Life Weaver (ASOIAF / WORM-OC SI)

[Hordac]

LW 28

The captain's quarters filled one by one, heavy with lamplight and irritation.

Runa entered first, cloak half-thrown over her shoulders, eyes sharp despite the hour. "If this is about a loose crate or a drunken deckhand," she said coolly, "Ivar, I will curse your hair to fall off."

Hjalti followed, scowling, rubbing a hand over his face. "Hjalti was dreaming of fighting," he muttered. "Fire that behaved. Hjalti was winning! Waking Hjalti for nonsense will make Hjalti mad."

Erik came in last, hair still loose, expression unreadable but distinctly unimpressed. "You don't call meetings in the middle of the night unless there's an emergency," he said. "Is there an emergency?"

Ivar waited until the door was shut before answering. "Not yet."

Runa exhaled sharply. "Then this had better be worth it"

Stigr slipped in behind them, barefoot and grinning, looking far too awake. "Hey, at least the moon's nice tonight."

Runa shot him a look that could curdle milk. "You are the reason people throw others overboard."

Erik rapped his knuckles once against the table. The sound cut through the grumbling cleanly. "Enough."

Silence settled, reluctant but complete.

"Sit," he said. "All of you."

They did, or in Runa's case, leaned with obvious defiance.

Ivar's eyes locked onto Stigr. "Tell them."

Stigr scratched the back of his head, then grinned faintly, the expression jarringly light for the moment. "Right. So. Levi says we've got company."

Runa's eyes narrowed. "Define company."

"Five ships," Stigr said easily. "Far back. They're spread out but all of them have been following us ever since we left Braavos. Moving like they don't want to be seen, but also don't want to lose us."

Hjalti straightened. "How far?"

Stigr tilted his head, listening to something only he could hear. "Levi says far enough that you'd miss them if you weren't looking for trouble. Close enough that they can follow without being spotted easily."

Erik pushed off the wall. "You are sure?"

Stigr's grin faded, replaced by something older and stranger. "Levi know what he's seeing. He smarter than the other beasts"

A brief silence followed.

Runa broke it with a soft, humorless laugh. "Of course," she said. "We leave Braavos rich and intact, and suddenly the sea grows teeth."

Ivar leaned forward, fingers drumming once against the table. "Privateers," he said. "Most likely hired by Braavos"

Hjalti looked to Erik. "Orders?"

Runa spoke before he could. "Running only confirms we're worth chasing. Fighting four unknowns in open water is idiotic. And pretending this is coincidence is insulting."

Her eyes flicked to Ivar. "So what game are they playing?"

Ivar smiled, sharp and joyless. "The same one everyone plays when they smell blood. They want to know where we're going. What we're hiding. And whether we're weak."

Erik exhaled slowly. "Then we assume they're watching and waiting for an opening."

Ivar nodded. "Which means we don't give them one."

Hjalti's hand drifted to the hilt of his weapon. "Or we turn around and take one of them apart. Make an example."

Runa's gaze sharpened. "And announce to the rest that we noticed? No. Let them believe they're ghosts."

Ivar looked between them, eyes gleaming. "Good. Let them follow. Let them learn just enough to keep following us. Then we lure them into a trap they can't escape from and sink them one by one."

Erik shook his head, slow and deliberate.

"No," he said. "We don't sink them"

Runa's eyes flicked to him at once. Ivar's smile thinned.

"Why sink them," Erik continued calmly, "when they're presenting us with the perfect opportunity?"

Hjalti frowned. "Hjalti likes sinking," he said. "Sinking ends problems."

"It ends the opportunity for gathering information," Erik replied. "And wastes resources."

Ivar tilted his head, studying him. "You want prisoners."

"I want ships and prisoners both" Erik said. "Crews. Knowledge. Names. Who hired them. Who they report to. Where they think we're going and what they think we carry."

Runa's expression shifted, interest sharpening. "And when they don't talk?"

"They will," Erik said evenly. "Because we won't treat them like enemies. We'll treat them like men who made a bad calculation."

Ivar let out a low laugh. "You're assuming we can take four ships cleanly."

Erik met his gaze. "I'm assuming they underestimate us. Everyone does."

Hjalti scratched his beard. "Hjalti can board," he said. "Hjalti can take one ship alone."

Runa nodded slowly. "Captured ships mean deniability," she said. "Privateers vanish all the time. Especially incompetent ones."

Ivar's grin returned, wider now, more dangerous. "Fine," he said. "We don't sink them."

He leaned forward, palms on the table. "We take them on. Quietly."

Erik inclined his head once. "Exactly. And then we decide whether we keep the ships, sell them, or send them back carrying a message."

Runa's smile was thin and sharp. "Nothing terrifies the powerful like survivors who owe their lives to restraint."

Stigr beamed. "Levi will like this plan," he said. "It has drama."

Ivar straightened. "Then it's settled. We let them follow. We choose the ground. And when they think they've found their moment…"

He looked at each of them in turn.

"…they discover they were never the hunters."

The ship creaked softly around them, the sea whispering against the hull, already conspiring.

He turned back to Stigr. "Tell Levi to keep his distance and his eyes open."

Stigr's smile returned, wide and unbothered. "Already done."

The lamp flickered as the ship rolled, the sea murmuring against the hull like a held breath.

Four ships followed them through the dark, unaware that they had already been seen and their roles were soon about to be reversed.

------

For three weeks they let the distance hold.

The four ships remained behind them like patient scars on the horizon, never closing, never falling away. It was exactly what Erik wanted. Too far to force a fight, too close to resist temptation. Each day that passed carried them farther from Braavos and closer to home, where every captured hull would matter and every crewman could be spared.

They delayed the strike for a simple reason. Even victory had limits. Taking ships was useless if they lacked the hands to sail them, and Erik would not trade foresight for bravado. Better to wait, to thin the distance, to ensure that when the net closed it would not tear under its own weight.

Midway through the third week, they changed course.

Instead of turning west and then hugging the Westeros' coast northward as planned, Erik and Ivar redrew the route entirely. The Obsidian Leaf angled away from familiar waters, cutting a hard diagonal across the open sea. It shaved days off the journey, but it also carried risk. Deeper water. Fewer ships. Nowhere to hide if the weather turned or the pursuers chose to strike all at once.

The trailing ships followed without hesitation.

That, more than anything, confirmed Erik's suspicions. Sailors tended to fear going into deeper waters. Those who did were either desperate or ordered to continue at any cost.

The nights grew darker. The swells grew longer and heavier. The world narrowed to wind, water, and the thin thread of patience holding the hunt together.

The moon thinned with each passing dusk, shrinking from a pale coin to a ragged sliver, until the sea lay under a lid of darkness so complete it swallowed sound and distance alike. The four shadows behind them remained, patient and confident, never guessing that patience was being measured against them.

At the end of the fourth week when they were close to Weirstad, Ivar gave the word.

Lanterns were shuttered until the Obsidian Leaf became little more than a darker stain against the water. Oars were shipped and muffled, sail eased to a whisper. The ship slid sideways on the tide, silent as breath held in a throat.

Below deck, Erik moved among the crew.

"Eyes," he said simply.

His hand brushed foreheads, one after another. A brief warmth, a pressure behind the eyes, then the world changed. Darkness thinned. Edges sharpened. The sea glimmered faintly, every ripple outlined in ghostly contrast. Faces emerged from shadow, pupils wide, reflecting like those of hunting cats.

A murmur ran through the crew, cut short by Ivar's raised fist.

Ahead, one of the trailing galleys loomed, its silhouette careless, lanterns dim but present, oars resting. They had grown lazy.

"Boarding teams," Ivar whispered. "Go."

Small boats slipped into the water without a splash, oars dipping in perfect unison. Hjalti stood at the prow of the lead skiff, grin pale in the dark.

"Hjalti likes cat eyes," he murmured. "Now Hjalti can smash stupid foes just as well in the dark."

They reached the galley's flank unseen.

The first grenades thrown in didn't release fire, but with stink and smoke.

Clay spheres shattered against the deck, bursting into choking clouds of stench so foul it stole breath and thought alike. Shouts erupted instantly, confused and panicked, followed by retching. Before the crew could rally, a second volley arced in.

Smoke.

Thick, black, clinging smoke poured across the deck, swallowing lantern light, turning the galley into a blind, coughing thing adrift in the dark. Men stumbled, colliding with one another, shouting orders no one could see to follow.

Then the sticky grenades struck.

They slapped wetly against wood, against railings, against armor, hardening in seconds, binding limbs, freezing oars, sealing hatches. One man went down screaming as his feet glued to the deck. Another tore at his hands, only to trap them together.

And then Erik's crew was among them. Their cat eyes allowed them to see n the dark and the wet rags tied in front of thoer mouth prevented them form becoming victims of their own grenades.

They moved like ghosts.

Where the enemy saw nothing but darkness and smoke, Erik's people saw everything. Cat-bright eyes cut through the gloom. Blades struck hilts, not throats. Clubs cracked against shoulders. Men were disarmed, tripped, pinned before they understood they were under attack.

Hjalti vaulted the rail, taking two men down with him in a tangle of limbs and curses. "Hjalti says drop your arms and give up," he growled, planting a knee. "Or Hjalti hacks off your arms."

At the helm, Ivar appeared out of the smoke, grin white and feral. He drove the captain backward with the flat of his blade, kicked his legs from under him, and pressed steel to his throat.

"Quiet," Ivar whispered. "You're already beaten."

Within minutes it was over.

The smoke thinned. The stench lingered. The deck was a chaos of bound men, coughing and groaning, eyes wide with shock. A handful nursed bruises or shallow cuts. Two of Erik's crew sat against the rail, bloodied but grinning, injuries already being tended.

No bodies floated in the water.

No alarm reached the other ships.

The captured galley drifted under new hands as lines were thrown and secured. The Obsidian Leaf slid alongside like a predator reclaiming its kill.

Erik stepped onto the enemy deck and looked around once, calm as ever.

"One," he said quietly.

Far out in the dark, three more ships sailed on, unaware that the tables had been turned and it was the hunters that were being hunted.

The second galley fell much the same way.

Darkness, silence, then filth and smoke. Grenades burst and spread panic faster than flame ever could. Sticky resin locked feet to planks and sealed hatches before a single clear order could be given. Cat-eyed figures moved through the chaos with brutal restraint, breaking resistance without breaking bodies. When it was over, the deck was theirs, the enemy bound and coughing, and not a single corpse marked the water.

Their only cost was a handful of bruises, a cracked rib, a deep cut along one forearm. Erik moved among them without ceremony, light flaring briefly beneath his hands as pain faded and flesh knit. Within minutes, the injured were back on their feet.

Then the light changed.

The horizon paled. Smoke thinned into gray wisps. And too late, the third ship saw.

A horn sounded, harsh and urgent, cutting across the water. The third galley swung hard, oars biting, turning not toward the Obsidian Leaf but toward its remaining ally.

Runa swore softly. "Dawn," she said.

Erik was already moving. "No," he replied. "That was expected."

Orders snapped out fast and clean. Only a skeleton crew remained aboard the second captured ship, just enough to finish binding prisoners and hold the deck. The rest withdrew at once, skiffs racing back to the Obsidian Leaf as the two enemy galleys closed ranks and surged forward together.

They meant to overwhelm the prize before Erik could return.

They did not make it halfway.

"Stigr," Erik said, already gripping the rail. "Now."

Stigr's grin was wild and eager. He planted his feet, eyes rolling back as the sea itself seemed to inhale.

Levi answered.

Far beneath the surface, something vast shifted. The water ahead of the advancing galleys bulged unnaturally, the swell rising too fast, too steep. Sailors shouted warnings. Oars faltered.

Then the wave rose.

It was not a storm surge or a rolling swell, but a single, towering wall of water driven by living force. The sea heaved upward as if punched from below, the crest curling and darkening as it rushed toward the ships.

The first galley barely had time to turn its bow before the wave struck.

The impact was thunderous. The ship reeled sideways, oars snapping, men thrown screaming across the deck. The second ship slammed into the trough behind it, masts groaning, rigging tearing as water poured over the rails. One vessel nearly capsized outright, saved only by frantic ballast dumping and pure luck.

