THE SUNSET SEA
Daenerys awoke to an ocean mist thickening around her dragon's wings. The milky light of morning made a layer of dew shimmeracross his scales like watery stars, fading as Drogon turned into the wind. Droplets raced along his spines, breaking free at their sharp tips and took flight into the unknown waters below. Some struck her face until she lay against the warm body seated behind. Her knight's arms wrapped around her waist in sleep as if afraid she might slip away during the night, stolen by the moon. Jorah rested peacefully on the leather coverings of the saddle while the furs gifted by the Jogos Nhai were as black as their dragon. Daenerys reached up to his face, gently laying the back of her hand on his cheek where the pale ghost of a scar ran along his bone, earned in the fighting pits of Meereen in search of her forgiveness. He looked young, dreaming of home. She envied his repose. When she closed her eyes the gods sent nothing but warnings of the future – cursed truths of the past and every painful lesson in between. A dragon's dreams were soaked in blood then set alight.
"Your Grace?" his voice croaked, awakened by her touch.
Her hand fell away. "We're over the water," she answered.
Jorah opened his eyes, momentarily embarrassed to find his arms around the queen. He went to untangle himself but she stopped him. Even now, grazing the clouds, she was warm. "I did not mean to sleep so long." Rising up on either side were the curved peaks of fog, lifting as the air gradually warmed. Where it tore apart he caught glimpses of a deep grey sea, calm as glass. Fragments of ice bobbed on the surface, drifting South. "This doesn't look like the Shivering Sea..."
"How can you tell?"
"If we looked upon that writhing mess, you would know. It is a violent body of water, constantly whipped up by the Northern winds, mostly frozen and capped with white peaks where the waves crash together leaving a salty foam. This is calm – lulling against the edge of the world. Almost looks like..." Jorah frowned, leaning closer until the saddle groaned. "It could not be the Sunset Sea," he whispered. The more he looked, the more obvious it became. He'd felt these fogs wrap around his home, cover the island in a white blanket for days. He'd been here only moments before, dreaming of its golden waves and the tiny outcrop of land at the edge, propelled from the depths. "Drogon's flown East – so far East he's found the Western shore."
As if hearing his words, Drogon dipped a wing, curving elegantly into the layers of fog. The world became white. The sky above vanished. They covered their faces as a shower of water condensed on their skin until Drogon broke free, soaring under the fog. The sea beneath was starting to turn with the sun. Flickers of gold caught its edges and a single, distant ship cast a long shadow. An endless rise of chalk cliffs greeted the water on the Eastern shore, pink against the waves.
"I don't understand," Daenerys said, entranced by the softness of the world. "Where are we going?"
"Home..." Jorah looked warily toward the North, past the curve of the stony land and beyond.
Theon paced the deck of the fishing vessel. Old but loved, it creaked against water, trawling nets through the depths where brightly coloured fish schooled from its grasp. He'd been watching an iceberg meander by, glistening like a spectre in the morning light. As they drew closer, Theon awed at its immensity. It was the size of a castle, bobbing silently in the water. Dozens of lazy gulls perched on the top flank, heads tucked back into their feathers while a brown-nosed seal rolled over, wondering it was worth the effort to catch one Sometimes the ice drifts made it as far as Pyke but by then the warm currents had broken them apart into tiny fragments that washed up on the shore, tossed about by Ironborn children.
His gaze wandered up to an enormous ocean eagle, slipping through the fog. It was a long way off, playing in the wind but... Theon tilted his head. The bird appeared to have a tail, as long as its body, dragging in the wind behind. It was an odd sort of a thing, mostly black but with red wings when it banked into the sun, heading further North.
WINTERFELL RUINS – THE NORTH
The wolf licked tentatively at the sour flesh, rasping layers of blood away before sinking its fangs into the corpse's lip, tearing it. Ramsay's body had been left to rot, twitching with a banner pole erupted through his thigh. Bathed in blood, the mud around him froze as the sun vanished. Ice settled, painting the battlefield white. Soldiers of the Vale wandered from pyre to pyre, pouring fresh oil on the bodies that refused to burn. Those that did lit up the night and brought all manner of creature out of the forest to bask in the warmth. Wolves howled, pacing at the edges of the Godwood. Crows tugged scraps of meat from the fire. Wanderers, displaced by the wars of the North fleeced the dead men of their worldly goods.
