(Dragonstone: 10/18/298 AC) Mai VII

Mai sat upon the gilded chair within the administrative chamber, the quiet stillness was as uncomfortable as the jagged armrests pressing through her cotton sleeves. She shifted her arms in a futile attempt to ameliorate the discomfort, watching, waiting for the silence to be broken. Her oldest friend stood a few steps away, analyzing her regal reflection within the large mirror hanging opposite the desk of carved oak with fiery golden trim. Even through the sweet-smell of Azula's aroma, the air still possessed a heaviness to it that Mai felt pushing down on her, almost warning her something was going to happen, and soon. Then, she remembered where she had sensed the ill-feeling before, 'It was before Zuko attended his first war council. So many years ago now,' the thought was unnecessarily quaint and she brushed it aside just as quickly as her mind had conjured it up. The chamber had remained undisturbed ever since its owner's departure, standing empty and alone at the top level of the Administration tower, which itself had been constructed at the highest point on the island, the intention of which being quite clear for all the denizens of Dragonstone.

"He took it far better than I had anticipated," Azula said, finally shattering the quiet that had descended upon the room like a foul odor that somehow reminded her of simpler times in the most inopportune moments.

"Who? Oberyn?" Mai scoffed at the thought of the exceedingly promiscuous and flirtatious Prince of Dorne, happy to be rid of her inner musings for the moment. "He took it in stride. All those marriage proposals he threw at you during the dinner? Quentyn, Trystane, and Arianne? Not to mention his own children? And here I thought getting Nymeria for Davos' son was something big."

"' Something big?'" she turned and let loose a genuine laugh. "Oh come on, Mai. That was never meant to be anything more than an appetizer if even that. The marriage between some simple Dornish bastard and a smuggler's son is not the fulcrum upon which my plans rest. It's not even a screw in my machinations."

She groaned, "Well I'm sorry, but you can never tell with you. Some of your plans have a habit of being very obtuse. A bird could fly into a snowstorm somewhere and somehow that could be part of your plan," she waved her hands lazily about.

"Who knows? It could be," Azula raised a brow and grinned, then turned her back to face the mirror once more. "As lacking in subtlety, as Oberyn was, it could just be a ruse to butter me up," Azula's reflection thumbed her chin and covered her lips with her index finger. "Oberyn is clever enough for it," she tilted her head and opened the hand at her chin, "but considering his near-immediate question about the inheritability of fire bending, it is most likely not. As it is, I have it on good authority that the man has dabbled in sorcery, so it should be no surprise that he was less taken aback than everyone else."

"And you didn't feel the need to tell me this?"

"Well, what would have been the point?" Lowering her arm, Azula turned on her heel to stare at the profile she presented within the mirror, before giving it a sharp smile.

"Yeah," she shrugged. "I suppose it doesn't matter if you don't seem too concerned over it."

"If I come across any worrisome information, then you'll be the first to know. Things that don't bother me are nothing worth tormenting yourself over, Mai. Anyway, eventually, I will have to fully explore the subject of potential marriage alliances with Prince Doran, once Oberyn clears it with him, of course. As of now, getting them onside, even with an ambiguous promise of a potential match between Steffon and Arianne, would assist us in our little endeavor. But enough of this," she cleared her throat, "my original statement had been in regards to Stark."

"Hmm," she used the pause to gather her thoughts on the Lord of Winterfell, and his expressions, or lack thereof, during the previous day's tour. "His nickname as the 'quiet wolf' seems to be well-earned," Mai stared at her seated reflection behind Azula, "so I couldn't get a proper read on him. He did seem a bit on edge, though that was more along the lines of what I expected, so who knows how he took it? I did find it rather interesting that he didn't ask about Baelish though," she answered. "It was a gamble with him, even more so than it was with Oberyn. You knew how reserved Stark was."

"Of course, but I already had a foothold with the Mormonts, and Lord Stark is not one to follow Tywin's example with upstart houses, especially one as small, poor, and secluded as theirs. Had I approached the Boltons, instead of the Mormonts, then we might have had some problems. As for Baelish, he is a non-factor to Eddard, at the moment, and it's just as well. No need to complicate matters yet. Baelish has served his purpose thus far, so that unasked line of questioning was understandable," she sniffed. "Though I'm sure at some point he'll swing back around to ask after the little man. Assuming Baelish doesn't find himself dead before then."

"I still don't understand why you keep him around. I don't like him," she retorted, the experience of having personally met him during the removal project still lingered around in her memories, leaving a bitter taste in her mouth.

"He's one of my many scapegoats. Just in case things go south."

"If you say so," the reply came out as a sigh as she was unconvinced at the reasoning.

She saw Azula's reflection frown. "You see a problem I don't? Have you had extensive dealings with the man, which I am as of yet unaware of, that give you some deep insight into the insect and the threat he poses to me? Which is none, by the way," she stared at her, then twitched the corners of her lips upward. "Honest council is hard to come by, especially here, so out with it."

"It is hard to come by, but a whole lot of good it does you if you get all sarcastic about it," she countered.

"I'm not…" the Fire Lord paused, then glimpsed her seated form in the mirror. "Look, I understand your reservations. Believe me, I do. But I have enough dirt on him and the rest of the vermin, to have them buried at the center of the earth," Azula shifted her focus back to her uniform and adjusted the raised collar. "Make no mistake, that if by some unfortunate twist of fate I should perish through unnatural means, then his continued existence will be voided alongside the lives of that meddlesome little arachnid," Azula pinched her fingers together as she spoke of the eunuch, "and golden-haired bitch," she continued, sneering all the while as she spat out the words. "I have charged Bau to personally see to it that they are all sent back to their places of birth in unmarked urns, no matter what it takes. So please, rest easy."

"That's not very comforting," she lingered on her words. "But alright, just as long as you are aware of my misgivings. I don't want to have to say 'I told you so' to your corpse," she shared a poignant look with her friend and saw a flash of genuine gratitude in her eyes.

"Noted, but," Azula shook her head nonchalantly, "that's beside the point. Even had everything not panned out as expected, with Stark, my icy trump card sits just below us, and it had entered my calculations the moment I became aware of its importance. When I gamble, it's no gamble at all, just assured victory hidden beneath the guise of chance," a predatory glow burned within Azula's eyes. "If I didn't have any of those boons, then I would have proceeded quite differently. That being said, while I am certain Stark has his reservations about this whole sordid affair with Cersei's inbred spawn, and our bending, his meeting with Robert's bastard at the dinner and the brat at the nursery seemed to indicate a definite trend in our direction. The Other is just that final push over the edge into the fire pit." Azula kept a straight face and twisted her body side-to-side while keeping her hands at her back to test how the fabric rested and shifted.

"Any plans for the boy and girl, after?" she couldn't help but ask the question she knew Ty Lee would have asked.

"Not really. They both have Robert's blood, so I imagine they will be useful in some manner, though in what capacity I have yet to discern. Westeros' attitudes towards bastards leave me with few options. At least, for the moment."

"I just hope you don't burn them for whatever miracle the red priests promise you," Mai knew her words had been fairly harsh, but she also knew what the red priests were capable of.

"Don't be silly. The optics would be bad enough, even if they weren't of royal blood. I'm trying to win people over, not drive them away. If anything, I'd worry more about Stannis doing that than me," she laughed.

'Uh-huh,' she told herself.

After a while, Mai had grown bored of watching Azula priming and raised her sleeves. There, her focus shifted to the obsidian stilettos at her wrists. The bizarre ear-piercing shrieks the creature had given off when it had entered the caverns with the exposed volcanic glass, had left her with the impression that the creature was terrified of the substance. So she made certain to acquire bits of the black glass when she had been able and had them fashioned into small throwing knives. 'There is no guarantee that the monster would be hurt by them,' she thought, 'At least not without having tested it, but it had to mean something.' Even though she would never have admitted it to anyone, the thing had terrified her far more than Ozai or Azula ever had.

"I wouldn't worry about it," Azula's unexpected voice surprised her in her ruminations, though her face wouldn't show it. A glance upward had seen the two lock eyes, as her friend had caught Mai's errant examination of her wrists, within the mirror. "The thing hasn't made any attempt at escape, and even if it does, we won't be going in alone."

"Maybe," she caught her voice sounding far more unenthusiastic than normal. "But better safe than sorry. That creature is scared of obsidian, so it might be useful," Mai shrugged, her nonchalant manner contradicting the feeling of dread within.

"Well, whatever, suit yourself," the Fire Lord waved it off, her confidence almost making Mai forget her fear. 'Almost.' Azula stretched and looked down at her nearly flat stomach, before giving it a soft pat. The smooth line across her face to morphed into a frown. "Huh, it's getting kind of tight in this," Azula groaned, then straightened out her uniform. After casting the 'royal' look towards the mirror, she turned on her heel.

"Pregnancy tends to have that effect," Mai groaned, trying in-part to dispel her thoughts on the thing in the caverns. "Remember Ursa?" she added, her eyes still taking careful observation of the obsidian blades and the wrist straps and padding holding them in safely in place.

"Yes, well, so does stress, and it didn't help that Ursa's development gave me cravings that had me eating like Robert," Azula sniffed.