Both ships lost way at once.

They wallowed, decks awash, formations shattered, crews scrambling just to stay upright.

"That buys us time," Ivar said, teeth bared in delight.

"More than time," Erik replied.

The Obsidian Leaf surged forward, sails catching, oars biting deep. Boarding hooks were readied. Grenades were brought up again, fresh and waiting.

Ahead, the enemy ships struggled in the aftermath of the leviathan's passing, broken, disordered, and very suddenly aware that they were no longer advancing.

They were about to be taken.

The Obsidian Leaf cut through the churned water like a blade through flesh.

The enemy crews were still fighting the sea when the first grenades flew.

Stink burst across soaked decks, mixing with salt and bilge until men gagged and slipped on their own panic. Smoke followed, thick and oily, clinging low where the wind could not strip it away. Shouts dissolved into coughing. Orders turned into screams.

"Again," Ivar barked, laughing as another wave of chaos bloomed.

Boarding lines snapped tight. Hooks bit into rail and mast. The Obsidian Leaf slammed alongside the nearer galley, hulls grinding as Erik's crew poured across.

Cat eyes flared in the half-light of dawn, cutting through smoke and spray alike. Wet rags were pulled tight. The enemy, already shaken by the leviathan's strike, broke almost instantly. Men tried to run and found their feet glued fast. Others raised weapons only to have them torn from their hands and hurled aside.

Hjalti hit the deck like a falling hammer. And with a roar, flattened one man with a shield bash and driving another to his knees.

Ivar moved faster than seemed possible, a pale blur between bodies. He struck tendons, wrists, hilts. Pain, not death. Control, not slaughter. Wherever he went, resistance collapsed into submission.

On the second galley, the wave had done even more damage. Waterlogged oars hung uselessly. Men clung to rigging as Erik himself crossed over, boots splashing through pooled seawater. A sailor lunged at him in blind terror.

'Time for some psychological warfare' he thought 'I'll scare them into surrendering'

Erik caught the man's wrist and twisted. Bones cracked. The knife hit the deck along with the sailor.

"Enough," Erik said, his voice calm and carrying even through the smoke.

For a heartbeat, nothing moved.

Then something changed.

A low, unfamiliar tension rippled through Erik's frame, subtle at first, like a tightening coil. Muscles thickened beneath skin, cords standing out along his forearms and neck as his biotinkered flesh answered his will. The fatigue of battle vanished from his posture, replaced by effortless, predatory strength that wouldnnot last for long but was perfect for the intimidating show he was about to pull off.

The injured sailor who had lunged at him tried to crawl away.

Erik did not let him.

He reached out, closed one hand around the man's throat, and lifted.

Not a shove. Not a struggle. Just a smooth, casual rise, until the man's boots dangled a full arm's length above the deck. He kicked once, weakly, hands clawing at Erik's wrist, eyes wide with dawning terror.

Erik did not look strained. He did not even look angry.

At the same time, the sea behind him moved.

The water bulged and parted as Levi surfaced, vast and impossible, its blackened bulk rising like a living cliff just off the galley's stern. Wet flesh gleamed in the newborn light. A massive eye broke the surface, fixed on the ship.

Then came the sound.

A deep, echoing click rolled across the water, followed by a long, mournful moan that vibrated through hull and bone alike. The sea itself seemed to recoil from it.

Men froze.

Some dropped to their knees. Others stared over the rail in wordless horror, weapons slipping from numb fingers.

Erik raised the man in his grip a little higher, just enough to be unmistakable, and finally spoke again.

His gaze swept the deck, cold and absolute.

"Surrender. Drop every weapon and lie down flat on the ground. Do it now, and you might walk away from this alive"

His fingers tightened just enough to make the man scramble more desperately making the lesson clear.

"Resist," Erik continued, voice still calm, "and you will learn how small a ship feels when the sea itself decides it doesn't like you."

Behind him, Levi let out another rolling moan, closer this time, the sound reverberating through the planks beneath their feet.

The man in Erik's hand choked once.

Then Erik threw him casually and the man flew a few meters and struck the mast , the cracking sounds of even more bones breaking was heard clearly.

The sailor collapsed in a heap, gasping, alive.

Weapons hit the deck in a clattering rush.

Men dropped flat where they stood, arms spread, faces pressed to wet planks. Others scrambled to do the same, shouting surrender over one another in hoarse, panicked voices.

Within seconds, there was no resistance left to break.

Erik let the strength drain from his body as quietly as it had come. Levi sank back beneath the surface, the sea smoothing over him as if he had never been there at all.

Silence fell, broken only by labored breathing and the creak of timbers. Erik's crew quickly took over , tyring the prisoners and rendering first aid.

Ivar let out a low, appreciative laugh.
"Well," he said. "That was efficient."

Erik turned away, already done with it.

"Bind them," he ordered. "We're finished here."

Minutes later, it was done.

Both ships were secured. Crews bound. Wounded tended on both sides. Erik moved from man to man, sealing gashes, setting breaks, pulling sailors back from the edge of shock whether they wore his colors or not. No one died. No one needed to.

From the rail of the Obsidian Leaf, Runa watched the last prisoners tied off and exhaled slowly. "Four ships," she murmured. "Taken intact."

Ivar laughed outright, sharp and delighted. "Good. Let their masters wonder where their hunters went. They'll think they ran off with our loot"

Erik looked out over the captured vessels, sails slack, decks quiet at last. four prizes. four crews.

"Secure them," he said.

The sea settled behind them, smooth and innocent once more, as if it had not just risen to swallow ships at his command.

Ivar surveyed the captured ships, counting masts, hulls, and men with a veteran's eye. The thrill had faded, replaced by cold arithmetic.

"We can't sail five ships," he said at last, voice sharp with irritation. "Not with this crew. Not even close. It's a fantasy. An impossible one"

Runa folded her arms, expression cool and cutting. "I agree with the madman for once," she said dryly. "Unless you plan to conjure sailors out of seawater. Even stripped to skeleton crews, we're short. Someone will make a mistake."

Ivar turned to Erik. "We take what we can, scuttle the rest, or tow one at best. Anything else is gambling with everything."

Erik didn't reply. He simply watched the water for a moment, his mind processing dozens of ideas before settling on one .He then turned back to them. "It's possible."

Runa arched a brow. "That's not an explanation. That's a provocation."

Erik met her gaze evenly. "You like those."

She smirked despite herself.

He raised his voice, calm but carrying. "Bring everyone we took aboard in Braavos. All of them."

Ivar scoffed. "They're not sailors."

"They're not helpless either," Erik said. "And they'll learn faster than you think when I implant sailor's memories and instincts in them"

Within the hour, they stood assembled. The craftsmen. The dockhands. The down-on-their-luck former citizens of Braavos. Erik moved among them, speaking plainly, dividing them with practiced efficiency all the while implanting sailor memories with a single tap on the forehead

He mixed them deliberately. Veterans from the Obsidian Leaf paired with two or three from Braavos. Knowledge distributed, not concentrated. No ship left without experienced hands. No newcomer left without guidance.

When he was done, the expanded crew was split four ways and sent to the captured galleys.

Barely enough.

Lines were cast. Sails raised cautiously. Each ship moved uncertainly at first, then steadied as shouted orders found rhythm. It wasn't elegant. It wasn't safe.

But it worked.

Ivar studied the result, teeth bared in reluctant admiration. "Barely enough," he said. "If one man slips, the whole thing falls apart."

"That's true of everything worth doing," Erik replied.

"It's crazy" Ivar stated " but crazy enough that it might just work"

Ivar laughed, sharp and pleased. "You planned this back in Braavos."

"I plan for many things," Erik corrected. "and as many contingencies as possible"

Ivar's gaze shifted back to the Obsidian Leaf. "You've stripped us down to bone," he said. "What about our ship?"

Erik turned and pointed.

Stigr stood at the bow, feet planted, grinning like a man about to perform a trick he'd been saving. The sea around the hull was already stirring, currents bending unnaturally, as if something vast was circling just below.

"Levi alone," Erik said evenly, "is more than enough to pull us to Weirstad."

As if summoned by his name, the water surged forward. The Obsidian Leaf lurched not violently, but decisively as an immense force took hold beneath her keel. The ship began to move without oars, without wind, cutting through the sea as if drawn by an invisible chain.

Stigr laughed, wide and unbothered. "He likes helping," he said.

Runa stared at the wake, then shook her head slowly. "We're going to rewrite half the naval assumptions of this world," she murmured.

Ivar laughed, sharp and delighted. "Five ships," he said. "Captured, crewed, and moving."

He clapped Erik once on the shoulder. "Impossible," he admitted. "Apparently."

Erik watched the small fleet align, four captured galleys and the Obsidian Leaf at their heart, drawn forward by something ancient and unseen.

"Set course," he said. "We're going home."

----

Author notes

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[Hordac]

LW 29

The Caldera cliffs of Weirstad rose from the morning mist like something half-remembered from a dream.

When the horns sounded from the watchtowers, the harbor answered at once. Bells rang. Doors burst open. People poured down toward the docks in a tide of motion and disbelief as five ships came into view where only one should have been.

At the head of them all, the Obsidian Leaf glided forward, scarred, proud, and unmistakably hers.

For a long moment there was stunned silence.

Then the cheering began.

It rolled across the water, raw and unrestrained. Men shouted names. Women wept openly. Children ran along the quay pointing at the captured galleys as if afraid they might vanish if they blinked.

Runa stood at the rail, arms folded, lips curved into a rare, genuine smile. "I suppose this is what success looks like," she murmured.

Erik said nothing. He watched faces instead. Recognition. Relief. Hope.

On the docks, Korb was already pushing forward, dark hair tied back, he looked tired and haggard but eyes were sharp despite the emotion he clearly despised showing. He stopped at the water's edge, hands resting on the pommel of his sword, and snorted.

"You go away on a single ship," Korb said dryly, "and come back with a small fleet. Subtle as ever."

Erik stepped down onto the quay. "You look tired."

"I am" Korb grunted. "and you look like trouble found you. And lost."

Behind him, Gonir leapt onto a crate, arms flung wide, laughing like a madman. "Five ships!" he crowed. "Five! I told them the sea likes us. I told them!"

Helga shoved past him, tears streaking freely down her face as she seized Erik in a fierce motherly embrace. "Don't ever do that again," she said, voice breaking.

Skaldi clapped Erik on the shoulder hard enough to make lesser men stagger. "You bring spoils, ships, and stories," he boomed. "The gods are paying attention now."

Halldis approached more quietly, eyes already cataloging hulls, rigging, crews. "Captured intact," she noted. "No burn marks. No blood in the water." She glanced at Erik. "Impressive restraint."

Yrsa laughed as she wiped her eyes. "Restraint or not, the kitchens will be very tonight. Won't they Sigrun?"

"Aye" Sigrun replied happily "We'll cook up a mighty feast in honor your safe return. I've been wanting to try a few new recipes too!"

Helga was last.

She didn't speak at first. She simply stepped forward and placed both hands on Erik's face, studying him as if to make sure he was real. Then she pulled him into a tight embrace.

"You're home," she said softly.

"Yes," Erik replied, and for the first time since Braavos, the word felt heavy with meaning.

The days that followed were a controlled kind of chaos, the sort that only looked unruly to those who did not understand what they were seeing. The Braavosi recruits were settled carefully, not crammed into barracks or cast aside to fend for themselves, but placed with intent and cinsideration. Temporary halls went up first, then permanent workshops as timber and stone were brought in. Existing buildings were expanded, walls knocked through, floors reinforced to bear heavier tools.

Erik had put strict building codes that everyone had to follow. This allowed for ground floor and basements to build wide and strong with large gaps between so that future expansion would happened both outward as well as upward. Fire safety was also considered and appropriate measure were enacted and taught.

Weirstad had never maintained true metalworking on this scale. That changed immediately. Kate and her rejuvenated father, Luca, were given full authority over raising a forge complex near the river, where water, charcoal, and transport met. They chose the site themselves, pacing the ground, testing the wind, arguing loudly over chimney height and draw while Erik listened without interruption.

