So the idea for this came from a line I'm planning to use in the final chapter of 'Reunion' (yes, I thought I was done, but apparently people thought Arya and Gendry have a bit more to do, so I'm working on it). Anyway, the line is: 'Our magic is the way of the earth and snow and ice', which naturally got me thinking about what other elemental magics all the other houses would use/have. This chapter is just the Starks, and I am working on the others as we speak/you read. Hope you enjoy. (P.S. Because the books are better - seriously I'll fight you on that - this takes place in book canon)
1. Robb was the spitting image of his mother, and so it came as a great surprise to everyone when the red-haired lad turned six and caused the floor of the kitchen to raise him four feet into the air, to grasp the fresh pastries the head chef had placed well out of the greedy boy's reach.
Ned had laughed and used his own power of earth to bring the old stone floor back to what it was, and then placed his hand on his son's shoulder and took him to a small alcove. It was there Ned impressed upon Robb the importance of control, particularly of one's own power, his voice soft but firm, yet a warm smile took any possible sting from his words. Upon hearing the news, Catelyn smiled wanly, and immediately began to question Ned about Robb's magical tutoring. Ned promised to take care of it himself.
(He succeeded. It wasn't enough)
2. Sansa was the perfect vision of a Tully, and so it came as no surprise to anyone when her magic manifested as the calm flowing water powers passed down through the Riverlands' bloodline. At the age of five she and Jeyne Poole had been playing 'come into my castle' and they'd been paying little attention to the ground. Sansa had nearly stepped into a large puddle, Jeyne squealed at the last moment, and suddenly the water parted around Sansa's foot. Upon seeing this, the girls had gone in search of other water sources; running out to the weirwood tree, although neither were brave enough to look on its face, and making ripples and small waves in the pool there. Catelyn had been overjoyed to have a daughter take after her own blood, and took Sansa aside and explained to her the different ways she could use her powers to better her prospects. She insisted that she be the one who would guide Sansa through life's intricacies.
(She would fail. Miserably)
3. Bran had Cat's hair and Ned's face. He was a sombre, quiet child, except when he was climbing all over the castle walls. Cat half wished for him to develop earth powers, like his father and brother, so that she need never fear that he would fall and crack his head open on the cold hard ground. But the years passed and Bran did not develop any of the natural Stark powers, neither did he show any sign of the Tully's.
"He may be a late bloomer," Ned comforted Cat, as Bran's seventh birthday had come and gone without a whisper of power, "My grandfather did not develop his magic until he was near a man grown. Bran may be the same. He is a worldly child, even for one so young. There is power yet in him, you'll see." In truth, Bran's quiet unnerved even Ned, but he could feel in his heart that Bran was special.
(If only he'd known how much)
4. Arya was Ned's daughter through and through, even to the point of picking up a sword and attempting to hack the practice straw men to pieces. Cat was at her wits end trying to keep Arya indoors, knowing that if she turned her head for more than a second, Arya would have scampered out the nearest door and bolted for the practice yard. Knitting could not hold her interest, needlepoint bored her and Cat was beginning to believe that she was purposely getting her courtesies wrong, or trying to turn them into something rude, even from the age of six.
Arya's power, when it finally manifested, shocked everyone however, as even in the Stark line it was unusual for women to gain this particular magic. Arya, Sansa and Jeyne had been sitting near each other in the Hall during luncheon, the two older girls making slight comments to Arya, who responded loudly and coarsely. Catelyn was almost ready to intervene when Jeyne 'accidentally-on-purpose' pushed her glass over in such a way that the contents would spill all over Arya. Even at such a young age, Arya had good reflexes and saw the cup tipping. With a loud shout, she pushed her hand out, she knew not why, and the water froze in mid-air. The shattering of the ice on the table was clearly heard throughout the hall, as all had stopped in wonder, and Cat in horror. Arya looked down at the shattered water and then began to giggle. She turned to the next goblet of wine and dipped her finger into it, bursting out into laughter as it froze solid. Catelyn was on her feet, shouting at Arya to stop dipping her finger into someone else's wine but Arya was already beginning to run, knowing that she was in trouble and not caring a jot. As she passed the large tureen of soup, she again stuck her finger into it and the entire thing froze. She ran out of the hall, laughing all the way. Catelyn sighed and let her head fall into her hands. She could feel herself turning grey.
