(Winterfell: 10/9/298 AC) Arya III

The cold winds howled, and she shivered, bundling up tightly within her light gray wolf skin. Thick woolen pants and coat, covered thinner clothing underneath. Even in the freezing, all-encompassing blizzard, the furred skin made her feel safe and warm, as she trudged along the waist deep snow, her legs dragging like iron weights.

'This place, where have I seen it?' she wondered, thinking on the few times she had left the confines of Winterfell.

Arya did not know how long she had been struggling against the unrelenting snowstorm, only that it had felt like forever. Out in the distance, nearly invisible in the white void, she spied a large somber-looking building. Destination discovered, she pressed on, 'Crunch,' and on, 'crunch,' heading for the dreary thing, and the shelter it promised.

The snow grew thicker as she walked, the beating wind rising to a near deafening pitch. Her hair whipped about her face, stinging like blades against her skin.

'Crack!' 'Crack!' the sounds of breaking ice emerged from below and above, surrounding her, hidden out in the maddening whiteness. She grew cautious and shuffled along carefully, unsure if the sound hinted at her standing atop a frozen river, until something grabbed her foot.

"Aggggh!" she screeched, kicking off whatever appendage lay hidden beneath the milky white snow.

The ground rumbled, and the packs of snow began rippling, causing her to lose her footing and fall head first into the deep silvery substance. Her body sank into the ice, and she flailed, lifting her head to see a pair of icy blues eyes staring at her from a frozen, nearly skeletal, corpse. It opened its black maw and let out a blood-curdling scream.

"Ahhh!" she shot out of her snowy grave and ran for the building. All around her, she saw others rising from graves of their own, all with baleful blue eyes. Men, women, and children, decayed and dead, wearing cloth rags, clad in rusted armors of full plate and Fire Nation leathers, each letting out screams of their own. All of their cries were strange and ill, sounding more like ancient malice given voice, than the usual commotion of the living.

'ARH-WOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!' a wolf howled from somewhere, hidden deep within the snowy tempest, drawing her attention past the dead. A decision she had quickly grown to regret, as hordes of frozen, rotting animals charged at her from the grey, sharing the same azure gleam as the dead men who rose around her. Lions and bears roared with unnatural fury, and stags cried. Further back, she saw numerous pairs of blue stars.

'Woosh!' a sudden gust of wind nearly threw her off her feet as a massive shadow passed above, its owner unseen in the angry billowing sky. Her lungs began burning, chest heaving, as she sprinted through a snowbank, narrowly dodging a grasping hand that sprung out from the snow until the shadow flew over once more.

'A dragon?' she looked up, remembering having seen illustrations of them before, from the books of Winterfell's own maester Luwin. The dragon landed a fair distance away, to her left, and she held out the tiniest of hopes that it would save her, but its open eyes revealed the same hateful sapphire look of the others. As the dead began closing in, her small legs threatened to give out beneath her. Arya knew the encroaching building, 'a fortress,' she saw clearly now, would not be able to protect her from them all. However, she would not surrender, or give in to despair. 'Ursa wouldn't.'

Gradually, she began noticing the dead at her sides starting to dissipate, though she was unsure of those at her back. The animals she could see turned tail and ran, the decaying people following soon thereafter, sinking back into the snow.

'Almost seems like they are afraid of the fortress and its steel gate.'

She stopped at the archway of the gate, and Arya Stark, the underfoot, Wolfguard of Ursa Baratheon, had turned heel expecting to see an army of the dead. Her eyes, however, had revealed an empty crystalline field. The youngest of the Stark girls felt a cool, calming, wind run through her, more than likely, disheveled hair.

'Even the dragon is gone,' she sighed in relief.

Seeing no signs that anything had followed her, she turned to face the gate once more. Picked up by the gentle wind, sheets of parchments wafted towards her, disappearing into the snow surrounding the area. Mounds of books, taller than she, lay piled haphazardly under the beat-up old gate leading into the central courtyard of the fortress. As she passed under the shadow of the steel gateway and made her way into the grand stone enclosure, she found that not only books littered the area, but dense packs of snow.

'Tall as Old Nan had once said of them when she had been in her youth,' she recalled, with a morbid curiosity, observing the lumps of whiteness that lay dispersed throughout. 'No. Even larger than that…'

At the center of the courtyard stood a large stone statue, broken and cracked in parts, face smashed, but clearly depicting a woman with sword hand raised, standing atop a large, multi-armed beast, with numerous sets of eyes and razor teeth embedded within a monstrous cow-like skull. The creature's back held scales like a snake but were considerably thicker, longer, and sharper than any scales she had ever seen.

'A wall of gigantic icicles.'

'CAW!' a crow called out above her.

