GLASS WOOD – THE NORTH

"Edd, the fuck you doing?"

"Aye?"

"With that shovel."

Edd examined his shovel with an air of confusion. There was nothing amiss with it or the snow. He was a fair enough distance from the camp – plenty of tree-like things around making a struggle out of life, still within sight of the fire. Nothing wrong with it at all. "What's it look like?" he barked back at his man. Boy. Under all those black rags and sunken cheeks he was only a few days into manhood. A doe in the pines, waiting a Lord's arrow... Edd lost heart just looking at him.

The young crow had a shovel, same as Edd's. "Shovellin' shit."

"Well done. You'll go far, you will." Edd set about his work, plunging the sharp edge of the spade into the virgin snow which had collected in sweeping, stagnant rivers – the ghostly children of Winter's wind. Edd liked to amuse himself in his work, pretending it were bone corpses below the blade and their heads rolling away. He struck at it hard. That's what he was going to do to them dead fucks.

Their petty camp was a freezing oddity. No one ranged beyond the Wall any more. All the gates were closed. The locks had been welded and the hinges too. Edd and his party trekked beside the beastly front of ice, travelling toward the Nightfort. If the walkers were coming, they were going to need use of that big black gate and all its magic. 'Go to the fort,' Snow has said. So here they were, with Thorne's grace, picking through the frozen world, quiet as foxes. Hell, old cunt probably wished them to die but Edd had other plans. He was going to spite the gods, old and new. Edd was going to live.

The Wall cast a shadow over them. It stole the afternoon light making the days short. A wind came off the top, caught by its enormous structure and tunnelled down as if from an ocean. It created unnatural snowdrifts behind the last pines, huge cleaves of ice that had fallen from the Wall and abandoned buildings. Any man foolish enough to fall in one vanished to their waist and had to be dug out. Everything about the land was set on murder – first chance it got.

Edd gave the Wall a reverent nod. Imagining what was beyond that boundary of ice and knowing for sure were two very different things. The brothers fresh from Castle Black loitered around its buttress during the morning light, chucking stones and plucking winter roses from the unstable facade. Edd forbade them. 'Tempt the gods on your own watch,' he'd say, 'not in the company of my men.' The gods must be drunk if he had men in his charge.

"That's low work, that is." The young crow replied, watching Edd hack away at the snow. "I'll do it. Sit with them men there an' rest. They like your stories. Bit o' fear, keep 'em true."

"You can join me instead." Edd thrust the shovel back into the ground. "Always shovel your own shit. Low. High. Everyone's responsible for their shit. You think a Lord's arse smells any better than ours? 'course it bloody doesn't. We're all the same, ain't we? Fodder for the wolves. Or worse."

"You mean them wights?"

"Yes boy, I mean the dead. I'd tell you to pray that you never see them but even the gods know they're coming. Doubt they'll knock politely on that there pretty wall of ours."

"Why the Nightfort? Isn' it empty an' all?"

"It is. Thorne says we are to send men there soon."

"Men from where? The realm's at war. There are no men that ain' fighting for their 'ouse or stealin' from what's left."

"It's not for us to worry about the men. You worry about your shit."

A silence passed between them. The Glass Wood was an uncomfortable place. In truth it was two forests, one new with tall, narrow saplings and the other ancient. In ages lost, ten thousand years ago, a storm ran over the land without a wall to stop it. Its air froze those pines solid – buried them in an instant and left them silent in an ice prison. When the summers came and the snow receded, their corpses emerged. Now they stood between the living wood as broken ghosts shattering at the touch of a raven's wing.

"S'it always so quiet?"

"What? Yes. Winter is quiet. So should you fucking be." Edd sighed when he saw the boy dismayed. "Where you from then? It's an odd tone your words 'ave."

"These aren' my first words." He pointed the shovel at himself. "Dornish."

"From the fucking desert – sand and such?"

"Not all of Dorne is sand. I live in the mountains, high up, sea below – hollow kings on the other side."

"What's a Dornish boy doing at the miserable Wall? You murder a Lord or summthin'?"