She snorted, remembering the moment Azula had eaten an entire roasted pig, bones, and all when she had been late into her pregnancy with Ursa.

"That better have been a sneeze because if you're laughing about what I think you're laughing about, don't you say a word. Lo and Li never let me live that down, and I don't want a verbal reminder," the Fire Lord walked over to the window beside her desk. Its shutters had the barest of gaps between them. They were enough to allow slits of sunlight into the room and nothing more until Azula threw them completely open.

Light flooded into the chamber, causing Mai to squint as she raised her arm to shield against the onslaught of light. As her eyes adjusted, she gradually lowered her arm and began to notice the hints of dust drifting in the air. She turned to see Azula's silhouette against the normalizing brightness of the outside and rose to join at her side. Together, they watched the bustling little figures of Administration personnel and guards below, before looking up and catching sight of the dark clouds to the east. "Looks like rain," they said in unison.

"Let's hope it doesn't ruin our little tour, or Ty Lee's playdate with the Mormont girls," Azula commented, the last part having a bit more disappointed tone than the first. They both turned their attentions downward once more, to witness the gathering of twenty men clad in Northern and Dornish garb, in the middle of which stood the forms of Eddard Stark and Oberyn Martell. At Azula's insistence, the Viper had left his Paramour and a handful of guards at their guest quarters in the castle. Off to the side of the crowd, sulked the large red priest Moqorro.

No sooner had they seen the assembly of men below when she heard a series of hurried armored footsteps and a knock upon the sturdy oaken door. "Mother, the…"

"Yes, I see them," Azula barked at the voice of her eldest before she nodded a look to her and marched to the door. Securing the straps on her wrists one last time, Mai trailed after her and together they ventured out into the hall where Ser Steffon, Major Sandor Clegane, three Repurposed Flameguard, and a lone Fire Nation soldier awaited them, all clad in their armors and assorted battle gear. While Clegane, Steffon, and the Repurposed Flameguard held the standard full-plate armor of Dragonstone, with its black, red, and gold motif, Azula's son and the scarred man bore no helmets unlike the Repurposed at their sides. Resting within Steffon's polished black-leather scabbard, was the tell-tale stag head pommel of none other than Stannis' Valyrian-steel sword 'Nameless.' Clegane wielded a fearsome-looking bastard sword, while two of the Repurposed were armed with sword and shield, with the last and largest of the trio brandishing a battle axe. The trooper kept to the standard leathers and light-plate armor of their nation, a Jian sword at his side, while his helmet was of the same open-faced design as Chi-Ha's had been when she had departed for King's Landing.

"So what mysteries do you plan to unveil this day?" Oberyn questioned, his eyes lighting up like a child holding up a new toy. The man had stuck to them like glue as he walked beside Azula and herself when they entered the main hall where the lift to the caverns was held. The royal apartment building held many of the same features she had recalled from her times visiting Azula at the royal place in their youth. Sturdy wooden pillars lined the large gallery, painted red with gold leaf embellishments depicting the dragons of their world at their bases. Sumptuous crimson curtains draped down from the rafters, giving off the uneasy look of blood while hanging golden lanterns with fire patterns provided a bright glow just overhead. A series of ornate wooden stands with coiled Fire Nation dragons were interspersed evenly among the cascading crimson cloths.

"Wait and see, Prince Oberyn," her friend assured him with the slightest twinkle in her eyes.

Mai heard Stark mutter something under his breath, but could not make out what he had said. The rest of the Northern guard seemed to share in their Lord's cold temperament when they came to stand just in front of the circular carpet with the Fire Nation sigil.

"Major, if you please?" Azula motioned to the crank disguised as a twisting, old-world, dragon plated in gold.

"Yes, Fire Lord," Clegane grunted his reply and moved to the identified object. He lifted his large hand and wrapped it around the head of the gilded dragon before giving it a hard pull. The golden figure shifted forward atop the wooden platform until a click resonated from somewhere below, followed shortly by a heavy metallic groan as the sigil at their feet rose a touch then split in two, revealing a narrow concrete passage with a metal staircase. At the commotion, several of the Dornish and Northmen reached for their arms in alarm, before both the Viper and Ned Stark waved them down.

"It's quite safe, I assure you. I'll go first," Azula stated to the assembled North and Dornishmen, before stepping down into the inky darkness. Mai entered the passage at the Fire Lord's side, followed closely by Steffon, who kept a comfortable space between them as the hall was three-and-a-half-men wide. Looking back, she saw Clegane taking up the rear of their group, the red priest following at his heels. Prince Oberyn made move to follow suit with his guards in tow, only being waylaid a fleeting moment by one of them who muttered something into his ear. Whatever words had been said were dismissed by the Viper causing the concerned man to frown. 'Probably 'be careful,' or something,' she thought, watching as the Dornishman stepped back alongside his fellow guardsmen. They all spoke amongst each other in hushed tones all the while stealing questioning looks towards Azula and their Prince. Mai idly ran her palms over the obsidian knives at her wrist, not out of concern for the Viper's protectors, but in the silent agreement of the warning, she had suspected the man had delivered to their charge. She knew he had likely meant against Azula, but given what they were about to see, the warning had still held some worth.

After the last Dornishmen had filed into the passage, she noticed Eddard Stark whispering something to his man Harwin,before both men entered the passage with the rest of the Northmen trailing behind. As she stepped down to the metal grating, the iron lanterns lining the handrails of the lift burst into azure life, revealing a series of metal hand-railings lining the center of the lift in a cross-shaped pattern. The dancing shadows of the blue flames traced strange shapes upon the thin hall at their back and the across the upper part of the cavern ceiling, causing several amongst the Stark men to shift about uncomfortably.

"I did not think to ask about it on our last meeting, because I was somewhat distracted, but why blue fire?" the Red Viper questioned, his face still plastered with an intrigued, smiling expression. "Is this something unique to you, my Lady? The few others I had seen practice during our dinner did not produce the same flame nor the lightning for that matter," he turned to Azula, who stood at the front of the lift, near the controls that would start the machine.

The Fire Lord turned away from the controls to confirm all had stepped onto the platform before she answered. "Yes, Prince Oberyn. Not only are they unique in their color, but they burn hotter and rise higher than flames of the rest of my people, barring my daughter's own."

"Which one?" the Lord of Winterfell asked aloud, finally breaking his silence with the rest of the group.

"Ursa," she raised a brow, "though she still needs some additional, 'refinement,' in that regard, and her fire does not burn blue. As for the lightning? I appear to be the only one capable of it, though I have faith in my daughters," Azula continued looking at their gathered entourage of North, Dornish, and Dragonstone guards.

In the brief silence following, Mai swore she had heard the off-putting red priest Moqorro whisper something that sounded like, "The High Priest was correct." However, no one else had seemed to have taken notice of his words, not even Azula. She deigned to wait a moment, seeing if perhaps she had been mistaken, and nothing. 'Must be hearing things,' she told herself. 'Couldn't have happened at a better moment,' Mai added, the last thoughts almost escaping her lips.

"And what of your son?" Oberyn asked, looking towards Azula's firstborn.

"As of yet, he has shown no propensity for it, but that can change," both mother and son shared a knowing glance before she turned her eyes upon the disappointed looking Prince of Dorne. Steffon turned away with an unreadable expression, causing Azula to sigh, before adding, "He is capable of something arguably more impressive than simple bending."

"Hmmm, and that is?" Oberyn stroked his chin.

Steffon looked towards his mother and they shared a simple nod. "Spiritwalking," The young knight cleared his throat, "I believe the only thing you could liken it to would be to the greenseers of the North. Even then, that would be a bit of a stretch."

"Greenseers?" the large man at Lord Stark's side, Harwin, scoffed, apparently bewildered by the word. Several of the Dornish and Northern guards mumbled amongst themselves. "They haven't…"

Both Lord Stark and the Prince of Dorne cast sideways looks at the man, and he became silent, uttering a silent apology towards his liege lord. After Harwin's wordless reprimand, the assorted murmurs silenced themselves almost immediately thereafter.

"Would you be so kind as to remind me again what greenseers were rumored to be capable of, good Ser? I fear that my studies into the northern tales were less than adequate," the Viper questioned with twinkling black eyes, his interest seemingly peaking evermore above the clouds.

"Well, they were said to be capable of communicating through the weirwoods and seeing into the past and future. Though I am not capable of seeing past and future events, I can communicate with others who share my abilities. At the moment the number of practitioners is not very large, but given time, such instantaneous communication could well-serve the Seven-Kingdoms," Steffon stated proudly, puffing up his chest. The boy took any encouragement, whether it was off-handed or not, from Azula with high praise and this time had been no exception.

"Greenseers are old wives tales, Ser Steffon, nothing more," Eddard's face had turned to stone and an icy look had overcome his eyes as he looked to her friend. "What is this, my Lady? You reveal a secret that you have held for many years, only to reveal yet more? I understand the need to hold them, believe me when I say that, but thus far I have only found you to be holding far too many."

