The Dragon and the Hawke 44
Marian was wandering the halls of the pyramid, wondering exactly what she should be doing with her time. She had already bothered the dragons, talked a bit with Dany, cuddled with Missandei, and bickered with Barristan. She supposed she could go see what Sansa and Tyrion were doing, but then she remembered that they were in Winterfell awaiting the arrival of the young woman's brother.
It wouldn't be kind to interrupt them, really. She could probably do it, but she knew the importance of a loving family, and it wouldn't be kind to interrupt if there was anything heartwarming and intimate going on.
On the subject of intimacy, though one less emotional and human, she should probably start figuring out her enhanced connection to the Fade. It was something she had been putting off for somewhere going on three years now, and looking into the subject seemed as decent a method of curbing her boredom as any. Admittedly, she probably should have started looking into the matter when she first noticed how much more powerful she was in Essos than Thedas, but things had always conveniently come up.
Unfortunately, nothing came up this time, even when she gave it a good ten minutes to happen. With a sigh she made her way back to her room, hoping that every corner would lead to something else.
Because nothing did pop around any corners, she made it to her and Missandei's chambers after only a few minutes of walking. She slid to the carpeted floor, closed her eyes, and crossed her legs, trying to meditate. She sat like that for five minutes before she popped one eye open and frowned. Bethany had always made it look so easy, this meditating business, but Marian had never managed to get the hang of it.
Her ass ached, her back was stiff, and there was a kink in her armor that was digging into the inside of her thigh. She moved to stand, but then she felt the magic slam into her.
"Hold the door?" She asked the air, looking around.
She blinks when something white floats past her eyes, and she turns to follow it. The snow floats around her room, and as it spins in a circle around her she reaches out to catch it.
And then there wasn't just a single snowflake. Instead there was a torrent of them, accompanied by a dull screaming. Marian drops her hand and spins towards the sound, and is knocked off her feet by a girl pulling a sled.
Both mage and girl give startled huffs, and the girl quickly pulls herself to her feet and draws a sword. Marian raises an eyebrow at the sword, and then looks behind the girl towards where the screaming is still coming from.
"What the hell is going on here?" She asks as she watches a large man hold a wooden door against a mob of undead.
The girl gives a startled gasp at the sound of Marian's voice and then tells her, "We need to run! They're coming!"
"I can see that they're coming," Marian agrees, and with a negligent wave pulls the big man away from the door.
There is a startled cry of "HooOodoor!" as the man flies forward and then a thump as he smacks into the snow. Marian waves her hand in a circle and brings it down, and the sky erupts in a falling rain of fire. Ball after ball of burning magic slam into the ground and obliterate the undead that try and rush the large man, girl, mage, and sled.
"Care to explain exactly what's happening?" Marian asks the girl
"I think you'd know more than I would," The girl tells her with the dull expression of one who had seen just about everything that life could throw at you and yet there was just that one more thing that made them think.
"Not the firestorm, I mean the undead that are trying to get through it," Marian clarifies
"They're wights," The girl lowers her sword and sheaths it in the sled, picking up the handles and pulling. As she starts to pull the sled away, Marian finally noticed that there was a young man sitting in it.
"Hey! I know that kid!" She exclaims
"What?" the girl asks, but doesn't stop pulling the sled, picking up speed.
Marian, seeing that the girl would soon be out of hearing range, shrugs and waves a hand; the big man is lifted from the ground and pulled after her as she sets off after the kid, "Hey, what's your name?"
"Meera," The now identified Meera tells her as the firestorm fades from sight.
"Nice to meet you Meera, I'm Marian," Marian tells her, and then flicks her wrist and the sled that the girl has been dragging is lifted into the air alongside the large man, "What are they called?"
"The big one is Hodor, and the boy is Bran," Meera tells her, then furrows her brow, "How do you know him?"
"I saw him talking to an old guy with a tree sticking out of him a few years back," Marian tells her.
"What!?" Meera nearly spins around to demand answers, but remembers where they are and what is behind them, and instead simply turns her head and demands, "You saw Bran training with the Three Eyed Raven? How?"
"I was testing out my ability to open breaches anywhere in the world," Marian tells her, "I went to him and the old guy, an orgy in some desert somewhere, and a dead tree with a bunch of blue men around it."
"What? How?... What!?" Meera has to stop now, the information that Marian has given her temporarily overriding her fear of the wights and their masters. It wasn't that she lost her fear of them, it was just that she could not process her fear and the mage at the same time.
Marian shrugs, "It's a thing."
Meera blinks a few times, then she hears the shrieks of the undead as they started to catch up, and she focuses on the one thing that truly matters, "You can go anywhere in the world?"
Marian nods, and turns to thrust out a hand, from her fingers a wave of sparkling electricity flies and strikes a wight. After that one, the bolt passes into the next, then splits into the ten after that, and so on and so forth until there was a massive and synchronized popping sound as all of the wights at the front of the charge burst.
