Sansa

First Frost made no attempt to flee, even as Sansa led the Other and his captors back down into the crypts. Even as she kept her pace even, slow and deliberate, Sansa could feel her heart hammer in her chest. This is too much, she thought, trying to keep her breathing steady. I wonder if he can hear the difference between forced breaths and natural calm. She wanted nothing more than to be the girl she was again, head full of knights and songs and whiling the days away with Jeyne Poole or the daughters of Father's visiting vassals. To be Baelfea no longer, who grows to overshadow Sansa Stark by the hour. Though she could keep a straight face, the hounds were not so easily stilled. They were a nervous yelping chorus, ready to bolt pell-mell heedless of direction. No so when I woke in the kennel, or when they saw Myranda come up from the frozen earth. Speaking of, the dead girl seemed no worse for wear from Howling Wind's mother seizing her strings, standing just too straight to be normal. The dead don't fidget, after all. Their muscles don't ache, their eyes don't twitch. They had gone green again, as well. I don't think she was much expecting to be kicked out. Nor had Myranda acted mindlessly. Her stiff dead hands had reached only for me. Perhaps Her Grace believes me threat enough to try killing before their armies proper are brought to bear. Had it been for the sake of the war, though? Sansa had not forgotten the look the Other-queen had given her when she walked in Howling Wind's mantle. More like to keep her cherished daughter safe, and hang the war. First Frost's frigid presence intensified as he got closer, passing Sansa it seemed purposefully slowly before limping back into the crypt of the Hungry Wolf. Despite his wounds, his bruises, his rent limbs, Sansa got the distinct impression that the Other was not so displeased with his lot as he might otherwise be.

"The next time you come out of there will be the last." Sansa said, trying to keep tears from dribbling down her face. It was all just so exhaustingly overwhelming…

"Yes." The she-Singer who had run Sansa's words through the True Tongue and First Frost's back in turn at the base of the broken tower fulfilled such a function now. I must ask her name when I get a moment. Just now though, Sansa felt too tired to do more than stiffly leave the crypts. The Other's eyes followed her as far as they could, burning bright blue all the way. The pack kept pace with her out of sorts as they were, though whether on account of First Frost's presence or some bestial fear of the dark Sansa had no notion. They are not used to being chased, she thought. Not used to being prey. Something is clinging to their heels, a hunger in the darkness.

Up in the cold open air the pack was somewhat more at ease, peering back every few trots to the entrance of the crypts, where the hungry thing that ran within their minds dwelled. Perhaps the kings, Sansa pondered. The Kings of Winter and their stone wolves, their steely spirits free to wander now the swords across their laps have gone. People ran to and fro, Jon's people, northmen and Valemen and Free Folk and more, yet Sansa could only sit on a nearby barrel and bury her head in her hands.

"Alayne Stone." Dimly the words rang like tinkly bells in the tempest that whirled in Sansa's mind. Let's see Howling Wind try something in this, Sansa thought ruefully. "Alayne." The name came again and hands with it, over Sansa's shoulders. When she looked up she found herself looking at Myranda Royce, as boisterous as she'd been when they were in the Vale together. When I was merely Alayne Stone, Littlefinger's bastard daughter. When my hair was dyed brown, like yours. After the Eyrie and the Gates of the Moon had come time in the hands of House Bolton, of course. Time best left forgotten. "There you are." Myranda sat down on a crate, the wood creaking in protest.

"Hello, Myranda. I'm sure you must know by now-"

"-that you'll never call me Randa, no matter how many times I ask. That you're a Stark, not a Stone. That you have red hair instead of brown, and even left to its own wild devices manages to look better than my own!" Myranda finished in mock protest. Sansa found herself endeared to the Royce girl, who seemed to sense her weariness and besides, was able to finish Sansa's sentences. Or at least Alayne's. I doubt she'd have much to say to what Baelfea's seen and done. Despite her small, pretty mouth, Sansa knew Myranda Royce seldom ever closed it. Though, whether because she's a hopeless gossip or just wants to appear the brainless buxom butterball, I'm not certain. Certainly Myranda was keener than the Lords Declarant who had sought to pluck Sweetrobin out from Littlefinger's clutches, but that was like saying a man was handsomer than Tyrion Lannister or Sandor Clegane. "Oh!" Myranda cried suddenly, pulling something from her pocket. An apple, Sansa saw, that ran red-and-yellow without ever truly going orange. "As if I needed extra difficulty staying in my seams… our orchards' apples have been going into pies I'd sooner marry than most men, and happily. At least a well-cooked pie will stay warmer than a man, and keep its sweetness longer, too." Myranda said, shaking the apple in front of Sansa. Despite herself she gave a giggle. "There's a laugh, and I didn't even have to barb any of these passing knightly fools to do it."

