WILOW-Ch.330: Secret Passage
Nightfort Castle, The Wall
POV of Domeric Bolton
It took them one more week to reach Nightfort.
Just like everyone had told Domeric, the tunnels of the Nightfort had been sealed. And considering how the Long Night was coming, he had no plans to open the tunnels any time soon.
That didn't mean that there wasn't another secret way to go across the Wall.
He was told about this secret passage by the Children of the Forest, who had helped Bran the Builder in building the Wall.
The secret passage led to an underground tunnel where he had to recite the full Night's Watch vow to a gate.
Thankfully, the vow was not binding in any way, so anyone could say the vow, and the gate would open for them.
But when he returned, he would still ask Leaf if there was a way to change the password.
If possible, he would prefer a portal that only certain people could open, rather than one accessible to everyone.
And a shorter password wouldn't hurt either. Like "Mellon," for example.
Unfortunately, the tunnel was too dark for him and his men to see anything. And he couldn't allow them to bring torches into the underground tunnel due to the risk of suffocation or explosion.
He could partially solve his problem with Lumos's magic. Still, it would only illuminate his immediate surroundings, and considering they would have to pass through in a long line, it wasn't very convenient.
Besides, he didn't want the women he'd brought with him to see him casting spells. Otherwise, he would have to erase their memories, and he didn't want to do that if possible.
Finally, he decided on a middle ground and took out the light crystals from his bottomless pouch, giving them to Walton to distribute to his men. It would be enough for one light crystal for every ten men in the formation they would be marching in.
Domeric had made these light crystals by engraving runes onto glass crystals. He mostly used them to illuminate his underground base, but he always carried a few in his bottomless pouch just in case.
Finally, they entered the tunnel, and the whole march took an hour, after which they were able to cross safely.
When they came out of the other side, the builders and workers were shocked to see people coming out of a secret gate and became ready to attack them.
But once they saw who he was and who was following him, they instantly recognized him and went back to their work.
Once all of them were outside Nightfort, he turned to the women and said, "You have two choices now. You can either settle in one of the newly growing villages in the Old and New gifts, or you can come and live in the Bolton lands."
The women thought it over and decided to live in his lands. That was just fine with him.
There were more than a few Free Folk villages in his land, and they would fit in any of these villages.
He gave his men orders to escort these women to the Lundenhold before he used his Portkey to take him, Ygritte, Varko, and Raksa to Dreadfort.
Upon arriving at Dreadfort, his first act was to take the Dragonglass Coffin containing the White Walker and head to the underground base without dealing with anything else.
This time, he wanted to secure the evidence of the Long Night's arrival completely. And for this, he intended to use Dragonglass for its new cage, just like the coffin that contained the White Walker.
Dragonglass was a magically resistant substance.
But with enough magic, he was able to transfigure it to his wishes.
That was how he was able to encase the White Walker's body inside a large Dragonglass cube in a way so that only its head was jutting out of the cube.
Putting someone in captivity like this was a rather cruel thing to do. After all, the White Walker could only move its head, and he planned to leave it in the same position for months.
A human would dehydrate to death within days and starve to death within weeks. And even if they were watered and fed, they would have no way to piss or poop inside such confinement.
Frankly, a human would not even be able to breathe in such confinement.
But he was sure that White Walkers did not eat or drink like humans. And he was sure they would not go mad from being confined to the same position for months.
Actually, he did not really want to do this to the White Walker.
Frankly, he would have liked to start with the experiments, but the Army of the North had already left Winterfell and was halfway to Moat Cailin.
Although he planned to wait for his men to arrive in Dreadfort from Nightfort before pursuing the Northern Campaign, he had many other things to attend to and prepare during this time.
So, he put the White Walker in a cage, put that cage in a magically reinforced cage, and then buried that cage some 100 meters below the ground near the underground base.
If the White Walker still managed to escape its confinement, then some magical wards would inform him about it.
With all those things done, he filled the hole back with dirt and went back to Dreadfort.
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"Riverlands is burning." Lyra said, "If you were expecting them to help you in the Long Night, then I'm afraid to tell you that such a thing is not possible anymore."
"That bad?" he said as he lay down on a bed and was massaged by an old woman from Essos whom he had bought for these exact services.
"Yes, that bad. Gregor Clegane and his men really did a number on the towns and villages in the Riverlands. The stories about the atrocities committed by those men make me shudder in fear."
"The Mountain will get his due sooner or later." He said, "As will Tywin Lannister. I might not have targeted them before this, but they should not have involved innocents in their war."
"You're going to kill them personally?" Lyra asked.
"No. I plan to give them to Dorne." He said and smiled to himself, "I don't think Oberyn Martell is going to give either Tywin or the Mountain a slow death. Furthermore, they will be a good bargaining chip, allowing them to recognize me as their Emperor in the name of the empire I will establish."
"Another piece of bad news is that Ser Devan Lannister broke Ser Edmure's army and captured him just outside the Riverlands." She shook her head, "I truly do not understand how the fool managed to get captured right outside his own castle walls."
He shrugged, "Edmure is ignorant about the ways of war. He does not have any spy network that would have warned him about the incoming Lannister army until it was too late. Frankly, I would have been surprised if he were able to win the encounter against the Lannisters."
"Robb Stark and Jon Snow were able to do pretty well in their first battle, from what you told me," Lyra said.
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Next Chapters' Name:
Ch.331: Infiltrating the Eyrie
Ch.332: A Regretful Knight
Ch.333: Someone Worthy of His Loyalty