Arya's eyes darted upward, scanning the many windows lining the upper balconies of the courtyard, finding nothing but openings into shadowed rooms, or closed wooden shutters.

'Hmmm, must be coming from one of the open rooms,' she reasoned, looking back down towards the foot of the stone sculpture. A dying stag, gasping for breath, greeted her eyes. From her view, she realized that two of its antlers had been broken, but by what, and where they had disappeared to, she could not say.

"Poor thing," she whispered, stepping forward to circle the animal and see its belly. Arya gasped, seeing what poor state the stag had truly been in, as a pool of its life's blood gushed out from its ripped open chest, revealing a feverishly beating heart burning within a brilliant white flame. Terrified of the gruesome scene, she turned away and nearly screamed in terror at the small doe that had appeared behind her. Intense golden eyes stared right through her, piercing her soul, and Arya felt a sense of familiarity concealed within its withering glare.

'At least it's not one of the dead,' relief washed over her as the dainty animal grew closer and planted its shiny wet nose against her left cheek. Suddenly, the doe's head perked up and it bolted past, heading for the quickly expiring stag. Arya felt an inexplicable sadness as she watched the small creature nuzzle the larger one, giving only the faintest of bleats as the doe dropped to its knees, and rested its head against the stag's thick neck. There it remained, small head rising and falling to the large creature's shallow breaths until at last the stag was still.

Arya felt a wetness in her eyes and sniffled, but she did not understand why. 'I hold no kinship with these animals. So why do I feel sad?' she asked herself, looking to the doe.

The dainty thing seemed uncertain, and even though its eyes were large and glassy, they still held that dazzling golden glow. After a moment, the animal shifted its attention to the still burning heart within the dead stag's chest and pressed its nose against it, releasing a blinding flash of light that overtook the courtyard and her senses. When the light finally abated, she saw endless night beneath a starless sky. In the darkness, she heard four sounds and four voices.

A woman roared in pain, her gasps and words sounded erratic, frantic.

"Like mother, when she had Rickon," she mumbled to no one in particular.

"I am not a monster!" the woman cried between labored breaths. "You are! No!" she heard what sounded like wood scraping against a stone floor, and telltale blasts of flame.

"Keep her still," a voiced entered her mind, calm and commanding.

'A far more mannish tone, but its similar to Ursa's' she noted.

"Hold her down! We cannot lose our child!" the man bellowed in a voice that sounded so terrified, and so near, that it was almost as if she had been in whatever room the people had shared.

"A thousand apologies, my lady!" another man, with a far mellower voice joined the fray.

"Don't you dare touch me, you drunken priest! No! I am better than you! Get away! Better than you both! Arrgghhh!" she heard flames once more. "Ahhhhhhhhh! Get. This. Out. Of. Me!" the lady grunted amidst the sounds of wood and stone, scraping and clashing, against one another. "Mhhhmmnnnnn!" the woman strained for quite some time, before finally sighing, and collapsing into a bed. A sound which Arya knew intimately well.

"Waaaaaaaaaaaa," she heard a baby's cry, gentle and weak, emerging from the clamor.

"I am better than the both of you. I am…"

'That voice!' Arya knew it, had memorized it from the moment she had heard her speak, but never had she heard it shout. 'Azula.'

"Haha. I will be a better mother than you! And a better Fire Lord than you! Haha!" the laugh held no mirth and a certain cruelty, but it was weak from exhaustion.

"Waaaaa…" the infant's cry had grown considerably weaker, but the voice of Azula had not seemed to notice.

"I know just what to call her, husband. Ur…sa…" a wooden bed frame creaked.

'Ursa!'

She heard feet scuttle across a stone floor. Whatever room from which the voices came had grown silent, apprehensive. "She will live. Childbirth will not be her end."

"waaa….." the baby had let out its final cry.

'It can't be, Ursa's alive…something's wrong,' she knew, and in the emptiness, Arya found herself beholding a crimson light arising from the east. To the she-wolf, it looked like a mountain of burning coals. Reddish and almost white hot, but not quite, and moving, bringing the light with it.

"Healer! Come quickly!" shouted the man with the gravelly voice.

As the thing grew closer, she tried withdrawing, but her feet would not move. There she remained, rooted to the spot, frightfully aware that whatever burning monster was stalking towards her would be her end.

Hurried footfalls and fevered moments of hands, followed by a deep silence, echoed in the blackness. "Apologies, my lord. But the child is dead."

"No, I do not accept that! You are the master healer of 'the Ozai' are you not? Then heal her, bring her back, or answer to your Fire Lord when she awakens!"

"My lord?" the warm voice from before spoke once again. "If you would allow me?"

