A Game of Legends
The Bastard of Winterfell
"Fill, fill, fill, fill, fill."
The things he did for his little sister.
His hands were still smeared with blood, as Jon Snow rose to his feet, feeling like the villain in one of Old Nan's tall tales. The granite floor beneath his feet had been carefully painted with the blood of an innocent fawn. In order to see that done, he had spent half the morning in a tomb which would have been pitch black, if not for the faint light of the two candle wall sconces Jon had lit, just above the lowest, collapsed levels of Wintefell's crypts. Now, finished with his gory work, the fourteen year-old boy stood in front of the giant, eight-sided crimson star he had drawn, and the two circles of the same hue into which that star had been inscribed. Ancient runes and strange symbols decorated the design, as well. Jon had dutifully copied them, even if he knew little of their meaning.
"Please, Jon. Please. We have to! What if... what if Bran never wakes up?"
Arya had begged him. He had tried to tell her that Old Nan's tales of magic were just that – stories, not truth – but his little sister would not hear him. Her words were of Bran's legs – twisted and warped in ways which made her weep – of his pallor – which she said would put a ghost to shame – of how small he looked, and how helpless. His nine year-old sister had no desire to shed more tears. She wanted to help Bran, and Jon could not blame her for that. No, if blame lay anywhere, then it rested at Maester's Luwin's feet. Their old teacher was the one who had left within Arya's sight the tome which had placed such absurd hopes in her head.
"Repeat five times. But when each is filled, destroy it."
A wish: that was what the southron septon who had written the text promised. No. In fact, this Septon Barth's claims were even more ridiculous than that. According to the volume Arya had found open upon Maester Luwin's desk, by drawing a few, unusual shapes on the ground, and reciting a chant, any man could bring forth a god, sworn and bound to see his wish come true.
There was, of course, more to the tome: ways to ensure one called upon a particular god, esoteric formulae, which seemed like gibberish to Jon's eyes, details on the bindings, and how to avoid error. In truth, while more advanced than Arya, his grasp of High Valyrian was still not nearly firm enough that Jon could say that he had perfectly understood all of what Septon Barth intended to convey. However, since the ritual was obviously a fraud, he saw little danger in that. As it was, Jon only intended to prove to Arya that there were no miracles to be found in such chicanery.
He could do precious little for Bran – indeed, Jon was reluctant to even visit his younger brother, so long as Lady Catelyn sat at his bedside. Arya, however, was another matter. Even a bastard brother could steer a young sister away from folly and towards wisdom. There would be tears – he did not doubt that – but, hopefully, in time, healing would come, as well. At the very least, Jon hoped to bring an end to Arya's recent practice of staying up through the night, so that she could have a few more hours to struggle over Septon Barth's convoluted explanations. It was not right that a girl of nine name days should place such a great burden upon herself.
"A base of silver and iron. A foundation of stone, and the Archduke of contracts. And the great master, Vahaemarr Qohlaeron."
Arya had seated herself upon the bottom step of the stairway leading up to the higher levels of Winterfell's crypts. Idly petting the direwolves – one snow white and one grey – seated on either side of her, the long-faced brunette was biting her lower lip nervously, as she watched Jon chant above the bloody circle he had drawn. One of his arms was raised towards the center of the ritual figure, while the other held the tome from which he was reading close enough to his face that Jon could just barely make out its words.
"A wall to block the falling wind. The gates at the cardinal directions close. From the crown, come forth and follow the forked road leading to the kingdom. I command thee. My will creates your body, and your sword creates my destiny. Abiding by the Holy Grail's summon, if thou accedes to this will and reason, then answer me."
Nymeria – Arya's grey-furred direwolf pup – was whimpering. The sound, blending together within his own chanting, made such a discordant duet that even Jon's nearly tone deaf father would likely have winced to hear it. Fortunately, Jon's own contribution to said duet would soon be coming to an end.
"I hereby swear..." he declared. "I am the embodiment of all the good in the ethereal world. I will slay all the evil in the ethereal world. Thee, the seven heavens which bear the great trinity. Come forth from the circle of constraint... Guardian of the Balance."
For a few seconds after he had finished the invocation, just as he had expected, nothing happened at all. Then, just as Jon was about to turn away from the bloody spectacle he had created, he felt a sharp pain shoot through his left hand. Crying out at the unexpected sensation – like someone was cutting a design onto the top of his hand with a dull knife – Jon dropped the book he had been reading, and turned over his left arm. His eyes widened. Somehow, a pair of crimson, flame-like designs had appeared upon the back of his hand, dancing around the blade of a sword, outlined in red ink.
A bright white glow began to emanate from the center of the circle in front of him, lightning crackling around its edges.
"Jon!"
But he needed no warning. The lightning grew thicker and stronger, as he experienced a sudden feeling of weight. Jon was being tugged, or, perhaps, he was being used as an anchor. Regardless, as white light exploded forth from the circle he had drawn, blinding him, Jon felt as if a great kraken, from deep beneath the sea, had wrapped one of its tentacles around his heart, so as to pull itself up from the depths.