'Burn them all...' Jon Stark had said, staring haunted at the piles of dead men. He remained on the highest wall of Winterfell with Davros at his side while the Red Woman walked between flames, purring at them as if they were her children.
Sansa stood alone in the royal tent. Her clothes displayed a river of Ramsay's blood, fanning out from her waist into a delta that soaked all the way to the hem. She clutched the knife, turning it over and over with equally red hands. He is dead. A whisper from her lips as the blade flipped. He is dead. Over again. Her reflection caught on the surface. Sansa was caught by her own eyes. They were cold – set in the steel. The eyes of her mother.
A tear touched the blade, sliding along its edge until it formed a scarlet droplet at the tip. Another shattered on the surface. Her body trembled but she kept hold of the knife. She thought of Ramsay's throat – how easily the flesh peeled away and all the madness of his soul spilled over the stones of Winterfell. All the politics in the world could not solve what violence had taken. There was a brutal truth to war. The last frontier of hope.
"Do not cry..." The voice slipped into the tent before the man.
Petyr Baelish was alone, unarmed and unusually cautious in his approach. He folded the tent closed then turned, taking in the silhouette of the North's new queen. It was official, as the rebel houses bent the knee to her in the mud with banners flapping against the collapsed buildings. Jon Snow may style himself 'King' but he was a warrior not a commander – leader of the armies but not of men's hearts. The true ruler stood before him, steeped in blood.
"I am sorry about your brother. He has been laid to rest in an undamaged part of the crypt."
Sansa kept hold of the dagger and left her tears where they were, growing cold against her cheek. "I do not cry for Rickon," she replied, voice steady. "He is free. As am I."
"Tears of happiness," he realised. Ah yes, he could see the strength in her. The immensity of it shook her bones. She bid him come closer and he obeyed, willingly led. As Petyr approached, Sansa reached forward, trailing her hand from his neck – lingering on the mockingbird pin before roaming down the line of silver buttons on his cloak. Dropping his guard, Petyr's gaze followed the progress of her pale fingers and entirely missed the blade coming for his neck. Sansa gripped his cloak, dragging him sharply towards her as her bloody knife pressed against his skin. He lifted his hands – startled. "Sansa...?"
"Did you believe me ignorant of your true nature?" He voice caressed the air, sliding under the perfumed lamp oil.
Petyr felt the warmth of her skin and smelled the faint trace of winter roses, clinging to her hair. If it weren't for the sharp edge of her blade, he'd take her in his arms. He did not dare insult her with a denial. "How long have you known?" he asked instead, offering no resistance.
"A little bird whispered it to Lysa. My aunt delighted in sharing the depths of your depravity with me."
Varys... Petyr realised. Even vanished off the edge of the world he rammed swords through Petyr's chest, firing arrows blindly into the field. The eunuch had the most exceptional talent for destruction. "The moment your father accepted Robert's offer he was a dead man. King's Landing is a viper pit and he charged in, seeking justice against very powerful people. As Your Grace knows, blind honour leads to death." The blade pressed a fraction harder. "Eddard Stark was nothing like you."
"That may be so, Lord Baelish but that did not give you the right to push him toward the fall. Was that a demand of your ambition or jealousy?"
He stepped closer in defiance of her rage. "Both, I imagine." One of Petyr's hands lowered, brushing down through Sansa's hair and onto her arm. She held steady – eyes full of hate and something else. Petyr laid a dangerous wager on what that something might be. Why else was he alive? Sansa could have killed him many times since the Vale but she kept him, for what, he wondered...
"You have my army," Petyr promised. "I ordered them to follow your command should anything unforeseen happen to me..." He let that settle with her. "Take your revenge. Seize the Vale – murdering that weak boy would be a moment's work. You'll be Queen of the North amassing land in the South. With your mother's name you could take swathes of territory from far worse men than me." He'd drifted closer, his other hand skimming along the arm that held the blade – moving up to trace the delicate edge of her cheek where a tear had left a scar of blood. She was fierce and Petyr had no wish to see her tamed. Let her kill me, he thought, if that be her will – but first... "If it is power you want, Sansa," his voice was almost a purr, "then take it..."
