Torrhen Stark
The morning air in the training yard was crisp, biting at the nose and ears of the gathered boys. It was the kind of cold that usually made limbs stiff and movements sluggish.
But Torrhen didn't feel the cold.
He stood in the center of the ring, a padded leather jerkon over his chest and a blunted wooden sword in his right hand—the marked hand. He wore a glove to hide the white brand, but the leather was already stiff with frost where it touched his skin.
Opposite him was Harwin, a squire three years his senior. Harwin was broad-shouldered, stronger, and usually tossed Torrhen into the mud within three clashes.
"Ready, my Prince?" Harwin grinned, twirling his heavier practice blade. "Try to keep your shield up this time."
Torrhen nodded silently. He felt... strange. The world seemed sharper. The sound of the blacksmith's hammer in the distance was distinct, individual clangs rather than a rhythmic noise. The steam rising from the horses in the stables seemed to curl in slow motion.
"Begin!" shouted Hallis, the Master-at-Arms, from the sidelines.
Harwin lunged. It was a standard opening—a feint to the left, followed by a heavy overhand chop.
Usually, Torrhen would flinch. Usually, he would scramble to raise his shield, the blow rattling his teeth.
But today, he didn't see a blur of motion.
He saw the shift in Harwin's weight before the foot moved. He saw the shoulder muscle tensing. He saw the wooden blade arc through the air as if it were moving through honey.
He is so slow, Torrhen thought.
Without thinking, Torrhen didn't block. He stepped.
It was a small movement, a fluid slide to the right. Harwin's blade whooshed past Torrhen's ear, missing by an inch.
Harwin stumbled, off-balance from missing a strike he was sure would land.
Torrhen's body moved on its own accord, driven by the cold pulse in his right hand. He snapped his wooden sword up. It wasn't a clumsy chop; it was a viper's strike.
CRACK.
Torrhen's practice blade slammed into Harwin's ribs.
The sound was like a tree limb snapping in a storm. Harwin gasped, the air driven from his lungs, and he was lifted—actually lifted—off his feet. He landed hard in the mud three yards away, wheezing, clutching his side.
Silence descended on the yard. The other boys stopped their drills. The blacksmith stopped hammering.
Torrhen stood frozen, staring at his own hand. He hadn't swung that hard. He couldn't swing that hard. He was ten.
Harwin groaned, rolling over. "Seven Hells, Torrhen... what have you been eating?"
Hallis strode into the ring. His face was unreadable to the others, but Torrhen saw the wariness in his eyes. He knew.
"Again," Hallis commanded, his voice tight. "Rodrik, step in. Two on one."
Rodrik, another older boy, hesitated, then stepped up beside the groaning Harwin, who was getting back to his feet.
"Go," Hallis barked.
Both older boys attacked at once. Harwin went low; Rodrik went high. A classic pincer move designed to overwhelm a smaller opponent.
Torrhen's heart rate didn't even rise. The mark on his hand flared with cold, sending a jolt of adrenaline up his arm that felt like ice water.
Step. Parry. Duck.
He moved like a dancer. He batted Rodrik's sword aside with a flick of his wrist that nearly disarmed the older boy. In the same motion, he spun, ducking under Harwin's swing.
To the onlookers, Torrhen was a blur of grey and brown. To Torrhen, they were statues trying to move.
He tapped Rodrik on the back of the knee—thwack—sending him crumbling to the dirt. He spun back to Harwin, caught the boy's wrist with his free hand, and twisted.
Harwin yelped as he was spun around and shoved face-first into the hay bales.
It was over in four seconds.
Torrhen stood in the center of the yard, breathing calmly, while two older, stronger boys lay defeated in the mud. He squeezed his right hand into a fist. The glove creaked, frozen solid.
"Enough," Hallis said. He stepped between Torrhen and the other boys. He looked down at the young prince. "That is enough for today, Torrhen."
"I'm not tired," Torrhen said, and it was true. He felt like he could run for days. He felt like he could fight a bear.
"I said that is enough," Hallis said, sharper this time. He leaned in close, his voice a whisper meant only for Torrhen. "Your glove is turning white with frost, boy. Hide it before the Maester sees."
