Winter is coming...
The morning is crisp and cool, the ride is long, and the promised end is grim. They approach the hold-fast from the south, and the man is bound to the wall hand and foot, awaiting their arrival and with it justice.
There is only one end for deserters of the Night's Watch, but the man is... pathetic. Strung up on the holdfast's walls, he's old, scrawny, missing both ears and a finger to frostbite. His blacks are grimy, tattered, nothing like the famed blacks of the sworn brothers of the Night's Watch, and yet clearly with the same origin. His eyes... his eyes are terrified.
Arya grieves for the confusion in Bran's eyes. There is nothing glorious in the King's Justice, not like he's been glorifying it as a symbol of adulthood. Just- terrified men, and the ends of their lines.
A chill wind blows around them, hinting at the end of summer, even as Father recedes, and Lord Eddard Stark begins his investigation. It's mere formality, as everyone knows; deserters get the chopping block. Arya's heard it all many times before, she doesn't pay much attention. Instead, as Theon Greyjoy, her father's ward, brings forth Ice, she urges her horse minutely closer to Bran's pony. "Keep the pony well in hand," she whispers quietly. "and don't look away, Father will know, and he'll be disappointed."
Two of the guardsmen drag the ragged man to the ironwood stump in the center of the square. They force his head down onto the hard black wood. Lord Stark pulls his gloves off, takes hold of the greatsword in a two-handed grip and sentences clearly, "In the name of Robert of the House Baratheon, the First of his Name, King of the Andals and the Rhoynar and the First Men, Lord of the Seven Kingdoms and Protector of the Realm, by the word of Eddard of the House Stark, Lord of Winterfell and Warden of the North, I do sentence you to die."
He lifts the great sword above his head, and Arya looks straight at a scene she has seen before, if not many times, than enough, and does not look away.
The sword falls, and Lord Eddard Stark takes off his head in a clean swift stroke. Blood sprays across clean snow. Horses neigh, spooked by the scent of fresh blood. Arya sits tall and steady on her horse, and she's pleased to glimpse Bran checking his pony's instinctive bolt. She is sure: he didn't look away.
The head rolls off a stump, coming to halt near Greyjoy's feet. He laughs, as is his habit, and kicks it idly. Arya growls quietly. Uncouth ass. Then she looks down at Bran who's still staring at the blood on the snow, puts a hand on his thin shoulder and shakes gently. "Hey," she says. "You did well."
Bran's eyes are wide, uncertain, and what she says eases the hurt in them some, but doesn't erase it. Bran is... Bran, sweet-tempered, a dreamer. Father will help him through the rest, Arya tells herself, and makes sure to keep him between her and Robb as they ride out, far ahead of the main party, Bran's pony struggling to keep up with her and Robb's horses.
She and Robb talk, discussing the deserter and his death, the trial, desertion from the wall. Robb insists he died bravely, as he didn't struggle, Arya, thinking of the bone-chilling, deadening terror in the man's eyes, disagrees. "The man was dead with fear, Robb." she insists. "That was not courage." Bran stays quiet, as he often does, thinking. His hands are white-knuckled on his reigns.
When Arya sees Father approaching, she looks once at Robb. That is enough, he challenges her to a race, and she pulls her horse into a gallop immediately, leaning close to it's neck. She hears Robb shouting indignantly behind her, and crouches further down, sinking down into her seat. She always has an advantage in these races; she's a head shorter than Robb and much lighter than his broad figure. With her head start, she's already won.
When Robb shouts behind her, she ignores him at first, Then the tone of his voice changes as he yells, "Arya!" And she's wheeling her horse around so hard that it half rears. Her heart is beating faster, as she races for Robb. He has dismounted and is standing on the river bank, knee-deep in snow, his Tully-red hair glinting in the sun. He seems alright, so she eases her horse back from it's gallop.
Robb's staring at something, and when she gets close enough to see, her heart leaps up into her throat. A wolf, no, a Direwolf! It's huge, and half buried in the snow, and dead, but that barely retracts from it's pure awe. "Run and get Father and Bran." he says, his own eyes wide with wonder, "This will cheer him up." Arya takes another long look, notices the newborn pups squirming at it's- her- belly. Her eyes widen, she takes another look, then spurs her horse back along their trail.
Crowning the hill, she spots Father and Bran and yells, "Come and see what Robb found!" Then she turns and canters back.
By the time she's back to Robb, he already has one of the pups, a tiny grey-black bundle, in his arms, and, Arya judges with a sharp look, is halfway in love. It's blind and whimpering, mewling as it nuzzles at Robb's chest, nosing between his leathers, searching for milk. Arya reaches for it, and Robb lets her touch. The pup is warm and soft.
Robb grins at her excitedly. "Dire-wolf pups, Arya! Just think!"
She smiles back, keeping her own thoughts tightly lidded, even as the first riders- Theon and Jory, her father's guard, catch a glimpse of the carcass.
Jory's blade is unsheathed immediately. "Robb, get away from it," he shouts, as his horse rears under him.
"She's dead!" Robb shouts back. "It's fine!"
"What in the seven hells is that?" Greyjoy is saying
"A wolf," Robb tells him.
"A freak," Greyjoy says. "Look at the size of it."
Bran wriggles his way closer through the men that press around to get a glimpse of the dead wolf. Arya absently corrects Theon, watching Bran get his first look at the direwolf. It's bigger than Bran is, monstrously large, maybe as big as a pony. When he tears his eyes away from the wolf, he notices Robb's pup, and reaches for it hesitantly.
