Being wed before the gods hadn't changed a thing between Rick and Val—not in how they lived, not in how they moved through each day. She still trained with her spear, fierce and focused, her form sharper with each passing moon. He still worked at the forge, though now less with his hands and more with his mind. With seasoned blacksmiths from across the North now aiding in the great armament effort, Rick had the freedom to dedicate himself to special projects—works of vision, of legacy.
He'd completed the spiked frontal armor for the cavalry horses, wickedly curved to break a charging line. He'd finished molding his unique shield design—compact, multi-layered, and deceptively light. And now, finally, he had finished a piece he'd poured his heart into: Maege Mormont's morningstar. Identical in shape to the one he had gifted her before leaving Bear Island, this one was forged entirely from Valyrian steel—its head black as brown as a bear's fur with faint forest green veins pulsing through it like frozen lightning. Balanced, brutal, and beautiful.
To honor House Mormont, he crafted one-handed axes, elegant maces, and swords worthy of their bear banners. House Stark received the same courtesy: sleek, deadly weapons that bore the quiet dignity of the direwolf. For House Umber—now tied to him by marriage—he forged mightier tools of war. A double-edged battle axe with blades as broad as a man's chest, and a titanic greatsword, sixty-three inches long and twelve inches wide. Even light as Valyrian steel was, the sword required an Umber's mass and muscle to wield. No southerner would lift it from the ground, let alone fight with it.
But the piece that made him proudest was the spear he made for Val.
It was art. The shaft carved with elegant knotwork, the runes subtle and clean. The blade itself was unique—not just in shape, but in color. Blue and white, like sky kissed with snow. Rick had discovered he could mix dried flower petals into the metal during the hammering process—petals from frost-blossoms, ice lilies, and pale Northern roses. It gave the blade its color, but more than that, it felt hers. He carved the final rune into the base with his own hand: Strength in Love.
His final project was far more ambitious.
Lightbringer. The sword of Azor Ahai. The blade of legend that glowed with inner fire and could cut shadow itself. Freyja had told him what little she knew—the original was made of bronze, not steel, and had been reforged many times. Azor had tried to temper it in water. The sword shattered. He tried it in a lion's heart. Still it broke. Only when he quenched it in the chest of Nissa Nissa, the woman he loved most, did it hold together—forever fused with her sacrifice.
Rick wasn't going to do that. Not only was he working with Valyrian steel, not bronze—but he wouldn't harm Val for anything. Not for a sword. Not for the gods. Let the world burn before he laid a finger on her.
Still… the story gave him an idea.
But the story stuck in his mind. A question burned at the back of his thoughts: What if it wasn't the sacrifice that made the magic work—but the blood itself? What if Nissa Nissa had carried something powerful in her veins? Enough to stabilize the enchantments and bind them to the blade?
Alexstrasza thought it possible.
"Blood magic is unstable," she told him. "Because it's not just about blood—it's about will. Magic feeds on intent. If the blood is given freely, the spell becomes steady. Clean. Strong. But if it's taken against someone's will…" she paused. "It can twist. Fail. Or turn against you."
The Valyrians had taken her blood by force—bled her, bound her to their ritual, used her essence without her consent. That was their mistake. Her will, even weakened, fought back. She corrupted the ritual from within. What they had tried to control, she unraveled. It was how she had pumped more magic than they needed into it and fire rained from the sky as a result.
That sealed Rick's decision.
He would not use dragon's blood. He would use his own. Freely given. Poured into the blade during its forging and again at its quenching. He asked Alexstrasza for her purest flame—true dragonfire. To give it, she would need to take her real form. So they would head south of the Wall, far enough for her to transform safely.Only then would the real forging begin.
That posed a problem.
The amount of blood needed for the whole endeavor… was more than Rick could give at once. Not without killing himself. Even with the fire of magic coursing hot through his veins, his body was still flesh, and flesh had limits.
It would take moons. Maybe longer.
He'd have to do it slowly—bleeding himself in measured amounts, giving time to rest, to recover, to build his strength back up. One mistake, and the whole thing could kill him before the blade ever saw the light of day.
That was where Maester Aemon stepped in.
Though old and blind, the maester's mind was as sharp as ever, and his knowledge of the body second to none. He prepared tonics to help replenish blood, taught Rick the safest ways to draw it without causing lasting harm, and checked on him daily with a quiet but firm insistence.
