Happy holidays, y'all!

Previously, on AtD: Rise and Fall:

Arya and her allies have reclaimed Riverrun for house Tully. She got some vengeance, and found it a bit less satisfying than she expected, but she is FINALLY ready to go home!

Dany, her dragons, and her fleet are in Oldtown, where Euron summoned a kraken by spilling the blood of his own niece and brother.

Jon is leading the fight at the Wall, which broke in 4 places when Bran crossed, and now the Watch, the Wildlings, the Northmen, and Jaime's merry band of Westerlanders are trying to close up the gaps and kill the White Walkers.

Samwell was at the Citadel, until Marwyn the Mage pulled him, Alleras, and Leo Tyrell into a conspiracy to sneak the magic books out of Oldtown. They're going north in a wagon train led by Lord Hightower.

Sansa is ruling as regent in Winterfell, using her warging skills to root out treachery. Meanwhile, Bran is using the weirwood net to try and figure out what the Starks of old hid in the crypts.

Jaime IV

Jaime thought he knew hell.

As a young Kingsguard, the sights, smells, and sounds of the deepest of the Seven Hells had been branded into his memory forever. The halls in his nightmares echoed with the shrieks of madmen and the cries of helpless women in pain. The air carried the overwhelming scent of cooked meat, and glowed with unnatural green fire. For the people trapped within, the worst torture was the hopelessness and abiding horror, more than any physical ailment.

But Jaime had grown older, and perhaps a little wiser. The smell of charred human flesh remained in his new version of hell, but that was the only similarity to the Red Keep in the Mad King's time.

The deepest hell was freezing, far colder than anything Jaime had ever experienced before. It was a chill that sank into one's bones and refused to budge, no matter how close he stood to the fire. Hell was eerie blue eyes in a face that had been intelligent once, but was now devoid of wit or memory. Hell was killing monsters with the faces of children, wide-eyed and round-cheeked and half-rotted. It was ashy wind that stung the eyes, coated the tongue, and filled the lungs. It was disease without end, festering wounds that would never heal, and brave men doomed to a pyre far from home.

On his sixteenth nameday, Jaime Lannister had opened gifts, and gone to an alehouse to celebrate with his friends.

On this nameday, the nine-and-thirty-year-old Jaime found himself at a breach in the Wall, shivering, surrounded by the undead and the dying, and killing wights until his arms trembled from the effort. There would be no celebrations or gifts here, not while the breach remained open.

Where were the gods-cursed reinforcements? he thought, parrying the next blow from a Clegane-sized wildling wight in tattered pelts. The Northmen from Oakenshield should have been here by now.

He had lost count of the White Walkers he'd killed. Even the novelty of wielding Dark Sister had worn off; if this was what it took to become a legendary hero, Jaime had no interest in it. He needed a hot bath, a moon's worth of sleep, and a river of wine to dull the horror.

He knew he would get none of it. Instead, he cut the wight into quarters, left him for the torch-bearers, and looked for his next opponent.

"Ser! Ser Jaime!"

Jaime turned, and saw Ser Steffon running in his direction, his frostbitten nose poking out over his scarf. Behind Swyft and the mass of fighters, to Jaime's eternal relief, rode a host flying crowned direwolf banners.

The Northmen—and their king—had arrived.

Jaime walked away from the breach, his sword suddenly too heavy to lift as exhaustion caught up to him. His sharp green eyes counted men and horses, and finally stopped on a large woman riding near the front of the column.

Brienne.

The leader called out an order, but Jaime didn't hear it. He was busy watching Brienne of Tarth as she dismounted, looking as whole as the wench was capable of looking. Her hooded, fur-lined cloak covered her golden hair, and a thick scarf covered most of her face, but those bright blue eyes were unmistakable.

She wasn't pretty or feminine. Not even this terrible place could make her appear beautiful, and Jaime knew that under her scarf, she would have the same exaggerated freckles, scars, and over-large teeth. But for some reason, Jaime's eyes were glued to the Lady Commander, and he felt something close to happiness thawing his frozen heart.