"No, watched it 'appen. Men in gold coats. Came in the night, they did. Up the mountain path, set fire to our watch. Our buildings ain' like yours, all stone an' rock. We build from wood. It burned all night – my home, the forest too. Sisters, brothers, parents – murdered by the men. I woke up in a garden of ash. Twelve years on, Wall. Better here. Less fire."

"Name?"

The boy shrugged. "Don' remember my name. Man at the Watch signed me as Cub."

Edd blinked slowly in astonishment. Someone had a sense of bloody humour. That's the last thing they needed. Seven hells and all the rest. "I ain't calling you 'Cub'."

"I don' mind it," Cub insisted. "When I live out the Winter, you can change it. Cubs grow into many things. Who can say wha'?"

"Grow into a pine tree for all the good it'll do ya. I'd rather toss my body over the Wall than endure more half-wit philosophy. Back to work. Dragon's arse!" Edd shook his hand violently, grimacing. His naked skin had stuck to a nail, frozen well and good until it tore his flesh clean off. By the time his blood hit the slow, it was ice."

"Said I so, should use them gloves as we was told."

Edd would have beat the little shit to death himself except he had a point. "Shovel yer shit, yeah?"


THE SKIES ABOVE YI TI

A whole day on dragon-back passed. It was rough riding, with the sun bearing down. Jorah and the queen draped cloaks over their heads while the wind did its best to rip them away.

The burned lands of the South had been replaced by dense forests, clinging to brutal cliffs like those they'd seen at the far end of the world. A few hours ago those had given way to more sand, ochre this time with red stains where rivers once flowed. Long dead. A new range of mountains thrust out of the mess. They were unmistakably red – a hue that deepened to the colour of cheap wine as the sun failed. These were the Mountains of the Morn, the first peaks to find the sun. The Yi Ti worshipped them as the gateway to the world of death and surely they were right. Beyond them was sorrow and terror. Land dragons feared to tread.

"Braavos is not this way." The queen's words were closer to a question.

"It is not." His cloak tried to escape again. Jorah renewed his grip. Only his eyes were visible between the folds of black fabric. Daenerys was the same aside from a few stray strands of silver hair.

"Our lives are in the clutch of a dragon," Jorah added, running his hand over its scales. Some were larger than the spread of his hands. They resembled cooled lava, cracked but smooth.

"Why do you eye our right flank with such disdain, Ser? I see the way you shun the mountains. They cannot be worse than what we have faced."

She was right. His steel eyes often lingered on those bloody peaks. "I do not mind Drogon heading North but should he decide to dip beyond that range we'll find ourselves at the mercy of half-creatures, murders and gods-know-not-what. That way is death."

"They are beautiful though, don't you think?"

The mountains' gory colour had shifted to pink. Their snow was gold. Made from quartz, their many broken faces sparkled oddly at the sunset. "All the same, we're best to stay as far away from them as we can."

Drogon had a different view. Dragons were the lovers of mountains. They played in the shadow of their cliffs, made nests in the screaming caverns and beat their huge wings against the fierce winds that tore through their valleys.

"Drogon – no!" Daenerys shouted at her child, as the huge body tilted beneath them.

To no effect.

Drogon turned, fell and darted like a fish until they were close enough to the cliffs to see ancient flows of ice locked by folds of rock. Glaciers flowed until they crumbled onto the desert where deep blue pools of water formed oases.

Jorah pushed her flat against the dragon. His arms stretched either side of her, gripping feverishly at dwarfed horns as Drogon banked sharply, suddenly perpendicular to the ground. He could hear the sound of wind against the granite cliffs. Its bitter surface was inches from them when Jorah's hold slipped. They slid across the dragon's back, hundreds of feet in the air, heading towards the inevitable fall.

His boots struggled for purchase. They found it leaving Jorah standing on the dragon's spines, using them like the rungs of a ladder. Dany screamed again. Her defiant grip and Jorah's chest were her only barrier to death. "Drogon! Drogon!"

The creature had forgot they were aboard. After the arduous journey the temptation of play was too much.

Drogon's wing clipped the rock, throwing a cloud of dirt over his riders. When the cliff ended in a ravine, the dragon banked in the opposite direction. Ill positioned, Dany and Jorah tumbled between the beast's shoulders leaving the queen tangled in his spines, reclining dangerously between the run of horns down Drogon's back and the curved defensive protrusions above the wings.