The forge was built from nothing. A waist-high hearth was laid first, stone stacked and mortared, its surface coated thick with clay mixed with straw until it could drink heat without cracking. Luca oversaw the shaping of the tuyere, a clay-and-stone throat set deep into the hearth to drive air directly into the heart of the fire. "If the breath isn't true," he warned the apprentices, "you'll never reach welding heat."

Bellows came next. Two great wooden frames were carved and jointed, their teardrop shapes sealed with stitched hide that smelled of oil and smoke. They were mounted behind the hearth and tested by hand, each pull forcing a steady stream of air through the tuyere until the charcoal burned white-hot. Kate adjusted the rhythm herself, nodding only when the fire responded properly.

For the anvil, they sank a massive hardwood log deep into the earth to drink the shock of every blow. Into it they drove a heavy iron bickern, its horn polished smooth by years of use, hauled from Braavos and reforged to suit Weirstad's needs. Until more anvils could be made, a flat stone served for the first work, and Luca insisted on it. From that crude surface, they forged their own hammers and tongs, then used those to create better tools, stakes, and swages, each piece improving the next.

The workshop rose around the forge last. High ceilings. Wide doors. Open vents cut into the walls so smoke and heat could escape instead of poisoning the men within. Nothing decorative. Everything purposeful. Charcoal bins lined one wall. Water troughs the other. By the time the roof beams were set, the forge was already alive.

Apprentices were assigned at once, not only as helpers, but students as well. Every artisan was given two or three, sometimes more, placed under sharp-eyed supervision. Mistakes were allowed, but repeated ignorance was not. Warehouses filled quickly. Imported looms from Braavos were assembled piece by piece, then taken apart again under watchful eyes as local craftsmen sketched every joint and tension point. Within days, rough copies began to appear beside the originals, clumsier at first, then steadily improving.

Counting tables were set up in long rows, scribes learning to track materials as carefully as coin. Sailmakers claimed open yards where canvas could be stretched and cut in the wind. Ropeworkers strung long frames along the docks, testing twists and tar blends.

Jewelry makers were given gold and silver along with pearls and some other precious stones to make into expensive jewelry that could be exported.

Everywhere, hands moved with purpose.

Erik walked through it all daily.

"No idle talents," he told Korb as they watched a artisan demonstrate a Braavosi construction trick to three wide-eyed apprentices. "And no wasted knowledge."

A mandatory language hall was established within the week. Newcomers were taught the old tongue of Weirstad, while local apprentices and sailors learned Braavosi alongside them. Commands, measurements, and tools were named in both languages until misunderstanding became rare and silence became suspicious. Laughter carried through the halls as accents clashed and blended.

Each Braavosi was paired deliberately with several locals, never allowed to work alone for long. Skills were shared slowly, intentionally, broken down into steps and reasons rather than secrets. Techniques were questioned, tested, and adapted to Weirstad's materials and climate. What worked was kept. What failed was recorded and discarded.

By the end of the first tenday, it was no longer clear which methods were Braavosi and which were Weirstad's. They had begun to merge and evolve.

And Weirstad learned faster than it ever had before.

Gonir wandered through it all like a delighted ghost, offering advice no one asked for and occasionally brilliant insights no one expected.

"This place is changing," he told Runa one evening, watching sparks rise from the forges. "You can hear it, if you listen."

Runa folded her arms, eyes reflecting firelight. "I know. The question is whether the world will let it."

----

Celebration did not mean mercy.

Once the cheering faded and the ships were secured, the harder work began.

Over six hundred men were marched from the captured galleys and penned in one of the larger caves with a single enterance. Sun-hardened sell sails. Privateers with mismatched armor, scarred hands, and eyes that measured exits by instinct. Most were not even Braavosi. Men loyal to coin, captains, or nothing at all.

Korb stood with Erik before them, arms crossed, expression carved from stone.

"Six hundred mouths," Korb muttered. "And six hundred knives."

Erik nodded once. "Which is why they get the same choice as the raiders. Penance or death. They'll be useful either way"

The crowd quieted as Erik stepped forward, voice carrying without strain.

"You are not prisoners," he said. "Here in Weirstad, we don't believe in prisons that fatten up lazy criminals while other toil"

Murmurs rippled.

The crowd quieted as Erik stepped forward, his presence alone enough to still the restless shuffling. He did not raise his voice. He did not need to. When he spoke, his words carried across the square with calm, measured certainty.

"You are not prisoners," he said. "Weirstad does not keep cages to feed idle criminals while others bleed and work to keep them alive."

A low murmur rolled through the assembled sellsails, wary and uncertain.

"You have three paths before you," Erik continued, unhurried. "Choose carefully, because here, choice still matters."

He lifted one hand, extending a single finger.

"First. Trial by combat. You may face me, or one of my chosen, alone. No tricks. No mercy asked. If the gods judge you worthy and you win, you walk out of Weirstad free."

A few men laughed, sharp and uneasy, trying to pretend bravery where none truly lived. No one stepped forward.

Erik raised a second finger.

"Second. Refuse." His tone did not change. "You will be sacrificed. Your blood and life will be given to the weirwood groves that protect this city. You will not be remembered, but you will be useful."

The laughter died as if cut with a blade. Men swallowed. Eyes shifted. The weight of the words settled like frost.

Then Erik lifted his third finger.

"Third. Penance."

He let the silence stretch before continuing.

"You will serve Weirstad for twenty years. You will swallow a weirwood penance seed. It will take root in you. It will spread through your flesh, bind your will to this city, and make you ours."

A ripple of fear passed through the crowd.

"You break your oath," Erik said softly, "and it breaks you. Completely."

He lowered his hand.

"Serve well, and when your years are done, you will have a choice again. Stay, and become citizens of Weirstad. Leave, and go free with coin earned by honest work."

His gaze swept over them, steady and unyielding.

"These are not threats," Erik said. "They are terms. Decide."

A privateer near the front spat. "And why would any of us trust that?"

Erik met his eyes. "Because you're alive to ask. Now choose and choose wisely"

Silence stretched.

One man stepped forward. Big. Confident. Scar across his jaw. "I'll fight," he said. "I've beaten worse than you."

They cleared a ring. Weapons were distributed

It lasted less than a minute.

The second challenger lasted even less.

By the tenth duel, no one was smiling.

By the twentieth, men were looking at the ground.

In the end, only fifty or so still refused to kneel.

They fought. They lost. Every single one.

Those who fell were bound and taken away, marked for later sacrifice. No cheers followed them. Only grim acceptance.

The rest of them that totaled over five hundred men knelt.

One by one, they swallowed the penance seed.

Some trembled. Some cursed. Some stared straight ahead as the weirwood bond settled into their blood, quiet and absolute.

Gonir watched with fascination, head tilted. "Such a polite little monster," he whispered to Skaldi. "Wood that eats lies. Vines that slip in veins and grips the hearts and souls"

Skaldi grunted. "I don't like it but I can't argue with the results. Some of my best soldiers are the penanced"

Korb spoke quietly to Erik as the last of them were processed. "They'll serve. But they won't love this place. Atleast not in the beginning."

"They don't need to," Erik replied. "They need to sail. We lacked veteran sailors. Now we have plenty"

And sail they would.

The new sailors were deliberately mixed, never allowed to form old crews or follow old captains. Obsidian Leaf veterans were seeded among them. Commands split. Loyalties fractured and reforged by design.

Within days, four ships were crewed properly.

Not barely.

Properly.

Ivar reviewed the rosters and allowed herself a rare nod. "Experienced hands. Weather-wise. Battle-tested. Now we have the beginnings of a proper fleet"

Runa glanced toward the harbor where the repainted black ships rocked gently. "You just turned an enemy fleet into a backbone."

Erik watched the sails. "They were never loyal to begin with."

Helga stepped beside him. "And if they try to turn?"

"They won't, They can't" Erik said simply.

ne of the other massive undertakings that accelerated alongside the workshops was timber cutting for export to Braavos, and with it came the quiet, necessary labor of charcoal making for metalworking. The forests west of Weirstad, threaded through by the Antler River, were worked with deliberate restraint. Trees were felled in marked sections, chosen for straight grain and strength rather than speed. Branches were stripped where they fell, bark scored and trimmed, and the green logs slid into the river in controlled releases, never enough to choke the current or foul the flow.

Not all the wood went to the water. Harder cuts and off-length pieces were stacked in covered pits deeper in the forest, where charcoal burners sealed them beneath earth and turf. Slow, smothered fires were lit and watched for days, then weeks, until the wood surrendered everything but its carbon. When the pits were opened, blackened charcoal was bagged and hauled downriver by cart and barge, light in weight but rich in heat, enough to feed the new forges without draining the shipwright's timber.

River Antler Guides took over the floating logs. They rode the moving wood in narrow skiffs, boots wet, poles and hooks always in hand, steering, separating, and recovering strays before jams could form. Shouted signals echoed from bank to bank as the logs were coaxed into the river's deeper channels. After only a few days of steady work, the Antler itself seemed trained, carrying timber westward with a predictability that felt almost unnatural.

At the river's mouth, the flow slowed beneath the curving stone piers that guarded the estuary like the tines of a great antler. There the timber was gathered, counted, and sorted again. Logs were bound into massive sea-rafts, each one a floating lattice of forest, lashed tight with resin-sealed rope and iron clamps driven home by mallet and wedge as the greater timbers were prepared for the long pull toward Braavos.

-------

Two months later

Two months of hard work later, the next shipment for Braavos was ready.

Timber was the heart of it. Most of Weirstad's effort had gone into logging and preparing the great trunks for transport, selecting straight-grained giants and working them down with care rather than haste. The first products to come out of the newly raised forges were not weapons, but tools: steel saws forged long and thin, their teeth cut true and hardened for the lumber crews upriver. With them, the work sped up, cleaner and more precise, each tree yielding more usable wood than before.

Alongside the timber went the goods Weirstad had already become known for. Carbon fibre armor and weapons, light and unnervingly strong, were packed in oiled wrappings. Bundles of rare animal pelts were stacked deep in the holds, each one carefully cured. Chests of gold and silver jewelry followed, worked into clean, deliberate designs and set with pearls taken from cold waters, understated enough to intrigue, valuable enough to command attention.

By the time the cargo was tallied and sealed, the docks were crowded with stacked wealth and quiet confidence. This was no desperate venture or hopeful gamble. It was the measured output of a system that had learned to make trade goods itself and now intended to sell it to one of the richest cities in the world.

The timber sea-rafts waited at the mouth of the Antler, vast floating lattices of forest bound tight with iron and resin. When Stigr Warged with his animal and whispered the call, the sea itself seemed to listen.

Levi rose.

The leviathan did not strain against the rafts. He pulled forward, and the water followed him. Tow-lines fanned out from his harness, drawing the timber islands into his wake as if they belonged there. Waves flattened. Wind lost its voice. What should have been an unwieldy, impossible cargo crossed open water with steady, terrifying inevitability.

From the quarterdeck of the Obsidian Leaf, Ivar watched in open fascination, his grin sharp and restless.
"A forest that walks on water," he said. "If I hadn't seen it with my own eyes, I'd have a difficult time believing it."

Erik stood beside him, hands resting on the rail, eyes on the moving rafts.
"Just be careful in Braavos" Erik advised "Don't take risks. It's not worth it"

Ivar turned his head slowly, studying Erik's profile, amusement flickering into something sharper.
"Me? Careful," he repeated, tasting the word. "You know I've never been very good at that."

"That's exactly why I'm saying it," Erik replied "You're not going there to rile them up. You're going there to sell wood and goods and leave with coin. Nothing more. Remember why you're going."

Ivar laughed under his breath.
"Oh, I remember," he said. "I just enjoy walking close to the edge."

"Not this time Ivar" Erik stated clearly "You'll get the chance to have fun after this. For now, play it safe"

"Fine" Ivar groused "Ruin all my fun"

The Obsidian Leaf, captained by Ivar, sailed alongside the moving forest, close enough to guard and guide, far enough to avoid Levi's churn. Her holds carried finer trade goods, worked materials, tools, and sealed chests from Weirstad's workshops. Stigr stood at the bow, half in the world of men and half elsewhere, his will riding the leviathan's mind. When Levi drifted too shallow or too fast, Stigr corrected him with a thought. When currents shifted, Levi adjusted without command.

