WYL – DORNE

"Did you ever notice," Sam questioned, as the ale smacked onto their table. Its cracked surface was drowned in sticky wine, salt and ash that stuck to their glasses. "That we keep endin' up in taverns? North ter' South o' Westeros and it looks about the same..."

The tavern staff were drawn and sallow – a pack of starved wolves weaving through the storm of patrons. Enormous seaweed mats were draped over the walls, breaking the limestone which peeked through the weave like bones from a corpse. Glass vases swirled with smoke while merchants took turns dragging breath from metal pipes attached in snake-like forms to their bases and embellished with silver dragons, fish and crabs. The merchants laid back in squat chairs, drunk on perfumed air.

Marwyn scraped his goblet closer and dipped his thumb warily into the contents. Weak. Cheap.Words that had come to describe his life. "There's not much of anything else, Tarly, that's why. Where would you have us meet the Targarayen queen's representative, on the street? There is no safer place than a tavern," he insisted. "Look at all those eyes." They shone from every corner. "Watchmen keep you safe. I do all my business in hovels like this. Trust me, eh? I've made it this far in the world."

There were women in taverns too… Several Dothraki slithered up against the opposing wall casting lascivious looks in Marwyn's direction which he mistook for leers. He thirsted for the taste of flesh and the warmth only another's body could bring. He had a woman in every city from King's Landing to Asshai – two when he was younger. 'Those whores will be the death of you!' Leyton had warned, whenever he stumbled into the Hightower smelling of drink. 'Fucking well hope so...' He'd always replied, with a shine in his eye. If he could pick the manner of his departure it'd be between a woman's thighs.

"If they come," Sam nudged the handle of his drink with no intention of indulging. Even the look of it made him lurch. "There's no way of knowing if her man is comin' - or that they received your message. You are so desperately convinced of your own gravitas that you've overlooked the obvious." Sam had to pause and dab sweat from his forehead. "That we are insignificant and a member of the queen's court simply tossed our request into the fire. Face it, Marwyn… We might need ter start thinkin' of a different plan. Someone else who can help us. There are others. There are always others."

Gilly rubbed his back softly. "Ill?"

"Sea-legs, they call it." Sam leaned heavily against the wretched table. Both his hands gripped the edge until his knuckles turned white. "It's when sailors who've been at sea too long imagine that dry land is movin' like the sea. Even this tavern, Gilly, it's going back and an' bloody forth. I can' stand it!"

"We are all done with those boats. Sh..." Gilly bounced Little Sam on her knee. The tavern was thick with noise and the constant 'clink' of coin falling onto its pale-wood bar. It was the largest of its kind, curving through the length of the dwelling and threatening all who approached with its carved façade of screaming mer-creatures with gemstone eyes and brass tridents. The tavern's ceiling was supported by ancient ship masts, collected from the harbour and propped up through the room with steel bands which were polished to a fault, picking up the lamplight. Scraps from Nymeria's fleet. "They look odd..."

"Unsullied," Marwyn replied. "Freed by the queen. A slaver tried to sell them to her in the East for a fair price. Instead, she burned the city to the ground and took the slave army into the desert. Now they fight for her. Of course, one wonders if the trail of blood would be quite so thick if the slaver hadn't first insulted her. A mistake not to be repeated. "And there are the Dornish, with their yellow sashes. Even the Dothraki savages made it inside tonight. Was there ever an army with so much colour?" He mused into his glass. The Targaryen's mismatched forces were a nightmare waiting for dusk. Peace would be her undoing, of that Marwyn had no doubt.

"He looks like he's from the North." Sam pointed out the tall, older man who had entered the tavern and cast his blue eyes carefully over the room. His sandy hair was flecked with grey but his figure was as sharp as any of the younger men. He wore the Targaryen colours – black and red except for the pair of dancing bears threaded into his shirt.

Marwyn struggled to turn his sizable form around. "Bloody hell..." he exhaled. "I mean – I knew – of course but it's something else an' all to see the man in the flesh. That there is the exiled Mormont prince, only son of your departed Lord Commander. 'Prince of Winter' in days past. No wonder he looks so fucking awkward. I bet he never thought he'd find himself back in Westeros. Not in a thousand years. That'll be who the queen's sent to speak with us. Gilly, would you mind bringing him over?"


Jorah Mormont wasn't sure what to make of his company. A runaway from the Night's Watch calling himself a maester-in-training. The most notorious mage at the citadel who had recently abandoned his post after burning part of the great library to the ground. A child and - "Who are you, again?" He asked the woman.

"Gilly..." she bristled at his tone.

"Like the flower." The woman had the look of the North. "And where are you from, Gilly?" Jorah pressed, his disposition cold.

"Mole's Town," Marwyn quickly intervened. Mormonts would rather kill Wildlings than take ale with them. Maybe living in exile had changed the Bear's opinion on the subject. More likely not. "Do you know it?"

"Ay. I know it." Jorah replied simply. If she was from Mole's Town then he was a fucking dragon. "You sent a request to meet Queen Daenerys Targaryen, why?"

"We have an important message for her – from the Lord Commander of the Night's Watch."

"From Thorne?" Jorah dipped his head curiously. There wasn't a cryptic bone in that man's body.

"Ah – the late Lord Commander Snow – no longer 'late' actually. He died and then there was this Red Priestess and a fire – something about a wolf..."

Jorah considered leaving. He should have sent Black Scale to deal with these lunatics although that ball-less monster had even less patience than he did. "What was the message?" He prompted, when Tarly finished rambling without actually managing to depart any useful information.

