EASTWATCH BY THE SEA – THE WALL

It was night when the row boat crashed upon the rocks. Wooden boards splintered at the touch of volcanic innards. Oars splashed into the black sea, rubbing up against ice bergs which suffocated the horizon. The moon hung low – a solitary light at half-strength casting a pale halo over the frost where spinifex snapped in the wind.

Above everything loomed The Wall. Its ice blue even at night, glowing faintly from within. The slosh of water against the shore dominated, interrupted by snow tumbling out of the air. It smashed on the rock like glass.

Across the Bay of Seals, Skargosi fires dotted the island. Tiny pinpricks of light with trails of smoke wandering the sky. To the left stretched the peninsula, torn apart by marauding sheets of ice that had snapped off The Wall on their right or journeyed in through the channel from glaciers lining the Lands of Always Winter. Ahead lay endless snowdrifts. Mole's Town glowed dimly like a lantern in the forest barely raising a challenge to the starlight. The tail of the red comet drifted further North, entirely hidden by The Wall. They'd followed it across The Shivering Sea and now it had been sucked from the sky, robbing them of hope.

Lorath cursed the freezing stone beneath his hands as he dragged himself away from the hungry tide. His breath turned to snow while numb limbs clumsily grabbed onto a rope and pulled the prow of the boat ashore. Others helped – falling out into the water. More made landfall either side. Dozens, abandoning the wounded ships they'd left moored in the open water. Eastwatch's jetty, once used for supplies, stretched deep into the bay. It was barely more than a skeleton with pieces missing and entire segments snatched away by passing bergs. Its presence taunted the remainder of Bu Gai's fleet who had to make do with the uneven beach.

Wordlessly, hands went out. Legs straddled boats. Boots slid on black ice. Oars washed up. Lorath pried the prince from the back of the boat and with both hands helped him onto Westerosi soil. Many of the warriors around them were bloodied, wearing frozen clothes. More were walking dead, numbed by the cold and unable to feel their mortal wounds.

"Eastwatch." Lorath pointed to the shadow at the base of The Wall. The monstrosity clawed up the ice, grown like a vine meandering for a foothold. Once it had been a feat of engineering but now, with The Wall in a state of collapse where it met the water, it looked like a metaphor for the Winter to come.

Bu Gai was wrapped in furs and cuts of leather held together by coarse rope. His skin had turned grey from the sickness living in his wound yet there was strength returning to his limbs. Unholy life taking hold of the flesh. He shouted orders at the night, hastening the survivors onto land. They dragged their boats right out of the rock and moored them on the flat, stabbing spikes into the frozen ground.

The majority of Bu Gai's people remained aboard the fleet, watching the procession of lantern-light edge toward the castle. What began as four-hundred thousand had thinned to half that. Still, at the cusp of the world that was a lot of mouths to feed and they immediately turned their eye on Skagos and its frozen forests.

Lorath led the landing party of fifty men along the water. A solitary ship sat locked by ice, hemmed in on all sides by glacial drifts. Closer to The Wall, another called Talon was half-sunk in the shallow water with a few sad shreds of grey flapping like flesh. A few more masts stuck out from the waves like headstones. Lorath listened to the anguished snap of their ruined sails as though they were screaming.

Enormous, green-backed crabs with orange 'V's scuttled between the rocks underfoot. The men eyed them hungrily. A lone wolf kept her distance. Gulls cawed at each other. Winter rabbits ducked into holes dug before the ground froze. Lorath kept watch over them all, writing them into his memory. He'd never set foot on a land brimmed with mourn – terror yes but not resigned to its fate.

"Bastard-bugger-shit!" Lorath scared himself half to death, stumbling over a corpse buried to its waist in the snow. With a face full of snow, Lorath turned his head to the horrific obstacle. Old Wyllis' bones kept guard near the entrance to Eastwatch, empty sockets watching the world. His maester's chain caught the moonlight. Snowflakes bounced off the metal. Perfectly preserved, he might be alive save for the eyes which the crows had picked clean.

Eastwatch was held together by ice. Most of the stone was encased by several feet of it – angled away from the water in strange shapes sculpted by the waves and wind where the sea-spray froze mid-break. Gales roared through these tunnels sending a terrible song into the endless twilight. Further South, the difference between Summer and Winter was a dusting of snow but in the North, the far North, the Winter killed the sun, pushing it under the horizon until it became a nomadic eye occasionally winking at the world.

There were no lifts to scale The Wall. Instead steps had been cut into the ice interspersed with ladders made of ghost-wood that shone like threads from a spider's web.

Defences around Eastwatch were almost non existent. Having become the Northern-most trade port during the Long Summer, it had forgotten its true purpose and relaxed into the lull of commerce. Now its courtyard was empty. The make-shift market stalls that lined the entrance had been dismantled and burned for warmth leaving abandoned pits of charcoal.

"Looting, not war..." Lorath muttered to himself. No one else understand him. "Abandoned – uh – empty," he tried to gesture at the castle, hoping Bu Gai followed his patchy logic and confusing hand signals.