From a distance, it looked like a myth unfolding in plain sight. A ship escorting a forest across the sea. A beast older than sail towing wealth no navy could seize.

Author notes

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[Hordac]

LW 30

The weeks that followed were spent not in spectacle or expansion, but in the quieter, harder work of assimilation.

The penanced sailors were deliberately kept ashore, housed within the city rather than sent back to sea. Officially, it was to keep an eye on them. In truth, it was just as much to force familiarity and find the troublemakers. They worked the docks, hauled timber, learned new routes through streets that had once felt hostile, and shared meals in common halls instead of eating apart. Day by day, Weirstad stopped feeling like a sentence and began to feel like a place. The defiant stubborn ones were separated and posted in placed where a more careful eye can be kept on them. Not that the Penance seed symbiote needed it but redundancy was always good to have.

Erik made no speeches about redemption. He didn't need to. The hope was simple and practical: that most of them would change their minds. That they would grow used to the rhythm of the city, to steady work and predictable nights, and perhaps even grow to like it. At the subtle hinting of Helga to her more zealous followers many found themselves invited into households, into shared laughter, into the beginnings of something resembling a future. Those unhappy with their profession were quietly encouraged to apprentice under locals and use this chance to find a career they liked. A few began to speak of staying, of taking partners, of putting down roots where none had been intended.

The same care was taken with the down on their luck Braavosi artisans and skilled workers brought from Braavos. They were not isolated or set apart as foreign specialists. Instead, they were woven deliberately into existing workshops, paired with local hands, their methods observed, questioned, and slowly adopted. Some new workshops that had to be built were given many locals as apprentices. Differences in technique became conversations instead of barriers. Accents softened. Habits blended. Pride gave way to mutual respect.

Erik insisted on it being done this way. No enclaves. No divisions. No guilds. If Weirstad was to grow, it would do so as a single body, not a collection of competing parts that impeded progress.

He wanted every newcomer whether they be sailor, smith, scribe, or weaver to feel that this was not a temporary shelter or an imposed exile. He wanted them to look around, after weeks of shared labor and shared nights, and realize they were no longer guests. They were not treated as captured assets or borrowed hands but equal members of a free society that was trying its best to be above discrimination of any sort. Each craft was given space, materials, and apprentices. Everyone had equally great opportunity to grow and fulfill their dreams.

Painters and sculptors were settled near the river light, where stone dust and pigments could be washed away easily. Goldsmiths worked beside pearl traders, refining techniques that blended Braavosi delicacy with Weirstad's heavier northern aesthetics. Woodcarvers shared long halls with architects, their sketches pinned beside beams and scale models as new districts slowly took shape.

Textile sectors also bloomed. Tailors, spinners, weavers, auroch and yak wool workers, and embroiderers working side by side. New improved looms that were copied, improved, and sometimes broken, filled the air with constant motion. Patterns changed. Styles softened. Weirstad began to look like a city.

Metal rang from dawn to dusk. Blacksmiths, metalworkers, armorers, and tin workers expanded Kate and Luca's forges into a complex of heat and sound. Nearby, stonemasons, bricklayers, and carpenters raised permanent structures instead of temporary sheds, buildings meant to last generations, not seasons.

Apothecaries and pigment makers took over a cluster of stone rooms near the groves, cataloguing plants, resins, and powders. Leatherworkers of every specialization found purpose. Cordwainers crafting fine shoes, shoemakers and cobblers dividing labor cleanly, saddlers and glovers shaping luxury and utility alike. Girdlers, botteliers, scabbard-makers, thongers, and bookbinders turned hides into everything a growing city needed. Even earthenware craftsmen were brought in, their kilns glowing at night like low stars.

And then came the moneyers, the coin makers. The mint was established within the giant hybrid Heart Tree itself, built in one of it its vast hollowed interior chambers to keep it close at hand and secure against theft and tampering. Deep root chambers were hollowed and reinforced with stone and iron, their entrances hidden behind living bark and guarded day and night. The tree's sheer mass shielded the mint from fire, frost, and forced entry, while its living presence discouraged carelessness and corruption alike.

Here, metal was weighed, tested, and struck under constant watch. Every die was accounted for. Every blank counted. Nothing entered or left without record

Gold and silver were brought under heavy guard, carried in locked chests and watched by his most loyal men. Each bar was weighed twice, tested for purity, then broken and fed to the crucibles. The metal flowed bright and clean, poured into molds cut to exact measure. When the blanks cooled, new dies were brought out that were simple in design, deliberate in meaning and difficult to counterfeit.

One face bore the mark of the heartwood with a face in the trunk, unmistakable even when worn thin. The other was etched with runes of durability and attraction, worked subtly into the metal itself. They were not merely decorative. The runes strengthened the coin against wear and corrosion and gave it a faint, almost unconscious pull, something that made the hand reluctant to let it go. Coins meant to last. Coins meant to circulate. Coins meant to be chosen, again and again, over any other measure of worth. So that eventually it would become the preferred currency for international trade.

It was the first large-scale deployment of magic runes Weirstad had ever attempted, and it did not come easily. Eldri Runetongue labored for weeks over wax molds and test blanks, arguing late into the night with Runa, while Bloom of the Children of the Forest corrected them both in soft, patient tones older than their language. The challenge was not power, but restraint. The runic lattice had to be compact enough to fit within the thin skin of a coin, subtle enough not to flare or draw attention, and stable enough to feed on nothing more than the faint ambient energies that permeated the air of Planetos itself.

Dozens of designs failed. Some cracked the metal. Others drank too deeply and warped. A few worked too well, clinging to hands so stubbornly they had to be pried loose with a knife. In the end, they found balance: a nested pattern, shallow but precise, that sipped rather than consumed, reinforcing without dominating. When the first successful coins were struck and cooled, the runes went quiet, settling into the metal like something that had always belonged there.

Weirstad's money was not large-scale showy magic like that of the Valyrians.
It was patient magic that was hidden in plain sight.
And it would travel farther than any spell ever cast in a single night.

"These coins are the first step in creating our economy," Erik said as the first blanks were struck, the sharp ring of metal echoing through the mint. He watched closely, not the coin, but the faces around him. "The free folk are used to barter, meat for grain, labor for shelter. Coin will feel like a trick to them at first."

He picked one up, turning it between his fingers so the light caught the runes.
"So it must never be a trick. Anyone who holds one of these should know exactly where it came from, why it's worth something, and that it will still be worth something centuries from now."

One of the moneyers frowned thoughtfully. "Trust won't come quickly."

"No," Erik agreed calmly. "But consistency builds faster than fear. Fixed weights. Fixed purity. No debasement. No sudden changes." His eyes hardened slightly. "And anyone caught shaving, clipping, or falsifying my coin will wish they'd chosen sacrifice instead."

That earned a few thin smiles.

The accountants exchanged glances, already thinking in columns and ledgers, supply and flow. They understood what Erik was building, not just currency, but control without chains. A system that rewarded honesty, punished greed, and made Weirstad the quiet center of trade whether merchants admitted it or not.

The hammers fell again.
Coin by coin, an economy was born.

For now, they struck only three coins, simple in concept and absolute in clarity. Gold, silver, and bronze. No confusing weights, no shifting ratios, no hidden tricks meant to favor the powerful over the poor. Each denomination followed a strict factor of one hundred. One hundred bronze coins equaled a single silver. One hundred silver coins equaled a single gold.

The simplicity was deliberate.

Bronze was meant for daily life. Wages, food, tools, ferry fares, and drink. Heavy enough in the hand to feel real, common enough that no one feared spending it. Silver was the measure of craft and trade, used for finished goods, contracts, and shipments that crossed borders. Gold was rarer, reserved for ships, land, tribute, and long-distance exchange, a store of value that could travel anywhere and be trusted.

Each coin shared the same language of symbols and runes, scaled carefully so that no matter the metal, the promise remained identical. A bronze coin did not pretend to be a silver one, and silver never masqueraded as gold. Weight, size, and color made deception difficult, while the runes made counterfeiting impossible.

Erik insisted the ratios never change.

"People can learn numbers," he told the moneyers. "We will not let them learn mistrust. Once you break the scale, you break belief."

So Weirstad's economy began not with abundance, but with certainty. A child could count it. A sailor could trust it. A foreign merchant could test it and know its worth without ever hearing Weirstad's name spoken aloud. And as the coins passed from hand to hand, from port to port, they carried more than value with them.

They would carried the idea that this city meant what it made. It would become one of the many ways Weirstad would become known of quality and trust.

Every artisan was given a workshop. Every workshop was given apprentices. No skill remained isolated. No knowledge was hoarded. Weirstad did not grow fast, but it grew wide—interlocked, layered, and stubborn in the way only living things could be.

Painters worked beside sculptors, trading pigments for chisels. Goldsmiths shared space with moneyers, learning the precise weights and alloys that would soon circulate through every hand in the city. Woodcarvers and architects argued over grain and load-bearing curves while stonemasons and bricklayers turned those arguments into walls that would outlast them all. Tailors, spinners, and weavers filled long halls with the whisper of thread, while auroch and yak wool workers and embroiderers transformed imported luxuries into something unmistakably Weirstad.

Blacksmiths and armorers labored near the charcoal pits, where steady columns of smoke marked the slow burning of timber into fuel hot enough to bend steel. Apothecaries ground herbs beside pigment makers. Cordwainers, saddlers, glovers, and girdlers worked fine leather into forms both practical and beautiful, while cobblers repaired the old and bookbinders gave permanence to words that might otherwise fade. Even the earthenware craftsmen found their place, turning local clay into vessels that carried everything from coin to grain to ink.

Each newcomer was paired with locals. Each local was expected to learn as much as they taught. Mistakes were corrected publicly. Success was shared deliberately. Accents clashed. Tempers flared. Old guild habits died hard.

But by the end of those weeks, fewer people spoke of leaving.
More spoke of building.

They argued about expansions, about new kilns and deeper forges, about houses instead of barracks, about who might marry whom once the next winter passed. Children of Weirstad began using foreign words without realizing it, and the newcomers started swearing in the old tongue when they were tired or hurt.

And that, Erik knew, was how a city stopped being a refuge—
and became a home.

--------

A few days later Erik was out on an inspection tour of their newly planted fields. In particular he was interested in the fields planted using grain and vegetable seeds imported from Braavos.

The wind worried at the young fields as Erik walked among the plots, Helga and Sigrun at his sides. The ground was marked with neat rows and careful stones, every effort made to coax life from the soil. Too much of it lay bare, the promise of green reduced to scattered, stubborn survivors clinging to life.

"I had expected them to have a hard time growing here" Eik commented "But this is worse that any of my calculations"

Helga stopped first, crouching to touch a wilted shoot, her fingers gentle despite the calluses earned through honest work.
"They tried," she said quietly. "Some even succeeded us for a while. Grew straight and proud. Then the cold came back. They aren't hardy like ours are"

Sigrun folded her arms against the wind, expression sharp and unsympathetic. She nudged a dead stem with her boot.
"Braavosi seeds are soft," she said. "They expect kindness. This land gives none."

Erik knelt, scooping up a handful of earth and letting it sift slowly through his fingers. The soil was dark, rich, alive. Not the problem.
"The ground is fine," he said. "So is the water. It's the air that kills them. The cold nights. The way the frosty winds returns when it shouldn't, even in summer."

Helga looked up at him, searching his face. "Can you fix it?"

Erik hesitated, just long enough to matter.


"Yes," he said. Then he shook his head. "But not by cutting the plants apart and remaking them into something else."

Sigrun studied him closely. "You could change them," she said. "Make them harder."

"I could," Erik agreed. His mind was already accelerating, opening like a many-petaled flower. "Bioengineer thicker cell walls. Alter frost responses. Change how they store sugars. It would work. It would take time and lots of experimental trails"

Thoughts stacked and collapsed in rapid succession in Erik's enhanced mind. Spliced resilience. Engineered strains. Test beds. Generations of trial. And the cost. Taste altered. Nutrition shifted. Familiar foods becoming something else entirely. Years before stability. Years he did not want to spend.