"Winter isn' coming any more – it's 'ere," Sam leaned in, nearly knocking his ale over. A shower of sweat fell over the table. "Well, at The Wall. With my own eyes I saw it. Dead men. Rising out of the snow all bone an' corpse – demons made of ice. They brought the freezing winds with them… Forced the Freefolk out o' the lands beyond The Wall." He let that terrifying information settle, staring expectantly at the knight.

"I know." Jorah eyed the ale, wondering if it was any good. "I saw them."

"Saw them?" Sam's mouth fell open.

"Yes, Tarly, saw them. We were attacked in the Red Mountains by one of these ice creatures less than a week ago."

"But they're beyond The Wall – Hardhome and outside Craster's Keep. They – how could..." Sam turned to Marwyn but the mage was paralysed by an unspoken truth.

"The creature in the vaults of the citadel..." Marwyn whispered, then turned to Jorah. "There was a relic from the last war – or the war before it. One of those things... We thought we killed it with fire but it must have survived – somehow… Escaped. Neither of us saw the ice demon die. Sam and I – we couldn't see through the flames. There's a chance it lived. Old Town is not far from the Red Mountains."

Jorah reached forward and snatched Marwyn by his robes, dragging him uncomfortably close. The Bear smelled like smoke and dust. "What are you talking about? One of these things was at the citadel and you didn't tell anyone? For how long?"

"It was kept by Leyton Hightower – part of his collection of magical things." Marwyn tried to divert the Mormont's fury onto Leyton's corpse. "After he died we thought it safest to dispose of the creature instead of leaving it in the city. Those things, they get into people's heads – whispering without words – they make you do things you shouldn't. We did not know who we could trust. Leyton was murdered by a servant of the Faceless God. They are everywhere… I don't know what they want but they have infiltrated Westeros and started meddling in her politics." Marwyn saw recognition flicker across the knight's eyes. "You've come across them as well..."

"One of the Queen's sailors was replaced by a Faceless Man in Braavos. We suspected another to be on our ship shortly thereafter. Their hatred of Targaryens is legendary. They are trying to stop the Queen's conquest of Westeros incited by lords with money. There is something I do not understand." Jorah released his grip on the mage and shifted his interest to Tarly. "Why did Lord Snow send you all this way – to the other end of the continent with such a message? Commander Thorne already sent ravens to every ruler in the land, including the Queen, outlining the threat in the North. I am the most likely adviser to heed the warning so I will ask again and do not lie. Why have you come to meet Queen Daenerys?"

Sam was trapped in the knight's eyes. They were terrifying. He dared not lie again. "After Maester Aemon died I was sent to the citadel to train as his replacement. Aemon was a dragon. He worried for your queen. I think, his vows aside, he wanted to save her. I was with him in his last days."

"Aemon was an old man when I was a child..." Jorah admitted. It was strange to think of him as dead. Men like that did not die. They faded into the snow with their spirits fused to the world.

"After our devastating loss at Hardhome, Commander Snow was gravely worried. So much time 'as passed since the wars that built The Wall that no one really knows what ter do 'cept stand on them. I was meant ter search for material related to the ice demons in the citadel's archives. There are volumes that date back nearly a thousand years." Sam shook his head, unable to express his meaning. "You think you know somethin' - yer hear all the stories growin' up and then you realise tha' it's only smoke an' mirrors. We've got fragments o' useless knowledge that was probably born a lie. The men of The Watch, they ride out into the snow an' hope their gods protect them but the gods aren' there. Beyond The Wall there's only death an' it's coming fer the realm. Every man on that wall will fight ter the death but it won' make a damn bit o' difference."

"Instead of books, Tarly found me..." Marwyn finished. "There is no one in the realm who knows more about magic and dragons. It is my life's work and that of Leyton's." Although the statement rang false in the presence of a man who'd raised three dragons with a powerful, magical queen. He longed to lay eyes on her. The Mother of Dragons…

"I admit, your reputation precedes you..." Jorah insinuated Marwyn's fame extended beyond the common duties of 'maester'. He sat back in his chair and considered them. "Your information and warning about the North is being taken under advisement but I warn you, the Queen looks to the Iron Throne first. Then, if you remain alive, perhaps we can continue this discussion at a later time."

"But-" Sam opened his mouth.

"Mormont I-" Marwyn was too large to stop Mormont from leaving.

"Ser..." Gilly blocked Jorah's path with a child in her arms. "Yer know wha' I am. I can see it, in your face. Same thing I see n' all the Northerners..." It was an ingrained distaste. The Freefolk succeeded where the North failed and they'd never been forgiven for it. "I'm not from Mole's Town – I'm one o' Craster's wives. That shit beyond The Wall." She could feel Sam and Marwyn exchange a fearful glance. It was a risk to tempt a Mormont with the promise of Wildling blood – especially Ser Jorah. Rumour was his mother had been slain by a roving hoard. Bears were not in the habit of forgetting a thing like that.

"Craster is a man without a soul..." Jorah breathed in reply. The others relaxed.

"I was born int'er slavery. Raped and confined – forced to bear my father's child," she nodded at Little Sam who Jorah had incorrectly believed belonged to Tarly. "Craster used to offer up his boys to the blue-eyed creatures in th' forest. Blood sacrifices to the great power that lives beyond the snows."

"The ice demons are Craster's children?"

