NOVEL NEXT CHAPTER 82: Shadows in Ink
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I. Redna – Wolfsgrasp Outpost (Dawn)
The ink had barely dried.
Redna sat alone in the temporary outpost near Wolfsgrasp, a converted watchtower now serving as a message relay and intelligence cell. Light from a narrow window spilled across scrolls, ciphered letters, and a half-finished map detailing merchant movements and raven flight paths.
On the table before her: one ironborn cipher, decoded slowly over the last six days, line by line.
It spoke of unfamiliar names. Essosi port-masters, shipyards near Tyrosh, and a newly formed pact—between a Greyjoy splinter faction and Free Cities pirates. The purpose? Disrupt Northern coastal recovery. Draw resources away from inland reforms. Fray the edges of Arthur's progress by flooding small villages with terror again.
Redna tapped the parchment with one finger.
The cipher was consistent with the pattern she'd observed since the failed Ironborn invasion. The South now looked to sow unrest through proxies, rather than direct confrontation. Fewer banners. More knives.
A note beneath the message caught her eye:
"Bear Island. Sea Dragon Point. No banners. Swift strikes. Reap and vanish."
She narrowed her eyes.
"So they're probing. Testing how long the North's new nerves will hold."
A soft knock at the door.
It was Maelen—his hood dusted with snow, a leather scroll case in hand.
"I found this on the coast near Sea Watch," he said. "It wasn't meant to be found."
She opened the case. Inside was a diagram of Northern harbors, marked by anchor runes and flame sigils—symbols that reeked of Essosi sorcery circles she had encountered once in Volantis.
There was a pattern here.
But patterns could only mean one thing.
Someone was mapping the North.
From sea to snow.
II. Arthur – Training Field, Wolfsblood Ridge (Midday)
The ground had grown cold again—harder than it should be for the season.
Arthur stood at the edge of the field, watching a group of local sentries cycle through formations. Garron's training dummies lay cracked and battered in the corner, straw spilling like innards.
He adjusted a young soldier's grip, quietly corrected her footwork, and stepped back.
"Your feet remember what your mind doubts," he told her. "Trust the instinct. Then test it."
A voice behind him: "You've become a banner even without a sigil."
Redna.
Arthur turned. She held out the cipher and the harbor map.
He studied both in silence.
"These are not just raids," she said. "They're tracking strongholds. Possibly testing for something—material strength, supply lines, perhaps even your presence."
Arthur's fingers traced one anchor symbol.
"They want to see where we bleed."
He placed both scrolls on the bench beside him. "Increase ghost patrols near the coast. Tell Vaeren to distribute silent flares—if they land without banners, we won't waste words."
Redna paused. "And if it's more than raiders?"
Arthur's gaze didn't shift.
"Then we'll teach them that silence holds swords, too."
III. Redna – Hidden Study Beneath Wolfsgrasp (That Night)
She descended the stone stairs slowly, torch in hand. Below the barracks, beneath the frost-layered beams, was a concealed room only three knew of: herself, Arthur, and Thom.
Here she kept the classified documents—including decoded messages from the Citadel's back-channels and suspicious faith-based routes taken by traders.
She unfurled a second map. Laid it beside the Ironborn cipher.
Where Arthur had seen raids, she saw something deeper.
Faith merchants from the Reach arriving not just in White Harbor, but near the Barrowlands.
Discreet shipments to Houses with histories of Faith alignment—like the Dustins.
And now Essosi traders shadowing the same roads, carrying no religious iconography, yet always arriving a few days after sermons had been delivered.
It was a pattern of pressure points—economic, spiritual, and military. Subtle, but coordinated.
Redna sat back.
"This isn't a war of conquest," she muttered. "It's a soft siege. One grain sack, one prayer, one whisper at a time."
She sealed the scrolls. One copy would go to Rickard. Another—encoded in her personal cipher—would go to Sarra. The third she would deliver to Arthur herself.
Because the battle hadn't ended when the Ironborn fell.
It has only just begun.