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˖*°࿐chapter fifty-five. lv. GOING NORTH
LAELIA AND LARRIS ARE SITTING AT THE PAINTED TABLE, Allister and Arin standing near their queen, Tobin, and Dorin standing at the other side, Tobin reading a message that was ravened to him. "I thought Natalya was dead. I thought Ryan was dead."
"I'm happy for you," Laelia says to him, his troubled look turning to the ground below him. "You don't look happy."
"Ryan saw the Night King and his army marching towards Eastwatch. If they make it past the wall ―" He puts the parchment down, folding it over.
"The Wall has kept them out for thousands of years. Presumably ―"
"I need to go home," Tobin interrupts the old man, Laelia raising her eyebrows in confusion.
"You said you don't have enough men."
"We'll fight with the men we have. Unless you join us."
"And give the country to Catherine? As soon as I march away she marches in."
"Perhaps not. Catherine thinks the Army of the Dead is nothing but a story made up by wet nurses to frighten children. What if we prove her wrong?" Arin speaks up, the group turning to him, Tobin shaking his head: "I don't think she'll see the dead at my invitation." Arin walks around the table to stand in front of the King, "So bring the dead to her."
"I thought that was what we are trying to avoid," Laelia says.
"We don't have to bring the whole army," Arin faces her. "Only one soldier." Larris' head turns to all of them as they speak, eyebrows furrowed at them. Ser Dorin asks Tobin, "Is that possible?"
"The first White I ever saw was brought into Castle Black from beyond the Wall," he answers.
"Bring one of these things down to Estanding and show her the truth."
"Anything you bring back will be useless unless Catherine grants us an audience and is somehow convinced not to murder us the moment we set foot in the capital," Larris tells them, all of them realizing that it was a foolish plan and they had to make it foolproof. "The only person she listens to is Criss," Arin replies. "He may listen to me." Laelia taps her fingernails against the painted wood, sighing as she stared down at it. Long ago, her brother and their mother stood here and talked about battleplans against the Leygoods when Laelia was just a quickening in her mother's womb. She was nothing then, or so she had been told. But she had never been nothing; she was the blood of the dragon.
Arin's eyes land on her, her gaze looking up at him and she raises her hands off the table, "And how would you get to Estanding?" Everyone stops and looks at Dorin, waiting for an answer from him: "I can smuggle you in, but if the Goldcloaks were to recognize you, I'm warning you, I'm not a fighter." Arin nods his head.