Mai stared at the Warden of the North, surprised at his icy outburst. He had not shouted nor used harsh words, but his anger had been evident, if polite. As she looked to Azula, she noticed a look of surprise as well, even though she above all else, had anticipated it. 'We both knew she could never tell Stark outright about the King's bastards, without seeming suspect, so she led him on to figure it out for himself and ultimately realize that Azula had already known,' she told herself, having judged his sudden admonishment to be a sign that he had already done so, though 'when' had been more difficult for her to discern, as his relative silence from the day before had not provided any insight. As she ran through her thoughts she had been suddenly jerked back to the present with Eddard Stark's subsequent words.

"What next? You reveal to us a White Walker?"

Steffon and Clegane coughed awkwardly.

"We captured it in the Sunset Sea, aboard a derelict Ironborn ship, with several still-moving corpses. 'Wights' I believe your legends call them. The thing was an emaciated mess when the crew of the Firestorm encountered in the bowels of the ship," Azula continued without missing a beat.

Whatever surprise had lined her face and those of the others had not been present on her. 'She's leading the conversation,' Mai felt her lips twitch downward.

"What!? Impossible!" Eddard's eyes bulged out of their sockets before he regained his composure. The others save Oberyn and the Flameguard, shared in the Hand's disbelief. Moqorro seemed almost expectant of the news and had remained silent, only closing his eyes and mouthing what she assumed was a prayer, as a handful of the Dornish and Northmen began conversing with one another. Ignoring the commotion, the Lord of Winterfell spoke once more, "I fear this jest, malformed, and uninvited."

"Speak for yourself, Lord Stark," the Dornish Prince corrected, his eyes practically jubilant at the news, even though Mai had spotted several amongst his men holding looks indicative of the revelation not being well-received. "In all my travels this has surely been one of the most interesting! Do not keep us in suspense, my lady! Lead the way!" A man in Dornish garb tugged at the Prince's sleeve, whispering something into his ear. "Oh come now," he pulled his arm gently away. "If the thing is false or was falsely identified, it matters not. If it is real then it will surely be a thing to behold!" the Viper grinned. "I assume the creature to be secured?"

"Of course! It is quite secure! Lord Stark?" Azula eyed the Lord of Winterfell curiously.

A guarded pair of azure pools greeted Azula's fiery prying eyes. "If what you say is true, then you are playing with things you do not understand, my lady," the man frowned then looked to his retinue. "Men, be ready," he stated simply, then looked to her friend. "Proceed with caution."

"Indeed," Moqorro agreed, watching them all with a strangely predatory visage, his knuckles bone-white gripping at his staff.

The Fire Lord maintained a stiff countenance, upon Eddard Stark's words. "I am not playing with the thing, Lord Stark. I plan to eliminate it the moment you two become aware of it. Now, if you would all please steady yourselves upon the railings, this lift moves quite quickly," she stated, waiting until those on the lift had done as instructed, herself included.

After all, had secured themselves, her friend flipped a small lever that made the contraption shift beneath their feet before giving out a metallic groan. Several amongst the group let out startled gasps before the lift released its brake and raced down the cavernous path, causing several articles of clothing amongst them to flutter in the continuous rush of air. As before, amongst the numerous stoic or unsettled faces, only one stood out against them, the Red Viper of Dorne, who still held on to his delighted and oddly thoughtful grin.

Just as quickly as their descent had begun, so did it end, the moment had passed far too quickly for her tastes, as she was not eager to once again be in the creature's presence. Despite this, Mai continued forward, not wishing to leave Azula's side, not wishing to leave her friend vulnerable. As they passed through the familiar metal door at the bottom of the shaft, a stale air greeted them. The air had not been foul, only unexpected as it lingered about them throughout their procession. The only saving grace being that Azula's cherry-blossom aroma slightly muted the old air the closer she was to her.

"Didn't we fix that?" she whispered to her about the musty odor, having been just as surprised at the air around them and the distinct lack of any kind of burning incense to help mask the scent.

"It could've been worse," Azula replied softly, likely remembering the way it smelled before. "We will deal with that later, but for now we have a hanging cell to visit," she cleared her throat, then turned to face Lord Stark, Prince Oberyn, and their respective guards who had grown increasingly unsettled as time wore on. "This way," Azula's smoothly confident voice echoed out throughout the labyrinthine passageways.

As they traversed the underground halls, red torchlight flared blue, signaling to any of the failed Repurposed prowling nearby of the identity of the one approaching them. While Qyburn's experiments had worked on these unfortunate souls, there had been a select few who had retained a feral sense of self and had lacked the necessary subtlety and discretion Azula had desired. The wretches had been too valuable to simply dispose of and too wild to utilize near civilized company, so Azula had ultimately decided to put them to use as little more than guard dogs within the caverns. These things held a healthy fear of fire and large crowds unless pressed, and so kept to the habit of avoiding the more important sections of the cave where troopers, guards, and priests would commune. In the beginning, every so often one amongst the priesthood would venture too far into the hollows of Dragonstone and disappear, which Azula never cared enough to investigate and instead chose to use as an object lesson for the rest of her troops and loyalists. Mai remembered the disappearances ceasing soon thereafter.

"Apologies if this seems too forward, Lord Stark," Azula cast a sideways glance to her as she spoke, pausing mid-step. "But what information did you glean off of the King's bastards?"

'Subtle,' Mai exhaled and closed her eyes, pinching the bridge of her nose as she did so. 'I was wondering when you'd get to that. I thought you would cover the topic before coming down here?' she stared Azula's profile, turned as it was to their Northern and Dornish entourage. 'Didn't expect it to be this late. What are you playing at?'

"What indeed?" the Viper pitched in with a knowing smile, causing the Lord of Winterfell to scowl at the second son of Dorne.

"There is a time and place to hold that discussion, my lady, and now is not the time," Stark warned them both in a cold, lordly voice.

Without warning the large bulk of Moqorro burst in, pushing its way through the crowd, "The fires have told me the golden-haired children are bastards born of incest, between Ser Jaime Lannister and his sister the Queen," he stated bluntly, leaving all those gathered speechless, even Azula. "Now come, my Fire Lord, we must go. I wish to see the enemy of R'hllor."

Silence reigned long within the cavern, with only the soft sound of dripping water somewhere off in the distance. Azula's face had grown still at Moqorro's unexpected proclamation, and yet, even beneath the unreadable expression, Mai had known her well enough to tell that a war was brewing behind her golden eyes. 'Anger at the priest's lack of discretion, but unable to voice that anger without seeming complicit? Or worse yet, reprimanding the priest and risking Moqorro blurting out something even more dangerous,' she would have found the indecision written across Azula's face amusing if the situation had not been as dire as it was. Their impending visit towards the ice creature had not helped matters either.

"What?! How?!" her friend stumbled on her words, their usual confidence somewhat lacking.

The caverns quickly descended into madness, as Dornish and Northmen conversed with one another, with the words 'Treason' and 'Truth' uttered in equal measure.

"Hahaha!" the Prince of Dorne chuckled over the bickering men, watching the red priest with an amused smile as he moved ahead. "I like you, large man! No time for foreplay. Well there you have it!" he clapped his hands in excitement. "I was wondering who was going to speak first. The letters Sunspear received were intriguing enough to warrant a personal investigation…"

"Letters?" Azula blinked. "What letters? The proposals?"

"No. Those only became interesting once we received the others, my lady," Oberyn grinned. "The ones from a certain member of the small council?"

"Who?" questioned both the Lord of Winterfell and the Fire Lord of Dragonstone, causing the two to share a look before turning back to the Dornish Prince.

"I'm afraid our informant wishes to maintain a certain anonymity, just in case. The capital can be dangerous as I'm sure both of you know. Though worry not, the man has given his word to come forward once this information has been acted on and his position made secure," the Viper replied in a playfully serene voice. The man's black eyes seemed to be scouring Azula's molten rings, and Eddard's cerulean ones for any hidden intentions, ill or otherwise. "But at least now we know why you had shown interest in the babe and the boy, Lord Stark. This has been a very interesting moment in my life. You are certainly an exciting host, my Lady," Oberyn bowed with a great smile splashed across his olive-skinned face. "Now, if there are no other distractions, I very much share the priest's thoughts on the matter of your mythical prisoner," she followed the Viper's eyes and saw that Moqorro had continued down the hall, nearly out of reach of Azula's flames.

'Dammit,' she muttered to herself. 'He's getting too far…'

"So be it," Stark said, turning his icy stare towards Azula and Oberyn, and uttering in an even colder voice than before. "The three of us will discuss this later. As for the rest of you," he looked back towards his retinue, "be silent. I want no word of this leaving these caverns. Understood?"

"Yes, my lord," the Northmen replied in unison.

"I look forward to the conversation, Stark," the Viper stated, his face still beaming.

"As do I," Azula replied, her face retaining its indecipherable appearance.

"Dornishmen?" Oberyn continued, following Eddard Stark's example. "I trust no loose tongues will emerge from these caves, yes?"

"Yes, my prince," the Dornish guardsmen answered.

"Good, now let us continue," the Red Viper gestured ahead, his countenance shifting from a jovial grin to a straight frown, and becoming just as unreadable as Azula's and Eddard's own.