"But I don't want only engineered crops," Erik continued. "I want the originals too. The foods as they were meant to be eaten. I want both. The originals must also grow here"

"But how?" Helga asked

He rose slowly, gaze sweeping the barren plots as his thoughts leapt again. Stone shelters. Sunken beds. Heat-trapping walls. Smoke-warmed pits. Glass greenhouses—

No.

Myr's monopoly flared in his mind like a warning brand, a political dead end he refused to step into. Imported panes would be costly, fragile, and far too visible. Any large purchase would ripple outward through merchants and spies alike, noticed by eyes he had no interest in drawing this early.

I could make my own glass, he admitted to himself, the idea forming cleanly and then being weighed just as quickly. But it would be a massive undertaking. New furnaces. Purified sand. Controlled temperatures. Skilled glassworkers trained from nothing. Months, perhaps years of diverted labor and attention.

He dismissed it with a quiet breath.

I don't have the time, he thought. And I don't have the surplus yet. Resources were better spent building people, systems, and momentum. Glass would come later, when Weirstad could afford the luxury of patience.

For now, he needed something faster. Cheaper. Quieter.

Something that already lay at his feet.

"leaves" Erik muttered "Of course!"

Protection, not alteration. Green houses made not of glass but something else. Something they could make easily without being on Myr's radar

Shelters that breathed. Light that passed through. Warmth that lingered.

Plastic.

The word surfaced with surprising clarity, dragging a memory behind it. A documentary watched once, long ago. Crude oil. Refineries. Polymer chains. Waste and smoke and poisoned rivers. He discarded most of it instantly. No oil. No refineries. No ruined land.

But not all plastic was born that way.

His thoughts sharpened, reorganized. Cellulose. Leaves. Plant fibers. Binding agents. Plasticizers. Heat and pressure. Films and sheets thin enough to pass light, strong enough to break wind. Structures that trapped warmth without sealing life away.

Bioplastic.

He stopped walking.

Leaves. Bark. Sawdust. Organic waste they already had in abundance from the logging effort. Glycerol from rendered fats. Gelatin from bones. Ash and lime. Water. Heat. Every raw material already within Weirstad's grasp.

His pulse quickened.

Cold frames wrapped in translucent sheets. Layered insulation. Removable coverings for summer and winter. Greenhouses without glass. Cheap, light, replaceable. Subtle enough to draw no attention from foreign eyes.

Sigrun watched him smile, slow and certain. "You've found something," she said.

"Yes," Erik replied softly. "I don't need to change the land. I don't need to change the plants."

Helga followed his gaze back over the fields, the failed rows and stubborn survivors alike. "Then what do you change?"

"We change the space around them," Erik said. "We hide the crops from the cold."

Sigrun frowned, practical as ever. "And hide them from the sun as well?" she asked. "You'd kill them just as surely."

Erik turned to her, a spark of quiet excitement in his eyes. "Not if what we hide them with lets the sunlight through."

Understanding flickered across Helga's face first. "Something clear," she murmured. "Something thin."

"Something we can make ourselves," Erik added.

The wind swept across the empty rows again, tugging at cloaks and snapping at exposed skin, but Erik barely felt it now. His mind was already elsewhere, assembling sheds and frames, imagining molds and presses, sheets stretched tight over growing beds. Waste becoming shelter. Refuse turned into protection. Failure reshaped into advantage.

"Yes," he murmured to himself, rare satisfaction bleeding into his voice. "That will do."

------

Erik refused to let waste exist in Weirstad. Not if said waste could be used to make bioplastic.

Where others saw heaps of stripped branches, leaf piles, bark, and sweepings left behind by the great logging effort for Braavos, he saw a resource waiting to be disciplined. The forests fed the city twice over, once in timber and again in what was discarded. He ordered the organic refuse gathered, not burned or dumped, but sorted. Leaves, small branches, bark shavings, even sawdust too fine for carpentry were pulled aside and carried to a new set of low, steaming sheds downwind of the workshops.

The waste material had become a raw material.

The process began simply. Leaves were washed clean of soil and sap, then spread across drying racks under sun and wind until they crumbled easily between the fingers. Once dry, they were ground into a fine green-brown powder using millstones modified for light material rather than grain. The powder was then soaked and treated, first in alkaline solutions derived from ash and lime to break down unwanted compounds, then in carefully prepared green solvents that Erik devised with the apothecaries, mixtures that separated usable cellulose from lignin and resin without poisoning the workers or the land. What emerged was not waste but pulp, thick, fibrous, and pale.

That pulp became the foundation.

It was blended with natural binders and plasticizers. Gelatin rendered from bones, glycerol refined from fats, and plant oils were added in precise ratios, then heated slowly in large copper vessels while apprentices stirred constantly to prevent scorching. The mixture thickened into something strange and new, neither cloth nor wood nor leather. While still hot, it was poured into molds or spread into thin sheets, pressed flat, and left to cool and cure.

The result was a material that bent without tearing, resisted water for a time, and returned harmlessly to the earth when buried or burned. Biodegradable sheets used for packaging, sacks that replaced costly leather for short-term use, protective wrappings for cargo, liners for baskets and crates, and agricultural films for seed beds and soil protection. It was not meant to last forever. That was the point.

Weirstad's artisans learned quickly. What began as refuse became product. What had once clogged yards and fouled air became another export, another advantage. Even the charcoal burners benefitted, as the extracted lignin and bark residues burned hotter and cleaner than raw wood.

Erik watched the first finished sheets laid out to cool and nodded once.

"Nothing we take should die useless," he said. "If the forest feeds us, we return the favor by wasting nothing."

The skepticism in the workshops was as thick as the steam from the copper vats. The elder artisans, men and women whose hands were calloused by decades of honest timber and stone, poked at the cooling sheets with wary fingers.

"It's a trick of the light, Erik," Gonir muttered, flicking a translucent membrane. "It's too thin for a roof, too weak for a boot, and it rots in a few years. What good is a thing that's born to live only a couple of years?"

Erik didn't look up from the ledger where he was noting the curing times. "The forest dies every autumn, Gonir. Does that make the spring useless?"

He stood and beckoned them toward the eastern slope of the valley, a patch of land that the frost claimed weeks before the rest of the town. There, a skeleton of thin, arched saplings had been erected—a ribcage of wood stripped of its bark.

"Help me," Erik commanded.

They unrolled the long, pale rolls of the cured bioplastic. It was slightly cloudy, catching the morning sun but letting the light pass through in a soft, diffused glow. They stretched it over the wooden ribs, pinning it down with weighted stones and wooden stakes. Within an hour, they had created a series of long, shimmering tunnels.

Erik stepped inside the first tunnel and gestured for the others to follow. The air inside was instantly different. It felt heavy, still and significantly warmer than the cool breeze outside.

"You ask what good it is," Erik said, his voice echoing slightly in the confined space. "We live at the mercy of the frost. We eat what the cold allows us to grow and that gets us roots, hardy grains,kale and afew other edible plants. But inside these skins, the sun is trapped. The soil thinks it is summer even when the peaks are white with snow."

"The bioplastic allows for sunlight to enter but prevents long-wave heat from escaping. The physical barrier shields delicate shoots from the "black frost" that usually killed late-season crops. The sheets keep the humidity high, reducing the need for constant watering in the windy area close to the coast." Erik explained

"In these tunnels," Erik continued, pointing to the tilled earth beneath their feet, "we will plant the vegetables Braavos thinks we can only get through trade. Sweet peppers. Vine-ripened tomatoes. Green leafy vegetables Herbs that usually wither the moment the first leaf turns gold."

He looked at Gonir, who was now feeling the warmth of the trapped air with genuine surprise.

"It isn't meant to last forever, Harl. It's meant to last a few seasons. When the harvest is done and the plastic grows brittle, we plow it back into the dirt. It becomes the very soil that feeds the next crop. It's not waste. It's a bridge."

The skepticism began to melt, replaced by the quiet hum of calculation. They weren't just looking at "rotting" sheets anymore; they were looking at the ability to feed Weirstad through the long, lean months.

Author notes

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[Hordac]

Ch 31

Even though the green tunnels were a great milestone, Erik wanted to ensure the crop's survived and thrived. He worked directly on the seeds themselves, making genetic adjustments that would enable the crops to survive the harsher conditions and improve their yield.

Half of each seed stock was altered, the remainder left untouched as a control. The changes were restrained and reinforcing rather than transformative, reinforcing cold-resistance traits already present in the plants' lineage. Cell structures were subtly strengthened, frost-response mechanisms made more responsive, and energy storage adjusted to better survive sudden freezes. Flavor, yield, and nutritional value were deliberately preserved.

Once complete, the seeds were returned to the farmers and planted openly in the newly constructed bioplastic growing tunnels. Altered and unaltered seeds were set in adjacent rows beneath the same translucent skins, sharing identical soil, light, and water. The tunnels broke the wind, trapped warmth, and shielded the young shoots from black frost, creating a space where resilience could be guaranteed rather than hoped for.

When the colder winds returned, the results were clear. Outside the tunnels, exposed crops withered and eventually failed. Meanwhile inside the green tunnel, the unaltered plants struggled but lived, while the reinforced crops not only endured but grew steadily, their leaves thickening and darkening with health.

The farmers noticed this quickly. There was no cheering, only longer pauses during morning rounds, hands lingering on leaves that should not have survived. Word spread not in proclamations but in planning. conversations about staggered plantings, winter stores, and seeds worth saving. The prospect of more food, and more kinds of food, mattered deeply. Fresh vegetables meant fewer illnesses, better strength through winter, and meals that felt like living rather than enduring.

It became clear that the tunnels provided protection, the altered seeds provided margin, and together they offered something the North had rarely known: food guarantee. Not excess. Not miracles. Simply enough variety and reliability to keep people healthier, better fed, and quietly happier than they had been in years.

The news spread outward from the fields into the city, and from the city into the wider reaches of the true North. It became another wonder of Weirstad, not one of spectacle but of certainty. Another reason for free folk to visit, to trade, or to settle. Another small, deliberate step toward a prosperity built not on conquest or chance, but on trust and preparation.

The Obsidian Leaf returned three days later.

Her silhouette appeared first against the gray sea, black hull cutting cleanly through the chop, sails reefed and disciplined. She came in heavy, not with timber this time, but with weight of a different kind.

The weight of coins, Iron, silver and gold bricks. The weight of unemployed Braavosi skilled labor

The weight of success.

Ivar was the first down the gangplank, boots thudding on the dock, beard braided tight and eyes bright with something between triumph and disbelief. Stigr followed close behind, quieter as ever, gaze already cataloging the harbor like a man counting what had changed in his absence.

They brought ledgers.

And chests.

Lots of chests.

The unloading took hours. Bars of iron stamped with Braavosi marks. Silver ingots wrapped in oilcloth. Gold, less of it, but enough to make even the most stoic dockhands pause.

And coin.

Weirstad coin.

The moneyers had not expected that.

Ivar slapped a bronze piece down onto a crate with a sharp ring. "They took it."

One of the accountants frowned. "Tested?"

"Of course they tested it," Ivar replied, grinning. "Bit it. Weighed it. Scratched it. Ran it past two moneychangers and a suspicious priest. Then they asked if we had more."

Stigr crossed his arms. "They didn't like the runes."

"That's putting it mildly," Ivar said. "Called it unnerving. Which is Braavosi for they trust it but don't like it."

Erik, standing nearby, allowed himself a small, satisfied exhale.

"How much?" he asked.

Stigr handed over the ledger.

The numbers were clean. Conservative. Undersold, if anything. Timber fetched premium prices—straight northern grain, cut clean and cured properly. Resin and pitch moved faster than expected. The bioplastic sheets, quietly included as packing material and samples, had sparked interest even without explanation.

"They think it's some northern bark-craft," Stigr said. "Didn't press too hard."

"Good," Erik replied. "Let them wonder. What about our trader friend and his son?"

"Belicho was more than relieved," Ivar replied. "I gave him the medicine you prepared for his son and the instructions that went with it. After that, doors opened quickly. Too quickly for chance."