"I may not see you," Aemon told him one evening, feeling Rick's pulse with practiced fingers, "but I can hear the weariness in your breath. You're not to push too hard. Your blood may be powerful, but even magic has no use in a corpse."
Rick listened. Mostly. Freyja enforced the rest.
She watched over him like a direwolf guarding its pack. No bloodletting happened without her there. No slipping past Aemon's limits. When Rick grew pale, she made him stop. When his hand shook at the forge, she took the hammer from him herself.
But it was Alexstrasza, watching from the shadows with glowing eyes, who asked the question neither of them said aloud:
"What kind of weapon will come from this?"
Rick had the most magic in his blood of any mortal in recorded history. Not just a trickle from some long-dead bloodline. He was a living storm of fire and ice, old magic and newer wrath, all wrapped in a single man's form.
Freyja narrowed her gaze on him. "Your blood is deep magic—wild and old. The world might not be ready for what it forges."
"And yet," Alexstrasza added softly, "it needs it."
Not since the First Flame, not since the ancient days when gods still walked among men, had so much raw power been poured into a single creation. It wouldn't be Lightbringer.
This weapon would be his. Rick's.
Born not from sacrifice, but from resolve. From pain endured, not inflicted. From a man who bled for others but bowed to no one.
Val had understood what he was doing.
She hadn't liked it. No good wife would enjoy seeing her husband weakened, pale, abed with the strength drained from his limbs. But she said nothing. Not once. Because she understood it was necessary. Because she knew who he was—and what he was trying to create.
And because she loved him.
When he told her he would stay at Castle Black for moons to come, drawing his blood bit by bit, she didn't argue. She simply packed her things and joined him. No way in the world she was going to stay behind. Not now. Not with the war ahead. Not with the long shadow of duty and prophecy looming over their heads.
They both knew they wouldn't stay together after it was over. He had to go south. She had to remain in the North. That was the way of things. They had made peace with it—at least, as much as two people who loved each other could.
So she stayed. She slept beside him in the cold stone room, her spear always propped near the wall. She sat with him in the evenings, wrapped in his cloak, feeding him broth when his strength wavered. Sometimes, she simply held his hand in silence.
But it wasn't all solemn and quiet suffering.
With the quiet stretch of days ahead of them, Rick took the opportunity to fulfill a promise he had made long ago. In Valyria, he had tried to explain something to her—something she hadn't understood then, but something he had promised he would change if given the chance.
Val had never understood the point of books. Fiction, especially. She saw no use in stories about things that weren't real. She had always been a practical woman, focused on what was tangible, what could be held in your hands, what could be used.
Rick had promised her that one day, he would change her mind about that. He would show her that there was more to the written word than mere entertainment, that stories, even if false, had their place. And now, as they sat together in the quiet of Castle Black, he had the time to do it. He began reading from a book he had kept in his bag—a collection of stories, histories, and myths. He read not to entertain her, but to share the idea behind them. The books were important because they were a link to something enduring. The tales, while not real, connected people to a shared history, a shared experience. They were a way to remember, to pass down wisdom, and to keep alive things that might otherwise be forgotten.
Val, who had once scoffed at the idea of reading stories for pleasure, now found herself listening. She still didn't understand why the words mattered, but she could feel the importance of them. She could see the way Rick's eyes lit up when he read, the way the stories took on meaning for him. And while she might never fully understand the value of fiction, she could see that it meant something to him.
In the silence between them, as Rick read on, Val lay beside him. She didn't speak, nor did she interrupt. She simply listened. She understood now that this was part of who he was—this love of stories and the way they connected him to the past. She might never truly grasp the significance of it, but she understood that it was something worth sharing, something worth giving time to.
Rick, in turn, knew that he had kept his promise to her. He had shown her something beyond the practical, something beyond the everyday. And though Val might never see books the way he did, she had learned to appreciate them in her own way, as something important to him, and by extension, important to her as well.
It took three long moons for Rick to gather enough of his own blood, to restore his strength, and to return to full health. Every drop of effort, every ounce of energy, was spent in pursuit of this singular goal. As soon as his uncle Aemon cleared him for duty—his condition now sufficiently healed—Rick returned to Castle Black's forge with a single-mindedness that bordered on obsession.