"Some of them," Gilly nodded. At least two were hers… "Somehow they're changed. Sam there, he killed one of the demons when we ran away." She paused, looking at her beautiful, warm and alive child. "I've seen at least sixty children taken. Imagine how many Whitewalkers there are if every one of our babes was turned..."

Jorah eyed Tarly carefully. "How did you manage to better one of those creatures? Myself and a legendary fighter from Dorne stood toe-to-toe and could not stop an injured one. Near forty of our men died trying until the Queen finished the battle for us. How did you do it?"

"Dragonglass… Kills them quick if you can get near enough. I got lucky." Sam replied. "Same as Jon with the Commander's old sword. Mormont's sword. Your..." Sam struggled with the realisation. "Your sword… Ser. It's made of Valyrian steel. The Commander – Commander Mormont, he ah – he gave it to Jon before he died. It was meant to be yours but I think – I – your father knew what was out there waiting for us."

The moment was incredibly awkward. Marwyn kept quiet. House swords were a serious business, especially those made of Valyrian steel. Wars had been fought over less.

"We have a fleet of dragonglass..." Jorah ignored the revelation about his family heirloom. "Brought from the Far East to fight in the wars to come. Their blades are being refashioned as we speak."

Marwyn shifted. The Mormont had unwittingly revealed too much. "Then you know what your father knew..." he whispered. "That the real war is coming. Of course you do… You're a Bear. Why would you fight for a Targaryen unless you were promised something in return? You lot have never cared for thrones or gold so what is it?"

"As I said," Jorah repeated, stiffening. "We cannot help you – yet. There is much blood between the Queen and The Wall. The Lannisters have no interest in the problems of the North."

"Neither do Targaryens..." Marwyn countered, watching carefully for Jorah's reaction. The gave as much as a wall of ice.

"The Queen's magic runs deeper than dragons, as you are aware. Your friend Hightower had an interest in her that went beyond the casual. I should know. He was my father-in-law."

"Yes that's – that's why I came to you. I heard that she dreams…"

Jorah lowered his voice into a rustle of air that might be found between the pines. "Daenerys has seen things you cannot imagine, Marwyn..." He paused at the distinct chirp of a dragon. Jorah drew back in alarm.

"We ah – forgot to mention..." Sam nodded at the large brown sack under the table. "There's also a-"

"Not here!" Jorah hissed, at the idiots. "Outside. Now!"


"You do not keep a dragon in a sack!" Jorah could not believe his eyes.

They'd found a sort of cave pressed into the limestone cliffs where they could be alone. The lights of Wyl were a dim nest of stars below and the sea, barely a sheet of grey silk. Tarly untied the rope at the neck of the sack and a tiny, infant dragon tumbled onto the cave floor. The creature spun several times then immediately ran to Sam's feet. It was crimson, like the Queen's banners with black claws and the first hints of gold on its scales.

"We didn' have anything else to carry her in," Sam defended. "And we didn' want anyone to see."

"Well – you wouldn't..." Jorah was in shock. The creature scratching at the stone floor was an impossibility – at least in this part of the world. "Did you steal it?"

"Of course not!" Sam defended, and then found himself amending that statement. "Lord Hightower was dead. We didn't want his egg falling into the hands of the Faceless Men so we took it."

"And it just hatched. All on its own..."

"Not quite..."

"Tarly!" Jorah barked, causing the dragon to cower behind Sam. "You tell me how you hatched that egg!"

Gilly stepped forward. "Marwyn put it in the flames at the top of the Hightower. The Wildfire hatched it. No one expected it to work… We've no idea how to raise a dragon."

"Evidently..." Jorah knelt and extended his hand toward the dragon. He made soft, cooing sounds like one might beckon a foal. Slowly, the dragon pressed its nose out from behind Sam and nudged forward curiously. "If you keep her in a sack she'll never fly."

"The egg comes from Asshai." Marwyn admitted. He did not mention that there was a second, unhatched. "Ash is only a few months old but growing fast."

Ash inched out, closer and closer to Jorah until its tiny, sharp fangs nipped the top of his finger, drawing blood.

"Ash!" Gilly scorned sharply.

"No..." Jorah held his free hand up. "That is normal – they like to get a taste of you." A moment later, Ash licked Jorah's finger and then moved close enough for Jorah to pet the top of its head gently. It was a sweet thing. Calmer than the Queen's dragons. "You cannot have a dragon," he added, seriously.

"Well – we do." Gilly insisted.

"Politically." Jorah clarified. "The Queen is, 'The Mother of Dragons'. If you also have a dragon, then what does that make the Queen?"

None of them could answer. Sam scrambled forward and snatched Ash away from the knight. "We didn' hatch a dragon ter cause trouble. It just happened. We've come all this way for your help – to be allies. If you are not interested then we will leave. Simple as that."

"It is too late for you to leave..." Jorah drawled darkly. "If you want to be a friend to the Queen," he continued, standing so that he towered over all three of them, "then you will do exactly as I say." He spoke slowly, allowing each of his words to reverberate off the cave walls.

Marwyn's eyes were drawn to the hilt of the knight's sword. There was no mistaking House Dayne's relic. Mormont and his Silver Queen must have plucked if from the ash in the ruined tower. The gods, whichever ones they were, shadowed their cause. "May we have a moment to discuss-"

"No." Jorah cut Marwyn off. "Yes – or no." The dragon twisted in Tarly's arms. Soon she would be too large for any of them to control. "I do not think you grasp how far the Queen has come to take back her throne. Nothing will stop her. Not your heroic cause, not whispers of a future war and certainly not another dragon.


