"Looks like we've reached our first agreement," Mance said cheerfully.
"The oaths of kneelers are like the wind. If the Seven Kingdoms sent every oathbreaker to serve on the Wall, we'd never get through."
Lynn was moved by Mance's words, but the plan clashed with Kuna's idea, so he wanted to hear Mance's version first.
Fighting the dead was an easy choice. Fighting living people who only wanted to survive was harder. He was looking for some middle ground.
When Lynn shared his thoughts, Mance laid it out plainly.
"My plan is simple. Send a small team of elite raiders plus Thenn warriors over the Wall. They circle around behind Black Castle and hide. Then we hit every key outpost along the Wall…"
He tapped several spots on the sheepskin map—each one a vital choke point.
"…with raiding parties. That forces Black Castle to split its men and send help."
"Once their garrison is scattered, the main army feints a frontal attack and draws the rest of the crows up onto the Wall. That's when the team behind them storms Black Castle, takes it, and opens the gates."
"We take the Wall with almost no losses."
"What if it fails?" Lynn asked. "How did the old Kings-Beyond-the-Wall do it?"
"Two separate questions," Mance said, clearing his throat like he was settling in for a long tale. "First, I won't pretend failure is impossible. Most of the Night's Watch are criminals and scum, but there are some dangerous fighters among them. Still, they're fewer than a thousand. We have tens of thousands—spread across the hills like locusts."
"If the first try fails we keep pressing. We can split off men to build rafts, cross the Bay of Seals, and hit Eastwatch from behind. I know the ground around Shadow Tower better than any living man. Or we send thousands of warriors and mammoths to the abandoned castles and just dig through the gates—open a dozen at once."
"But that drags the fight out. The free folk bleed too much. The Wall's defenders take their toll, the Bay of Seals swallows rafts by the dozen, and the Others kill ten times more than any of that. You've seen them. The shorter the days and the colder the nights, the stronger they grow. They kill, then they raise the dead. Giants can't stop them. Neither can the Thenns, the Ice River clans, or the Hardfoots."
Lynn nodded. For the wildlings, this really was the best move right now.
"Of course, there's one simpler way—the legendary Horn of Winter that Joramun supposedly blew."
Lynn pulled the memory from Bloodraven's knowledge: the old tale of the King-Beyond-the-Wall who woke the giants under the earth and could supposedly bring the Wall crashing down.
"We dug up dozens of barrows along the Milkwater—old kings and heroes. We let loose countless shadows into the daylight, but we never found Joramun's horn that could topple the Wall."
Mance pointed to the corner of the tent.
"Even if we had the real one we couldn't blow it, right? The Others would hear and follow."
Lynn looked. A huge black warhorn rested there, curved and eight feet long, its mouth wide enough to fit a whole leg inside. If it came from a bull, it had to be the biggest bull that ever lived. What he had thought was bronze turned out to be ancient gold, etched with runes now fading to brown.
"We found it in a giant's tomb," Mance said, glancing at Nymo. "Keep that to yourself, lad."
Lynn sat back down, impressed. Mance really had thought of everything.
"As for how the old Kings-Beyond-the-Wall did it…" Mance took a sip of mead to wet his throat. "The Horned Lord and Joramun are too ancient—the stories are half fog now."
"Three thousand years ago the brothers Joramun and Gendel led the free folk through ancient caves under the mountains. Hundreds of tunnels, all connected. The crows never knew they existed. But when they came out, the wolves of Winterfell were waiting."
"It was a slaughter. Gendel killed the King in the North, but the king's son picked up his father's banner, put on his crown, and cut Gendel down. The clash woke the crows at Black Castle. They rode out in their black cloaks and caught the free folk between them. North had the King in the North, east had the Umbers, south had the Night's Watch. The free folk were almost wiped out."
"Joramun got away. He fought through the crows with the few men left and fled north, wolves howling behind him. They never caught him. But Joramun didn't know the caves like his brother. He took a wrong turn…"
"He kept going deeper and deeper. Tried to double back, but there was only stone—no sky. Torches started dying one by one until only darkness remained."
"No one ever saw Joramun or his men again. On quiet nights you can still hear their descendants weeping under the mountain, still searching for the way home."
Lynn rubbed his chin. "So the passage under the Wall was lost?"
"Some went looking. They went too deep and met Joramun's children. They're always hungry. In the dark, what else is there to eat but flesh?"
Mance's tone made it impossible to tell if he was joking.
Lynn said, "I remember the Bard Bael and Redbeard Raymun too."
"Yes," Mance continued. "They both climbed the Wall."
"Climbing leaves you helpless. The men on top can rain down stones, spears, and burning pitch while you're plastered against the ice like a bug."
"Sometimes the Wall itself seems to shake you off, the way a dog shakes off fleas."
Mance's eyes went distant as he remembered.
"I watched a sheet of ice crack right under a raider's feet and take half a dozen men with it. On patrols out of Shadow Tower we'd always find bodies smashed at the base of the Wall."
"But if the free folk could climb quietly and get on top, everything changes. Give them time and they can build a foothold up there, raise their own fort, then drop ropes and ladders for thousands more."
"The problem is it takes forever—almost as long as digging through—and burns through ropes and hides like crazy."