260 AC
Varg
The morning after claiming his father's throne, Varg sat alone in the dim enclosed chamber that served as Driftwood Hall's excuse for a solar. A table of blackened pine stretched before him, its surface scarred from years of spilled ale and careless blades. Piled atop it were crude maps, yellowed old things. He traced a calloused finger along the jagged outline of Skagos, his Skagos, or at least the northeastern third of this forsaken rock. His 'kingdom,' if you could call it that. A bitter smirk tugged at his lips as he leaned back in the creaking chair, the faint groan of wood echoing in the stillness.
He was a broke brokey. Comparing himself to the rest of the Westerosi nobility, he wasn't even a filthy Dornish. To put it in modern terms, he was the worst kind of third-world savage.
Driftwood Hall's so called treasury was a rusted chest in the corner half-empty save for a scattering of copper pennies and a few silver coins his father had hoarded like some miserly dragon. Fifty thousand souls, he guessed, scratched out a living under his rule, thralls some fishermen, trappers and half-starved peasants huddled in hovels across his lands. No wonder there was cannibalism here. As off course, there needs to be some cannibalism in these lands.
But Varg knew he would make something of this cesspit. The maps told a story of potential if you squinted hard enough and were drunk and perhaps beaten by a prostitute. His domain hugged the northeastern coast, a rugged stretch of cliffs and pebbled shores that gave way to a small but serviceable port. Fortunately right next to his Driftwood Hall castle. Below, his lands bordered the Magnars to the east and the Crowls to the south. Rival houses as brutal and backward as his own in total borders marked by blood feuds older than the few stones of this keep. Skagos itself was a vast starving cannibalistic hulking beast of an island dwarfing the Iron Islands' so-called "kingdom" or half a dozen Bear Isles stacked together. Of course, size meant nothing here when the land was a barren waste of rock and wind-lashed pines, its people too scattered and poor to matter.
Varg's gaze drifted to the port on the map marked with a crude sketch of a ship. His ship. An Essosi cog broad-bellied and weathered moored at the docks like a gift from some half-forgotten god. How it had ended up in his house's hands, he didn't know; probably bartered from some weak-willed trader for a pile of furs and a promise not to gut him. No wonder Skagos mostly gets cutthroat merchants here.
That ship was his lifeline, his ticket out of this squalor. He could almost hear the creak of its timbers and the snap of its sails as he pictured it cutting through the Shivering Sea.
Raiders. Traders. Conquerors. He'd turn these Skagosi savages into something more, something feared.
Driftwood Hall itself wasn't much to boast about, but it held its own. The wooden walls rose sturdy and thick, lashed together with iron bands and crowned with a palisade that could fend off a half-hearted siege. Three rought hundred men-at-arms answered his call, scarred brutes in patched gabesons and old mail their loyalty bought with ale and a good raiding on the neighbours. Then there were his ten-man retinue, the hard-eyed killers who'd followed him yesterday. They were a cut above the rest with their loyalty, their axes sharp, and their trust earned. They weren't your Kingsguard Knights, but it was a start.
His thoughts turned to trade the lifeblood he'd squeeze from this rock. Every year, a handful of sleek Braavosi ships slipped into Skagos's ports. They came with lemons and spiced wine, trading for furs and timber at prices that left the locals gaping like fools. Varg's father had been scammed by them, no doubt too drunk or too ignorant to haggle for a fair price. But Varg wasn't his father. The Essosi would be back soon; their sails would be on the horizon any month now, and he'd be ready. He leaned forward, tapping the map where the port lay. Essos wasn't far, so Braavos Lorath the Free Cities a world of wealth and opportunity just across the sea. He'd wring every scrap of knowledge from those traders, every rumor of the eas,t and turn it to his gain.
Then, there was the West. Beyond the Wall, the wildlings squatting in their frozen wastes a rabble of stone-age primitives who hadn't even sniffed the Iron Age. Varg's lip curled as he pictured them filthy fur-clad wretches wielding flint spears and bone clubs. Savages worse than his own. But numbers? They had those. And wealth of a sort. Antapped unguarded. Furs ivory women whatever they hid in their hovels. He could raid them, break them, bend them to his will.
A knock at the door snapped him out of his reverie. The old castellan Gorm, who yesterday pleaded to be merciful, poked his head in his gray beard, trembling as he shuffled forward.
"M'lord" he rasped voice thin as the wind outside, "the men are asking for orders. And the women your brother's lot they're wanting to know their place."
Before Varg could answer, a second sharper knock rattled the door. Gorm flinched, turning as it swung open, revealing Torv, Captain of Varg's retinue. The man's scarred face was taut, his hand resting on his axe hilt.
"Trouble m'lord" he said, voice low and urgent.
"Crowl Unicorn riders spotted a mile south. Ten of 'em armed and riding fast. Could be scouts could be raiders."
Varg's smirk vanished, his eyes narrowing. He shoved the chair back, its legs scraping the floor, and stood towering over the table.
"How long?" he barked.
"Half an hour if they push their Unicorns," Torv replied.
Varg's mind raced. The Crowls. Those dung-eating bastards wouldn't waste a day to test him. His father's corpse wasn't even cold, and already they sniffed for weakness. He slammed a fist on the map.
The impact rattled the coins in the chest. "Gorm," he snapped, "tell the men to arm up. Fifty to the walls, the rest to the port. Move!"
Varg waved a hand dismissive but firm.
"Tell the men to keep their posts for now. As for the women…" He paused, his eyes glinting with a cold edge.
"Tell them to ready themselves in the lordly quarters," Varg said this with a smirk and a face of lust.
Gorm nodded, bowing stiffly before retreating. Torv lingered his gaze steady. "Orders for us?" he asked, meaning the retinue.
"With me," Varg said, snatching a short sword from the table's edge and buckling it to his belt.
"We ride out. If they're scouts, we gut them before they report back. If they're raiders, we take their heads and send 'em to the Crowls in a sack. Either way, we'll gut them."
Torv grinned a jagged scar twisting his lip. "Aye, m'lord."
Varg turned back to the maps, his fingers drumming a slow rhythm on the table. Tick tock tick tock.
But now his blood thrummed with the old familiar thrill. Battle was coming sooner than he'd planned, and he'd meet it with iron. The women could wait. The Crowls wouldn't.