NIGHTFORT – THE NORTH

"How long's he been out there?" Edd asked, unable to take his eyes off the old man sunning himself by the fire. He ate ravenously, tearing strips of bear-meat off the bone. Ice melted from his matted beard and shoulder-length hair leaving a wreak of death around him. "Been in some kind of fight he has..." Edd added, nodding at the fresh scars. Angry purple lines crossed all over his flesh. "Recent. Month or so back, no more. Did you manage to find out anything about him?"

"A little," Cub replied. "He's from West of here. Walked along the front of The Wall for months searching for the Night's Watch but all them castles are abandoned. This one was too, when he arrived. He climbed up there to get away from the wolves."

"He's been up there since we got 'ere? Bloody hell."

"Says his name is Dorin Fell. The only thing West of 'ere is Bear Island so odds are that's where he's from."

"Got a bit of a bearish look about 'im. Big bloody bastards. Feed him up. Anyone that can hold a sword is good news far as I see it though he migh' lose a few of those fingers."

"There was something else," Cub added, before Edd could leave. "He's come all this way looking for the Lord Commander."

"He tell you why?" Cub shook his head. "All right." Edd folded his arms. "Let him sit there for a while an' find his wits. There's an air of madness about him needs burnin' off. Being out in the ice does tha' to the best of us. It'll pass. We used to see it in the ranging parties when they returned." Edd tapped the boy on the shoulder. He'd done well.

In the meantime, Reed sent scores of soldiers up the ice steps to the top of The Wall with oil and torches – chisels and axes. They swarmed over the bodies, hacking them free or melting those that had fused to the ice. The corpses were thrown over the edge, landing beside the Nightfort where men waited to drag them onto roaring pyres built from ancient pine Goliaths. They grew higher and higher, burning away the permafrost until there was a halo of black stone staring into the night like some fearsome eye.

Edd watched, thumbing the tip of an arrow head plucked from a body. His gaze moved from the fire to the Nightfort. "Think those stories were true?"

Howland Reed drank in the grisly view. He wore twice as much fur and still shook. "You only have to look at it. Power corrupts. Even Lord Commanders are not immune to its wiles."

"No – I mean the woman," Edd replied. "The dead thing the Thirteenth Lord Commander took as a wife. They say she was one of the Others. How desperate must you be to fuck a corpse, eh?"

"I heard that Lord Commander was a Stark," Reed added darkly. "I heard he had a name."


Dorin kept one eye on the woods which encroached upon his fire. The frozen trees and their needles of ice refused the caress of wind. Snow falling against their limbs sounded like Spring rain. Gentle, pure and false. He didn't trust the darkness. In his months alone he'd seen things between the trees that defied logic. A silver woman with a voice of ice and chains of pearls woven through her hair. He'd watched her wander along the edge of The Wall, dragging her claws against the surface. In their wake, the winter roses bloomed into someone else's nightmare.

"We've a horse to take you to Castle Black," Edd sat down beside Dorin and poured hot wine into his cup. "You'll be speakin' to the Lord Commander."

Dorin nodded, feeling some of his strength return. "They are trying to come in from the West." Finally he spoke. "I met a man from the Citadel who lived with the Wildlings. We sailed to the Bridge of Skulls and waited. You know it? Then they came... A plague of bone, white like the snow..." He lost his breath, gasping at the memory. His hand trembling on the bow. "I can still hear the sound of them crawling over the ice. Terrible sound. It doesn't leave you. Forever moving forward. Never dying. You've seen them too."

Edd nodded. "Aye... I seen 'em."

"Then you know the ache of cold that comes on the air." Dorin pierced deep into Edd's eyes. "We destroyed the bridge and cut the bastards off from Westeros but they will find a way around. Westwatch-by-the-Bridge barely stands. The edge of the Wall has fallen into the gorge leaving cracks any man can pass through. Dead or alive. Half these men should ride West – build what they can or hack the cliff away. That is where they'll start the attack and once they're on this side of The Wall the gods will be no use to us."

"I will speak to Lord Reed tonight." He promised.

"Not that it matters..." Dorin trailed off. "The Bay of Ice is freezing. All we are doing at this wall is delaying."


Edd was shaken. He cornered Lord Reed inside the Nightfort where they could be alone. They both stayed away from the walls which were coated in some form of scent-less oil. "If this man is tellin' the truth we'll need a fuck load more swords on these walls."