"Take us away from here! Now!" Meera begs and demands.
The mage turns back to the girl, sees the absolute terror in her eyes, and then presses the flat of her palm against empty air. It only takes her a second to zero in on her most familiar location, the White Room in Meereen, and then her hand sinks into the air halfway across the world.
The breach tears open around them, and with a wave Marian sends Bran and Hodor through the hole. They vanish and then Marian indicates for Meera to go.
But the girl is not looking at her anymore.
Marian turns her head to follow the girl's gaze, and immediately sees the five blue men standing in a curved line, staring at her. The mage tilts her head, "huh, another thing I've seen before."
The apparent leader of the blue men, indicated by his snappy dress sense and the horns popping out of his head in the shape of a crown, nods to her in something resembling respect. Marian raises an eyebrow but returns the nods, there was no need to be a dick to powerful magical creatures that had entire mythologies based off of them after all.
Because what she was looking at were five white walkers.
"Meera, go through the Breach and find Daenerys Targaryen," Marian tells the girl, "I may need her children."
"What!?" Meera demands, completely taking what the mage meant the wrong way.
Marian frowns at her own wording and the girls harsh and startled yell, but instead of answering she blasts the girl back. Meera flew through the air and then vanished through the green light that was the contained Breach.
"You aren't going to let me go without a fight, are you?" She asks
The leader of the White Walkers, she thinks he's called the Night's King, at least gives her the courtesy of a shaken head before he pulls his ice blade from his back. She watches it, and four more like it, come out and frowns at her unarmed state. But she could do this, she had to do this.
He hands alight with eldritch flame as the first of the White Walkers charges her with a guttural hiss. She waits until he is right on her before she ducks under his swipe, then grabs the creature's hand with her gauntleted hand. She had heard what these creatures could do with bare skin, but now was not the time for fear.
She is surprised though when the claws of her gauntlets dig into the frozen flesh and the Walker gives a screech of startled pain. She sees it drop its sword from its hand and she pushes forward with her free hand and her magic, sending the blade spinning off into the trunk of a far off tree.
Before she can capitalize on the unarmed nature of her opponent, though, she has to duck out of the way of another ice sword that sails through where her head had been only a second before. She could tell that all of them were moving in on her, all but the Night's King, who was content to watch her fight his generals.
She was largely on the defensive, ducking, weaving, and putting every trick that Isabella had taught her about combat to use. The swords would sing past her head, under her arms, between her legs, and they would knick nothing but the dragon plate of her armor.
Dragonglass, Dragonsteel, and it seemed that even Dragonflesh was immune to the frozen force of the White walkers, just as Jon told her they were immune to the touch of fire. That seemed to be the theme of the day, she mused as she smacked a Walker away with a telekinetic blast, an eternal battle between the powers of fire and ice.
Really, it all just seemed like picking which you'd rather die to!
As much as she loved Drogon, Rhaegal, and Viserion, she knew that they were more or less monsters. They didn't see people as people, they just saw them as two legged snacks. She didn't know why she and Dany rated different, but they did. With the White Walkers, it seemed, much the same was the case.
All of this was passing through her head as she caught two of the ice blades on the wristguard of her armored hand. The Lord Commander had said that the Walkers possessed unnatural strength, now it seemed that she was much the same, thank whatever god was out there.
With that thought, she pushed the two swords away and caught the third before it could cut her neck, but then she felt something enter her side. She blinked, startled, and then looked down.
The fourth Walker had retrieved his sword, it seemed, as it was currently sticking into her at a very uncomfortable angle. She frowned at the sword, and then looked up at the White Walker. It had a nearly satisfied gleam in its eyes as it tore its sword from her.
She is forced to stumble from the force of the yank, and glares at the White Walker as she stumbles away from it. The other three all step back, content to let her die from just that wound. They'd never seen any creature last longer than a single strike from their blades, so Marian was as good as dead in their eyes.
They didn't spot it, but the Night's King did.
He saw that her stumbling was taking her to the green horizon that she had created and sent their quarry through. He saw in a moment of clarity that she was not actually hurt, only pretending to be. He did not know how it was possible, but he needed to stop her from getting away or closing the hole towards the Greenseer.
But it was too late for him or his Generals, as Marian straightened and smiled at them to the shock of the four minion Walkers. She chuckles and tells them, "If I had a dragon for every time somebody stuck me, I'd be three dragons richer."
Then there is a roar from beyond the green Breach, "Speaking of!"
The Walkers flee, and Marian lets out a sigh of relief before stepping through the breach and sealing it behind her. Standing before her is Daenerys Stormborn and Drogon's face. Marian laughs and pats the black dragon on the snout before asking, "So… who wants to know what kind of day I've had?"