Alesander VIII

They tried to keep the prisoners ignorant. Talking was punished, and they were fed as little as possible to keep them weak. Some refused to march at all, and had to be piled like sacks of flour in the backs of carts. When Ser Domeric called a halt in the evening, some of them were dead and had to be abandoned on the road. Thankfully, the march from Harrenhall to Raventree took only a few days, even at their easy pace.

"What are you thinking about, dear?" Elia asked at his side. She hardly ever stopped talking since she found out Ser meant to knight them both. He'd never heard of a woman knight, but if anyone could make one, it was Ser Domeric. Nobody would gainsay their master, not after the war.

"Just wondering what goodfather is up to. Do you think it will really last for weeks?" Al shuddered in the saddle. It was well for him that they were not enemies. He made a special note always to be good to Elia.

"Oh, yes. There is a spell, you see. It is not entirely correct to say magic fled the world with the last dragon. Father and Tyene have been working on something for years. There is a way to weaken a poison, not to make it less deadly, but to slow the spread and prolong the agony. It's tedious work, I hear, maester's work with a lot of boiling and measuring and muttering songs in High Valyrian. Personally, I prefer a good sharp lance and have done with it. Your foe will be just as dead, but you know, my namesake and all. The men who did the deed are dead, but the man who commanded them yet lives. Payback is a bitch, as Ser likes to say."

Alesander laughed. "Yes, Ser has all sorts of queer sayings. Comes from living in the saddle, I think. In a few years serving him, I've seen more of the realm than I ever expected."

After that, their conversation tapered off a bit. Elia got quiet, even pensive.

"Is ought amiss, wife?" he asked.

She didn't reply immediately, lost in thought as she was. "What? Oh, well, I was pondering arrangements. This summer has been a long one, and we need to think about where we'll winter. I should like to ride with Ser Domeric even after we're knighted. Company on the road is welcome, no?"

"I agree completely, but what arrangements would you make?"

"A keep in Dorne, and well-provisioned. There's land along the Greenblood, though the most peopled part of Dorne, much is empty. My Uncle Doran would give us leave to build our hall easily enough, and we could stay at Sunspear sometimes. I think we should find a likely spot and pay workers to start as quick as may be. We are man and wife, after all, as queer as that is to say. It's past time we have a place to call our own."

"I'm not used to it, either. Back at the Twins, I didn't think I'd make a knight at all. There was no room, and my grandfather didn't lack for household knights. We're about to live a life I never planned for, Elia."

She smiled shyly and played with her long braid. "I shall endeavour to make our years lively enough, husband. You are no mean singer yourself, and we'd be welcome guests at any castle." Her face darkened. "The only problem shall be keeping the whores away."

Al gulped at the menace in her tone.

***

"Really, I've never read of anything like this," complained Hoster Blackwood, skinny and freakishly tall. The youth was seven feet if he was an inch. Lord Blackwood named him bookish, and Alesander could well believe it. Those hands were stained with ink and spent more time clutching a quill than holding a sword, if he was any judge.

"Read, and believe!" Sarella Sand shoved her ledger of figures into his spider-fingered hands. "The new heart tree at Harrenhal doubled in size within a moon's turn, and we fed it only a dozen men."

Hoster immediately began reading, and the more he read, the more troubled he looked. "It...I just...I can't...this should not be! Blood is salty! It defies sense. The salt should make the soil bad. Whatever else it may be, a weirwood is a tree, a plant, Sarella! There is no record of this!"

"You hold the record in your hand!" Sarella retorted hotly. "I have oft stayed at Barrowton, where my father wed the ruling lady. The Lady Barbrey does justice herself, and beheads criminals before the heart tree in her godswood. It was Ser Domeric's notion, and now I understand the practice is spreading. The tree grew, I tell you! White saplings sprouted from the blood-soaked earth! There is a process here, something we don't understand. Name them gods or no; the weirwoods have a relationship with life and death that we don't understand. I saw it in the North, and I saw it in the Vale. Everywhere, blood fed the heart tree. Blood is life and growth. In some ways, the weirwoods are more alive than anything else. Leave them alone, and they live forever; that much the records say."