"I have already sent ravens," Reed assured him. "We can only ask the realm for help – it cannot be forced upon them. I fear there aren't many more to find who aren't already on their way. The wars in the South have taken a heavy toll. Those who were children in Robert's rebellion are barely grown. There has not been enough peace..."

"Then send your ravens further!"

"Across the Narrow Sea?" He scoffed. "To what end? Essos cares nothing for our troubles. We are alone."

"I pray you are wrong – or we'll be dead..."


NIGHTSONG – DORNISH MARCHES

The Dornish Marches also happened to be sad expanses of soggy marsh except for the narrow road which twisted from hill to hill. At their wettest, they descended into broad lagoons of grey water choked with ibis. The rest was an unfathomable nightmare of grass and mud that felled armies. It was a land of permanent battle whose only buildings were defiant castles like that of Nightsong.

Built on a wide mountain and surrounded by terraces, its pastel stone and Western architecture made it look as though it had grown there.

On dragon-back, Jorah and Daenerys were cut off from one another. They could neither shout nor motion commands of any kind so they landed in the wet ground a safe distance from the castle. Their beasts huddled together, testing the tough water grass before moving onto the allure of fat wood ducks.

"Do we know who occupies it?" Daenerys asked.

"The Dayne says the bastard Rolland Storm. He was in the company of the two failed Baratheon challengers and set up a mining colony at Dragonstone – digging for obsidian." Raping her home for profit. "That all came to an end after a run in with the Crown. Rolland is hiding here and while he may not like the Dornish that's not to say he's opposed to a dragon."

"Bastards ache for legitimacy."

"Which the Crown will never bestow."

"It is neither here nor there to me who fought who or the legitimacy of a minor lord."

"Exactly. Ah – there is life in them yet. They've lit the fires." The castle was set into life by a serious of pyres stacked atop the walls. "A rider will be sent. Rolland has little to gain from a war with you."

They moved their dragons closer to the castle, setting down on the gravel road. A horse approached, pounding toward them with a constant splash of hooves where shallow rivers ran freely across the road. Its rider carried a white banner unfurling in his wake like one of the water birds startled from the reeds. The dragons sensed danger and remained close, wading shy of the road with their wings dipping into the water. Jorah loomed next to the queen in his usual swagger with one hand on Dawn and Snowflake glistening across his back.

If this was their first contact with Westeros, he hoped they could find a way to end peacefully.

"Un-be-fucking-lievable..." The rider spoke first, as he dismounted. He was no messenger. Those were all young, disposable boys worth a grain of sand. This man was in his forties, sturdy and horribly scarred from pox with one eye bulging larger than the other. "You hear things on the wind," he continued, strutting uncomfortably close to the queen until Jorah reminded him of his presence by shifting. "Dragons and the like. Here you are – Queen of the Seven Kingdoms. Saviour of the Realm, in the flesh." His look bordered on leering. Bet you shit silver."

"Saviour of the Realm?" Daenerys asked, navigating him cautiously.

"Well, so long as you're not a Lannister I suppose... You are here to kill them, aren't you? That's what they say..." His attention kept wandering to the dragons. They were not as big as the stories but they were sizeable enough to melt his castle back into the earth. "Ah... you were spoiling for a fight," he mused, at the queen's apparent disappointment. "Love a fight, me but the truth is I don't give a fuck for the Crown nor do most of the lords this way – 'cept maybe Tarly over yonder at Hornhill. I'd like nothing more than to see them burn and as it looks like you're on your way to do just that, I send my regards." He even managed an awkward bow.

Jorah despised the creature in front of them. He was clearly the filth of humanity but they had no legitimate cause to quarrel. Instead, the queen set her offer before him – which he laughed at – then mounted his horse.

"Keep your papers," he waved her off. "Though a small toll would buy the silence of my ravens."

"You should know," Daenerys added, "that if we come down this road and find your soldiers on it I'll make sure that you're the last to die." Her dragons twitched at the thought of tearing his limbs apart.

"Daenerys Targaryen..." he mulled her name over rancidity as his horse circled. "You not need to keep telling people that you are the queen. They can see it – soon as they see those fucking things." He raised his eyebrows at the dragons. "Enjoy your ride North. If you feel like mining a bit of dragon glass, I'll cut you a good deal."

Daenerys' lip curled but Jorah touched her back softly to hold her back.