After the tense exchange, she and Azula along with their Flameguard, hurried forward to close a bit of distance between themselves and their wayward priest, while the others lagged a comfortable space behind. Their expedition through the dank underground halls had continued unabated, the murmurs ever-present at their backs. Seeking to keep her words private, she grew closer to Azula and whispered, "I guess the priest stole your thunder? Huh? What do you know about the…"

Before she could finish, Azula replied in an equally soft tone, "Did he?"

Mai looked towards her and then behind, to make sure no others had been within earshot. She found the slightest of smirks gracing her friend's face. She reared her head back in confusion, "But, you said you were going to tell him yourself."

"Shh, we'll get to that later, we're getting closer," her words sounded slightly lower than usual, and Mai turned to discover that their group had begun entering the large hollow that lay just before the creature's prison. Like before, the cavern had retained its ominous appearance as the light of the wall sconces reflected off the obsidian shards strewn about above and below them within the vast man-made cavity.

Behind them, Oberyn whistled. "Impressive," he said, kicking up a small pebble and casting it out into the blackness. She and the rest of their group had not halted in their movements, though she could tell they had all remained as quiet as possible in their march, as they listened in for the ensuing sound of the bounding stone. After a very long silence, they finally heard the 'clack' of it hitting rock somewhere in the gloom. "Hmm, you could fit a small keep in here," the Viper observed.

"Yes," came the simple reply. "I suggest we form up a bit more, the path narrows ahead."

Taking Azula's advice, the Dornish and Northmen formed up behind their respective liege's and followed them down the quickly thinning track. The torches mounted along the walls began to dim as they grew closer to the passageway before the holding cavern. When they crossed beneath the arch of rock leading into the long corridor, she found two Fire Nation troopers standing at attention.

"Fire Lord!" they exclaimed, before saluting and presenting flame.

Mai spotted Moqorro up ahead speaking with six of his number that had been loitering within the hall before their arrival. A group of four Flameguard and one Repurposed stood opposite them, near the entryway to the cavern with the hanging cell. Even before they had entered the hall, a faint chill had begun running up Mai's spine, causing the hairs on her neck to stand on end. She paused just before the entrance to the creature's prison and felt her feet grow heavy. Mai turned to look at the Lord of Winterfell and found almost the same look of hesitation written across his face and body. No doubt feeling her eyes upon him, he looked to her and nodded, his face holding an icy resolve and fair bit of fear. "I have a bad feeling about this," she turned away from Ned and nudged Azula.

"Relax," she assured her. The air around her long-time friend held a pleasant warmth, almost as if the cold itself was too afraid to grasp at her. The Fire Lord faced the rest of their group and urged them forward, "Come." Together she and Azula entered the familiar hollow with the thin path that traced the edges of the circular cavern. Three wall-mounted torches were spread evenly along the walkway, all flaring blue upon the group's entrance.

Moqorro followed closely behind while the others started forming along the walkway, the Northmen to one side and the Dornishmen on the other. Both Eddard Stark and Oberyn Martell stood behind their respective guards along the walkway's edge. As Mai looked up she saw the cell and heard nothing. Silent as death, the prisoner had not stirred, with the only sounds being those of chains swaying in the blackness above. A fine white mist leaked out from the corners of the suspended chamber, and for a moment within the void of the viewing window, she beheld no twinkling blue stars.

"I suppose asking for it to be released would be too much to ask?" the Viper's query had no doubt been made in jest but the look in his eyes, which had only moments ago been both jovial and calculating, had grown grim.

"Hmm," Azula turned to face the priests at their back, her eyes resting upon the same woman Mai had seen two days past. "How long has it been silent?"

Mai kept a sharp ear on her friend's words, but her eyes maintained their full focus on the dangling metal sarcophagus. Before the priestess responded, twin stars suddenly materialized within the shadow of the coffin cell's window. The stars bore into her and shifted down to her wrists before they blinked out of sight. Her blood ran cold, and she knew what was about to happen.

"Since yesterday, Fire Lor…" the priestess did not finish her words as the metal box began to frost over, and Mai heard something old begin to stir inside.

"Azula!" she yelled for the first time in her life, surprising herself and making Azula's response all the more agonizingly slow as her friend processed Mai's shriek.

The red priest, Moqorro, had raised his staff just as the steel casket exploded outwards, unleashing jagged pieces of frozen steel and an impenetrable cloud of icy mist that poured out from the box like milk to their group below, forcing them back. She heard several men howl in pain at the sudden shrapnel while yet other men barked after their charges. The torches surrounding the cell snuffed out, while those within the hall behind Mai grew dangerously dim.

"Lord Stark! Prince Oberyn!" panicked voices echoed in the gloom.

Mai could not help but squint as the bitter cold began to sting her eyes and obscure her vision in the near blackness. Her ears twitched at the sounds of numerous hurried footfalls scuttling to and fro all around her and her skin rose at the presence of a fell breeze lingering just up ahead. She heard Moqorro shout a curse in some foreign language, and saw a flash of green before something shattered. The sounds of a scuffle ensued, and the Red Priest grunted once more before his voice faded away into the distance like a falling man. At that moment, Mai chanced a glance ahead, near the mouth of the pit where Azula was standing and beheld twin stars twinkling in ethereal blue right next to her.

"Ooof!" her friend yelped in the freezing darkness, just as the thing swiped its hand and Azula's form fell over the edge.

"Azula! Mother!" she, and Steffon who had been somewhere behind her, yelled as one.

Mai saw the darkened and scurrying forms of the Dornish and Northmen on the sides of the holding cavern. The mist quickly began to blanket the entire hollow and sweep over into the hall behind them, causing several of the already perilously dim torches to dim further into nothingness.

As soon as she caught sight of the creature, Mai flicked her wrists to procure an obsidian stiletto from their strap. Just as she did so, a Repurposed Flameguard suddenly burst out from the darkness to her right and took a swing at the Other with its battle-axe. The steelhead of the axe struck true and staggered the thing, but it shattered into a thousand pieces the moment after it touched the creature's icy skin. Mai locked eyes with the twin stars and they appeared to narrow in her direction, before the monster to which they belonged reached for the neck of the attacking Flameguard and lifted it with one hand. The thing, its eyes having never left her, tore off the arms of the flailing Repurposed and tossed them to her in a series of silent movements before finally tossing the Repurposed itself, forcing her to roll on to her side to avoid being hit. She felt the gusts of air from the thrown forms pass over her as she moved, and heard various cries as the arms and body of the Flameguard struck several of the unarmored priests that had been lingering in the hall before the creature's escape. The instant she stopped, she heard a crunch and felt a sharp pain course up from her right hand and into her arm.

"Ahhhh!" she screamed, looking to the source of the pain and spotting the creature's icy foot crushing down on her bloodied, broken hand, with its eyes, squarely focused on her. It started to reach down before it jerked its hand back and withdrew its body in response to a blade which had swung down and placed itself between her and it, in an attempt to remove the creature's arm.

"You die here, monster," Mai heard Steffon growl, the Valyrian-steel blade in his hand ringing sharply with anticipation.

"That's right, you ugly fuck!" Clegane barked his challenge and darted forward with Steffon.

Just then, another one of Azula's Repurposed burst out and rammed the Other with its shield, moving it only a step backward before the thing regained its footing and ripped the shield out of its grasp. The thing unleashed a sharp hiss before it drove its clawed hand into the armored breastplate of Qyburn's creation as if it had been made out of paper. Steffon charged forward with his blade and was swatted aside into unconsciousness with the armored bulk of the Repurposed, which the creature had taken to using as a shield and weapon in the same measure. Clegane moved in an instant after, and the Other used the actual shield in its other hand to whack Clegane against the stone wall with a meaty 'thunk.' The scarred man remained motionless on the ground, though Mai could still see his chest rise and fall in relative regularity. The Repurposed caught in the creature's grip kept clawing at it in a futile attempt to dissuade any further rampage, which resulted in the Other smashing the Flameguard's body against the wall three times and with such force that it made the torches lining the hallway rattle. The Repurposed guard fell limp and the ice demon glared at it with a peculiar sort of curiosity before it shot its gaze towards the pit. Mai did the same and heard a series of grunts echoing out from below before she spotted a faint blue hue reflecting off of the obsidian shards lining the walls of the holding cavern. The blue hue of a rising flame. The creature looked to her with sapphire malice, then threw the Repurposed at her while keeping the shield in hand. She kicked out from where she had been, cradling her limp hand as best as she could when she did so, though the movement itself had caused a near blinding amount of pain to course throughout her entire body. Narrowly avoiding the thrown corpse, she lifted her head and scanned where the creature had been only to see that it had already fled down the corridor, leaving a trail of dead priests behind.

Mai felt the heat begin returning to the room as the blue hue coming from the pit had grown steadily brighter until Azula leaped out from below with twin steams of azure flame emanating from her feet. Her friend's eyes glowed with an intensity Mai had not seen in a long time, and out into the darkness she stared before she tilted her head up and roared like a tigerdillo, releasing intense blue flames from her hands and mouth as she did so, and bathing the caverns in azure brilliance. Instantly, all of the formerly dead and dying torches lining the walls flared to life as Azula's roar reverberated throughout the caverns. The gathered men from the North and Dorne could do nothing but silence their panicked cries in sheer awe.

