(POV Elias)
The yard smelled of iron and woodsmoke and the bite of clean frost—the kind of morning that made Winterfell feel sharpened. Alpha sat on my left, Shade on my right, both still as carved wolves. Up close, their size was undeniable: Alpha stood about 3.2 feet (97 cm) at the shoulder, thick through the chest and forelegs, his head rising nearly to my sternum when he sat. Shade stood about 2.9 feet (89 cm) at the shoulder, leaner, longer in the leg; when she lifted her head to scent the air, her nose came level with my ribs.
I ran a palm down Alpha's ruff and felt how the double coat lay—dense underfur, coarse guard hairs that shed snow. Shade's weight shifted in that small, tireless dance of readiness. The morning's task was simple and not simple: take them through Wintertown before the wolfswood. Streets, smells, noise, strangers—then controlled tracking outside the gate.
Bootsteps scuffed behind me. I didn't have to turn to know who.
"You plan to walk those two straight into the trees," Benjen said, "without first letting them swim through a market?"
"They'll be fine," I said, standing.
"They'll be better if the first thing they learn is that a shout and a falling bucket don't mean charge." He came to my side, breath steam-white in the cold. "Crowd first. Then the woods. I'll lay the scent when we're done scaring old Garron out of his forge."
I gave a short nod. Benjen wasn't wrong, and I didn't need to be right in front of Alpha and Shade to prove anything.
We crossed the yard. The kennel chorus rose and fell as we passed the runs—barks, yips, a few uneasy whines. Alpha didn't look. Shade tracked every shadowed gap between buildings, every open door. When a groom hurried out of the stable with a bridle, she measured him with a glance and dismissed him. The groom stopped anyway and watched us go, one hand on the stable post as if it could anchor him from the look in her eyes.
At the gate, the portcullis groaned up, chain clanking against winter metal. The guards stood straighter than usual as we went under the teeth. I didn't speak to Alpha and Shade; I didn't need to. They kept pace as the ground sloped down toward Wintertown.
Wintertown at midmorning had its own smell—yeast, smoke, dung, thawing hides, hot iron, and the bright clean cut of snow on stone. The road was packed hard where carts and feet had chewed the frost flat. Benjen walked a half‑step ahead and to the side, like he'd done this with a dozen patrols and a dozen more boys in training.
The blacksmith's yard was our first test. Garron's hammer stopped mid‑swing when we turned in. He's a big man—thick arms, leather apron, hair frosted with sweat steam in the cold. His apprentice froze with a length of chain in both hands.
"Seven hells," Garron muttered, then caught himself and dipped his head. "M'lord. Those two… where'd you find beasts like that?"
"They're mine," I said. No point in answering the question. Shade's gaze slid over the apprentice—one quick pass up and down to mark hands, feet, the chain—and then moved on to the stack of bar stock, the open gate, the street beyond. Alpha planted his paws, weight even, body saying nothing but I'm here and I won't be moved by noise.
Garron took a half‑step like he might reach out, then thought better of it. "You want me to make collars that can hold that?" He nodded at Alpha's neck. "Not that I'm saying you need 'em. Just that iron's cheaper than a body if a dog goes wrong."
"They don't need collars," I said. "Thank you for the offer."
Benjen glanced at me. I pretended not to see it. We left the forge to its heat.
Past the smithy, a tanner's stall. A merchant woman balancing a bundle of hides stuttered mid‑step when Alpha's eyes met hers. Shade angled between me and a wagon wheel left at the edge of the path, then flowed around it without breaking stride. I shifted a little so Alpha's shoulder passed between me and the woman. She crossed herself in the Southern way—seven points in the air—and hurried on.
"You see how folk look?" Benjen murmured. "That's protection if they stand with you. It's trouble if they don't."
"I see it."
Children peeled away from a game of tag as we went by, curiosity louder than common sense. One boy crept close, hand outstretched to touch Alpha's flank. Alpha turned his head a fraction, looking down the boy's arm to the small, tentative hand. Not hostile. Not warning. Just weighing.
"Don't," Benjen said gently, without heat. "Ask first."
The boy snatched his hand back, grinning anyway, and his friends shoved him with the kind of envy that turns into bravery next time. I kept walking. Alpha and Shade moved like they'd been raised in noise.
A baker's door banged open and a tray clattered to the stones. Shade's ears cut toward the sound; Alpha's weight shifted a hair toward me. That was all. The baker swore, laughed at herself, and pressed a bun into one of the girls' hands without noticing she'd done it. The girl glanced at us as if we'd conjured the gift, then scampered away.