Thus distracted, he didn't notice as one of the clansmen Wintersguards approached.

"Ser Jaime," he said politely, in the hoarse voice they all had after inhaling so much smoke, "the King in the North would like a full report of the situation here. We will relieve your men. Lord Royce and Cotter Pyke are already riding to Long Barrow."

"I will be there shortly," Jaime answered.

Jaime had spent most of his life dancing to the tune of one king or another. It was no hardship to leave this horrific battlefield behind and head for Long Barrow, where he could warm up by the fire, rest his tired limbs, and trade news. By all accounts, this king was a much better sort than Aerys, Robert, or Joffrey, so any comparison would be a disservice to Jon Snow.

He found Glory huddling for warmth with the other horses. The Night's Watch had built a large tent to serve as a stable at the breach, and hung every blanket that could be spared to protect the horses from the chill. Even so, the shaggy Northern garrons were faring far better than the destriers of the warmer South. Jaime's horses had never looked at him with such woe.

"Come on, boy," Jaime told the horse, saddling him with trembling arms and half-numb fingers. "Let's get some real walls around us, eh?"

Glory pawed anxiously at the snow. None of the horses liked the smell of the pyres, and there was a wrongness in the air that the animals felt long before humans. Harrold Hardying's horse had tried to bolt, only two days past, and the Valemen had nearly brought the stable-tent down in their frantic chase.

Jaime's poor, well-natured destrier was eager to go, and Jaime had no cause to delay. He mounted Glory and rode off at once, far more familiar with the path to Long Barrow than he would have liked. It was a relief to feel the unnatural cold recede as he rode further away from the breach.

If I live through this, he thought grimly, I never want to see snow again. I'll move to Sothoryos if I must.

The ride was uneventful, but Jaime and the other Westerlanders had learned to never let down their guard. After that first encounter with wights on the way to Castle Black, Jaime spent the entirety of his rides looking to both sides, ahead, and behind, searching every shadow in the snow for more undead.

Finally, he rode through the Long Barrow gate, the man on watch recognizing him on sight after so many days of fighting there. The main courtyard was a hive of activity, and Jaime saw Northmen and Night's Watchmen unloading supplies and stabling horses with all due haste. He left Glory with one of the stablehands, and headed for the fort commander's solar as ordered.

Two guards in Stark gray, a wildling and a clansman, kept watch outside the solar. Jaime nodded to them silently, and was admitted into the room, his hood still covered in fresh snowflakes. Immediately, warmth sunk into Jaime's body like a heavy blanket.

"Ser Jaime," called King Jon, seated at the desk with that white beast of his by his side. To the wolf's left sat Cotter Pyke, the ugly Ironborn bastard who needed a maester to write his letters for him. Lord Royce sat on the king's right with Lord Glover.

"Your Grace, my lords," greeted Jaime with a bow, then took the only seat available after removing his heavy cloak.

Pyke gave him a dirty look, but much less vicious than usual. He looked too tired to be intimidating. Lord Glover gave Jaime a nod in greeting, and passed him a bowl of steaming hot barley and vegetable soup, which he took gratefully. Jaime had never eaten in the presence of royalty when the king was not eating, but Rhaegar's son waved an impatient hand at him. Jaime didn't need to be told twice, and the bland soup served at the Wall had never tasted so good.

"You'll be happy to know that the Oakenshield breach has been sealed up to a hundred and sixty-four feet, and appears to be holding," the king began. "That makes two of the four, and based on the last report we had from the Nightfort, they will be sealing theirs in the next few days. It was the largest hole and the hardest hit, but the additional men from Greyguard will help them rest easier and work the catapults faster. We've filled thirty cages with wights, ready to send to major holdfasts in the South."