He worked with the hammer like a man possessed. Every stroke of the hammer sent sparks flying into the air, his sweat mixing with the heat of the forge. The scent of metal and sweat became as familiar to him as the breath he took. He carved runes along the dragonball handle with an artist's precision, his hands steady as he worked the intricate symbols that would bind the blade with magic. The blade itself was no less a canvas, each rune etched into the steel with care, the purpose of each symbol clear in Rick's mind but known only to him.
He worked tirelessly, losing track of time. Often he forgot to sleep, sometimes even forgoing meals, so absorbed was he in the task at hand. The fire of the forge crackled on through the night, and it seemed as if Rick was no longer aware of the world around him—only the molten steel, the hammer, and the song of the forge.
Finally, the moment came when the sword was nearly complete. There was a final detail, one that would test the very foundation of the weapon—its heart. With steady hands, Rick carefully quenched the blade in his own blood, the liquid mingling with the heat of the steel. The dark crimson seeped into the sword like a final breath of life.
The sun had long since set, casting the forge in the eerie light of the hour between twilight and the full night—the hour of the owl giving way to the hour of the wolf. Rick's muscles ached from the effort, and yet, there was no sense of fatigue. He felt alive, more alive than he had in moons. Many in Castle Black still worked, but Rick's focus was entirely on the blade as he pulled it from the blood-soaked quench, its surface shimmering with the reflections of the forge's dying flames.
Rick admired his creation—a sword like no other, a weapon that would be both a legacy and a symbol. It was long and sleek, a perfect blend of function and artistry. The blade itself was polished to a flawless sheen, its surface marked with delicate runes that seemed to pulse with a strange energy. The hilt was wrapped in dark leather, smooth to the touch, with intricate designs worked into its pommel, giving the impression of a direwolf's head, fierce and protective. The blade was dragon-forged, and the pattern of the steel seemed to shift as if it were alive, the edges of the blade flickering like the scales of a dragon in the light.
The blade's color was unlike any other Rick had seen before. It was a silvery hue, cool to the eye, yet glowing faintly in the dim light of the forge. The steel itself had a gleaming, reflective quality, a color reminiscent of moonlight on snow, but tinged with the deep, cold blue of ice. The silvery hue was further accentuated by the intricate patterns of frost-like etching that ran down the blade, making it seem as though the weapon was forged from both fire and ice, an embodiment of the dual forces that shaped Rick's world.
The pommel, designed to echo the head of a direwolf, was no less impressive. It was adorned with silver inlays, depicting the fierce wolf's eyes, their gaze fierce and unyielding. Its fangs were exaggerated, as though ready to strike, while the curve of its nose and the sharpness of its features made it unmistakably the symbol of the North. The crossguard, in turn, resembled dragon wings, with delicate scales etched into the steel, their form tapering toward the hilt. They provided an elegant contrast to the rest of the weapon's rugged strength.
The sword was a perfect marriage of fire and ice, dragon and direwolf, embodying the very essence of Rick's world—of his past, his future, and the forces at war within him. As he stood there, the final piece of his work complete, he couldn't help but feel the weight of it in his hands. This was not just a weapon—it was a symbol. It was something more than just a tool for battle. It was a creation of power, blood, and magic, forged from everything Rick was and everything he had yet to become.
He held it before him, staring at the shimmering steel, knowing it was more than just his finest work. It was his legacy.
As Rick placed his hand on the hilt of the sword, his grip firm and steady, he took a deep breath. He closed his eyes, feeling the surge of power inside him—the raw, ancient magic that thrummed within his blood. Slowly, deliberately, he began to let the magic flow, his energy spiraling into the blade. The steel responded instantly, the runes glowing faintly at first before a pulse of crimson light exploded along the length of the sword. The light was so intense that it blinded Rick for a brief moment, the brilliance searing into his vision like a sunrise. His breath caught in his throat, and for an instant, he felt like he might lose himself within the blade's power, the sword almost alive in his hands.
How long he stood there, he couldn't say. Time seemed to bend and warp as the blade hummed with energy, a connection so deep that it felt as if he and the sword were one, bound by magic and blood. But it was the voice of Jeor Mormont that brought him back from his reverie, grounding him once again in the reality of the forge.
"By the Old Gods!" the Lord Commander exclaimed, his voice full of awe and disbelief.
Rick blinked, his vision slowly clearing. He turned his head, slowly detaching his gaze from the sword. The room around him was filled with familiar faces—his uncles, Benjen and Eddard Stark, their expressions wide with astonishment. Alexstrasza, still in her human form but with eyes that glinted with an understanding of the ancient forces at play. Freyja, standing tall and proud as always, her blue eyes softened in silent approval. And Melisandre, the Red Priestess, her gaze fixed on the sword with a mixture of curiosity and reverence.
