THE RED MOUNTAINS – DORNE

"Was there ever a moment, in all those years – that you considered it?"

Daenerys' eyes lifted slowly to her guardian. The faithful knight; martyr of love, honour and redemption, had fixed her with a curious gaze which lingered. Behind, the desert shifted unnaturally, disturbed by a wayward brush of wind from the coast. Storms dragged across The Narrow Sea bringing with them tides of blood. She cold almost feel them lapping at her hair while she lay upon the beach pinned by fallen swords. Jorah sensed them too. He had an ear for the distant rumble of death.

The dragon had taken them as far as The Red Mountains where the forests ended in the high lands behind leaving them to wander through the valley where crimson sand collected in a silent pool. Drogon's shadow crossed overhead occasionally as he hunted the skies, picking off eagles. Jorah had fashioned a leather strap for Dawn which, even sitting high on his spine, threatened to kiss the sand at his heels. Its jewelled hilt glistened in challenge of the sun. Time stepped on.

"I was never in a position to consider anything. From the start – the day I was born – I was the plaything of other peoples' dreams." There was a hiss of venom in her words.

"My Queen, you are mistaken," Jorah slowed his pace to fall into step beside her. The loose red dirt filled their shoes as they pressed toward the valley mouth and the wider desert beyond. "There have been many times where you had the opportunity to wander a different path. You could have conspired with your brother, killed your husband and made off with the Dothrakiriches. Raped the world at your horse lord's side and lived the comfortable life of a Khaleesi. Died between the dunes in the Red Waste. Married your merchant in Qarth and revelled in his honey-lies. Sold your dragon eggs and lived quietly in Lys with your kin... All of these were choices, Khaleesi and you made them, sure as we head to war in Westeros."

"You'd see me become a recluse, tucked safely away on an island at the edge of the world?"

"Hardly the edge, Your Grace," he replied, with a patient smile. "If you saw Lys you might look upon it with more kindness but yes, there were days I'd much prefer to see you safe." Just as he meditated fondly on the frozen pines of his home. "This dream we walk now is fragile. A breath in the wrong direction might set it ablaze. When the black smoke fills our lungs and we find ourselves beneath the executioner's blade -"

Daenerys turned on him, grasping at the strap across his chest. The sudden force brought them both to a stop. "I know what you are doing," she whispered, pushing him firmly without letting go. He stumbled. "You are thinking that is this the last time there will be a choice. The final bridge. If I march on the capital there can be no going back. We win or we die – here in the West. The song of the 'would be queen' dances with Death like the rest of the Targaryens and all their spurned prayers."

Silently, Jorah dipped his head in a single nod.

"We are the playthings of the gods," she stepped closer, sliding her tiny pale hand up the leather to his shoulder where it settled tenderly. "Those choices were stolen."

Jorah raised his calloused, cloth-bound hand, placing it over hers. "There are always choices. Say the word."

"I have thought often of the words you said in Qarth. You were right." Daenerys had not been a queen in her heart until that moment.

Daenerys slid his hand off her shoulder and kept a hold of it while they walked. It was the first time she had allowed anyone to walk hand in hand with her. Out here, cradled by stark protrusions of rock, was as close to 'freedom' as a royal could find.

"Are you still planning to take up residence in Dragonstone?"

"King's Landing holds unpleasant memories..." She replied, leaving out the recurring vision of it twisted amid a storm of ash. "Dragonstone is better suited for our purpose. The West can only be dismantled from an impenetrable fortress. King's Landing, as we are about to prove, is a snowflake in the Summer sun."


KING'S LANDING – WESTEROS

Olenna stared impassively at the blood soaking through the sheets. Pycelle died slowly, tearing at life with his fingernails – twisting and retching, gurgling pleas to gods he thought false. His eyes were pale in the moonlight, rendered almost clear by the time his breaths had stopped. Finally, his hand fell down to the bedding.

He was half-dressed in his robes with the maester's chain laid on the floor where it had fallen in the struggle. Olenna picked it up and slowly wrapped it around his neck like a noose. Her own, ailing limbs protested as she wrestled Pycelle's legs onto the bed. The dagger was retrieved – wiped clean on the sheets and then returned to the folds of Olenna's dress.

"You mad bastard..." She hissed at the corpse.