He took a sip of mulled wine. "We also welcomed two new Watch-bound maesters. The Citadel had sent them to Castle Black, but of course, that is not where we needed them. Maester Morn is now at Oakenshield tending to the wounded, and Maester Andros should be arriving at the Nightfort in two days.

Cotter Pyke frowned. "Why would the Citadel send two, if they don't know what's happening here?"

"Morn is old," Lord Glover explained. "Not as old as Aemon was, but old enough to bring his replacement with him."

"That's just perfect," spat the Ironborn. "The Watch always gets the old, the drunk, the blind, the idiots...never a real maester."

Jon Snow raised an eyebrow. "If Maester Harmune is not living up to his oaths, by all means, report him to the Citadel and request a new man," he said mildly. "I'll take an old maester or a drunkard over none. And my uncle Aemon was clever enough, even for a blind man."

Cotter Pyke remembered that the king in the room was Aemon Targaryen's many-times grandnephew, and shut up.

"The two new maesters took inventory of the Night's Watch infirmaries, and their cries of horror must have shaken the Titan of Braavos. A large shipment of medicine, food, herbs, and other supplies should be coming up from White Harbor in the next moon, a courtesy from House Bolton's treasury to our old friends, the Night's Watch. I don't think we'd ever get enough for every wounded and sick man on the Wall, but it's better than what we have now."

"I'm glad to hear it, your grace," Lord Royce said gravely. "Too many of the common men, and even some lords, are losing their teeth for lack of fruit. And southerners of all stripes are suffering cruelly from this cold. There are several strains of disease in the camp."

"Aye," the king answered with a grimace. "The Watch had run out of limes before I became Lord Commander, and then Stannis Baratheon came to us and wanted lemons juiced for his damned water every day. The man couldn't drink a gods-cursed ale or wine like everyone else."

That, thought Jaime, sounded just like Robert's younger brother. Before coming to the Wall, he might have japed about how a man could only get so sour with an entire lemon grove at his disposal. But Jon Snow's mention of the man had brought an old memory to the forefront of Jaime's mind, and suddenly, Stannis Baratheon and his oddities were not funny anymore.

He saw King's Landing in his mind's eye, many years ago, as a gaunt, hollow-eyed Stannis, swimming in his finest clothes, knelt to swear fealty before his new king, the glorious Demon of the Trident. He saw a blue-eyed boy, also too thin, crying in his skeletal brother's arms after eating himself sick at a feast. He remembered Stannis picking at a child's portion that he couldn't finish, but squeezing as much lemon juice into his drink as he could stand.

No, it definitely wasn't funny. Jaime had seen too much of what happened to injured, tired, and freezing men without proper food.

I should send a raven to the Rock, he thought, his conscience pricked. My men didn't ask for this; they only followed me on my wild-goose chase. The least I can do is buy some Dornish oranges so they don't lose their teeth!

"That takes care of our news," the King in the North was saying, finally pulling Jaime back into the present. "What is the situation here?"

The king let each of them talk. Cotter Pyke, for the Night's Watch. Lord Royce, for the Vale knights. And Jaime, for the Westerlanders in this corner of hell.

Jon Snow took careful notes of the wights slain, the frequency of the attacks, the presence of White Walkers, and of course, the casualties.

"And your cages and catapults?" he asked, looking at Pyke.

The man shook his head. "We've built eight cages and two catapults. We can't cut down wood fast enough to keep up the fires, let alone build anything."

"Our men will help," the king answered. "They've gotten fast at it. Good work, all of you. Now get some hot food and rest," he ordered, watching Jaime drain the last of his soup.

Jaime stayed back as Lords Glover and Royce got to their weary feet and left.

"Is Maester Harmune about? I'd like to send a raven to the Rock if I may, and request more supplies."

"The old drunkard is in the infirmary tents," Pyke responded shortly. "And I don't know if the ravens would remember the way. It's been years since Casterly Rock sent any messages to Eastwatch, and this ain't even Eastwatch."

