Tywin Lannister wiped the blood from the corner of his mouth with the back of his hand.
Casterly Rock was gone.
Those few simple words shattered everything he took pride in.
Reason, strategy, honor-all turned to ash in that instant.
All that remained was the savage fury of a beast whose den had been violated.
"Retreat!"
"Turn the entire army around! March to Casterly Rock's aid!"
The orders echoed through the command tent, carrying an unprecedented note of panic.
Kevan Lannister looked into his elder brother's bloodshot eyes. He wanted to reason with him, but could not get a single word out.
He knew it was over.
The moment Tywin Lannister lost his composure, they had already lost this war.
The army of the Westerlands, that torrent of steel which had once swept across Westeros, began a humiliating rout.
They were no longer lions, but a pack of feral dogs stabbed in the backside by a hunter, desperate to flee back to their kennel.
But Brynden Tully, that cunning Blackfish, had already spread his net behind them.
Harassment. Endless harassment.
One day, he burned a supply convoy; the next, he poisoned a water source they had to stop at; the day after, mounted archers shadowed them from a distance.
He refused to engage them, content simply to torment them.
The Lannister soldiers were driven to the brink of collapse.
They had to march at speed during the day and guard against unpredictable raids at night. Many did not even dare remove their armor before sleeping.
The once-terrifying lions of the Westerlands now resembled toothless old dogs, dragging their heavy feet through the mud.
Their only remaining conviction was to get home.
Back to Casterly Rock, their impregnable home.
At last, after losing nearly ten thousand men to noncombat attrition and