He glanced around before continuing. "He pushed the trade through personally. Cut his own commission to the bone. And he gathered others for us, Braavosi craftsmen and skilled hands who'd fallen out of favor or run out of coin. People with reasons to leave."

Korb's expression hardened. "That kind of help never comes without strings."

"Exactly," Ivar said. "None of them looked like obvious spies. That worries me more than if they had."

Erik nodded slowly. "We observe. Quietly. Pair them with locals. No enclaves. No access to sensitive work until trust is earned. The hybrid tree spore will infect them in a few days and then if they so much as sneeze in the wrong direction. We'll know"

He paused. "Success draws attention. That's inevitable. What matters is whether those who come looking find a secret worth stealing, or a system too strong to be uprooted."

That night, the return of the Obsidian Leaf was celebrated.

The sailors who had once expected punishment now drank alongside locals, spending bronze without hesitation and laughing at jokes that would have earned them glares weeks earlier. Some still carried the stiff posture of men waiting for a sentence, but it was fading. Coin passed from hand to hand without suspicion. Cups were refilled without keeping count.

Nearby, artisans argued animatedly over half-finished plans. Gonir and two younger smiths sketched forge expansions directly onto a table dusted with flour, debating airflow and charcoal supply as if the matter were already settled. A pair of weavers listened with half an ear, more interested in whether the new looms could handle finer thread than in who technically owned the space. No one spoke of permission. They spoke of when.

Farmers clustered in knots at the edge of the square, their talk no longer circling around how long stores would last. They argued instead about planting rotations, about whether the altered seeds should go into the tunnels first or saved for late spring fields, about how much land could be risked without threatening winter reserves. Disagreements were sharp but hopeful. Survival was no longer the baseline.

Children ran through the streets in uneven packs, darting between adults and carts, shouting words borrowed from foreign tongues without knowing they were foreign at all. The streets felt narrower for it—fuller. Alive.

Erik stood at the edge of the square, hands clasped behind his back, watching it all with the stillness of someone who understood that moments like this could not be commanded. They could only be allowed.

Helga came to stand beside him, her shoulder brushing his, eyes following the same scenes. "You did this," she said quietly, not accusing, not praising. Simply stating what it looked like from the outside.

He shook his head. "No. We all did. I just guided them. They chose to listen."

Jakob leaned against a post nearby, arms crossed, scanning the square with an old man's eye. "Listening is rare," she said. "Keeping it is harder."

"Then we keep earning it," Erik replied.

A little farther off, Ivar raised a mug in their direction without ceremony before turning back to his table, already deep in conversation with a recruited Braavosi sailor about routes and contracts. Stigr stood behind him, silent as ever, watching hands and faces instead of drinks, counting futures the way other men counted coin.

Helga smiled, small and genuine. "They're not afraid tonight," she said.

"No," Erik agreed. "They're content."

Above them, lantern light reflected off new stonework and half-finished beams. Beyond the square, the bioplastic tunnels caught the moonlight in pale arcs, sheltering seeds that promised variety instead of scarcity. Weirstad did not feel like a refuge anymore.

Out beyond the lights, the tunnels gleamed faintly under moonlight, their bioplastic skins whispering softly in the wind. Beneath them, seeds—old and new—pushed roots into warming soil.

Weirstad was no longer waiting to see if it would survive. It felt like a place people wanted to become part of.

----

The council reviewed the early reports with more seriousness than celebration. Yield projections were still cautious, but the implications were unmistakable. Increased food security, even by modest margins, translated directly into healthier bodies, lower winter mortality, and fewer labor days lost to illness. The variety mattered as much as the volume—fresh greens and vegetables meant fewer deficiencies, stronger immune resistance, and children who grew rather than merely survived.

Helga spoke for the households, noting the change in morale almost immediately. People planned meals again instead of rationing them in advance. Mothers worried less. Workers took risks on apprenticeships and long projects because the fear of an empty larder had loosened its grip. Stability, once gained, reinforced itself.

Sigrun focused on resilience. A population that ate well endured stress better, fought harder when needed, and recovered faster from injury and loss. She pointed out that well-fed people were also harder to panic and slower to turn desperate—no small advantage in a growing city that would inevitably draw envy and pressure.

Erik framed it in simpler terms. "Food doesn't just keep people alive," he said. "It tells them tomorrow is worth preparing for."

The council agreed that the tunnels and altered seed program should be expanded steadily, not aggressively. No dependence on a single method. No promises made faster than they could be kept. But as a foundation for long-term population health and collective morale, the consensus was clear: this was not merely an agricultural success.

Attention then turned to the remaining problem—the four captured ships still riding at anchor.

The debate was sharper here.

Sigrun argued for retaining them as a defensive fleet. Ships meant reach, warning, and deterrence. Even a modest squadron could make raiders think twice. Others countered that idle ships drained manpower and supplies, and that openly maintaining a fleet would draw exactly the kind of attention Weirstad was not yet ready to answer.

Trade options were proposed instead. Sending ships to other free cities. Testing relations with Westerosi ports—Oldtown, Sunspear, Lannisport, Gulltown, Planky Town, the Weeping Town, even White Harbor. Distance became the deciding factor. Oldtown, Sunspear, and Lannisport were dismissed quickly—too far, too visible, too politically dense for early outreach.

In the end, they settled on White Harbor.

It was close. Northern. Pragmatic. A place where ships were valued more for their cargo than their origin.

Two of the four vessels would be sent, laden with timber, resin, and surplus goods, not enough to boast, but enough to be taken seriously. Their crews would be mixed by design. Penanced former sellsails who had reformed the most were paired with veterans from the Obsidian Leaf, overseen by officers Erik trusted, and supplemented by local recruits who had been training on the captured ships.

No single loyalty. No single failure point.

The remaining ships would stay, maintained but unadvertised, their fate deferred until Weirstad could afford either a fleet or the attention one would bring.

With that, the council adjourned.

-----------

With the city stable and the council occupied with longer arcs of planning and Runa busy with her own projects and mastering runes with the help of Bloom, Erik finally found something rare.

Time.

He spent it where he always did when problems resisted force or policy—alone in the lab, surrounded by notes, samples, and the quiet hum of restrained curiosity. One issue had been pressing at him for weeks now, unresolved not because it was dangerous, but because it was inefficient.

They needed more wargs.

Not warriors trained into the role, but true wargs—those born with the capacity to reach beyond their own skin. The problem was not training. It was discovery. Wargs were rare, and worse, unreliable to identify. Most never realized what they were. Others learned only after moments of crisis, too late to be cultivated safely. Chance and luck dictated one of Weirstad's most valuable assets.

Erik disliked systems that depended on luck.

He began with what he had.

Blood samples from every confirmed wargs in Weirstad, handled carefully, anonymized, catalogued. He compared them relentlessly. Patterns emerged slowly, then all at once. A shared sequence. A recurring marker nestled deep in the genome, subtle but unmistakable once seen. Not the power itself, but the capacity for it. A door, not the room beyond.

"So that's you," he murmured to himself.

Finding the marker was the easy part.

Finding people who carried it was harder.

He paced the lab, ideas forming and collapsing in equal measure.

'Thos isn't the modern world where everyone can be tested in a diagnostic lab' Erik thought

One option was direct contact. He'd have touching everyone, probing gently, feeling for resonance. Effective. Also impossibly slow, deeply inappropriate, and guaranteed to breed fear.

'I don't want to spend weeks doing this!' Erik thought 'There has to be a better way'

Another thought crossed his mind and was dismissed just as quickly. Standing beside Helga during her sermons. Offering blessings. Letting his power brush the crowd indirectly.

It would work.

Which was precisely why he hated it.

Too close to manipulation. Too close to faith being used as a tool. He would not blur that line anymore than iit already was, not here, not now.

He stopped pacing.

His gaze drifted upward, through stone and timber, toward the massive hybrid Heart Tree that anchored Weirstad like a living spine. Its roots fed half the city. Its canopy shaded markets and halls alike. Its spore cycles were already carefully controlled, tuned to release harmless biological markers for air purification and pollen suppression.

And then inspiration came!

Erik smiled.

"Of course," he said softly.

The tree already touched everyone. Its spores were everywhere an in everyone.

He didn't change its nature. He added to it.

Within the spore-release system, Erik introduced a secondary, harmless spore, biologically inert, incapable of reproduction, designed to degrade naturally within days. It carried no magic, no compulsion, no influence. It did exactly one thing.

If the spore encountered the warg genetic marker in a person's body, it triggered a temporary, unmistakable reaction. A vivid shift in skin pigmentation. Bright. Purple. Impossible to miss. Impossible to fake. Gone within a few days leaving no trace behind.

Those without the marker?

Nothing happened at all.

No pain. No side effects. No sensation. No change.

He spent the next few days refining the release timing, ensuring even distribution, testing degradation rates. When he was satisfied, he informed the council.

Reactions were… mixed.

Sigrun stared at him for a long moment. "You're telling me," she said slowly, "that anyone who turns purple might be a warg."

"Has the potential," Erik corrected. "Training and temperament still matter and decide if they can become one"

Helga tilted her head, thoughtful. "And they'll know?"

"Yes," Erik said. "So will everyone else. Which is why this only works once."

That sobered the room.

Sheriffs were briefed carefully. Instructions were explicit: no arrests, no pressure, no announcements. Anyone showing the coloration was to be invited, not seized. Observed quietly. Gathered discreetly in the Great hall. Explanations given later.

"We're not hunting," Erik said firmly. "We're offering answers."

The spores were released at dawn.

By midday, the city noticed.

A dockworker with purple hands. A baker whose face had turned violet halfway through kneading dough. A child laughing in the street, delighted by the color of her arms, unaware of what it might mean.

Confusion followed. Then curiosity.

Then understanding.

By evening, the sheriffs' lists had begun to fill.

-----

By the following morning, the main hall within the hollow of the hybrid Heart Tree was full.

Purple stood out starkly against wood and stone. Skin tones ranged from pale violet to deep bruised plum, some faint enough to be doubted, others impossible to ignore. People clustered in uncertain knots, voices low, eyes darting. Infants cradled against chests bore faint lavender cheeks. Elderly men leaned on canes, their hands unmistakably colored. The range alone unsettled everyone.

Korb, Jakob, and Stigr halted just inside the threshold.

They stared.

Jakob was the first to speak. "That's… a lot more of us than I was expecting."

Korb crossed his arms, scowling at his own hands. "I was expecting dozens at most." He glanced around the hall again. "Not this."

Stigr said nothing, but his jaw tightened as his gaze swept the room. Soldiers' instincts didn't care about color—they cared about numbers.

Helga approached them first, purple unmistakable even beneath the hall's filtered light. Ketil followed a step behind, his expression caught somewhere between irritation and affront.

"I hate this color," Ketil said flatly, rubbing at his forearm as if it might come off. "If I'd known, I would've objected on principle."

Korb snorted. "You and me both. I look ridiculous!"

"It's undignified," Ketil agreed sourly

"It is quite entertaining looking at you two" Helga smiled despite herself. "Fortunately for you, It is temporary," she reminded them.

"That's not the point," Ketil muttered.

Their attention drifted back to the room to the sheer number of people gathered. Fear, curiosity, excitement, and disbelief all lived together under the Tree's vast ribs.

"They didn't know," Jakob said quietly. "Any of them. They're so many like us"

"No reason to," Helga replied. "Most people never get the chance. Or if they do, the pull is weak. Or they dismiss it. Or they're afraid."

She looked around thoughtfully. "Warging isn't just ability. It's proximity. Temperament. Opportunity. And sometimes… something else we don't yet understand."

Korb's eyes found Erik across the hall, standing apart, watching rather than directing.

"You knew," Korb said.

Erik met his gaze evenly. "I suspected. Statistically, it never made sense that so few existed."

"And now?" Helga asked, practical as ever. "What do we do with all of them?"

Erik didn't hesitate. "What else?" He raised his voice just enough to carry. "Everyone trains."

A murmur rippled through the hall.

"Not all of you will succeed," he continued calmly. "Some may never move beyond awareness. That's fine. This isn't conscription. It's instruction. Knowledge is not obligation."

Korb exhaled slowly. "And who's teaching?"

