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Year 298 AC/7 ABY
Wolfswood, The North
Jon's mount shifted beneath him, hooves breaking through the ice-crusted snow with sharp, brittle snaps. The cold bit through his gloves, numbing his fingers where they gripped the reins. The Force prickled along his spine like frost forming on bare skin. He'd grown accustomed to its constant murmur these past months, the way it whispered warnings through the soles of his boots and the roots of his teeth. But this felt different. Colder. Wrong in a way that made his stomach clench.
"I swear by the old gods and the new," Theon's voice cut through the morning quiet, "if we find these wildlings holed up with their women, I call first pick." His grin held that particular smugness that made Jon's jaw clench. "Been too long since I've had a proper northern girl warm my—"
"Tracks veer east here, m'lords." Quent's interruption saved them from whatever crude imagery Theon had been building toward. The captain of guards dismounted, studying the disturbed snow. "Fresh. Maybe six, seven sets of prints."
Jon swung down from his saddle, the movement fluid in a way that would have surprised him months ago. The Force hummed beneath his awareness, not the overwhelming flood from his first lessons, but a steady current he'd learned to navigate. As his boots touched ground, something cold slithered through that current. A wrongness that made his hand drift toward his sword.
Robb caught his eye, a slight tightening around his mouth the only sign he felt it too. That creeping unease that had nothing to do with the winter morning.
"How far ahead?" Robb asked, voice carrying easy authority.
Harwin crouched beside Quent, fingers tracing the boot prints. "Few hours at most. They're moving heavy—probably carrying what they stole from the Tallhart farmstead."
"Carrying steel and grain while we ride fresh." Theon's eagerness bled through his words. "We'll run them down before midday."
Jon knelt beside the tracks, letting his fingers hover above the disturbed snow. Luke's voice echoed in his memory: The Force flows through all living things. Even their passing leaves ripples.
There—faint as morning mist, but unmistakable. Fear threaded through determination. Desperation sharp as winter wind. These weren't raiders glutted on violence. These were people running from something.
"Jon?" Robb's question held layers only Jon would catch.
"They're scared." The words came quiet, meant only for his brother. "Not of us. Of something else."
Wayn shifted uneasily in his saddle. "Begging your pardon, but how could you know that from tracks?"
Jon stood, brushing snow from his knees rather than answering. Some secrets cut deeper than bastard blood.
They rode in tighter formation as the tracks led deeper into the wolfswood. The trees pressed close here, ancient sentinels that had stood since before the Andals came. Jon's enhanced hearing caught sounds the others missed—the snap of a branch two hundred yards north, the whisper of disturbed snow where something had passed recently.
"There." He pointed to a thin column of smoke rising between the trees. "Half a mile, maybe less."
Theon squinted. "I don't see any—" He stopped, frowning. "Seven hells, how did you spot that?"
But Jon had already urged his mount forward, following the acrid scent of burned timber that shouldn't have reached them yet. The others followed, hands moving to sword hilts as the trees opened into a small clearing.
The farmstead had been modest, a single longhouse with an attached barn, the kind of holding that dotted the North's wilderness. Now it was a blackened skeleton, roof beams collapsed inward like broken ribs. The stench of charred meat made Harwin gag.
"Gods be good," Jory muttered, crossing himself.
Three bodies lay in the yard, arrows sprouting from their backs. A man, a woman, and what might have been a boy of ten. The cold had preserved them perfectly, down to the expression of terror frozen on the woman's face.
Jon dismounted, bile rising in his throat. Through the Force, death echoed like a scream and not just the ending of life, but the fear and pain that had preceded it. His hands trembled as he knelt beside the boy's body.
"Bloody Wildlings," Theon's voice had lost all traces of humor. "But why burn the house? Why waste arrows on people already running?"
"Because they enjoyed it." The words tasted like ash in Jon's mouth. Master Luke had warned him about this, how the Force would make him feel death more keenly, how each life lost would weigh on him. With great power comes great responsibility, his teacher had said. Never forget that those you fight were once children who laughed and loved.