"Speaking of knights, this is scarce a place for you, my lady."

"You still less, dear princess. Come, come, let's get us into some dreadful mischief and leave this awfulness to men with steel in their hands- and in their pants- for battle that the Battle of the Bastards scarcely whetted." Does she not see my skull-capped branch? The wild storms behind my eyes? Does she think I need merely drop this stick and brush my hair to half become Alayne Stone again?

"Myranda, the last time I got into mischief with another girl of high birth, it didn't go so well." Sansa said wearily. Much to her dismay, Myranda Royce's demeanor only brightened as they walked back to the keep.

"Oh? Have you been gossiping with another, my princess? I'm wounded! I knew I should have come to you sooner, but it seemed you were seldom at dinner and even when you were, I thought it best you should spend the time with Prince Brandon and his wife. I haven't seen that honey-haired wildling in the hall in some time, Val, perhaps it was her you were off listening at keyholes with!" Her words made Sansa's brow furrow and mouth tighten. Val. I had forgotten her. They had burned the Hungry Wolf, Bran had arrived with Meera…and that was the last Sansa could remember of her. Winterfell is a huge place, only bigger with the additions, and yet I've not seen so much as a honey-colored hair in months. One might think Val was hiding. That thought set Sansa ill at ease, her mind far from Myranda Royce's prattling. I'll have to find her. She is precious to Jon, he would take it badly if something happened to her out in the Winter Town or an outbuilding when he'd want her in the keep with us.

"…by the way, how have things gone with dear Harry?" In years past, Sansa would have thought nothing further of the question. Having spent so much time in the proximity of Howling Wind, quite apart from cold bothering her no more and being able to see clearly in the dark, Sansa could hear too the difference between a voice at calm and one trying to sound so. Ah, so that's what she's after.

"He seems perfectly chivalrous, if a little tactless sometimes."

"If that's what you can call tumbling peasant girls without a care in all the world." Myranda said, making a face. "I hear he's got a Stone or two of his own, in fact."

"Alys, yes, and another on the way. If the gods are good, the girl will have an easy time of it and bear a healthy baby." That Sansa knew Harry had bastard children seemed to confound Myranda. "Littlefinger told me, and besides, Lord Arryn told me himself. He was quite candid about it."

"Oh-" It was Sansa's turn to interrupt.

"Lady Royce, suffice it to say that it's quite unlikely Lord Harrold and I will marry. If you still have designs on him, as you did before Alayne Stone appeared, feel free to pursue them. Alayne Stone was a mummery, a farce, and one in markedly ill taste. I am Sansa Stark and always have been and will be until I die." And after, Sansa thought. Myranda was silent for the rest of the walk back toward the Royces' quarters, cheeks pink. Only when she laid her hand on the door did she speak, her almost simpering manner gone.

"I apologize, Princess Sansa. Clearly, you're made of stronger stuff than I accounted for on first taking your measure."

"You need not apologize, Lady Royce. Just know that I'm not the starry-eyed maiden with songs and knights in her head you surely saw when you first laid eyes on Alayne Stone. Time with Joffrey, Littlefinger and Ramsay Snow proved quite able to silence every song and slay every knight in here." She touched her hand to her head.

"More's the pity, princess." She turned to go, stopping only when the door was already half-open. "Oh. Speaking of dejected beauties, you haven't happened to spot Mya Stone, have you?" Just what I needed, another worry.

"No, but surely she came with the rest of Lord Nestor's retainers?"

"That's just what I thought, and yet I haven't spotted her once in all my time at Winterfell. At least there's space enough and more for all of us…ah, well. Mayhaps she's off sulking or else spending time with people from outside the Vale for once. I'd bet a golden dragon she's still cut up over Mychel Redfort marrying Ys." Yes, Ysilla. Daughter of Lord Yohn Royce and your cousin, of sorts. It was as if Sansa was drawing a great family tree on a parchment in her mind, the stillness and the thought required to keep everyone straight enough to slow the storms, but not stop them. "Lord Horton might have left Mychel to live awhile before killing him with marriage, eh?" Myranda asked. "Before killing Mya too with heartbreak, true."

"What possessed him to push Mychel into marrying? He's scarcely older than I am."

"He might say that once a man is knighted, it's due time for him to wed. I say old Horton must be playing every angle of the board. In the event handsome Harrold Arryn dies without an heir- unlikely, as our falcon's got an egg in every nest- the issue of overlordship of the Vale will surely spring its truly ugly head. House Royce of Runestone might be eminent for a time, but Lord Yohn's day is done and with only Andar left of his crop of three boys, and yet unmatched, it would seem the best way to secure their ascent to the Eyrie would be to have Andar marry you. A princess for a bride, the beautiful sister of the King in the North…aye, that would push things well in Runestone's favor." Small wonder, then, that Lord Yohn broached the issue with Jon so quickly after the Battle of the Bastards. He must have been kicking himself for shrugging his daughter off on a mere Redfort when she might have been Queen in the North.