Ned eventually found her by the weirwood, freezing small patches of the hot spring pool and watching them melt again in the pool's heat. He sat her on his knee and told her that she had inherited a great power, as old as the Stark line, and that she shouldn't be using it for such petty things as freezing the soup. When asked what the power could be used for, Ned hesitated, but said that the Stark lords of ice were capable of doing battle with an entire army of wildlings on their own, armed with daggers of ice and the ability to freeze any liquid with a touch. When asked who the last Stark was to have the power of ice, Ned's face dropped and his eyes brightened.
"Lyanna." He said softly.
(Of course)
5. Rickon was only four, nowhere near old enough to manifest his powers, but that didn't stop Cat from worrying about him. He was a wild thing, for all that his colouring was Tully; he had the Stark's fabled wolfs blood coursing through him, that much was clear to all. Cat prayed to the Seven that he inherited her soothing water powers, in the hope that it would counter his wildness and bring him back to civilisation. The rest of the castle instead muttered the likeliness that the wild little wolf would inherit either the power of ice, as his sister had, or the power of snow. Bets were taken on the outcome, and the maids shuddered at what a holy little terror that boy would be when he finally manifested.
(They never got to collect on those bets)
6. Jon hated his gift.
Theon took great pleasure in commenting loudly on whether he was named Snow because he could control it, or whether his name had chosen his power for him. Theon had laughed himself stupid, believing himself quite the wit.
When he was younger, he'd found some joy in it. Arya had loved watching the flakes fall around her, the only thing she found worthy of beauty. She'd taken to touching as many of the snowflakes as she could before they hit the ground. It had been something of a game.
He used it to hide. Whenever Catelyn Stark came looking for Arya, he would whip up a quick snowstorm and they would run off into the forests, or to the weirwood, to catch a little more time away from Winterfell, and the maester's lessons and Catelyn's harsh stare. They were always found though, and Arya told, repeatedly, that she shouldn't consort with bastards.
He used it in anger. When the days had been full of mean glances, of muttered words, of Catelyn's fierce glares, he would walk out into the woods and scream. And as he screamed, the snows would begin to fall, whipping around him as his anger built, a giant screen of snow surrounding him, shielding him, protecting him. But when it was over, when the white lay strewn across the ground, and covered the trees, he felt a loathing rise in him.
What a useless gift. To turn everything white and cold and wet. Snow was hated in the North, it killed crops and cattle and new born babes. It foretold the coming of winter. It was bad luck.
(He did not yet know that he would come to rely on it, when he was beyond any civilisation, when the dead would rise and ancient nightmares would once again stalk the lands and he would need to hide)
+1. Theon could barely remember the sea. He'd been taken from Pike so young that he hardly remembered his father's face anymore, or what the Seastone Chair looked like. Yet for all that, the blood of the Greyjoys flowed through him, and with it, the powers of salt and iron. He had the blacksmith tip his arrows with iron points, and they never missed their mark so long as he used them. On those days when he had little and less to do, he would visit the forge and feel the song of the iron flowing through his veins as it was moulded into Stark weapons. He had not used his true salt powers in so long that he had near forgotten the feel of them, how he could ride the waves as easily as a fish. What little he could use, he used on the grounds of Winterfell, when the cold winds chilled him, when the maids had scowled and spat at him, when the Tully Bitch had glared at him one to many times, he would find a small patch in the forest and pour his anger into the soil.
"We do not sow." He whispered, as the grass shrivelled and died beneath his gaze. (Indeed, they do not)
A/N. So...any good? Leave a comment if you liked it that much and have fun speculating what powers the other houses will have. I'm sure some are fairly obvious, but I particularly enjoyed coming up with the Lannisters. Heads up (possible expectation inflation) I may have somehow made Tywin worse.