5 Months before the Death of Jon Arryn
Stann
It took all of Stann's energy to avoid falling from the black gelding he had stolen from the Night's Watch. He had named the horse Flight, and had cast all of his hopes of living to see a new day on the horse. Today was the eighth day since Stann had deserted the Watch on that hill, which by now was well south of where he was taking Flight.
Stann managed to pull the knife that was now his from its sheath on his hip, and rested it against the pommel of his saddle. Stann had pulled the knife from his own flesh, after it had buried itself in his hip during his desertion. The blade was castle forged steel, and could only have been Benjen Stark's blade. There certainly wasn't steel this good at Castle Black.
But even if Stann didn't know enough to tell castle-forged steel when he saw it, the blade had an inscription on it. For Benjen, the blade said. Stann knew how much the blade must mean to the First Ranger, and he had a foolish daydream of returning it to the First Ranger.
But Stann was smart enough to know he would never see a member of the Night's Watch again. If a brother caught him, he would be executed as a traitor and a deserter.
This was if he lived long enough to worry about such a thing. Though he had removed the blade from his body, the wound Benjen inflicted, his parting gift to Stann, may very well end up doing Stann in. The wound was surrounded by a ring of red flesh, and it was hot to the touch. Stann knew next to nothing about healing or medicine, but he did know if he didn't come up with some solution, some cure, he would be dead within the fortnight.
Even if the wound didn't kill him directly, it was making it harder and harder for Stann to ride. And if Stann couldn't ride, he would be easy prey for the Wildlings who lived this far north.
So far, Stann had managed to outrun all four bands of Wildlings he had come across because they had not had horses. But even these brief encounters with the Free Folk were enough for Stann to know full well he did not want to be forced to fight one. The leader of one of the bands Stann had come across had been wearing a suit of armor made of human bones.
Five hours later, Stann fell from his horse. The horse was a well-trained steed; it stopped and stood in place as soon as the reins were dropped. Stann tried to rise, but the pain was too much. He could not get up, so he crawled through the snow to a tree trunk and propped himself up against it. From his new position, Stann could see that on the other side of his horse lay three corpses. Suddenly, this stop seemed much more ominous.
Stann lay back down against the tree trunk, and silently shouted out to the Seven, begging them to tell him what he had done to deserve this. Someone, or several someones, had to have died during his escape. That was the only explanation for why this was happening to him.
While Stann was lamenting his bad situation, the three corpses on the other side of Flight rose. Stann's bladder and bowels both burst in fear as he quickly tried to draw his sword and prop it up between himself and the walking corpses. One corpse carried a rudimentary spear, and the other two were unarmed, but they came toward Stann unafraid. They ignored Flight, coming straight for Stann instead.
Once they had gotten around the horse, Stann threw Benjen's knife. To his own surprise, the blade hit one of the corpses in the eye socket. The thing fell to the ground, but then rolled to its feet and continued its march toward Stann.
The blade in Stann's hands was shaking more than the branches of a sapling in a Stormlands hurricane. Stann was going to die here, divine justice for the carnage he had inflicting while deserting his Brothers. There was nothing else Stann could have done that would account for such a cruel fate.
A ball of light erupted from the line of trees behind Stann and took the lead corpse in the chest. The thing exploded in a shower of bones and blackened flesh. Two more balls of light dispatched the other two before a tiny person emerged from behind the tree and entered Stann's line of sight.
"You are lucky these three are the first wights to have found you this far North. You clearly have no idea how to deal with them." The person turned to look at him, and Stann realized immediately that this was no person. Though humanoid, its eyes glowed with the weight of an antiquity no human could ever achieve.
"You are a Chil-" he began, before being interrupted by a raised hand.
"You could not begin to understand what we call ourselves" it said in a voice far deeper than its size should have allowed. "But please do not show us such disrespect. If you have to call us something, the Wildlings of the Far North call us the Old Ones. This is the best and most accurate name you humans have come up with. Children is just so demeaning."
"I am sorry, Old One" said Stann hesitantly.
The Old One waved its hand and Stann felt the pain in his hip vanish. He ran his hands over the wound, and found nothing. Hesitantly, he stood.
"You are needed to the South" it said.
"To the South? I cannot go south."
"If you do not go South, the whole world will perish in a coming wave of ice. Do you understand? You either do what I say, or we all die. Every man, woman, and child of both our races will vanish from the face of Westeros. Do you understand this?"
"I think you've made a mistake. If you think I am somehow crucial to the salvation of the world, you have made a great mistake. I am just a boy from the Reach."
"If you go North, the Old One said, "all you will find is many more like these. And I cannot go with you. But if you go south, there will always be six people to whom you can entrust your life."
"What are you saying?"
"I am telling you that if you go North, Westeros, Essos, everywhere, everything that breathes will die. If you turn around there may still be time to change this fate."
"Will I live if I go south?"
"You will die if you go north."
"That is not what I asked."
"If you go North, the future is set. One will freeze to death between the forks, one will be beheaded in Winterfell, one will be hanged in Mole's Town, you will be killed by the Night King, one will be killed climbing the wall, one will be skewered by a mounted stag, and the Dealmaker will start a war he can't end, a war that will tear Westeros apart.
"If you head back South, I cannot guarantee these things will not happen anyway. But I cannot see them. The future may yet be changed."
"Old One, I know not what you want from me. I do not even know what you are talking about."
"It is beyond you" the Old One thundered. "Know this: if you continue North, or if you go East or West, you will die within the month. If you turn south, your future is not determined. If you go any of three directions, you have thirty days. If you go South, you could die tomorrow, or one hundred years from now."
The Old One did not walk away; it simply vanished when it stopped talking.
Stann knew not what had happened. He did not know what it had been talking about. But it had healed him. That was at least one reason to trust it.
But something else was also clear. To the Old One, Stann was expendable. The Old One cared not for him; it cared only for its war with the Wights. But it had healed Stann and saved him. This fact was inescapable.
Stann mounted Flight again. Stann surveyed the area around him in a broad circle. He was his own man, a free agent. He could go in any direction he chose. The choices were limitless. The choices were infinite. But in the end, there was really only one.