(Third-person perspective)
Olenna saw the parchment and realized it was a Crow that had delivered a message, but she didn't understand why the Crow had come to her instead of the broodroom, nor how Crow could be so big. She gently pushed away Margaery, who was clinging to her in fear, and walked toward the maids.
The soldiers charged at them, armed with spears and crossbows.
Before she could even get them to stop, a soldier fired a crossbow bolt at the bird. The bolt whistled through the air and struck the bird, but what she expected didn't happen; the bird flapped its enormous wings, deflecting the bolt like swatting a fly.
Only then did Olenna realize what it was, but her soldiers, witnessing what had happened, were even more terrified. More men flew towards the beast simultaneously; this time, it spread its wings and soared into the sky, dodging all the crossbow bolts fired. Olenna shouted...
"Cease fire immediately!"
She had many spies in the Westerlands, the Riverlands, and the Vale, but fewer and fewer in the North. She still managed to get some rumors, one of which was about Druid ' magical beasts, which were impervious to arrows. She guessed that this beast was sent by the Druid or someone close to him.
"Go back to your posts. I don't need your help dealing with a raven."
Margaery mustered her strength and approached her grandmother.
"Was that really a cacophony crow?"
The Crow perched again on the pergola, its large wings spread, cawing loudly. It looked angry. Olenna looked at the beast with admiration in her eyes. It was magnificent. Its feathers were as black as night. Except for a small patch of white feathers where its wings met, the beast was entirely black. She approached it. Margaery expressed her concern.
"Grandma, be careful... be careful."
The Crow hopped off the table, stretched out its legs, Olenna approached it, picking up the parchment. Then, she tried to touch the bird's feathers, which shimmered like obsidian fragments, but it turned and snarled at her before flying away.
She assumed it was from Druid and immediately opened it to read. When she finished reading the letter, she was amused and couldn't help but laugh.
"What's written on it?" Margaery tried to decipher it, but Olenna immediately crumpled it into a ball and asked.
"We will be welcoming some guests in a month."
She turned to a maid and said.
"Call the finance manager and the housekeeper."
She stroked Margaery's cheek as she spoke.
"Honey, call Willas, we need to have a meeting. I hope you can both come."
When Willas and Margaery entered the sunroom, Olenna was burning the parchment the spies had brought. A few minutes later, the two Highgarden advisors also entered her sunroom. Olenna, the Highgarden's treasurer Roland Hightower, and the Highgarden's steward Cedric Meadows sat around a large oak table. Margaery and Willas sat on either side of her; their attention was focused on their grandmother and what she was about to say.
Willas realized that his grandmother was thinking about many things while they waited for her to speak. Then he said...
" The Vale is at war with the Mountain Clans."
Willas found it strange. The Mountain Clans were just a nuisance in the Vale, not a real threat. As long as they weren't in the mountains, they were no different from poorly equipped bandit gangs, Willas said.
"Grandma, Undeserving this newsworthy? The Vale could wipe them out at any moment; they might have already taken them down before this news even reaches us."
Olenna nodded.
"You're right, aren't you? If it were Mountain Clans from the past, the Vale could wipe them out in less than a day, but if..."
She gazed out the window into the distance and continued speaking.
"What if someone unified them, sold them good weapons, and trained them for years, turning them from a ragtag army into a respectable force?"
Margaery also joined in.
Is that what the letter said?
Olenna shook her head.
"No, if we believe what the letter says, that the Mountain Tribes united under the Moon Brothers and burned all the crops in the Vale of Arryn."
She sat down in the chair and began tapping her fingers on the table.
"The part about selling weapons and training them is just theory. As you said, the Mountain Tribes of the past couldn't have done that. If it had actually happened, my scouts in the North would have already informed me. In a few days, the news will reach us."
She turned to the advisors.
"If this is true, we need to start sending more food to Gulltown. How much food do we have left?"
Cedric Meadows said.
"Can we trust this letter, madam?"
"The source of the letter is reliable, so I have already sent word to our warehouse in Gulltown to triple the price, but the real plan will not begin until I can confirm it with my source. Now, load all the remaining grain onto the ship."
Margaery didn't understand why they were in such a hurry to fill the boat, so she asked.
"Why are we in such a hurry? We haven't even confirmed it's true yet."
"Willas said."
"That's not really important. If it's true, our grain needs to get there in over a month to seize the opportunity."
What opportunity?
"War, right, Grandma?"
Olenna nodded, her eyes filled with pride as she looked at her grandson.
"You're right."
Willas continued,
"If this is true, it means the Vale will have to fight and feed its millions of people without a harvest. Therefore, they must use their emergency reserves. Feeding an army will be an arduous task. This will limit the number of people they can muster, and even if they can be fed for about two months, they will starve after that. So our warehouse in Gulltown has become their savior. What I don't understand is, if we sell at too high a price, won't they just get supplies from the Riverlands?"
Olenna shook her head and sighed. "Willas is still young and inexperienced," Roland Hightower explained.
"They have to buy from us because there won't be much Riverlands left, as their harvest is at least three months away."
Cedric said.
"Their land is as fertile as ours, so they can harvest two or three times a year, but their land is not as vast as ours. Their harvest is limited; they must have already sold their last harvest to Essos."
"If I'm not mistaken, the Riverlands may have received similar letters as well," Olenna said thoughtfully. The political climate was changing, and a cold wind was blowing from the far the North. Olenna smiled, full of anticipation for what was to come.