Blood And Iron (ASOIAF/GoT)

Chapter 21: what lurks in the woods



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POV of Randyll Tartly (Considerable use of third person)

It was a normal day for the tyrell forces that had been on the outskirts of Storm's End, besieging it for more than a moon since they defeated the Baratheon forces at the Battle of Ashford.

The tyrell camp was well-built and stretched across a huge expanse of fields demonstrating the enormous strength of the host and they had erected a palisade in front of the great stronghold of the lords of the Stormlands, to prevent them from attempting night assaults, there was not the slightest attempt to speed up the siege, there was no siege weaponry such as no trench work to try and destabilize the walls or any preparations to storm the walls with ladders.

The Tyrells decided that the best way to proceed with the siege was patience, having all the time in the world was the most sensible thing to do because having thousands of men die trying to take the walls when you can simply expect the defenders to starve to death

With control of land and sea, the tyrell expected the impregnable Baratheon stronghold to fall in days when they saw the size of the attacking force, but they underestimated the stubbornness of the defenders' leader.

Stannis was determined to defend the fortress to the last man, even with the barns of the fortress almost empty he decided to resist, as surrendering the fortress that belonged to his brother was not right, not fair and not honorable, so he decided to resist until help arrived or die in the attempt.

The tyrells took it with patience and then with joy, for their lord mace tyrell was feasting every day, filled with all the luxuries that only the lord of one of the most fertile territories in the seven kingdoms could have.

And they always made sure that the defenders saw them gorging themselves on roast beef and the freshest fruits, while the defenders were cutting back on rations so that they could continue to resist the siege.

Every day since the siege began feasts were held without exception, but one day out of the blue more wagon loads of food stopped arriving from the reach

And so, another day with no more food arriving, and still mace continued to feast.

When the third day came and no supplies arrived either, the lords of the reach began to worry about the constant feasting that they themselves were holding.

It was at this point that some lords began to send several of their riders in search of their supply wagons, but they returned without any answers, no more supplies were on their way.

'' Lord mace we have checked twice already, there are no more supplies on the way, something has happened, but at least within three days of marching there are no supply wagons on the way and we still have no response from the ravens we have sent home''report what my riders had told me

''But we have not received any information from Highgarden about this, we depend on supplies to continue the siege, it just must have been a mistake, more supplies should be arriving soon and this will simply be a memory, we cannot abandon the siege just because a few days the relevant supplies did not arrive'' said lord Fossoway

''If we wait for more supplies to arrive we will be tempting fate with the siege, keeping this army fed is not easy, between men and horses we consume tons of food a day and especially with the extravagant feasts we are holding every day'' I replied to lord Fossoway.

''We will simply have to raid the surrounding villages and we should get enough food for a few moons, and when the supply wagons return we will have much more variety for the next feasts'' Lord Caswell said as he raised a cup full of wine.

''We could do that if it weren't for the fact that it was the first thing we did when we arrived here was loot everything, now all the small folks have escaped possibly into castles of the lords who are still loyal to the rebels'' I said as I frowned looking at the unconcerned lord Caswell

''lord mace we must do something, we are almost out of food and if we wait any longer we will not make it back to our domain before we run out of what little we have to feed our men'' I tried to convince the useless lord.

During the last few days, Mace has been acting strangely, more so than usual, as it takes him several minutes to make a decision and he always found himself looking to Leyton Hightower for help on these occasions and this was no exception.

''Ah, mace, I also think you shouldn't act so carefree, it could be a serious problem in our territories like a band of thieves attacking our supply lines, we should be cautious and'' said Leyton supporting my position.

''But we have been besieging for several weeks this fortress and we do not let them reap the harvest, they must be starving, we must only resist and we can deliver to our king the heads of the brothers of the rebel Robert''said lord Fossoway.

''If we run out of food our great army will begin to disappear like snow when summer comes, between desertions and dead we can't do something so reckless, we must go back!'', I said already quite annoyed.

I looked at Leyton to see if he still supported me, and he nodded.

'At least there is someone with a brain here, this place is full of idiots trying to eat and drink as much as they can of the tyrell's luxuries.'

''that's right, it wouldn't be wise, son-in-law we should go home, in any case we can always come back when we sort out whatever it is that's going on, that keeps more supplies from coming our way''Leyton told mace

after this brief discussion in the lord of the reach's tent everyone began to order their respective men to break camp and take with them everything important from what was left of the impotent siege camp.

As the huge army marched away all the defenders shouted in jubilation at their victory against the Tyrells

the great tyrell army of over one hundred and twenty thousand men were marching homeward along the same road that had brought them to the storm lands, their marching columns stretching for kilometers, on their way back they had to pass through a stretch of forest.

