BEAR ISLAND – BAY OF ICE

Pine needles slashed across his face. Branches whipped backwards sending explosions of snow into the air as Dorin ploughed through the forest. He emerged on the flat, bloodied and freezing with his heart staggering to keep pace. He barely felt the weight of his axe and sword as he edged toward the cliff.

Dusk approached.

The waters of the bay had turned to milk, washing aimlessly on a dead tide. An army of Wildling boats were scattered over it like leaves, brushing together in a mess. Dorin swore at the sinking star whose fiery edge was about to touch the water. It was an ambivalent god, shutting its eye on the world.

The closest boats were packed with hard-faced warriors, their uncouth vessels drowned in the blood of an earlier battle and littered with broken weapons while severed limbs had been left forgotten at their feet. One of the Wildlings looked up toward the cliff, catching Dorin's eye over the vast desolation. They stared at one another until the horn of Bear Island blew, cutting through the air to signal war. Dorin staggered back from the frontier of ice. Shortly after the village bells rang and the afternoon filled with screams.

The fires were lit. Smoke blackened the air. War began.


Vastly outnumbered, the inhabitants of Bear Island poured onto the beach to greet the Wildling invaders. They brandished an assortment of weapons, stumbling over the treacherous rocks that marred the coastline until they assembled, waiting for their enemy to draw closer. Each Wildling boat that entered the shallows found itself swamped. Those on board were cut down as more defending islanders waded out. Before long the waters were soaked with blood. Women. Children. Beast. Man. They were all Wildling and ended the same.

Old Bear Dorin took the cliff pass, scaling down a child's path until he hit the beach. His axe sank into a Wildling, severing most of its neck. It fell away from his blade, collapsing against the black cliff wall to be fed upon by the waves which lacerated the coast, pulsing like the heart of some dying beast. Another crawled over a boulder, sliding along the smooth edge and directly onto Dorin's sword. Barely a man, the Wildling grabbed at the knife in his belly – cutting his pale hands as he tried to free himself with a sickening groan of pain. Dorin finished it with the swing of his axe. The moment he struck, a sharp cry split the air. It came from above.

Dorin shifted to find a child peering over the rock at the body of the Wildling. Tears streamed down its face turning pink in the light. He pulled his sword and axe free. The body fell. Fresh blood ran down the handles of his weapons and onto Dorin's arms. He could feel its warmth, fresh and slick. Why bring children on a raid? He wondered, angry as his hand was forced into violence. All must die.


"By all the gods..." Daenerys watched the carnage, helpless in the face of slaughter. It was far from her first taste of bloodshed but usually war was planned – armies aligned and met on equal ground. This was bloodshed. Like the Dothraki hoards, the Bears tore apart whatever they could reach, tossing the corpses into the water or thrashing them against the volcanic rock.

Jorah held her away from the edge with his hand wrapped firmly around her wrist. The Bay of Ice was awash with Wildling boats. Many had been shattered against the cliffs and broken into splinters where waves crashed into an ancient lava flow that slithered into the water like a poisonous serpent. Lifeless eyes stared at the last moments of sunset, bobbing briefly on the surface until they slid into the abyss. The beach was thick with Mormonts. They rumbled along it, shouting ancient war cries.

"Word of the Northern wars has spread," Jorah whispered, tugging gently to ease his queen from the edge. "It's no secret that our fighting men are dead or too young to hold a sword. The Free Men probably wagered that they could take Bear Island and begin their migration beyond The Wall. They have been testing the waters of the North for many years – digging tunnels, raiding villages. Some have even been so bold as to scale the ruddy wall itself. If they intend to have Bear Island they are wrong. We've held this post for more than a thousand years. We'd sooner let the Drowned God have it than those murdering savages."

Daenerys rarely heard Ser Jorah speak with unbridled hate. It sounded sour on his lips. If it weren't for her pale hand in his he'd be over the cliff, thrusting himself into the water to tear down the Wildlings.