"Where is it!?" she commanded, as her fiery gaze scanned their surroundings like a wolf. The temperature within the cavern grew ever hotter but cooled the moment Azula spotted the motionless body of her son. "Steffon!" she screeched, her voice quivering slightly at the sight. She bolted for her son's body until Mai heard movement behind her. The priests she had assumed dead had begun stirring, revealing eerily bright blue eyes, and catching Azula's attention. The Fire Lord sneered and stopped in the middle of her dash to her son, before planting her feet firmly into the ground and unleashing a torrent of cerulean flame, bathing the recently revived priests with her fury. Several gave an inhuman cry before they collapsed and turned to ash. Mai felt moisture collecting on her brow, in response to the intense heat. "Steffon?" Azula asked the unmoving form of her son as she knelt by his side, and cradled his head. "Steffon?" she asked again, her voice quivering even more than before.

"Mother?" he replied, at last, his words sounding slurred and sluggish as if he had just awoken from a long nap.

"Steffon!" the Fire Lord exclaimed, planting kisses upon his cheek, before catching herself and nudging him away. "I'm pleased to see that you aren't weak," she cleared her throat.

The young man's eyes bulged out of their sockets, his mind likely having suddenly returned to their full facilities in regards to their present state of affairs. "Mother! The creature," he rose on unsteady legs and used the wall to brace himself. "It's after Ty Lee! She's on the beach with the Mormonts! That's why it waited this long to escape! It must be!"

Azula shot up with a deadly focus burning within her eyes, before looking back to her eldest. "Remain here and see to the wounded. Trooper!" she turned to face the startled Fire Bender with the ashen face, standing to the side.

"Fire Lord?!" he clapped his heels to attention, though his face remained pale white and seemed scared beyond belief.

"Guard my son with your life. I will return," golden eyes turned to her next. "Mai," she started before looking down towards the bloodied cuffs of her robes.

"It's okay, I'm good," she looked her square in the eye, even though her arm felt like it had been trampled by a horse, and Azula nodded. 'That thing is going to pay for this.'

"Come on, let's go kill that creature, and mount its head on my wall!" the Fire Lord turned to continue the chase, before Eddard Stark and Oberyn Martell rose their voices.

"Then we will accompany you with some of our men," they said in unison, surprising each other as they did so.

"Then keep up," she replied tersely then sprinted ahead down the cavern into which the Other had fled.

"Harwin, with me. The rest of you remain with the wounded," Stark commanded the Northman, who snapped to attention, before brandishing his sword. The Prince of Dorne followed suit and declared a similar order of his own.

"You two with me, the rest of you stay," the Viper awkwardly grabbed at a fallen sword, then switched for a spear, taken from one of his guards, who brandished a scimitar after being relieved of his primary weapon. "I pray we contest this thing in the open," he said, his earlier bravado seemingly having somewhat diminished as he charged forward with his two guards in tow, keeping on Azula's heels. Lord Eddard had been on the verge of doing the same until Steffon stopped him.

"Lord Stark!" Steffon shouted, drawing the Lord of Winterfell's attention. "Take this!" he sheathed 'Nameless' and tossed it to the honorable Northman. "It avoided the weapon. It's Valyrian-steel, it may help."

"What if it returns?" Stark asked.

"If it wanted us dead, it wouldn't have run, and if it comes back it means you're dead along with my mother. If it can get through her then it wouldn't matter if I had it."

"I will return this to you, you have my word," the Northman assured him.

"I should hope so. It's extremely valuable. Now go!" Steffon urged. The Lord of Winterfell nodded his understanding and set on to the path ahead with Harwin, while she took to the rear.

As they raced down the rocky corridors, she heard the fell shrieks of the monster echo all around them, accompanied by the sounds of battle, fire, and clashing steel. "How many benders were within the cavern when we came? A dozen? How many soldiers? Thirty?" she wondered once she heard the fire and ringing steel. At every step, Mai's arm felt like it was stirring within a barrel of nails and broken glass. She gritted her teeth and pushed the pain away as best she could, and focused on Azula's form at the head of the group, a good fifty feet, by her measure. In-between them, Eddard and his man, Harwin, were running in near-complete silence, as were Oberyn and his guards, who were just ahead of the Northerners. Suddenly a scream drowned out the sounds of conflict, and Mai saw Azula pause, then crouched up ahead, while the others caught up. The caverns grew silent, and Azula hushed them in their heavy breathing.

"This is not the path we came through," Oberyn whispered.

"No, this is the path to the beach entrance, where the creature had been brought in," Azula looked around the turn in their path.

"So Steffon was correct, it was planning this?" she spoke, keeping her eyes open in the azure twilight of the torches still burning at their backs.

"So it would appear. The path ahead is dark," her friend warned causing both Oberyn and Stark both to peer around the corner as well.

'And full of terrors,' she thought idly. "Why don't you just ignite the torches as you did back there?" Mai gestured back from where they had come.

"They're not catching. Not a spark of life in them…" Azula threw an errant fireball down the hall to light the way, allowing Mai to spot all the formerly mounted torches scattered around the stone floor, their iron heads warped like tin and emitting a faint icy mist, with nigh a body to be seen. "Hmmm. I think the creature touched them to delay our pursuit, but it didn't do all of them," Azula replied, then looked back.

"It didn't touch them. It crushed them," Stark observed, his voice was low and ominous.

"Bring the torches," Azula pointed to the four closest ones still burning behind them. Eddard and Oberyn nodded to their respective guards, Harwin, and the two Dornishmen, while Mai rose to claim the fourth torch for herself, feeling more useful as a light source, for the moment, than a true combatant with her ruined hand. When they returned, the Fire Lord stared at her 'guests' and spoke, "The path to the beach is straight ahead, one-hundred-eighty-one-point-five yards, and then left two-hundred-and-twenty-two-point-six."

"Bloody hell! Three-hundred yards down a narrow fucking corridor with a blasted Other prancing about!?" Harwin groaned, his words sounding far shakier than she remembered from just moments before the thing had escaped.

"I assure you, that the Other has more to fear from me if it hurts my daughter than you do from it," Azula answered, just as Mai suddenly felt out of breath at the thought of running that particular gamut.

"If anything happened to her it'd be your fault all over again. You learned to be less dismissive of advice, but you still have a nasty habit of being stubborn when you think you're right," she wanted to say but refrained from doing so in light of their current situation. "And judging by what the creature did back there with the dead, we potentially have around thirty to forty corpses to deal with during our spirited little jaunt into the darkness," Mai pointed out, while she glanced at Azula's stony face and narrowed eyes.

"When it rains it pours," Oberyn chuckled with a sharp smile, as his two Dornish guards, and Harwin looked at him and then each other with bewildered expressions. Meanwhile, Mai noticed that Lord Stark had retained a resolute countenance throughout the exchange, his knuckles bone white as they gripped 'Nameless.'

"That's assuming everyone that remained at their posts has been slain. Though I pray they were not, of course, I always assume the worst to not be surprised. Be ready and stay behind me," the Fire Lord ordered. After silent approvals, Azula turned the corner and let loose an immense fire stream that hurtled down the length of the hall, illuminating the caverns all around them. Mai heard two inhuman shrieks in the roaring azure conflagration before they grew silent. Then she heard the clamor of armored feet along the stone floor, and what sounded like a dozen more shrieks in the darkness of the corridor. "Go!" Azula yelled.

They charged ahead, keeping pace with Azula, though the Dornish guardsman and Harwin started drawing ragged breaths. As they passed midway through the exceedingly long passage, she saw two smoldering corpses strewn about in an unnatural position, both clad in Flameguard armor. "Not Repurposed," she noted the familiar scent of burned flesh and singed hair, and not the pungent smell that Repurposed tended to emanate when exposed to high temperatures. A bit of dread crept up on her as she realized the things had prowled halfway down the length of the hall in complete silence in-between the time Azula had thrown her fireball and when they had finished their conversation. Four diagonal gashes, reminiscent of those she had seen on the deck of the Firestorm, though lacking a digit, were splayed across their scorched black chest plates with bits of smoke wafting out at the edges.

Out in the darkness, ahead of their group, and emerging from the right-side corridor of the forked path, a set of four pale blue eyes twinkled into existence. Inhuman shrieks accompanied them before they were engulfed in a bright red flame that illuminated their path. Their group stopped until Mai heard very human shouts and clanging armor. "Come! This is the way to the holding cavern where that blasted creature was held, and where the Fire Lord was headed! We must protect her, if she yet lives, and avenge her if she does not!" The mystery voice drew closer until its owner rounded the corner alongside nine Flameguard, and a duo of fellow Fire Nation troopers, all of which were shallow of breath save for a single Flameguard who Mai deduced quite quickly was more than likely a Repurposed given its calm state. The group jumped in surprise, bar the Repurposed man, and for a moment seemed poised to attack before they realize the state of Azula's group. "Fire Lord!" the mystery voice exclaimed and took a knee before Azula waved him off.