As the tyrell men entered the forest, a group of men wearing wolf's heads on their helmets watched them from the tops of several trees, waiting patiently.

While the tyrell used patience during the siege, these eight thousand hunters had prepared for the tyrell's return home to be incredibly difficult.

These eight thousand men had prepared a multitude of traps in the forest.

The tyrell men were marching on their second day back through the forest and everything was going normally.

Until an unusual noise was heard, and many trees began to collapse on the tyrell marching columns.

the tyrell soldiers, unaware of the presence of their enemies and formed in large groups, were easy prey for these trees that fell on them

causing hundreds of men, horses, and supply wagons to be crushed by the force of the trees

as the dust was kicked up by the trees a war cry was heard

HAKKAA PÄÄLLE thousands of men rose from their hiding places of mud and leaves and began to attack several groups of the tyrell who were still in shock at what had happened.

During the fall of the trees my horse was hit and I was almost crushed with it, but I hit the ground very hard

'Shit, shit, shit, shit, I see everything blurry'.

I was trying to get to my feet as fast as I could, but I was too dazed to do so and the sounds of fighting were all over the place

'My sword, I need to get the sword out, quick.'

My hands were shaking when I finally managed to unsheathe my sword I turned around and saw how our opponents had already killed almost all the men with me

Rising to my feet I presented them with my Valyrian steel sword to fight.

But they quickly surrounded me, they didn't hesitate for a second.

'They are trained, they know how to fight as a team, damn my luck'.

I tried to cut off the head of the one closest to me, but he dodged it as if my cut were too slow.

But before I could turn to look at the ones behind me, I received a kick in one of my legs causing me to fall to the ground through the mud and then the man I tried to kill earlier kicked me in the face and fell to the ground being surrounded by them.

'Am I going to die here?'

I stayed on the ground waiting for the final blow but it never came.

The Finns attacked, but their only target was the tyrell supplies when they were sure they were all on fire and had spilled all the water they had brought to drink, they set about wounding as many of the enemy as they could with their knives and arrows.

When the tyrell lines began to reassemble the Finns retreated taking with them their wounded and dead leaving everything as if they had never been there.

The Finns also took with them several tyrell men tied up with them back to the safety of the forest.

I lay on the ground until I could get up again and saw the chaos of the battle, there were dead everywhere.

'No, our supplies, they're going to try to starve us to death'.

I tried to see if there was anything we could salvage from the supply wagons but it looks like they used something to make it burn faster, there is nothing to salvage here.

I tried to reorganize my men to see the size of our losses, I had lost over three hundred men and had about the same amount of wounded.

When I verified my losses, I went to meet with our Lord.

I had to walk and jump over logs and many dead bodies, the sound of groans of pain was something that dominated over everything including the sound of the fire burning what was left of our wagons.

After moving a little among the dead and wounded we came to where the banner of house tyrell stood.

Lord Mace, Lord Leyton, are you all right?" I asked the lords.

Mace had the face of a frightened child, while Leyton was perplexed.

''I could say yes, but I lost a lot of knights to the damn trees,'' said Leyton a little nervously.

''What do we do now my lord, it would be very dangerous to continue without exploring before there could be more traps, it seems that they were waiting for us days ago if they had everything ready to ambush us'' I said trying to control my breathing.

''Yes, send a patrol to check the road and another one to hunt those cowards'' said Leyton very annoyed.

We both looked at mace to give the order who was still looking at the battlefield.

''Yeah.... do that'' said mace very nervous

''They focused on burning our supplies all the supply wagons were burned and they threw away all the water we had, we have almost nothing, except the meat from the dead horses, they are going to try to starve us out here and if we don't do anything they are going to succeed'' I said seriously

''We could go back and march to the capital and help the king end the rebellion'' said Leyton.

'We get ambushed in a forest and you propose to travel through one of the largest forests in the kingdom, gosh, sometimes I think I'm the only one who knows about strategy here'.

''No...we shouldn't...'' said Mace.

'Eh, did I hear you right, Mace, saying something coherent?'

''Yeah, we shouldn't, we were ambushed here in a forest, it would be suicide to travel through the biggest forest we have nearby'' I said looking at Leyton.

''You're right, sorry I'm still thinking about what happened'' said Leyton sitting on the ground.

''I will go with some of my men to look for food from the villages nearby, we should be able to get some food and water, to hold out, if they are going to set up camp, double guard we must be ready if they try to return'' I said getting on one of the horses nearby.

''I'll prepare the scouting parties and those in charge of searching for the bastards'' said Leyton.

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