Indeed it was a shell. Inside they found only the most worthless items strewn over bare basalt floors but the solid walls were enough of a comfort to the men who'd had their fill of open seas and winds that tore through their bones. Fires were lit. Provisions brought ashore and the most vulnerable transported to the many empty rooms crammed into the castle's three towers. For the first time in years, Eastwatch took a shaky breath and rustled snow from its feathers.

Lorath climbed to the highest turret. Closest to the sea it petered right on the edge of the shore. There were no cliffs this far North. Instead the water lapped along a shallow beach of black stones and, on the highest tides, the moon dragged them onto the frozen moors where they drowned the world in salt. White lines were left all through the lower floor of the castle, marking these king tides. The highest as tall as a man.

From the ruined outpost, Lorath had an intimate view of The Wall. What appeared a formidable barrier from afar was actually riddled with deterioration and fatigue from centuries of weathering. Long Summers had partially melted the outer shell letting in deposits of salt. Sudden, short Winters expanded hairline fractures which the sea instantly penetrated turning those cracks into enormous seams. The worst delved all the way to The Wall's foundation where gravity took over, tugging the severed towers of ice into the Bay of Seals. At least three more columns of ice leaned toward the water, ready to go. Lorath heard them groan.

He stepped backwards and turned his attention to a line of lights along the top of The Wall, approaching from the West. There was a slight curve in the ice that left them visible for a few hours. He tried explaining to Bu Gai but the foreign prince was too ill to sit and lay among a bed of seal-fur and dried weed, muttering ancient enchantments while his witches kept the fire stoked. His strength came and went. Tomorrow he might fight a war or perish with a whimper. It was impossible to tell.

Lorath returned to the line of boats lashed together on the moor, taking a seat in one of them. The rest of the fleet waited. They couldn't remain marooned on board. A few savage fishermen on Skagos was far from a deterrent. The gnarled atoll contained enough wood and food to keep them alive for several months.

It took three days for the lights along The Wall to appear above Eastwatch. Lorath and a dozen ship builders did their best to repair the scaffolding that linked the platforms of ice cut directly into the surface. Some of the alcoves ran several metres deep and contained stores of weapons – swords, quivers and a few nine-foot spears all frozen into the surface. At the very top was the first of several 'Crows' nests' made by the Night's Watch. Fortified, thatched huts, they'd hung on against the elements with a view of Haunted Forest. It was thickest where it met the Bay of Seals – near impenetrable. Like everything else, the trees slept – waiting out the night.

Lorath and his builders set up camp inside one of the thatch structures, braving the darkness and constant howl of wind while they waited for the owners of the lights to creep closer. An hour before the false-dawn, the lights became a shuffle of boots.


Dacey raised her hand. The party stopped. Tormund lifted his torch a fraction higher sending its glow over the partially collapsed structure ahead. Its roof leaned perilously toward the edge of The Wall where a decent wind might knock it free. Either side, the world gaped – twin expanses of ice. Behind the hold lay the Bay of Seals and a pink prick of light where the sun intended to emerge for a few hours.

"What do yer think?" Tormund hissed under his beard, nearly a foot taller than the rest. "Thieves an' the like?"

"There's definitely someone in there," Dacey agreed, tilting her head slightly to change the play of shadows. "Crows, perhaps – some of your lot?"

"Might be," Tormund admitted. "Might be fisher-folk from that island, there." He pointed towards Skagos. "Oh aye, those ships."

The rising light over the bay revealed a substantial fleet, its masts poking out from the mist. They scattered the morning hue like a fever dream full of lies and sea-born curses. "A fleet. Wildlings and Crows don't have a handful of ships between them. Stannis?"

"His ships are at the bottom of the sea," Tormund replied. "The rest went South to bugger knows where."

"Fine," Dacey had no answer for the sight before them. "Shall we introduce ourselves?"

They kept their weapons low, sword tips hovering above the icy path. As they approached the structure a man emerged. Tall with a thin ginger beard and eyes as green as the Jade Sea. He'd been starved to the bone, burned and cut. Bruises circled both his eyes while necklaces of bone and shell rustled over his fur clothing. The man brandished a fishing spear with three terrifying prongs that smelled of Fleabottom's worst pits. He was the first to raise his hand in greeting, lowering his spear.

"Morning," Dacey began casually, "we come from Castle Black. Who are you?"

The man's face broke into an enormous grin, his teeth whiter than the fading stars. "You speak the Common Tongue!" He replied, as though he'd stumbled upon the greatest treasure in the Seven Kingdoms.

"Aye, we do."

"Not well but enough." He shook his head in joyous disbelief. "A man has waited many months to hear those words. Lorath," he added, introducing himself.

"The island above Norvos?"

"No. That is what they call me," he pointed to the faces in the hold behind. "I am not here alone." Lorath motioned for the others to join him. "You may have noticed the ships in the bay. If you come from Castle Black that must make you Night's Watch – though I did not realise they counted women among their number."

"That lot are," Dacey nodded over her shoulder. "This is Tormund, he is king of the Wildlings."

"And you?"

"I am a Mormont."

"A mix of fur and feather, then," Lorath replied. "There are a great many things that must be said but perhaps we could retire to the castle?"