Jorah, heavier and with further to fall, rolled straight over the queen, grabbed unsuccessfully at the dragon and then met the air. The queen twisted, reaching instinctively for him. Her hands found his arm. Skin slid against leather. Caught. Gripped tight. For a moment she had him... Then his weight tested her hold and broke it immediately.

Jorah was gone.


WINTERFELL RUINS – THE NORTH

Jon Stark's army was exactly as Littlefinger had pictured.

A muck of Wildlings filled the number. Their image of terror was disappointing although in fairness he had to concede that the worst of the Freefolk were already dead. He'd half expected a mangy pack of children in tow but instead they presented with a giant, nine feet above the tallest man. A strange thing, a giant. It was intrinsically awkward – like a boy king. All the pieces were there, a crown, a throne, the words – those things did not make a king. It was the same with the giant. Indeed, he was a formidable beast but not a mythical fury from the legends. Shame. Perhaps the Wall was a garden path and Winter naught but a light snow...

"Your brother's army arrives in good time," Littlefinger nudged his horse so that it walked up beside the queen's. He'd deliberately chosen a shorter beast so that when seated, Sansa towered over him. She did so now, her silver fur trim curving around her neck and tumbling across her shoulder. It made her hair a deeper shade of blood. In all regards, the Stark was dangerous.

"How far away are the Boltons?" she asked.

"Two days. I have heard whispers of their army passing the Grey Bridge. Ramsey caught wind of Snow's army riding to your aid. I made quite sure he knew their number and unique origin." Behind Littlefinger, the real army shifted. More soldiers arrived from the Vale every hour, pouring out from the woods. Their camp was a city, three times what the Boltons could muster. The battle had to begin soon. Logistics was the art behind war. An army needed feeding and with Winterfell a ruin and its grain stores burned, the men would start to starve inside the week.

"That would have amused him."

The peace was aggravated by hammering. Behind, on the rise of snow across the front of the Godwood, Sansa had the men erecting a cross – symbol of the Bolton house. All it needed was a skinless man. Littlefinger glanced at it, careful never to pay it too much mind. While Sansa's lust for vengeance was promising, her methods were as frightening as any Northern Lord. Her father never would have given leave to such indulgence. Ned Stark was a man of justice. Sansa was closer to her mother. The women of the river embraced terror. Littlefinger admired that about her even though he understood the limitations of the emotion.

"All the Boltons must die and those that support them," she hissed at the wind.

"The Boltons, yes. To the other houses you should show mercy. When you are done warring the North has to survive. If we kill all our enemies, their problems become yours."

His advice tasted bitter so Sansa dug her heels into the horse and trotted out to meet her brother.


"So... What do you think?" Podrick's horse shuffled about. He had named it 'Traitor' after it ran off several times to feed in the wood. Hell it was barely tame and he, a sub-par horseman, was a passenger.

Brienne's beast had the countenance of a statue. Its only movement was the rustle of wind through a thick, tangled mane. "I dislike him. A man does not come from nothing to sit at the head of an army like that without some wickedness."

"Indeed you have a point. Tyrion spoke oft of him in King's Landing and I met him more than once. He's a dangerous man but he also has an uncommon interest in Queen Sansa's survival – beyond all reason, far as I can tell but what I actually meant was, 'what do you think of Snow's army?' We rode up here to have a look."

Brienne briefly shifted her gaze to the assortment of woeful creatures lining the opposing ridge. They'd begun their descent toward Winterfell, spilling out in undisciplined form. "I wonder at why the North could not defeat the Wildlings, all these hundreds of years."

Podrick shrugged. "I guess it was more of a part time war than an actual one." His horse leaned over, nipping at Brienne's despite his objections. "Unruly beast!" he complained. "That's the bastard then," he added, as Jon Snow rode toward Sansa. "Think he really died out there?"

"His enemies do not debate it."

"Think I preferred King's Landing."

"No, you do not," Brienne assured him.

Podrick thought about that for a little while before finally agreeing. "No, I don't."