"There are so many of them." The boats trailed all the way to the silver curve of land. It wasn't a raid – this was a full scale invasion. "Your people will suffocate under those numbers."

"You have not seen a Mormont fight."

"I have..." She eyed her knight.

"I am not a good example, Your Grace. Those she-bears down there, they'd tear apart the rock itself to protect their village. The Dothraki are dangerous," he continued, "the North is savage. You cannot imagine..." he trailed off. Jorah was shocked by the brutality it could unleash if forced. "We must leave. If the Wildlings breech the beach they may find the caves where we're hiding. They'll not spare a Southern queen. You'll be raped and butchered where you stand. That is the Wildling way." He itched to fight alongside his kin. Jorah had unfinished business with the free men beyond The Wall.


The bloodshed permeated the cave, echoing up the walls of the cliff. It thrummed in the background as Jorah and Daenerys collected their things and headed out into the snow. They emerged to the unmistakable cry of a dragon. Drogon had abandoned his hide and taken to the air. He circled the bloody bay, dipping toward the boats with his talons scraping their hulls.

"Daenerys..." Jorah whispered in alarm, as she pushed by him to scream Drogon's name. It was too late. The dragon was loose on the air.

THE HOUSE OF BLACK AND WHITE BRAAVOS – ESSOS


The Waif's stick left an assortment of demonic marks festering in Arya's skin. They used to burn but Arya was beyond the common taste of pain. Pain was for men with names. Instead she felt the Waif's fury. Her jealousy. The seething rage. Hate. Envy. Fear... The stick beat against her face until Arya was thrown from their sparring mat onto the stone. She lay there, turning her cheek to the cool touch of marble that reminded her of ice. She longed for those white obliques, jutting between forests in the North. She could almost hear the crunch of hooves sinking through them as hunting parties returned. Sometimes she ran with her wolf with Nymeria's paws dancing over the surface like a ghost.

Arya opened her eyes. Smoke from the oil lamps had turned the ceiling black over the centuries. Now it resembled a cave or the throat of a slain god.

"A girl is getting faster," Jaqen H'ghar noted, much later.

Arya approached him barefoot. Half her face was darkened like the doors. One black, one white. One in shadow and the other facing the sun. She had meant to ask if they represented the full spectrum of the gods or the embodiment of deception. Perhaps that was the same thing. Arya had long suspected that there were no gods at all.

"Who is she?" Arya asked, licking dried blood from her lips.

"No one at all..." he replied dutifully.

Jaqen H'ghar was not the same as the other Faceless Men. When he spoke there was an edge to his answers that suggested he might share more with Arya one day. Either Jaqen did not know what motived the Waif or he chose not to say.

"A girl has a name," he offered instead, turning to Arya.

"A girl is no one-" she started to reply when she was stopped by the back of his hand. Interesting, she thought, at the sting. "A girl is Arya Stark..." This time he smiled and then dipped his head in the slightest of nods. Today I am Arya.

"A name has been given the gods," he continued, leading her over to a table. A Valyrian sword lay upon it, glistening in the candlelight. Jaqen H'ghar had left it laying on folds of silk, cushioned like a king. He watched Arya reach toward it and run her tiny fingertips over the length of the metal. She had an eye for weapons, revelling in their violence. Arya lacked the temperament for an assassin. Violence was personal to her as it had been to him. Maybe it still was.

"Are you leaving," she asked, "to take the name?"

"This name belongs to Arya Stark."

Arya felt her heart fall through the floor. He was giving her a name – her first kill. Jaqen wasn't giving it to a nameless envoy of their order, he was giving it to her. "I thought a girl wasn't ready yet..."

"No one said anything about being ready. The name is still yours."

Arya's momentary thrill gave way to something else. "Wait – are you sending me away?" Perhaps they were throwing her out of the order.

Jaqen H'ghar turned so that he could rest against the table. For a moment the face he had chosen was unguarded. Behind the flap of skin Arya glimpsed something of the man. "Yes. Arya Stark must be sent away. The name is not in Braavos."

"You know what I mean..."