"Mount up." Robb's command cut sharp. "They can't be far."
They rode harder now, urgency replacing caution. The tracks grew fresher, the disturbed snow showing signs of haste. Jon's anger built with each hoofbeat, a cold fire that Luke would have warned him against. But Master Luke wasn't here, and those bodies—
Movement.
Jon's hand flew up, bringing the column to a halt. Through the Force, he felt them—seven minds pulsing with adrenaline and bloodlust, spread in a rough crescent ahead.
"Ambush," he breathed. "They're waiting for us!"
The air split with the twang of bowstrings.
Time stretched like honey in winter. Jon saw the arrow cutting through the air toward Harwin's throat, saw the guard's eyes widening, saw death approaching on raven's wings. His hand moved without thought, Force flowing through him like lightning.
The arrow diverted.
"What in the seven hells!" someone started.
Then chaos erupted.
Wildlings burst from the undergrowth, screaming war cries in the Old Tongue. "Kill the kneelers! Take their steel!"
Jon's sword cleared its sheath as a scarred woman charged him, axe raised high. He flowed into Soresu, body moving with an economy that made her wild swings look clumsy. Sidestep, redirect, let her momentum carry her past. His blade found the gap beneath her arm, and she crumpled with a gurgle.
Through the Force, he felt her life gutter out like a blown candle. The weight of it staggered him.
No time for grief, he told himself, spinning to meet the next attacker.
Robb fought like a man possessed, Djem So's aggression channeled into precise devastation. His sword rose and fell in perfect rhythm, each strike calculated for maximum effect. But it was more than training. Jon felt his brother's mind brushing against his own, sharing awareness.
Left flank, two incoming, Robb's thoughts whispered.
Jon pivoted, bringing his blade up to catch a wildling's descending strike. The impact jarred through his arms, but he let it flow past him, redirecting the force into a spinning counter that opened the man's throat.
"Yield!" Jon shouted in the Old Tongue, the words clumsy but understandable. "Throw down your weapons!"
A wildling with filed teeth snarled back. "Southron talk, all piss and chains! We seen what happens to kneelers."
Theon's sword took the man in the side, dropping him mid-sentence. "Should've listened, you stupid bastard."
The fight was brutal in its brevity. Six wildlings against six Winterfell men should have been a close thing. Should have been bloody and desperate. Instead, it was a slaughter.
Jon moved through them like water through rocks, each motion flowing into the next. When a wildling tried to flank Quent, Jon was there, blade intercepting. When another aimed a bow at Robb's back, Jon's thrown dagger found his eye before he could loose.
And through it all, that terrible awareness of each death rippling through the Force, each ended life adding weight to his soul.
The last wildling fell with Wayn's spear in his gut, and sudden silence descended. Six bodies littered the bloody snow. The Winterfell men stood panting, some bleeding from minor wounds, all staring at Jon and Robb with expressions caught between awe and fear.
"How..." Harwin's voice cracked. "That arrow… it was meant for me."
Before Jon could answer, movement caught his eye. A figure emerged from behind a massive oak, spear raised but trembling. A woman, tall and lean, with the hard beauty of those born beyond the Wall. Her eyes darted between them like a trapped animal's.
"I yield!" The words burst from her lips as she threw the spear down. "I yield to you, little lord! Grant me mercy!"
Theon's sword came up. "One more for the worms."
Jon's blade blocked his before thought formed. "She yielded."
"So?" Theon's eyes blazed. "You saw what they did to that family. She was with them."
"A woman don't last long alone past the Wall 'less she's sharp, mean, or lucky. I been all three." The wildling woman kept her hands visible, movements careful. "I didn't lay hand on those Southron pinks. Didn't care to. But men like them don't ask — they take. Try tellin' 'em no, see how long your teeth stay in your head."
"Convenient story," Theon spat.
