“The others return with me. You wouldn’t want your own sweet sister to brave the dangers of the wood without an escort, would you? There are direwolves prowling the dark.” She uncoiled from the great stone seat and rose to her feet. “Come, let us go somewhere we can speak more privily¹.”  She was right, he knew, though it galled² him that she would make that decision. I should never have come to the hall, he realized belatedly. I should have summoned her to me.  It was too late for that now, however. Theon had no choice but to lead Asha to Ned Stark³’s solar. There, before the ashes of a dead fire, he blurted⁵, “Dagmer’s lost the fight at Torrhen’s Square-”  “The old castellan broke his shield wall, yes,” Asha said calmly. “What did you expect? This Ser Rodrik knows the land intimately, as the Cleftjaw does not, and many of the northmen were mounted. The ironborn lack the discipline to stand a charge of armored horse. Dagmer lives, be grateful for that much. He’s leading the survivors⁶ back toward the Stony⁷ Shore.”  She knows more than I do, Theon realized. That only made him angrier. “The victory has given Leobald Tallhart the courage to come out from behind his walls and join Ser Rodrik. And I’ve had reports that Lord Manderly has sent a dozen barges⁸ upriver packed with knights⁹, warhorses, and siege engines. The Umbers are gathering¹⁰ beyond the Last River as well. I’ll have an army at my gates before the moon turns, and you bring me only ten men?”  “I need not have brought you any.”  “I commanded you-”  “Father commanded me to take Deepwood Motte,” she snapped. “He said nothing of me having to rescue my little brother.”  “Bugger Deepwood,” he said. “It’s a wooden pisspot on a hill. Winterfell is the heart of the land, but how am I to hold it without a

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