Welcome to my new fic,
So this is just a prologue of an idea I have had on my mind for a while now, I don't expect it will be updated every week as I have my ongoing story - The Bronze Prince - which is taking priority.
Comments are greatly appreciated and will decide whether I should continue the fic (Heavily inspired by both the books and the show, and will include moments from both)
TORRHEN
Winterfell, 298 AC
A cold breeze left the boy's mouth as an arrow pierced through the air and landed directly into the stag's heart. It must have weighed upwards of twenty-five stone, a perfect prize to take back to Winterfell.
"Good one, Torrhen." The words came from the captain of his father's household guard, Jory Cassel, who accompanied him along with three others, to ensure no one dared trouble the thirteen name day old Torrhen Stark.
He was named for the King who knelt, Torrhen Stark, who saved thousands of lives when he bent the knee to Aegon the Conqueror and the dragons near to three hundred years ago, at least that is how the story goes in the books, and what Maester Luwin taught him.
"Robb is going to be jealous when I bring back this beast, and Jon too.." Torrhen replied, he was always in competition with his brothers, only being a year younger than them, though he hated to admit it, he never actually beat either of them at anything.
He led his horse over to the beast, roping it up until it was secure to his saddle, as to not become loose on the way back to Winterfell, it had been his first time hunting without his father or even the huntsman, and Torrhen was glad to have something grand to bring back, to show them both that he was ready for more.
"Travelling at speed, we should reach Winterfell in a few hours, close to noon." Jory Cassel said, his long brown hair waving in the wind as he picked himself up onto his own horse, of which Torrhen soon followed.
They were quick to return to Winterfell, and had arrived sooner than Jory expected, travelling along the gravel road as the gates to the castle opened up, his brothers were in the courtyard as he arrived, along with Robb and Jon, there were his younger brothers, Bran and Rickon, each of them with the thick auburn hair of his mother, Catelyn, while he shared much of his father's features, as did Jon and his younger sister, Arya.
"Where have you been?" Robb's voice boomed across the courtyard as Torrhen settled himself off from his horse near to the stables, unloosening the ropes from the stag, with the assistance of the household guards.
His brother had been big and broad, and appeared to be growing what seemed like everyday, though they did not look similar to each other, as he shared their mother's features, the fair skin and red-brown hair, and the bright blue eyes.
"Where does it look like I have been, brother?" Torrhen said, with a hint of sarcasm in his voice, gesturing towards the stag "It is not likely I found this beast in Wintertown, is it?"
"I can't believe father lets you go out hunting by yourself." Robb shook his head "I am the elder, and he hardly lets me out of his sight."
"Well, brother, that is because you are his precious heir." Torrhen smirked. "And to say I go out alone is not exactly true, I have Jory constantly looking over my shoulder, I can't take a shit without him knowing." they both chuckled along, walking over towards the archery training, Bran was currently learning how to shoot a bow correctly.
"Come on, Bran, father's watching." his bastard brother, Jon, had stated as he clapped his hands down onto the boy's shoulders, then backing off, Bran raised the bow and soon released his arrow, and it missed, sailing past the target post and broke off as it reached the stoned walls.
Jon bellowed out a laugh, shortly followed by Rickon, while Torrhen and Robb trying their best at keeping their own laughs hidden, turning their heads away from Bran, as to not discourage him.
"Which one of you was a marksman at ten, eh?" Lord Stark looked down upon them from the balcony above, each of them turned their heads to look at him "Keep practising Bran, go on now."
Both Lord Stark and his mother soon turned away and came out of view, and the boys each came to focus on Bran once more and his training.
"You are thinking too much, Bran." Torrhen added "Just take a deep breath and release, and I promise it will hit, you just need to believe it will." he smiled, crossing his arms as Bran nocked his arrow and raised the bow once more at the target.
They were soon all shocked as an arrow lodged into the bullseye of the target, but it had not come from Bran, each of them looked behind them as Arya stood a few paces behind with her own bow in hand, the little ones each looked to one another before Bran went chasing after her as he mockingly curtsied.
"Our sister is becoming more wild by the second." Torrhen said, as they each chuckled as the younger siblings chased each other around the courtyard.