But Robb had dismounted, approaching the woman with measured steps. Jon felt his brother's mind working, Force senses reading deeper than words.
"What's your name?" Robb's voice held quiet authority.
"Osha." She met his eyes steadily, fear there but also defiance. "You lot've got the look—Stark pups, all long faces and longer honor."
"Why are you south of the Wall?" Jon asked, moving to stand beside his brother. "The truth now."
Something shifted in Osha's expression—fear deeper than death, of eyes that saw too much. Her voice dropped to barely above a whisper.
"The wind's gone cruel. The dead ain't sleeping, not no more. The white shadows ride, and the cold's their breath." She shuddered, wrapping her arms around herself. "You think I'd climb the bloody Wall for stale bread and rusted steel? There's worse things behind me than a crow's rope."
The words hit Jon like ice water. Luke's warnings, Father's reports from the Wall, the creeping wrongness he'd felt all morning—threads weaving into a pattern he didn't want to see.
"You're lying," Theon said, but uncertainty colored his voice.
"Am I?" Osha's laugh held no humor. "That Wall o' yours been standin' so long, you soft lot forgot what it's holdin' back. But we ain't. We who sleep in its shadow, we know what wakes when the cold bites deep. The Long Night? Ain't some tale for babes. It's comin'. And it don't knock."
Jon exchanged glances with Robb. Through their growing Force bond, he felt his brother's mind racing through the same calculations. Father investigating strange reports. Luke's warnings about darkness in the North. And now this.
"Quent," Robb commanded, "bind her hands but don't harm her. She comes back to Winterfell."
"My lord?" Quent's uncertainty was plain.
"She has information Father needs to hear." Robb's tone brooked no argument. "And if she's lying, well—the dungeons are warm enough."
As Quent moved to comply, Jon caught Robb's arm. "The arrow," he said quietly. "They know something is amiss."
Robb's jaw tightened. "I know."
"Father said to keep it secret."
"And we have." Robb's blue eyes held steady. "From everyone outside the household. These men are ours, Jon. They'll hold their tongues."
Jon wanted to believe that. But as they prepared to ride back, he caught the way Harwin looked at him. The way Wayn's hand trembled on his reins. The way even Quent kept glancing back, as if expecting something.
Everything's changing, Jon thought as they turned toward Winterfell. And I don't think we can stop it.
Behind them, the dead wildlings lay cooling in the snow, their blood already freezing. Jon didn't look back, but he felt them—six more weights added to a burden he was only beginning to understand.
Ghost would be waiting at Winterfell, and Jon found himself longing for the wolf's simple presence. In Ghost's mind, there were no questions about right or wrong, no weight of power or responsibility. Only the pure, clean purpose of the pack.
But Jon was learning that men didn't have that luxury. Men had to choose, and live with their choices, and carry the weight of every life they took or saved.
The wind picked up as they rode, setting the trees to groaning. And if it sounded like whispers—like warnings of worse things coming—Jon tried very hard not to listen.
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Kingslanding, Crownlands
The heels of Tyrion's boots caught on an uneven flagstone, jolting him forward as he navigated the Tower of the Hand's corridors. The scent of beeswax and old parchment gave way to something sharper—his father's particular blend of ink and iron, a smell that had haunted Tyrion's childhood nightmares.
Tywin Lannister sat behind the Hand's desk as if he'd occupied it for years rather than minutes. No papers before him, nor wine at hand, just those pale green eyes dissecting the world with surgical precision. The golden lion brooch at his throat caught the afternoon light filtering through tall windows.
"You're late," Tywin said, not looking up from whatever invisible calculations occupied his mind.
"The stairs proved challenging." Tyrion wheeled himself closer, noting how his father had already rearranged the office. Jon Arryn's personal effects—gone. Any trace of warmth—eliminated. "Though I suspect you'd have found fault with my timing regardless."
"Spare me your self-pity." Tywin's gaze finally settled on him, cold as a Casterly Rock winter. "Robert has asked me to serve as his Hand."
