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fewer. The Greatjon sat at Robb's left hand, and then Theon Greyjoy; Galbart Glover and Lady

Mormont were to the right of Catelyn. Lord Rickard Karstark, gaunt and hollow-eyed in his grief, took

his seat like a man in a nightmare, his long beard uncombed and unwashed. He had left two sons dead in

the Whispering Wood, and there was no word of the third, his eldest, who had led the Karstark spears

against Tywin Lannister on the Green Fork.

The arguing raged on late into the night. Each lord had a right to speak, and speak they did . . . and

shout, and curse, and reason, and cajole, and jest, and bargain, and slam tankards on the table, and

threaten, and walk out, and return sullen or smiling. Catelyn sat and listened to it all.

Roose Bolton had re-formed the battered remnants of their other host at the mouth of the causeway. Ser

Helman Tallhart and Walder Frey still held the Twins. Lord Tywin's army had crossed the Trident,

and was making for Harrenhal. And there were two kings in the realm. Two kings, and no agreement.

Many of the lords bannermen wanted to march on Harrenhal at once, to meet Lord Tywin and end

Lannister power for all time. Young, hot-tempered Marq Piper urged a strike west at Casterly Rock

instead. Still others counseled patience. Riverrun sat athwart the Lannister supply lines, Jason Mallister

pointed out; let them bide their time, denying Lord Tywin fresh levies and provisions while they

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strengthened their defenses and rested their weary troops. Lord Blackwood would have none of it. They

should finish the work they began in the Whispering Wood. March to Harrenhal and bring Roose

Bolton's army down as well. What Blackwood urged, Bracken opposed, as ever; Lord Jonos Bracken

rose to insist they ought pledge their fealty to King Renly, and move south to join their might to his.

"Renly is not the king," Robb said. It was the first time her son had spoken. Like his father, he knew how

to listen.

"You cannot mean to hold to Joffrey, my lord," Galbart Glover said. "He put your father to death."

"That makes him evil," Robb replied. "I do not know that it makes Renly king. Joffrey is still Robert's

eldest trueborn son, so the throne is rightfully his by all the laws of the realm. Were he to die, and I mean

to see that he does, he has a younger brother. Tommen is next in line after Joffrey."

"Tommen is no less a Lannister," Ser Marq Piper snapped.

"As you say," said Robb, troubled. "Yet if neither one is king, still, how could it be Lord Renly? He's

Robert's younger brother. Bran can't be Lord of Winterfell before me, and Renly can't be king before

Lord Stannis."

Lady Mormont agreed. "Lord Stannis has the better claim."

"Renly is crowned," said Marq Piper. "Highgarden and Storm's End support his claim, and the

Dornishmen will not be laggardly. If Winterfell and Riverrun add their strength to his, he will have five of

the seven great houses behind him. Six, if the Arryns bestir themselves! Six against the Rock! My lords,

within the year, we will have all their heads on pikes, the queen and the boy king, Lord Tywin, the Imp,

the Kingslayer, Ser Kevan, all of them! That is what we shall win if we join with King Renly. What does

Lord Stannis have against that, that we should cast it all aside?"

"The right," said Robb stubbornly. Catelyn thought he sounded eerily like his father as he said it.

"So you mean us to declare for Stannis?" asked Edmure.

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"I don't know," said Robb. "I prayed to know what to do, but the

gods did not answer. The Lannisters killed my father for a traitor, and we know that was a lie, but if

Joffrey is the lawful king and we fight against him, we will be traitors."

"My lord father would urge caution," aged Ser Stevron said, with the weaselly smile of a Frey. "Wait, let

these two kings play their game of thrones. When they are done fighting, we can bend our knees to the

victor, or oppose him, as we choose. With Renly arming, likely Lord Tywin would welcome a truce . . .

and the safe return of his son. Noble lords, allow me to go to him at Harrenhal and arrange good terms

and ransoms . . ."

A roar of outrage drowned out his voice. "Craven!" the Greatjon thundered. "Begging for a truce will

make us seem weak," declared Lady Mormont. "Ransoms be damned, we must not give up the

Kingslayer," shouted Rickard Karstark.

"Why not a peace?" Catelyn asked.

The lords looked at her, but it was Robb's eyes she felt, his and his alone. "My lady, they murdered my

lord father, your husband," he said grimly. He unsheathed his longsword and laid it on the table before

him, the bright steel on the rough wood. "This is the only peace I have for Lannisters."

The Greatjon bellowed his approval, and other men added their voices, shouting and drawing swords

and pounding their fists on the table. Catelyn waited until they had quieted. "My lords," she said then,

"Lord Eddard was your liege, but I shared his bed and bore his children. Do you think I love him any less

than you?" Her voice almost broke with her grief, but Catelyn took a long breath and steadied herself.

"Robb, if that sword could bring him back, I should never let you sheathe it until Ned stood at my side

once more . . . but he is gone, and hundred Whispering Woods will not change that. Ned is gone, and

Daryn Hornwood, and Lord Karstark's valiant sons, and many other good men besides, and none of

them will return to us. Must we have more deaths still?"

"You are a woman, my lady," the Greatjon rumbled in his deep voice. "Women do not understand these

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things."

"You are the gentle sex," said Lord Karstark, with the lines of grief fresh on his face. "A man has a need

for vengeance."

"Give me Cersei Lannister, Lord Karstark, and you would see how gentle a woman can be," Catelyn

replied. "Perhaps I do not understand tactics and strategy . . . but I understand futility. We went to war

when Lannister armies were ravaging the riverlands, and Ned was a prisoner, falsely accused of treason.

We fought to defend ourselves, and to win my lord's freedom.

"Well, the one is done, and the other forever beyond our reach. I will mourn for Ned until the end of my

days, but I must think of the living. I want my daughters back, and the queen holds them still. If I must

trade our four Lannisters for their two Starks, I will call that a bargain and thank the gods. I want you

safe, Robb, ruling at Winterfell from your father's seat. I want you to live your life, to kiss a girl and wed

a woman and father a son. I want to write an end to this. I want to go home, my lords, and weep for my

husband."

The hall was very quiet when Catelyn finished speaking.

"Peace," said her uncle Brynden. "Peace is sweet, my lady . . . but on what terms? It is no good

hammering your sword into a plowshare if you must forge it again on the morrow."

"What did Torrhen and my Eddard die for, if I am to return to Karhold with nothing but their bones?"

asked Rickard Karstark.

"Aye," said Lord Bracken. "Gregor Clegane laid waste to my fields, slaughtered my smallfolk, and left

Stone Hedge a smoking ruin. Am I now to bend the knee to the ones who sent him? What have we

fought for, if we are to put all back as it was before?"

Lord Blackwood agreed, to Catelyn's surprise and dismay. "And if we do make peace with King

Joffrey, are we not then traitors to King Renly? What if the stag should prevail against the lion, where

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would that leave us?"

"Whatever you may decide for yourselves, I shall never call a Lannister my king," declared Marq Piper.

"Nor P" yelled the little Darry boy. "I never will!"

Again the shouting began. Catelyn sat despairing. She had come so close, she thought. They had almost

listened, almost . . . but the moment was gone. There would be no peace, no chance to heal, no safety.

She looked at her son, watched him as he listened to the lords debate, frowning, troubled, yet wedded to

his war. He had pledged himself to marry a daughter of Walder Frey, but she saw his true bride plain