[Winterfell, 6th moon, 298AC]
Bran Stark could not sleep.
The walls of Winterfell were thick stone, ancient and unmoving, but even they couldn't keep out the raucous sound of the Great Hall below. Music tumbled up the stairwells like a drunkard's laughter, mingled with the pounding of tankards on long tables, and King Robert Baratheon's unmistakable voice booming over all. Bran rolled to his side beneath his furs, then onto his back. Summer was curled at the foot of the bed, warm and breathing slow. The direwolf cracked an eye open, watching Bran with quiet concern.
It had been like this nearly every night since the king and his whole court arrived. Every feast a thunderclap, every hall lit like a blazing hearth. Bran had thought it would be exciting, and for a time, it had been. But now his eyes burned with exhaustion, and his mind ran in circles too fast to catch.
"Go to sleep," he muttered to himself, fisting the furs around his chest.
Outside, Winterfell slept under pale stars and northern winds. Inside Bran's mind, shadows began to gather. At last, his eyelids fluttered shut, and sleep took him like a slow wave crashing over snow.
He stood on a plain of endless snow, a cold so deep it made his breath crack like ice. It was neither day nor night. The sky was a smear of blue and grey, low and heavy.
In the distance, a massive wolf loomed. It was bigger than the Greatjon, bigger than even Summer, whose golden eyes were distant stars in the dream. The wolf was silver and grey, fur rippling in the wind like banners on the battlefield, and a crown of bronze and iron adorned its head. It turned to Bran, and in its eyes he saw the trees of Winterfell, the godswood, the red leaves, the weirwood's face.
Then came a shape from the storm, a figure made of ice and shadow, tall as a tower, wielding a spear of frozen glass. The wolf snarled and charged, but the icy figure did not flinch. It drove the spear through the beast's side with terrible force. Bran screamed.
The wolf howled as it fell, and the sound became wind, then thunder, then silence.
Then they came, dead things. Men in armor rimed with frost, women with empty eyes, children with shattered limbs and gaping mouths. They poured from every angle like a tide of rot, and they reached for Bran with cold, broken hands.
He screamed again—
*Bark!*
He bolted upright, chest heaving, his room bathed in moonlight. Summer was beside him, licking his face, his body tense. Bran touched his forehead. It was slick with sweat, though the night was cool.
"I'm fine," he whispered, more to calm himself than Summer.
The direwolf licked his cheek again, whining low. Bran scratched behind his ears, eyes still wide.
The dream was fading now, like breath on glass. But he remembered the wolf. And the spear. And the ice.
Was it just a dream?
Eventually, with Summer pressed close beside him, Bran drifted off again into sleep untroubled by visions, dreaming of flying through the air with wings like an eagle.
[The Next Morning, The Lord's Solar]
The solar of Winterfell was a long, warm chamber with thick carpets underfoot and tall windows letting in morning light. A hearth burned in the corner, and maps, books, and carved wooden figures were scattered across a great oaken table. Lord Alaric Stark sat in his high-backed chair, fingers steepled, dark hair drawn back from his face.
Bran sat cross-legged across from him, and Edwyn sat beside him, eyes wide with curiosity.
"In the days before the Kings of Winter ruled the entire North," Alaric was saying, "Starks were warlords in wolfskin cloaks, those same massive beasts marched alongside them into battle. Not High Kings, as they were known back then, not yet. The North was broken into a hundred petty realms. The Barrow Kings. The Marsh Kings. The various White Knife and Mountain Clans. The Skagosi. Even the Ryder Kings of the Rills."
"Sometimes, even the ironborn reared their filthy heads in our lands."
"Did we fight them all?" Bran asked.
Alaric smiled faintly. "Not all. Some bent the knee. Some were married into. But most? Aye. We fought them. For thousands of years, the Starks conquered the North. Not with dragons or wildfire, but with blood and winter. My namesake, King Alaric "the Great Wolf", rode with only a hundred men to retake Sea Dragon Point."
"And won?" Edwyn asked.
"And won. His enemies laughed, thinking him mad. But the night before battle, his men cut the oars of the enemy's longships, stranded them. The next morning, they struck."
A knock came at the heavy oak door.
Alaric looked up. "Enter, Ser Desmond."
The door opened and in walked two figures, both clad in rich clothing, though one wore the proud crimson and gold of House Lannister, and the other plainer mail and leather.
"Lord Stark," came the familiar voice of Tyrion Lannister, short of stature but sharp of eye. "I hope we're not interrupting tales of Northern bloodletting."