Daenerys Targaryen could not find any words. Her army was pitched in the mountains outside Wyl. Their sheer number suffocated any thought of rebellion from the locals providing them with a safe refuge. It was a blessing, after days spent under constant assault in the marshes from thieves and insects. The steep climb from the town nearly killed Marwyn. He left a trail of sweat on the dirt. The last to stop in, he folded the flap of the Queen's tent down ending the drone of mosquitoes.

Ash lay in the coals of a fire burning in the centre of the tent, barely visible between the hissing flames. Behind, Marwyn caught his first glimpse of the Silver Queen, quivering on the other side of the fire. A living, breathing Targaryen alive in the world and she was every inch her ancestors. Oh yes, she was as beautiful as the rumours promised. She was a falling star, tearing itself apart on night's endless fabric. She was not simply soaked in magic, her form was writ in it. Fire churned beneath her pale skin.

"Your Grace..." Marwyn fell to his knees, folded double. Both his hands flush to the dirt. He dared to lift his head and look on her again. Targaryens were not meant for the West. "I have travelled further than most men alive," he began, "and discovered many eyes like yours – all of them in the East."

"Look again," Daenerys replied, her voice twisting as though it were part of the flames, "the East is a land of ghosts."

He did look again and could have sworn that he saw an apparition in the flames. "Apologies… If I offended."

The Queen smirked and let her eyebrow curl slightly as she turned toward Jorah. Offending her required more skill than this curious maester possessed.

"It will never survive..." Daenerys broke her silence. "I had to wait many years in the desert for my dragons to grow before they were large enough to sail to Westeros. In that time there were dozens of attempts to kill and steal them. The larger they grow, the stronger they become. Young dragons are a risk. Even if your dragon lives, soon it will grow beyond your control and lay waste to whatever it sees – or simply fly into the sunset."

"Help us, then..." Tarly asked, stepping from the shadows. "Why should Ash die simply because she was born at the wrong time?"

Daenerys' breathe caught in her throat. She nearly died because of the poor timing of her birth. "Ash is a female dragon?" Tarly nodded. "All of mine are male. They will never lay eggs. I always imagined that they would be the last dragons in Westeros." Like her.

A female dragon could mean the beginning of a dynasty.

The Queen crossed the tent and eased Tarly off the dirt. "I will try, Tarly of the Night's Watch, to raise your dragon. That is all I can promise. Even if I succeed I warn you, she will not be large enough to defend your ice wall. This creature is hope – a promise after the Winter – not a soldier."

"Queen Daenerys," Marwyn addressed her carefully. "May I ask a question?" He waited for her to nod before continuing. "Your knight mentioned that it was you who ended the battle in The Red Mountains. How?"

"The ice creature touched me and shattered."

He could not believe what he was looking at. Daenerys was not simply a queen, she was a creature of prophecy. "No one has ever done that," he whispered. "Not even in the ages past."

'There are times I look at you and still can't believe you're real.' She heard Jorah's voice in her head.

"I have brought something else to show you," Tarly interrupted, extracting a heavy package which he laid over an up-turned trunk. The glass candles were wrapped in many layers of cloth. "We borrowed these from the citadel..."

Marwyn surged forward when he realised what was about to happen. "No! You must not!" Marwyn snatched the coverings and put them back over the emerging glass candles. "My apologies..." he added, to the Queen and Jorah who had been about to do the same. "The candles are awake, Sam," he explained. "Anyone might be watching. The last thing we want them seeing is a Targaryen with a dragon."

Sam felt embarrassed. That was not the first time he'd had a glass candle snatched away. "I saw a pair of blue eyes in that one," he explained. "And – you, I think. In a cave. Does that mean you have a candle of your own."

Daenerys nodded. "We found a similar object at the edge of the world – in a cave… And I have seen you, Sam Tarly, in its sad waters. Why else do you think I permitted you entrance to this tent? The gods are watching us – the demons too."


Daenerys and Jorah were left with the scarlet dragon. The tiny creature mewed sadly at the stretch of canvas. "If we intend to keep this dragon those three will have to join us. It has a bond with them."

Jorah laid out old cloth on the floor for it to sleep in and some straw. "I know. It cannot hurt to have a man of the Night's Watch and a mage from the citadel in our number. They might be useful."

"They could be trouble..."

"So could an army of the undead, Your Grace."

"Especially Marwyn. I get the feeling he wants to collect me."

Jorah clicked his fingers, trying to coax the dragon out of the flames but instead it sank deeper. "It is large, don't you think, for its age?"

"I noticed."

"Marwyn is notorious for – well – everything..." There was no delicate way for Jorah to put that. "But there is one truth that persists in every account that I have heard. Grandmaester Marwyn is brilliant. My father-in-law trusted him above every soul in the realm. Daenerys, you are his life's work. He is a passionate person, loyal and devout. Turning him away would be a mistake. Curse your enemies all you like but curse your friends at great risk."

"I suppose it is customary for every King in Westeros to have a maester but the others? A man of the Night's Watch and his woman?" Eventually Daenerys gave up protesting and sank onto the cushions. The tiny dragon was shifting in the flames, considering the bed Jorah had prepared. "What were you saying earlier, about your father's sword?"

"It is with the Stark King," Jorah joined her, nursing a pitcher of wine. "I returned it to my father before I fled from the North. House swords stay with the family. If my father chose to give it to that Stark boy then there is nothing more to say on the subject." Although it stung to think of another man's bastard being worthy of his family's affection when he was not. Jorah made mistakes, he understood this but his family meant everything to him and he meant nothing to them.