Erik glanced at him, Jakob, Stigr, and Ketil. "You are. You four have walked the path already. You know the dangers better than anyone." A pause. "I'll assist where I can."

Stigr nodded once. Jakob looked overwhelmed, but resolute.

Korb opened his mouth to argue then stopped.

"No," he said firmly. "Not like this."

Ketil nodded immediately. "Agreed. Absolutely not."

Helga blinked. "Not like what?"

Korb gestured at his skin. "Not while we're purple."

Ketil scowled. "I refuse to instruct anyone while looking like a bruised grape."

A few nervous laughs broke out nearby, tension easing just a fraction.

Erik allowed himself the barest hint of a smile. "Very well," he said steeping forward and placed a hand on Ketil "Give me a moment all I'll reverse it"

"Good," Ketil said. "Then we teach."

He looked around the hall again, at the infants, the elders, the dockworkers and farmers and children.

"But why do we need so many wargs?" Stigr asked at last.

The hall quieted around the question. It wasn't suspicion in his voice, only curiosity. Numbers mattered to him. Every skill had a cost.

Erik turned from the crowd to face him. "Because sight decides survival, dominance and victory" he said calmly. "Because knowledge is power"

He gestured outward, as if tracing the shape of the city beyond the living walls. "We need more eyes in our cavalry, scouts who can see beyond hills and forests without riding blindly into traps. We need them in our defense forces and among the sheriffs, watching borders, roads, and approaches no watchtower can fully cover."

He paused, then added, "And we need them especilly out at sea."

That drew attention.

"I once read the work of a scholar from Yi Ti " Erik continued changing China with Yi TI as the cavitations were very similar "He was a famous strategist named Sun Tzu. He wrote that if you know the enemy and know yourself, you need not fear the outcome of a hundred battles. Victory comes not from strength alone, but from understanding and knowing where your enemy is strong, where they are weak, and where they do not expect to be seen."

Some of the council exchanged glances. Others simply listened.

"We are getting stronger every day," Erik went on. "But strength without intelligence invites disaster. Wargs give us knowledge before danger arrives. They let us act and merely react. They let us choose when to fight or when not to."

Stigr's brow furrowed. "And the sea?"

Erik's expression hardened just slightly. "The sea is where the need for intelligence and dominance is the greatest."

He folded his hands behind his back. "If we are to trade, to move ships, to defend our coast, then the waters around Weirstad cannot be left to chance. Ships are good but we need an edge over our enemies. We need wargs who can bond with leviathans, whales, krakens, creatures that see what no sailor ever will. Storms, fleets, threats moving beneath the waves."

A quiet understanding spread through the room.

"The land can be watched by walls and towers," Erik said. "The sea is too vast and open. It cannot be defended as easily. Not without help from our giant marine friends."

He looked back at the gathered purple-skinned crowd not as resources, but as possibilities.

"We need an army of wargs," he concluded. "We need enough to ensure that nothing approaches Weirstad unseen by land or by water or even the skies"

Stigr considered that, then nodded once. "Information is important," he said.

"Exactly," Erik replied. "Battles won before they're fought."

The Tree's vast hollow seemed to listen along with them, its roots deep in earth and its branches stretching toward sky and sea alike. And beneath the living arches of the Heart Tree, surrounded by people who had never known what they carried inside themselves, Weirstad quietly took another step away from chance and toward certainty.

Author notes

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[Hordac]

LW 32

The weeks that followed were methodical and busy rather than dramatically chaotic.

The purple tint on the skin of the people with genetic potential to be wargs faded first. Slowly, unevenly, skin tones returning to normal over days as the altered spores degraded exactly as Erik had intended. With the color gone came the real work done quietly and individually thus being time-consuming.

Nearly one hundred and fifty people carried the marker.

It was far more than Erik had expected.

From the stories he had studied in another life, skinchangers were vanishingly rare. One man in a thousand, the old accounts claimed, might be born with the gift. And among skinchangers, only one in a thousand might ever become something more, a greenseer, a mind that could touch trees and time alike.

Weirstad's numbers did not match the legends.

At first, he suspected error. Sampling bias. Environmental influence. Or perhaps the North had always carried more dormant potential than the maesters of the south ever recorded.

But the results held when he checked them.

The city's population, drawn from Free Folk, northern settlers, refugees, and distant migrants, had created a genetic convergence that the old world had never catalogued. Isolation, selection pressure, and generations of survival beyond the Wall had quietly preserved traits that more "civilized" regions had shunned and exterminated out of fear.

Chance had shaped them.

Erik intended to refine them.

He did not seek greenseers for now. That path was uncertain, dangerous, and poorly understood even in legend. If some were found , he'd find a way to make them useful.

But skinchangers were different. They were measurable, improvable, and, with care, scalable.

The marker he had found was only the beginning.

By strengthening weak expressions, stabilizing inheritance, and removing dormant inhibitors, he ensured that Weirstad would not rely on luck or myth. Over generations, the ratio would shift. Not one in a thousand, but one in a hundred. Then perhaps one in ten, if society could bear the weight of that power.

He made no grand announcements about it.

Ignorance of power that multiplied too quickly drew fear. Time would cure them of said ignorance so they would not fear what would come to understand and appreciate.

Records were kept. Lineages mapped. Training protocols refined. What had once been folklore became data. What had once been destiny became policy.

If the old world had relied on chance to produce legends, Weirstad would rely on intention to produce guardians.

Some barely registered at all, their potential no more than a faint echo. Others showed strength that surprised even Korb and Jakob. Between those extremes lay every possible variation, and each case had to be examined on its own terms. There were no shortcuts. No mass solutions.

Erik met with them one by one.

For those whose potential was present but weak, he intervened carefully. Those altered would not only be capable wargs themselves, but would pass on stronger, more reliable potential to their children.

The city was not building a generation.

It was shaping a lineage.

Older candidates required different work. Age dulled learning speed, adaptability, and endurance, fatal limitations for warging. Erik reversed what time had taken just enough so they had clearer senses, steadier cognition, bodies capable of strain again. Not youth restored, but usefulness renewed. Elders who had once assumed themselves irrelevant found they could still serve, still learn, still matter.

Space quickly became the next constraint.

The existing school was expanded outward and downward, classrooms widened, practice chambers reinforced, and quiet rooms set aside for failures and recovery. What emerged was no longer just a school—it was an academy.

The Warg Academy.

Attendance was mandatory for those with the potential.

Not as punishment, but as protection. Untrained wargs were dangers to themselves and others. Within the academy, they learned discipline before power, control before reach. Bonding exercises came slowly, always supervised. No one was permitted to reach for a living mind until they understood the weight of doing so.

And warging was not the only subject.

Every student learned to read and write. To record observations. To send clear reports. A warg who could not communicate was half-blind, no matter how far their senses traveled. Literacy turned instinct into intelligence, sensation into strategy.

Children sat beside adults. Farmers beside sailors. The young learned quickly. The old learned carefully. None were exempt.

By the end of the month, Weirstad had something it had never possessed before, not merely wargs, but an institution. A system that could teach, correct, and endure beyond any single person.

And for the first time, the gift that had once belonged to chance now belonged to design.

Alongside the academy, another structure rose, quieter but no less important.

A menagerie.

It was built deliberately close, separated only by a controlled corridor and reinforced gates, so that training could move from theory to practice without unnecessary risk. The purpose was never spectacle. Every enclosure served a function.

Animals useful for warging were gathered carefully and humanely, with attention paid to temperament as much as strength. Snow bears occupied the largest pens, their space wide and reinforced, used only by advanced guardians under supervision. Shadowcats were kept in shaded stone runs, their intelligence and stealth prized for reconnaissance. Wolves formed the backbone of land-based training, familiar, social, and adaptable.

Above, enclosed aviaries housed hawks, eagles, and ravens. Aerial warging was taught early, not for combat, but for awareness. Height revealed patterns. Patterns revealed intent. Even a single flight could uncover threats weeks before they reached the city.

Smaller enclosures held ferrets and other burrowing animals, invaluable for navigating tight spaces, walls, and underground routes. Larger pens were reserved for giant elk and other herd beasts, used to teach endurance, shared awareness, and calm control over immense strength. A few exotic acquisitions, including massive horned rhinos obtained through trade, were kept isolated and rarely used, their purpose strictly instructional for those capable of handling overwhelming physical presence without losing themselves.

Every animal was treated as a partner, not a tool.

Students were taught that warging was not possession, but alignment. The animal's instincts were not obstacles to overcome, but currents to move with. Failure to respect that principle resulted in immediate removal from practical training.

The menagerie also served another purpose.

It reminded the guardians that their gift was bounded by life. Every bond carried responsibility, not only to the city, but to the creatures that lent them sight, strength, or speed. Injury, exhaustion, or abuse of an animal was treated as a failure of character, not skill.

Together, the academy and the menagerie formed a complete system. Knowledge, discipline, and controlled experience. No shortcuts. No legends born prematurely.

Weirstad was not creating monsters or mystics.

It was creating guardians who understood exactly what it meant to see through another's eyes, and why such sight must never be taken lightly.

The numbers posed a problem of their own.

Weirstad was not ready to train nearly one hundred and fifty potential wargs at once. Not with the depth of discipline Erik demanded, and not without risking uncontrolled power spreading faster than understanding. The academy could scale, but not instantly, and mistakes in this field would not be theoretical.

Erik wanted quality as the Wargs were a precious and rare resource.

So, they chose to select.

Every candidate was tested, observed, and evaluated. Strength of connection, emotional stability, discipline, ability to learn, and willingness to serve were all weighed. Raw power mattered, but temperament mattered more. A reckless mind inside another creature was a liability, not an asset.

In the end, fifty were chosen.

The first cohort.

They would receive focused, intensive training for one to two years. When they emerged, they would not only serve, but teach. The next wave would be trained by those who had already walked the path under strict guidance, allowing the system to grow without collapsing under its own ambition.

Erik intended to be personally involved.

These were not merely students. They were to be his eyes and ears across forest, tundra, mountain, and sea. If the need arose, they would be more than watchers. They would be instruments that moved unseen.

He did not romanticize that.

He taught them things no one else in Weirstad knew. This that would make them extremely proficient and improve their survival chances out in the world

How to observe without being seen. How to move through wilderness without leaving sign. How to survive alone for weeks with minimal supplies. How to remain calm when separated from their bodies and how to return without panic. How to resist coercion, how to compartmentalize secrets, and how to report with precision rather than rumor. He taught them poisons and ways to administer them stealthily. He taught them various mental techniques so they wouldn't take on animal instincts and remain themselves and in control.

They learned discipline before daring, restraint before reach.

He taught them that information was often more valuable than force, and silence more powerful than action. That the best guardian was the one no one ever noticed, and the best victory was the one that never required a battle.

Korb and Stigr handled physical and martial discipline. Jakob taught control and mental grounding. Helga taught ethics, duty, and spiritual framing.

Erik taught purpose.

He never told them they were weapons.
He told them they were responsibilities given form.

But in private, as he reviewed their reports and watched them practice, he knew exactly what he was building.

A network of minds that could see beyond walls, beyond oceans, beyond borders. A system that could detect threats before they formed and influence events without banners or armies.

Weirstad would not be blind to world's events.

And if the world beyond ever turned hostile, his guardians would already be there, watching, listening, and ready to act long before anyone realized they had been seen. They would be his eyes, his ears and if need be his daggers in the dark.

To improve the perspective of the free folk about wargs, Helga carried the same message into the temple halls and open squares, shaping it for ears that listened through faith rather than strategy.

She spoke often to the guardians directly, but just as often to the people who watched them.

"Our high and privileged calling," she preached, her voice steady beneath the boughs of the Tree, "is to do the will of The Old Gods in the power of The Old Gods for the glory of The Old Gods."

She made certain the words were not mistaken for praise.

"This calling is not comfort," she told them. "It is not safety. Privilege does not mean ease. It means burden accepted willingly."

To the wargs, she explained that their gift was not proof of favor, but proof of trust. Power was given because responsibility was expected. To refuse to serve would not be sin, but to hide from duty would be.

On other days, when fear or doubt rose among the newly revealed guardians, Helga spoke more fiercely.