"Aye, she must take after you, don't you think, Snow?" Robb stated, turning his attention their half-brother, they had been the same age, with Father having brought Jon back to Winterfell after the War, there was always a hatred towards him from his mother, but Torrhen always thought of him as no less a brother than Robb, Bran or little Rickon.
"That she does, Stark." Jon agreed "Was that a stag I saw you come through with? We are to have a great meal from it."
They were each heading to the Great Hall when they were told they would be journeying out to see a man beheaded, and Torrhen was surprised at most to hear Bran was heading out with them, only being a boy of seven, while Torrhen was ten before his father decided he was ready to go with him.
There were twenty men in total who came out on the trip, consisting of Lord Stark, Robb, Jon, Torrhen, Bran and their household guard, which included both Rodrik and Jory Cassel, with Jory keeping close by to Torrhen, to ensure he did run off as he had done before.
Each of them spoke amongst each other at guessing what the man might be, Robb had thought he was a wildling, serving the King-beyond-the-wall, Mance Rayder, who was said to be a former crow of the Night's Watch, who went against his vows, Old Nan told them stories that gave Torrhen nightmares, saying that Wildlings ate little children, and drank blood from horns made of bone.
The man found was bound hand and foot to a small holdfast in the hills a distance away from Winterfell, both his ears and a single finger had been lost to frostbite, and he wore the blackened furs of the Night's Watch, though they appeared ragged and greasy.
His father had the man cut down from the wall and dragged before them, and with his command, two of the guards men dragged the man to the ironwood stump in the centre of the square, forcing his head down onto the hard blackwood.
Torrhen removed himself from his horse, watching from a distance as his father also dismounted and his ward, Theon Greyjoy, followed after him with the greatsword 'Ice' in his hands, which he was just able to hold, and in front of the stump stood a great banner of the Starks of Winterfell which was a grey direwolf racing across an ice-white field.
Ice was of a metal not quite known to this land, Valyrian Steel, and while many houses carried these ancient blades, the art of forging them had long passed, his father's blade 'Ice' was as wide across as a grown man's hand, and is even taller than Torrhen.
"In the name of Robert of the House Baratheon, the First of his Name, King of the Andals and the Rhoynar and the First Men, Lord of the Seven Kingdoms and Protector of the Realm, by the word of Eddard of House Stark, Lord of Winterfell and Warden of the North, I do sentence you to die."
Torrhen's father raised his sword up into the air, and with one fell stroke, blood sprayed across the snow, and the head bounced off a thickened root and rolled up to Theon Greyjoy's feet, the man had been older than all of them, at the age of nineteen, and had a dark sense of humour, kicking the head away while chuckling.
Torrhen walked over to his younger brother, Bran, placing a hand upon his shoulder and giving him a warm smile "You did good, Bran, father is sure to be proud."
They made their way back over to the horses, and as Bran was preparing to seat back onto his pony, their father soon made his way over to him "Are you okay, Bran?" Torrhen overheard, walking up to them to join the conversation.
"Yes, Father." Bran told him, their father was wrapped in furs and leathers "Robb says the man died bravely."
"And what do you think, son?" their father asked.
"Can a man still be brave if he is afraid?" It took a while for Bran to respond, as he looked in deep thought, Torrhen remembered asking their father a similar question the first time he witnessed a beheading.
"That is the only time a man can be brave." his father had told him.
"Did this one speak of the White Walkers, father?" Torrhen asked "As some of the others did." this wasn't the first man of the night's watch to have broken his oath, they journeyed out to this same spot often, in what seemed like every month now, all of them bringing the same story, that the white walkers had returned.
"That he did, Torrhen." his father answered, he had always told them the truth no matter how much they may not want to know the answer "But the White Walkers have been gone for thousands of years."
His father's attention turned back to Bran "Do you understand why I had to do it?"
"Our way is the old way?" Bran quickly answered.
"The man who passes the sentence, should swing the sword." Their father responded, a lesson each of them had learned, and one they took to heart "The blood of the first men flow through our veins, and we still hold to that belief, if you would take a man's life, you owe to him to look into his eyes and hear his final words, and if you cannot bear to do that, then that man may not deserve to die."