The sight of the blade burning with crimson light had captured them all, and Rick could see their awe reflected in their faces.
"Lightbringer," Melisandre murmured absently, her voice distant, as if already lost in her thoughts about the prophecy.
Rick's lips curled into a faint, almost bitter smile. He shook his head, disagreeing before the words even fully formed.
"No," he said firmly. "Lightbringer was a weapon forged to bring light through the darkness, to cut through the Long Night. But the Long Night is not upon us yet. We still have light. We are not there, not yet. No… this sword is not for bringing light. Its purpose is not to bring the dawn."
Rick's fingers tightened around the hilt as he looked down at the glowing crimson blade, its light flickering and shifting like a living thing. He felt the weight of its purpose settle upon him.
"It's purpose," he continued, his voice steady now, "is to burn away the dead. Burn away the darkness and leave nothing but ash in its wake. Ashbringer..." He let the name roll off his tongue, savoring the way it felt to say it. It sounded right. It felt right. "Yes. Ashbringer. That's what it is."
There was a quiet pause, the silence thick with the gravity of Rick's words. It seemed as though everyone in the room was taking in the weight of what he had just declared. No longer was this a blade that merely cut through the darkness—it was something more. It was a weapon meant to destroy, to annihilate that which threatened to consume the world. It was a symbol of fire and death, of an end that would cleanse the earth of the unnatural horrors that walked in the shadows.
For a moment, no one spoke. Then, finally, it was Alexstrasza who broke the silence, her voice as steady as ever, though there was a deep respect in her tone.
"Ashbringer," she repeated softly, her eyes never leaving the blade. "Indeed, it is fitting."
And for the first time in many moons, Rick felt something beyond the weight of responsibility settle upon him. It was the understanding that this weapon, this creation, was his. It was a weapon forged not just from steel and blood, but from the very purpose he carried. His world, his future—everything was now bound to the blade in his hand. The Ashbringer would be his sword, his symbol, his legacy in the battle against the coming darkness. Done with admiring it, he put it in the scabbard of dragonhide he had made.
"By the way," Rick asked, a slight smirk tugging at his lips as he lowered the sword and the crimson flames flickered out, "what are you all doing here?"
Mormont let out a low chuckle, a twinkle of amusement in his eyes. "We were dining in the hall when we saw a red light shining through the windows. One of my men came in a panic, saying it came from here."
Rick's smile faltered, and he scratched the back of his neck sheepishly. "Ah. Sorry about that. Didn't know it would do that."
The Lord Commander raised an eyebrow, but his expression softened into a grin. "Well, you let me see that sword up close, and you're forgiven."
Rick didn't hesitate. He tossed it and Mormont caught it with a practiced hand, and before he could even marvel at its weight, Benjen and Eddard Stark were already at his side, eyes wide in wonder. The three men crowded around the blade.
"Men will be men," Melisandre thought to herself, a small smile curling at the corner of her lips as she observed the scene.
Mormont took a deep breath and slowly unsheathed the blade, the rasp of metal against leather breaking the silence. But as the sword was drawn, the expected flare of flame never came. He looked up at Rick, his face a little disappointed, but the young man only shrugged.
"The flame only responds to my magic," Rick explained calmly. "It won't light unless I call on it."
Benjen and Eddard exchanged a look, clearly fascinated, but neither seemed disappointed by the absence of fire. They both understood the power that resided within the blade, even without its fiery flare. It was, after all, more than just a weapon—it was a piece of history, an art forged from the ancient power of Valyria and the blood of a man bound to its magic.
The Lord Commander lifted the sword once more, his hands steady despite the weight of its significance. "A fine blade," he muttered, a rare respect in his voice. "The finest I've ever laid eyes on."
Benjen and Eddard nodded in agreement, their gazes fixed on the sword. It was impossible not to be awed by the craftsmanship, the artistry of it. The runes etched into the hilt, the faint shimmer of the steel, the faint feeling of magic that pulsed beneath the surface—it was like nothing they had ever seen before.
For the first time in a long while, Rick could see the weight of his creation in the eyes of those around him. It wasn't just his responsibility to wield it—it was the beginning of something much larger. The Ashbringer was more than just a sword. It was a promise. A promise that the darkness would not go unanswered.