"What has that to do with the Redforts, though?" Sansa asked, keen for once on something other than the ceaseless tempests that raged whenever she closed her eyes. Myranda shrugged.

"Mine own father has only a single son in turn, unwed and my elder. Should this lunacy with the walking corpses prove the end of the Royces of Runestone and the Royces of the Gates of the Moon, any children Ys and gallant Ser Mychel have will succeed to the titles of both. Should Lord Horton live to see it, there's an outside but not impossible chance the grandchild of such a match might sit the weirwood throne in the Eyrie's Great Hall."

"A dozen coins will land on edge before such a thing will come to pass. Lord Arryn may skirt the whole issue by marrying you and giving you a burbling babe to keep you out of mischief." Myranda gave a laugh that sounded half genuine to Sansa.

"Me, keeping out of mischief? I thought you smarter than that, princess. Besides, what with your stern Stark demeanor, it falls to me to do mischief enough for both of us." She ought ask Howling Wind how incapable of mischief I am. She ought ask First Frost. Surely word had reached the canny Myranda Royce of Sansa's talking their prisoner down lest a lizard-lion devour him whole. Perhaps she's genuinely concerned for me, even if she also desires to marry Harry. A small curious face peeked out the door, going white at the sight of Sansa, wide eyes locked on the skull-capped walnut branch she held. Myranda Royce, quick of eye if not of limb, did not fail to take notice and with a harsh word sent the younger girl back to the hidden gaggle of unmarried maidens from the Vale, no doubt a ploy by their families to keep them out of sight of any wildling men. Shows what they know. There are hardly any left, and those that are have spearwives to reckon with.

"Princess Sansa." The voice was so unlike Myranda's that for a moment Sansa wondered if she were hearing things. When she turned she spotted Brienne's squire, the Payne boy. Perhaps the only westerman in all of Winterfell. His appearance made her think on Tyrion for the second time in an hour. I wonder if I'll ever see him again. He had sent the raven bearing Daenerys Targaryen's seal to Winterfell, which meant he had evaded capture by Cersei…surely, he would be in the dragon queen's company when she came north? If she did. Nothing had been heard of Jon, or his companions, after they had sailed south from White Harbor. A long silence, over many months. Not very difficult to think things have gone ill on Dragonstone. Nobody had ever voiced their doubts, at least to Sansa, perhaps because it was her idea for Jon to court the mysterious queen, freshly returned from exile, in the first place. No doubt some must think me foolish now, trying to play matchmaker and see the two made one, like in a tale. Nobody else was about to bring dragons into play against the sea of dead men that raged around the outer ring without respite, though, so Sansa easily brushed away any doubts of her own. No one had seen Ghost since he'd last departed Winterfell in the days before Jon's own departure, yet Sansa knew he was fine wherever he'd gone. He comes and goes as he will, as does Jon. A direwolf, not a dog. Besides, Sansa had known a dog wilder perhaps than his masters would have liked. The North is a place for wild creatures, fit for them. Direwolves, shadowcats, white owls with eyes that shine like stars…

The Payne boy coughed and Sansa blinked herself back into the moment at hand. How is it he's been separated from his charge?

"Where's Brienne?" Sansa asked. Only when she took the measure of his ashen face, his grief-filled eyes, did she realize what must have happened. It was Oathkeeper that Howland Reed held, I might have known then. She would never have been parted from that sword. Half of Ice, Father's own steel. The thought made her shiver. "Where did she fall?" Sansa asked, Myranda Royce and all her courtly games quite forgotten.

"We were on the ring, out facing the wolfswood. These…things came out of the trees, with the dead men and the spiders. A pair of them made off with my lady after they disarmed her." Sansa was sure she'd misheard.

"They what?"

"They took Oathkeeper from her and flung it away. Then one of them grabbed her up and off they went, back into the forest." She can't be far, then.

"Podrick, worry not for Brienne of Tarth. If she can overmatch Sandor Clegane, she can certainly prove the better of a few lanky savages. Just now, I want you to find Val. Some call her the wildling princess, though she's not partial to the title. Honey-colored hair in a long braid. Do you know her?"

"Yes. The k- er, His Grace was fond of her. Is. Uh, is fond. Of her." he said, tripping over his tongue as oft he did.

"Good. You find Val and when you do, bring her to my room." He did not look any less worried.

"What about you, princess?"

"I'm going to find our blue beauty." Sansa replied, turning to Myranda Royce.

"Do forgive me. I'm off to make northern mischief."