"What do you want...?" she turned the question on him. He was impossibly close, his touch burning against her face. Sansa felt herself lean slightly towards his gloved hand and the tenderness there. She recognised his contradiction – the impasse in his soul. It was mirrored in hers.
"I thought you knew what I wanted." He leaned closer, ignoring the knife. Petyr allowed her to decide, lingering close enough to touch, eyes heavy with something deeper than lust.
"Neither of us can have what we want," Sansa cautioned, barely a breath on his lips before she closed the distance. Her desire to murder blurred with the taste of his lips. He was the first man to kiss her, a lifetime ago in the snow. His kiss was fearful, trembling at her touch. A smart man would have left her to die in the midst of battle and take the North for himself but he didn't. He came for her, claimed victory and then relinquished it to her whim. Bolder, she felt his lips part, nervous – immeasurably more afraid of her kiss than her blade. Sansa's free hand slid into his hair, dragging him closer as they met in the murky waters of their desire.
Petyr pulled away sharply, blood running down his neck where her blade broke the skin. It was Sansa's hand that snaked over his naked flesh, pressing into the wound to staunch the flow. Then, she leaned to steal his lips again, wrapping her arm around his shoulder in either surrender or victory. Neither of them knew any more.
"You cannot marry me," she nudged his cheek with her nose. "I lose the North and you lose the Vale. You have brought the soldiers here but not their masters – those men lurk in the mountains with their boy lord." Her eyes found his. "By your own reasoning, I must marry Robin Arryn. A puppet too young to rule either."
"Until he grows..." He barely found the breath to reply.
"If he grows." Sansa guided Petyr's hand to rest at his neck while she moved away to a table, taking a length of bandage. She returned but he kept her at arm's reach, wary of both the wolf and of his own emotions.
"I'd rather die here than watch you marry another. You are not an object to be bartered between lords any more. Sansa, you are a Stark, rightful heir. Marry no one."
"Without the Vale's army-"
"Leave the Vale to me. You are wrong," he added, lowering the barrier he'd placed between them. "I don't want to marry you – I want to serve you, my queen." Petyr sank slowly to his knees, lifting his head to look upon her. She was a queen, perhaps the first person he'd ever thought to honour. "And to love you."
Sansa shook her head at his declaration. The waver in his voice and the depth of gaze told her his affection would not die away. "Impossible..."
"Why?"
"Reasons too numerous to count."
Petyr was not deterred. "Everything can be tallied," he replied, returning to his feet. He collected the knife, offering it to her. "Even the stars – if one has the patience."
KING'S LANDING – WESTEROS
The tiny slip of parchment tumbled from her hand until it scratched against the cold stone, rolling around in the drafts. Her raven hopped across the sill, ruffling its feathers while the city slept behind. Cersei Lannister trampled the message beneath her bare feet as she joined the raven, stroking the creature with a hand that could just as easily crush the life from its pitiful neck.
Although her power had been dismantled, the view remained the same. There were still trade vessels moored along the walls, bonfires in Fleabottom and the hourly chime of the clock tower. It was due any minute, signalling another wasted day. Imprisoned, alone and cornered, she'd like nothing better than to rip that bell down and shove it deep into the High Sparrow's throat. Let him choke on time. Gag at her violence. Lack of opportunity was the only thing keeping the Sparrow afloat.
Cersei felt a flicker of pride for that bitch-wolf in the North. The days of Starks kneeling to Lannisters were long gone, killed the moment Eddard's head rolled into the street but she'd watched Sansa navigate the treacherous waters of power for a time. Schooled her, even. Curious, that Littlefinger's little bird found a window of the Red Keep and not the King's.
'By the Old Gods and the Red God...'
She had never seen him show the faintest interest in the gods. It was a warning, she reasoned, to the Crown and The Faith. Stay away from the North it may as well have read. Were murmurings of dissent enough to tempt The Sparrow into war? The loss of their taxes might be. Cersei could not stand the thought of Littlefinger's smug face. He knew very well that the Crown could not touch his rebellion and he was goading her into fostering another, for that is what it was. He had two of the Seven Kingdoms at his will before anyone realised he was there. As for Sansa Stark – sister in law, how vile that sounded, Cersei wondered if there was any warmth left in that stone heart of hers.