Olenna wondered if Pycelle grasped what he had done. The barrels of Wildfire beneath the city were an abstract concept, lurking in the dark with the other shadows. He probably never paused to imagine what might happen if their fuse was lit. Perhaps he doubted the strength of Cersei's will. That was always a mistake. Madness and power, both born out of lust and inferiority. With two children already cold in the ground, Cersei's mind had become a vessel for the Mad King's soul. She could almost see glimpses of his ghost on the throne – his claws dragging against the castle walls like a caged dragon.

Pycelle was not going to be enough. That undead abomination of Cersei's had to be surgically removed from her side before any more moves could be made. Olenna knew her limits. The creature would have to wait.

She retraced her steps, shuffling through the moonlit hallways. Every now and then an archway opened up and a front of salt air hit her face. Olenna tried to remember the gardens of her home – the sprawling walls of flowers and fruit. There were pale trees so immense and old that their limbs held the castle up while their red foliage rustled against the stone like whispers. She'd never walk those gardens again.

Within a breath, Olenna had sunk into a shadow. Another restless soul strolled ahead. They approached steadily, creeping forward into a shard of moonlight. Olenna pressed closer to the stone. Cersei. Draped in black with a goblet of wine threatening to tip from her hand. Maybe she could just... Olenna's hand tightened on the knife.

Cersei paused at one of the archways. She turned, setting her cup on the stone with a 'clink'. The city lay before her and while the King saw his subjects, Cersei smirked at the thought of their screams.

"Bit late, to be prowling the castle..."

Before Cersei turned, she took another gulp of wine. It made her lips glisten. "I could have sworn I glanced at arrangements for your funeral in the Sept. A quiet affair, I believe. Frugal."

Olenna accentuated her limp, making sure to lean against the wall. "That is comforting," she replied calmly. "I was never one for surprises."

Cersei's patience evaporated as quickly as her sanity. She reeled on Olenna, fixing her with cold, dead eyes. "Why are you here?"

"I am very old and close to night's breath," Olenna replied, a touch of sincerity in her voice. "I prefer not to sleep. Why tempt the gods? They only fill our dreams with whispers and terrors. That is why you choose wine over sleep... I have often wondered, do you see your children there?"

"Do not attempt to know me," Cersei hissed darkly. "No one can ever know me."

"Your brother does a good job of it – not the little one," Olenna quickly amended. "He's scattered with the wind. Rumour has that those winds fill a dragon's wings..."

"I have heard those rumours too," Cersei admitted. Her little brother, tagging along as some kind of pet. Was he so treacherous to the family name? She'd never thought that he had it in him, to defy their family. Then he killed their father. "If I find that you have been in contact with my traitorous sibling-"

Olenna lifted her hand calmly. "As you well know, I cannot even steal a letter to my kin. The Sparrow has more wings than any of us. Perhaps you should ask him?" It had been her intention to leave with that bitter-sweet scowl on her lips but she found herself brought to pause, close enough to see an edge of water catch the moonlight in Cersei's eyes. "If I believe one truth of you, it is that you love your children. By the gods in all their high towers, you may have been the only soul to love Geoffrey but Mycella... All accounts were that she had the best of her parents. Tommen too. If he's allowed to live he may yet rule a prosperous kingdom. Neither one us, with all our rage, can protect our children while the High Sparrow holds the heart strings. The Iron Bank is locking your purse and very soon we'll be snuffed. Come find me when you're ready to talk."

With that, Olenna left Cersei in possession of the hall. She proceeded directly to the small courtyard with a single Autumn Rose wrapped around a broken gate. There, beneath the third tile, was a coded note from Winterfell.


Tommen had always known. Before she sailed for Dorne, Mycella had pulled him into an alcove beneath the Red Keep where the water wore away a series of tunnels in the edge of the city. There, where molluscs had conquered the stone, she whispered in his ear. It made him think to the Targaryens and their incestuous rule. There were great kings born of such distasteful acts as well as mad ones.

'You might be a good king – if you were older.' The old Tyrell's words haunted him. If. It was as though his die were cast and his rule decided. If. His reign a pending failure before he had a chance to fit the crown.

The Tyrells were powerful and he was married to their future. Perhaps there was another 'if' available to him. If he could save Margaery, he'd have Tyrell support. He might not be able to claim a king as a father but his grandfather was undoubtedly the most powerful man in the realm. He spent his time among the dust of books and on the fields of war. Tommen was too young for a sword but he could read well enough. To free his wife he'd have to catch a bird. In the drapes of night, he turned away from his quarters and instead took the spiral steps to the cold stone rooms at the top of the tower where the ravens were kept. Their stench and screeching filled the night. Black chaos enveloped the room beyond the bars. Feathers escaped, wafting into the air around Tommen. He reached out, letting one of them rest on his arm.