"A man knows what a girl means. Take the name." In his palm sat a single coin. Arya took it, thumbing the silver edge.


Needle slid from its hiding place with a shower of chalk dust. Arya rested its sharp edge on her palm. Memories flooded back as she let the weight shift on her skin. She could see her brother's kind brown eyes as he bestowed it upon her. Bastard or not, he was brother to her. Jon knew that she was never going to be one of the Northern ladies, locked in a castle with a crown. She was a wolf and he gave her fangs.

The House of Black and White loomed behind her tiny figure. It was cold, merciless like the assassins' creed within. Jaqen watched from the door, blending in against the Weirwood. She wondered if he had memories too. If he hid things beneath the Braavosi stones or perhaps lowered them into the depths of the lake where they'd never be found.

Arya finally stood. She turned to Jaqen and the two of them watched each other. Arya heard the lagoon lap at the steps and the Shivering Sea roll beyond, beckoning her. A girl was going home. When she turned back, Jaqen was gone.

BEAR ISLAND – BAY OF ICE


Fire chased the waves across the bay. Steam lifted in a mist as the dragon passed, blowing onto the charred boats. Water lapped over their sides, flooding them until the tide pushed what was left into the rocks where they jammed between boulders. Everyone fled from the screeching dragon as it lay waste to the shore. The Mormonts retreated into the cliffs while some of the invaders tried to push their boats back out into the water only to find a wall of flame. Everything burned.

Dragonglass dripped down the cave wall beside Dorin. He shuffled away from the red glow that sagged into tear drops. Like the innards of an angry mountain, it bled from the cliffs all the way along the crescent bay where the dragon had unleashed its fury.

He could see the creature as it headed into deeper water to burn the rest of the boats. They lit up the bay, drifting idly as if they were stars fading before the dawn. Eventually they sank into the frigid water. Wailing filled the air. The Bears crept out, wary of the shadow playing in the afternoon light. Some of the Wildlings had survived. They reached up, clutching at anything that moved. An old woman caught her claws in his cloak. Dorin turned on her, staring back at her glassy eyes. Blind. She hissed at him – filthy words in a foreign tongue. A wave hit her back and she was dragged into oblivion.

The dragon circled the water, climbing higher in the wind. The Mormonts watched from the beach, whispering the old songs amongst themselves. This was the second dragon in as many months to stain the skies of the North. Winterfell's dragon has been spotted over the water before vanishing into the Lands of Always Winter. The few who refused to believe would be turned now. Burning bodies could not be dismissed as easily as a shadow.

Dorin left the massacre on the beach and headed into the cliffs. Filthy smoke was blown over the rock making him choke. The stench of burning bodies was unbearable. He pulled the furs across his face and climbed.

He emerged within sight of the Targaryen and Jorah. Blood dripped fresh off his weapons as he crossed the snow and stopped in front of them. "You mustn't call for it..." he warned, as the silver haired woman cried out to her dragon. "Or they'll hear you on the beach."

"I don't understand..." Daenerys insisted. "I didn't..."

"Only the gods know the will of a dragon," Dorin assured her. "Be glad of it. That creature saved the island, even if the people fear it." Dorin's gaze came to settle on Jorah. "Did you find them on the far side of the world? The dragon eggs of Westeros were worthless ornaments in the king's chamber."

"They were a gift to the queen on her wedding," Jorah replied, letting Daenerys go. She broke away from him and sat beneath the Weirwood tree, resting against its thick roots to watch Drogon's shadow in the distance. "Illyrio of Pentos brought them. Dorin, I can see you know more... Where did Illyrio get the eggs?"

"I only know what your father told me," Dorin let his weapons fall into the snow. There was no need of them. Whatever wasn't dead would soon belong to the sea.

"Were they stolen from Asshai? Did Illyrio travel there – did my fa-" Jorah paused when Dorin held up his hands in a bid to stop wild guesses spilling forth.

"The eggs were stolen," Dorin admitted, "from the crypts of Winterfell."

"What..."