"Send your raven to Winterfell, Ser Jaime," King Jon suggested practically. "The new maester there will pass your message on to the Rock."

"Harmune has a boy helping him named Byric," offered Pyke. "He'll do it."

"My thanks," replied Jaime to the king and the Watchman. Then, with a bow, he left the room and went in search of the maester's helper.

Many hours later, a clear night had fallen over Long Barrow. Jaime was exhausted, but sleep was impossible. It was the kind of night in which no sleeping position was comfortable, Addam's snores were unbearable, and ghost pains from his missing hand only made things worse. Jaime could not stay still.

He leapt out of bed with a curse, and dressed in double and triple layers. Only then did he venture outside the western tower, and into the underground tunnels connecting the buildings. Common soldiers were everywhere, sleeping on the wormway floors or on ancient, creaky benches, and the air reeked of unwashed men.

When he finally reached the yard, Jaime took several deep breaths. The men on breach duty were miles away at the battlefield, and all was still in the castle yards. For once, the sky above was perfectly clear.

Jaime went for a short walk, shivering but calmer than he'd been in his bed. Now and then he passed other men, tired and hoarse and frostbitten. But sitting on a barrel, with a white direwolf curled at his feet, was none other than the King in the North. Jaime watched curiously as the man turned an unsealed letter in his gloved hands, as though debating whether or not to open it. The solemn expression on his face reminded Jaime of the Silver Prince when he was brooding. The resemblance was truly remarkable sometimes.

Jon's two Wintersguards for the night, a Wull and a Snow, watched their young king brood in silence.

"Your grace," Jaime said quietly, approaching Rhaegar's son. "Isn't the solar a better place to read correspondence?"

"Aye," replied the younger man, "if I made up my mind to read it, certainly."

This answer only made Jaime more curious.

"Who is it from?"

Jon Targaryen sighed deeply. "My mother; she wrote it as she was dying. It was in that chest I showed you at Winterfell."

The former Kingsguard sat on another barrel beside the king. "Then why wouldn't you read it?" he asked, one orphan to another.

"It's hard to explain," Jon breathed. "It doesn't feel right. She only lived long enough to write one letter for me. I expect Sansa packed it with my things, hoping it would give me comfort. But I don't know if I want to bring my mother to this place," he said, gesturing to the dilapidated castle with his hands. "Would you?"

Jaime snorted. "I'm not a patient man," he answered honestly. "If my mother had written a deathbed letter, I would've read it the moment I had it. And I'm no great reader," he added. "But in my case, I had nine years with her. I know what she would have written, because she told me. I love you. Look after Tyrion and Cersei," he added ruefully.

He let the boy stew on that for a bit.

"However, your grace is a king and may do as you please," Jaime added in a lighter tone. "Perhaps read letters from your siblings now, and save Lady Lyanna's until you're at home in your crypts. She probably expected you to read it in Winterfell, in the godswood or in that crypt of yours."

Jon acknowledged this with a nod. "True, but the crypts aren't exactly peaceful at the moment. My brother saw something in a vision and now they're excavating the collapsed tunnels."

"Dare I ask what for?"

"We don't know. Something that can help protect us against the White Walkers, but Bran doesn't understand enough of the Old Tongue to explain it yet."

Jaime leaned back on his barrel with a sigh, and watched the king place his mother's letter in his pocket, still unread. "I remember the days when a man returning from the dead after multiple stab wounds was strange. Now we have a whole army of undead, legendary creatures who raise them, wargs controlling animals, a boy who can see visions...and we just accept it as normal and move on with our lives. Why in the Seven Hells did I come here?"

"Because your sister is madder than my grandfather and you had nothing better to do," the king replied in the same lighthearted tone. "But mostly because Brienne is here."

"Ah yes," Jaime answered with a grin. "Now I remember. Is she on duty tonight, mayhaps?"

The king raised an eyebrow.