"One day, it may be the case where both you and Torrhen are Robb's bannermen, holding keeps of your own and delivering justice for your brother and your king, when that day comes, you must take no pleasure in it, but neither must you look away, a rule who hides behind paid executioners soon forgets what death truly is."
They travelled through the forests back to Winterfell when they had reached a bridge, it was then that Robb was quick to get off his horse as he looked to the east, travelling down to the Riverbank "Where is the boy headed now?" their father asked.
Jon was soon to follow after him, and everyone else remained at the bridge awaiting their return, it was not long until Jon came back through the bushes "Father, come quickly, see what Robb has found." then he was quick to be gone again.
"Is there any trouble, my lord?" Jory asked, riding up alongside Torrhen, who soon got off his horse and journeyed down where Jon came from, without his father's approval..
"What are you both up to?" Torrhen asked as he reached the both of them, Robb stood knee-deep in white as the late summer snows had been heavy this moonturn, he appeared to be cradling some sort of animal in his arms, while each of them spoke in hushed voices.
"Come look." Robb said quietly, revealing what looked like a wolf, its furs were grey, though what Torrhen saw next took him by surprise, a great large direwolf, like he had read in the stories, lying dead with five more pups surrounding it.
"Are those Direwolves?" he whispered, trying to hide his excitement as he picked up one of his own, another grey direwolf pup with patches of white, cradling it as if it was a baby, as he once did with Rickon when he was first born, from what he had read, Direwolves had not been seen south of the walls in two hundred years.
"Gods!" Theon exclaimed, as he and Jory were the first to reach them, with Bran and their father following soon after them.
"Robb, Torrhen, get away from it!" Jory's sword was drawn.
"She can't hurt you." Robb grinned, looking up from the bundle in his arms for the first time "She is dead, and has left us a gift."
"What in the seven hells is it?" Torrhen heard Theon say, despite him spending many years in the north, the fool knew nothing of its history, he was a squid throughout.
"A wolf." Torrhen told him.
"More like a freak, just look at the thing." Greyjoy said "the size of it is abnormal."
The direwolf pups mother had been half-buried in bloodstained snow, Ice having formed in its shaggy grey fur, its blind eyes were crawling with maggots, and Torrhen looked directly at its wide mouth filled of yellow teeth, it was twice the size of any hound found in his father's kennels.
"That is no freak." Jon said calmly.
"Jon is right, that there is a Direwolf, it is said they grow larger than normal wolves, this clearly proves that." Torrhen added, gesturing towards the mother.
"You are both mad." Theon said "Direwolves have not been sighted south of the wall in two hundred years at least."
"Well I clearly see one now, squid." Torrhen replied.
"Come, Bran." Robb said, as their younger brother seemed amazed by the creatures, though appeared scared to step closer towards them "You can touch him." he added, kneeling down to his level to allow more access.
Torrhen's head lowered down and looked to the pup in his arms, smiling as he stroke his hand along its cold fur, he soon lifted his head to see Jon pick a pup up in his own arms, and walk over to bran "Here you go, Bran, there are six of them."
"This ain't right, m'lord, Direwolves now loose in the realm, after so many years." their master of horse, Hullen muttered.
"Perhaps it is a sign, Lord." Jory said.
"This is only a dead animal, Jory." their father frowned, yet by his voice, he seemed deeply troubled by what he had seen. "Do we know what killed her?" he continued, snow crunching under his boots and he moved around the carcass.
"Looks like something's in its throat, father." Robb told him.
Their father had then knelt down and groped under the beast's head with his hand, yanking out what appeared to have been a foot of shattered antler, tines snapped off, all wet with blood.
A silence swept over the party, each of them looking to the antler uneasily, and no one dared to speak until their father had.
"I am quite surprised it has lived long enough to whelp." he said, his voice breaking the spell of silence across the party.
"It could be that she didn't, father." Torrhen said "Old Nan has told us tales… maybe the mother was already dead when they came."
"Born with the dead." Jory put in "Worse luck."
"It does not matter." Hullen said "They'll all be dead soon without their mother."
"The sooner the better, I say." Theon agreed, drawing his blade "Give the beast here, Bran."
"No!" Bran cried, and Torrhen was soon to put himself between the squid and his brother.