Cersei lifted her gaze to the chiming of the bells.
Another day.
PORT MORAQ GREAT MORAQ – THE JADE SEA
Quaithe wedged her body between the boulders, casually thrown across the shore. Great Moraq was a mess of jungle behind. Its flowing water trees held bowers of waxy, purple flowers that shed over the rock. Monkeys chattered in their bowers, creeping up on Wreab's sailors to thieve buttons and scraps of food. Wreab, barely taller than one of the ochre creatures, leaned in and hissed, scaring a group of them into the forest.
Around the corner of the bay lurked Port Moraq. It stretched back into the jungle with shaded stone buildings, walled gardens dripping with fruit and wild animals prowling the streets. The forest protected the settlement from the raging winds funnelled through the Cinnamon Straits. They hit Wreab's ship, tossing it about in the water despite its sails hanging harmlessly beside the mast.
"You really are a pirate," Quaithe pointed out, observing Wreab's clothes sodden with mud and bits of jungle. His men had been gone for many hours, retrieving cargo left buried onshore.
"Safer than a bank," he replied. "Those cunts in Braavos are all freed thieves."
Her gold-plated mask rattled as she covered a laugh. Wreab had ferried her over many seas. Perhaps he thought her a lucky a charm, of sorts. "Wise words from a wise man. Merchants are king of thieves." He struggled up the rough rocks toward her, slipping on the mud he'd brought with him. "Are we walking to the capital?"
"It is usually best," he replied, perching awkwardly. "Port Moraq is not somewhere I'd choose to leave my ship. Spirits might whisk it away in the night."
"When do we leave?"
"Now," he nodded at the men readying a litter. Quaithe nodded and went to rise when a chubby hand thrust in front of her path. "I need you to stay here. Guard the boat. The men fear you – that is useful to me."
Quaithe could barely refuse. Her presence was at his leisure. "May the gods go with you."
His flame-coloured hair had been tossed about by the wind, forming it into a crude fire. "I'll bring you back something nice," he winked, slipping off the rock.
Quaithe had no doubt that he would. Strange little man, she found herself thinking. He was a scoundrel, a liar – thief and murderer yet he had a strict code of honour that kept him afloat. She watched him seep into the forest with his men before she returned to the ship.
The wind was rough, kicking against them even from their protected position behind the natural curve of the shore. Quaithe wondered which gods angered it. Which gods watched over them... Her visions showed her nothing of gods or their fragile wills. For so long she'd seen two faces in her dreams, each turning away from her – wandering to the farthest reaches of the world. One wrapped himself in gold, razed his own blood to the ground. The other drifted in the winter winds and sank into the dreams of ghostly forests.
Aeogor and Bryden, two men to love – two to send away. One had eyes of steel, the other – stone. Her love was poison to them both. She dreamt of laying under the water, a star beneath the waves. Her skin turning pale – all her masks washed away. Every time she stepped aboard a ship she wondered will this be the time? Am I to return to the waves? Not today... Not today.
Quaithe's eyes lifted to a line of white sneaking up on the horizon. A moment later, the sailor in the crow's nest whistled.
Ships.
A fleet was sailing toward Port Moraq and there, above their masts, a dragon tumbling in the wind.
THE SUNSET SEA
"Drogon, what are you doing, daft dragon?" Daenerys lay forwards against the great beast as he beat his wings, lowering toward the Bay of Ice. The land to their right was covered in snow drifts, reflecting the rising sun. The rest was covered in dense pine forests, almost black beneath. Mountains loomed further North and beyond those, a line of white where another continent drifted silently.
"Come back," Jorah waved her over. She had crawled out of the saddle to lay against Drogon's neck. Now, the dragon seemed to be preparing to land. Daenerys returned, sliding her legs into the straps. "You'll be able to see it in a minute."
"See what?" she asked, folding away the furs.
"The Wall," Jorah replied solemnly. It been many years since he'd locked eyes on the spread of ice dividing the lands.
