A Sword Without a Hilt: A Song of Ice and Fire/D&D 3.5 Crossover

Thirtieth Day of the Fourth Month 294 AC

Although General Yanis had offered him a place of honor at the head of the Lancers together with the Frey Knights for the ride to Seaguard, Ser Benjicot Brown rode instead with the men and women he had led these part years, growing from a ragtag band of wanderers and outcasts to a match for any lord's picked band. A hundred knights might not seem like a lot before the might of the Legion or the wealth of House Frey, but each and every one of them was armed and armored in hardened steel and riding a horse of fine Dornish blood, each with two squires riding at their sides.

The men-at-arms had put on war paint and woven twigs into their hair like rangers for the ride. Rather than hiding, it instead gave them a sort of leafy pageantry, as though they were spirits of the woods come to reclaim the land for the lords of old. Of course, there were actual wood spirits in their company, both those who served the Old Gods and fey who had sensed which way the wind was blowing, the pipes of satyrs adding to the sound of Tom's old harp. The actual skirmishers, archers, crossbowmen and the like, Benjicot had commanded to keep the irregulars in line. Unfortunately, not every man and women willing to fight for the Lads could be gathered for the march, but there were more than a few fresh faces there, a cousin of a cousin, uncle of a half-brother, and a friend of a friend.

'Defeat's a bastard and victory has a thousand fathers', the saying went. The brown-cloaked knight supposed that made victory a sort of bastard, too, just the lucky sort. Still, it was good to keep an eye on the new folk to make sure they did not cause trouble. They shouldn't be able to on a night's ride to Seaguard and in the company of the Legion besides, but you never knew with the folly of men.

"I can't believe it's finally happening," Maisie said from beside him, sounding a little breathless with excitement and possibly also with the march. "Do you think it will be done tonight?"

Benjicot looked up at the silent silver shapes of the 'air force' accompanying the hosts on their way to Seaguard. "Aye, lass. One way or another, it ends tonight and only a mad man would think it could end with any victor save the Dragon." A sigh escaped his lips unbidden.

"What?" The girl asked. Damn her sharp healer's eyes, she saw too much of a man's ills, even when you did not want her to.

"Never you mind," he groused, turning his head back towards the road.

"When has that ever worked on me?" Maisie asked, her sweet features setting in a familiar expression indeed. Now take your medicine already, it seemed to say, clear as if she had said it aloud.

"I'm starting to wonder what all the fighting in the Riverlands counted for, what with armies being conjured from the air and ships of the sky peering over walls," he admitted. "Vanity is what it is. I thought I had been cured of mine, but apparently if you give a man a new cloak..."

"You know it might have taken days longer to march all the hosts about without us," she interrupted. "Speed will make the lords who have not dipped their banners yet all the more likely to do it, not to mention all the lords who only went to pledge to the Dragon already because we gave them that one little push, making the Lannisters look silly and all."

"When did you learn so much about war, lass?" Benjicot laughed, for her words rang as true as they were kind.

"Well, you see, I've been spending all my time around soldiers these past months. Terrible company, my ma used to say..." She tsked dramatically, this time drawing laughs from all around.

"You ain't seen bad company yet," Byron Sykes called. "There's tales of victory to be told and wine to be drunk on the morrow, and other things that oughtn't be shared in the company of a lady."

"Since when am I a lady?" Maisie giggled. "I'm just... me." The last was said a little more seriously, as she realized that 'me' was not the girl who had ran off into the woods all those months ago, and that she could not go back to her old life. "What do you want to do afterwards? I know Tom's talking about traveling to Essos to learn new tales and sing fresh songs, Justman is hoping for a keep, and Byron wants to trade in his green cloak for a red one, but you have never said what you want to do."

To tell the truth, Benjicot had no answer. When he had decided to fight for the true, king Benjicot had just thought of it as a way to end his days with honor and some sort of meaning, and though the dark thoughts had drawn back since then, they had left behind a sort of emptiness. He did not know what he wanted for himself. Another keep, another life, like rolling the bones a second time... the thought tasted bitter on the tongue. "I think I'll be joining the Praetorians we've been hearing about so much. I'm sure the King... the Imperator will find good use for my sword arm some place."

"That's a... big decision," Maisie said, not entirely approvingly. "I think I will go with you at least as far as Sorcerer's Deep. Maybe I'll stay at the Scholarum there to study. All well and good to learn by doing, but sometimes I feel as though my magic is a tangled ball of wool, all different colors."

Before he could reply, the walls of Seaguard showed themselves pale in the light of the nearly full moon. The time had come to see if Ser Jason Mallister, called the Knight of Eagles, had at least as much wit as a bird between his ears.


The bells of Seaguard rang long and loud in creaking alarm, as they had done to herald Ironborn invasions. Its ramparts were manned and its people ready to hold them. Though they might quail at the sight before them, the men in Mallister colors did not show it. Poor bastards won't know what hit them. I thought Ser Jason had more sense than this, Benjicot thought as he watched the knight make his way onto the battlements in his new winged armor. There was supposedly some magic to it, but what it was supposed to do against the foes arrayed against him was anyone's guess.


"I will not bend the knee to a tyrant and the son of a tyrant, to a man who waters the fields of his so called 'realm' with noble blood, and feeds their children to foul gods. If this is to be our ending, then let it be said that the Mallisers of Seaguard held their oaths to kith and kin, to lord and land, and did not bow to foul powers... foul. Ah, be damned all of you." The lord whirled with a twist of his cloak to the jeers of the army that stood before his walls.

Maisie, however, was staring fixedly at the place where he had been. "The way he was repeating himself, the way he moved sort of twitchy. I think he's being enchanted, or controlled," she said urgently. "We have to tell the general."

The portents were cast and gods of distant realms asked for the truth of Maisie's words, and she was proven right. The Lord of Seaguard had been enchanted, and Tywin Lannister's hand was on it.

What does the general choose to do?

[] Try to draw the lord out again somehow and dispel the enchantment

[] Send in infiltrators to try to break the spell

[] Write in

OOC: This ended up being mostly about the Lads but I pushed through to have a decent vote at the end.