"You'll not fight him for it, if you see him?"

"No… Though I might ask if he'd consider passing it to Lyanna. By rights it is hers. What?"

"I was wondering how swords became so important to the Westerosi. Almost all your swords were once Targaryen but we treated them as weapons not slithers of god," she replied, sensing his stormy mood. "I have read many stories about Houses that let their people starve rather than trade their sword. They are more precious than all the coin in the kingdom, as proved by the Lannisters when they tried and failed to purchase one for themselves. Do you think that, somewhere buried under all the tribal wars of the last thousand years, that we remember the true purpose of such blades?"

"We must pray they do, Khaleesi," said Jorah, laying his pair of swords on the rug beside them. "Fear breeds loyalty and you will need a great deal of it for what lays ahead. That Tarly boy was right about one thing. Most of what we remember was born of lies."


THE FROST FANGS – THE LANDS OF ALWAYS WINTER

Cold Hands could not tell if the castle was made of ice or stone. Its foundations had been consumed by the former long ago and then adorned with enormous protrusions of white, naturally formed into brutal spines by the wind and constant drip of the glacier above.

An unknown race, thousands of years before the Dawn Age, built it into the Frost Fangs, wedged between two mountains with a glacier eating its way overhead causing the ice to crack and growl. Every few days another cleave of it snapped off and tumbled hundreds of feet down the cliffs, smashing into the unknown wilderness below.

All he knew was that this castle was protected by magic. A different kind to The Wall. His like – a halfling possessed just enough humanity to break through the invisible barrier but the truly dead fell to pieces at his door.

He kept his horse inside, fed with shrubs harvested from the deepest valleys still warm enough to host life. Cold Hands was not alive enough to eat but he drank directly from the walls, suckling at the ice until it melted. He had become a parasite of the thing he cursed most.

Cold Hands wiped his mouth and settled in the centre of the room. He unwrapped a swaddle of filthy, black cloth to reveal the obelisk of glass. His fingers stroked along the smooth edge, feeling its power throb as though a fire raged there. He balanced it in the ice and stared into its depths. The smoke trapped within parted and for the briefest of moments, he glimpsed the Silver Queen and a flash of red scale. Then it fell dark. He did not know how many glass candles there were in the world but their owners were cautious. Cold Hands had nothing to lose and nothing to hide so he spent his days and nights holding vigil at its side. He saw many things – not all of which he believed.

His horse shifted restlessly at the back of the room. Cold Hands could hear the moan from the snow outside as the dead filled the valley below. He climbed to the window and peered down. A thick layer of mist had settled between the Frost Fangs concealing everything below. They were down there – somewhere – heading South.


WYL – DORNE

"And you will remove that chain from your neck," Daenerys added, the next afternoon, as she paced around Marwyn. She had agreed to their presence in her convoy, something for which Marwyn had repeatedly thanked her to the point that she was considering having him gagged. "I fought my whole life for the removal of chains, I'll not have one displayed on any of my followers."

Marwyn wondered if the Silver Queen was able to see the irony in her demand. To wear chains and be in chains were one and the same. He did not blame her. She behaved like a queen. Strength of will was imperative to survival. Better to make a mistake boldly than take the right course tepidly. No one followed a whisper into death.

"They are not chains like those you found on the slaves in the East, Your Grace," Marwyn replied. Without her knight watching on, he pressed to learn her true intentions for the realm. "Each link is a mark of status which the other Houses recognise."

"Do not lecture me on the symbols of Westeros. I have more than enough advisers, Maester Marwyn-"

"Grandmaester Marwyn." He could have sworn a flicker of fire crossed her eyes as he corrected her.

"Test me if you like, Marwyn," she dropped his titles entirely, "but cleverer men than you have tried and failed. Their bones lay in the sea."

Not metaphorically… Marwyn removed his chain and dropped it onto the floor. "The physical weight of the metal is meant to represent the burden of knowledge," he explained. "I find that the only thing it represents is a back ache."

"I can arrange for you achievements to be tattooed onto your neck if you are in any danger of forgetting them. Now – to the dragon..."


Sam and Gilly were forced to leave Ash with the queen while she manufactured a reason for the arrival of a fourth dragon in the realm. Considering the spectacular birth of the other three, an excuse for the fourth would be difficult.

They walked around the edge of the mountain. Their view was an obscured vista full of other, equally uninteresting mountains covered in moss and short grass. Goats roamed everywhere much to the delight of the queen's three dragons who were out feasting.

"How big do you think they are?" Sam asked, his eyes picking through the sky as morning broke.

"Huge..." Arya replied, climbing up beside them.

They startled at the stranger. "Do I know you?"

"I doubt it," Arya set herself down on the rocks beside and watched the sky. "Arya Stark," she introduced herself, "of Winterfell."

Sam nearly fell off his perch. He stood immediately and stumbled over to the girl. Then, he sat on the cold earth in front of her, much to Arya's confusion. "I know your brother," he said. Of course. The Starks all looked the same. It was as though they were forged from the snow itself. "He spoke of you. Jon – he knew that you were alive." Then Sam turned quiet. "Your brother, Rickon… He was lost in the battle against the Boltons. You deserve to know."

"I know." Arya prodded the cold ground with a stick. "Sometimes when I sleep I see things. I saw that." She went on to describe the event in such horrific detail that Sam begged her to stop. "He was one of the lucky ones."

