Battle in the snow

Joffrey POV

Cold, it was even colder beyond the Wall, never would I imagine I would travel here, but it is what it is. Craster's keep was a disgusting place, the man was obnoxious at best of times, still, it was a roof over my head and I couldn't refuse heat from the fireplace. Daughter-wives, he dares to threaten us, for looking at them, if not for Lord Commander Mormont I would have cut down the wildling already.

We passed about seven empty wildling villages along the way, now we learned from Craster, that all wildlings have joined a new king beyond the wall, someone called Mance Ryder. It seems lord Commander knew him, he said he was once a member of the night's watch. That why we will go to an even colder region, the frostfangs, to scout them out.

It was late evening, I could not sleep very well in those conditions, so I was awake when I saw Jon, go outside. After some time he came back with lord commander, he did not look well like he just saw some kind of ghost and not his dire wolf. Jon seems angry at something, I would ask him, but I am not leaving my bedding, it's way too cold, it can wait till morning.

"What happened last night?" In the morning I go and ask Jon.

"What do you mean?" Jon looks away from me and says.

"Don't play a fool, I saw you leave in the night and then getting in some kind of argument with lord commander," I tell him. "Answer, what happened?"

"Nothing, it is not your business, you would not believe me anyway." He says the last part with a low voice.

"So be it, you can brood over it yourself, I don't care about it anyway," I tell him angrily and leave to prepare for the expedition.

…

Fist of the first men, it looked fascinating, ancient ruins stood here, I would look around more, if not that damn cold, so here I was, close to the campfire, looking after it. Samwell was telling another story about the ruin, something about children of the forest and some kind of pact, I was not interested. It was peaceful until the men from the Shadow tower showed up, with about two hundred men led by Qhorin Halfhand. From what I heard, they have encountered some of the wildling scouts and had them hunted down.

"Guys, look, Ghost has found something." I hear Samwell say in loud voice.

"What it is, some bone or something?" I ask looking at him and seeing Ghost digging in the ground covered in snow.

"It is something," Jon answers and takes some kind of bag, from the hole.

"What it is?" Edd asks this time.

"Some kind of blades and a horn." Samwell answers after opening the bag.

"It is a dragonglass," I say after inspecting the blades.

"Dragonglass, how do you know?" Everybody near me looks at me, after Edds question.

"I have seen it before, my brother played with something like that," I answer. "The question should be, what it is doing here, the only place I know that can produce dragonglass is Dragonstone."

"Then it may be something important, take the bag, for now, Tarly." Lord commander orders, when he come to check on the noise.

"Yes, my lord," Samwell answers nervously.

After that, it was decided that three groups will be formed to scout the wildling army. Jon Snow was in one of those groups, leaving his dire wolf with the rest of us. Sitting by the fire, I think of my time here, at first I felt alone and abandoned, but now I have some friends, real friends, that do not tell me sweet lies, but crude truths.

…

Taking care of campfires, was my job, well there was no other choice, if I leave the warmth of the fire, I become quite useless, so keeping the fire burning was my job. It was after some time that one of the scouting teams have returned. Thoren Smallwood's team, I didn't know him. Now we only need to wait for the other two teams.

It was already dark when I was looking at the sky, I have noticed fast-approaching storm clouds illuminated by moonlight, it seems I am not the only one who has noticed it. Going to fire and getting a torch, in the snowstorm it is hard to see, and easy to get lost, so it is better to have some kind of light, Jon Snow has told me that.

In mere moments, the storm had reached us, snow blowing all around me, I could not see anything but some flickering lights. Then the screams started coming from all around me, I was looking around and didn't understand what was going on, and then a horn blew, I was relieved it seems the other scouts have returned, but then a horn blew a second time, it was a wildling attack, I thought. So it confused me greatly when a third horn blew, it can't be, is some kind of mistake, after all, three horns means the Others are coming, but aren't they long gone?

My thoughts were interrupted when the screams started coming from everywhere around me, lights getting lost in the darkness, I could not understand what was going on, so I went to find someone, the only one, after a while, I could find was Samwell, who was panicking himself to the death.

"Samwell, what going on?" I ask him, seeing him working on some kind of message near ravens.

"Joff, it is the Others, I saw them, everyone is dying." He says after looking at me. "Quickly, help me send the message back to the Wall."

"What? It can't be true." I say with disbelief and go to help him.

It was then, when from darkness, a man showed up, he wore black, but before he could get close to a fire, he fell. Drawing my sword and holding my torch in front of myself, I look ahead, but see nothing.