Tormund shook his head. Dacey nodded. "No," she insisted, "let's talk a little more out here." Where the narrow path along The Wall nullified the travellers' numbers.


Tormund could not drag his eyes away from the egg-shaped heads. Normally bald, the men from Pol Qo's camp had allowed their hair to grow thick and long. They wrapped coloured ties around them as either decoration or rank. They were short too but strong with strange tattoos on their faces in the shape of demons.

"These men are the Jogos Nai, from East of the Bone Mountains. They, along with hundreds of scattered tribes were chased from their homes by monsters."

"Monsters?" Tormund asked.

"Demons. Undead… Whatever you wish to name them. No one knows exactly what they are but they came out of the Grey Waste. Everything they touched became one of them. Horse. Rabbit. Man. Their ranks are full of rotting flesh. Pol Qo – that is, the horselord king, marched his people all the way to the banks of the Bleeding Sea where the Mountains of the Morn erode into sand. He used one of the Black Forts as protection."

"You mean to say," said Dacey, "that all the nomads of the plains ran to the edge of the world?"

"No only the nomads. Yi Ti was gutted and Yin destroyed. Their prince, Bu Gai travels with us but he is grave along with many of our number. His people travelled West instead, better suited to the journey overland."

The idea that these two groups of savage people were willing to trade leaders left her unsettled. It would be like the Dornish accepting the Salt Crown as their sovereign. "How does an army from the East end up at The Wall?"

"We crossed paths with a dragon," Lorath replied. "A silver queen and a bear knight, like you."

Dacey's breath caught. "Jorah Mormont..."

"The same. They flew in on the back of a black dragon. The Targaryen girl dreamed our futures and saw our end in the fire. Go North, she said, or die. So here we are, North in this frightful, frozen hell."

"You mentioned two parties, where is the other?"

"Headed to Westwatch."

Tormund leaned close to Dacey, whispering, "I thought the dragon girl was after a sword-throne?"

"Sh..." Dacey waved him off. "We'd like to speak with this prince, Bu Gai."


The smell of rotting flesh collected in the room, trapped by stone walls and thick pine doors. Bu Gai was kept on the ground floor, tucked away in a room that backed directly onto the ice. Its cold ebbed through the stone causing the warmer air to condense and drip down the surface – crying. A single, struggling vine grew along the stone with a couple of sad leaves. A winter rose with no one to bloom for.

Lorath stopped Dacey and Tormund outside the door. "A man will go first, then when I say – enter."

"Do all East-pricks talk like tha'?" Asked Tormund, once they were alone.

"People from Lorath are a little odd. Who knows if it is religion or culture but they talk of themselves as if they're not quite present."

"An' they make lords an' ladies learn these things?"

"We learn the name of every city in the world and every house in the Seven Kingdoms."

"Nothin' of the lands beyond The Wall."

"Bears know a little more than most, except perhaps the Starks."

"Wolf cunts."

"No argument there."

Dacey waited patiently. Tormund said nothing further. He'd been scouting the men inside the castle. The Crows they'd brought with them had been dispersed to assess the physical state of Eastwatch. They were viewed with equal curiosity. Some of the Jogos Nai called them ghosts others took to following them, conspiring gods know what.

Eventually Lorath beckoned. Dacey paused in the doorway, covering her nose from the odd stench that permeated everything. Lorath withdrew to lay against the left-hand wall beside the vine, giving the others some space. A bed of straw and fur had been fashioned opposite where a man reclined, propped up by cloth pillows. Bu Gai was nothing like the cone-headed men. He was tall, bronze-skinned with eyes that appeared to shed glowing tears like the edge of the cursed tide. The only evidence of his regal status were the jewels pinned to his flesh.

"He does not speak the Common Tongue," Lorath warned, "but if you are patient, a man has a basic sort of communication."

"There's something wrong with him..." Dacey asked.

"One of the dead creatures bit him on the eve of Yin's destruction. A man does not like to guess but probably this will kill him. He is the last of his line. No more jewelled Emperors. The final tombstone of the glorious empire. Strange, that he should die in a foreign land."

Dacey knelt on the stone beside the prince while Tormund kept one hand firmly on the base of his sword. He had no fondness for dead things.

"Tell him," she instructed Lorath, "that we welcome the prince and his people to the North but whatever Daenerys Targaryen has told him, there is nothing up this way except ice and death."

Lorath did his best, speaking in fragments of High Valyrian until the prince stopped him and shuffled upright in his bed, looking stronger. A flush of dark magic in his cheeks.

"Walking death," said Bu Gai, pointing his finger at the wall of ice, then to himself. "Kill death."

"Hundreds of thousands," Tormund whispered to Dacey, "they can't stay on them boats – or 'ere. They'll bloody starve within days."

"I know – I know. Lorath, if these people truly are here to fight with us, most of them need to spread inland to other castles. I can send ravens to Castle Black and request a translator along with provisions to wait out the Winter. House Tyrell has a shipment diverted if we are quick. Somehow you need to make the prince and his men understand that we have come here to scout Eastwatch and return it to its status as an outpost fort. We were going to bring men from The Watch but I see no reason why we cannot use Bu Gai's army. It may be possible to find safe passage for the women and children South."