Sam's emotions swelled. "Is it true what the Mormont said about the attack last week?"

"I lost my horse in the fire," she replied. "You could feel it coming. They making everything go cold."

"Do you fight an' all?" Sam nodded at her sword. She was protective of it, subconsciously tilting her body away. "Of course you do – you're Ned Stark's girl."

"Even the best fighters die." The girl added darkly, thinking of her Water Dancer. "My trainer from Braavos had a saying. 'What do we tell Death? Not today.' That is what I keep saying. I'll know when I'm ready to greet Death. I'll bow and draw my sword and greet him as a friend." Her grey eyes lifted to Sam's. He'd expected to find ice in them like all Northerners but they were clouded with mist. "Death and I are well acquainted." She assured them, then pointed at the ranges. "This is them now."

"By all the Seven Gods!" Sam gasped, as the dragons appeared. They were not as large as their brethren who conquered Westeros but they were big enough to burn King's Landing to the ground. He felt a rush of joy at the sight of their elegant wings. How beautiful they were. Gold, green and black. "That's five dragons." Sam whispered. "Alive at the same time."

"They will tear the realm apart..." Arya assured them.


THE EYRIE – THE VALE OF ARRYN

"The Lady Lysa Arryn was of disturbed mind. This worsened following the loss of her husband. Stress, her maester warned, could accentuate her fragile condition. Were you, Lord Baelish, at any time aware of her disposition?"

Heavy chains weighed his wrists down. Every time Petyr moved they scraped across the stone floor – echoes bouncing from face to face. The Lords of the Vale packed themselves in, shoulder to shoulder, to witness the trial. They reminded him of vultures waiting their turn for a corpse. The largest of their number, Yohn Royce now Lord of the Vale, headed the trial and read the questions from a carefully prepared text. Yohn was an enormous man, towering over the others by half a head. Blood of the First Men. You could always pick it. The eyes – slate and ice.

"I was aware of her peculiarities," Petyr admitted. "As were we all. Lady Arryn was a woman sensitive to the dangers of ruling. She feared, as was natural, for her son. That acute fear led her to behave in ways one might see as unusual."

"You admit to knowledge that she was impressionable?"

"Impressionable to fear? Yes. Of course. Fear played in her mind like a bitter tune." Petyr tapped the side of his head causing his chains to smash against the stone barrier separating him from the Lords. The noise sounded like a reckoning.

"Fear that you fed with whispers."

"No." He denied, repeatedly.

"Fear that you used to your advantage."

"No." Petyr kept his answers tight and calm. Lord Royce pushed his scrolls aside and leaned to his lift, allowing one of the others to whisper against his ear. After a moment he nodded. Their confidence made Petyr glance nervously toward the Moon Door. It remained covered but he knew well enough how easily that stone was pulled back and the guilty flung onto the cliffs below.

"You and Lady Arryn were lovers."

"Of course. Lady Lysa Arryn was my wife. Lords Royce, Redfort, Templeton," Petyr took care to utter every name opposite, "all attended the festivities."

"I believe I speak for all the Lords of the Vale when I say that no one doubts Lady Arryn's affection for you." There was a general murmur of agreement. "It was, as they say, not an affection born overnight."

The hairs on the back of Petyr's neck prickled. Suddenly he became aware of the drip of water running down the walls from passing showers and the distant howl of wind.

"Indeed," Lord Royce continued, "it is common knowledge that you and Lady Arryn had become intimately acquainted since you were barely more than children."

"There is no evidence of-"

"-and that you conspired to murder Lord Jon Arryn so that-"

"-that is not-"

"-sit down, Lord Baelish. So that you might wed her yourself-"

"-I really must object to such-"

"-and become Lord of the Vale. A position you later acquired." Lord Royce waited for some time before adding. "Now, you are quiet?"

"Merely stunned by the accusation." Petyr felt the freezing air pass right through the rags they'd dressed him in. This time he did not have Sansa Stark to act as his character witness. He was alone and the Lords of the Vale were starving for justice. The empty coffins kept piling up and unlike King's Landing, mysterious deaths were not swept out with the tide. "I am sure that you have heard far more interesting rumours..." Petyr fought to keep his voice steady. He would have to tear his nest of secrets open if he wished to survive. "Rumours about Lysa's sister, Lady Catelyn Stark."

Recognition washed over their faces. Everyone in the realm had heard those rumours and took great amusement in them. Like pale wolves, they edged in – drawn by Petyr's words.

"I have the scars to prove the validity of those whispers," Petyr assured them, ghosting diagonally across his chest with his hand. "I confess… I loved the Lady Stark." His voice lifted dramatically. "It was the kind of love that formed in the heart of a boy, never to be cut out by rejection, death or fear..." His eyes took on a shine. "Love that, despite logic, refused to be buried, as it should. Love that wholly distracted me. At the time of Lord Arryn's death I was far away, thinking only of how I might one day see Lady Stark."

Littlefinger's story might have been common knowledge but hearing it from his wry lips was a shocking confession. "But – Lady Arryn..."

"Was as misguided in her love as I was." Petyr allowed a carefully crafted tear to break the edge of his eye. It cut a freezing river down his cheek. "Later, I learned the truth of what I had long suspected when I arrived in the Vale to wed Lysa."

"Of what truth do you speak, Lord Baelish?"