"He's not the worst person I've met," she sighed, as Rolland retreated. "But I would prefer to never encounter him again. Is this what the realm is full of? Pretending lords and land-locked piracy? How is anyone to rule such men?" Tchic-tchik. She called Drogon. The dragon lumbered out of the water but Jorah had to wade in after Viserion.

"Don't pretend, Your Grace, that part of you isn't disappointed. I saw the way you looked at that castle and imagined it glowing red like the heart of a furnace."

"Fantasising about fire and wanting to murder with it are two very different things that my father failed to separate in his fractured mind."

"I won't fail to separate Rolland's head from his neck if he gives us any trouble," Jorah assured her.


Darkstar watched the castle flare to life in the distance and shortly after, a pair of shadows take to the darkening sky. It would be foolish to begin a march across unforgiving terrain when the sun was considering its fall so he and the men prepared camp in the mountains.

He remained near the red witch's litter. Several layers of silk and cloth concealed her from view but he could hear Quaithe's whispers through the veil, hissing out beneath her golden mask. Dothraki women crouched nearby. There were many priests who claimed to hear the whispers of the gods. Targaryens had more truth than most. Since their passing, all the realm had to offer were stories of old women frightening children to keep them from the dark.

"Cold?" Aryawedged herself between the Dayne and the fire. The unseasonal cold crept out of the clear skies that had existed weeks without rain. As it was, the queen's army congregated around thousands of tiny fires while they waited for the dragon riders to return. The Dothraki made camp with the Dornish, sharing stories of their violent histories and mythical battles. Some descended into fucking with neither culture having a skerrick of restraint. The remaining Unsullied held back, watching from the edge of the forest – some keenly, others with eyes deep with envy.

"I suppose you are not, coming from the great lands in the North?"

Arya shrugged. "I've been away from the North nearly as long as I was in it," she replied. Her accent betrayed as much. Yes, it had a Northern base but it had been corrupted by a dozen tongues since then. "There are times I think it was a dream – that it never happened at all." Partly a lie. There'd always be ice in her blood.

"I doubt that very much," Darkstar replied, kicking another branch into the fire. "You carry your name boldly across your heart. Very soon, you'll find the North again and slide into the fold of home and this will become the dream. Your bones are destined for the snow."

Maybe that was why she felt the cold, although she denied it. The ice was a breath of fate. "Are you thinking of her?" Arya asked, when the troubled Dayne fell quiet. "The princess. Guess you are. People spend a lot of time thinking about the dead. They don't think about us. The dead. Except if they come back to life. I've seen that too."

He frowned at the girl. No. Though she had a boyish face, Arya Stark was older than a girl – near sixteen if he were to guess. "What do you mean? The dead are dead."

"Not any more. I saw a priest of R'hllor kiss a man back to life."

"Liar."

"Whatever you like. If you come far enough North with the queen you'll see it too. They say my brother died for three days before a Red Priest brought him back. There are other ways for the dead to walk again." Her mind wandered to the halls of faces, glistening in the torch light. She wondered what face Jaqen H'ghar wore today. Her mind had been reaching back, replaying every moment from Braavos to Dorne. He'd saved her from discovery more than once wearing Missandei's face.

"Men aren't meant to come back from death," Darkstar bristled to her company. Starks were difficult creatures to like. It was the way they looked at you – as though you were a meal. "There is a dangerous place – between the two realms – where restless souls are trapped, wandering forever. To die is a gift. To live is a dream. The only way to be born again is through our children. Like you... Ned Stark all over. And yes, in answer to your question. I think of her. I'll always think of her."


The dragons landed in the mountains and abandoned their riders before pushing off into the wind to hunt. They snapped at each other, tussling before vanishing from view. Daenerys drifted toward Jorah, rubbing her naked arms against the cold. "It's freezing..." she murmured.

He wished he had something to give her but his plate armour was of little use. It picked up the cold worse than her skin. He remembered what it was like to wear it in the snow – how it burned naked flesh and tore it away. Beyond the wall, it had to be abandoned entirely replaced by thick layers of leather.

They had no torches but the fires of her army were easy to pick in the sparse forest. "It will only become colder from here. One day you will miss the desert heat, Khaleesi, though you scorned it so vehemently." Khaleesi suited her better than queen.