"This can't be true," I repeat to myself and then look behind me. "Hurry up, what are you even writing? Just send it now, I don't want to stay here any longer."

"Fine, I going to send it." He says and takes a raven and tying a massage before letting it go.

"Good, let's go find lord commander, he will know what to do." I turn back to him and tell, but he looks behind me and points a finger at me. "What?"

"Behind you!" He yells.

Quickly turning myself, I saw the man in black standing up and stepping close to the fire and I saw in the light, that his throat was torn apart. The man then steps away from the fire, and runs at me, I swung my sword cutting him on the chest, but he didn't stop. Knocking me on the ground, I lost my sword and the man jumps at me, all I could do was to hold my torch in front of myself and close my eyes.

The shriek and heat made me open my eyes again, and see the body burning on top of me, it was a good thing that Samwell get hold of my shoulders and dragged me away. Seeing the body burn and hearing its shrieks, give me goosebumps all over my body.

"We should go." Says Samwell and he helps me up, no need to ask me twice.

Running we meet other groups of men, but I see no familiar faces, staying close to one group who was firing fire arrows into the darkness. One arrow hits true and a body is lit up, in the light I could see dozen more bodies going for us.

"Run, we need to run," I yell and push Samwell out of here.

Behind me, I hear screams and without looking, I ran, Samwell close to me. Running was all we could do, what else could we possibly do, I don't have any weapon or a torch. While running in darkness for some time, I could see some light flickering in the distance. Going that way we met with Grenn and a couple of other night watch members.

"Sam, Joff, are you alright?" Seeing us Grenn asks.

"Of course we are not, I have lost my weapon and torch to one of those things that are attacking us and I still don't know what is going on," I answer with anger in my voice.

"What there do know, we are attacked by The Others." One of the men in black tells me.

"We should get going, we need to find lord commander," Samwell interjects, before I can give my piece to the man.

"Sam is right, let's go, I can see some light in that way," Grenn tells us, and we start walking towards the light.

After some time of walking, I have calmed down, but now I feel my feet and hands are starting to freeze. The snow is up to my ankles and the total darkness around us doesn't give me any relief. Samwell is starting to lag down behind us, I probably join him soon too. We walked in silence until I hear someone drop behind me, looking behind, I saw Samwell on the ground.

"Leave the pig alone, he will hold down the Others at least." One of the men in the groups says.

"We are not leaving anyone behind, hold my torch Joff, I will help Sam." Grenn gives me his torch and goes to Samwell.

After helping him up, he holds him by the shoulder and carries him with us. I can't fall, I repeat it in my head, I know if I fall, I won't be able to get up anymore. So only looking at my feet I walk slowly until I bump at someone's back.

"I don't see any lights anymore." The man says before I could ask why he stopped.

"Great, what now?" I ask after looking around, scared, hungry, cold and now lost.

"We move forward that all we can do," Grenn says still carrying Samwell.

So we moved until we stopped after traveling a few more feet. In front of us was a horse, a dead horse. Stepping back I see a man, he was not in black, but in elegant ice armor and with a sharp ice spear in his hand, cold blue eyes staring at us, he got off his horse and steps towards us. The first man in black screams and runs toward the icy thing, with a raised sword, only being pierced by the ice spear. Another man then swings his sword at its head but is blocked and batted away.

Feeling the chill in my back, I start going back, only stop when Grenn gets in front of me with his sword held firmly. He then runs towards it and tries to stab it, while it is distracted, but the sword stops at its armor.

"Fuck it," I yell and go with my torch trying to hit it.

Only for my torch being cut in two, then the blue eyes are set on me, readying its arm to stab me with the spear. Looking at it, I could not move my body as the spear neared me, but the scream from Samwell startled me and I managed to drop on the ground and the spear went over me. Samwell from its side raised the dragonglass blade and then stabbing at its shoulder with closed eyes. The six of us that were still alive were surprised when it let out a shallow scream and started to melt to the ground until there was nothing left of it.

…

After that ordeal with the Other, we somehow manage to regroup with the lord commander and the rest of the men. Only a hundred and fifty men in black had survived the night, after seeing us he decided it would be best to retreat to Craster's keep, to get some supplies and rest. So the marching began again, this time most of us didn't have any horses.

Looking at the tired men and then at myself, I could not believe that I fought the Other and have survived, well most of the men didn't believe us when we told our tale. Only lord commander asked some questions and then took the dragonglass blade to inspect it.