"My congratulations." Tyrion reached for the wine decanter on a side table, pleased to find it still there. Apparently even Tywin Lannister couldn't purge all comfort from the realm. "Though I imagine you're less than thrilled. You do so hate leaving your counting house."
"What I hate," Tywin said, each word precise as a dagger thrust, "is necessity. Eddard Stark's refusal has created... complications."
Tyrion paused mid-pour. "Complications?" The wine gurgled into his cup, a rich Arbor gold that promised temporary escape from his father's presence. "Shouldn't you be delight with the Starks?"
"Nothing about the Starks is delightful." Tywin's fingers drummed once—a rare display of irritation. "They're proving far more interesting than anticipated. Were you aware there was an assassination attempt on the eldest daughter?"
The wine cup stopped halfway to Tyrion's lips. His mind raced through possibilities. Who, why, how—even as he kept his expression carefully neutral. "Sansa Stark? When?"
"Three nights past, according to my source in Winter Town." Tywin watched him with the intensity of a cat studying a mouse hole. "A sellsword but the girl survived."
"To attack the Starks is to attack the King," Tyrion's voice climbed despite himself. "No sane person would do that."
"Indeed." Tywin leaned back, the chair creaking under his weight. "More curious still, the Starks have made no announcement. No ravens to the King. No calls for justice. Nothing."
Tyrion took a long swallow of wine, buying time to process. The Starks, those paragons of Northern honor, keeping quiet about an attempt on their daughter's life? It didn't fit. Unless...
"They suspect someone powerful," he said slowly. "Someone they can't move against openly."
"Or they have something to hide." Tywin's tone suggested he found this possibility more likely. "You were there, you've noticed nothing unusual during your visit?"
Tyrion almost laughed at his father's ability to make the word sound like an accusation. "Strange is a relative term in the North, though nothing was out of the ordinary."
But even as he said it, Tyrion remembered that strange moment in the practice yard. Jon Snow moving with impossible speed, almost defeating Ser Barristan as if he could see the future. And that peculiar instructor, Luke Skywalker, with his talk of distant lands and eyes that held too many secrets.
"You're lying." Tywin's pronouncement fell like an executioner's axe. "Poorly. Whatever you're protecting, I suggest you reconsider. The game has changed, Tyrion. Stark's refusal signals something larger at work."
"Everything signals something larger to you." Tyrion drained his cup, already reaching for more. "A servant drops a plate, and you see Dornish conspiracy."
"A servant drops a plate, and I see carelessness that spreads like rot." Tywin rose, moving to the window with measured steps. "The realm bleeds from a thousand small wounds. Robert whores and drinks. Cersei schemes. That fool Littlefinger plays with numbers while the crown's debt drowns us all. And now the Starks—the loyal Starks—keep secrets and refuse honors."
The afternoon sun painted Tywin's profile in harsh relief, every line earned through decades of ruthless calculation. Tyrion studied his father and saw not the Lord of Casterly Rock, but something more dangerous—a man who'd found his assumptions challenged.
"What will you do?" Tyrion asked, though he suspected he knew.
"What I always do. Restore order." Tywin turned from the window. "You'll remain in King's Landing when I assume the Handship. Your... connections... may prove useful."
"How flattering. I've always wanted to be useful."
"You've always wanted to be clever." Tywin's voice could have frozen dragonfire. "The two are not synonymous. This assassination attempt, investigate it. Quietly. I want to know who wanted the Stark girl dead, and why her family hides it."
Tyrion considered refusing, but the wine hadn't dulled his survival instincts that much. "And if the trail leads somewhere inconvenient?"
"Then you'll tell me, and I'll decide what's to be done." Tywin moved toward the door, each step measured and deliberate. "The Starks think themselves above the game, hidden in their frozen wasteland. They're about to learn otherwise."