"Begging your pardon but they all fight. A man has seen their violence."

Dacey did not know how to make Lorath understand. "The dead things that you saw in Essos, there is worse here. An army of corpses is headed this way. We don't know when they will get here only that they are waiting for the bay to freeze. If we don't hold this line all of Westeros may fall behind the veil."

"The prince understands better than you think." Then Lorath shared the horrific fate of Braavos.


Alone outside Eastwatch castle, Tormund took Dacey by the arm and dragged her behind a wall, out of sight of the foreigners whose cooking fires left a rank scent on the twilight.

Dacey growled, puzzled by his grip.

"That ain't all he said."

"'scuse me?" Dacey slipped free of his hold. She matched his whisper. "Lorath?"

"No. The Eastern cunt." Tormund made her follow him further into the shadows cast by the weak light. There were fogs drifting in from the sea, curling around the edge of The Wall from the North. Soon they'd be surrounded. "He said that them 'death walkers' tha' destroyed Essos come from beyond Mossovy – whatever that is – that they walk white waters in the night."

"You speak High Valyrian?"

"I speak many things," Tormund nodded. "Yer have to, 'ter keep peace between a hundred tribes. Mance taught me a few Southern words 'case you lot came 'ter terms. Waste o' bloody time. Most of 'em are dead an' gone."

"Why didn't you offer to speak to the prince? It would have made things a hell of a lot -"

"Best they don' know. Might 'ear somethin' interesting."

A chill rose through Dacey's veins. Tormund had a sound point. "Mossovy is a kingdom in the North of Essos. It borders the Shivering Sea."

"'an North o' that?"

"Nobody knows but it sounds as though it freezes over during the Winter, like the Bay of Ice and the Bay of Seals." Dacey frowned in thought – her gaze drifting to the water. "And dead men walk across it like a bridge."

Dacely slid down the black wall until she was sitting in the snow. Tormund joined her but would never admit that his feet ached.

"What if it's all the same shit?" Dacey asked. "Same North. The same things that crawl out of death to haunt us. One wall isn't enough to stop them from crossing into the realm of the living. They'll – they'll wait. Winter is coming. There must be paths of ice opening across the Shivering Sea."

"What good is a bloody wall if them dead things are already 'ere?"

"You saw it yourself when you sailed out of Hardhome. They can't cross the water without help. Westeros is an island. Couldn't think of a better spot for a last stand."

"Maybe them First Men had the same thought."

"Sever Westeros from the world."


Lorath took the bear and the Wildling to the pile of bones lodged in the snow. He stopped and pointed at the half-buried corpse then shrugged. "A man thought perhaps, a maester – on account of the chains."

Dacey approached the corpse. The Lorathian was right. A heavy chain hung around its neck with links in several metals. "Maester Wyllis. Poor old fool. We heard stories about him. He made it to Eastwatch after all."

Tormund grimaced at the partially decomposed corpse. "Why is he 'ere?"

"Every castle needs a maester, especially The Watch. He heard there was an opening an'-"

"Nah," Tormund interrupted. "Why is he 'ere – the snow. If he died o' the cold they'd of buried the bugger. Murder well, why leave 'im out in the open?"

Lorath looked between Eastwatch and the snow. "The castle may have been abandoned when he got here."

"Had 'ter be recent. There were lights on when we sailed in after Hardhome." Tormund agreed. "That were only a few months back."

"So maybe he stayed in the empty castle as long as he could. With no ravens he was cut off from the rest of the kingdom. Eventually he took his chances with the snow instead of dying alone in a crypt."

"You could ask the other one."

"The other what?" Asked Dacey.

"Old man. We found him in one of the castle rooms muttering insanity to himself so a man thought it best to leave him there."


"I know 'im," said Tormund, as they entered the room perched near the top of the main building. "He was captain of the ship tha' sailed us out o' Hardhome."

"Aye I was a captain," Maynard Holt replied, standing as they entered his room. Like everyone else, he was thinned to bone but strong. "Not much of anything left to captain."

"Except the fleet moored in the bay." Dacey pointed out.

"Ironwood bricks, good fer nothin' but sinking. The Talon. Now she was a ship. Half a bloody wreck now. Yer can still see 'er there, out in the bay. Frozen decks and scraps for sails. A gravestone if e'er I saw one and a bastard tragedy on account of the wolf cub thinkin' he knows what's best."

Maynard's white beard tapered past his waist where a thick leather belt held his clothes in place. The body beneath, once wide had withered with the cold.

"I am sorry for your ship," Dacey offered carefully. "How long has Eastwatch been abandoned?"

"That pack o' Crows you lot left 'ere deserted on the third night of the raid. Them Skagosi cunts came out of the mist one night and butchered the traders. They took everything. The horses. The pigs. Oil for the lanterns. All we had were pieces of flint and scrolls from the maester's keep to stop our toes from fallin' off. No bloody light this time o' year. Supposed to be in the Summer Isles by now. All that's gone to fuck. Pirates from 'ere to Asshai. Whole fuckin' world a mess."

