Alyx VI

"Tormund, explain to the noble Mag Mar Tun Doh Weg how crop rotation works, if you would," Alyx said. She sat astride her horse, overseeing the construction of "Ironforge," which was to be the great citadel of the giants. Her husband had thought of the name, which seemed oddly appropriate given the great open pits the big hairy folk had already dug and the carts of ore presently flowing down from the Lonely Hills. A great combination of smiths and smelters had been assembled to forge giant-sized tools of various kinds.

"What's crop rotation?" asked the insolent wildling. Alyx sent him a withering look, and he withered.

"Mag's kind likes turnips, no? Explain how growing turnips is a part of growing grain. The more fields they plow, the more can be switched to turnips when the time comes." Briefly, Lady Alyx gave the savage a simple maester's lesson in how four fields might be used to bring in crop after crop without wearing out the land, at least in summer.

The short, hairy man, who only came up to her chest when they weren't ahorse, nodded along, understanding perhaps half of it. Afterward, the one they called Giantsbane repeated the lesson to Mag the Mighty, great among giants, who looked like he understood less than half of it.

She really needed to learn how to speak the Old Tongue. Many wildling tribes didn't understand Common at all. Valleys and ridges across the Bolton lands held new villages of people she couldn't communicate with. Mance would have to teach her, and soon. As for Tormund, she didn't have much hope for that one's lessons.

The giant lord listened seriously, then bowed to her. It looked passing queer, since he was easily twelve feet tall, if not more, twice a tall man at least. "Mag says it'll be done as the pink lady says," Tormund relayed his words. "The great stone hall will be finished today, and the pen for the mammoths. Once they've the iron hoes you promised, he means to dig great vegetable gardens in the valley yonder."

"Very good, Tormund," she answered. The outer defenses of Ironforge had already been assembled: a ring of huge stones too large for any man to move, based on the description of the Fist she had from Domeric and her brothers. Giants were slow, lumbering creatures, but tireless and even stronger than their size would suggest. Their ability to work all day saw Ironforge rising around them faster than Alyx would've believed possible. Human stonecutters had been brought up from the now-finished Barrow Hall, the new seat of Domeric's aunt Barbrey. They shaped and fitted the stones with hammer and chisel, leaving final assembly to the giants themselves. Once Ironforge was done, it would be huger than Harrenhal, but wider than tall. The giants misliked tall towers with steps, preferring instead a single broad structure where they could all sleep under a single roof.

Some quarried fresh stones, some piled them at the direction of her masons, and some dug the open-pit mines deeper still, unearthing huge veins of iron ore and rock salt. They had great firepits for roasting vegetables, and braziers overflowing with black coal. Since wages were worthless to the giants, they would soon have a system where mines produced without needing to pay workers, at least in coin.

When everything was complete, she'd lead the lot south, digging irrigation ditches, plowing fields, and dredging out the port, as well as the sandbars and shallow spots in the Weeping Water to make the river more navigable, for much traffic would go over those waters, more than the Bolton lands had ever seen.

The author's tale has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.

Alyx left Tormund with a few final instructions, though the giants were clever enough to follow pictures and the hand signals of her masons, and rode back to the small holdfast where she had been bedding down. Leaving the final settlement of the giants to any underling would be unwise. She absolutely had to be on hand.

The guard captain, Walton, or Steelshanks to some, helped her down from her horse, and a servant took her cloak. Alyx dismissed the rest of her guards and bid the servants start heating water for a bath. The air up in Ironforge was thick with dust and the sweat of giants.

One of the wildlings who rode with Tormund, the cold beauty, Val, asked to join her, and Alyx saw no reason to refuse since the copper tub was big enough for four or five.

Her golden hair was gorgeous, and her body lean and lithe, but Alyx was proud to notice her breasts were far larger, and her hips wider, and would have been even if she were not pregnant. Alyx knew what Domeric liked, what kindled his passions in the night, and took satisfaction in knowing she had it, and Val didn't.

The girl, who was sister to Mance's woman Dalla, snorted in derision as she lowered herself into the tub. "And I thought Mance a king, how little I knew. How little any of us knew."

Not one for empty courtesies, I see, Alyx thought. "What brought this on? Do you mislike the lands south of the Wall?"

Val laughed, a high and brittle sound. "Nay, lady. These lands are as green and fair as any I've seen. Your dread stone castle is an unequaled palace, and your husband, the Domeric, speaks greatness into existence. The giants talk of naming you two gods, you know."

Alyx sank into the warm water, letting her cares float off with the dust clinging to her body. Surely she misheard. "Gods?"

Val's ice-blue eyes flashed. "Aye, gods, and why not? Domeric slew the Others. Styr saw. Mance saw. Other chiefs and warleaders saw. They swore to the truth of it. We all saw the heaps of burned wights, the same that menaced us for a hundred leagues. With a word, he delivers us past the Wall to the promised land and builds a home for the giants greater than any they ever had, and the giants are old, great lady. They remember the time before men when the world was young. The great stony place of safety has them half-mad with happiness. All this he did in a few fortnights. I ask you, if the Domeric is not a king, then what is Mance?"

The woman's pain was plain to hear. She was in a new land, lost and confused. "I do not wish to brag, Val, but my husband is the greatest warrior in the Seven Kingdoms. Any man would seem small compared to him."

The blonde snorted again, kicking up bubbles in the bath where her head had half sunk below the waterline. There was more mirth this time. "No bragging? Well, it's not bragging if it's true. A wise woman, well, a woods witch in truth, claimed the gods fight on the Domeric's side and hold winter at bay for his sake. Not many have seen fit to disagree with her."

The warmth of the bath seemed uncomfortably hot all of a sudden, or mayhaps it was the way the wildling Val looked at her. There was respect there, even awe. Did she think her husband was a god, or at least beloved of the gods? Alyx's hand drifted to the swell of her belly. Did they think the same of the child growing within her?

Well, it made no matter. She would finish her work and tell Domeric just what people were saying about him. He could be queerly modest. Mayhaps they could use this to keep the peace, which was a chief concern of his.