"Say no more, Princess Sansa. I ought be minding these cheeping chicks anyway." With that the older girl vanished behind the door. Sansa made her way to her room, to where the mirror that had been hers since she could remember stood. Arya needed no mirror. She never checked to see if she had leaves in her hair, dirt on her face or mud on her dress. She always did, but more so she lived a life outside such vanities. It wasn't her own face Sansa wanted to spot, though. If I can go out without really going out, so much the better. I needn't give Howling Wind another opportunity to wreak havoc behind Winterfell's walls. Though she gripped the looking glass until her shaking made her reflection ripple, there was no forthcoming glimpse of blue eyes. Tarth blue or otherwise. Finally she moved to the window, staring out across the breadth of Winterfell into the far treeline, the edge of the wolfswood. Dead men coursed from the trees even then, looking like ants from so far away. Once they might have terrified me, she thought, completely calm. Before I knew what bid them walk again. Howling Wind and her mother. First Frost. The Lords of the Long Night. Before too, I saw Branch and his kind scythe them down like so much wheat. Her thoughts wandered over the she-Other in the mantle. I never wanted her, I wanted Lady. Only Lady. The part of me that might have grown into more than a stupid girl fumbling at all that's mystic like a dockhand with a slippery fish. Bran would be more suited to this, she knew. Bran has a wife and son now to tend to. I have nobody to leave behind. No Lady to mourn my passing. Indeed, perhaps it's due time she and I are reunited. Summer's still out there, in thrall of the Night King. Perhaps I can get him back for Bran, in a way. Or just stop the Night King from desecrating his bones any further. She shut her eyes tight, then opened them, looking past the wall, the earthen rings, the black line of trees that hid the enemy from every eye. Save two.

Dimly she could remember a kindred spirit, one that stood on two legs and quite oblivious to all around her to be seen, heard, smelled. Still, the spirit had been warm and loving, had held her when she was small and more than earned trust. The world had been warm and loving too, blue above and green about, with nary a cold breeze to trouble her. When she blinked, that memory faded, as it always did. Quicker than last time, and she knew it would fade quicker still when next it came. If it did. Just now, the world was cold, dark, without a single other voice to join her own to. It did not matter. There had been others, once, but they were hazier memories still than the spirit who had made for her a place in the world. Now it was just her, running without respite in a world in darkness. She'd been afraid at first of course, cold, hungry, but those feelings too faded the longer she ran in the night that did not end. Even with no call to eat or sleep she did not reach its end, nor did the light in the darkness once show its lovely silver face. Once there had been more, to the world and to her, but no longer. A shadow was all she was, barely there and nearly gone. Then came the Call, mesmerizing and utterly undeniable. She shot straight for it, whatever it was, answering as loudly as she could manage. The shadows lifted, the mists parted, and she found herself bounding headlong into a place she remembered. Shapes blundered about, harsh hoarse cries of alarm broke the night's silence and sharp glittering things lunged out at her, seeking to stick her as the prey's antlers had once stuck her mother. The cold points found no purchase, for she was no more flesh than blood, no more blood than bone. A hungry face leaned out of the night, mouth agape, and the body that wore it had only time to raise an arm before she was on it, pulling it to ground without a second thought. Her teeth found the long bone in its arm, splintering it in its wrapping of cold stringy meat while its owner screamed. She found its throat next, locking her jaws around the skull and ripping it from its moorings before crunching it between her teeth. Though chaos seethed and raged like a wildfire in all directions, she had ears only for the next note of the Call. There were more of the thing, of whatever she had just killed, bounding away as fast as they could, and things like men but weren't men that milled about like livestock, utterly unable to withstand her fury. There were others as well, quicker than any man and stronger than any, too. It didn't matter. They were meat, flesh and blood and bone, no more. Shrieking things with twice the legs she had that only shrieked and squealed when her spectral teeth crunched through their hard bodies like they were roasted chicken, the same as the kindred spirit had once fed her form her own selfless hand. Another cold tooth bit into her shoulder. Or would have, were she still one of the countless creatures big and small, hot and cold, that called this world home. She rounded on her newest attacker, at once flinging its cold body to the hard-frozen earth. She was the larger by far, looming over her fallen foe muzzle locked in a snarl. A thin wisp of beard, a shriveled shrunken face, clear liquid oozing from its mouth and nose. Bright eyes, bright as stars, that dimmed when the wound she'd given took its toll. Movement caught her gaze and for a moment she was overjoyed, one of her own drawing near. A brother, she knew. But his movements were stiff and no breath fogged the air in front of his muzzle. Behind him plodded a dead man of uncommon size and one alike to the creature whose clear cold blood dripped still from her teeth. What fear she might have felt the lightless world had taken from her and besides, what could they do to her that had not already been done?