"Truth that I wished to spare the boy." There was even honestly in his confession. "Since he is dead, it cannot do any further harm. Permit me?" He stood, placing both his hands on the stone so that it could take the weight of his chains. "You are right, Lord Royce, Lady Arryn was an impressionable, fragile mind as well as a passionate woman. You are also correct in your guess that she and I knew each other when we were young. It was the result of drink and despair, as I am sure most of you are familiar with. I, myself, had forgot the event and continued to wallow in my own misfortune. Lady Arryn festered. Her love for me was like a poison that darkened after the birth of her boy."

"Lord Baelish, what are you saying?"

"After I married Lady Arryn she confessed to me something I had previously only guessed at – that she had poisoned her husband, Lord Jon Arryn." Petyr was forced to take a breath as gasps rang out. His audience were as predictable as the tolling of church bells. He knew how to play people. How to mix whispers, truth and lies until they were indiscernible. "Tears of Lys, purchased on her account now missing, were added to his wine and drunk in King's Landing. When I learned I was afraid – for her and the boy."

"Outrageous!" Hissed one. "Shocking!" Another. "Snake!"

Yohn Royce held up his hand until they fell quiet. Of all the lords, Yohn knew Lysa best of all. She was unsound of mind but capable of murder. Lord Baelish wanted Lady Stark not Arryn… "These things will be checked," he assured Littlefinger. "Though I do not understand. If you knew of such a plot, as you claim, and loved another, as you've said, then why did you come to the Vale and marry Lady Arryn?"

"My lords, is it not obvious?" He was met with blank looks. "Lady Sansa Stark… Her life was in great danger and Lysa was the only member of her family I could trust. Marrying Lysa was the price I paid for Sansa Stark's life. I – I..." Petyr's voice caught. Tears fell. He buried his head deep in his hands for a moment as he forged the memory of Sansa held above the Moon Door. "I misjudged Lysa's jealousy. Hate me if you will. I married Lysa to save a life. I am not the first to trade happiness for security nor is there a law against it – except the laws of the heart which I have offended and will pay for in misery for the remainder of my life. The rest – the rest you know." He sank to stone seat, a broken man. "Telling you the truth earlier would have left the boy without a mother. He was too young to rule. Lysa would never hurt her own child so I held my tongue and left with Lady Stark. That, my lords, is the truth of my dealings in the Vale of Arryn."


He was thrown back into the sky cell, this time to face the rain which misted in through the void. Endless grey covered the world. He pressed himself into the far side of the cell and for the first time in his life, found himself thinking about Lysa and the life she'd lived. It struck him how similar her story was to his. Her madness was, he knew a manifestation of his rejection. He had used her mercilessly to murder Lord Arryn and weaken the Vale so that he might rule it but when the moment came – when he stood as Lord of the Vale beside Lysa, he could not maintain the illusion. He'd been foolish. He'd chosen a Stark girl – a shadow of the mother – over the power he'd courted for decades. That choice nearly cost him his life. It still might.

The irony.

Every time Petyr brushed close to Death, a Stark lay at the cause.

A smart man would take that as a sign to leave well enough alone.

Petyr flinched when he heard the bolt on the door slip. He found his feet, preparing himself for another routine beating. Lord Royce was on the other side. He was nearly as wide as the gaping stone and certainly taller. His guards hung close by. For a long time the Lord of the Vale did nothing but stand there.

"I always knew that she had killed him," Royce finally spoke. "I found her in the royal courtyard a few days after the news of Lord Arryn's death reached the Vale. She was – laughing… Laughing when she should have been crying. The maesters called it madness but I think it was something far simpler. Relief. Robert and Eddard may have liked him but he was a cruel husband and absent father."

Petyr was not sure what to say. A word in the wrong place and he may as well throw himself from the sky cell.

"If we are being honest, Lord Baelish – I do not care for you. I believe you to be a dangerous, lying, violent, vapid, corrupt narcissist who will sacrifice empires to get what you want."

"Were you reaching for a compliment, Lord Royce?"

"You claim to care for both the former and current Lady Stark but I'd wager every crown in the kingdom that you killed Eddard Stark. No – there was no need for you to hold the blade." Lord Royce intercepted Littlefinger's rebuff. "There are many roads to murder. That said..." He stepped through the door showing that he had no fear of his prisoner. "That said there was something genuine in your confession that I am not sure the other lords grasped. You look at Sansa the way you used to look at Cat. Oh, you may have forgotten but I have been around a long time. Several of us had the misfortune of listening to you fuck that poor girl when you were too drunk to stand. Her so eager and you moaning her sister's name. Cat is dead but in your eyes, she lives. You see her in Sansa. Ordinarily that would be reason enough for me to have you put to the sword."

"Then why am I alive, if what you say about me is true?" Petyr choked on his words. There was nothing he hated more than his darkest scars laid bare. It killed him to know that everyone laughed behind his back – since he was a boy. No amount of success, money or brutality could bury their smiles. They'd always see him as that desperate, pining boy. He wanted to murder them all.

"Because Sansa Stark needs loyal council. Winterfell is the North and there must always be a Stark inside its walls if we are to survive. Her brother is a bastard and the rest are, far as we know, dead. The Lords of the Vale are not interested in testing the old gods."

"So, you are not going to kill me?"

"Your fate is not up to me, Lord Baelish," he replied, but the hesitation suggested the reality was more complex. "Stay alive."

That was the last thing he said. Petyr was left with the wind and the rain. Their assault masked the tears which continued to fall through dusk and into the evening. He felt like a small child, sitting on the moors. A boy with such beautiful dreams and terrible nightmares.