By the time we reached the last row of squat houses where the road ran thin and the trees pressed close, the street had learned them the way they were already learning the street. Alpha's head swung back once toward the gate until the portcullis teeth hid the sky again. Shade counted alley gaps. I didn't need to guess; the thought pressed faintly at the edge of the bond—angles, approaches, moving shapes.
The wolfswood waited, trunks black and silver with frost. The sound of Wintertown died behind us like a door closing.
"This spot," Benjen said, picking a stand of pines that cupped a shallow hollow. He pulled a small cloth bag from his belt. "We'll lay the trail crooked—wind turns nasty here in the afternoons."
I held Alpha and Shade by their napes while Benjen dragged the meat scent across low branches, scuffed it over bark, doubled back over his own line twice, then tossed the last scrap into a tuft of snow under a fallen limb. When he was done, he set his hands on his hips and watched me out of the corner of his eye.
"Find," I said, letting them both loose.
Shade dropped her nose immediately, weaving left and right with the kind of skill that looks like grace from a distance and like calculation up close. Alpha slid into a position a half body‑length back and to her left: guard dog to the scout, eyes up, head level, pace matched without touching.
They took the first turn clean. Shade's tail ticked twice—confidence. At the second bend, where Benjen had crossed and re‑crossed, she stopped dead, nostrils flaring, then cut the corner wide and picked up the line beyond the tangle. Alpha moved into her space as she paused, body facing the open side of the hollow, weight forward, making himself a wall without blocking her nose.
"Better than good," Benjen said under his breath.
At the third lay, where the wind pooled cold in a shallow dip and muddled every scent with frost, Shade lifted her head and tasted the air, ears pivoting, eyes flicking in small jumps like she could see the smell moving. She cast a small circle, reduced it, found a thread, and followed it. Alpha never glanced down. He watched the trees.
They found the last scrap under the limb, Shade nosing the snow aside precisely without shoving her muzzle into drift. She placed a paw beside it, glanced at me once—this?—and when I lifted two fingers, she left it and returned to heel. Alpha rotated a half‑step later, cutting one more sweep with his eyes through the trees we hadn't come from. I didn't praise them much. I didn't need to. The bond hummed, warm as cupped breath in cold air.
"None of our hounds run like that," Benjen said. "They'll learn to. But they don't start there."
"They start here," I said simply. It wasn't a boast. It was a statement of what I'd made: a starting line better than most finish.
We ran the trail again with no scent, only hand signals. Shade learned the pattern of my shoulder and wrist as if reading a language she'd been half‑taught before birth. Alpha learned my breath. On the third circuit, I turned my back and kept walking toward a tree I'd marked earlier. The line pulled tight inside my head without pain. When I said "To me," low, both came in without breaking into a run until they reached the last five paces, then matched my speed so cleanly it looked choreographed.
Benjen let out a breath through his nose. "You'll want to be careful who sees that."
"I am."
"You'll want to be more careful than that," he said, and there was no smile in it. "Folk don't fear sharp teeth if they know which way they point. They fear not knowing. Keep the pointing clear."
We cut back toward Wintertown with the light turning thin. Alpha watched the track we'd made behind us until the first roofs showed; Shade started counting doorways again two dozen paces before the first one appeared. The crowds had grown denser with the hour. A fishmonger called his prices; a man with a cart full of smoked eels stopped mid‑shout when he saw us and fumbled one onto the slush. A woman carrying a basket sucked a breath between her teeth as Shade's head turned and then made the sign for luck on her breast.
A farrier stepped out into our path, looked at Alpha too long, then stepped back without realizing he'd moved. A boy—bolder, or simply too young to feel consequences—fell in beside us and walked three steps without asking, like he could test the space where the dogs' shoulders guarded mine. Shade gave him nothing. Alpha gave him less. The boy lasted three breaths, then darted away, laughing like he'd stolen something.
Benjen kept his voice pitched for me alone. "You'll have tales by nightfall. Best you set the tone early."
"I'm not telling a story for their benefit," I said. "I'm making sure the truth goes where it needs to."
"And what truth is that?"
"That Winterfell grows new teeth," I said, and didn't add the part about which way they point. Benjen knew already.
The gate guard straightened when he saw me coming. "M'lord," he said, too formally for a man who'd watched me learn to string a bow. He didn't look at me a second time. He looked at the dogs.