"Only continuing them," Alaric said. "Bran, Edwyn, meet Lord Tyrion Lannister, brother of the queen, and Ser Lucion Lannister."
Bran studied the two. Tyrion's eyes were bright, curious, and full of mischief. Ser Lucion was tall and broad, clean-shaven, with a solemn expression and hair the pale gold of his kin, though he lacked their smugness.
"Boys," Tyrion said, bowing slightly. "I always enjoy seeing who our future executioners will be."
Bran blinked. Edwyn grinned.
"You come with questions," Alaric said flatly.
"Oh, always," Tyrion replied. "How could I resist the North's rising star? Tales reach even Casterly Rock of Alaric the Builder returned, reshaping Moat Cailin, digging your canal, humbling Ironborn. I had to see if the man matched the myth."
Alaric raised a brow. "Flattery, even backhanded, ill suits a Lannister."
"Then allow me to be direct. I wish to know more about you. You're a curious man, Lord Alaric."
"Curiosity can be dangerous."
"But often worthwhile."
While the two bantered, Ser Lucion stood quietly, until he took a step forward.
"Lord Alaric," he said, voice steady, "I have come to swear myself to your service."
Even Tyrion blinked in surprise. "Well, that's sudden."
Bran leaned forward, eyes wide.
Alaric studied Lucion in silence for a long moment. "You wear Lannister colors. Why forsake your House for mine?"
"Because I am no lion," Lucion said calmly. "Not truly. My mother was of House Crakehall, from an old branch that kept the Old Gods. She raised me to the trees and the stones, not the Seven. Among my kin, I'm a black sheep. In your house, I see something I want to fight for."
Alaric folded his arms. "You wish to serve the Old Gods? Then swear it. But hear me first. You will serve me and me alone. You will be watched. Judged. And if I see a hint of duplicity, you'll be cast out, or worse."
Lucion nodded without hesitation. "Then let the trees judge me. I swear upon the Old Gods to serve House Stark, and only House Stark, until my death."
Alaric stood, stepped forward, and extended a hand.
"Then rise, Ser Lucion Lannister, you shall be admitted into my personal retinue in the Winter Guard. On probation, of course."
The man took his hand.
"Of course, my lord, I pray the Old gods hear my pledge, I shall never forsake you or yours." the man of nine-and-ten said with solemn zeal
Bran watched the exchange with awe. A Lannister swearing to the Starks? What next? A dragon in the godswood?
[Later That Day, The Training Yard]
Bran leaned against the railing above the training yard, Summer lying beside him with tongue lolling. Below, Ser Rodrik Cassel barked orders as squires and men-at-arms sparred.
Edwyn stood beside Bran, watching Ser Desmond spar with Ser Lucion.
"He moves fast," Edwyn muttered.
"Too fast," Bran said. "Ser Desmond's bigger. He's just testing him."
Alaric stood nearby, arms crossed, silent.
After a flurry of clashing blades, Ser Desmond Manderly brought his longsword up in a feint, then dropped it down with a resounding crack against Lucion's side. The Lannister knight stumbled, dropped to one knee, but raised his blade again. He was smiling.
Alaric's face remained as stoic as the weirwoods themself.
Tyrion approached from behind. "He fights well. And he's serious. Are you certain you aren't raising a Lannister army under our very noses?"
"He's under no lion's banner now," Alaric said. "And if he proves false, he'll die in wolfskin."
Tyrion raised a cup of wine. "To wolves and lions both, then. Gods help us if they ever march together."
Bran shivered, but not from the wind. Somewhere, far to the north, he remembered the dream. The wolf. The spear. The ice.
And the dead.
Winter was coming.
[Later that evening]
The banners of House Stark stirred in the firelight above the high tables, and Winterfell's Great Hall pulsed with the life of a feast yet again.
Bran sat between Edwyn and Harlon Stark near the middle benches, his trencher half-eaten, his goblet untouched. The air smelled of roasted pork and apple glaze, furred cow steaks, sweet bread, and sweet summer wine. The high table at the front of the hall gleamed with polished silver, and the king's laughter, loud and warm and unashamed, rose above the sound of music and merrymaking like a horn blown over hills.
Alaric sat at King Robert's right, his tall frame as still as a statue, though he offered the king respectful nods and the occasional sharp remark that made Robert slap the table with a thick hand. Ned Stark was on Robert's left, quieter, leaning in to murmur something Bran couldn't hear over the song and cheer. But he saw the way Robert's face changed, less laughter now. Serious talk.