Birds were hungry. They crushed each other under its pangs. A scrap of bread caused a riot.

Tommen smirked, touching one of the beaks protruding from the bars. What was he but a scrap of bread for the mob? The beak cut through his thumb, splashing fresh blood over the stone. Tommen felt nothing.


THE RED MOUNTAINS – DORNE

Jorah was beginning to wonder if Drogon had any intention of returning to them before the day finished. He couldn't pick the creature out from the deep shadows in the cliff but those eyes were on him somewhere. Drogon was most fond of the violent outbursts of rock, digging his claws into the softer folds of shale.

Daenerys roamed in front of Jorah, head tilted to the sky where she watched a sudden shower of shooting stars trail across the blue with long, fiery tails. The travelled East to West, dying somewhere beyond the mountains with a soft thunder. Their master – the dragon of the sky – a comet that had haunted them in The Red Waste, hung somewhere out there beyond their view.

"Careful, Khaleesi..." Jorah called, when she roamed too far ahead. She spiralled in response, causing the sand to swirl at her feet. He was reminded of the sword on his back. It was significantly lighter than true steel, weighed down by its jewels rather than blade. He noticed pieces of its milk-like stone scattered on the ground around them – remnants of another fallen star. Dawn was home amongst its brethren. Jorah wondered if it was forged here too.

Daenerys let him catch up to her – stretching out her hand for him to take. She was caught by a gasp of freedom, empowered by the heat. Like her dragon, she revelled in the sun. Words from some forgotten song sprang from her lips as she dragged Jorah from his stride into a wayward dance. He considered protesting but her joy won out. When both their hands were entwined and the world a blur behind, he risked a smile. Daenerys was half-mad.

"Finally, you laugh!" She grinned, spinning them faster.

It took Jorah another moment to recognise this as a Westerosi dance that she must have learned with Illyrio. He had not danced it since his wedding feast with all the lords and ladies staring down their goblets at the unlikely match. An impoverished Northern lord and the wealthiest woman in the realm.

"Where are you?" Daenerys asked, when she noticed her knight staring directly through her. "North..." she guessed. "Back in the snow drifts?"

"No, indeed," he replied, sliding his hand down to her hip as their dance progressed. They had only the wind as their song and the crush of sand to keep pace. "This song – it is popular in the wedding feasts of Westeros."

"I know," she replied. "That's where I learned. In Pentos, it was one of our duties, hiding in plain sight among the great balls. Viserys used to braid lemon leaves through my hair instead of blossoms."

"He always was odd..."

Daenerys arched her eyebrow. "He thought we would be king and queen, riding into Westeros on white horses to the sound of cheering crowds. When I ride into King's Landing it will be on the back of a dragon with flame and smoke blocking out the sun."

That gave Jorah pause. He was no friend of the capital but a great many people were about to die by their hand. Instead of dealing with the reality, he pulled her closer until their cheeks brushed and his hand splayed across her back.

"Dear Ser..." Daenerys murmured, rubbing her face gently against his. "I do not believe this is part of the dance."

"Dorne was never one for rules," he replied, dipping his head to place a fleeting kiss on her cheek. His free hand traced the bracelet on her wrist given to her by the Dornish prince. Promised in marriage and yet, when they were alone, he was sure that...

Jorah's thoughts were lost as her lips stole his. Her hand ran through his salt-stained hair, dislodging ash from Starfall. His lips parted, giving way to her as she began to melt against him. They were not dancing any more. Daenerys was exploring a scar along his neck, memorising it with her fingertips as they traced the flesh to his shoulder where his shirt began.

Daenerys groaned when he pressed against her stab wound, breaking contact with his lips for a moment. The pain and pleasure danced as they had, merging into something that swelled in the pit of her stomach. She shifted, taking his lips again in one of their more possessive kisses. Eyes closed, tongues circling, they failed to notice another wind from the East.


WINTERFELL RUINS – THE NORTH

The beast stood in the centre of the crypt, drinking from the pool of smoking water. As it dipped low, its antlers grazed the surface of the water.

'Why do you haunt me?' Melisandre asked the vision, as it began to fade.

"Which dead men haunt you?" Jon asked, stepping into the doorway.