MOUNTAINS OF THE MORN – YI TI

Daenerys peered over the edge of Drogon's body. Of course there was nothing to see but sand. They'd flown well past where Jorah fell in the few moments she'd spent in shocked silence. The queen searched the barren landscape all the same. She wasn't sure what she hoped to find. A body? A tiny imperfection on the flank of a mountain? Impossible. Quaithe had promised. He could not be dead. The gods forbade it.

"Jorah...?" she whispered, with no expectation of hope.

A bear grumbled below.

Daenerys crawled closer to the edge of Drogon's wing but there was nothing save a harsh rush of air which pushed her back. She blinked away sharp grit from her eyes. "Where are you?"

Jorah dangled from Drogon's paw, easily caught by the creature, mid fall. The dragon seemed to think this was all a wonderful game. "Great big ugly paw!" Jorah yelled, though it was near inaudible. The roar of wind and flap of wings drowned their voices out.

Resigned to his fate of uncomfortable travel, Jorah relaxed, reaching up to wrap his arm around Drogon's ankle. The view was incredible. It wasn't only the mountains to their right, rearing up out of the wasteland – there was an ominous line of buildings approaching. They were great, black mounds of pure vile that looked like they had been ripped out of Asshai and hammered into the sand against their will. Their enormity was staggering. The closest one stood beside the mountain range as a brother, seven-hundred feet of pure malice. It refused the colours of the sunset.

Although he had heard stories of these structures none of the tales mentioned the obvious – that a wall of ice had stretched from the Mountains of Morn, across the front of the Five Forts and ended in the Bleeding Sea. Even from this distance, Jorah could see the unmistakable scars left in the land by the ice. At some point Essos had an ice wall, glaciers and snow fields exactly like the North. Now it was gone leaving the land a devastated graveyard.

The light was dying fast, vanishing far off in the West many seas away. Moments later the mountains were dull. Their shadows had been replaced by a general darkness and the moon, now with a piece slashed out of its side, struggled behind a low-riding bank of clouds, stuck to the curve of the world.

Hours dragged on by before Drogon changed his flight, preparing to land. The dragon circled around one of the forts, edging gently toward the ragged top. Both Jorah and Dany were asleep, lulled away into oblivion. Neither of them noticed Drogon touch down softly. He opened his paw, laying Jorah on the oily stone.


Jorah woke on his back to a bed of stars. Foolishly, he smiled at them, forgetting where he was. The scratch of claws on stone. A faint trail of smoke wafting by. Drogon. Daenerys.

He rolled over onto his knees, Snowflake scratching against the ground. Starlight did its best to light the black fort but it was more or less a construct of shadow with faint impressions of walls surrounding him on all sides. Beyond that, nothing at all. He found a sleeping dragon opposite, breathing steadily accompanied by a silver mist of smoke. They were so high that the cold air kept the smoke at their feet, pushing it down against the stone.

"Daenerys?" Jorah hissed. He stood, approaching the dragon carefully so as not to startle it. The queen was no longer on its back.

Her voice came from one of the walls. Daenerys lingered, looking down upon the valley as though it were part of her dominion. "Over here. Who do you think they are?" she asked, when he came to stand beside her.

Far below, where the sands of Yi Ti met the fortress walls, several hundred thousand people had gathered in a sea. They stopped at the invisible boundary between the fortresses but spread far back into the rise of the dunes. Their numerous, tiny camp fires lit up the ground as a second expanse of stars. Jorah had never seen so many gathered in one place outside of a city. It was a city in itself – one without walls.

"Horselords of the Jogos Nai perhaps – similar to the Dothraki," he explained. "Only short, thick and fierce with striped horses. Their temper is rumoured to be as ill as their masteres. They fight with the civilised cultures of the East. Best avoided. We should stay quiet – sleep and leave before they notice Drogon."

"You think these Jogos Nai would hunt a dragon?"

"They might."

Drogon was enormous, well on his way to becoming one of the largest dragons known but he appeared as a cat curled up in the corner, such was the colossal scale of the fort.

"What are they doing here? There is nothing but sand and murderers, you said so."

"I could not guess. Maybe they were chased here by something."

"Or they're waiting for it to come out of the mountains."

"Either way, your Grace, we are sitting above the unknown." The queen looked again. The crowd was split – distinct lines running between the camps. "No." Jorah murmured.

