Tiber awoke in pain.
His head throbbed, his mouth was dry, and his nose—shattered—bled down over his lips. He blinked away the crust of dried blood and tried to move, but his arms were bound above him. Chains rattled. His back ached where he'd been lashed to a pole, and every part of his body screamed with bruises.
The tent around him stank of sweat, rot, and old blood. Faint sunlight leaked through animal-hide flaps.
Then he heard it—the grunting, the wet slap of skin on skin.
A man's voice groaned with pleasure.
Tiber turned his head. His vision was blurred, but he saw a huge, broad-shouldered man with greasy blonde hair moving atop a woman on a fur-covered bed. She didn't look at Tiber—just closed her eyes and turned away, jaw clenched, enduring.
When the man finished, he slapped the woman's ass and shoved her aside with a bark of laughter. He stood, his naked body pale and thick with muscle, and turned toward Tiber.
His name came back to him in a rush: Ulf the Broad.
The one who led the camp.
The one who broke his nose with a warhammer and dragged him off in chains.
Ulf grinned when he saw Tiber awake. His teeth were yellow, one missing. He swaggered over, his cock swinging, a grotesque mockery of power.
"Well, well. The little bird's finally fluttered awake."
He leaned in close, reeking of ale and sweat. "You're a pretty one, aren't you? Prettier than some of the women from the clan. I've half a mind to—"
"Go fuck yourself," Tiber spat through blood.
Ulf's smile widened, surprised and amused. "Ah. Got some bark, do we?"
Tiber's mind raced. He was in no shape to fight. His sword was gone. He could barely breathe through his broken nose. But then, through the haze of pain, he remembered something.
The books. The old tomes Ser Rickon had made him read, about the mountain clans.
There had been a line, an old tradition.
> "To challenge the chieftain in single combat is sacred. No man of the mountain may refuse."
He didn't know if it was true. Maybe they'd kill him anyway. But he had nothing left to lose.
Tiber lifted his head and stared Ulf down.
"I challenge you. To a duel."
The tent fell silent.
Ulf blinked, taken aback. Then he laughed—deep and roaring. "You? You want to fight me? Like this?"
Tiber said nothing.
Ulf stepped back, scratching his bearded chin. Then he nodded slowly. "Can't say no to that, can I? The Old Ways are the Old Ways."
He turned and barked to the guards outside.
"Unchain him. Give the pup his sword. We've got a duel!"
---
They marched him to the center of the camp—a filthy sprawl of hide tents, totems, and blood-stained posts.
Men and women gathered around, forming a loose circle of spectators. Their faces were painted with soot, blood, and ash. Some wore necklaces of ears. Children clung to mothers' skirts. The whole camp buzzed with excitement.
Ulf stepped into the ring, now dressed in leather and fur, a rusted axe in one hand, a dagger in the other.
Tiber stood across from him, holding his own castle-forged sword, his grip steady despite the tremble in his limbs. His breath rasped through his broken nose. His head still spun. But his heart was ice.
They began.
---
Ulf came in fast and hard, like a boulder crashing down a hill. He swung the axe, roaring, and Tiber barely sidestepped. The blade missed his skull by inches. Tiber ducked and rolled, slashing upward, scoring a deep cut across Ulf's thigh.
The crowd screamed.
Ulf snarled and swung again, catching Tiber's shoulder. Blood sprayed—but Tiber twisted with it, turning the pain into momentum.
He darted back, circling like a wolf.
Ulf charged.
Tiber let him.
And at the last moment, he slid under Ulf's guard and drove his sword across the back of Ulf's knee—severing muscle and tendon. Ulf collapsed with a howl, but before he could rise, Tiber struck again, cutting the other leg at the ankle.
Blood gushed like a fountain. Ulf fell to the ground, screaming, arms flailing.
The crowd fell into stunned silence.
"Please!" Ulf cried, crawling through the dirt, leaving a red smear. "Mercy! I surrender!"
Tiber stood over him, sword dripping red. "You want mercy?"
He thought of his Grandpa and Grandma.
Their bodies, cold and broken.
"No."
But he didn't kill him.
He leaned down instead, pressing the blade to Ulf's cheek.
"Where is the Burned Men's camp?"
Ulf, weeping, nodded frantically. "East. Beyond the Wolfshead cliffs. They move, but… that's where they were last. Please…"
Tiber stood.
He looked at the crowd. No one stopped him. No one spoke.
He turned and walked away, his sword gleaming with blood, the camp fading behind him.
He didn't look back.
It had been a day since Tiber left Ulf's camp.
He cursed himself now—he'd been so eager to leave, so blinded by the thrill of victory, he'd forgotten his bow. The mountain air was dry and sharp in his lungs, and the dense fog curling over the slopes of the Wolfshead made every step a gamble.
The cliffs weren't just steep—they were treacherous, as Ser Rickon's maps had warned. Slabs of stone jutted out at random, and the rocks beneath his boots were slick with frost or crumbled underfoot without warning. He slipped more than once, catching himself with raw hands against jagged stone.