"Report!" Azula commanded, glaring down at the path the men had emerged from and allowing the new group no respite.

"Fire Lord! Second Lieutenant Quni, reporting!" the man stood at attention, breath still heavy. "The gathering halls…" he heaved. "We were swarmed by the dead. Many were lost in the initial ambush, priests, and Flameguard chief amongst them, around twenty as far as I could tell. As for our people," he took another deep breath. "Commander Meng managed to rally what troopers he could and corralled the creatures into a dead end, and incinerated them, before more of the things came flooding into the halls, separating us. We attempted to push back towards the Commander, but he ordered us to break for the holding cavern to find you. We also saw several of the Kemurikage emerge from your study during the fighting, but we lost them in the darkness."

The question of 'Where did they come from?' popped into her head, before she realized their proximity to the fire pits. 'There had been smoke yesterday,' she recalled the black tendrils emanating from the steelwork flues, and the vents leading up from the fire pits to help mask the burning of the dead. Looking to Azula, she saw the same idea forming behind her eyes before she turned and nodded to Mai to remain silent. 'That can't be!' she toyed with the thought, debating with herself on how it was possible. 'There shouldn't be any leftover corpses! The Repurposement staff, Major Sanro,' Mai lingered on her internal dialogue with rising irritation and confusion, her injured hand and temple pulsing in response. 'He was very meticulous and adamant about disposal protocol,' her quiet fury threatened to become louder than she was accustomed. 'Whoever was in charge of the pits, oh they would pay. Azula would make sure of that, and if she didn't, I would. I'm not very happy at all,' she frowned, cradling her injured hand as tiny black spots danced around in her vision.

"From where did the dead emerge?" Eddard Stark questioned, his expression hidden in the shadows of the flickering torchlight.

"We can discuss that after," Azula cut off any response. "We must get to my daughter!" her friend said behind clenched jaws, likely angered at the breach of security and procedure. "Quni? You and the three of you," the Fire Lord pointed toward three of the Flameguard, including the Repurposed among them. "With me. The rest of you go to the holding cavern. Secure my son and make for the lift, and let no harm come to him. Or else," the torches flared blue at the words, causing Azula's narrowed golden eyes to shimmer in the twilight.

"As you command, Fire Lord!" the men saluted and broke off from their group, heading down to the holding cavern while Quni and the three Flameguard took up positions around Azula. Without missing a beat, Azula continued down the hall at full tilt, holding up her palms a shooting off a fire blast every so often to illuminate and clear the way. Mai's lungs burned and more than a few seemed to be desperately gasping for air, save Eddard Stark and the Martell prince. In the distance, she caught sight of the steel door that separated them from the beach, or what had remained of it, ripped through like tin. Mai saw flashes of light and murky darkness just outside, and she sighed at their luck. 'Of course, the storm came.' Had her hand not been in such a state, she felt she would have facepalmed.

The air was cold, but alive with the sounds of a violent shore when they emerged from the caverns. Their labored breaths gave off a pale mist that quickly swirled away in the rising gale. What had started as sparse droplets of water near-instantly became a constant pelting of pea-sized hail the moment they took a few steps away from the entryway to the caverns.

"By the old gods," she heard the Eddard and Harwin mutter, the former shielding himself with his cloak and the latter with his sword arm.

Mai raised her arm to defend against the onslaught of ice, the wide sleeves of her Ao Dai taking the brunt of it. As she looked to her left she saw the waves hungrily crashing upon the black rocks of Dragonstone's dead beach. The clouds grew black as night, smothering the sun above them, save for a few rays shining out far out into the distance. The rising cacophony almost drowned out Azula's fevered shouts, but Mai knew better than most that Azula would not be silenced. "This way!" she roared, after having crouched down to examine the icy trail of their inhuman quarry.

Flashes of lightning illuminated their group and Mai noticed the pellets of ice turning to mist upon Azula's normally fair skin, as she dashed in the direction identified. It was in that moment that she caught sight of her friend's ripped sleeves and tattered right bracer, the left having been discarded sometime during their chase. 'She must have torn them during her climb out of the pit, and I just missed it in the excitement,' she reasoned.

Azula ran with a singular focus, Mai noted, watching as her friend's hands sliced through the air like knives, while her feet glided over the surface of the sand as if they had been made of wind. Another flash of lightning allowed her to see that several of the others were lagging, save Quni, and the Repurposed man. The trail of frozen footprints extended outwards before disappearing behind a large string of rocky outcroppings that merged into the sheer cliff along the coastline. Even as well as she ran, Mai doubted she could keep up with Azula as the Fire Lord kept putting more and more distance between them with no signs of slowing. 'Not that she should,' she knew, being as worried about Ty Lee as Azula most certainly was. The formerly small bits of steam that had been whisping off Azula had begun rippling across her body like a cloak.

"Ahhhhh!" Mai heard a very familiar childish cry echo off in the distance, even over the near-deafening crash of the lightning, rain, and hail around them.

"Ty Lee!" she and Azula yelled in unison, the anxiety giving her just enough energy to catch up with her friend. The ground shook immediately thereafter, causing them all to stumble in their sprint, before a brilliant pillar of light shot up into the sky, illuminating the area around them even brighter than the flashes of lightning before.

"What in the fresh hell is that?" Harwin exclaimed, squinting as he protected his face with his large forearm before the earth rumbled once more and the fell shriek she had now grown very familiar with drifted along with the storm.

As she looked up at the pillar of light she saw a large boulder shooting up from the origin of light, before arching and falling back right down in their direction. In the shadow of the rock, Mai saw twin stars peering out, and a faint icy blue shimmer, before the stars disappeared and a smaller crystalline form detached from the falling chunk of earth.

'Kaboom!' lightning flashed ever so close, the delayed sound nearly deafening her when it hit the beach. Loud as it was, its light allowed her to catch a glimpse at the falling rock and the smaller form that had separated from it.

'A ghost of mist,' Mai thought, as she traced the trajectory of the figure, which she now knew for certain was the Other and who had somehow still held a shield in hand. Judging that the creature would fall right behind them just as the boulder would land in front, "Azul…." she tried to warn, only to see that Azula had calculated the same and had used a fire burst from her feet to dash towards the shoreline, away from the rock. Arcs of electricity began flowing around Azula's body and towards her fingertips, and in the gloom, she saw her friend's fiery eyes focused on one of the two things that were drawing closer to the ground.

"Incoming! Everyone scatter!" she heard Quni holler over the din of lightning and crashing waves. The men behind did as instructed without hesitation, their warrior instincts having seemingly kicked in. Stark, Harwin, and a lone Dornishman dove left, while the Viper, his remaining Dornish guard, and the Dragonstone guard dove right.

'Kakoom!' Azula's fingers came to life as a devastatingly bright burst of lightning illuminated the air around them. Fired from both of her fingertips the electricity surged through the air, aimed directly at the ghostly figure tracing an arc through the dark sky. Mai saw the Other move its shield to protect itself, and a loud 'Bang!' rattled her teeth as the lightning struck true, yet fell short as the shield absorbed the massive charge of energy. The shield became white-hot before a small explosion of blue energy discharged and blasted the Other away from them. Using the backward momentum the thing redirected itself nearer to the cluster of rocks at the base of the sea cliff Mai had spied only moments before. Following the electrical detonation, the piece of earth which had accompanied the creature came crashing down with a 'Thump!' The sound reverberated throughout her chest as the flying slab slammed into the cold beach, and threw clumps of wet sand in all directions. Though none had been injured, the thing stood like a tombstone in the darkness and screeching winds, an ominous pillar of jagged black rock.

'It's looking for cover,' Mai made note of the falling iceman as her hair whipped about her face, before casting knowing looks to Azula, Eddard Stark, Quni, and the Martell Prince. All of whom returned nods of acknowledgment as they and their men moved to surround the outcropping.

"Do not enter the crags! Draw it out! I need a clean shot!" Azula shouted over the howling wind. She saw the thing land behind the cluster of rocks following by the sound of ringing steel as the shield struck hard earth. She, Quni, and one Flameguard trailed behind Azula to ensure the creature did not try to attack from the rear, while the Repurposed and the other Flameguard stood at the Fire Lord's side.

'Tkk…tkkk…tkkk,' the small bits of hail struck at the outcropping at an annoying tempo. Mai battered hand quivered and she tucked it in at her side, while simultaneously willing the other to keep its firm tautness. The black spots came in and out of focus, as the sour taste of bile began to creep up at the back of her throat. She clenched her good hand to ease the discomfort, yet it only seemed to make it worse as her arm pulsed. Tensing her jaw, she used her good hand to flick an obsidian stiletto into her palm before raising her arm in preparation. Her steps were as silent and controlled as she could manage in the tempest. 'Breathe,' Mai told herself, as her Ao Dai flapped in the wind.

