle for Robert. By the time the complaints look like one design, Ashenblade's stores will be empty."

He believed the timing mattered more than legality. A blockade that worked for two months and was condemned in the third had still worked.

Ravens began leaving Nightsong before midnight. Riders followed toward the checkpoints, and men who knew the Red Mountain trails received quieter instructions without seals.

Toll keepers also received orders to measure axles twice, question foreign crews, reject jars whose seals did not match local forms, and delay perishable cargo until an officer arrived from another road. Each act could be defended as care. Repeated across five crossings, they would turn days into spoiled food and wages paid to guards who went nowhere.

Elton placed different men over each obstruction. No captain knew the whole schedule, and payment came through ordinary road accounts. If one checkpoint failed or spoke, the others could continue while Nightsong denied a common order.

Elton stood at the window while the last bird disappeared into darkness. Every open attack had made Arlan stronger. This time he intended to force FireStorm to spend strength merely staying alive, and to make that survival look suspicious if Robert asked why so much steel was moving through the southern marches.

Before sleeping, he burned the draft that named all five checkpoints together and left each captain only his own instructions. Ash cooled in the brazier while separate riders carried separate delays into the dark.