Sansa stood at the window, unable to do anything more than listen to the chaos brewing in the wolfswood. Cracking ice, shrill cries of pain, the brutes' harsh bellowing in the old tongue. The howling of a direwolf. The wolfswood. Not the Otherwood, not the wightwood or the brutewood or the webwood. At last the tide from the trees faltered, dead men rushing to put themselves between whatever had erupted into their midst and the cold beings who drove them. As if I didn't know. Feeling returned to her legs and in an instant she was off. Her fist pounded on Bran's door so fast Sansa couldn't hear each separate knock and when it opened, she found herself facing down half a dozen nocked arrows. How does one take a crannogman by surprise? Sansa found herself thinking. By accident, of course. No doubt the wolfswood has them thinking the castle's about to come down!

"Sansa, what's-"

"Bran, reach for Summer! I tried to…I don't know, I suppose look for him out in the forest, and instead I found Lady, who found him for me!" Her nephew, to his credit, did not cry out at her knocking nor her voice just shy of a shout. All he did was move his grey eyes, wide with surprise, from his mother's face, to his father's, to his aunt's.

"Sansa, Summer's dead." Bran, you saw the grotto sure as Meera and I did. What does death mean in a place like this?

"So was Lady, but not completely. A bit of her lived, lives in me, else I could not wreak my mischief on the Others' heads as I've done. You are by far the better warg, I'm sure if you tried you could have Summer return to you." In one form or another. "A cup of wine may spill, but all that's needed is to pour another cup from the cask."

"What about the cask, Sansa? What happens when it goes empty?"

"Better then, to mourn the wine spilled on the floor and let a second cup go untasted? Wine is meant for drinking and life meant for living." I must sound half-mad. Her euphoria did not fade though, even in the midst of anxious glances between prince and princess. Finally, Bran bit his lip and sat down in a chair. Betraying his experience, Sansa thought wryly. I always forget to sit down first and when I wake up, I'm lying on the ground somewhere. Meera kept Howland near, letting him see his father was alright. The baby mumbled, not sounding convinced. Sansa sat on the edge of the bed, so terribly excited it was a moment before she managed to follow Bran out to the wolfswood.

Lady was bringing down another brute when Sansa found her again. They were spectacularly afraid of her; a feeling Sansa had never thought to experience. They were just tall enough for their heads to be out of reach on foot but bowling them over quite removed that obstacle. Where's Summer? Sansa thought, Lady snapping her head about to locate him. Why, with Hodor, she answered herself a second later. With the Night King. Even as she ran, Sansa could feel the contempt rising. King of what? A few wandering wights? Of miscreated hapless creatures like himself? It was Howling Wind's mother who's bidding the Lords of the Long Night did. Her and her husband, wherever he is. Sansa wondered whether killing him, if indeed he lived at all and happened to turn up, would much stop the Others' push south. Lady killed a half dozen in the wolfswood and nobody called a halt then. Her quarry had gone further into the forest, where the trees were close and tall and old. Webs covered nearly everything, but they proved no barrier to Lady, who did not even cause the frozen dew to scatter off the silken strands. Summer may not have had a scent to follow but tufts of fur in the webs betrayed his passing. Lady will find him sooner or later. A glimpse of white in the high darkness of the tree branches Lady disregarded as just another ice spider but when the soft hoot of an owl was forthcoming, she stopped. I know that hoot well. Lady looked up to find the bird perched primly on the lowest branch of a massive pine tree. No doubt she's behind its blue eyes sure as I'm behind Lady's. It did not appear alarmed, for ferocious as the direwolf was and spectral at that, Lady could not fly. It took off, unrushed, soaring silently ahead. Lady had only to maintain a saunter to keep up. Mischief to put any of Myranda Royce's to shame. Sansa didn't like following Howling Wind's course. As miraculous as the last odd year had been, she was certain her fumblings must seem like just that to someone much the more practiced. Well, she hasn't killed me yet. Either she won't, or she can't. The trees parted to reveal a ruined fastness in the wolfswood, a relic form the time of the First Men. There is nothing so close to Winterfell. Lady has traveled far. It alone among the countless trunks and boulders was untouched by webs, and Sansa could see several figures standing on its ruined ramparts. Ramparts. They're scarcely at head-height, a giant could reach over them and easily snatch up a defender. As she closed with the ruin, the hairs on Lady's neck stood up. At the edge of her hearing a low humming could be heard, louder as she got still closer to the stone wall. The owl promptly returned to the arms of the one who'd sent it, Howling Wind's hooded head looking down at Lady from the top of the ruin.