"And what will you do, priest?" both voices had sounded dismissive of the man.

"I will speak the words of R'hllor, and see if they take root…"

It was then that the form of the creature was made clear. "You?" she asked, looking upwards at the now towering figure of the doe from before. Trails of shadowy vapor rippled off of its body like smoke.

'It's taller than even the main tower of Winterfell.'

The animal's formerly frail-looking body glowed in an ethereal crimson light that was reminiscent of a freshly lit brazier. Brilliant golden eyes, brighter than the sun, looked down upon her, gauging her soul and measuring her worth. In spite of this, the little wolf felt her spirit rise as she was illuminated in the pure light. She had but a moment to adjust before the ground burst into life, and found her sitting beneath a canopy of leaves sprouting from green trees.

'Where am I now?' She wondered, scanning her surroundings and discovering rays of light shining through the branches above. The doe had vanished, but she could still feel its presence granting her courage.

'Crack!' she stepped forward, the scattered bits of broken branches lining the grounds of woods giving away her every move.

'Snap!'

"Another branch," Arya grumbled, perplexed on why her feet were being unusually uncooperative in keeping quiet. In the distance, she spotted a clearing where bright rays of light shone through, creating an idyllic looking resting area with a largish tree situated in the centermost area of the glade.

'Crunch! Thwack!' the sounds of breaking twigs followed her as she ventured forth through the brush, pulling at stray twigs that found themselves caught in her wild hair. Even though she had thrown stepping lightly to the wind, she kept her eyes open, and ears alert. Looking this way and that had revealed nothing to the Underfoot, but empty woodland, until at last she had arrived at the edges of the dell.

A watery blue sky filled with spots of fluffy whiteness lingered just above. Shielding her eyes from the bright sun, she surveyed the area and noticed several roses, both red and blue, scattered about. Stepping forward had issued no sounds of snapping twigs or brittle underbrush, only of small feet padding along the soft grass.

'Winter roses?' Arya reached down to pluck at the blue flower near the base of her feet until something caught her ear. 'Voices!' she recognized, originating from somewhere just behind the tree at the center of the dene. The she-wolf carefully slunk ahead, resting her back fully against the large tree, listening in to what few words she could hear.

"What of the king? Will he not…" she heard a young woman say with a slight quiver, the apprehension evident in her tone.

"My father is not the greatest of my concerns," a man replied in a voice that reminded her of somewhat of her brother, Jon. Arya slithered around the thick tree trunk, with the intention of getting a better view of the two speakers just on the other side.

"Robert?" the woman asked, just as Arya had reached the end of her side of the tree.

'King Robert?' she wondered, twisting her head as far right as she could until the corner of her eyes caught sight of a handsome young man with silver-gold hair speaking to a northern-looking woman with lusterless brown locks and a longish face similar to her own. 'A Targaryen?' the stories her father told of the Targaryens and their famous silvery-white hair had bubbled up within her mind.

"He will not understand," the silver-haired man answered, face scrunched in consternation.

The woman reached up, touching the man's face. "You must make him understand."

'If Robert was not king, and a Targaryen is here with a northerner…then that means…' Arya struggled to remember the stories some had told of the war. Her father had never spoken of it but she knew it had started with a crown of blue roses and had ended by the head of a war hammer. 'Aunt Lyanna and Rhaegar Targaryen,' she felt a pit in her stomach, as the revelation hit her like a sack of potatoes.

"Well done," a sudden voice echoed out from somewhere nearby, startling her out of her thoughts.

"Who's there?!" she screeched, then slipped as she attempted scrambling over a large root to break away, causing her to fall into the view of her aunt and the Mad King's son.

'Clink!' the sounds of breaking glass followed her as she fell.

Arya winced, afraid of what it would mean to be caught by figures from the past. She remained curled on the ground, near the roots of the tree, eyes closed.

"Robert is not a man of words. He is a man of action. I doubt I could dissuade him," the man, who she believed to be Rhaegar Targaryen, continued speaking as if nothing had happened. She heard nothing but the sound of grinding glass, after the man spoke, and opened her eyes a wink. The former Prince and her aunt Lyanna seemed shattered, parts of them were replaced by darker pieces, looking into darker places.

'Like a broken mirror.'

Her aunt spoke, but the words were jumbled, and Arya could not make out what was being said. A triangular piece of the mirror flashed, replacing Rhaegar's exquisitely clothed arm and upper back with another. This one was of battle-worn armor that had seen some failed attempt at polishing. A simple black cloak with an embroidered Baratheon sigil, flowed downward, over the back of the armor.

'Crack!' another piece flickered around her aunt's chest, exposing a uniform and color scheme she had long since grown accustomed to seeing.