THE TWINS – RIVERLANDS

Jaqen H'ghar found a horse feeding near its master's rotting body, slipped the reins over its head and mounted it. Together, they found the King's Road and all the sad souls that trod it. They headed North as a quivering mass of hopelessness. Starved, poor and fleeing the inevitable war at the capital, he blended into the mosaic of despair.

He had been to Westeros several times to offer names to the Faceless God. Money and murder ran deep in the tumultuous nation. He wanted to despise the stink of it – the fields built on bones, burned husks of castles, screaming ghost trees and the tribal nature of its people. Instead he came to realise that Westeros was the embodiment of his lifelong passion. A nation free of servitude. A world without dragons where men were their own kings and the Faceless God feasted. The East claimed to be free but every stone in every city was built by a slave. He could feel their screams echoing from the foundations of the very building he called home.

Westeros – it was wild. Wild like the wolf-girl he'd encountered.

Jaqen looked ahead as the mountains ended and the road dipped down toward the river flats. There were endless stretches of grass and swamp, cut by hundreds of tiny rivers and there, at its heart, the Green Fork of the Trident and the pair of twin castles guarding the route North.


"What mayhem is this?" asked Ser Davos, as he rode up beside Lord Stark and his three companions. "Tell yer the truth, didn' think I'd catch you up so fast. Did you get stuck somewhere?"

Jon nodded. "Ran into a storm a few nights back. We had to wait it out in a village for the sake of the horses. When we set out again there were a lot of bodies on the road. They just leave them there. Takes all my nerve not to stop and burn them. And you, Ser Davos, you must have ridden flat to be here?"

Davos nodded. "Had time to make up. Things are complicated at Winterfell. I will explain everything after we get through this."

"If we get through this..." One of the other men muttered.

The Twins blocked the way, controlling the flow of movement between the North and the South. Since the flood of Southerners began, Walder Frey increased taxes on the bridge. A temporary camp sprang into life on the Southern bank of the river where people short on money could trade items and services in order to afford passage. The way into the South suffered in return, with the bridge clogged and nearly impassable.

"We'll be here for days trying to get through this mess."

"There are people in this line that have been 'ere for weeks."

Jon moved his horse closer to Davos so that they could speak privately. "Might as well tell me you news now, Ser..."


At nightfall, the bridge was closed and both sides forced to make camp. Only the military and registered officials were allowed to travel – both of which Jon was trying to avoid.

"Most of Westeros doesn' care much about you," Davos began, "but Frey is a nasty piece o'work. He murdered most of your family an' believe me, if he knew you were 'ere he'd wrap you up an' send you straight to Cersei."

"You think I don't know that?" Jon watched the fire in their pitiful camp. "He stitched my brother's body to his direwolf's head and threw my mother in the river when they were done slitting her throat. If it were not for the vows I made to Sansa I'd tear down those walls with my hands and show Walder Frey what a wolf can do."

No one spoke for the rest of the evening. In the morning they shuffled closer to the bridge. Soon, they were brought into the shadow of the castle. Jon tilted his head back and watched the Frey banners flap against the stone. One day, he promised himself, when the wars were fought and the snows pushed back, he'd return to his place and tear those banners down. He'd put Frey and all his generations into the river so that his insidious evil would forever be silenced. He dared not do it yet.

They each offered false travel documents, paid the fee and crossed into the South. Jon stole a moment, turning his horse so that he could look back toward the North and the faint hue of mountains lurking with the clouds. He'd never been father from home. Davos tapped him on the should and they headed out together.

The Southern territories of the Riverlands were made of great swathes of sky and outbursts of grey rock, thrust from low lying fields of peat freshly dusted with snow. The ever-present creep of Winter pursued them. They followed the Trident but its water ran black. Davos led, showing them the safest places to camp when the night folded in around them. Usually, it was by the banks where the mists were at their thickest. Their horses grazed nearby while they cooked rabbit.

"You served a king that took your hand."

"Fingers, my Lord," Davos replied, holding up his gloved hand. "Not so bad."

"A king that burned his own child to purchase victory from the gods."

Davos looked away toward the dark stain of the river. "If he still lived I'd kill him myself. No one should worship gods that demand such things or follow them into war."

"Ser Davos..." Jon waited until the other man met his eyes. "I believe you wish to kill the red priestess. All I ask of you is not yet. Do you understand? Not yet."


The first two of Jon's men died silently. Their throats were cut while they slept and their blood left to trickle into the freezing mud. The third opened his eyes in time to see the curved blade swipe over his skin. He groaned – thrashed and knocked his cup into the fire. The wine sent the flames into a hiss of sparks. Ser Davos woke and saw a thief stand over the fresh body.

Davos roused from sleep and was on his feet in a moment, sword drawn. "Jon!" He shouted, causing his Lord to wake.

The thief, Davos and Jon all circled the fire at the centre of the camp.

"If you're after money, we have none!" said Jon. "You've killed those men for nothing."

"A man is not here for trinkets..." The thief replied. He was light on his feet, withdrawing a second blade from his robes as he contemplated the two men before him. "Lord Snow," he dipped his head. "Or Stark? Perhaps another name. Your father's name."

Jon's breath caught. Did this man know? How could he possibly know… "Who are you?" He demanded.

"No one at all. I am the last face you will see."

"I know who he is," Davos whispered. "He's from Braavos – one of their assassins. Take care. They are dangerous."

Jon tightened his grip on his Valyrian sword.