The door closed with finality, leaving Tyrion alone with his wine and racing thoughts. An assassination attempt on Sansa Stark. Silence where there should be outrage.
He wheeled himself to the window, looking out over King's Landing's sprawl. Somewhere in this cesspit of ambition and vice, someone had paid to kill a girl whose greatest crime was probably an excess of courtesy. And somewhere in the North, the Starks were playing their own game—one his father couldn't see from his tower of assumptions.
Tyrion smiled grimly and poured another cup. He'd investigate, as ordered. But perhaps not quite as his father expected.
After all, clever and useful weren't synonymous. But sometimes, if you were very careful, they could appear to be.
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Castle Black, The Wall
The raven arrived during the evening meal, its black wings cutting through Castle Black's perpetual chill. Eddard set down his horn of ale as Maester Aemon's steward approached, the sealed parchment trembling in the old man's grip.
"For Lord Stark, from Winterfell."
Ice crystallized in Eddard's veins before he'd broken the seal. The wax bore Luwin's mark—not Catelyn's. His fingers worked mechanically, unfolding the parchment while conversations continued around him. Greatjon's booming laughter. The scrape of wooden spoons against bowls. All of it faded as he read.
Assassination attempt on Lady Sansa. Attacker dead. She lives, unharmed. Valyrian steel dagger recovered. Lady Stark requests your immediate return.
The parchment crumpled in his fist. Around him, the common hall continued its nightly rhythms—black brothers arguing over dice, hounds fighting for scraps, wind rattling the shutters. None of it penetrated the roaring in his ears.
"Ned?" Benjen's voice, sharp with concern.
Eddard passed the letter wordlessly. His brother's face darkened as he read, jaw muscles bunching. The Greatjon leaned over, scanning the message before slamming his massive fist onto the table. Bowls jumped. Ale sloshed.
"What craven whoreson dares attack House Stark!"
"We ride tonight." Eddard stood, the bench scraping against stone. "Greatjon, ready the men."
"The hour grows late, my lord." Maester Aemon's soft voice carried from the high table. "The Kingsroad is treacherous in darkness."
"Then we'll ride carefully." The words came out harder than Eddard intended. He forced himself to breathe, to think past the image of steel at his daughter's throat. "Forgive me, Maester. But my daughter—"
"Needs her father. Yes." Aemon's milky eyes seemed to see through him regardless. "Though haste born of fear oft leads to folly."
Benjen gripped Eddard's shoulder. "I'll gather supplies. You'll need more hands."
"You'll do nothing." The fury in Eddard's voice surprised them both. "You'll stay here, where you're needed."
"She's my niece!"
"And the Watch is your life." Eddard softened his tone, recognizing his brother's anguish mirrored his own. "You said it yourself—the Watch bleeds men daily. I won't have you abandon your post for my family's sake."
Benjen's face twisted, duty warring with blood. "If I could just—"
"Lord Stark." Jeor Mormont's gravel voice cut through their argument. The Lord Commander stood in the doorway, his raven perched on his shoulder. "A word, before you depart."
Eddard wanted to refuse. Every heartbeat wasted here meant another league between him and Winterfell. But the Old Bear's expression brooked no argument.
"Make it quick, Lord Commander."
"There's something you must see." Mormont turned without waiting for agreement. "It concerns the threat we discussed. The threat to all our families."
Sansa. Her name pounded through Eddard's skull with each step down the tower stairs. Who would dare? Why? The questions churned as they descended into Castle Black's bowels, where ice crept along stone walls and torches fought a losing battle against the dark.
"We found him three moons past." Mormont's voice echoed off narrow walls. "Ser Waymar Royce. Bronze Yohn's son."
The name penetrated Eddard's fury. He'd seen the boy years ago. A third son, proud and eager to prove himself. "Benjen said he was lost beyond the Wall."
"Aye. Lost and found again." They reached a heavy door bound with iron. Mormont produced a key. "I'd planned to send him home to his father, but..."