"Our…?" Dacey pried. "Do you mean the this army or-"

"Wyllis, poor fuck." Maynard shook his head, rustling ice free. "Begged me not to burn the scrolls but yer 'ave to cook rats." There was almost a pause of sadness. "Told him not ter leave, didn' I. Worst snow I seen in years. He wouldn' listen. Insisted."

"Why did you leave him out front?" Dacey asked.

"Should 'ave burned him-" Tormund agreed.

"He hated this place," Maynard admitted. "Didn't see the sense of draggin' 'im back. As for burning. Ran out of fire. If this lot hadn't turned up I'd 'ave joined him out there."

"But you did see something, didn't you?" Dacey pressed. "That's why Wyllis was intent on leaving Eastwatch. What was it… What did Wyllis know that was so important?"

Maynard shook his head wearily. "Argh," he sighed, "nobody'd fuckin' believe it. They think men o' the sea are mad that's why they create them stories – giant squid the size of cities, ancient races with fish heads and lion bodies, creatures that crawl out of the water to fuck an' eat. All fantasies created by landlocked folk terrified of the storms that blow in from the East."

"Or the people that come with the storms..." Dacey all but whispered, remembering the Wildling hoards that tore about Bear Island when clouds hid the moon.

"Yeah," Maynard continued, "well Wyllis did have something to tell the Night's Watch but it wasn' nothing we saw. Can' see much of shit these days. If yer hadn' noticed, the sun never bloody rises this side o' The Wall. It was ah, in the maester's room, among the papers. Old fool wouldn' let me burn it. Made me swear on the souls o' all my dead children."

"This scroll – do you still have it?"

"No. Gave it to that flowery prick. Couldn' read it, could I?"

All eyes turned to Lorath, who'd been silent until this point. "A man has a scroll."


The maester's room wrapped around the entire top of Eastwatch's turret, lined with empty cages and a layer of black feathers drifting over the floor. The spare seed had been stolen long ago. There wasn't a single grain of it left. Either they'd eaten the birds or the last maester set them free. One sad skeleton remained with its leg tied to a wooden ornament on the desk. A dragon.

"It is not High Valyrian," Lorath flattened it out on the table and placed a few ocean stones on the corners. "More like Old Ghiscari which means the prince has a better chance of correctly translating it. If a man had to guess, he'd say it was even older – the language of the fallen empire." He pointed to a set of markings. "Death raisers, or necromancers. This is the symbol for moon – it still appears on a few temples in the Free Cities. The most interesting part is here – Western Lands. Westeros. This maester Wyllis probably thought that this scroll dated from soon after Eastwatch was built and that it contains one of the earliest accounts of the men that walk in the snow. Here – it's yours." Lorath handed it to Dacey.

"We might not have wings but we have Crows… I say we send two of them back with one of your men," she said to Tormund, "with a copy of this. Fast as we can." Then she turned to Lorath. "What do you think our chances are of borrowing one of these ships?"

"Why do you want a ship?" Asked Tormund.

"To meet a queen."

Lorath shrugged. "A man will ask." Then he left the room, scurrying down the endless spiral steps inside the tower.

"He is a very odd creature," Dacey admitted of Lorath. "He's not very forthcoming about how a man from Lorath ended up on the far side of the world with an army of savages." Though there was no time for that story. "Where are the bodies? Lorath said they lost fifty men in the first days ashore – died of their wounds from Braavos. There are no pyres. I saw no graves."

"Buried at sea?" Tormund offered. "Plenty of folk offer dead things to the water."

Dacey closed her eyes in realisation. The stench in the air. The fires in the kitchens. Bowls full of stew to feed the starving thousands.


Maynard was the only captain that could be persuaded to take them South. The others refused to set to the water again but they were prepared to loan one of their Ironwood ships. Dacey left the rest of their men at Eastwatch where Lorath promised to keep an eye on them.

Dacey walked the frosted deck of the ship. It was squat and heavy in the water – a good thing too by the look of the ice floating beside, knocking up against the hull. Tormund cursed the whole time. He hated the water with unrestrained passion and snapped at any gulls brave enough to land on the ship beside him.

"You going to stand out here the whole way to King's Landing?"

"Might bloody do," he replied, keeping his eyes on the tempestuous water.

"Your beard will freeze solid," she warned, "or something else..."

That earned a choked laugh. "Look, if the last time you'd been on a boat ended as badly as mine, yer might think twice 'bout it too. Who wants ter go further fuckin' South? Land of the perfumed vipers."

"This Targaryen queen has involved herself in this war. Those are her men at Eastwatch – more than a hundred fold our number and more again on their way to the West. We need to know what she's planning, one way or another. Last thing any of us want is to accidentally kill our allies when we need them most."

"Long as they all piss off when it's done."

All Dacey could do was smile. Like Tormund, she loved the drifts of snow and endless walls of ice but most folk couldn't wait to be rid of it and return to warmer waters.