Sure enough, the sun caught the polished edge of The Wall. It cut the land with a line of light, carving up the snow. Its front was blue, deep as the ocean and either side the snow spread out.
"I've never seen it like this," Jorah added. "The ice drifts have breached the forest. This is Winter."
"What are those?"
Daenerys pointed to a speck of black against the wall, pressed into the side with smoke rising out of the tower. "One of the Northern castles that guard the wall." It was difficult to tell from this height will all the landmarks covered by snow. They were far to the West. "This must be The Shadow Tower, one of nineteen castles along the wall – only three are manned and that is one of them. My father wished to use men from there to re-fashion Stonedoor against the Wildlings. Ah there..." he added, as they approached. "That monstrosity on the very edge of The Wall is the ruins of Westwatch by the Bridge. I have been there as a child and walked clear around The Wall into The Lands of Always Winter."
"I thought the great Northern wall was impervious – an impasse between the realms of the living and the dead? I remember the stories from my childhood. Ser Darry used to speak reverently of The Wall and the men that guard it. The bravest men," he called them, "men that earn their honour on the edge of a blade. What?"
Jorah had stared at her a fraction too long. He'd heard those words before. "The Wall is not impossible to breach," he assured her. "Wildlings have been doing it for thousands of years, pillaging the Northern Lords – taking their women, burning their fields and killing indiscriminately. They slide through passages in the ice, climb the ice cliffs and take boats across the bay."
"Is that what happened to your family?"
"Aye. The Wildlings come in many tribes. I'll never know which took canoes from the Southern shore over there," he pointed to the flat edge of nameless land, "crossed the Bay of Ice and landed on our island. They have no laws but their own and a King of Bones, worshipping the serpents of death. My father died beyond that wall, in the wilderness searching for answers about the great war that is to come. A war between the living and the dead."
Daenerys had walked these lands – crossed through the Black Gate and into the ice-locked lands beyond. She'd stand there again but not yet. It was too soon. "Will we find shelter with your kin? If that is where Drogon is taking us."
He could see Bear Island, standing alone in the dark water with ice edging in. The hot springs below continuously melted the snow, leaving a permanent steam lifting off its cliffs. It was alive. "Every man in the North is honour bound to take my head," Jorah replied, "including my niece. If she's anything like her sister, she'll have me on the block before the sun sets."
"Your own blood would kill you after so much time has passed?"
"Honour is everything in the North, Your Grace. Here, I have none."
That's what was bothering him, Daenerys realised. Jorah loved his home but in these icy waters, he was unwelcome. Returning home had been a fantasy and bringing a foreign queen was not likely to aid his cause. "Then I gather we'll not be making an appearance in this Lady's court?"
"That would be unwise," he nodded. "Let us hope that Drogon intends only to rest here. If we're careful – land on the Western side of the island, we make pass through without a soul noticing that we were ever here. The time will come to forge alliances with these houses but not until the throne is yours."
"It's beautiful," she added, as Bear Island approached. Its buildings were built straight from the rock as if part of the monstrous forms. The woods and snow crept over them, treating them the same. There was a certain elegance about its defiance. It stood against winter, against the sea and against the rest of Westeros, out on its own – a lonely bear.
"Thank you, Your Grace. I am rather fond of it."
"How am I ever to rule such a place?" she whispered, as the winter winds bit at her face. "This may as well be the sands beyond the desert – the barren carcass of Asshai. What need do they have of a queen in the South, ruling from a throne of burned swords? I have less chance of protecting the Northern realm from what lies beyond that wall than I had of saving Meereen. The edges of the world must rule themselves."
"Once there was a King in the North and his name was Stark," Jorah remembered his old words. "If a Stark still breathes, the North will rise to follow them. You cannot rule in opposition to their ways, they are older than your civilisation and they endure, through the longest of nights."
"Are you speaking as a Northerner or as my council?" Daenerys asked carefully. He rarely spoke of his loyalties. Ruling Westeros was one thing, threatening his homelands was something quite different. "I see you," she added, tilting her head to find her knight staring at the frozen world beneath. "I know what you want."
"I doubt it," he breathed, mist lifting from his words.
Daenerys brushed her thumb over his lips.