"My guards and I are quartered in Osbert's tower," he answered, pointing. "She should be fast asleep in her cell by now. And for your sake, I hope you have the best of intentions toward the Lady Commander of my Wintersguard."

"Best intentions, from me? Perish the thought," Jaime said lightly, though the king and the knight both knew of Jaime's deeply-hidden honor, especially after their confessions in Winterfell. "Fear not, your grace. Should I even think dishonorable thoughts, the lady will set me straight with a sound thrashing."

"Then I wish you and Brienne a good night, Ser Jaime," the king responded, leaning sideways to scratch the silent wolf's mighty head. "Someone ought to have one. Her cell is the first on the second floor."

Jaime left him to it. He was feeling the cold again, and bothering his favorite lady warrior seemed like a better idea than making small talk with a king. He walked briskly to Osbert's tower, a squat, crumbling wreck of a building shored up with beams of green wood. The inside looked no better, but at least it was warmer.

Before he could rethink the idea, he found himself rapping on Brienne's door. He almost regretted waking her when he heard her sleepy response.

Almost.

The door opened just wide enough for Jaime to catch a glimpse of blinking sapphire eyes over a candle.

"Ser Jaime?" asked the wench. "What is it?"

"You wound me, Lady Brienne," Jaime teased. "I braved the ridiculous northern cold to come and say hello on the night of your arrival, and you won't open the door for me?"

Her cheeks flushed a delicious red. It was so easy to get a rise out of her!

"I'm—not decent, Ser Jaime," she said, hesitating.

Jaime scoffed at that. "Nothing I haven't seen before," he reminded her, making Brienne blush even harder. "And it's just Jaime. We're beyond such formalities, are we not?"

Brienne blinked, now appearing more awake. Her eyes sharpened, and she pulled the door wide enough for Jaime to slip through. Once he was in her cell and the door was closed, the mood shifted. She hastily dropped the candle on a nearby table, and then Jaime Lannister had an armful of Lady Commander in his arms.

"So you have missed me," he murmured, a bit surprised but quite happy. His arms fell comfortably around her waist. "I wondered why you didn't seek me out."

"You idiot," she answered, leaning back enough to look into his eyes. "Of course I missed you. I just had duties to fulfill."

She kissed him then, still inexperienced but quite eager. Jaime returned the kiss with just as much enthusiasm. She was as hard and muscled as ever, but her skin felt wonderfully warm under her silk nightrail.

When they finally paused for breath, Brienne rested her forehead against Jaime's, breathing deeply. For once, they had a moment of peace.

"Did you know today was my nameday?" Jaime asked her suddenly.

Brienne shook her head. "I have no gift to give you."

"Who's the idiot now?" Jaime laughed, bringing up his hand to her freckled cheek. "Seeing you alive is the gift, Brienne."

"It feels wrong, to be happy in such a terrible place," she whispered, half-ashamed. "But I am happy to be with you, Jaime."

"So am I," he told her sincerely.

Brienne bit her lip. She seemed to be working up the courage to ask something.

"What is it?" Jaime asked, stepping away from her and removing his heavy black cloak. It wasn't needed inside the room.

"Stay with me?" Brienne mumbled, so quiet that he barely heard it.

Jaime's response was to take off his clothes, layer by layer, until he, too, was down to his silk shirt, thick black socks, and smallclothes.

"I thought you'd never ask," he told her with a grin.

Then, holding out his good hand, he led Brienne back to her bed.

Hell was much more bearable with Brienne by his side. Jaime found that over the next several weeks, the constant horror of the undead eased at times, enough for him to smile and even joke with the other fighters. The unnatural cold of the breach gave way to comfortable warmth, when he and Brienne lay as close as two large bodies could get on her narrow cot. The clean, flowery scent of her soap masked the smells of smoke and death that permeated everything, at least for a while.

When he lost a friend, his Winterguard's arms could shield him from the grief, if only temporarily. It was Brienne who held Jaime as he got drunk on piss-poor ale, cursed, and then wept for Addam Marbrand, whose plain steel sword—the best gold could buy—had been no match for the White Walker. It was she who tore him away from the funeral pyre of Roland Crakehall, a man who Jaime had known since his squire days.