After a long march, we finally reached the Craster's keep, everyone was exhausted, cold and hungry, so when we were given some small piece of bread and water, that supposed to be soup, we become quite angry, while he sits on his high chair and eats meat, most of are on sitting on the ground eating scraps.

"This is not right, he is hiding food from us, I say we kill him and take it for ourselves." Dirk, he was from Kings Landing too, says.

"Lord commander won't let it happen." Ollo Lophand says he is a man from Tyrosh, with one hand.

"It doesn't matter what commander let's or don't, if we don't do anything, we going to die from starvation," Dirk tells Ollo, who nods in agreement.

"We not some thieves, but men of the night's watch," Samwell says, trying to calm people down.

"Aye and he is a wildling, isn't that what the men of the night's watch do? kill wildlings?" Dirk says and more men start agreeing with him.

"We should first ask if he has more food, we don't need to resort to violence," Edd speaks.

"Fine, but I tell you right now, that he is hiding it." He says and goes to the dining table with others, I look at Grenn and Edd and follow them.

At the dining table, Craster takes a bite from his meat leg, which looks and smells very good, right now any kind of food would do just fine. As we walk towards him, he looks at us with a disgusting look, like we are below him.

"What do you want now?" He asks.

"We want more food, we know you are hiding it." Clubfoot Karl tells him.

"You want more food, eh? And why I should give to you more food, eh?" He asks with an insulting tone and takes another bite.

"I show why you should do as we say, you damn bastard." Karl gets close to Craster.

"Enough, sit down." Lord commander tries to block Karl but Ollo stands in between them.

"What did you say, I let you in my home and give you food, and you dare to call me a bastard." Craster gets angry and flips the table, but before he could do anything else his throat is slit by Dirk.

"Now that he is dead, you tell me where the food is," Dirk says after putting his knife under the chin of one of Craster's wives.

"Put the knife down." Lord commander tells him, but now his path is blocked by another man, Garth of Greenaway.

"Enough, Craster is already dead, we can find the food ourselves, put the knife down." Edd then tells dirk.

"You're right we could find the food ourselves, but now I think, I would like to enjoy myself too." He says and touches the girl's bullocks.

"Put down your knife, Dirk." Lord commander commands him and draws his sword.

"I think I like to enjoy myself too," Ollo says and stabs lord commander in the guts.

It happened fast before we could do anything to stop it, but the old bear was tougher than Ollo thought and is pushed back by him. Lord commander pierces Ollo through the neck.

"Draw your sword, and kill the traitors." He orders with such a tone, that I immediately draw my sword.

Before Dirk and his friend could stop us, everyone in the keep has now drawn his sword, but the traitors attacked us first. Barely blocking one of the swords I look at the started battle against each other, I could not tell who was who. So I went to lord commander for guidance but saw him collapse on the ground.

"Kill Dirk, he's the only one who should die." Yells Grenn and men on our side go for him, but his friends interject us.

The keep was already cramped and swinging a longsword was too difficult, so I throw my sword at one of the traitors, and go for a near ax. Before I could take it, someone kicks me and I fell to the ground, looking up and seeing that another man has taken the ax and now going for me, but before he could finish me, the white dire wolf jumps over me and bites into the throat. The Blood splatters on me and colors the wolf red.

Before long only Dirk is left with half a dozen of us in the keep, and hearing the footsteps, it seems more are coming from outside. Dirk looks at us with his sadistic smile and two knives in his hands.

"Now, it seems, it hasn't gone according to the plan." He says and then goes for the window, jumping through the window, others went to follow, but it was already too late, he got away, it would be foolish to follow him in the darkness.

"What do we do now?" Asks Edd while holding his injured side.

"The commander is dead," Grenn says after going to check on him. "We should take some food and go back to the wall."

"What about the girls?" Samwell comes from under the table and asks.

"Leave them." One man in black says.

"But you have heard of the wildlings army, if they come for the wall, they go through here," Samwell says.

"And?" I ask this time, knowing that there is something he wants to say.

"The girls will give them information on us, they will know that we lost more than six hundred men in the raging." He continues.

"So we should kill them then." Another man says.

"We can't just kill them." Tells Edd. "We will take them to the Wall, we will need to inform Lord Stark of what has happened, he will know what do to."

"Fine, then you can be a responsible one for them." He tells Edd, who just nods and goes to talk to the girls.

Just sitting here, I was thinking of what has happened in the past few days, wondering, how in the seven hells I am still alive?

...

A.N. Sorry for not writing more action, but I wanted to write it with Joffrey POV and he is not much of a warrior.