From the water, Skagos formed the perfect mirror of Ib. Ironwood trees barely a foot apart crowded the mountainous innards, their purple leaves concealed beneath fresh snow. Even the Skagosi shared the maleficent features of the Ibbenese, tall and muscular with something of the sea about them. They were waiting on the rocks that lined the shore, perched holding spears as their ship cut through the water. Lorath backed away from the edge.

The Jogos Nai sailors circled the entire island. There was barely a harbour without faces watching from the trees. They shook their heads. No one, it seemed, wanted to test the native population while the sheer number of ships kept the Ibbenese fishermen grounded on their island.

Lorath turned his attention further North and asked if they might sail a little beyond the collapsing wall of ice. The ship snuck by several towers of ice, larger than buildings. One had a bloody stain on one side where a seal had been savaged and left in pieces with half a frozen head still balanced on top. The world after that was quite different.

There were several more islands, significantly smaller and uninhabited. Their forests were swamped with snow while several monstrous shelves of ice had rammed into their shores and created white skirts. On the right, Skagos continued but ahead the Shivering Sea waited for victims. Left, the famed Lands of Always Winter, although Lorath found them rather underwhelming. The Haunted Forest was simply a snow-dusted wood and the shore interspersed with glaciers containingthe same pods of seals and seagulls as before. It looked almost-

"Beautiful..." Lorath breathed.

A sailor nudged his arm and pointed further to a figure standing at the edge of the water. Rags for clothes. Bone for legs. Blue eyes. Unbreathing.

More – dotted along black rocks. Keeping watch of the water. Or waiting for those waters to freeze.

"Turn the ship around..."

They didn't understand Lorath but they must have had the same thought for the sails fell flat and the wheel creaked full circle.


Bu Gai was waiting for Lorath outside Eastwatch. Stronger again, the prince now dressed to fit his station and carried a curved sword at his waist. His irritable gestures toward Skagos suggested he wanted to launch a raid. Lorath placed his hands carefully on the prince's shoulders and shook his head, trying to make him understand the folly of this action.

Instead of invasion, a ship was scuttled and used as firewood. Three more died during the day and come night they filled the bowls along with rabbit and crab. The Crows refused to take part and spent hours with repaired fishing nets, dragging what little they could from the water. One of the Wildlings was a Thenn and joined the butchers in the kitchen, carving limbs with terrifying delight.

Lorath sat with the Crows if only for the conversation. They were wary of him and he of them. He'd heard the stories of the Night's Watch – how they were a band made from the worst of the Seven Kingdoms. A few vows hardly changed a man and this lot looked dire without their commander.

"What state is Greenguard Castle in?"

"That piece of shit?" Replied one, with a distinctly Southern accent. "About the same as this except it's got a halfway decent forest and a hot spring that melts the ice. There's enough people here to fill castles all the way to Oakenshield. Ask me, this lot are wasting their time. Pretty soon the world will look like us but you go on, scatter from one end of The Wall to the next if you like."

Another Crow grabbed Lorath by the neck, his enormous hand crushing the breath from his lungs as he was dragged backwards through the room. Lorath kicked his legs wildly, struggling against the brutal hold while the others laughed.

"Prettiest cunt we've seen in years," another added.

"The cone heads don't count."

"Or that dried out Mormont bitch."

Then laughter rattled through the frigid air like bones shaking in the crypt.

DEEP LAKE – THE WALL

Emerald waters smoked, puffing from fires deep below which kept the beautiful green lake liquid through the longest Winters. The forest huddled right to the edges with some pines that strayed too close boiled alive, left standing as sharp, stripped trunks. Yellow rings gathered on their bark. Sulphurous stains which left the water equally undrinkable.

Deep Lake castle was nothing like its sisters. New and built in the Valyrian style, it meandered along the base of The Wall with pretty, steep thatched buildings that stood separate from each other. The main castle had elegant, tapered walls with dragon statues perched on every cornice. Useless balconies looked South while an ornate barrier, made of pine instead of stone, offered the illusion of protection that had never been tested.

Built by the wish of Alysanne Targaryen, there was even a roost for her dragon, Silverwing. The dragon motifs continued to the castle hall where, after passing through a set of double doors engraved with old songs, there was a mosaic floor, as beautiful as any in the realm, with a startling silver dragon, wings spread against an azure sky. There were display sections cut into the walls of the main hall where various relics collected from beyond The Wall sat untouched.

Melisandre avoided the dragon floor and instead took a turn of the room, lingering at the captured objects. The last was a curved dragon fang, dug out of the ice along the Frozen Shore. Alysanne had collected it herself during one of her long flights into the untamed extremity. Dorin smacked her hand away as she reached for the bone.

"Sacred!" He growled at her. "Touch nothing, fire witch." Dorin may have saved her from the snow but he had no special love for creatures of magic. "I don' want your fire gods upsettin' the old gods."

"Dragons are made of fire," she replied calmly, stroking her fingers along the curve of bone in defiance. "They are my kin."

"Not these dragons," Dorin replied darkly. "Here, dragons are made of ice."

Melisandre removed her hand and turned her attention to the hall. "This is different to the other castles."

"It has been manned since it was built," Dorin replied. "For a time it was popular with lords and ladies who wished to take a gander at The Wall. Some of them travelled for months to stay here. Should be this way-" he added, leading her into a side room.