The fires perished into glowing embers surrounded by bodies. In the fair weather most did not bother with a tent except the queen. Hers was strung between a pair of leaning pines. Their bark frayed the rope and shed insects which, confused, ambled over the silks.

Their pretence bordered on the ridiculous.

Nightly, Queen Daenerys and her Bear performed a dance for the benefit of the army. Talks began at sunset – strategic meetings attended by the generals. These evolved into political talks confined to her council which further still deteriorated into private discussions until only the knight remained. They carried on through dinner, retiring to the queen's tent where neither were seen again until morning. However their intentions began, the result endured.

They lay on the floor, separated by an unfathomable spread of cushions. The queen asleep. I am watching over her, Jorah told himself, as he turned onto his side. Her silver hair was caught behind her while a layer of fur was pulled to her neck. He reached over, running his hand down the wolf fur.

"You are breaking your own rules, ser Jorah..." The queen murmured.

So he was. His hand drifted to a safe distance.


Darkstar wandered to escape the watchful eye of the wolf. The terrain was difficult, riddled with flat boulders and shale which broke away underfoot. He gripped onto the trees, pulling himself over dry creek beds until he found a quiet place to sit.

It was uncommonly cold. He'd travelled these mountains many times at this time of the year and never felt quite so much bite in the air. There was even a layer of mist starting to gather ahead, illuminated by the rising moon.

Truth hit him. The world had fallen quiet. Owls tucked their beaks between layers of down. The thrum of insects suffocated. The Dothraki horses who had been restless all night, stilled. Even he had gone quiet, listening intently to the world.

Something was wrong.

Carefully, he pried himself off the rock and withdrew his curved sword. It caught the moonlight for a moment while he spun slowly, searching the wood for signs of movement. He found none but his shadow. The mist thickened into a fog as he watched. His breath filled the air with clouds of vapour. The camp fires behind faded, obscured by the cold.

His skin crawled.

Quickly as he dared, Darkstar headed back, climbing toward the camp which clawed along the ridge. He did not want to shout in case their army had been followed into the hills by a raiding force – Martell had enemies yet and the Silver Dragon inherited them. It might be nothing. Surely it was nothing. Who would dare attack an army as large as the queen's with a pair of dragons keeping watch? Who could?

Darkstar stopped dead.

Ice crawled up the back of his neck. He could feel snow gathering in his long hair and the metal blade in his hand freezing beneath his touch. A sound cracked on the air, splitting it apart. An impending sense of dread gripped his body. Fear. True – primal fear. The deepest kind that stole the breath away. It took a hold of his heart, clenching into a fist around it until he felt like he was choking.

He forced himself to turn on the woods. He found a glistening silhouette forged from ice. Nearly eight feet tall – edges glistening like the surface of the sea – and eyes – a pair of sapphires with the sun behind.

It had one arm – the other was severed roughly with strips of purple withered at the wound. A face of ice barely moved as the demon opened its mouth and sent a foul sound on the world. For a moment Darkstar remained perfectly still, staring in awe at the walking myth. He was dreaming. Another nightmare... As the Other approached the cold intensified until it covered his arms with a layer of frost.

Darkstar lifted his sword, swaying it from side to side. He backed away, feeling the ground behind raising toward the camp. He did not know where the creature had come from but it was here to kill them all.

"ATTACK!" Darkstar screamed, at the top of his lungs. It was the only word he had time for.

The creature lunged on him at once, weaving through the trees like smoke before it reached for Darkstar's sword with its bare hands. Darkstar swung, clutching the weapon with both hands. Time slowed. His world became the passage of the blade, cutting through the mist. Closer and closer. Ice and steel. The sword shattered into a thousand pieces as it touched the creature's flesh. Darkstar was carried over with the momentum, stumbling to his left with the base of the sword caught in his hands. He gasped at the sudden loss, staring in confusion for a fatal moment. The Other gripped him by the back of his clothes and tossed him through the wood like a bag of seed.

Wind rushed across his body while the blur of the forest passed. He waited for the inevitable – a crunch of his bones against the stomach of a tree – but it never came. Instead, Darkstar landed in a storm of sails which tore apart under his crashing weight. The structure folded inwards like the arms of a Craken, dragging him into the dark and quiet.

Daenerys and Jorah rolled at the last minute, lifting their hands defensively as the entire side of the tent suddenly collapsed. A body hit the cushions before they were all consumed by darkness. Outside, Jorah heard swords drawing. Men running. Fires hissing. Dothraki horses whinnying in panic.

