Dusk bleeds slowly into the forest, turning the snow a muted lavender. The cold sharpens as the sun fades, biting harder with each passing minute.
Aeryon and Rodrik ride at a tense, measured pace—too slow to flee, too fast for comfort. The trees press in tighter, their tangled branches forming a skeletal archway above the Kingsroad.
Rodrik has barely spoken for an hour.
Not since the creature mimicked Aeryon's posture.
Now he mutters under his breath every few minutes, rubbing his thumb compulsively along the worn grip of his sword.
"We're takin' this to Winterfell," he says again.
He's repeated it five times already.
"Maester Luwin will know what to make of it."
Aeryon keeps his tone calm.
"You're assuming it follows us all the way there."
Rodrik's jaw tightens.
"It will. You saw how it moved. How it watched you."
Aeryon hums. "It watched both of us."
Rodrik glares sideways.
"No. It hated me. But with you… gods, Aeryon, it looked at you like—"
He cuts himself off, shuddering.
"—like it knew you."
Aeryon says nothing.
Because the UI pulses again.
[OBSERVER: VERY CLOSE — NEARBY TREE]
He waits.
Listens.
A faint scrape of bark.
A breath of disturbed snow.
Then—
A sound he hasn't heard from the child before.
A soft, low humming.
Rodrik stiffens.
"You hear that?"
Aeryon nods once.
The humming grows louder—
not melodic, not human, just a drawn-out vibration like someone testing their voice for the first time.
Rodrik's horse whinnies nervously.
"Gods… that's comin' from the left."
Aeryon doesn't look.
Rodrik does.
He sucks in a breath.
The greenseer child sits on a branch barely fifteen feet away—
legs dangling, pale toes swinging idly like any bored child would do.
But its head is tilted… off.
Its neck at a slant no human neck should allow.
Its eyes track only Aeryon.
It stops humming.
Aeryon speaks quietly, voice steady.
"Don't react."
Rodrik whispers back, "I'm tryin'."
The child lifts one hand—
a small, pale, frostbitten thing—
and extends its index finger toward Aeryon.
Not beckoning.
Not pointing.
Just… identifying.
As if naming him in its mind.
Rodrik hisses, "Why is it lookin' at you like that?"
Aeryon doesn't break eye contact.
"Because I didn't show fear."
The creature mimics Aeryon's words—
not with sound,
but with the shapes of its lips.
The exact formation.
The same tempo.
Rodrik curses under his breath.
Aeryon keeps his face neutral.
But the child's body language shifts again—
one foot curling against the bark,
hands gripping the branch with sudden tension.
Rodrik sees it.
"Aeryon… get your hand near your sword."
"No."
Rodrik almost shouts, "ARE YOU TRYIN' TO DIE?!"
Aeryon finally turns his head slightly toward him.
"If you draw steel on something with instincts like that, we won't make it ten steps."
Rodrik freezes, breathing shallow.
The child leans forward.
Then—
It mirrors Aeryon's breathing.
Exact rhythm.
Exact rise and fall.
Rodrik sees it and looks horrified.
"That's not a child. That's not a greenseer. That's a demon of the woods."
Aeryon doesn't look away from the creature.
"Demons don't mimic. Predators do."
Rodrik stares.
"…That's worse."
The child slides down the branch, slow and silent, until its bare feet touch the snow.
It stands upright.
Rodrik's breath hitches.
The creature takes one soft step toward Aeryon.
Just one.
Aeryon keeps his posture still.
Rodrik grips his reins so hard his knuckles turn bloodless.
The child lifts its chin—studying Aeryon's face, eyes narrowing with something like comprehension.
Then—
Without warning—
It makes a sound.
A quiet, shaking whisper:
"…Aeh…yon…"
Rodrik jolts.
Aeryon's veins turn ice-cold.
It spoke his name.
Not perfectly.
But unmistakably.
The child tilts its head—
waiting for something.
Aeryon swallows once.
Rodrik whispers, trembling:
"How in the seven bloody gods does it know your NAME?"
Aeryon doesn't answer.
Because up close—
close enough to see the faint cracks in its lips and the frost clinging to its lashes—
the child looks almost afraid.
Not of Rodrik.
Not of the forest.
But of losing sight of Aeryon.
Its breath fogs out in a small, desperate puff.
Then it whispers again.
"…Aeh…yon…"
Aeryon feels a pull then.
Instinct.
Curiosity.
Connection.
Something ancient in its eyes stirs—
as if it sees something beyond his face, beyond this world—
Something from the place he came from.
Rodrik finally snaps.
"We're leavin'. NOW."
He yanks his reins. His horse jerks back.
And the creature reacts.
It doesn't attack.
It doesn't chase.
It flinches.
And vanishes straight up the tree trunk in a blur of motion—
scrambling into the canopy as if fleeing a threat.
Rodrik doesn't wait for permission.
He kicks his horse into a trot.
Aeryon follows, Quiet keeping an even pace.
The forest remains silent for a long while.
Then the UI flickers.
[OBSERVER: DISTANT — STILL FOLLOWING]
Rodrik curses under his breath again.
"That thing said your name."
Aeryon nods once.
"And it didn't learn it from me."
Rodrik stares straight ahead.
"…What ARE you, Aeryon?"
Aeryon keeps his face blank.
"Someone who wants to get to Winterfell."
Rodrik doesn't accept the answer.
But he doesn't ask again.
Not yet.
Because somewhere behind them, high in the trees, the greenseer child hums softly—
practicing the shape of Aeryon's name in its throat.