Arya leans back a little, looks at the beast's belly again. Four whimpering bundles, five counting the one in Robb's arms. She heads closer, noticing the differences, mild as they are in the pups, and chooses what seems to be the calmest, a grey ball of fur that isn't moving as much as it's litter-mates, picking it up by the scruff of it's neck. "Here," she says, depositing it into Bran's arms. He folds, dropping down in the snow right then and there, to hug it into his arms.
And then Father pulls a length of antler out of the dire-wolf's throat, and everyone stills. She and Robb exchange uneasy glances, as she notices the men around her doing the same. When conversation restarts, she's preoccupied, still think about the unlikely-hood and symbolism in the stark scene. Then Theon draws his sword and says, "Give the beast here, Bran."
Bran protests, instinctively, while Arya wracks her brain for a solution. Killing the pups will wreck Bran, and Robb will sulk for days. She takes another glance at the pups, then,
"Lord Stark," she says formally, "There are five pups. Four male, one female."
Ned Stark looks at her solemnly. She's grabbed his attention at least, she thinks, fleetingly, wryly. "What of it, Arya?"
She hurts, just a little, but one glance at Bran's face, trusting, desperately hopeful, is enough.
"You have five trueborn children," Arya says "Four sons, a daughter. The direwolf is the sigil of your House. Your children were meant to have these pups, my lord."
Father's face changes a little. He might hurt with her, she thinks, in the same quick-silver way she thought before, not allowing herself to dwell long on any one thought, lest it cut. "You want no pup for yourself, Arya?" he asks softly.
Yes. She does. She throws that thought down deep, locks it up. "The dire-wolf graces the banners of House Stark," she points out. "I am no Stark." And that cut deep, she acknowledges to herself.
Her father nods, then warns the boys. She wanders away, watching the pups at their mother's belly idly. That's why she's the first to hear the snarl.
She spins on her heel, looking sharply at the trees. Though she's waiting for it, the speed still takes her aback, as a pup, older than the newborns, but not by much, bounds out of tree cover. It doesn't attack, but heads straight for the carcass, where it crouches over the pups and growls, long and low. The men, already spooked, react violently, Jory's sword first out of it's sheathe, Theon's not far behind.
Arya looks at the pup. It... she? is ungainly in the way of pups everywhere, paws and head too large for the body. But the teeth look sharp, bared as they are. The pup is black-furred, not yet as big as a small dog.
"No." she says, firmly. "Sheathe your swords."
Theon Greyjoy laughs mockingly. "This one is should be yours, Snow." He says, grinning at Arya. "The bastard of the family."
His voice is a taunt, but Arya doesn't react. "This one belongs to me," she agrees, kneeling in the snow, and extending her hand.
There are sharp intakes of breath behind her, namely Father's "Arya!"
She ignores them all, keeping her face coaxing. "Come on," she croons in a voice too low to be heard by the men. "Come on." It's eyes meet her's, sharp, golden, intelligent. She almost feels the connection snap between them, as the pup's snarls wind down slowly to a low continuous growling. She stretches her hand out cautiously, keeping it still every time the growling rises, and continuing steadily when it stays level.
There is a frozen silence behind her.
Her hand gets close enough to touch, and she hovers it slowly above the raised hackles, in full sight of the pup. Slowly, slowly, it's hackles start to fall. Just as slowly, her hand descends, until she's touching the warmth of the pup. She can feel the growl underneath her hand, but even that gets lower, until she can't hear it anymore, and eventually, even the slight vibration is gone. The pup relaxes, increment by increment, while she stays entirely still. Finally, finally, the pup heaves out a soft sigh, and licks her hand, just a little bit.
The silence persists, even as she slowly pulls the pup into her lap, it submitting patiently to her ministrations, not even flashing a fang. When she has it comfortably situated, she looks up. Theon's eyes are wide, his hands still white-knuckled on the hilt of his sword. She supposes he intended to save her from being savaged; Theon has always harbored a not-so-well hidden fantasy of being her golden knight. It doesn't prevent him from being an ass to her and pulling up her status as a bastard. The perils of being scorned, she supposes.
Behind her Father's face is a little pale. Jory whispers, "Never seen something like that before." His voice is almost reverent.
Father's voice is doubly stern for the shock. "The same rules apply to you, Arya." he says firmly, and she relaxes slightly at the tacit permission, "You will train it. It will be harder, for the pup is older, but if you cannot, it will be put down."
Arya bends her gaze to the sharp gold of her pup's. She thinks of the lesson Bran learned today: The man who passes the sentence should swing the sword. "I'll do it myself," she says softly, but her voice carries.
Ned Stark pauses besides her, and offers his hand to pull her off the ground. A stern, northern sort of pride is in the firmness of his grasp, and definitely in the help he gives her in mounting without parting from the pup. "I know," he says, and there is no doubt in his voice.
Arya and Jon. The two Stark-Snow siblings that look most alike, and arguably, are alike in temperament. Arya is definitely more hotheaded, but that could easily be cause she's legitimate, and Jon's learned to curb his temperament. Both have the whole, quick thing going for them.
So what happens when Arya is illegitimate and Jon isn't? Well, she isn't going to the wall! Danny Flint is a bad example. Other than that... I'll have tofigure it out, if you guys are interested.
So this chapter is largely from the book, which is from Bran's POV. Differs where the wolves happen, but chunks of text from the book, mostly dialogue, and some description is lifted wholesale from the book, with added Arya POV.
So yeah. No copyright infringement intended.