The door swung open on a cell carved from ice and stone. On a crude table lay a form wrapped in black wool. Even through the cloth, Eddard could see the body's outline—too still, too rigid.
"Three moons, you said?"
"Look closer."
Mormont pulled back the covering. Waymar Royce stared at the ceiling with eyes like blue stars. His face bore no decay, no bloating—as perfect as a statue carved from white marble. The cold had preserved him, yet...
"This isn't natural preservation." Eddard leaned closer, fighting revulsion. "There's no discoloration. No—"
The eyes moved.
Eddard jerked back as Waymar Royce sat up with inhuman grace. No breath misted from blue lips. No blood flowed beneath translucent skin. The thing that had been Bronze Yohn's son turned its head with the mechanical precision of a siege engine.
"Gods be good." Mormont stumbled backward.
The wight lunged with shocking speed. Dead fingers closed around the Lord Commander's throat, lifting him off his feet as if he weighed nothing. Mormont's face purpled, hands clawing uselessly at the iron grip.
Eddard's hand found Ice's hilt without thought. The Valyrian steel sang as it cleared the scabbard, its weight familiar as breathing. He swung in a tight arc—the cell left no room for proper swordwork.
The blade sheared through the wight's arm at the elbow. No blood sprayed. The severed limb continued squeezing Mormont's throat even as it fell.
The wight turned those terrible blue eyes on Eddard. Its remaining hand reached for him, fingers splayed like claws.
"The head!" Mormont gasped, prying dead fingers from his throat. "Take the head!"
Eddard's next stroke separated Waymar Royce's head from his shoulders. The body collapsed like a marionette with severed strings. Those blue eyes dimmed, fading to the clouded grey of ordinary death.
Silence filled the cell, broken only by their ragged breathing. Eddard stared at what remained of a boy who'd eaten at his table, trained in his yard. Luke Skywalker's words echoed: Ice and death marching south.
"Now you understand." Mormont rubbed his bruised throat. "This is what waits beyond the Wall. This is what the wildlings flee."
"How many?"
"We don't know. The rangers who return speak of endless bodies." Mormont nudged the severed head with his boot. "I'll still send him to Bronze Yohn. Let the Vale see what we face. Let them all see."
Eddard cleaned Ice with mechanical precision, his mind racing. An assassin in Winterfell. The dead walking beyond the Wall. The realm scheming while true darkness gathered strength.
"My oath stands." He sheathed the great sword. "Whatever Winterfell can spare, you'll have. Men, steel, provisions."
"And when you reach King's Landing? When you take your place as Hand?"
"I refused Robert." The admission tasted bitter now. "I thought the North needed me here. But if this threat is real..."
"You've seen the dead walk." Mormont's eyes held grim certainty. "The realm will need unity to survive what's coming. It will need leaders who understand the true enemy."
Eddard thought of Sansa, of the blade at her throat. Of his children training with Luke Skywalker, learning powers he barely comprehended. Perhaps the stranger had spoken truly—perhaps they would need every advantage to survive the coming storm.
"I must go." He turned from the corpse. "My daughter needs me."
"Go." Mormont stepped aside. "But remember what you've seen. The game of thrones matters nothing if we're all corpses."
Eddard climbed the stairs two at a time, Mormont's words chasing him. In the courtyard, Greatjon had the horses saddled and men mounted. Benjen waited by Eddard's destrier, holding the reins.
"Whatever comes," his brother said quietly, "the Watch stands ready."
Eddard clasped Benjen's shoulder, feeling the weight of all they faced. "Guard the realms of men, brother. I fear we'll all be tested before this ends."
He swung into the saddle, Ice's weight across his back a cold comfort. Sansa lived—that was what mattered now. But as they rode through Castle Black's gates into the frozen night, Eddard couldn't forget those blue eyes.
The dead walked. His daughter had been marked for death. And somewhere in Winterfell, Luke Skywalker trained his children in powers that might be their only hope.
Winter is coming. The words had never felt more true.