Sometimes, Jaime and Brienne went into battle together. At other times, he found himself with the king, or with the young heir from the Vale, Harrold Hardying, or some grim-faced northman with the king's sword. The king's orders were to never leave the breach without Valyrian steel, and he always lent Blackfyre to another warrior when it was his turn to rest.

Jaime had never seen a king hand over the symbol of his authority in this way—especially a priceless Valyrian steel heirloom—and he couldn't bring himself to do the same, though Brienne did. Dark Sister slew White Walkers in his hand, hung from his hip, or lay under his bed within easy reach, always.

One freezing morning, Jaime lay on his side in Brienne's cot, his good arm wrapped around her as the wind howled outside. It was the banging of loose shutters somewhere that had woken him, though Brienne slept on, snoring slightly.

He woke her as gently as he could, and they dressed silently in their warmest clothes. Brienne helped Jaime with the buttons and laces he couldn't do up himself, without him needing to ask. The builders were due to finish the catapults this morning, which meant that if a long enough break occurred in the fighting, they would finally seal this breach in the Wall.

They broke their fast in silence. The king's urgent request for supplies had brought forth vegetables, if not yet Dornish fruit, and now the scurvy-plagued men at the Wall were eating cabbage, sprouts, and the occasional bit of currant, berry, or persimmon preserves. Much more frequently, the cooks prepared a medicinal tea, which smelled like ginger and some Tyrell's flower garden. Jaime hated the taste, but he needed his teeth too much to refuse it when offered. All he could do was force himself to swallow, and count the days until the additional supplies came from Casterly Rock.

The breach looked different a moon's turn after the king's arrival. The gaping hole in the gray-white Wall was still there, but the many ice-boulders fallen from it had been cut into smaller pieces, cleared and sent to the catapults. The ground was as muddy as ever, but now the icy mud had been covered with sodden blankets and crude green wood walkways, when gravel was not enough. The Northmen had built more cages and filled them, and they'd added log walls around the infirmary tents, to block the worst of the wind.

The men of the night shift looked even more exhausted than usual. When Lord Ryswell spotted Brienne and approached to return her sword, they found out why.

"Nineteen," he said grimly, holding out Longclaw for Brienne to take. "And at least two thousand wights with them. Your blade claimed six of the bastards, my lady," he informed her gratefully, "but we ran out of wood again."

Jaime turned to look at the pyres, and shivered. The men at the Wall had learned early on that there could be no delays in burning the dead, or their comrades-in-arms would rise again and fight against them. But they consumed wood and dried peat so quickly that this was impossible. All too often, they were forced to kill a wight, behead and quarter it, and then pile up the limbs near the fires. It wasn't uncommon for a crawling arm or hand to grab an unsuspecting fighter's ankle if they got too close, and Jaime could see a large pile of rotting, blue-eyed heads, glaring helplessly at their killers as they waited to be burned.

"Well done, Lord Ryswell," Brienne replied, taking the sword back and scanning the battlefield. "How is His Grace?"

"Tired, hoarse, cold," responded the Northman wryly, "but he lives, and he's killed a few White Walkers. His Grace is there," he added, pointing to a knot of men in Stark gray, slightly left of the breach.

The former Kingsguard and the Wintersguard waded into the fray, leading a band of Northmen and Westerlanders towards the king. The men of the night shift retreated, eager to nurse their wounds and eat a hot breakfast before burrowing into their blankets.

Jaime lost track of the time. There was only the bitter cold, and the wights in front of him. Occasionally, he would glance at Brienne, who was fighting on the king's right. Her height made her easy to find in the chaos, an advantage Jaime never thought he might want in a lover.