He groaned, as the tentacle gripped so tightly that he worried his heart might burst. Something was pouring out of him, as his vision swam. As essential to life as his own blood – it was escaping through his pores, so that his body was left as enervated as that of an old crone, starving in the twilight of her final winter.
His body was falling. Arya was yelling something frantically. Even Ghost – his preternaturally silent wolf pup – was barking fearfully. Jon wanted to reassure them, but he could not quite remember how to move his lips. And the clearest voice of all was wholly unfamiliar, but no less strong or beautiful for its novelty.
"I ask of you... Are you my master?"
He doubted that, but could not seem to put his doubts into words. His head struck something, as his body collapsed onto the floor, and he thought he heard those bell-like tones grow more shrill.
"Master!"
But he felt woozy, and it was getting dark. Surely, a brief rest would not do any harm.
OOO
Drip.
Drip.
Drip, drip.
His face was wet. It was not soaked, but felt something like when a younger Jon Snow had turned his head heavenward in the midst of a cool, summer drizzle. Tiny droplets of liquid fell upon, and then wound down, his smooth cheeks.
"Jon," a familiar, well-loved voice spoke, her grief-stricken words reaching him within the darkness. "Wake up, Jon. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. Please, wake up."
Jon wanted to reassure her. However, motion was hard – like swimming through a sea of thick mud.
"Jon," she sobbed again. "Please."
And Jon Snow's eyes opened, just in time for a thick, salty tear to fall upon the iris of his right eye, setting him to reflexively blinking. He groaned.
"Jon?"
"A-Arya?"
His voice was raw. Had he been shouting?
"Jon! You're awake!"
Then, in a motion which could not possibly have been as swift as it seemed to him, a pair of thin arms wrapped around his neck, clutching Jon, as if he might vanish at any moment. Ghost's wet tongue slid across his cheek, greeting his return to the world of the living with the direwolf's customary silence.
What had he been doing? Every inch of his body was sore and strained, as if a great beast had tried to pull him apart. His current headache made the hangover he had experienced after overindulging on wine, during the feast celebrating King Robert's arrival, seem positively blissful, by comparison.
Oh, and his hands were soaked in slowly drying blood. In fact, the blood reminded him of something. Some memory...
"Master, I am pleased to see that your condition is improving. When it is convenient, we should review the current tactical situation."
Jon blinked very slowly. The words had not come from Arya's lips, and that was not her voice.
"I don't understand. What situation?"
Arya pulled her face out of Jon's chest, wearing a quizzical expression.
"Jon?"
"The Grail War, of course. While my parameters are near their peak, your magical powers seem insufficient to support my materialization so far from King's Landing. I have cut off the majority of my prana intake, in order to stabilize your physical condition, but my capacity to defend you will be limited in this state."
Trying to look past his sister, around the rest of the tomb in which he had awoken, Jon's eyes sought the source of that voice, yet found nothing.
"Jon?" his sister finally interjected, her tone both concerned and curious. "What are you looking at?"
"I..." he began, before trailing off. "Arya, did you just..." He hesitated again, wondering if the the large bump on his head might have knocked something loose. "Did you hear anything?"
Arya's head tilted sideways, as she peered at him like a confused pup.
"Anything like what?"
"I-I thought I heard a voice." His brain finally managed to make a connection. "I heard it just before I passed out, as well. It's a woman's voice, and-"
"You mean the goddess!" Arya interrupted, her eyes flying wide open. "Is-is she still here?"
"You saw her as well then, Arya?"
Arya nodded vigorously.
"But she vanished just after you got hurt, so I thought she might have gone away. I was worried that you'd got hurt casting that stupid spell I found, and we wouldn't even be able to help Bran. I..."
She sniffled, and Jon forced himself up into a sitting position – ignoring the hot spikes of pain which shot up his arms at the sudden motion – so that he could place a comforting arm around her shoulders.
"There, there, little sister. I'm fine, and even if I wasn't, it would be no fault of yours."
"But, I-"
"I was the one who decided to cast the spell. That was my choice, so don't blame yourself."
Arya's expression still seemed a bit doubtful to Jon, but she at least seemed content enough to curl herself deeper into his shoulder, seeking comfort. For a moment, the pair simply sat there, in that dark, dank crypt, quietly, right up until Arya's head shot up towards him so quickly that only the reflexes he had earned in the practice yards saved their heads from crashing together.
"And what about the goddess? Do you really see her? Can she really help Bran? Why can't I see her?"
"One question at a time, Little Sister," he responded with a chuckle, ruffling her hair. "In truth, I know little, save that I cannot see her. I did hear her, though, so I'm not sure why you do not."