Melisandre startled out of her dream to find the White Wolf in her room. He was dressed in travelling furs like a child in his father's clothes. "Stannis," she replied, shifting closer to the fire. "He lies in the snow somewhere nearby. Restless kings make for dangerous spectres." She could still see the great deer stepping back from the edge, its hooves on fire. "Are you finally heading South?"

Jon nodded. "Now. Where are your things?"

Melisandre showed no sign of leaving her chair. "I am staying here."

"We agreed. Your skills are needed at The Wall."

She was shaking her head. "I am no good for kings," Melisandre replied.

"You are no good for anyone shrivelled up in this room. Besides, there are no kings where you are going. The men leave before the hour is over and you with them."

Jon stole away from the room, nodding at a few of his men to make sure the witch was ready. A Targaryen King, he kept thinking to himself. That way led to madness.

Two caravans readied themselves in the snow – one bound for Castle Black, the other for Dorne. Jon paced roughly through the snow around the Weirwood. The face in the wood had changed form overnight. Its features were younger and its blood tears ran heavy, dripping down over knotted roots. He could not find any words to say to Eddard Stark's spirit. Instead of elation, Jon felt as though he'd had his father torn from him again as surely as the blade severed the great lord's head. Uncle. Father. Eddard had grown to be both just as Catelyn was his mother.

With no words, Jon unsheathed his sword and thrust it into the heart of the ghost tree with a scream that shook the leaves and all of Winterfell.


The red witch felt the ice crack on the lake beneath her horse. More than dead kings stirred in the North.


A CAVE – BEYOND THE WALL

Bran fell backwards, arms flailing as he hit the ice. He rummaged through his vest, feeling for the phantom blade. He mistook the snow melt for pools of blood and the crunch of bone for a carpet of leaves. Slowly, the cave came back into focus. He was alone, strewn over the nesting roots of a buried forest. Weirwoods, grown into each other since time was time, had been shaped into an archway through which Bran dragged his broken body.

The ground was a cemetery where rats and men became a single layer in time. He could not say how long he'd dreamed. There were no days below the earth, no nights and no seasons to tell one year from the next. His thoughts were a scramble of raving Greenseers who eked out lives from within their wooden cells.

Leaf found him. Silently, she squatted on the bones ahead, tilting her head and enormous dark eyes curiously while Bran clawed at the dirt. He inched himself toward her.

"The trees won't have you," said Leaf calmly.

Dirt pushed into his mouth. "Maybe, but they can't stop me from looking either."

"The old raven is wrong about you," Leaf continued. Her words felt cold but then again, she was very old. "Wolves and dragons see the world through opposing veils. He fears the ice creeping from the roof in silent daggers but you..." Leaf crawled forward, letting her digits sink into the death surrounding them. "You like frozen, broken things."

"Where is he?" Bran asked fearfully. Leaf had saved his life but her reasons were cloaked in fog. A part of him remembered the days of old when men and children warred.

"Sinking deeper into time," Leaf replied. "Soon, the Three Eyed Raven will become like the others – a face in a tree, awash with visions he cannot share."

Bran felt ice form in his veins. Suddenly the cave seemed smaller and the pale roots closer.


ABANDONED WILDING CAMP – BEYOND THE WALL

Pinnacles of black rock protruded from the permafrost, barely visible under layers of ice so thick their grey had become an ocean blue. They spiralled out from the centre of the city ruins in seven arms reaching all the way to a petrified forest. The skeletal remains of pine trees obscured the last few rocks but Cold Hands knew they were there. Patterns had power. Like magic, they littered the lands beyond The Wall.

These ruins were much younger than the rocks. The dead city sprawled in fragments – torn hides, black scars from a hundred fires – broken spears... At its heart lay the bleached, partially mummified corpse of an ice dragon. Tail to snout, three Targaryen monsters could curl up with room to spare. He could hear the snow hit its ribcage in a type of dying song.

Backed by The Frost Fangs, the name of the city was lost. Time literally froze within its shredded edges. Ancient runes had been scratched into the ice with bear blood leaving him to count at least four distinct types of magic washing restlessly over the site.

It was exactly as Mance described.

Cold Hands held back, lingering on the sheets of ice. Fog clung to the edges, building unnaturally. His blue eyes searched the landscape waiting for the army of undead. Whatever was buried here, it drew the dead and the living alike.


THE RED MOUNTAINS – DORNE

They fell against the entrance of the cave. Rock met flesh – fire against the relative ice in the shadows where flecks of quartz entombed streaks of fools gold. There were hundreds of caverns around the base of the mountains, each a chasm into the ancient river system long since sunken into the bedrock.