"Mance Rayder – the Free Folk call him, 'The King Beyond The Wall'. Well, your father caught him breach The Wall several times, vanishing South. A while later he'd return, as though he'd been lookin' for something. Dacey -"

"Dacey...?" Jorah shifted in alarm.

"She wasn't allowed t' join the Night's Watch so your father had her follow that Wildling King all the way to Winterfell where he broke into the crypts. Spent weeks down there, shuffling about among them corpses until he returned, same as, empted handed. Dacey went back to that dead place and found the eggs."

Daenerys interrupted, "My dragons come from the North?"

"Aye, they do." Dorin spared a moment to search the skies. The beast was heading toward Bear Island. "Laid in miserable depths of Winterfell. S'no place to raise a dragon."


As soon as Drogon landed, Daenerys and Jorah clambered aboard, lashing their things to the harness before Daenerys ordered him to fly. The shore had been set alight where Mormonts piled the bodies of the dead while the cliff glowed wherever Drogon's flame had touched. Jorah leaned around a curved spike to watch it recede into the darkness.

Jorah could not shake the feeling that they would be back this way again. Daenerys must have felt it too, for she looked over her shoulder until Bear Island was a smudge in the night.

Water was replaced by snow. The desolate landscape of the North reflected the moon which had lifted high enough to cast shadows on the flats. Daenerys was shaken. There was a tremble in her hand where she clutched the saddle. Her pale flesh was crisp under the moonlight, as though she were made of ice.

"It's not the first time Drogon has gone off on his own like that..."

"Headed into battle without your command?" Jorah asked, she nodded.

"What's to stop him burning Braavos to the ground?"

"Nothing, Your Grace," Jorah admitted. "For what comfort it is worth, I do not believe he will."

He queen turned, Valyrian eyes upon his. "Why is that, Ser? You remember the beach in the Southern waters. Dozens of my men were turned to ash... I screamed and screamed but he would not stop. We nearly died in those waters, you and I, with blood in the waves."

What could he say? Drogon did as he pleased. "It will take time," was all he could offer. "The masters of Old Valyria spent many years training their dragons. Yours have had to learn in the world."

And what had she taught them? Daenerys wondered. She'd locked them in a dungeon, alone in the dark. They'd been taught pain, vengeance, hunger and fear. "Neither of us have years, Ser Jorah. There is more than one war coming to meet us."

"We will find out soon enough... Before the sun sets on another day, we'll be in Braavosi skies. If the city burns then it burns, Your Grace. You have come too far to falter before the start."

"I'll not falter," she assured her knight. Her face may as well have been steel. It did not flinch as it faced the wind and Narrow Sea parting the lands.


Dorin paused the door of his cabin. Ajar, a beam of light cut through onto the snow beside him. He could hear something shuffle about inside. Not an animal. They did not waste moments of their lives lighting lamps. The Bear took a measured step back before throwing his weight forward, kicking in his own door. The wood slammed against the wall. Half the cabin shook with it. The frail wisp of a man cowering over Dorin's desk dropped his quill in fright, sending ink all over the room.

A slight figure with barely a scrap of meat to cover his bones, startled badly. "Wait, wait, wait, wait!" was all he managed to gargle, as Dorin's hand took hold of his bony shoulders and lifted him clear out of the chair.

Wildling shit! The audacity to make himself at home! He threw it to the floor where it crawled toward the fire.

"Oh gods! Please! Wait!" The Wildling protested feverishly in the Common Tongue. "I am a maester of the Citadel – under their protection! A maester!"

"You ruddy are not," Dorin assured him, briefly hunting for a chain. The man wore nothing but the garb of a regular Wildling. "I ought to throw your corpse in the bay with the rest."

The man's protests continued, repeated over and over until they became a mantra. "The guild at Old Town sent me. Ask them if you wish. I am no Wildling!"

Checking would take weeks. Dorin doubted that they had hours before another raid was on their shore.

"What maester lives beyond The Wall?" Dorin asked, selecting a hunting knife from the wall.

