New students start from 'Game of Thrones'

Chapter 79 Evacuation, Bad News

In the twilight, Owen moved with blinding speed. In an instant, he was before the White Walker. Both swung their weapons.

The clash was brutal. The White Walker staggered back, reeling from the impact. Owen pressed his advantage, charging forward. One sword flicked upward, sending the Walker's ice weapon flying; the other came down, severing its head. The Walker crumbled into shards of ice.

After slaying the Walker, Owen turned his dual swords on the wight horde. With every swing, arcs of flame and steel cut through the wights—leaving nothing but ash in their wake.

As long as Owen held the line, the wights swarmed toward him, giving the remaining survivors a chance to flee. He fought and retreated, conjuring flames to carve a path whenever he neared being surrounded. But the wights were endless; even Owen couldn't draw all their attention. Worse, the other White Walkers had joined the fray, organizing the wights into disciplined groups to hunt down the Free Folk. Casualties spiked.

Through it all, the Night King watched, cold and unyielding as the Lands of Always Winter. He did not lift a finger, even when Owen slew his White Walkers. He stood at the rear of the horde, silent, as the Free Folk were butchered.

Raising a White Walker was no easy task for the Night King—they were forged from living men. Recall Craster's offerings: the baby boys he gave up. The Walkers took those infants to the farthest north, placing them on altars made of ice lilies. When the Night King touched them, the babies twisted and changed, becoming his White Walker lieutenants.

Thus, White Walkers were few—and far deadlier than wights. When a Walker died, the wights it had raised lost their magic, collapsing back into lifeless corpses... unless another Walker reanimated them.

Owen held his ground until more survivors had boarded the small boats heading for the warships. Only then did he break free from the wight siege and retreat toward the shore.

Just as he reached the water's edge, about to board a boat, a wave of murderous intent washed over him—so intense his hair stood on end.

Owen reacted on instinct: he dodged sideways, raised his swords to block, and willed flames to erupt around him.

"CLANG!"

His blade struck something hard, sending it flying. When Owen followed its trajectory, he saw it was an ice spear—identical to the one the Night King had used to kill Daenerys's dragon Viserion in the tales. In those stories, that spear had brought the milky-white dragon crashing from the sky, dead in one hit.

Yet Owen had blocked it with a single swing.

He used magic to propel his boat toward the warships, his gaze locked on the Night King, who was walking slowly toward the shore. The Night King stopped at the water's edge, then lifted his hands. The bodies of the Free Folk the wights had killed rose again—their empty eyes fixed on Owen.

Owen saw it clearly: triumph and mockery in the Night King's gaze. As if to say, You cannot stop us.

There was nothing Owen could do. His longbow was on the ship; if he'd had it, he would have shot the arrogant king then and there.

The evacuation from Hardhome had been a disaster. Owen's miscalculations and the White Walkers' surprise attack had cost the Free Folk nearly half their number. Even though more had survived than in the old tales, the White Walkers had still grown stronger—and Owen's optimism about the coming war faded.

It took several days for Owen and the others to return to Castle Black. With so many more survivors in tow, delays had been inevitable.

"Things are worse than we feared," Stannis said, his face grim after hearing Owen's report.

"At least we still have the Wall," Eddard Stark replied. "And from what you've told us, the White Walkers can't cross the sea—not yet. If we hold the Wall, we can hold them back, for now."

"Or perhaps not," Melisandre said suddenly.

"What do you mean?" Stannis asked, turning to her.

"I've spent days reading the books in Castle Black's library," Melisandre explained. "The records say the Wall is anchored by great magic—magic that runs deep beneath it. But when I've studied the Wall these past nights, I've felt no magic below. Only faint traces remain, clinging to the ice itself."

"What does that matter?" a lord from the Vale asked, speaking up.

"It means the Wall's magic is fading," Owen cut in. "For thousands of years, that magic was what kept the White Walkers out—it suppressed their power. Now? They've already probed the Wall. They must know the magic is weakening."

His words sent a stir through the council chamber. Murmurs broke out as lords exchanged worried glances.

"We need to speed up dragonglass mining on Dragonstone," Stannis said, his jaw tight. "We must ensure every man has a dragonglass weapon—spears, arrows, anything."

"And we need to strengthen our defenses," Eddard added. "Starting now, evacuate all villagers in the Gift south of Last Hearth—farther south, if possible."

Eddard's suggestion was unanimously approved. Stannis issued orders at once: the allied forces and Free Folk would begin building new fortifications—trenches and walls that took shape quickly under their combined labor.

But even as they toiled day and night, trouble brewed in the south of Westeros.

First, King's Landing. With Jaime Lannister's return, Cersei had found new confidence—and grown more reckless. She imprisoned the Dornish prince's daughter, Tommen's queen, on trumped-up charges. The fragile alliance between Dorne and the Westerlands teetered on the brink of collapse.

Meanwhile, the Faith of the Seven had grown powerful in King's Landing. The High Sparrow's influence challenged Cersei's authority—and she would not tolerate that.

Then came news from the Iron Islands. Balon Greyjoy, the hard-handed King of the Iron Islands, was dead. His brother Euron—missing for years—had suddenly returned, seized control of the islands, and driven Balon's daughter Asha into exile. Worse, Euron had pledged the Iron Islands' strength to King's Landing—and become Cersei's lover.

Jaime, already disgusted by Cersei's actions, could not stomach this. He left King's Landing alone, returning to the Westerlands to raise an army and march north.

Jaime's departure only emboldened Cersei. Urged on by the ambitious Euron, she unleashed a massacre unlike any Westeros had seen. During a grand gathering at the Great Sept of Baelor, she used wildfire to destroy the cathedral—and burn thousands alive in the plaza outside.

For the allied forces defending the Wall, these were distractions, not disasters. But the true bad news came from Dragonstone.

Stannis's army had left Dragonstone long ago, but Davos Seaworth's friend—a pirate captain of the narrow sea—had stayed to guard the island. It was he who sent the message:

Across the narrow sea, Daenerys Targaryen, the Mother of Dragons, was coming. She led tens of thousands of Dothraki horsemen, the Unsullied, the Second Sons—and three full-grown dragons. Her target? Dragonstone.