'Qrkk…qrkk,' Mai's ears perked up, and Azula paused midstep. 'That's not hail,' Mai immediately crouched low at the sound, as did her friend and the Flameguard around them, save for the Repurposed who lacked the same sense of cautious restraint. The winds whistled throughout the maze of wet-toothed rocks, yet to her, they seemed to grow almost silent as she concentrated on hearing anything that sounded even vaguely threatening. Azula placed her back against a tall rock and glanced around the edge. Mai followed suit and peered through the rocks situated at her position, only to be greeted by a twisted black maw of serrated stone fangs and no sign of the creature.

Azula released a small fireball down the maze of stone, revealing nothing. "Hmmm. Quni, Mai, hold position here. You," she glared at the Repurposed guard, "remain with them. You two with me," the normal Flameguard formed up and continued down the stretch of rocks, before disappearing.

She and Quni kept scanning the tangle of rocks, for what seemed like hours, while the Repurposed stood watch at their backs. A flash of lightning illuminated the black stones and for a brief instant, Mai saw a pale mist drifting along with the wind that thrashed through the rocky maze. "Did you see that?" she whispered to Quni and drew her hand tighter around the dragonglass stiletto.

"I did," he whispered back.

"Where in the blazes did it go?" Mai heard Harwin's voice echoing through the stone labyrinth.

"Over there!" Oberyn's voice answered somewhere on the opposite side of the outcropping.

Staring down the twisted mess of rocks, she had barely enough time to react when another flash of lightning lit up the blackness and found her staring at the creature's profile. Mai noticed its gaze fixed on something in the sky, and in the howling winds, she thought she heard a crow's call before it somehow sensed her and snapped its head in her direction. The Other tilted its ghastly visage in seeming recognition, staring at her good hand in a childlike manner, before howling its inhuman howl.

Mai shot out her hand and released an obsidian barb at the thing, only for the White Walker to twist its torso to one side and dodge the projectile which clattered uselessly and disappeared in the black tangle of rocks at its back, before suddenly bounding out of view like a cat. The black stone maw was silent a fleeting moment before the thing reappeared a few rocks nearer and hurled a chunk of stone at her. Mai scrambled back behind cover just in time to hear the stone crack against the edge of her rocky shield and brushing her injured side with a few chipped stones and causing pain to explode in her vision. She palmed another knife and turned the corner only to see the ghostly thing barreling down the shadowy darkness right at her, large frosted rock in hand, and twinkling blue eyes full of malice. She released the dagger by reflex, the ethereal creature having been far too close for comfort, and once more hit nothing but air. Mai withdrew, brandishing another dagger. 'Damnit! Four more left,' she cursed to herself, noting that Quni had begun pelting the creature with fire blasts. The Other appeared to pay the flames no mind, treating them as if they had been little more than puffs of smoke.

"Impossible!" Quni growled, frantically firing more and more at the charging ice demon.

The instant the creature cleared the rocks the Repurposed guard shot forward with its shield only for the Other to stop the charge dead in its tracks as the shield shattered upon impact. The ice wraith used the mass of earth in its hand to swat the large Flameguard away like a gnat, sending him careening nearly twenty feet in the air before landing in a heap closer to the shore, inadvertently sharpening the rock as pieces of it chipped off in the impact. Spending no time waxing on its accomplishment, it turned its baleful gaze back to her, ignoring Quni and his flames, as it continued its seemingly implacable advance. 'Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck,' her heart was pounding, the blood flow drumming in her ears, as annoying bits of hail continued pelting her without cessation.

"Here, creature!" Quni howled, frantically trying to get the Other's attention away from her and launching several blasts towards the fabled creature's head. To his credit, Mai noticed the twinkling blue eyes glance towards the lone fire bender before it cast the sharpened rock towards its. "Ahhh!" the lieutenant yelped and flew back as the heavy pointed stone lodged itself in his right shoulder.

Pressed for time and desperate to stop the creature before it came within range Mai only hoped the man yet lived and release her stiletto. The iceman tilted left and stretched its arm backward, causing her stomach to drop as she stared on in horror when it flashed the small obsidian knife. Gripped by its even smaller hilt, the Other presented a grisly frown before throwing the glassy black dagger right back. 'How,' was the only thought she could muster before she felt the dragonglass blade slice through her left side, followed by a warm wetness above her hip. "Ugh!" she grit her teeth, retreating as it continued its assault and raked its icy claws in the space she had previously stood. She could feel the cold presence of the Other, felt as it disturbed the air, and bucked her head back, sensing the terribly cold hand slice through where it had been, before palming another dagger. 'Three left,' she told herself. Skipping backward, she launched the thing from her fingers, and once more it dodged her throw, dipping its left shoulder downwards and letting the knife zip past. "Azula!" she screeched, surprising even herself at the outburst. Undaunted, the thing resumed battering down her resolve and pushing her back towards the rocks, slicing wildly through the air with its icy claws. It came up to her with terrible speed and she loosed another dagger only for it to narrowly miss the side of the creature's head. Frantically she fumbled for another knife and ducked, seeing as the thing stabbed its right hand into the rock behind her. When she looked up, bits of rock and ice scattered about her vision, followed by the thing wailing in pain, as it retrieved its own ruined hand.

'Ha! Fuck you!' she couldn't help but think, cursing Sandor Clegane's near six-year presence on Dragonstone and his vocabularic influence. In the brief respite, Mai locked eyes with the deathly visage towering above and steadied her hand, quickly producing another blade from underneath her sleeves. The iceman had been quicker though, and she winced when she felt the creature's frozen left-hand wrap around the one which held the dragonglass blade and squeeze.

"Ahhhh!" she screamed, simultaneously feeling the warmness of blood as it trickled down her arm, and the snapping of finger bones deforming around the blade's small hilt and piercing her skin. She kicked and tried beating the creature's hand away with her broken one, to no avail, and in her desperation, she felt tears threatening to run down her cheeks. 'No! I'm not ready yet!' she steeled herself, ignoring the protests of her aching body, and blinked away the tears. Mai felt a heavy frown mar her face, but the Other's cold grip slowly began to numb the pain and she eyed the thing's right knee, which had been hovering ever so closely to her left foot. Staring up, she saw the ghostly man raise its free, though ruined, hand, above its waist, displaying its broken fingers like blades. Mai narrowed her eyes and kicked as hard as she could to the exposed knee. To her, it felt like she had hit solid stone, but the crack that sounded had thankfully not been hers. The thing screeched and stumbled back, releasing its grip. For a moment, Mai felt a faint hope reignite in her chest before the creature regained its posture and snapped the knee back into place with a glacial roar. 'Fuck!' she rolled out from her prone position, ignoring the searing pain in her hands, and made for safety. A strong tug at the hem of her Ao Dai destroyed that plan and lifted her over the Other and into the air only to come slamming down into the wet sand. The impact knocked the wind out of her and she could only see through blurred vision as the thing charged her with its right arm clocked back to deliver the death blow.

'Khhchnt!' the sound of rattling armor sped past her, a flash of lightning illuminating the form of the Repurposed guard the creature had tossed aside only moments earlier. Large armored arms wrapped around the Other's waist, just as nearly three-hundred pounds of muscle, steel, and foul alchemy collided with the legendary creature in a deafening 'Clang!' The White Walker stumbled back a step, before planting its feet. The thing hissed and raised its left hand for what Mai assumed would be a hammer strike at the back of one of Qyburn's experiments. Taking the opportunity, she scurried away from beneath the clashing shadows, cradling both of her ruined hands. Looking back she saw as the former northern myth brought its hand down, smashing open the backplate of the Repurposed's armor, like glass. Mai heard a squelch as the thing dug its icy hand into the former man and ripped out his spinal column. Frozen drops of black blood formed an arc in the air before the mute Flameguard fell limply to the ground and moved no more. The monster stared at the body a moment, then shrieked, before it shifted its burning blue eyes to her and threw the bloodied vertebrae.

'Dammit, Azula, where the hell are you!?' She cursed and rolled away, expecting the spike of pain as her hands skidded along the sand before she came to a kneeling position before the Other, who had somehow crossed the distance. "Do your worst," she spat, surprised at its speed, but never one to show emotion.

"My lady!" she heard the voice of Eddard Stark sound off in the distance, as he, the Prince of Dorne and their respective retainers rounded the crags, all brandishing their assorted weapons. The Prince and one of his guards wielded spears, while the other held a scimitar. Harwin kept his longsword close, and of the various arms, chief amongst them was the smoky black blade of 'Scarred Brother.' The Valyrian steel weapon shimmered in the darkness as it was clasped firmly in the hands of the Warden of the North. Twin stars stared at them all, before coming to rest upon the Lord of Winterfell. Mai saw the thing mouth something, then tense, seemingly waiting for them to move. Unfortunately for the creature, lightning cracked first. The near blinding light revealed the barren shore and cast long shadows along the dark sand, but not before crashing into the exposed side of the Other's misty, unearthly form, with an earsplitting 'bang!'

"Mai!" Azula's voice broke the silence, sounding more like sheer divinity than mortal speech. Shielding her eyes from the flash of light, Mai caught the faintest of sights from beneath the hem of her sleeves as the explosion lifted the creature off its feet and hurled it backward, closer to the shore and away from the outcropping. A kaleidoscope of twinkling blue ice and impossibly bright white liquid exploded out, igniting the dreary beach in a brief, but otherworldly sort of beauty. It was short-lived, however, as Mai spotted the iceman land and roll with the blast, narrowly missing another lightning strike by Azula before leaping forward in a strange, yet oddly familiar sort of movement.