"I did not say anything," Daenerys defended.

"You were thinking it very loudly."

"An army of that size-"

"-would have us tied to a spit before the sun. This far out, titles and great names mean nothing. Drogon might be formidable but not even he could save you from that many hungry mouths."

"I survived the Dothraki."

"You married a khal and spoke their language."

"I survived the Slavers."

"You conquered them briefly."

"They will have food and water – both of which we need if we want to survive. There is nothing up here to live on. Would you have us die here instead?"

Jorah sighed. When the queen had a mind about something there was nothing to be done about changing it. "For the sake or argument, let's imagine that we can wander over to this lawless hoard in the desert for a chat – how are we to get down there? We have no torches to risk the descent inside the fort. The dragon is asleep. Why are you smiling?"

"Ever you look, Ser yet do not see."

When he did, his answer was the same as before. A very firm, 'No...'


NIGHTFORT – THE NORTH

"Fuck the gods..." Edd, knee deep in soft snow, stopped at the ugly construct of stone grown out of the ice. The Nightfort was a creation – like a ghoul, vast and in a permanent state of collapse. Outbursts of white tree roots surged from the oldest stone and gripped at the blue ice. Perhaps it grew through the Wall, as Sam had read in those useless scraps of parchment.

"Castle Black could fit in there a dozen bloody times an' still 'ave room for a castle," one of the men added.

"Going to need a thousand men just ter-get it lit up," Cub stopped beside Edd. "Thousand more to man the top. Thirty-thousand more to patrol tha' Wall."

"Let's hope half the realm is commin' then," Edd replied.

Edd strode out in front, ploughing his way toward the castle. He could hear wind howl through the open windows, playing a mournful tune as though it were an instrument. A moment later, he realised no one had followed. The sorry group of men, half sunk in snow, refused to approach the old ruin.

"You ladies waiting for an invitation then, or what? Don' look at the castle, look at me. You think them old black walls are haunted? That spirits lurk in the vaults beneath the keep? The Night's King and his demon bride sit on thrones in the keep? That what you heard? I heard it too. I know what I seen though. Believe me, hatchlings – the dead are coming. The king and all his army. His bitch-queen. They are on the other side of that fucking wall. Now get into that bleedin' wreck of a castle before I paint the walls red. That's better."

A crow watched, perched on one of the desolate walls. It titled its head as the men pushed through a broken fence, squeezing between the bars. Beside the Nightfort there was a zigzagging staircase cut directly into the Wall. The three-eyed crow kept to its morbid perch until the men of the Night's Watch vanished into the fort.

The crow climbed steeply, clearing the pines then the Wall. On the other side the Haunted Forest was set back from the Wall, held at bay by the shadow it cast. The forest needed light to grow. In the void, figures had assembled. There were only a few, scattered at random – some at the forest edge, others pressed against the ice. They swayed with the wind – dead as the night, bones white as snow, eyes blue like the roses. Waiting.


There were no doors, Edd noticed, the wood had either burned into a smear of ash or fallen flat against the Winter winds. Snow filled the void, clawing into the Nightfort until it became a dangerous veneer of ice which his boots fought against.

"Think we ought get some wood – light them fires," Edd ordered, as they picked one of the outer buildings to make their camp in. A few hours work with the shovels had the snow banished. The fire melted the ice from the walls. A bit of attention and the small room was almost homely.

"Meat's still good, I'd say," Cub wandered beside a line of rabbits, skinned, gutted and hung on hooks. They were frozen solid and left when the castle was abandoned. The place gave him the creeps. It was full of relics, as if the last men to occupy it had simply vanished with the night.

"Maybe," Edd agreed. "Get that bastard Geriim to check. "Cunt thinks himself a chef."

"Yes, boss."

"An' I want the others makin' torches, you here? Few hours rest, then we head into the main castle." Another flurry of snow spiralled in, hitting Edd in the face. "Find a door while you're at it. Any ol' thing'll do."


FIVE FORTS – YI TI

Daenerys could feel her knight's disapproval. Spiralling around the outside wall of the fort was a perilous staircase wide enough for one soldier to climb. There were holes in the steps and wall which Daenerys clung at. Thousands of years ago they were the foundations for a wooden frame that protected climbers from both attack and the fall. That was gone, rotted away like the ice.

