"Coward! Milk-drinking stone man hiding in an iron box!" Khal Jhezkahn spat the Dothraki curses through bared teeth, his dark eyes burning with humiliated fury. The horse lords despised nothing more than the men who shrouded themselves in steel and walls.
The Khal swung his silver arakh, the heavy gold bells woven into his long braid chiming a frantic, chaotic rhythm. The blade—half-sword, half-scythe—caught the sunlight as it descended in a blinding arc.
Gendry did not flinch. He leaned into the strike, bringing his heavy shield up just enough to deflect the curved steel away from his waist. The arakh scraped against his black scale armor, throwing a shower of yellow sparks but failing to bite into the iron beneath.
All around them, the battlefield had compressed into a localized hurricane. Captain Spear of the Wolf Pack cavalry and Gillo Rhear of the Long Lances drove their mounts forward, intercepting Jhezkahn's two bloodriders. The Dothraki bodyguards fought with the fanaticism of men whose lives were tied to their Khal, their blades seeking the vulnerable joints of the Westerosi horses.
Gendry remained a calm center in the storm. His Myrish smiths had earned their gold; the heavy black scale armor had been masterfully modified to protect the traditional weak points of Westerosi plate—the armpits, the inner elbows, and the backs of the knees.
"Only a coward refuses to bleed!" Jhezkahn roared. His arakh danced like a silver tempest, whistling as it sliced through the air. A Dothraki duel was a chaotic, unarmored dance of speed and butchery, ending when one man spilled his opponent's bowels onto the dirt. The Khal was entirely unaccustomed to an enemy who simply let the blows land.
Jhezkahn was not a fool. He adjusted his grip, his eyes darting to the seams of Gendry's armor, seeking a gap to slide the curved tip of his blade into. He struck at the throat, the underarm, the thigh.
Gendry pivoted, his movements economical and grounded. When the arakh struck true, it simply rebounded off the hardened steel vambraces and thick scale. But when Gendry swung back, the air tore. The massive iron warhammer hummed, slamming into Jhezkahn's guard. The sheer kinetic force traveled down the Khal's arm, leaving his muscles trembling and his knuckles white.
Speed against speed, strength against strength. Gendry felt the rhythm of the forge singing in his blood. He had youth, reach, and impenetrable iron on his side.
Jhezkahn was a veteran of a thousand skirmishes, having risen to lead seven thousand screamers. But he was past forty, and the wild stamina of his youth was fading. Through the slit of his helm, Gendry watched the Khal's chest heave. The warlord's breathing grew ragged, his strikes losing their initial, blinding velocity. A flicker of something cold and unfamiliar flashed in Jhezkahn's dark eyes—the realization that his blade could not cut stone.
The Khal knew the jaqqa rhan were watching. To retreat from a boy in an iron suit would shatter his rule. He gripped his arakh with both hands, forsaking defense for a frenzied, desperate assault.
"Die!" Jhezkahn shrieked, driving his horse closer. He swung for Gendry's neck, but the blade merely glanced off the heavy steel gorget, sliding harmlessly down the pauldron.
Crack.
Gendry found his opening. He stepped into the Khal's guard and brought the warhammer up in a brutal, bone-shattering arc. The spiked iron head slammed into Jhezkahn's right shoulder. The sickening crunch of pulverizing bone echoed over the din of battle. The Khal's face contorted, all color draining from his copper skin as his right arm went limp, the arakh slipping from his numb fingers.
Before Jhezkahn could spur his horse away, Gendry reversed his grip and swung a second time.
The hammer met the Khal's temple. The skull gave way instantly, bursting open in a spray of red mist, bone splinters, and gray matter. Khal Jhezkahn slumped sideways in his saddle, sliding off his magnificent black stallion and hitting the blood-soaked earth like a discarded sack of meat.
"The Khal is dead!"
"Jhezkahn falls!"
The bloodriders howled in anguish, abandoning their own defenses to hurl themselves at Gendry in a suicidal bid for vengeance. Their blind fury was their undoing. Gillo Rhear parried a wild swing, driving his broadsword clean through the first bloodrider's chest. Beside him, Captain Spear hurled a short javelin at point-blank range, pinning the second Dothraki to his saddle.
Spear swung down from his mount, drew his dagger, and severed Jhezkahn's head. He tossed the grisly, bell-tangled trophy to Gendry, who bound it to his saddle horn.
The sight of their Khal's severed head triggered a catastrophic collapse in the Dothraki lines. Without a central warlord, the khalasar immediately fractured. Jhezkahn's bloodriders had died, but his kos—the lieutenants commanding the sub-factions—had no intention of sharing his fate. They began shouting conflicting orders, gathering their own khas to abandon the siege and flee back toward the Rhoyne.
The heavy war drums of Myr shifted their tempo, beating a rapid, triumphant march.
The iron gates of the city roared with cheers. One king had fallen, and the Regent of Myr stood victorious in the blood and mud.
As the Dothraki turned their horses to flee, the true slaughter began. Gendry's hidden reserves sprang their traps.
From the southern ridge, Prince Oberyn Martell crested the hill. He rode a midnight-black sand steed with a mane and tail the color of fresh blood. The Red Viper wore flowing silks over his bronze scales, catching the sun like a mirage of fire. He raised his ash-wood spear, his round shield bearing the sun-and-spear of House Martell strapped to his arm.
The hundred Dornish light horsemen swept down the ridge. They did not engage in heavy melee; they rode along the flanks of the routing Dothraki, unleashing devastating volleys from their recurve bows and hurling light spears into the unprotected backs of the screamers.
Farther east, a second trap snapped shut. Brown Ben Plumm and the Second Sons erupted from their concealed positions. True to their sellsword nature, they bypassed the retreating warriors entirely. Instead, they rode hard into the sprawling Dothraki baggage train, cutting down the rear guard and scattering the vulnerable women, children, and slaves that made up the heart of the khalasar.
The horde disintegrated into a panicked, screaming stampede.
"Long live Myr!" the Free Army chanted, their spears raised to the sky.
"Long live the Hammer King!"
Gendry sat atop his destrier, breathing heavily in the stifling heat of his helm. The plains were littered with the dead, but the city behind him stood unbroken.