The wight in front of Jaime now would give him even more nightmares than he already had. The eyes were that inhuman blue all wights shared, of course, but the wight girl was pale and slender, with hair so blonde it was almost white. Perhaps he had spent too long around the half-Targaryen king, but the girl looked so like Rhaella that Jaime's arm nearly faltered.

He recovered in time to kill it, and to get an earful from Brienne. Her king was surrounded by guards and not in immediate danger, so she had turned to her right and caught Jaime's moment of weakness. She just didn't know why, and he had no time or desire to explain.

The freezing fog lifted too suddenly to be natural, and a few seconds later, the sentry on top of the Wall blew two blasts. The coast was clear.

The King in the North sprinted away from the breach and towards the siege weapons, followed by his wolf and guards. Jaime watched, drinking deeply from his waterskin, as the man conferred with the builders. Then, a Night's Watch boy blew one long horn blast, and one short.

It was time.

"Clear the breach!" shouted the commanders, as hoarse as ever. "Get back, all of you!"

Jaime parroted the command, shooing his Westerlanders back. Then, as soon as the men had moved away, King Jon gave the order.

"Loose!" he cried, in between coughs.

Immediately, the catapults began to fire man-sized ice-boulders at the breach with impressive accuracy. Jaime supposed the builders had perfected their ice-aiming skills at Oakenshield. With a noise like thunder, hundreds of pounds of ice crashed into the hole, faster than men could have stacked them in between wight attacks.

"Reload!" came the cry, and the men assigned to the task took their sleds, ropes, and horse-drawn carts, and pulled the next load of ice into place.

"Loose!"

"Reload!"

On and on it went, with load after load of ice. The men watching sighed in relief as the ice reached man-height, and then went higher, in just a few minutes.

"Let's not stand here and dawdle," Jaime ordered his men, realizing he should be doing something. "We can assist with the pyres while they build up the Wall."

He led the Westerlanders behind the catapults and around the cages, closer to the inadequate fires. As Jaime and his men stripped armor and weapons from corpses and cut limbs from the wights waiting to be burned, the crash of ice against the Wall continued, with breaks to adjust the release angle, and the scramble of men reloading the machines.

Once the barrage had paused, Jaime turned around to look. The once pristine, blue-white Wall had been growing steadily darker at the base, as ashes from the constant pyres coated it. Now there was a pile of ice boulders covering the bottom half of the hole, white against gray, irregular next to smooth and straight. A few more rounds of catapult barrage raised the patch by another sixty or seventy feet, though at that height, the target was shrinking, and many of the boulders fell off as soon as they struck.

The work continued. Now that the catapults had done their job, a massive double-sided ladder and pulleys went up, and the men chosen for the task scrambled to the top of the patch. The remaining triangular hole was seven or eight feet in width; hard to reach without very tall ladders or climbing spikes on the other side, but still large enough for men (or wights) to slip through. Leaving it open was not an option.

"Buckets!" ordered the king, his voice nearly gone from his earlier shouted commands. "Bucket detail, form a line!"

Every bucket that could be spared was now filled with the smaller ice boulders men had been cutting into bricks for weeks. As Jaime's men continued building up the fires and disarming the dead, the Northmen and Night's Watch formed two lines and took their buckets to the ladder. The pulleys got the buckets up to the top. There, the two men standing on the icy patch would take the ice and fill the gap, like southron bricklayers building a house.

Filling the hole would take days, by Jaime's estimation. It was over a hundred feet tall and as deep as the Wall itself, though they would not fill it that far. He finished his task, and when the last corpse was ready for burning, his men returned to the fort for food and rest. Jaime stayed behind, as had become his habit, to stop by the infirmary tents and see if any of his bannermen were there. The stench of death, vomit, and worse nearly bowled him over before he'd lifted the tent flap.

"Well, if it isn't my good friend, the Kingslayer," someone called out weakly from a cot.

Jaime whirled around to face the man on the third cot from the left. There, hoarse-voiced, scarred, and with his head half-shaved to reveal a hideous festering wound, was Ser Bronn of the Blackwater.