With her were several of the Others Sansa had spotted the last time she was in Howling Wind's company. One wore woven web, his bow ever at hand. The other wore plate-ice and in his hand was a sword of the like Sansa had never seen before. That's not razor-ice any more than it is common steel. It was black, wholly black, as if the Other had reached up to pluck a sliver of starless night out of the sky. He did not feel its point as men like Lyn Corbray sometimes had at the Eyrie, oft to unnerve. In Sansa's opinion, it only showed how insecure the man was. There was not a trace of insecurity in the Other who held the black sword's face. He has an older man's stillness. Something of Roose Bolton came to Sansa then, but he had never been able to hide the lie behind his dirty ice-colored eyes. He turned away from Lady and there was a quick utterance in the True Tongue. Howling Wind's mother appeared next, and she was as striking a figure as Sansa remembered. Lady was not so taken aback, though, even baring her teeth at the queenly figure wrapped in spidersilk, ice, and diamonds. She paid the direwolf no mind, blue eyes moving to the western treeline. Out stepped the Night King, followed by Summer, Hodor and who knew how many wights. No unseen barrier, Lady observed, hummed between her and the Others' underling. Now, Bran! Sansa cried. There was no answer, no hint that her brother had made it as far as she had. Lady, ignorant of any plan, simply bounded for the Night King. He whipped his crooked spear off his back, planted his feet- and Lady knocked him to the web-strewn frozen earth, teeth crunching down on his arm. His eyes went wide, his nostrils flared but there was no outcry of pain, only the mob of dead rushing to get him away from Lady. Sweet, simple Hodor, who might have been a wall that could talk for all the Sansa who had known him cared, went down when Lady ripped a leg from his heavy plodding body. What power laid in Lady's jaws, Sansa did not know, but limbs they parted from the bodies in the wights moved no more, unlike when it was swords that did the parting. The same went for blue-eyed heads. Eerie snapping things when taken by axes snapped their last after Lady pulled them from their shoulders. Only when she felt the Night King's knee pop between her teeth did the hum kick up, forcing her away from her fallen, helpless prey. No, Sansa thought, as Lady's teeth snapped shut on empty air. She shied away from the impenetrable wall, no longer a danger, but the Night King did not rise. If anything, stirring in the snow and dirt, breathing through gritted teeth and eye twitching, Sansa was only reminded how unremarkable he was. He bleeds like we do. She turned to the ruin, from which the Others watched impassively. Howling Wind's dainty hands were sliding out of sight, back beneath her splendid mantle. Then again, I knew she was no helpless maiden in a tower, as I was when trapped in the Red Keep. Were it her in my place, she'd have brought the castle down on her way out. If only Summer was Summer, instead of just another wight! There would be no barrier between the Night King and certain death then. Sansa's tested patience, Lady's frayed nerves, it was enough to make her scream. Enough to make Lady howl, and howl she did. It was no common cry that left her then, for she had no lungs to empty of air and no limit to how deep her call could sound. Sansa found herself joining in (or had she been the one to start?) and it was as if all those who had gone before, every member of every pack since the first packs ran, were singing through her. Vaguely Sansa caught sight of the snow growing brighter. It's the moon, Sansa thought. We are stronger with the moon. The Others, to a one, let out cries of surprise or irritation. Through Lady's eyes, Sansa watched the wintery queen wrap an arm protectively around her daughter while the rest made do with raised hands. Having seen what she had of the Others prior, she found herself understanding. It's not just the sun that gives them such grief, it's light itself. Small wonder then the wolves should so love the moon, full of its own radiance, when the night by right belong to the Others and their ilk. There was stirring and Sansa felt her insides freeze when Howling Wind, eyes protected by her deep hood, pulled Brienne of Tarth onto her feet and into view with a single slender hand.

Frost immediately spiderwebbed down Brienne's deep blue pauldron, a blue that could not hope to rival that which shone in her eyes. No wight, Sansa saw at once. You are not so blunt an instrument as to simply smash all aside with an endless tide of dead. Instead Lady felt the same as she had when she'd locked gazes with the white owl. Using Brienne as a Myrish eye, Sansa realized. One well-fit to seeing in the light of the full moon. Ire replaced ice inside her and she howled again. Lady, Sansa, one was the other and both were under the moon in all her might, in all her power. One the Others have never touched. Lady's here-and-gone body was given full shape, if briefly, and Sansa could feel the hole that Lady's death had bored into her being filling up, filling in, filling over. Flesh has no power here, even the cold kind that can pull a portcullis off its frame. We are in a world of spirit now, where bodies are made of feeling. That notion seemed evident to Howling Wind through Brienne as well, and it was one that by the look on both their faces she fancied not one bit. The Call sounded again, and to Lady's elation she could hear voices she thought she'd forgotten join in. Her silent brother to the north, something so precious in his protection, her regal sister to the south, setting a city full of men to panic…but it was the wild chorus of cries, carried by a savage booming voice wild to the bone and deeper, that made Summer twitch and jitter.