He'd wrapped his cloak tighter and made camp under a stunted pine. That night, the stars were distant, blurred behind mist. The cold bit through the cloth, and even curled beside the fire, sleep came slow. His thoughts returned to the men he'd killed. The gleam of his sword in firelight. The look in Ulf's eyes when he begged for mercy. Tiber didn't flinch from it. He embraced it.
He wasn't a boy anymore.
---
By morning, he was walking again. Two hours passed before the cliffs opened to a narrow ridge. Far below, he saw a thread of smoke.
Tiber crouched low, crawling to the edge. Beneath him, nestled in a gulley carved into the rock, was a makeshift Burned Men camp. Just two of them, tending a fire, skinning a hare.
His lips curled. Finally.
He made his way down the ridge, quiet as wind over stone. Sword drawn, eyes hard. He waited until one of the men turned away—and then struck like a viper.
Steel flashed. The first man never even screamed—Tiber's blade ran him through the belly, gutting him clean.
The second turned just in time to see his friend collapse, entrails steaming in the cold air. He scrambled for a weapon, but Tiber was already on him.
They struggled, fists slamming, knees driving into ribs. Tiber smashed the man's head into the rock once, twice, three times—until the Burned Man's nose was broken and blood blinded him.
"Where's your chief?" Tiber growled.
The man choked, spat, then coughed the words: "South… south ridge… the old mine."
Tiber didn't thank him.
He slit his throat.
---
It took him another half hour to reach the edge of the Burned Men's true camp.
There were tents, dozens. Warriors sharpening blades. Fires burning with meat roasting on spits. Totems carved from bone and charred wood. A few children ran barefoot. He saw women, too—some warriors, others tending to the wounded.
He didn't sneak.
He walked straight toward them, sword on his back, voice loud:
"I CALL FOR YOUR CHIEF!" he bellowed. "Or is he too much of a coward to face the boy whose kin he slaughtered?"
Heads turned. Whispers swept through the camp like wind.
"If he hides, let the gods curse him for a craven. Let his men mock him. Let the mountains spit his name!"
He stood there, arms crossed, daring them.
Twenty minutes passed.
And then—he emerged.
The crowd parted for him. He was taller than most, a mountain of a man in steel armor, finely crafted but battered and marked with an X scored over the sigil of House Arryn.
He walked with a measured pace. On his back, a greatsword wider than a man's hand. His face was obscured by a heavy steel helm, but the moment he raised his sword and pointed it at Tiber, the air tightened.
"You want death, boy?" the chieftain said. "Then come take it."
---
The circle formed quickly.
Silence.
Tiber drew his sword, the castle-forged blade gleaming in the firelight. He rolled his shoulders, loosening his limbs. The pain in his face from Ulf's hammer still throbbed. But he pushed it down.
The chieftain moved first—fast, too fast for a man his size. The greatsword came down like a thunderbolt. Tiber sidestepped, barely—the shockwave of the blow cracked the stone beneath.
He retaliated with a slash—met with steel.
Sparks flew.
They circled.
The chieftain came in again, swinging high, then low. Tiber parried, but the strength behind the blows jarred his arms. His fingers numbed. The greatsword slammed into a boulder, carving a chunk of stone.
Tiber danced back, eyes darting, watching for patterns.
He ducked under a heavy swing and drove a quick thrust at the armpit—metal met flesh, blood gushed, but the chieftain roared and smashed his pommel into Tiber's face.
Tiber staggered, blood rushing down from his already-broken nose. His vision blurred. The world tilted.
He blinked it away.
Focus, damn it. Use your speed.
The next time the chieftain swung, Tiber rolled low, slashed at the back of his knee, and came up behind him.
He went for the neck—but the chieftain spun and caught the blade with his gauntlet. They grappled, bodies crashing together.
Tiber slammed his head into the chieftain's helm, then again. His forehead split open, blood in his eyes, but the man's grip loosened.
Tiber broke free.
A final breath.
Then the opening came—a gap at the base of the neck, just above the breastplate.
Tiber lunged.
Steel plunged into flesh.
The chieftain froze—eyes wide, breath caught.
Tiber twisted the blade and yanked it free. Blood spurted, hot and arterial.
The man collapsed.
The camp stared in shocked silence.
Tiber stood over the corpse. He reached down, removed the helm.
Beneath it, the chieftain's face was half-burned—a mass of scar tissue and melted flesh, one eye gone, a grin etched forever in scorched skin.
Tiber stared.
Then used his sword and severed the man's head, holding it up to the crowd.
No one moved.
He dropped it at his feet.
---
He was leaving when he saw them.
A woman, weeping, knelt beside the headless corpse.
Beside her, a boy no older than eight, tears streaking down a soot-smeared face. The boy's eyes locked on Tiber—wide, terrified, and burning with hate.
Tiber looked away.
For a moment, something twisted in his chest. A memory: his own tears, clinging to his grandparents' corpses. The helpless fury.
The grief.
But he said nothing.
He turned his back and walked.
These people had slaughtered his kin. They'd burned his village. They'd made him this.
He owed them nothing.
Not even guilt.