'Ty Lee?' the image of her long-dead friend performing something similar flashed in her head, as she stared at the creature with its half missing abdomen. Glowing, silvery strands lay bundled within the injury like muscle and despite the apparent handicap, the Other kept up its unnatural speed, dodging blasts of lightning from Azula's fingertips by the skin of its icicled teeth. 'It wants to get closer to Azula,' Mai surmised, watching as the thing tried closing the gap. However, the Fire Lord was not as receptive to a close-quarters engagement and thus kept the creature at bay with a constant bombardment of lightning strikes. 'But a point-blank hit should end it,' she continued, assessing the damage Azula had already incurred upon the thing while being frightfully aware of the danger should her friend misstep.

"Almost perfect isn't good enough!" she recalled the words Azula had shouted to an eight-year-old Ursa. Immediately after the memory, she could hear a three-year-old Ursa's voice happily cry, "Mama! Papa! I make fiya!" and the glimmer in Azula's eyes that soon followed.

'No. She wouldn't misstep,' Mai said to herself, wondering what Azula was playing at. 'Is she purposely keeping the fight going? Is the White Walker? Are they both? No, that can't be…' Gradually the thing was pushed back to the lapping waves, dodging every blast, yet unable to make headway, until Mai saw a dangerous glint come over its starry eyes.

"Keep its back towards the sea!" the Lord of Winterfell shouted, his man Harwin at his side. A flash of light illuminated the grim frown on the Viper's face before he tilted his head to the Lord of Winterfell. Together, the two Northmen positioned themselves opposite of the Martell and his men, while Azula took to the center with her two Flameguard.

Gradually, the group marched past her and came to form a crescent around the creature, while Azula continued unleashing a barrage of lightning. A knot formed in the pit of her stomach as the thing stole a look at her, past the advancing group, its twin stars dimming in the gloom. It glared at the Hand of the King and almost seemed to grin as it let out a blood-curdling shriek. A thick icy mist blasted out of its mouth in its fell roar, before it crouched down and launched itself towards the Eddard Stark. 'Azula's not going to be able to fire into the group without injuring them!' She saw in its hateful advance that its focus was on the Valyrian Steel blade in the quiet wolf's hands, and something in her mind clicked. "The blade, Lord Stark, it knows what it is!" she shouted, risking her own well-being and damning her sense of self-preservation, for she had seen that deadly focus before. Amidst the crashing waves, swirling winds, and plinking hail, she caught Lord Stark appearing to nod his head at her words. 'I hope he did. It recognized the obsidian, and now it somehow distinguished the Valyrian steel blade apart from the others.' Mai knew that its drive was ceaseless, inhuman, and having suffered from its predations, she expected its aim now was to disarm and kill the Warden of the North before using the others as cover to kill Azula, possibly with 'Nameless' itself.

Before she knew it, the creature made contact with the assortment of North and Dornishmen, and the Lord of Winterfell swept the blade in a forward, horizontal arc. The Other drew back, swinging a clawed hand in response to Eddard Stark's advance, but the grizzled Northman pressed forward with a speed she had not expected from the man. 'He's no Lee, but he is quick,' she noted. The creature hissed when it drew back, like a snake, when the Prince of Dorne and his spearman guard jutted their weapons forward in an attempt to force the thing into the Valyrian blade. Turning its attention to the Dornish spearman, it seized the head of the weapon and snatched it out of the man's grasp as easily as an adult would have from a child.

"Urgh," the Dornish guard coughed, as he stumbled forward with the sudden tug, only to be impaled on the creature's damaged hand. Blood streamed down the man's mouth and the creature's arm, as it lifted the now immobile form off the ground and tossed it towards the encroaching Northmen. Eddard Stark bore the brunt of the thrown man, collapsing beneath his weight, and dropping 'Nameless' by his feet in the fall.

"Dylar!" the Viper bellowed alongside his countryman, with the scimitar, both turning a deadly eye towards the monster and attacking in a frenzy. Oberyn pivoted the tip of his spear to and fro, which were deflected in kind, while the other man took up a position at his Prince's side to prevent the creature from closing too quickly. In the commotion, she realized the wound on the creature's side had begun to close as ice began growing over the exposed milky-white ligaments.

"What the hell?" she whispered, dumbstruck at the sight.

"My lord!" Harwin exclaimed immediately after, rushing to lift the corpse off of his liege lord, only to be mesmerized when the body began moving. A fell cry, not unlike the Other which harried them now, reverberated in her ears, and she saw the fallen Dornishman begin to strangle the Lord of Winterfell. In the struggle she noticed the dead thing kick out, thrusting 'Nameless' away from them, a dull 'thwang' hinting that it had hit somewhere in the bed of rocks surrounding the outcropping, though in the darkness she could not see precisely where.

'What's it doing?' Mai wondered, knowing that the creature could have just rushed the Dornishmen, if it so pleased, after having seen normal steel weapons break upon its skin like glass and its apparent rapid healing. She tracked its eyes, hard as they were to miss, and found them spying out into the darkness, in the direction which the Valyrian sword had been cast. 'The sword!' she scampered around the perimeter of the group on her elbows and knees, unintentionally keeping a low profile, due to her damaged hands. Thankfully, she realized the thing had not taken notice of her uncharacteristic crawling around in the sand. If the situation hadn't been so dire, Mai certainly expected Azula to be laughing.

"Help the Prince!" Azula shouted to her guards, shattering the wayward thought. The two scrambled at her words and moved to assist the Prince of Dorne while she maneuvered to support the Warden of the North. Lord Stark grabbed the deadman's wrists and pulled, while Harwin hooked his arms under the wight's shoulder and attempted the same to no discernable effect. For all of the pandemonium surrounding them, Azula might as well have strolled up to the wight as she cupped its face between her hands and burnt it to ash, leaving behind a smoking stump for a neck and a now truly lifeless body which the Hand of the King lifted and shoved off to the side.

The iceman wailed when the deadman was silenced, and as the duo of Flameguard rushed into flank the creature, it barreled right through them, ignoring the strikes of their weapons which fragmented just as she had expected. 'Oh no you don't!' she made a break for it, understanding now that 'Nameless' was its goal, though to wield it or prevent others from wielding it she knew not. Stifling the tinge of pain, she lifted herself and bolted in the general direction of the fallen weapon. Almost as if by design, lightning brightened the dark shadows, revealing the smoky black blade laying atop a pile of rocks near the mouth of the outcropping they had so painfully attempted to avoid returning to. 'The thing sees me now,' she knew, feeling the cold eyes upon her back and hoping against hope that someone was keeping it a bay. 'How are we going to get it?' she asked herself. 'I'll get it with my fucking teeth!' Once the blade was within reach she felt an explosion of pain within her chest, losing her breath instantly, she flew forward into the rocks, striking her head hard against the stone and producing nothing but stars in her vision.

"Mai!" she heard Azula cry.

'Why does it sound like she's underwater?' Blood trickled down her lips, at the thought, and in her stupor she looked down at her chest and saw a spearhead firmly lodged in the stone, keeping her in place. Beneath her dangling feet, she saw the Valyrian blade. 'Huh, there you are.' She tried lifting her arms to push herself off somehow but found herself lacking in strength. Turning her head suffered the same outcome, even as she heard several men crash upon the creature near her. She drifted her ever heavy eyes over to look and saw the Flameguard duo holding down the thing's left arm while the Dornish prince, his guard, and Harwin wrestled with its right. Strong hands seized her, prying the spearhead out of the rock, before lowering her to the ground and laying her upon her side. She wanted to scream at the pain, but her exhaustion had finally caught up and she felt a tiredness wash upon her. Mai still felt the foreign object embedded in her chest as she turned to face her savior, seeing the Lord of Winterfell looking down at her with a worried expression painted across his face. 'Why do you look like that? We don't even know each other.' Behind him, she saw the creature toss the men away only to be blocked by her friend. 'Azula. Kill it,' she frowned, a dull realization that her life was coming to an ignoble end. The Other swiped at her friend, finding nothing but air as the Fire Lord ducked and formed fire daggers. Catapulting forward, Azula stabbed at the creature's limbs, causing great plumes of steam to erupt from the wounds when she withdrew the burning blades. The Other flailed its hands trying to grab at its flighty prey and only achieving marginal success when it grabbed Azula's exposed, left forearm when she loosed a bolt of lightning. Both attacker and victim screamed as the point of contact hissed with blue vapor, the residual charge kicking back the iceman and leaving it dazed. Taking the opportunity, Azula charged up again and fired another blast of electricity into the creature's face, shattering it to pieces, its crystalline body following soon thereafter as it collapsed into shards. In the twilight of her vision, she saw Azula rushing up to her side before suddenly grabbing at her frostbitten arm and falling into the pile of sand and stone surrounding them. The last thing Mai saw was her friend's brilliant golden eyes flaring and full of tears before everything went black.