"Dany!" He shouted, moving blindly through the ocean of leather and silk. "Dany!" Cushions. Plates of fruit. Sheets. A warm body. He latched onto her wrist.

"Ser?"

"Take my hand," Jorah replied. He took his dagger and slashed open the tent, gasping at the fresh, night air. It was immediately replaced with rolling clouds of smoke. Chaos surrounded them. The edge of the forest around the camp had caught alight. Flames ripped up the tree trunks sending out desperate shrills from the birds that lived there. Dothraki were racing for their horses, trying to pull them back from the flames as they bucked and kicked. The Dornish were drunk on wine and sleep, stumbling around camp for their weapons. Their tent had been destroyed by a writhing body, clutching his arm where fresh blood spilled.

"Gerold?" Jorah grabbed him by the chest and pulled Darkstar to his feet, looking the man up and down in shock. "What the bloody hell is going on? Hey!" The Dayne's eyes were elsewhere, focused on the wood where swords were fighting. "Look at me!" The next word out of Jorah's lips was a slap in the face.

"I saw it, in the trees!" Darkstar recovered, standing on his own. The dull throb in his arm went unnoticed. He looked down at the empty handle of his sword that he was still clutching. "A demon made of ice."

Jorah pried it from his grasp and wiped away the blood. "Only one thing does that to a steel blade." He turned to the queen. "We have to get you out of here. Drogon – he can fly you to safety."

"Drogon is hunting." She replied, sliding a dagger from beneath her robes.

"That'll do no good against what hunts you – better to have both hands. A horse – then. Ride into the Dornish Marches. I will find you there. Go. Go!"

She nodded and headed immediately for a horse – any horse while Jorah and Darkstar re-grouped. "Which way?" Jorah demanded, unsheathing Dawn while he handed Snowflake to the Dayne. "I don't know how much it will count for but it's one of their weapons."

Darkstar stared at the white blade, amazed. He could see the cold coming off the edge in a white mist.

They followed the screams, pushing into the woods between roaring arches of flame that had taken hold in the pines. Around them, corpses of the recently dead started to twitch. Their eyes widened as those bodies lifted their heads and sat up, eyes blue as the sea.

"Ser..." Darkstar's voice wavered.

"Fire..." he replied, plucking a log from the ground, thick has his arm. He held it in the fire long enough to set the end alight. Darkstar did the same.

"What are you doing?!" Darkstar tried to pull Jorah away as he touched the edge of his torch onto the clothes of a twitching corpse. "He was still alive!"

If that were true, there would have been screaming. "Not the sort of life you imagine," Jorah promised, as the body roared into flame. Another sword shattered nearby. They followed it and found a group of soldiers circling the ice demon. Some foolishly held swords. Others did as Jorah and brandished flaming logs. "It's just the one..."

"One what?" Darkstar mouthed.

"I'll tell you after we kill it."

While the men were planning to attack the Other – the dead raised by its horrific magic stumbled closer. They picked the men off one at a time, tearing at their flesh with their bare hands. Their victims were vivisected and themselves brought back into the fight.

Darkstar was first, bounding over a flat rock – skidding down the surface before launching himself with considerable force at the Other's back. His sword was aimed for the flesh and met its mark, sinking into the ice. The sound of a glacier cleaving from the sure deafened the men. The Other spun wildly, throwing Darkstar off before reaching behind for the sword that had already fallen to the ground.

While Darkstar scrambled to retrieve it, Jorah was next, lifting the milkglass blade over his head. He did not get the chance to strike. Cold hands caught his back – pulled him out of step. The dead reached hungrily for his flesh. He fought them off, kicking and swiping until Darkstar held a flame to their faces. When the looked up, fresh from survival, the Other was gone.

"Qrugh! skoriot se nopāzma gōntan ziry jikagon?" Darkstar fell into his native tongue of High Valyrian. He spun endlessly, searching the mist. Bodies were rising all around them. They'd have to burn the forest to the ground.

"The Queen..." Jorah replied. "It came here for her."


Daenerys slid her leg over the bare back of the horse and wrapped her arms around its neck. Soldiers ran everywhere, darting between flames while the roar of trees catching fire made the beast buck beneath her.