"Stay your hand, squid, or I will remove it." Torrhen defended the pups and his younger brother, standing strong against Theon before he soon put away his blade.
"We will be keeping these pups." Robb commanded, for a moment he sounded like the lord he was one day destined to be.
"You cannot do that, boy." Harwin said, who was the son of their master of horse, Hullen.
"It'd be a mercy to kill them, young lord." Hullen agreed.
Their father looked saddened, as they each looked to him, receiving only a frown, and a furrowed brow in response.
"Hullen speaks true, son, better a swift death than a hard one of cold and starvation."
"No!" Bran cried again, Torrhen placed the pup into his brother, Jon, hand's as he knelt down to their younger brother and wiped away the tears in his eyes.
"Calm now, Bran, we won't be killing them."
"Ser Rodrik's red bitch whelped again last week." Robb stubbornly resisted "It was a small litter, only two live pups, she'll have enough milk to go around."
"She'll rip them apart when they try to nurse."
"Lord Stark." Jon said, it was rare to see him ever call him 'father', whether that be in public or just amongst the family, though he had always been very formal. "There are six pups." he told father "Four males, two females."
"What of it, Jon?"
"You have six trueborn children." Jon said "Four sons, two daughters, the direwolf is the sigil of your house, they were meant to have them."
"And you want no pup for yourself, Jon?" their father asked, as each of the men glanced at each other, the count had only come right because Jon removed himself, including the girls and little Rickon, but not himself, A bastard born with the name 'Snow'
"The direwolf graces the banners of House Stark, my lord." Jon points out "I am not a Stark."
"I will nurse him myself, father." Robb was quick to add "I will soak a towel with warm milk, and give him suck from that."
"Me too!" Bran echoed.
Torrhen got back up onto his feet, wiping away the snow on trousers and taking back his pup from Jon, smiling warmly at his brother as he did.
"That much is easy to say, but harder to do, sons." the lord weighed his sons long and carefully with his eyes "I will not have you wasting the servants time with this. If you want these pups, you must each feed them yourselves, do you understand?"
"Yes, father." Torrhen responded, while the others agreed with a nod of their heads.
"You must train them as well." their father added to the conditions "You must train them, the kennel master will have nothing to do with these monsters, I promise you that."
Torrhen directed his head down towards the pup, kissing it on the cheek, which was responded with a lick on his face, the pup had a warm tongue, making Torrhen giggle.
"And the gods help you if you neglect them, or brutalise them, or train them badly. These are not pets that will beg for treats and slink off at a kick, A direwolf will be quick to rip a man's arm off his shoulder as easily as a dog will kill a rat. Are you certain that you all want this?"
"Yes, father." Bran said.
"Yes." Both Robb and Torrhen agreed.
"It may be that the pups die anyway, despite everything you attempt."
"They won't die, father." Torrhen was quick to add.
"We won't let them die." Robb followed.
"Then you shall keep them" their father decreed "Jory, Desmond, gather up the other pups, it's time we were back to Winterfell."
Torrhen got back atop his horse, and allowed the pup to snuggle within the furs of his coat to keep him warm, for the entire journey, his mind would be on a single thought, what to name him.
Halfway across the bridge, Jon stopped in his tracks, looking around as if he had lost something.
"Jon, what is it?" Torrhen asked.
"Jon?" their father soon asked "We must be heading back."
"Do you all not hear it?"
As Torrhen filtered out the noise of the wind, there was a small whimpering of a hungry pup, which he had thought belonged to his own, but soon figured out that it did not.
"There!" Jon said, swinging his horse around and galloping back across the bridge, all of them watched on as he dismounted where the direwolf lay dead, and he kneeled, soon riding back to them smiling with what appeared to be another pup in his arms.
"He must have crawled away from the others."
"That much is good, it would appear you have one of your own now, brother." Torrhen grinned.
"It is an albino." Theon Greyjoy said "It will die even faster than the other freaks."
"Watch your tongue, I won't warn you again, squid." Torrhen stared at him with deep hatred.
"I think not, Greyjoy." Jon snow replied, giving his father's ward a chilling look "This one now belongs to me."
A/N
I would love your suggestions for the name of Torrhen's Direwolf 🐺