"You know that voice." Bran's own came from everywhere, from nowhere. "As sure as I do. Hear it, flesh-of-mine-own, and run beneath the moon again." The rich howl that echoed off the stones and trees came again. "Hear him. Alive, alive." The stiff frostbitten fur began to thaw. The gashes the wights had opened in Summer's flesh were not so deep, so red, as they had been when Sansa had first found the clearing. "Remember the taste of prey you hunted together, so that you may hunt together again." One filthy, ragged boy is much like another, and not Jon nor I had seen him in years. No doubt the Umber lands had orphans aplenty after Robb's ride south. The Smalljon paid Ramsay in his own coin. Summer's nose twitched, as a wight's never would. All the while, the Others were beside themselves trying to get their princess out of harm's way. Get her gone back to the Land of Always Winter then, my cold lords. Sansa thought. This is a place for wolves. While Summer, returning from death a piece at a time before their eyes, drew the others' gazes, Howling Wind's own eyes, and Brienne's, never left Lady. Leaving the direwolf Sansa reached for the winter princess, imagining a hand stretching out to trace the she-Other's perfect oval face. Sansa held Brienne in her mind, so stolidly that Howling Wind could not fail to notice. I would have my blue beauty back. It was the waterfall Sansa showed her then, the one at the end of the passage in the crypts. She pictured Howling Wind o the other side of the wall of water, outside Winterfell and thus whatever magics within it held the Others at bay so far. If spottily. Sansa wondered if Branch would be of service translating the True Tongue just then or if he'd be too busy railing against such a dialogue. Howling Wind's mouth became a hard line. Sansa was shown in turn the fallen leaves of autumn curling in on themselves, turning white with frost. Cairn stones covered under a fine icy sheen. Disbelievingly, Sansa recalled First Frost and at a gasp from Howling Wind she knew the bargain had been struck.

Whoever the prisoner was to Howling Wind, Sansa could not find it in herself to care. Just then she was preoccupied with plucking Brienne from the clutches of the Others without any harm coming to her, a door fast closing if her bluish lips and pale frosted face was any sign. When Sansa pulled away from Howling Wind she found she was on the wall as well, her normal two-legged red-haired self. In the flesh, utterly without recourse. Snarling caught her attention and she turned just in time to see the Night King go to earth again under Lady's weight, her heart leaping in her chest at the sight of Summer, hale and hearty, tearing into the cold leather and the flesh beneath it. That's our part done, Sansa thought hurriedly, trying to will herself back into Lady before Howling Wind's surprise kept her from simply throwing Sansa off the wall as if she were a dwarf in a giant's arms. The cold slender hand came up, the fingers brushing her cheek. Sansa felt no cold. Though she did not really expect to, Howling Wind it seemed thought her touch would have some effect.

"No longer." Sansa said, knowing full well Howling Wind spoke not a word of the Common Tongue and never would. Lady and Summer bounded off, the wights too busy slamming themselves to pieces against the ruin's stones trying to reach Sansa. Not Howling Wind's puppets, then. Though the corpses managed to simply pile over the ramparts, dead hands surging toward her, Sansa didn't flinch. You want First Frost back too badly to throw away a chance at getting him back. Her hunch proved true when Howling Wind's finger prodded her in the shoulder and she was roaring back through the trees, bounding in Lady's body, faster, faster, until she was writhing around on the floor of her bedchamber. That's odd, she thought. I started in Bran's room. Then she realized she was famished and parched beyond words besides. Looking around, eyes spinning in their sockets, she caught sight of Podrick Payne and held onto his face in her mind until the tempest within her stilled. Only when the rining in her ears faded did she try to speak, sounding like an old woods witch. Podrick handed her a cup of hot lemon water at once, it appeared having it ready in the event she woke up. She guzzled it in one hearty gulp, feeling both exhausted and exhilarated.

"Lord Payne. I apologize if I alarmed you." she got out finally, if a bit raspy still. He gave no hysterical response as her own maidservants were wont to do, only his wide eyes betrayed that he had seen anything out of sorts at all.

"You were asleep for three days, Princess Sansa. I would wait to move until you've eaten and you're certain your legs will hold you up." he said quickly when she made to rise. "Perhaps some food as well-"

"It can wait." Sansa cut him off, getting up on knocking knees. "Come with me." she said, steadily working feeling back into her calves.

The entrance to the crypts was not an area normally heavy in traffic. Now that the Singers had taken up in the earth beyond it as well as the common knowledge now that an Other languished somewhere in the depths, it was a place positively avoided. Podrick Payne did not caution her against her course, though Sansa rather thought he'd not have guessed it in a thousand years. The Hungry Wolf's crypt for once looked secure, none other than Branch standing outside it, tending to the red vines.