'A Fire Nation uniform!' she almost shouted. Its wearer stood against a large stained glass window, wearing a black cloak of its own with a high, gold-trimmed, red collar covering the neck. A golden, four-pronged flame rested at the center of the cloak, tapering upwards into a v-shape until finally hooking off at the shoulders.

She heard glass gnashing against itself until all was silent, and in the mess of broken pieces of different worlds and different people, she heard the words that she never wanted to hear anyone say to her. Or hear herself say to anyone else, coming from two of the voices she had heard before seeing the Targaryen Prince and her aunt.

"Father. Smith. Warrior. Mother. Maiden. Crone. Stranger. I am hers, and she is mine, from this day, until the end of my days," the man's words seemed sullen, lifeless, but they gradually raised with each utterance of the marriage vows, matching the woman's own.

"Father. Smith. Warrior. Mother. Maiden. Crone. Stranger. I am his, and he is mine, from this day, until the end of my days."

Towards the end, both had been practically shouting at each other. 'They sounded like they were in pain…'

"The change will be complete soon…we are running out of time," the mystery voice that had startled her had returned.

She turned back, and saw a man in modest black clothing, sitting in the grass, legs crossed, hands lowered, and hood drawn. "Who are you?"

The man reached up to the sides of his face and removed his dingy hood.

"Bran?!" the words left her mouth before she could think on them. He was considerably older than she had left him. "What? How?" she started, but stopped, not entirely certain where her train of thought was taking her with all of the strangeness it had just witnessed.

"Am I older?" he smiled sadly, with a face almost as old as Robb's, but as tired as her father's. "It's quite the tale, that we just do not have the time to discuss, Arya. All you need to know, is that I am your little brother from a less than pleasant time in our family's history…or your former future," he shrugged. "But everything changed when the Fire Nation attacked. That woman and her people…their sudden appearance may have just granted our family a better future, or not." The man with the light stubble cradled his head in-between his roughish hands. "My memories," he grunted, "are quickly becoming useless. They are fading. All I have left is the knowledge to teach you, and I hope that is enough."

"What do you mean? What changed?" the man claiming to be her little brother looked past her.

She followed his gaze back to where the cracked mirror resided and found nothing. Everything was gone, everyone was gone. All that remained was the tree, and it started moving, bending into an otherworldly shape, its branches twisting like gnarled old fingers. A black growth grew at the center of the, now nearly blood-red, trunk.

'Like a mother with child,' she realized, as she stared at the tree before it rippled back into normalcy.

"Everything. Everything changed…." the man's forehead was crinkled with worry when she turned back. "I saw you earlier. It was years ago for me, but only days for you. The duel between the she-wolf and the knight? Do you remember? That was when time changed, for me at least."

"I…" she tried remembering. His words had made no sense to her. She was only nine name days old, and this was almost too much for her young mind, but she was stubborn and clever.

"You move like a newborn babe, little brother of mine," she heard that sly voice and a clash of training swords. Then she heard the gnashing of teeth, and the dead things, she shuddered.

"Wait!" she gasped at the sudden resurgence of memory. "You were there!"

"Indeed I was," the man raised a brow in slight annoyance.

"If you say everything changed," she felt a frown on her face, along with furrowed brow. "Then," Arya looked at the man, "how did you know to call out to the Lady Azula when she was slain by that creature?"

He sighed, "My mind. My memories were incoherent flashes at the time before they started fading altogether. Bits and pieces of what I assume were your little brother's memories mingling with my own. Those memories would have most certainly killed me, had I not withdrawn." The man paused, closing his eyes, then reopening them, only to reveal eyes white as milk. "That was why I could not bring your Bran to this place, and why your Bloodraven cannot see him now," he blinked once, then twice, until Arya found herself staring into Bran's normal blue eyes. "Whatever destiny had linked them is now little more than dust in the wind."

"So why are you doing this?" she curled her knees up to the chin and hugged her legs.

"You know the saying 'There must always be a Stark in Winterfell?'" elder Bran's face was straight with no hint of emotion lining his face.

"Of course," she scoffed, uncertain what the saying had to do with her question.

"Well, consider these my own personal words. 'There must always be a Stark greenseer.'" Bran looked at her then nodded. "Perhaps not as exciting as the first, but in time that saying will carry the weight of not just the north, but the world itself. Are you ready?"

"Do I have a choice?" the question seemed quaint, and she watched as the man across from her seemed to mull it over in his mind.

"No," he answered flatly, rising to his feet and casting his rather large shadow over her.

"Fine then. How do we start?" she stood up not in anger or hesitation, but just in supremely cautious childish excitement.

"By throwing you off a cliff to see if you can fly…"

'CAW!'