Mors Umber

Crowfood's nickname comes from a moment of carelessness: asleep by the roadside, a crow mistook him for a dead man and pecked at him until it tore out one eye. He has covered the empty socket with a white leather patch ever since, and wears a bearskin cloak with the animal's head as a hood over a weathered face and an old man's white beard, though he keeps the bulk and fierceness of someone far younger.

His life has been marked by loss: his wife died giving birth, his two sons fell at the Battle of the Trident during the War of the Usurper, and his only daughter was carried off by a man of the Free Folk. That is where his hatred of everything wildling comes from.

At the harvest feast held in Winterfell, Mors attends alongside his brother Hother Whoresbane and offers himself as a new husband for the widowed Lady Hornwood, arguing that if the Greatjon is the Young Wolf's right hand, no Umber is better suited to protect her lands. Maester Luwin promises to pass the request on to King Robb, though privately it is expected to be refused, since the widow has no liking for Crowfood.

When Whoresbane asks for ships and men to stop wildling raids along the Bay of Seals, an alliance is settled between the Umbers and Lord Wyman Manderly, who is set on building a new northern fleet. Mors is scornful of Manderly, mocking him for his girth, but ends up accepting the arrangement on Ser Rodrik Cassel's orders.

When the Greatjon tells King Robb that his uncles wish to remarry, Robb considers having Crowfood take one of Lord Walder Frey's daughters as a second wife.

Mors is among the northern lords who swear loyalty to Stannis Baratheon, but sets a condition: he will only serve if Stannis brings him Mance Rayder's skull. He also makes clear he will not fight his own brother, who swore fealty to House Bolton only because the Greatjon is held prisoner by the Iron Throne. Stannis agrees to both terms and promises to place Mors and his men opposite Hother on the battlefield.

Camped outside Winterfell, Mors captures Theon Greyjoy and Jeyne Poole as they flee the castle, and crosses paths with the Braavosi banker Tycho Nestoris, who has come looking for Stannis. He sends both prisoners off with Tycho and his escort.