Neither of them noticed.

The Queen and her knight rolled along the nearest wall, fumbling in the darkness until a shower of sparks sprung from the handle of Dawn as it hit the stone. Jorah pulled back as the last flare of light died between them. Silently, terrified of breaking the moment, Daenerys reached to the buckle on the leather strap. She worked fast, loosening the latch until together they lifted the holster and its sword over his head. Together they laid it on the cave floor. Freed, it was Jorah who led. With two steps forward, his queen, his khaleesi was flush against the rock. In the half-light he watched her head tip back and lips part. Breaths passed. His thumb explored her lip, dipping into the warmth of her mouth for a moment.

Fire made flesh.

He could feel something burning inside her that went beyond the magic of a woman.

"Are you going to kiss me – or stare at me, ser?"

Both, thought Jorah but gave his answer as a crushing kissed that pressed her hard against the rock. He felt her moan into his mouth before she writhed, slipping through his fingers. Hers were at his shirt, peeling the material from his shoulders. He was back on her lips before she'd finished and the fabric was left to fall unnoticed.

His touches were reverent. Once, he might have imagined taking her as Drogo had – brash and unthinking but now that she was here he realised that she was a creature from the songs of myth. Mortals had no place in her affections and had he been a better man he might be able to lay his sword at her feet and ignore the aching of his heart. Not today.

Daenerys Stormborn. Mother of Dragons. Khaleesi of the Great Grass Sea. Queen of Meereen, the Andals, Rhoynar and the First Men. Lord of the Seven Kingdoms. Breaker of Chains. Princess of Dragonstone. Jorah loved every version of her.

A gasp escaped her as Jorah's large hands cupped her upper thighs and lifted, sliding their naked chests together until her legs wrapped around his hips and she gave into the flame that had burned in her heart from the beginning.


NIGHTFORT – THE NORTH

They waited. Days passed into Winter since the banging on the Black Gate had stopped. Edd and his men were left with silence filled only by the occasional creak of ice growing through stone.

"What der you think?" One of them asked, his accent roughed by years of incarceration.

Edd cast the flames from his torch in front of the Weirwood exterior. "Whatever it was out there, it's either dead or waitin'. If it's dead there's nothin' to be done. If it's waitin' we ain't opening that door. What's your assessment of the fort?"

The man shook his head. "No good. Place been torn apart by ze ice. Falling to shreds. Tha' tower has a lean on it."

"So it's all show and no fucking. Great." Edd started along the hallway leading away from the Black Gate. "There's more?"

"Ay," he nodded. "Raven came. Thar's a whole damn army on their wayz 'ere."

Edd had mixed feelings about that. There was a certain comfort in great numbers but up here, in the ice and snow, they were all mouths to feed and corpses for crows. If they weren't prepared for the Winter they'd be blue-eyed ghosts before the week was out. "I hope they brought food 'cause there's fuck all here. What happened to Cub?"

"Up at the South tour clearin' ice from the lift."

Cub dug his foot in between two black stones, anchoring himself to the fort's dilapidated wall while his body stretched across the heart stopping chasm between the Nightfort and its lift. With one hand clinging onto a spike hammered into The Wall, the other was free to wield a pick. Its curved blade dislodged a storm of white from the lift's mechanism with each blow. The impact echoed along the endless wall. A dull thud, thud, thud...

Abandoned for decades, the lift was used to ferry weaponry too dangerous for the famous staircase. It was built solid but the intervening years had left it partially consumed by the ravenous ice.

Suddenly, its base snapped free – groaning against heavy chains. Cub slipped, losing his footing on the fort. He lurched forward, gripping both the pick and the lift – which was swaying free. Stretched between the two, he looked down to the snow beneath. Pain branched between his arms. He had no choice but to release the pick. Cub screamed as his weight encouraged the lift's movement. With all his force, he dragged his flailing body onto the old wooden platform and ducked away from the rough surface of The Wall as it crashed past.

"Fuckin ay, Cub!" One of the Night's Watch men applauded from the tower. "Thought you were dead that time."

Cub rested his head against the chain. He closed his eyes as the lift began to settle, hanging loose as it should. He thought he was dead too.

"Hey, Cub – see that?" The man continued, pointing toward the East.

Cub followed his hand and saw a dark shadow weaving along the base of The Wall. There was an army approaching.