"Telepathy," that same, mysterious voice interjected, seeming to come from nowhere and every direction at once. "A servant and master can communicate directly – mind to mind. As I am not currently corporeal, this is the limit of my current capacity to communicate."
Was such a thing truly possible? Well, he supposed it was no more unbelievable than summoning a goddess, in the first place. That the goddess would call him master was even more bizarre.
"She says that she can talk directly into my mind," he informed Arya. "Only my mind, I think, since I'm the one that summoned her."
"But I could hear her before. Why doesn't she come out again?"
His brow furrowed in thought for a moment, as he tried to recall what she had told him.
"She said that I am not a powerful enough wizard. Hardly surprising, I suppose, as I hadn't known I could do magic at all, but that's why she does not have a body."
"But, if she doesn't have a body, then she can still help Bran?"
He had no idea.
"Master," the goddess spoke into his mind once more, "I believe that you are laboring under a number of misconceptions. However, before that, if this Bran is in need of rescue, then know that I will lend my sword to your cause. Due to your limitations, I may only be able to materialize briefly, but, as a Saber-class servant, my combat skills are high enough that I should still be able to dispatch whatever rogues might threaten him."
"No," he clarified, shaking his head. "Bran's not being threatened. He's badly injured. We're not even sure he'll ever wake up. That's why we summoned you."
Jon did not bother mentioning that he had believed the entire ritual a hoax, right up until he collapsed in excruciating pain.
A long pause followed his words, while Arya clearly struggled not to interrupt a conversation which she could apparently not hear at all. Finally, the goddess' voice returned.
"That is your wish, then. You wish to use the Grail in order to perform this healing?"
"The... Grail?"
The explanation which followed – chock full of scolding, dismay on the part of his so-called servant, and politely expressed disbelief at his near complete ignorance – left Jon feeling about two feet tall by its conclusion. On a more positive note, however, Eddard Stark's natural son did understand just what he had involved himself in by that point.
"So, if I want to help Bran, then I have to go to King's Landing." He frowned. "But I'm to join the Night's Watch."
He had another problem, as well. She was short, feisty, and running out of patience, after nearly ten minutes of only hearing the less interesting half of what sounded like a very important conversation.
"Jon! What's going on? I can't tell just from what you're saying. Why can't she help Bran now?"
He turned his head down towards his younger sister. At least her irritated face gave him something to look at, unlike Saber, who, from how she described her present state, could be floating around just about anywhere, as some sort of invisible ghost.
"Arya, I'm sorry, but having a wish granted is apparently not so easy. According to Saber, a war is to fought between seven beings like her, in King's Landing, and only the pair who win will have a wish. If we won, we could heal Bran entirely, but that is only in we win."
Arya's lips pursed at that, and her forehead scrunched up.
"So, you want to fight, but father's making you go north?"
"He's not making me, Arya. I have always dreamed of joining the Night's Watch. I would rather stay until Bran recovers, of course, but-"
"Then stay," she interrupted him. "At least until we've saved Bran. You have to, Jon."
"Arya, it's not so-"
"I could hide you in my chest! That way, you could come with us, and no one would notice at all."
"And when Septa Mordane opens up your chest to check your packing?"
Arya looked a bit uncertain at his question.
"Well, maybe if we hid you under some of my dresses, she wouldn't notice?"
The end of her reply sounded more like a question than an answer. Chuckling, he shook his head and mussed Arya hair.
"Under your dresses? Even your septa is not so easy to fool. And what of father and Robb? Even Sansa would likely notice if I simply disappeared right before we left. No, Arya. We'll need to speak with father."
"But what will you tell him?" she asked.
"I know not. I would tell father the truth, but Saber tells me that this is a war fought in secret. Of course, that assumes he would even believe me. Father... is not one to put much stock in wishes or magic. Perhaps, I could say that I would seek a knight who would have a bastard for a squire. Even if I cannot find one, after all, it would still be an excuse to go south."
As much as it was his dream – an honorable calling, in which a bastard could serve as well as a trueborn Stark – the Night's Watch was hardly going anywhere. A year, even a few years delay, would be nothing, if he could help Bran – if he could prove himself as good as any trueborn brother. And, Arya was smiling again.
Seven servants, six magi and Jon. As he led Arya back up into the light, a pair of direwolf pups trailing at their heels, while he answered his sisters' questions as best as he could, Jon found himself wondering what the others might be like. Saber had little to say of their foes, save that the magi were likely to be more experienced than Jon, and that she was confident in her ability to overcome any single foe.
What sort of people would participate in a life and death tourney with such high stakes? What sort of wishes might they have, and how honorable might they be? Jon had no idea. He had never killed before. He had never even fought with live steel. Yet, if these people truly stood between him and Bran's legs, he would. They would all have chosen to fight, so there was no dishonor in that. No, father had always taught him that there was great honor in defending one's kin, so Jon would follow his lessons. He would be a worthy son of Lord Eddard Stark, no matter what challenges that path laid before him.