Chapter 18: The Echo of Thunder
The silence Thor left in his wake was more profound than the one his violence had created. The fear he had inspired in the throne room was a simple, primal thing. This new silence was complex, a vacuum of stunned comprehension. The thousands gathered in the plaza before the Great Sept of Baelor stared at the empty space where the Thunderer had stood, their minds struggling to process the sermon they had just received. He hadn't threatened them with fire or ruin. He had threatened them with a choice. He had judged them, not with a god's wrath, but with a god's disappointment.
Then, slowly, like the turning of a great tide, the silence broke. It was not a roar of anger, as Cersei had hoped, nor was it a cheer of acclamation. It was a murmur, a thousand different conversations erupting at once.
"Did you hear him?" a woman whispered, clutching the seven-pointed star around her neck. "He spoke of justice."
"It's a trick!" a man in a merchant's drab clothes argued, his face pale. "A northern demon, weaving honeyed words to confuse us!"
"But his eyes," a young apprentice breathed, his own eyes wide with awe. "It was like looking into a storm. He didn't speak like a man. He spoke like… like the stories."
"Blasphemy!" a Septon in the crowd shrieked, trying to regain control. "He denies the Seven! He sets himself up as a false idol!"
But his voice was just one among many now. The monolithic fear the Lannisters had cultivated had been shattered into a thousand pieces of doubt, awe, and argument. Factions were being born in the plaza. Some crossed themselves, muttering prayers to ward off the demon. Others looked at the Sept with new, questioning eyes. Thor had not brought peace. He had brought division, which was, in its own way, far more dangerous to the powers that be.
The walk back to the Tower of the Hand was an eerie pilgrimage. The crowds parted for Thor, a path clearing through the sea of humanity. But now, the faces that watched him were not just filled with terror. There was confusion, reverence, and a deep, unsettling curiosity. They were no longer looking at a monster. They were looking at a question, an answer to which might change their world. He walked, head held high, Stormbreaker held loosely at his side, its polished head reflecting the bewildered faces of the city. He did not acknowledge them. His sermon was over. It was time for them to think.
He found the Tower in the state he had left it, a tiny fortress of northern stoicism. His return was met not with cheers, but with the same stunned silence that had gripped the plaza. The Stark guardsmen looked at him with a new kind of reverence, as if they were guarding not just a man, but a holy relic.
Ned was waiting for him in the solar. Arya was at his side, her face alight with a fierce, triumphant glow. Sansa was nowhere to be seen, likely hiding in her chambers, terrified of the god who had just spoken to the city.
"You are mad," Ned said, the words a statement of fact, not an insult. The anger was gone, replaced by a profound, earth-shaking bewilderment. "Completely and utterly mad."
"Sanity is a matter of perspective, Lord Stark," Thor replied, leaning Stormbreaker against the wall. The axe seemed to sigh, its inner light dimming. "Your way, the sane way, was to die with honor in this room. I chose a different path."
"You spoke to them as a god," Ned said, shaking his head in disbelief. "You challenged the Faith of the Seven on the steps of their own Sept."
"I did not speak to them as a god," Thor corrected him gently. "I spoke to them as a king. Or, at least, as a king's son. A leader has a duty to protect his people, not just with swords, but with wisdom. To inspire them to be better than they are. Your Robert… he inspired them only to drink and fight. The Lannisters inspire them only to fear and obey. I offered them a third option."
"Honor," Ned breathed, the word tasting strange on his lips. He had lived his life by that code, and it had brought him to this precipice. Now, this being from another world was throwing his own code back at him, but on a scale he could barely comprehend.
"What you did out there…" Ned struggled for the words. "It was not war. It was not politics. It was… something else."
"It was a reminder," Thor said, his gaze turning distant, as if looking across worlds and centuries. "Power is not a throne. It is not a crown. It is a responsibility. A burden. I have seen beings who could shatter this world with a thought, who commanded armies that spanned galaxies. And the best of them, the ones worthy of remembrance, understood that. The worst… the worst were much like your Lannisters. They believed power was their right. They believed the universe was a thing to be consumed." He thought of Thanos, a sudden, sharp pang of failure and grief.