"You appear to know this castle well."

"Even I made the trip a few times tradin' bear skins. Ah, there's plenty of game up this way but the noble ladies, they want the white fur an' those beasts only hunt across the Bay of Ice. Big bastards. Live of them pelts for a few seasons." He paused suddenly at the skin mounted on the wall beside the fire. It was one of the white bears. Dorin pointed at it with a rare surge of pride. "One of mine an' all! Nearly bloody killed me. Dragged a few fishermen under in its time."

Deep Lake operated as it always had, with a stable population of Night's Watch along with mysterious families of women and children living out in the log cabins. Aside from muttering their vows at the bleeding tree and wearing black cloaks, they were starkly different to the rest of the kin helped in part by the fact that none of them had been sent from Southern prisons. They were all born free in the North, many of them right here and treated the castle as an inn, turning a moderate profit.

"You best fix those walls of yours," Dorin advised the Night's Watch brother that greeted them warmly. "There are hoards of starving creatures heading your way. Might take 'em a while but they'll soon hear of this gem."

Ignoring Dorin's warning, the brother assigned them to a cabin nearest the lake for half the purse Thorne had given them where the lowest limbs of the pines brushed the roof with a soft hiss that Dorin found rather comforting. It reminded him of the forest around his home and the endless days he'd spent laying under the rustling trees.

"What makes it do that?" He asked, of the bubbling lake.

Melisandre sat on the window ledge, her head resting on the glass. "There are great fires beneath the ground. In some places, the rock cracks releasing the flame. Sometimes this flows over the mountains. Others it is like this, trapped under water."

"You've seen these fire mountains?" Dorin asked curiously, as he penned a letter to send to Castle Black.

"There were many of these in Asshai. The Shadow Lands are full of embers from which the Red God watches."

"...and dragons hatch."

"And dragons hatch." She agreed. "Inside the Mountains of the Morn there are creatures forgotten by the world. They crawl deep into the throats of caves with tentacles for limbs and panels of large, red eyes. Dragons, so old and large that the mountains around their lairs smoke when they stir. Men of bone live in cities dressed by flesh. A yellow man rules, sunk halfway into death by the weight of jealousy and grief for an empire crushed to dust. Why do these things interest you so, Dorin? A simple man from a frozen island, what business do you have with my god?"

"Not a business I asked for," he assured her, "but one that kicks me in the face. Dragons and Bears, they dance together. I've watched their storms brew."

"You did not tell Commander Thorne the whole truth of what you saw."

"Thorne is a very serious sort of creature. After he sees the dead march on Castle Black, I will share the rest. You – I do not trust enough to tell. You burned a child to death in front of her parents to buy a warm Winter's morning. I wager you'd do anything your god asked without hesitation."

"Of course. We are all servants of the Red Lord."

"Not in the North. Up here we view our gods with suspicion. We choose, you understand, how far into hell we'll follow. I'll not be dragged into the flames with you unless I've carefully considered my options."

"I can see why your word carries weight along The Wall. You've no fear of consequence."

"Fear of consequence?" Dorin's throat ruptured in a type of laugh closer to a bear's growl. "When you live among savage creatures, every breath has consequence." He finished his letter, rolling the tiny strip of paper into the special carry pouch to tie onto a raven's leg. "That's why your religion can't make it past The Twins. Bullshit freezes faster than water up this way."

Aside from near constant references to her Lord of Light, Dorin found that he could bear her company rather well. With age came a certain appreciation for silence and they managed stretches of those, particularly when they walked down to the smouldering lake. Dorin brought his axe and laid a few snares.

"Not sure you should be doing that," he called over his shoulder, when he noticed Melisandre slide off her shoes and step onto the warm rocks edging the lake. Ignoring his concern, she stepped into the water. It burned against her skin but she revelled in its warmth, allowing the fire to seep into her soul. She closed her eyes and, ankle deep, whispered to the god below. Dorin, kneeling in the snow beside a freshly killed hare, stopped to watch. As the Red Priestess whispered enchantments, the mist hovering on the surface of the green lake whipped into a swirling nest. Transfixed, he dared not breathe as the mist took form – lifting into the bust of a woman with slender arms and flowing hair – all of her formed from the vapour except a pair of amethyst eyes. They stared desperately from their malformed shell. The same eyes he'd seen creep through the forest along The Wall, haunting the world of men. "No – no!" He found his voice, scrambling to his feet. He crossed the slurry of ice, grabbed the witch and dragged her out of the water.

The moment her words died, the pale woman collapsed back into a layer of fog.

"Who is she – who is she?" Dorin demanded, shaking Melisandre harder than he meant. He realised his violence and released her clothes, allowing her to sit. "The woman in the lake."

"I don't know..." Melisandre whispered, denying over and over, "but I can hear her wailing when I close my eyes."