"Sh – sh..." She cooed at it, pressing her weight onto its neck until its front hooves hit the rock. Then she tapped its ribs with her bare feet, startling it into life. The horse lurched forward, heading to the track that wounds its way down the mountain side. A few minutes later they passed beyond the flames and cut into the open where the cold mountain air brushed away the smoke. She faced the moon – the silvery orb hanging over the water with a thousand reflections glistening like tiny moons beneath. Men screamed behind her. Their howls followed her like shadows.

Hands scratched at her back. Bones that weren't there. Tracks of blood seeped through her silks from phantom wounds. Jorah. Wherever he was, the dead were upon him.

For a moment, she considered turning back.

There it was.

A pillar of ice blocked her path. The creature made from frozen wastes stalked forward with its single arm hanging at its side. Its eyes glowed, finding light from somewhere within its corpse. Magic swirled in the air, gathering as mist that bled from the ground at its feet.

She kicked her horse sharply, intending to rush the demon. Instead, the horse bucked up wildly, petrified. It reared, higher and higher until finally Daenerys' hands slipped over its mane and she was left tumbling toward the ground which she hit with a crack. Her body burned. The horse's hooves pummelled into the dirt either side, stomping wildly – barley missing her flesh. The mare retreated, storming back toward the flames of the camp behind.

Daenerys picked herself off the ground and faced the creature that lived in her nightmares. She has seen its form a thousand times. Night after night – wandering in the snows beyond the wall.

"Nyke gīmigon ao... I know you..." Daenerys addressed it in High Valyrian as she stalked toward the creature. All this time she had wondered what reaction her flesh would have. Fear? Would her limbs be stitched to her side and heart unable to beat? No. She felt only strength and the fire coiling beneath her skin. She was made to destroy it. "But you don't know me..."

If the creature was trying to say something, it left its cracked lips as a rasp. It was a man, entombed by ice and magic, existing somewhere between life and death where not even the gods could reach.


Jorah broke free of the smoke. Below, he saw Daenerys toe-to-toe with the monster of ice. It lumbered toward her, reaching forward with its single hand as it had done to the men. She held her ground. Mist gathering at her feet.

"Run..." he begged her, beneath his breath. "Run..."

Jorah vaulted over a chasm of rock, hit the flat face of another and skidded down the shale. Knots of wood and spined-ferns cut across his legs. He thought of nothing – saw nothing – except the queen bracing herself against the creature.


The back of Daenerys' legs pained with a thousands tiny cuts. In the distance she heard the whisper of her knight's voice, pushed back by the freezing wind. She held the Other in her gaze. It came for her, flexing its silver muscles – twitching fingers about to strike down on her face.

At the last moment, Daenerys lifted her arm, creating a barrier in front of her face. The creature struck – skin to skin – and found itself obliterated.

A thousands shards of ice fell as tears, flooding the stone.

Daenerys remained – a statue to the night.


Hundreds saw the demon massacred at her touch. They watched from their perch, swords dropping in shock, as the queen stepped through the pile of snow at her feet then turned with her unearthly eyes lifting to the army in the hills.

"I am fire made flesh!" Daenerys screamed at the night. "Iksan va ñellyrty perzys! Anha zin vorsa ki kher!" High Valyrian and Dothraki until all her hoards were shouting. She stood before them and roared until the moon itself bowed.

A god among men. Every knee found the earth. Every sword laid to rest. The doubting – the opportune – the vengeful and petty – all were made honest men at the feet of the Silver Queen. Even Darkstar felt the breath of the gods visit them upon that hill. There was a difference, he'd been told all his life, between skirmish and war. He saw the war waiting for them on the other side of dawn.

Ser Jorah, fallen at the edge of the path beneath the rocks, thrust Dawn into the dirt and used its strength to find his feet. Soot and blood obscured his face, pressed into the cracks. He had witnessed unspeakable things at her hands but never the defiance of a god.


They were stirred back into reality by the ruined bodies of trees falling in the forest, spreading fire from one hilltop to the next. Those that lived packed what they could and fled down the road toward the Dornish Marches. Half their horses were already there, seeking refuge for their burns in the cool waters. Daenerys' dragons were drawn back by the flames and circled, fanning them with each swipe of their wings. Jorah and Darkstar took teams of soldiers and patrolled the edge of the woods. They waited for the undead to rise and flee only to hurl their corpses back into the furnace.

When it was done, they counted their loss.

