Night fell the last day of the march to Parchments. It was not especially long-- they made the halfway point by sundown, passing Bronzegate hours ago. The mass of armored men and horse snaked along the Kingsroad, the constant thunder of foot and horse their companion. Recent rains-- there were always recent rains here-- meant that the host kicked up a smaller cloud of dust, which the Lord of the Parchments prayed would fool the black dragon into overconfidence.

A lot of the men were green, a lot were veterans of the Triarchy War. In either case it had been a decade since they’d drawn a sword at least. Inexperienced men were afraid, and scared men broke in the field. There’d be none of that, not among the Penrose ranks at least.

Lord Gunthor issued an order upon the army halting for the evening-- he sent runners to local taverns and breweries, and an oxcart to the Parchments in search of wine and ale and beer. His men paid with good coin, and soon enough casks of various liquors began trickling into camp, sent along sometimes with unaccepted coin from grateful locals.

As the moon rose, so did the sound around the Penrose encampment. Fires burned brightly and the ale flowed freely. Nowhere was the celebration more boisterous than under Lord Penrose’s canopy-- the Lord of the Parchments’ oxcart sat alongside the canopy, and the lord himself stood, arm over the wooden barrel, pointing at passers-by and forcing any variety of containers full of the contents into their hands.

“You!” Lord Gunthor called, sloshing ale into the grass. A knight in the black-and-green of House Fell froze. “Drink!”

The knight laughed-- it was his own former squire, Ser Jon Fell. “Of course, my lord.”

Ser Jon stepped forward and took the mug, drinking deeply. He looked up over the brim at the Penrose men-- Lord Gunthor, flanked by his sons Sers Robin and Aubrey. They looked alike, as fathers and their sons tended to. Lord Gunthor’s heir, Ser Robin, might well have been his father reincarnate. He sloshed wine out of glasses, passing it out to the men, laughing and singing bawdy songs. Ser Aubrey, the younger son, was quieter. Ser Aubrey held a cup of wine, but Ser Jon had yet to see it emptied.

One knight produced from his kit a lute, and he had a good enough voice. He called to himself the attention of those around Lord Penrose’s tent, “My lords, my knights, my fellows! I beg your attention!”

He ran his fingers across the strings of the lute. “In honor of the *prolific* Lord Gunthor,” he announced, drawing a boisterous guffaw from the man himself, “I should like to sing a song. *Seven Swords for Seven Sons*, and though our liege has yet to sire that many I have no doubt that given time he will!”

With that the knight began to sing, and the tent soon sang along with him. It was a tale befitting the time, of seven sons and their seven swords and the great deeds they performed with them-- all stirring, martial accomplishments. As the song came to an end, the men cheered and clinked their cups and mugs and horns together, wasting a great deal of drink and soaking many tunics and trousers.

“Do the Dornishman’s Wife!” a man called, to the cheering and applause of many of the men. Someone called back, “I’d like to!”

The lute began again, and the singing followed not so long after. Foremost among the would-be bards was Lord Gunthor himself, at the end of the song roaring, “*and I’ve tasted the Dornishman’s wife!*”

Shakily, the Lord of the Parchments climbed into the oxcart with the assistance of Ser Robin. “Listen, listen damn you!” he called, gesturing broadly with his mug. “We’re going to war tomorrow, or the next day, or whenever the fucking invaders make it to us. Fight like a madman, the Warrior likes that and the Stranger doesn’t. Do not count days, do not count leagues, keep fighting until we’re through the Kingswood and looking out over the Narrow Sea at the charred remnants of their seven-times-damned ships and their bloated fucking bodies in the surf!”

The men cheered, raising their glasses. “Kill the Blackfyres!”

“Kill the Blackfyres!” Lord Gunthor echoed, punctuating the point by launching his empty mug into the night sky. Moments later it thudded heavily onto the canvas of the canopy, spurring the inebriated lord to a full-throated laughter.

“Kill the Blackfyres! Kill the Blackfyres!”