"Let him out." she said, Branch not so much has turning to greet her. "I don't know just what lies between you and them. I don't care. I know if the prisoner in that cell is brought to the waterfall-"

"-someone lost to you will be given in return, yes?" Branch finished for her. Had he seen all that had transpired in the wolfswood? Probably, Sansa thought. There are weirwoods here and there and everywhere in there. She laid a hand on the vines and they peeled back, curling to the red roots in the stone.

"Tell him to come out." For once, Branch did not object. First Frost limped duly into view, looking like he'd just been roused from sleep. "Follow." Sansa said, heading for the passage. She extinguished each flame as she passed them, so that her captive might not walk into a wall or down some side crypt due to blindness. Only then did she realize that in the even something went wrong, she had only Branch and Podrick Payne on hand. Well, at least Podrick can be counted on, as far as his ability allows. Though the lack of light might have kept First Frost on the right path it was the opposite from the boy form the westerlands, and more than once Sansa heard him mutter a curse or hiss in pain at bumping his head or stubbing a toe. The waterfall had not frozen, to Sansa's relief, but she had no doubt the water was cold as could be. First Frost took a long breath at the sight of it. At the sight of freedom. Should he so much as touch it he'll be gone. They stood there for a moment, a peculiar group, until the winds picked up on the other side of the waterfall. First Frost's gasp matched the one Howling Wind gave in the wolfswood. Sansa could hear the water freezing just past the wall of water, the she-Other's eyes showing through it bright and blue. "Go." Sansa said. Branch relayed her words, curt and grudgingly as the True Tongue could sound. At least you'll be quit of Others for awhile. First Frost turned toward Sansa but did not move. Her fingers tightened their grip on the walnut branch. "Go." she said again. He turned toward the waterfall, limped toward it, and stopped just before he could feel its cascading droplets. The True Tongue filled the passage again, the otherworldly sound of ice shifting under a frozen lake. Then he disappeared into the deluge.

The eyes on the other side lost their interest in Sansa, Branch and Podrick at once. Slyly she reached for Brienne. After ascertaining that she was unharmed but for the cold, she took the opportunity to peer through her sapphire eyes. Howling Wind had First Frost by the shoulder, dousing him in water too cold to freeze as Sansa had done to the spider in the Haunted Forest. Washing him clean of the last of the dragonglass dust. They are not my concern any longer. She stayed with Brienne just enough to keep her moving through the waterfall, emerging in the passage soaked and shivering.

"My lady!" Podrick cried, dashing forth and wrapping her in his cloak. The wind outside picked up again and the eyes disappeared. Gone back to their fastness in the wolfswood, I imagine. While Brienne looked too cold to do more than shiver, Podrick's famously knotted tongue came rather unraveled. "I saw them throw Oathkeeper but I found where it lay and it's safe so you can get it when you're ready but not until you've had a rest and some food and maybe a wash." He babbled on so all the way back to the crypts proper. By then Brienne seemed to be finding some manner of strength, shaking off the cold without. "The cold within is another matter I'm afraid, Brienne. Perhaps the springs would do for that. Before you dash off," Sansa asked Podrick, "did you happen to locate Val?"

"I did, princess. Or, rather, a girl with a honey-colored braid to her thighs, living in one of the houses at the edge of the winter town. She…wouldn't come to the castle." Why would Val flee the safety of Winterfell to live in a hut? While Sansa pondered, Pod led Brienne off.

"I'm going back to Tarth once this is done," Sansa heard her murmur, "and I'll not ever leave it." When she turned to ask Branch what it was First Frost had said before he took his leave of Winterfell, she found he'd quite vanished. With a hood up and her branch left at the entrance to the crypts it was easy enough to move through town, bustling as it was with wounded men, burning corpse pits and panicked horses. There was no air of defeat, she saw, just nervousness. I'm sure the racket Lady roused was well within earshot. The wolfswood must have sounded as though it had come alive. At her side was the black bitch, who'd spent enough time in Winterfell's hall to know one person's scent from another. Before long Sansa was standing in front of a homey little hut squeezed between a Manderly knight's tent and a rack of spears. The smell of roasting chicken caught the dog's attention, but it was a sound that quite drowned everything else out. Sansa stepped to the door, laid her hand upon the wood, pushed it open. She crossed the threshold, even as a woman in a chair by the tiny hearth stood up. Clutching something to her chest. Sansa walked toward her, even as the woman shrank against the opposite wall. In the light of the hearth Sansa could see her face clearly. Val, in all her terrified beauty. When her face was less than a foot from the other girl's, Sansa looked down. A baby girl of an age with Howland peered up at her from her mother's arms. With the same grey eyes, she saw. Grey like Father's. Grey like Meera's. Grey like Jon's.

"I named her Dalla." Val whispered.