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"That's so," Hoster admitted grudgingly. They were so different, those two, black and white, but they were the same in this. Every book Sarella could mention, Hoster had read. "The First Men worshipped them as a symbol of eternity, a connection to all life, back to the beginning. And yes, they did practice human sacrifice at times, but I have never read any account of victims' blood making the weirwood grow stronger. Ours is dead, or asleep forever. It's nought but a roost for ravens now."

"We'll see," Ser Domeric said softly, sounding very much like his father, like he knew more than he said. Their master had been quieter since he saw the Great God.

Bigger than the towers of many a castle it was, and visible for long leagues. When they spotted it over the horizon, Ser did not speak for the rest of the day.

Al sighed. Organizing this would not be easy. The thousand men did not know their fate, but many suspected. They complained and cursed and struggled in their bonds. Ser Domeric's reputation traveled even across the Narrow Sea. "Ser, I think we ought to separate out the first day's sacrifices. In fact, breaking them apart into ten camps might serve us best. Lady Whent lent us enough men to guard them all."

Ser nodded. "Very well. We shall keep their fate from them as long as we can. They shouldn't see their fellows led off, never to return. One thousand prisoners. I think one hundred a day, for ten days of sacrifice, would be best. The Great God will wake. I know it."

On the first day, nothing happened. Ser Domeric cut one hundred throats himself, but Al, Elia, and the rest hanged the bodies from the branches with lengths of hempen rope. The ravens came at night, pecking out eyes. Sarella used a maester's trick to measure the tree's height by its shadow. She never looked away, not once, though she was more scholar than warrior. Alesander had killed many a man, but butchering the prisoners like harvest-day hogs still discomfited him a bit.

On the second day, Hoster claimed they were fools. No blood would wake the tree. Still, Domeric sacrificed one hundred more, and would hear no objections.

On the third day, little red buds appeared on the white limbs of the Great God. Hoster had nought to say to that, and Lord Tytos was so shocked that all he could do was kneel before the weirwood in awe. "It's alive," he whispered. There might've been tears in his eyes, or it might've been a trick of the light.

On the fifth day, the buds had grown, resembling drops of blood, and the face wept tears of sap. Hoster and Sarella ceased their bickering completely. Instead, they spoke softly, measuring what might be measured together. The tall boy believed his own eyes, at least. Sarella was good enough not to gloat.

On the eighth day, the ravens returned, perching on the tree, even in daylight. "Blood!" they quorked. "Blood! Blood! Blood!"

On the tenth and final day, the buds opened, flowering into a canopy of dark red leaves, shading the whole castle. Every man and woman at Raventree, from the lord himself to the meanest kitchen drab, came out to pay their respects.

When they ran out of prisoners, Ser Domeric turned to his squires. "You two shall spend the night outside, in the sight of the Great God. You will have your vigil, and I will knight you on the morrow."

So they did, Al and Elia both. What was strangest of all was that the ground wasn't wet. All that blood, one thousand men, and the gnarled white roots drank it all. In the morning, Ser Domeric returned, accompanied by Lord Tytos and all his knights and sons. He drew a sword and bid them kneel in a moment of silent prayer. It was so like their wedding that Al felt queer for a moment.

"I charge you to be brave in battle, faithful and true, fulfilling all oaths, loyal to your family, to revere the gods, guard your honor, and be just to all, whether highborn or low. Do you so swear?"

"Aye," they said together.

"Then, I, Ser Domeric of House Bolton, in recognition of your skill at arms and achievements in battle, name you knights. Arise, Ser Alesander, Ser Elia."

When Alesander Frey stood by his wife's side as a newly made knight, he felt like something was watching him, something more than a man. The Great God was awake. It lived. It knew.