WILOW-Ch.381: News Reaches Everywhere
POV of Davos Seaworth
King Stannis looked at the letter and continued to stare at it for a long moment before… chuckled???
The sound was foreign to his ears.
King Stannis was a hard man born from hard circumstances. He never smiled, even in his daughter's presence. However, his stern features did relax a bit when he was near her.
So, hearing him chuckle made Davos very curious about what was in that letter.
Finally, King Stannis put the letter down on the table, and he picked up the newspaper that came with the letter. After reading a section of the newspaper, he put it back on the table and looked toward him.
King Stannis remained silent for a while, mulling the words in his mind, and then finally spoke, "Domeric Bolton has taken Casterly Rock."
Those words were so out of his expectation that for a moment, he merely gaped at his King.
"Huh!?" he managed to let out at last before he shook his head and cleared his mind.
"How? When?… Wasn't he at Riverrun the last time we heard about him?" he asked.
"He was indeed." King Stannis said, and Davos could hear a hint of admiration in his voice.
"And in the time span of one month, he took Golden Tooth without anyone knowing, destroyed the Lannister army gathering outside Casterly Rock, and then took the castle, which everyone else said was impenetrable. Marvelous. Simply brilliant."
This was the first time he had heard his King praising someone so much. But he could understand why that was.
Casterly Rock was like Storms End in many ways.
It was only a decade and a half ago when the entirety of the Reach forces were stationed outside Storms End.
And King Stannis, who was a mere boy at that time, managed to hold the Castle against such a force with barely 1000 men for an entire year.
The Reach had over 60,000 men at that time, not to mention all the ships that surrounded them from the seaside.
So, the fact that Lord Bolton managed to take Casterly Rock with only 8000 men in the span of a few days was a remarkable feat indeed.
"As good as that news is, your grace… that doesn't solve our problem." He said and watched in silence as King Stannis' good mood disappeared almost instantly.
King Stannis turned and looked at him. "I know. That is why you'll be smuggling Lady Melisandre to the other side of the river tonight. This place where we have come for negotiations offers us an opportunity that we may not get again."
He almost grimaced at that.
He knew what was inside that Red Witch's womb. And he really, really wanted no part in this.
"Is there really no other way, your grace?" he asked, some of the desperation showing in his voice.
King Stannis didn't reply and simply stared at him. He already knew the answer.
There was no other way. No trick in the world would allow King Stannis to defeat a force 10 times his own.
In the end, he simply bowed. "I'll see it done, your grace."
King Stannis didn't reply, and he left the room with a heavy heart.
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Meanwhile, in almost every part of Westeros, Domeric's still-active shops or agents sold the Worldwide News newspaper daily.
Even in the lands where Domeric was at war, his newspaper was being sold and distributed secretly.
The only exception was King's Landing.
Domeric wanted the people in the Red Keep to hear the news from someone else first, and then read it in his newspaper.
This way, he could infuriate them twice.
Therefore, Domeric's reputation and deeds had spread throughout Westeros, except for King's Landing.
His nicknames, such as Blessed One, Chosen One, and even The Gift of the Gods, were on everyone's lips.
While the nobles discussed how Domeric Bolton had crossed the bridge he built in a week with his men and the Northern Host, annihilated the Lannister army at Riverrun with wildfire from wyverns, captured the Golden Tooth unnoticed, ambushed and destroyed the army outside the Casterly Rock in an hour, and captured the Rock after a few days of siege, the small folk were talking about something else entirely.
Domeric didn't consider it sufficient for his newspaper to be bought only by those who could afford it and were interested; he had assigned men to travel to villages and towns to read the newspaper's information to them.
Ultimately, Domeric's goal with his newspaper wasn't to make money, but to control information.
And what interested the small folk in the news they heard was how Lord Bolton treated small folk and what he did for them in the places he visited.
For the small folk, who mostly had never participated in war, didn't understand strategy, and didn't know much of Westeros' history, which castle fell or how a river was crossed didn't mean much to them.
Perhaps the only thing they cared about regarding the war was whether their lord's army was winning and whether enemy armies were advancing towards them.
Because these things determined the safety of their lives and whether new levies from their villages would be drafted into the war.
And if they didn't have such concerns, the parts of the news they focused on were those concerning other small folk.
Lord Bolton, unlike The Mountain, protected villages and provided food to them if needed, and even shared medicine with the seriously ill.
Even after capturing Casterly Rock, he chose not to attack Lannisport in order to avoid harming the small folk.
For the small folk, who had never encountered such a nobleman before, these stories were like a fairy tale.
And what the small folk living in Lundenhold, Lord Bolton's city, told the newspaper was more than a fairy tale.
Clean streets, high-paying jobs, three meals a day, houses that didn't leak in the rain and still warm in the cold weather, Bolton Laws protecting their rights, and courts run by the small folk that enforced those laws.
And in addition to all this, the small folk could save a portion of their surplus money and spend the rest on the city's various forms of entertainment, merchandise, and food.
If this wasn't paradise, then where was?
In their hearts, they all wished to have a lord like him, who would listen to their troubles and help them.
But they knew that a nobleman like Lord Bolton was just an exception. It would be foolish to expect all other nobles to be like him.
Their only hope was that perhaps one day Lord Bolton would pass through their village, and then they could see this Gift of the Gods.
If they had the means, they would have loved to go and live on Lord Bolton's lands, but even in peacetime, such a journey was dangerous and financially impossible for many small folk.
If only Lord Bolton were their king. Then, even if the other nobles ignored their problems, their king would do something for them, wouldn't he?
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Next Chapters' Name:
Ch.382: We Need to Try
Ch.383: A New Pawn & Aldrich Abomination
Ch.384: Time to Take Action