Dorin, ever a man of simple logic, relaxed into the snow to think. He looked between the lake, Wall and fire witch – then to the forest where he'd seen those eyes receding into shadow. "Whomever – whatever that ghost-lass is, I'd bet my axe she's got something ter do with all the shit that's been going on for the last few thousand years." This time, Dorin offered Melisandre his hand, dragging her off the ground. "Fire for blood or not, I'd rather you not catch cold before we get to Westwatch. You'll not be much good for the cause if you lose your voice."

"What is it you intend to do," she asked, after finding her feet, "when we reach this Western fort?"

Dorin was not a man of war. He felled pine for warmth and kept an eye on the forests of Bear Island. Every now and then he taught a cub how to use a sword against. "That green fire from the South. They say we can use it to set the dead alight. Fire kills the walking bone. There's a shit load of it en-route."

"And the pale-skinned demons that come with them?"

"I'll take my chances against one or two of those."

Melisandre did not doubt that for one moment. "This is The Great War," she warned. "Dreamers have seen it coming for centuries. I knew some of them. They lived within the cursed city and screamed through the night. Wars like this are not won one battle at a time. They must be waged from within. For a long time, I thought King Stannis was the light in the dark but his blood was that of a usurper, neither old nor powerful enough to stand against the gods." She hesitated. "You already know that this is a war for magic, or you'd not be helping the dragon girl."

"Listen – I remember the sound those bone-men made as they crossed the bridge. I don't want that to be the last thing ever soul in Westeros hears before the end. I meant what I know you heard me say at Castle Black. Witches are bad luck. I'll have to take that chance but if you're looking for worshippers to fall in line with your doctrine and tempting stories I'm afraid this is not your Northerner."

They returned to their hut as the brief sunlight died. The days shortened and the nights lengthened. Dorin had heard enough stories from his island to know that this was the approach of the next great Winter. Children born in Summer did not understand what it meant for the moon to replace the sun. Silver light had no warmth. All it did was illuminate the frost.

"I met the Targaryen queen," said Dorin, sinking into a chair by the fire. Snow fell outside the window. It would fall all night. "Tiny slip of a thing but very strange in the head. There are many kinds of madness. Anyway, the part I didn't tell you or Thorne was about her eyes. Same eyes," he pointed to his own, "same as that ghostly woman in the lake."


NIGHTFORT – THE WALL

"Still a bastard of a thing," declared Edd, leaning heavily on the handle of his shovel. Smoke poured from several chimneys in the castle, light shone from windows, doors had been refashioned and put in place, skins hung on racks, the clash of practice swords droned continuously from the main square and yet the Nightfort remained a nightmare on the landscape.

"Agreed," said Howland Reed. "Though it will have to do. Three more caravans were spotted heading this way. The steady trail of people from the South is about to turn into a tide."

"Foolish cunts," muttered Edd. "Who the fuck runs toward a war?"

"They are running from the wars in the South."

Edd scoffed. "They don' know how lucky they are. If I didn't have this cloak I'd buy me-self a ship and head to a perfect bloody atoll but an oath is an oath."

"That boy is getting bigger," Reed added, nodding to Cub who was half way through skinning a deer.

"Aye. Thought he was a runt but maybe not. Won't matter though. He'll still be half a foot smaller than the rest of us when the fighting starts."


Every morning Howland Reed traipsed through the fresh snowfall, carrying a lantern. He ducked beneath the weeping pines, ignored the distant howl of wolves and fought his way into the a small clearing. There he found a sapling, no bigger than a man. White bark with three strong branches holding a flourish of blood leaves. A new Weirwood, thriving in the sudden cold. The darkness brought it to life.

Reed knelt and set his lantern in the snow. He placed a pair of Winter Rose blossoms on the white carpet, closed his eyes and prayed to the Old Gods. Reed thought only of his children, lost beyond The Wall. Jojen used to visit him, possessing forest creatures that would pause oddly or approach him in the snow all with deep green eyes.

Crack.

He opened his eyes. The forest remained unmoved in the darkness. Snow flurries tumbled through the gap in the canopy. The stars glistened. Smoke from the fires of the Nightfort continued to taint the sky. The flame inside his lantern shivered.

Then he saw the pair of blue eyes watching him from the other side of the Weirwood. Enormous, yawning moons, pale as The Wall. The direwolf stood with its fur puffed across the shoulders – head dipped and left paw lifted from the twig it had snapped.

Reed knew that Lord Stark had given his children pups. In the years since, they'd grown into beasts. One of them used to accompany Robb's army – picking off men who strayed into the woods on their own or feasting on the corpses of slain Lannisters. Its head was sewn onto its owner's corpse. What a miserable folly those years had been.

This creature was different. White fur, enormous stance – towering near the hight of a pony. It had been wild for many years.

"Easy..." Howland breathed, careful not to move. If this wolf had ever been tame, it must the girl Arya's monster. What was the damn thing's name?

Breath puffed from the wolf's snout. A soft growl reverberated through its chest. Slowly, it placed its foot back on the broken twig and inched forward.

"Nymeria!" Howland fished the name from the fog. Of course, the warrior queen, like the young lady herself. "Nymeria..." he repeated, calmer. "I remember you."

Recognition flickered across the wolf's eyes but did not deter it from a meal. The North was sparse and its appetite deep. A familiar face was not enough.