Arya, who had been listening with rapt attention, stepped forward. "You showed them," she said, her voice filled with an almost religious fervor. "You showed them all. They won't forget."
"No," Thor said, his eyes meeting hers. "They will not. And that is the danger. We have not won a victory, little wolf. We have simply changed the nature of the war. Before, they fought us with swords they were afraid to use. Now, they will fight us with ideas. And that is a much deadlier battlefield."
His words were prophetic. In the Red Keep, the Small Council convened in a state of emergency. Cersei's rage was a palpable force in the room, a physical heat that made the air thick.
"He's making them love him!" she shrieked, pacing before the hearth. "The monster is turning the smallfolk into his worshippers! He must be destroyed!"
"And I ask you again, my sweet sister, with what army?" Tyrion drawled, pouring himself a generous cup of wine. He was the only one in the room who seemed remotely calm. In fact, he seemed to be enjoying himself immensely. "The Gold Cloaks are now a debating society on the nature of divinity. Your own household knights are checking their armor for rust and suddenly remembering urgent business in the Free Cities. You cannot fight awe with steel."
"Then we fight it with faith!" Cersei declared. "Varys! The High Septon! Is he ours?"
The Master of Whisperers glided forward. "His Holiness is… conflicted, Your Grace. The creature's words, while blasphemous in their implication, spoke of justice and peace. Many in the crowd were moved. To simply denounce him again as a demon may no longer be effective. They have seen him now. He does not have horns and a forked tongue."
"Then we do not attack the sermon," Petyr Baelish said, his voice a sly, insinuating whisper. "We attack the preacher. He calls himself a god. He performs 'miracles' with his axe. He appears from nowhere. He preaches a new way. This is not just a political matter anymore. It is a religious one."
"What are you saying, Littlefinger?" Jaime asked, his patience for intrigue wearing thin.
"I am saying that Lord Stark has not just committed treason," Littlefinger explained, a clever smile playing on his lips. "He has committed the far greater crime of heresy. He has brought a false god into our city, a demon masquerading as a saviour, to challenge the authority of the Seven. It is an attack not just on the Crown, but on the souls of every man, woman, and child in this kingdom."
A slow, terrible smile spread across Cersei's face as she understood. "Yes," she breathed. "Yes, of course. We are not fighting a traitor. We are fighting a heretic. A holy war."
"The Faith Militant has been outlawed for centuries," Jaime warned, a note of deep unease in his voice. "To arm the fanatics, to give them a mandate from the throne… that is a fire you will not be able to control, Cersei."
"I can control anything!" she snapped, her confidence restored. She had a new weapon. A better one. "Grand Maester, draft a decree. By order of King Joffrey, First of His Name, Eddard Stark is to be stripped of his titles and arrested on charges of high heresy. His familiar, the demon known as Thor, is to be exorcised and destroyed. The Faith will sanction it. The High Septon will bless it. And the people… the people will see it as their holy duty to help."
The new strategy was far more insidious, far more dangerous than the last. They would not send soldiers who might be afraid. They would send priests and fanatics, men armed with a conviction that was proof against any fear.
Back in the Tower of the Hand, an uneasy peace had settled. They were still prisoners, but the nature of their imprisonment had changed. They were no longer just a political problem for the Lannisters; they were a spiritual one for the entire city. The crowd outside had dispersed, but the air was still thick with tension, a city holding its breath.
That evening, Thor was cleaning Stormbreaker. It was a meditative ritual. He did not polish the Uru, for it never tarned, but he would run a whetstone along the edge of the axe blade, the rhythmic shhhh-shhhh a calming sound. It was not a weapon that needed sharpening, but a warrior who needed focus. He was thinking about his sermon, about the choice he had made. He had acted as he believed Odin would have, as a king should. But he was not Odin. And this was not Asgard. He had gambled, and he had no idea if he had won or lost.