"How many?" The queen demanded, while her ladies peeled away the silk dress from the wounds on her legs and back. Jorah winced, she did not.

"Nearly forty," he replied. "Five still missing and a dozen horses that ran into the woods. I have an inventory being made of the supplies but we were fortunate, it could have been a lot worse."

"Worse?" she whispered, brushing away the women. "One of those creatures – one – alone and severely injured took forty men? Hundreds more await and how many thousands of their ghoulish soldiers?" Her hand shook as it curled around the base of the goblet. She sipped the wine, letting it coat the back of her throat. There she held it, relishing the spice and smoke. "How did it get here? Everything we know about those creatures says that the great Northern Wall keeps them from the realm. What the hell is it doing prowling the edge of Dorne?"

Jorah shook his head. "I can not say. It does not make sense. We do not know if these Others die of their own accord-"

"How could they? They are already dead..."

"Exactly. It might be from a time before The Wall." Jorah shook his head. "Though I don't see how it could roam the world unnoticed. All we can do is hope that it is alone."

Hope? You bring me hope? She thought darkly.

The queen's bloodied clothes had been left in a pile in the corner of the tent, waiting to be burned. Jorah's eyes settled on them. The queen bled for him and there was nothing he could do about it. She caught his gaze lingering there and returned it with a scornful look. "How am I to head into battle," he said, "knowing what I do?"

"You must have faith, ser..." She replied. "That the gods have another purpose for us."

Faith? She demands faith? He wondered.

"The gods have a purpose," he replied, shaking his head in hopeless submission, "and that purpose is chaos. Varys knows it. Tyrion's played into its hands once before. You are about to bring it to King's Landing."


They could not remain on the narrow strip between the marshes. The thrum of insects attacked the flesh in clouds of noise. Smoke from the burning hilltops sank with the cold and suffocated the lands, mingling with the fog until it was all one wretched stench. Nightsong became a beacon on the road, burning to their left like a star as their army marched North.


KING'S LANDING – WESTEROS

The doors on the Sept of Baelor were nailed shut, covered in thick boards and reinforced with iron bands. Its stained glass windows were all smashed in letting the rain thrash on the marble floors. Another storm, passing the city in a nightly fuck as if the Storm God himself were visiting his whore.

Sparrows knelt in circles, praying at dark halls. They tried not to hear the thunder shaking what was left of their fortress. Parts of the city remained under their control but not Aegon's High Hill or Visenya's Hill where their temple stood. The collapsed ruins of the Dragonpit in the North had become their sanctuary. They'd smashed open the bronze doors, stepped over the bones of dragons and fortified themselves there. The Northern quadrant of the city extending the length of the West became their domain while the royal house held the ports to the East and the Tyrell's the Southern roads.

King's Landing had become a city divided by faith. Fuelled by jealousy and vacuums of power. People were crucified in the streets and left hanging as feasts for the gulls.

"Ready?" One of the Sparrows whispered, shouldering a sack.

It was the depths of both the night and the storm. The High Sparrow dragged the hood of his cloak down. Beneath the ragged cloth he was an old man. Only power born of jealousy fired his heart, pushing him out the narrow passage beneath the chapel and onto the street. The rain buried the stone in several inches of water. It stank of filth and death where rats swam by and all the hell of the violent mob rushed down hill around their ankles. They'd have to wade through it, passing from one dragon hill to the next.

The sky was black except for violent cracks of light that came and went. Rain approached in sheets, visible as grey walls that broke over the buildings and stole every sound from the air except the pounding of the clouds. Ahead, in the North of the city, perched the Dragonpit. The High Sparrow marvelled at its ruinous claws of stone, clasping at the storm.


King Tommen stood on the balcony overlooking the city. The Northern and Western areas had fallen into shadow, lapping like the hungry tide toward the reclaimed East. His council was right – the Faith Militant were a plague upon the realm spreading fear and violence, throwing his people into self-righteous poverty.

Fighting street to street was hopeless. The sickness was in their minds. The path back to civilisation lay gilded with the heads of every last Sparrow.

"My king..." Cersei whispered, sidling out from the cover of the stone archways. The city lay stretched at their feet and to their left, the endless void of Blackwater Bay. Now she knew how its name came about. When the storms arrived it descended into darkness. A nightmare between the gods. There were storms like this when she had first married Robert. She'd dragged herself outside and curled up in the rain to calm her despair. "Come out of the storm."