"What now, Lannister? How fucked are we?" he asked, sitting up slowly. As the blanket fell away, Jaime saw that the Lord of Stokeworth had lost his right arm up to the elbow.

"We're closing up the breach, finally," Jaime told him, trying not to stare at Bronn's bandaged stump.

"That's good, then," the other man replied, feigning cheerfulness under a haze of pain. "I suppose this trip wasn't a complete waste."

Looking at Bronn now was like looking at a mirror image of himself, back when he'd lost his hand. The horror of a fighting man losing his dominant hand was unlike anything else, and Bronn of the Blackwater didn't have the Lannister name and fortune to fall back on.

"Ah, don't look at me like that," the sellsword groaned under his bandages. "Get me a hand like yours and we'll be a matching set of golden cunts, eh? I can kill men and wights with my left hand just as well as with my right. Better yet, get me a dragonglass hand. I'll save the golden one for feast days."

Jaime nodded absently. He was no green boy; after spending enough time in infirmary tents, one noticed the signs of a man with no hope of survival. Bronn radiated warmth like a furnace, a clear sign of infection, and he was surrounded by unconscious, dying men. Those with lesser wounds were on the other end of the tent, screaming and moaning, with Maester Harmune and his helpers—mostly crannogmen and Northern clansmen—buzzing around their beds.

"Get some rest," Jaime ordered, watching Bronn's eyes fighting to stay open. "We'll see about your golden hand when you're better."

Once the former sellsword had closed his eyes, Jaime crossed the tent with long strides. For once, Harmune looked sober. The maester jumped to attention, and allowed Jaime to pull him aside.

"Lord Stokeworth is dying, is he not?" he asked seriously.

Harmune nodded. "Yes, ser. Even with the supplies the king brought, I don't have enough poultices for everyone. I have to prioritize those who are most likely to survive, and Ser Bronn was ill before his grievous injuries."

The maester's eyes roved over Jaime, and stopped on his golden hand.

"If I may ask, ser, who treated your own wound?"

"Qyburn," Jaime replied shortly, remembering the way the healer had worked to ingratiate himself with the Lannisters...and which Lannister Qyburn was serving now.

Harmune's face, previously tired but open, turned flinty.

"The necromancer!" he cried, nearly spitting the words in disgust.

"So I've heard," Jaime replied, not in a mood to argue. "I don't know what else he's done, but he stopped the infection that would have taken my arm, and possibly my life." He shrugged. "I suppose you would have done the same for Ser Bronn, if you had the medicine."

Harmune liked that comparison as much as Jaime's father had loved Tyrion, but he was a healer by trade and could not deny it.

"Of course I would have," he said, rising to his full (unimpressive) height. "It's not an easy thing to choose which of my patients to leave to the gods' mercy, but it must be done or even more will die. Gods be praised, Alsric here tells me the fighting men are finally sealing the Wall."

"Yes," Jaime confirmed. "Unless the wights can climb over a hundred feet without tools, there will be no new patients for you tonight."

"Thank the gods for that, old and new," the healer replied in sincere relief. "I have enough work for the entire Citadel here."

Jaime left him to it, seeing none of his Westerlanders for once. He had piled a few onto the pyres earlier, and he would need to send ravens to their families, but it seemed that his remaining men would survive another day.

The sun was already low in the west; Jaime always forgot how short the days were this far north, and the sinking sun meant the work on the Wall would have to stop until morning. It was too dangerous to walk on a slippery, uneven ice ledge with no lights or railings at nighttime. Still, seeing the partially-blocked fissure was a deeply reassuring sight, and Jaime knew he wasn't alone in thinking it. The next shift would arrive soon, just in case any wights attempted to climb, but everyone else would sleep better than they had in weeks.

Jaime raised his hood against the wind, and went in search of his horse. He was long overdue for a wash, and then? Perhaps Brienne would be free from her duties in time for dinner.