The maester fixated on the curved blade and the serrations in the metal. It was a crude thing – a brutal end if it was to be his. "I seek only the same as you," he implored the Bear. "To stop the war that is coming. The great war. The last war. The war before the night."

Dorin let him speak.

"I was invited under the protection of the King Beyond The Wall, Mance Rayder, he went by, until a Red Witch of R'hllor burned him. He wanted to bring his people South, Old Town was considering a motion of sanctuary in exchange for knowledge. A man of Bear Island, you imagine yourself a Northerner. You cannot grasp North. I have seen lands beyond the ice. Cities in the snow... They wake."

"Liar," Dorin said calmly. "Wildlings are nothing but thieves an' murders. They want t' live up there in tha' shit fuck of a place – it is their business. The moment they set foot beyond The Wall they'll find themselves on pyres. We'll make white ash out o' their bones."

The maester shook his head as if all the weight of civilisation had fallen upon it. "You do not understand. The Free Folk are not invading, they are fleeing. I have devoted my life to the deepest pits of history and things that crawled in the depths of Winter have returned. I have run from them. Seen their sapphire eyes. Their pale, rotten flesh. Listened to the step of dead horses and crack of their war cry. 'The North Remembers' so go your words but the North has forgotten. In two days they'll be at The Bridge of Bones where the undead will flood into the world of the living. I came all this way to warn you. I brought this..."

He shuffled about in his rags and withdrew a small medicine bottle. Inside sloshed the unmistakable iridescent green of Wildfire.

WINTERFELL – THE NORTH 280 AC


It was too warm for Dacey. Anything further than Deepwood Motte was considered 'South' and vulgar. It was in the air – water rather than ice. The evenings were damp and choked with mist and the stink of Pierwood smoke. A weed – the thin trees plagued the surrounding mountains with their golden crowns and supple trunks. They bent at the faintest breeze and found themselves a stable in the Winterfell fires. They burned white, crackling furiously.

Dacey made no fire. Lurking at the cusp of the Godswood, she dug herself a pit of snow and waited. This side of the castle was a sad sprawl of ancient stone, mostly overgrown. The ground was unnaturally warm, melting the ice around a pool of rocks and black water where bloodied leaves floated aimlessly. She could hear the creek of the Weirwood, groaning with age. It sounded exactly like the one on Bear Island. There was a feast raging in the castle. News of a baby princess had bled into the North. The Dornish horsemen pissed near the main gate, swigging ale and singing vulgar songs about Nymeria.

There. At the far edge of the Godswood Dacey saw a shadow stir. The Wildling King inched out of the forest and crossed the snow as though it were a sheet of rock. Envy snapped through her. However much hate she bore those creatures there was no escaping their skill. She had expected him to breech the castle through the servant's entrance but he diverted at the last moment, curving into the mess of buildings marking the tombs. Dacey lifted her head, watching the man duck down the stairs, vanishing.

"Bastard...!" She growled, sitting up. Dacey ran her hand through her long, dark hair – knocking a fresh dusting of snow from it. There was no choice but to follow him into the crypts.

Treacherous, moss-laden steps slid under her boots. Most were broken apart by the constant melt water, threatening to send her tumbling into the abyss with every hesitant step. She dared not light a torch. Weeks spent in the innards of The Nightfort had taught her to navigate the dark. It was a comfort, to be blind to the horrors of the world.

With one hand on the wall, she pushed deeper, listening for the Wildling. Flames from his torch created a glow ahead. It was a faint halo of light coming from behind a curtain of creeper vines that favoured caves in the North. They grew thick in the Winterfell crypts, feeding off the steam that seemed to saturate the air as if the whole place had been built on the heart of fire. Carefully, she pushed the soft vines aside and craned her head.

The Wildling crouched behind one of the oldest tombs. Whichever Stark that laid here had long ago turned to dust inside his stone prison. A crunch of rock was followed by a sharp crack as he removed one of the tiles from the wall. He'd done this before, Dacey could tell by his purposeful movements. Chip. Chip. Slide. More tiles were removed until an entrance large enough to crawl through gaped in front. The Wildling picked up his torch and shuffled into the hole leaving her in darkness once more.