There was a soft knock on his chamber door. It was Ned Stark. The Hand of the King looked older, his face a roadmap of worry, but the panicked fear was gone, replaced by a grim resolve.
"I have been a fool," Ned said without preamble.
Thor stopped his work. "You have been an honorable man in a place that has no honor. It is not the same as being a fool."
"Is it not?" Ned countered, a bitter smile on his lips. "My honor nearly got my daughters killed. It nearly got me killed. It was your… otherworldly wisdom… that saved us today. I came here to rule by the King's law. But the law is broken. The King is dead. And the game has changed." He looked at Thor, his grey eyes clear and steady. "I have spent my life fighting men. I do not know how to fight gods, or demons, or whatever it is you are."
"I am a man who has lost his way," Thor said quietly. "Just like you, Lord Stark. The difference is, my home is much farther away."
"I need you to tell me something," Ned said, his voice low and serious. "And I need you to tell me the truth. Not as a god, not as a monster. As a man. Can they be beaten? The Lannisters. Can we win this?"
Thor was silent for a long moment, considering the question. He thought of Cersei's ambition, Jaime's skill, Tyrion's intellect, and Tywin Lannister's vast, unseen armies. He thought of Littlefinger's schemes and Varys's webs. And he thought of the power humming in the axe beside him.
"Beaten?" Thor said finally. "Yes. They are mortals. They are driven by greed and fear. Such things can be broken." He stood up, his full height seeming to fill the room. "But it will not be a clean fight. There will be no honor in it. To win, you must be willing to do what you have, until now, found unthinkable. You must be willing to be as ruthless as they are. You must be willing to use the fear they have of me as a weapon. You must be willing to… become a king, in truth as well as in title."
He was offering Ned a terrible choice. To win, he would have to become the very thing he despised. He would have to abandon the northern code that had defined his entire life.
Before Ned could respond, a commotion was heard from the floor below. The sharp, authoritative rap of a spear butt on the barricaded door. A new voice, loud and imperious, echoed up the stairwell.
"In the name of the Seven, and by the authority of His Grace, King Joffrey, First of His Name, and the High Septon, we demand entry! Eddard Stark, you are summoned to answer for the crime of high heresy!"
Ned's face went pale. Heresy. It was a charge from which there was no appeal, no defense in law. It was a death sentence, blessed by the gods themselves.
He and Thor rushed to the window. Below, a new delegation stood before the tower. This time, it was not Littlefinger alone. He was flanked by the grim, thuggish form of Ser Meryn Trant of the Kingsguard. But on either side of them stood two imposing figures in the silver-and-white robes of the Faith. They were Warrior's Sons, the ancient holy order, their hands resting on the pommels of longswords. Behind them, a cordon of gold cloaks held back a new crowd, a crowd whose faces were not filled with confusion, but with a cold, pious fury. Their murmurs were not of debate, but of condemnation.
The Lannisters had made their counter-move. They had sanctified their cause. They were no longer fighting a political rival. They were leading a crusade against a heretic.
"What do we do?" Ned whispered, his voice a breath of despair.
Thor looked down at the men below, at their swords and their self-righteous certainty. He looked at Ned, at the honorable man trapped in a corner, his laws and decrees now meaningless. He looked at the axe in his hand.
He had offered the city a choice between peace and destruction. It seemed they had made their decision.
"You are the Protector of the Realm," Thor said, his voice a low, dangerous rumble. "It is your duty to protect it from all enemies, foreign and domestic. And these men, these false prophets who use their gods as a shield for a tyrant, are the gravest enemy of all."
He turned from the window, his eyes blazing with a righteous fury that dwarfed anything the Septons could muster. The echo of his sermon had faded. The time for words was over.
"You asked me if we can win," Thor said, his voice dropping to a near whisper, a promise of the violence to come. "Now, Lord Stark… now we win."