"Am I not a Stormlord?" The boy replied, his golden hair plastered across his forehead. The world was cast into a violent stab of light as a shard of the heavens forked down from the sky and connected with a ship in the harbour. The mast exploded as the lightning flashed three times then died. Around them, the air tore apart.

Cersei clapped her hands over her ears as the thunder growled, ducking behind the wall in the face of its violence. Their petty wars were nothing compared to the gods. She reached up – latching onto the stone and felt it tremble in sympathy.

The rain turned her make-up into rivers of black and white. Soot and ash, mixed with oil stuck in her eyes. "Tommen! Tommen – come inside!" She grasped at his robes. The sheer force of the wind pushed her back – filling her gaping sleeves as though they were a ship's sails.

When her boy king finally turned he looked like one of the drowned men, crawled out onto the bank. "You said you had a way to flush the Faith out of the Sept."

Cersei struggled to stand. "Come back inside!"

"What are you planning, mother?"

Another burst of light. A fork of fire hitting a building in the city. The world lit up for a moment and then vanished. "Tommen..."

"It's all right..." he turned back to the violence. "I already know. I've been waiting for you to tell me." Tommen tried to imagine the ocean of lurid green wildfire beneath the sept. One stray gasp of fire and the heart of the Faith would be evaporated. "Would you have done it with my wife still inside?" He faced his mother, nearly as tall as her. "Well? How far might you go – far enough to murder a queen?"

Cersei backed away from the storm, seeking shelter in the arms of stone. The king was forced to follow for his answer. Lamplight curved warmly around them. Oceans of water dripped from their clothes. "Of course not..." she replied, lifting her hand to her son's cheek. He shrunk away from her touch. "You love your queen. That is honourable – something worth fighting for. I am capable of many things but not destroying your happiness."

"I want to believe you – I do..."

"Then do..."

Tommen could see her lies as easily as the lightning in the storm. He wondered if his father saw as clearly as him. Tommen did everything he could to keep Jaime Lannister in the North, away from his mother's influence. Re-directing her letters – burning his reports. His mother was dangerous on her own – Tommen feared what she might do with an army at her back. Give my family a little more time, his wife had begged. "See that you take more care with the queen," Tommen stated plainly. "She is carrying your grandson."


BLACK WATER BAY – SOUTH OF DRAGONSTONE

The ship listed wildly in the storm. Daario slipped and smacked onto the deck as the world around him creaked violently. He started to slide with one edge of the ship curving into the waves. He flailed – reaching blindly until his arms wrapped around a protrusion of wood. For all his life he held on against the driving rain as his body parted from the deck. He hung there. Either side the grey wave curved, taking the ship with it like driftwood. In the howling wind he heard the men scream – his voice amongst them. Then suddenly the wave passed and the ship smacked back into the water sending everything into the air.

He slipped, flying five feet before gravity dragged him back, slamming him into the deck. Just as soon as he landed another wave rolled in, tilting the ship the other way this time. And so it began again.

"What the fuck are you doing!" Daario screamed at a huddle of pirates that were meant to be attending the sails.

"Praying!" One of his men replied, rolling across the deck – swept off his feet. "Prayin' for their lives."

Daario threw himself from mast to mast, crossing the ship with sheets of water tearing at his skin. "You don't need your hands to pray!" He grabbed each man and dragged him back to their posts. "Get on those fucking sails!"

He knew there were men in the water. He'd seen them go over. They bobbed in the rolling black, waiting for the gods of the deep to come for them. It was only the weight in their hulls that kept them steady. Without the treasure and weapons they'd have been scuttled hours ago.

Daario knew the waters around Dragonstone. They were cursed with rage. He thought of the ships beneath. The rotting wood. The carpet of bones. The filthy serpents of his childhood horrors.

"Captain – Captain!"

Daario spun around. Their ship had turned and now faced down the nose of the waves. They had climbed into the air without realising and reached the crest. The other side fell away and now they started to tip towards the infinite.

"Hold fast!" Daario shrieked. Every hand lunged to the rail, wrapping ropes around their bodies as the vessel teetered on oblivion. For one perfect moment the storm fell quiet. Daario could have sworn he heard the gentle pelt of rain on the glass of their last lantern. The flame swung. Extinguished. The world shifted underfoot and suddenly their boat had wings.