Neither of them spoke. It was too dangerous to break their concentration for even a moment. With a strong wind and the ever-present pull of the abyss below, they faced the wall and held onto any nook they could find with both hands. As they descended, the noise of the camp reached them.

Exhausted, Daenerys lowered her body, sitting on the endless steps with a view of the valley hoard. She rubbed her paining arms as Jorah sat beside her.

"Are you having seconds thoughts?" he asked. "We could always go back. It is not too late."

She shook her head. "It is not that. You see there," she pointed to the distinct lines between the camps. "This isn't one group of people."

"Forgive me but that seems unlikely. Everyone one is at war with everybody else in these parts. The empire has been fractured for many hundreds of years. They'd sooner kill each other than clog together in one camp."

"That may be so but I know camps. It was the same with the Dothraki when you and Daario came for me. See over there – the larger fire." The flame from it bit at the base of their tower, near where the stairs ended. "Whoever they are, their leaders are assembled at our feet."

"Have you thought of what you will say to them – if we can say anything at all?"

"I know what I will say," Daenerys replied.

There was no fear in her tone, as though she knew something that Jorah did not. It made him suspicious but he did not question her. She was his queen. "As you like." Then she was up again, descending toward the camp.


Eventually they were spotted. Jorah glanced over his shoulder to see a group assembling at the foot of the fort. Their number grew. They threw wood on the fire, building it up into a roaring sun. The warmth against their back was almost worth the death that surely awaited.

Daenerys paused a few steps from the base. She let go of the wall and turned to face the camp fire.

The hoard was organised. Their tents were substantial and their form structured, almost like streets. The fires were carefully placed to keep the entire camp lit. Jorah was correct, there were strange, brutish dwarfs with striped mules lingering nearby but they were not the only men in the camp. Others were tall, pale and willowy with black hair to their knees and almond shaped eyes. The man Daenerys assumed to be their leader was different again. He was average in height but lean, with olive skin and green eyes. There were gold braces strapped to his arms and ornately patterned silk around his waist.

Daenerys stepped onto the sand.

Jorah was a few feet behind. He was scanning the men around the fire – sizing each one up. They were laden with weapons, fit and naturally aggressive. Six he could take, eight maybe. There were more than fifty within easy reach. He kept his hands clearly at his side so that they could see he harboured no ill will.

The man with the golden jewellery led the approach. Barefoot, he wandered across the warm sand around the fire and stopped in front of the two figures that had climbed down from the forts. He started to speak, pointing between the figures and the fort.

"Jorah?" Daenerys whispered.

"Sounds like Yitish," he replied, standing beside her now – hands still raised. "I heard it sometimes on the docks. Traders speak it."

"Can you?"

"Barely..." Jorah cleared his throat then tried, "Morning!" No doubt it was the wrong greeting but it was one of the few words shouted across ship decks. The man stopped speaking for a moment. This time when he spoke, his tone was calmer. It was clearly a question even though Jorah could not understand it. Instead he asked the same thing in both Common Tongue and Valyrian.

"Valyrian will do," the man replied. "Did you come from beyond those mountains? These men around me are simple peoples, they think you are sorcerers. They say I should throw your pieces on the fire before you curse us."

"There is no need. We have travelled from the Shadow but we are not from there," Jorah assured him, lightening his tone. "I am a knight from Westeros."

"What part?"

"North. Tiny speck of a place called Bear Island." Surprisingly, there was recognition in the man's face. Common desert dwellers were not familiar with Westeros.

"Then you, ser, are a long way from home. Westerosi come to the East to die. The woman, there – wife or slave?"

Jorah was too stunned to reply. Daenerys was not. She lowered the vile hood from her robes, letting her silver hair spill free. Her unusual eyes caught the firelight as she stepped uncomfortably close to its heat. The men watched, unsure of what to make of her.

"He is my knight," she replied.

"And what are you?" The man tilted his head, looking around the fire at her. The flames seemed to dance in her eyes. "A lady of this Bear Island?"

Daenerys allowed a smile to curl her pink lips. "I am no lady," she assured the man.

Jorah knelt in the sand beside Daenerys. "You address the Queen."