Dacey waited ten minutes before doing the same, silently lowering herself into the abyss. Her feet hit the ground after a short drop, landing in a crouch with her hands splayed on the wet floor. The room beneath was flooded in several inches of water. Despite the blackness surrounding her, she could feel the walls of the tunnel close by. The glow of his torch flickered around the next bend. She made a step toward it, failing to see the shadow that attacked from behind.

Dacey was thrown against the wall, hitting her her head before sliding into the water. The Wildling grabbed her cloak and dragged her along the tunnel. Her ears rang from the impact. She struggled against the rush of water, flailing as the shock wore off. They reached the second room where he tossed her roughly across the floor. In the sudden light Dacey could see his wild complexion and the bluest eyes ever set into flesh.

"Who are you?" he hissed at her in broken Common Tongue. "Why do you follow?"

Blood dripped from a cut above her eye. Dacey used the wall to drag herself onto her feet. He was taller than her, draped in furs and leather that had been worn to scraps from surviving in the wilderness. Despite months or hard living there was a finer edge to his features, something found among the high born, even those that dwell beyond The Wall. Rings weighed down his fingers while stark tattoos twisted up his skin. Among the fang and claw were runes of the First Men.

"I am no one," Dacey assured him, "but you are the King Beyond the Wall."

"Then you know better than to follow me."

Dacey straightened her cloak leisurely, ghosting her palm across the hilt of her sword in threat. "I could kill you now," Dacey continued. The longer she looked at him, the more his fearsome image corroded. He was tired, carrying injuries of the body and soul. "Your people would disband leaving the North safe – for a time, at least."

He laughed. "You know nothing," he assured her, stalking closer. "The Free Folk are more than one man. Without me thousands of panicked tribes 'll rush into your North." He considered saying more but shrugged his thoughts off. What was the point? No one would believe what he had seen, lurking in the snow. Who could? Mance sighed deeply before drawing his sword. It left its sheath with a hiss. Dacey retreated until her back hit the crypt wall. "I cannot let you leave," he explained, approaching.

Dacey countered by drawing her sword in kind. It was thick and heavy – a man's sword. "I can't allow you to kill me."

For a moment, Mance Rayder smirked. "So be it," he replied, before their swords clashed.

The dance of iron echoed through the catacombs. Despite his size, the Wildling king was fast, meeting her strikes and pushing Dacey away, edging her around the room. She ducked when his blade found stone. Mance reached out, grabbed her cloak and yanked her backwards. For the second time Dacey found herself staring up at those blue eyes only this time they were cold with determination. She lifted her sword, holding it horizontally in front of her face with the dull edge of the blade pressed to her palm. Metal collided. Dacey groaned, taking the weight of his strike. She felt it push her into the ground until she thought the tomb might suck her into its depths.

"What are you looking for?" she asked again, growling as she kicked him sharply in the stomach. The force threw him off and a moment later she was back, spinning her sword with an arch of her bloodied eybrow. There was a solid plinth of rock between them. Age had obscured the lettering at its base but she could read the inscription. "Brandon Stark – the Shipwright... Odd choice of crypt to loot," she observed, circling so that the stone monument remained between their swords. "An empty room – not a bone in sight." Even as Dacey said the words she realised her error. The room was bare but it was hot. Steam seeped through cracks in the floor – fed from something deeper under Winterfell. "You're not here for bones of a Stark..."

"No... I'm not." Mance Rayder closed in. The Northern woman was distracted by her own curiosity. He used it against her, drawing her in.

"You are a long way from home," Dacey's eyes flicked to the edges of the room, searching. He was prying apart the enormous granite cover stones. "If you are seeking treasure I hate to disappoint you. The Starks are famously poor."

"Depends on your definition of treasure," Mance assured her. He was done playing with the woman. Using the wall as a brace, he pushed off in a lunge. They met at the edge of a blade, the side of which caught Dacey through her furs. She grit her teeth at the tear of flesh, striking back.