Inside the yard, the noise sounded warmer. The kennelmaster stood outside his run with a set to his mouth that said he'd been hearing opinions all morning. He called a half‑hearted greeting and didn't ask to see Alpha and Shade up close. Wise enough. The dogs ignored the kennel chorus again. I led them around the inner wall once at a walk, once at a half‑trot, stopped them without voice, and left them holding a sit for a count of fifty while I turned my back and walked ten paces away. At "free," they rose and came—not exploding into motion the way showmen like to teach, just sliding into place the way a blade slides home.
I took them to the smaller enclosure I'd had mended two days past: low roof against wind, fence line measured to a shoulder of 4 feet (122 cm) so there'd be no foolish jumping tests from townsfolk, fresh straw, clean water. Shade drank first, quick and neat. Alpha waited without being told, then drank slowly. Both ate with their heads down and their ears still moving.
Benjen rested his forearms on the top rail. "If I were a poacher with a knife and a hunger, and I saw those two in the trees, I'd try my luck somewhere else."
"That's the idea." I stayed silent a moment, listening to the small sounds—tongues against water, breath, straw settling. "How bad are the whispers?"
"Not bad yet." Benjen's mouth twitched. "Curious, mostly. A few prayers to the Seven in case the Old Gods were feeling left out. Garron will tell anyone who asks that you've got the best dogs he's seen. The tanner's woman will say they stare through you."
"She's not wrong," I said, and Shade flicked an ear as if she'd heard her part of the story.
He turned a little to look at me. "You didn't ask your father for a coin."
"I didn't need to." I shrugged. "The allowance he gives me each year sits useless if I don't turn it into something that lives and works. I bartered pelts for some, meat for others. It's cheaper than a bad winter's fever."
Benjen grunted. "Less coin than the way southerners buy, more sense than the way most boys buy glory."
We stood without speaking for a while. The light found that moment just before it gives up—when every edge softens and the snow reflects whatever color the sky thinks it is. Shade finished her water and set herself near the gate, not quite guarding, not quite resting. Alpha curled nose to tail, looking like a pile of grey fur if you were foolish enough to forget he wasn't.
"I'm taking them out again at dawn," I said.
"I'll come," Benjen said, like it wasn't a question. "We'll run a real trail. Fresh kill if the gods are kind. Nothing too big yet."
"Nothing too big," I agreed. He knew as well as I did: bigger prey could wait until we'd layered more commands, more trust, more muscle memory into their bones. There's philosophy in that kind of work—small wins stack in ways big gambles don't.
He pushed off the rail. "One more thing." He kept his eyes on the dogs. "If someone asks how you did it, you tell them you didn't. You tell them you got lucky. You tell them you prayed. You don't tell them anything that makes the wrong ears itch."
"I won't," I said, and meant it. No one would ever see the making. They could see what I let live beside me. That was enough.
He left me then to the quiet. I stood another minute, breath frosting and fading, then turned for the godswood. When work is done, you put your tools away clean.
The heart tree's face looked down with its red, unreadable eyes. Snow lay soft under the boughs where the wind couldn't find it. I knelt and set my palms to the roots until the vault opened in my mind—amber wolf‑souls, gold dog‑souls, the flicker of hares and squirrels like candle ends, one deep crimson coal I did not touch.
I didn't spend anything tonight. I only counted. Seven wolves pulsed steady. Two prime hounds burned warm beside them. Every soul is a kind of coin. A squirrel buys you inches. A wolf buys you yards. A human buys you miles and scars. Similar buys down cost—wolf to dog makes sense; wolf to wings is nonsense until you drown the nonsense in power and build the bones to carry it.
Not today. Today I wanted the line tight and the ledger balanced.
I let the vault dim and the cold return to my fingers. When I stood, I felt it again—what I always felt, under memory and oath and plan—the first kindness I ever knew: winter's breath against my cheek and fur against my ribs. If the Old Gods asked payment for work well done, I'd give them this: a North where children didn't cough themselves hollow in spring because some fool wouldn't boil a bucket; roads that didn't drown carts in thaw; dogs that made poachers think twice and raiders a third time.
At the edge of the godswood, I looked back once. The face in the bark did not change. It didn't need to. I knew the shape of its answer already.
Back in the yard, Alpha and Shade lifted their heads when my boots scuffed the hard ground. I didn't speak. I didn't need to. Their eyes told me everything I'd come to hear.
Tomorrow we'd hunt.
Tonight, we let the town talk.
And when talk ran out, I'd still have teeth.