After receiving his men's report, Earl Glover fell silent for a moment, his fingers tapping unconsciously against the edge of the rough wooden table, his worried gaze sweeping over the map spread across it.
Then he raised his head and addressed the steward behind him. "Keep sending men to Winterfell for help. Urge the duke to send us reinforcements at once. Tell the maester the situation is critical. The Ironborn raids have reached the heart of our family's lands, and Deepwood Motte is in imminent danger."
He had hardly any men left in the castle now. Almost all of them had been sent out to search for traces of the Ironborn across his lands. Their scattered attacks spread like wildfire, tying down his precious troops at every turn.
The steward nodded at the order, his face grave, then turned and hurried out to find the maester and arrange for the letters.
Watching the steward leave, Earl Glover's thoughts returned to more than ten years ago, when Balon Greyjoy had led the Iron Islands in their first rebellion.
He had followed Duke Eddard Stark south to the Iron Islands then, and had shed blood beneath the walls of Pyke. He had witnessed the Ironborn's madness and the resilience of his fellow northmen firsthand.
The smell of smoke and blood from that war still seemed to linger in his nostrils.
"Send a few more men to help clean up," he told a knight behind him, weariness in his voice. "See if anyone is still alive. If there are survivors, bring them all back to Deepwood Motte. Make sure the dead are buried. Don't let animals ravage their bodies."
He did this because the castle was short of men, and the villages that had been plundered and burned were too close to Deepwood