A seething slash of swords hit the stone slabs, dragging over them in a blaze of sparks. Neither noticed as one was displaced, cracking in half. One side fell away leaving a hole in the floor. Mance's torch was the only light in the room. Dacey felt the heat of the flame as they rolled toward it. Absently she reached until her fingers found the smooth wood. She brought it up, slashing the flame across his face. That sent the Wildling flying away from her, dropping his sword as his flesh reeled at the heat.

"What part of the North are you from?" he hissed in her direction, nursing his burned flesh. Dacey had his sword, one in each hand. She let him see the bear pummel on the top of her sword. "Fucking bear..."

"Aye, fucking bear," she assured him, pointing both swords toward his person. The torch burned beside her on the ground, lighting her hard features from below as if she were a cliff perched above the bay. "What are you looking for?"

Mance drew a pair of tapered daggers from his boots instead, refusing to bow to her will. He ran at her again, ducking straight to the stone while her swords slashed overhead. Her blood dripped as she turned, spraying out like the swirl on one of her mother's tapestries. Dacey fell to her knees and the two of them collided.

Weapons hit the floor. Fur smothered Dacey. It was soft against her face and smelled of pine forests. She gasped, arching her back against Mance Rayder's weight. Noses brushed and those eyes were on her again. There was something about them that she couldn't shake. Ice.

They weren't fighting.

Mance's strength failed. Dacey rolled them over until she was bearing down on him, a sword at his chest. She could feel his heart through the leather, pounding from the fray. He reached up, taking a fist full of her hair then he dragged her down with a surge of pain before cracked lips found hers.

BEAR ISLAND – BAY OF ICE


Dorin tied the maester to his cabin wall. 'Burn the bodies. Burn the bodies...' The old fool whispered to himself, tearing through some old bread. The Wildling corpses were already burning, set alight by the dragon. Leaving the maester to his ramblings, Dorin slipped away into the wood, circling around behind a distinctive boulder shaped in the rough form of a wolf. He knelt in the snow and hacked at it with his axe until the iron collided with steel.

Beneath the snow lay an old trunk buried by Jeor Mormont. It still bore his name, etched elegantly across the bindings. Taking a heart shaped key from his belt, Dorin opened the trunk, pushing its heavy lit off. He fell back onto his calves at the sight. Perched on velvet, the dragon egg shimmered like one of the snowflakes falling around him. Unlike the others he had seen, this one's surface was perfectly smooth. A pearl of fire, Jeor had called it, upon laying it in the trunk. It was their insurance if the Targaryens failed. Without dragons the North was lost to the depths of Winter.

He stared at the egg for some time before burying it in the snow.

THE IRON BANK BRAAVOS – ESSOS


Neither Tyrion nor Varys bothered to sit. Upon entering the inner sanctum they found the bankers aligned at their marble alter, bald heads shining in the light.

"The Iron Bank wishes to thank you for the courtesy that you have bestowed upon us with your visit prior to the planned invasion of Westeros."

Varys dutifully nodded at the pause in Tycho's words.

"That said, we cannot acknowledge the validity of Daenerys Targaryen's rule without her presence, as is our custom. Has your sovereign arrived in Braavos?" When the Lannister shook his head, Tycho continued. "Then it is our duty to act in accordance with the current reign of Westeros."

"If I may-" Varys attempted to interrupt but he was stopped by the banker.

"However, given the seriousness of the proposal put forward, we have decided to allow your queen one day to present herself to our council during which time we will hold Tyrion Lannister as guarantee on our accounts. If Daenerys fails to arrive, Tyrion Lannister will be traded to the Crown in exchange for the debts that they owe. You, Varys, are free to stay or leave at you wish."

With one subtle nod of his moon-head, guards emerged to seize Tyrion, dragging him out of the cavernous room leaving Varys with the floor.

"Do you accept our offer?"

Unmoved, Varys reciprocated with a bow of his own.