"The Old Gods desires to show Their power through your storm," she proclaimed. "Not by removing it. Not by sparing you from it. But by standing with you inside it."

She explained that wargs would be sent where others could not go. They would see what others were spared from seeing. They would feel danger before it reached the walls. That weight was not cruelty, but purpose. The storm was where vigilance mattered most.

"To be chosen," she said, "is not to be lifted above your people. It is to be placed in front of them."

Her sermons stripped away the last remnants of superstition. Wargs were no longer figures of unease or whispered suspicion. They became symbols of watchfulness and restraint. The people began to understand that the guardians paid for their privilege in effort, danger, and silence.

Erik listened often from the edges of the crowd.

Helga was doing what law and reward alone could not. She was anchoring the role of the guardians in conscience. Where he set structure, she set meaning. Where he demanded discipline, she demanded humility.

Together, the message settled into Weirstad's bones.

To be a warg was an honor. To be a guardian was a duty. To fail was human. To refuse this responsibility was shameful and selfish.

In time, the stigma did not merely fade. It inverted.

Children dreamed not of hiding their gift, but of being worthy of it. Adults who discovered their potential stepped forward instead of shrinking back. Social pressure no longer pushed wargs to the margins. It pushed them toward service.

And so, quietly and deliberately, Weirstad ensured that in the years to come, its most dangerous gifts would also be its most reliable protectors.

Not feared. But trusted. Not shunned. But honored.

--------

The forge district of Weirstad never slept.

Even in winter, heat shimmered above the furnaces, and the rhythmic hammering echoed through the stone corridors like a slow, steady heartbeat. The expanded complex sprawled now—multiple forges, bellows driven by animals, casting pits and neat rows of anvils where apprentices practiced under sharp-eyed masters.

Erik walked through it with hands clasped behind his back, boots crunching on slag and gravel. Sparks leapt in brief golden arcs as hammers struck glowing metal.

Kate walked beside him, soot smudged on her cheek, hair tied back with a leather cord. Her stride was confident, posture straight despite the long hours. On her other side was the newly rejuvenated Lotho, broad-shouldered, hands massive and scarred, moving with the quiet, heavy presence of a man who had shaped metal and war alike.

Erik stopped beside a line of new crucible furnaces.
"These are excellent," he said, examining the brickwork and airflow vents. "Fuel efficiency is up, slag waste is down, and your output has doubled without sacrificing quality."

Kate allowed herself a brief smile. "The apprentices are learning faster than I expected. And your new charcoal mix burns cleaner. Less choking smoke."

Lotho rumbled in agreement, resting his hands on the haft of a hammer like it was a staff. "A good forge is like a good farm," he said slowly, voice deep and calm. "If you tend it right, it gives back more than you ask."

"It's definitely better for working women" Kate shot her father a look. "It's got men who don't treat women like decorative furniture."

Lotho raised a hand defensively. "I never said that."

"You didn't have to," she replied, dryly.

Erik watched their exchange with faint amusement. "How are you settling in, Lotho?"

The older man considered the question seriously, gaze drifting over the surrounding

"I don't like the cold," he admitted. "And."

"I don't like the cold," he admitted after a moment. "It gets into the bones. And the food…" He paused, searching for polite words. "the food is strange. Too many herbs and meat, too many things mixed together. Give me a simple fish stew and bread, and I'm happy. Too much meat. Not enough bread and fish."

Kate snorted. "You've eaten three loaves with fish stew today, Father."

"That is not an answer," Kate said.

"It is an honest one," Lotho replied, then shrugged. "But everything else is better. The forges are clean. The tools are good. The apprentices listen. And no one tells me I should slow down because I've got grey in my beard thanks to your rejuvenation magic"

"No bribes to keep a forge license. No one telling my daughter what she can or cannot make."

He looked at Kate, eyes thoughtful rather than sentimental.

"That part is better."

Erik nodded. "We prefer competence over tradition here."

Kate folded her arms, thoughtful. "It's more than that. Weirstad is… fair. I don't have to fight twice as hard just to be taken seriously. Here, being a woman is just another fact, not a limitation. For someone who wants a career in craftsmanship, leadership, engineering, this city is better than any place I've seen."

Kate met Erik's gaze, voice firm. "Weirstad is better for women who want to build something. No one questions me because I'm a woman here. They question me because I'm young. That I can fix."

A hammer rang loudly as a billet was quenched, steam bursting upward like a dragon's breath.

"In Braavos," she continued, "I'd have had to marry into a guild family or work under a man who took credit for everything. Here, I run the forges. People listen. People obey. It's… refreshing."

Lotho gave a slow nod. "She was born to lead a forge. The world just needed catching up."

Lotho studied her for a moment, his expression softening. "Besides, You were always stubborn enough to make it anywhere."

"Stubborn isn't the same as welcome," she replied quietly. "and I got my stubbornness from you"

They chuckled good-naturedly.

Erik watched the apprentices moving in coordinated rhythm, metal glowing, water hissing, leather bellows pumping.

"That is the idea," he said quietly. "A place where skill matters more than birth. Where talent is not wasted on tradition."

Kate rested a hand on the railing overlooking the casting pits. "Then we'll make sure the metal matches the vision."

Lotho gripped his hammer again, knuckles white.
"And if the world doesn't like it," he added calmly, "they'll find out what Weirstad steel feels like."

Erik allowed himself a faint smile as the forge roared around them.

Lotho studied Erik for a long moment, eyes steady and thoughtful, like he was weighing iron on a scale.

"You're building more than a city," he said. "You're changing how people think."

Erik met his gaze without flinching.
"Yes."

For a while, only the forge spoke, hammers ringing, bellows breathing, apprentices shouting measurements.

Then Lotho shifted his weight, massive hands clasped together as if he were holding an invisible hammer.

"I can help you make Weirstad better."

Erik turned fully toward him. "How?"

Lotho hesitated. For a man who could face molten metal without blinking, speaking about himself clearly took more effort.

"Before I was a blacksmith," he said slowly, "I was a miner."

Kate looked up sharply. She had heard fragments of this before, but never in such plain words.

"A slave miner," Lotho continued, voice low and even. "From childhood. Youth. Most of my life. Digging in the dark for men who never cared if we lived or died. Iron, copper, silver. I learned the stone. Learned how veins twist, how rock lies, how the earth hides its bones."

His eyes drifted to the furnace walls, as if seeing something far deeper than brick and mortar.

"When I escaped and reached Braavos, I swore I'd never go underground again. But the knowledge of the Erth stayed. Stone speaks, if you know how to listen."

Erik's gaze sharpened with interest. "You believe there is iron here."

"There is always iron," Lotho said. "Mountains don't rise without it. Valleys don't settle without it.Some of it is easy to reach, most of it is not. You just need someone who knows where to look, and where not to waste time."

Kate crossed her arms, thoughtful. "Local ore would change everything."

Lotho nodded once. "No more paying merchants. No more begging cities that would rather see you weak. You make your own iron, your own steel. Cheaper tools. More plows. More weapons. A city that can build itself without asking permission."

He met Erik's eyes again, and for a moment the quiet forge master looked like the boy who had once dreamed of freedom under the earth.

"I'll go with your scouts. I'll teach them what I know. We'll find veins. Mark them. You can decide when and how to dig."

Erik was silent for several breaths. This was exactly the kind of leverage he had wanted but could not manufacture with knowledge alone. You could teach metallurgy from books. You could not teach the intuition of a man who had lived inside the bones of the world.

"I wanted this," Erik admitted quietly. "But I had no way to make it happen."

Lotho's lips twitched to almost a smile.
"Now you do."

Erik extended his hand. "You'll have scouts, supplies, and priority. Do not take unnecessary risks. I'd prefer my master blacksmith alive."

Lotho clasped Erik's forearm with a grip like iron bands.
"I survived chains and caves. I can survive your snow."

Kate shook her head, half exasperated, half proud. "You have been complaining about the cold since we arrived and now you want to go out there in the cold"

Lotho ignored her. "I spent my whole life in one city after I escaped. Same docks. Same forges. Same streets." He looked past the workshop doors toward the white hills beyond. "You gave me youth again. I don't want to spend it under roofs."

Erik studied him, seeing something rare in a man who had known both slavery and stability.

"You want to explore."

Lotho nodded once. "I want to see the world outside the cities."

The forge roared, sparks bursting like stars. Erik felt a strange satisfaction—not from conquest, not from magic, but from giving a man the freedom to choose what he did with his second life.

"Then go," Erik said. "Find me the bones of this land."

Lotho bowed his head slightly, a gesture of respect rather than submission.
"And when Weirstad stands on its own iron," he said, "I'll know I helped build it."

Kate watched her father walk away toward the edge of the forge complex, where snow met smoke and the wild hills waited.

"He always wanted more than anvils and walls," she said quietly.

Erik followed Lotho with his eyes.
"Then Weirstad will give him more than walls."

-------

Six months.

That was how long it took before Erik could finally tear himself away from Weirstad.

His previous departure had left a mountain of unresolved matters. Projects half-designed, workshops awaiting oversight, administrative reforms only sketched in ink and theory. And then came the potential wargs, each one a walking strategic revolution that demanded infrastructure, training, secrecy protocols, and political groundwork. The city had grown used to him being everywhere at once, and he had encouraged that expectation until it had trapped him in his own web of responsibility.

He had refused to leave until every major initiative was stable without his direct hand.

And until the ships were perfect.

The two vessels bound for White Harbor sat heavy in the harbor, their holds packed to the beams with the finest goods Weirstad could offer. Steel tools, woolen textiles woven with new patterns and dyes, sealed crates of preserved foods that could survive months without spoilage, pearl jewelry, carbon fiber resin weapons and armor and rare animal pelts. He wanted White Harbor's lord and merchants to see, immediately and undeniably, that Weirstad was not a curiosity or an upstart and that it was a rising power with tangible, practical miracles.

A first impression was a weapon. He intended to strike hard.

The morning of his departure was cold, the wind off the sea biting and metallic. Erik stood on the pier, hands clasped behind his back, coat pulled tight, eyes moving over the ships one last time.

Then he heard the footsteps.

"You're really going this time, then."

He turned to see Korb approaching hair tied back in a practical knot. His stride was confident, boots solid on the planks. Beside him walked Ivar and Lotho, broader now that his rejuvenation had fully taken hold, his back straight, his stride steady, his face lined by years of habit rather than age. He looked like a man in his early forties, but his eyes carried far more winters.

"Everything is ready," Erik said. "If I stay longer, I will only invent new reasons not to leave."

Lotho snorted quietly. "A man who can reshape steel and minds shouldn't be afraid of a little travel."

"I am not afraid," Erik said mildly. "I am cautious."

Korb grunted in approval.

They walked together along the pier, the sounds of dockworkers loading the final crates filling the air. Lotho watched them with a craftsman's eye, nodding approvingly at the crates marked with Weirsat's sigil.

"You've done well here," Ivar said. "Didn't think I'd see a city built so fast without it falling apart. Most places I've known grow crooked, like trees bent by bad winds."

"Weirstad has had the advantage of planning," Erik replied. "And of people willing to adapt."

Erik looked out at the ships again. "White Harbor will not be Weirstad," he said. "Not at first. But if they see what we can offer, they may choose to change."

Lotho grunted. "People don't like change."

"They like results," Erik said. "And power. And safety. We provide all three."

A dockmaster approached, bowed slightly. "Lord Erik, the ships are ready. Crew is aboard. Cargo secured."

Erik inclined his head. "Thank you."

He turned back to Korb and Lotho. "Keep the workshops running. Continue training apprentices. Record everything. If something breaks, fix it. If something improves, document it."

Korb grunted. "As if I'd have time to do anything else."

Lotho crossed his arms, broad and solid, like a man rooted to the ground. "Go show White Harbor what real steel looks like. And if their smiths think they're better than us, bring back a few of them. I could use the challenge."

Erik allowed himself a small smile.

Then he stepped onto the gangplank, the city of Weirstad behind him and the unknown politics of White Harbor ahead, his holds full, his plans layered, and his patience already tested by how long it had taken him to get here.

This was not a visit.

This was his opening move.

--------

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