Then Ned gestured across the hall, toward the doors that led out and into the night, and said something that made Robert grunt. Bran didn't need to hear to know what they were speaking of.
The Greyjoy Rebellion. Pyke. The siege. The storming of the castle. Bran had heard parts of the story whispered in the courtyard, pieced together from guardsmen's tales and Uncle Benjen's old stories. How Alaric and Ned had gone ashore through black waves and slaughtered Ironborn beside the King. How Balon Greyjoy had finally bent the knee. How Theon's brothers had died.
Theon sat two tables down, surrounded by squires and lesser lords, his goblet clutched tightly in one hand. His jaw was clenched, his eyes narrowed. When Robert raised a horn and boomed something Bran couldn't make out, but clearly about Pyke, from the loud cheer that followed, Theon stood so quickly his chair fell backward. He didn't say a word. He just turned and left the hall, pushing through two drunk knights without a glance back.
Bran blinked after him. No one stopped him. No one even seemed to notice, save Alaric, whose grey eyes flicked for a moment toward the doors before returning to Robert.
"Where do you think he's going?" Edwyn asked, mouth full of stewed apples.
"Don't know," Bran murmured. "Godswood, maybe."
"Not to pray," said Harlon, smug. "Not with that face."
"I'd go to the godswood to pray," piped up Beth Cassel from across the table, swinging her legs. "The gods can hear better when it's quiet."
"The gods don't listen to Ironborn," muttered Rickon from beneath the table, where he had taken up post with a half-eaten leg of duck. "They drown theirs."
Bran smiled faintly, but it didn't reach his eyes. He wasn't thinking about Theon anymore.
He watched Robb, up near the lords of House Manderly and Umber, laughing loudly and slapping backs as if he were one of them already. Jon sat nearby, quieter, but not unwelcome. Ser Torrhen had made space for him, and even the Greatjon had offered Jon a horn of mead. Bran saw in them what he was not. They would one day be lords. They would rule, lead, and fight.
He had dreamed, once, of being a knight. Of riding with a white cloak behind the King's Guard, shining in sun and steel. But now? The dreams had changed. He dreamed of wolves crowned in bronze and bleeding into snow. Of ice and death. Of trees that whispered things too old for words.
He didn't know what he wanted anymore.
The music shifted, flutes and high reeds replaced by drum and lute, and the floor cleared for dancing. Arya bounded in without shame, dragging Branda and Berena by the wrist, the three girls flushed and laughing. Sansa followed after them, moving gracefully to where Domeric Bolton bowed low with practiced charm.
"Are you going to dance, Bran?" Edwyn asked.
Bran shook his head. "No. I don't feel like it."
"You never feel like it," Harlon teased. "What do you feel like?"
Bran didn't answer.
His eyes lifted again to the high table, where Robert now leaned across his plate to whisper something to Ned. Alaric was watching the dancers, but his face was unreadable.
Bran wondered if they had dreams, too, Ned, Alaric, Jon, even Robb. Dreams of wolves and white things that smelled of cold and rot. Or was it only him?
He had told Maester Luwin once, but the old man had said dreams were only dreams. That Bran's thoughts were shaped by stories and cold nights and the howling of his direwolf. But Bran wasn't sure. When he dreamed, it felt real.
Too real.
He turned his head and saw Summer lying beneath the table, golden eyes watching, ears twitching at every sound. Not asleep. Never truly asleep anymore.
Something cold passed over Bran's heart. Not fear, exactly. Something older. A knowing.
He did not want to be a lord. He did not want to wear armor and carry a sword. He was not Robb. Not Jon. Gods know he's not Alaric, he was something else.
He just didn't know what yet.
When the hall began to dim, when the music slowed and the older lords began to retire, Alaric rose first from the high table, Alys beside him. King Robert clapped him on the back hard enough to echo off the stone, but Alaric only gave a stiff nod, while Alys curtsied toward the king, and the two descended the dais. Ned followed not long after, exchanging a quiet word with Jon and Robb before making his way toward the door.
Robb was found by Ysilla, and the two absconded to their chambers.
Bran caught Alaric's eye for a moment as the lord of Winterfell passed by. Just a glance, but Bran felt something in it. Not comfort. Not fear either. A recognition.
Then Alaric and Alys were gone.
Summer stood then, tail twitching.
Bran rose to follow. The music had ended. The warmth of the hall felt stifling.
He didn't know why, but he needed to be outside. Away. Beneath the sky.
Maybe it was time to go to the godswood, after all.
Not to pray.
To listen.
To see if the trees would whisper back.