Torrhen looked down. A layer of white rime was spreading across the leather of his glove, creeping up his wrist.
He quickly shoved his hand under his cloak.
"Go to the Godswood," Hallis ordered loudly, addressing the yard. "Pray for humility. Skill is a gift, not a toy."
Torrhen turned and walked away, his steps light, the snow crunching beneath his boots. He could feel the eyes of the garrison on his back—fear, respect, and confusion.
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Godswood
The Godswood of Winterfell was a place of silence, but never a place of emptiness. It was a silence that listened.
Torrhen Stark, the Prince of Winterfell and heir to the North, walked the crushed-gravel path with a heaviness that belied his ten years. The high stone walls of the castle seemed to mute the sounds of the outside world—the ring of the blacksmith's hammer, the shouting of the stable hands, the barking of dogs—until they were nothing but distant memories. Here, the air smelled of pine needles, wet earth, and the metallic tang of ancient sap.
He reached the center of the grove, where the black pool of water sat still as a mirror, reflecting the grey sky. Rising from the earth like the fist of a giant was the Heart Tree. Its bark was white as bone, its leaves the color of dried blood. The carved face, elongated and mournful, wept thick red sap that had hardened into amber tears over thousands of years.
Torrhen stopped before the face. He felt small.
His right hand, hidden inside a heavy fur mitten, throbbed. It was a dull, rhythmic ache, like a second heartbeat, syncing with the rustling of the red leaves above.
"Hallis said I should pray for humility," Torrhen whispered to the tree. His breath plumed in the air. "But I don't feel humble. I feel... cold."
The tree did not answer, but the wind sighed through its branches, a sound like a thousand voices whispering at once.
Torrhen pulled off his mitten. The skin of his hand was pale, the frost-white brand of the direwolf glowing faintly in the dim light of the canopy. He placed his marked palm against the white bark of the weirwood.
The reaction was instant.
A shockwave of sensation slammed into him—not pain, but a sudden, vertiginous drop, as if the ground beneath him had opened up. The smell of pine vanished, replaced by the scent of snow and ozone. The red leaves above him swirled, blurring into a vortex of crimson.
Torrhen didn't fall, but his mind did. It tumbled down, through the roots, through the dirt, through the stone, deep into the memory of the earth.
He opened his eyes.
He was standing in the Godswood, but it was not the Godswood he knew.
The walls of Winterfell were gone. In the distance, there were no towers, only the jagged teeth of snowy mountains and vast, endless forests of dark sentinel trees. The sky was a bruising shade of twilight purple, hung with stars that burned with a fierce, cold intensity. It was the North before men had tamed it.
The Heart Tree was there, but it was younger. Its face was less weary, its mouth less twisted in sorrow.
"You have the blood," a voice said. "But the blood is hot. The North requires ice."
Torrhen spun around.
Emerging from the shadows between the trees was a figure. It was shaped like a man, but its edges were indistinct, blurring into the grey mist that clung to the ground. It wore armor of bronze scales that dulled the light, and a cloak made of skins so old they looked like stone.
The face was obscured by a helm shaped like a wolf's skull, the iron rusted and pitted. Through the eye sockets of the helm, two points of pale blue light fixed upon Torrhen.
"Who are you?" Torrhen asked. His voice didn't sound like a child's here. It sounded steady.
"I am the root that drank the first blood," the figure said, its voice sounding like grinding stones. "I am the sword in the darkness. I am the King of Winter who laid the first stone."
The shadow stepped forward. It was huge, towering over the boy.
"You touched the Hammer," the Ancestor said. "You woke the magic that has slept since the Long Night. Do you think that makes you strong, boy? Beating other children in the mud?"
"I moved faster than them," Torrhen said, lifting his chin, though he felt a tremor of fear. "I was stronger."
The shadow laughed. It was a dry, cracking sound, like ice breaking on a frozen lake.
"You used the cold like a brute uses a club. You swung it. You let it rage. That is not the way of Winter."
The figure raised a hand. From the mist, a sword materialized. It wasn't steel. It was a blade of clear, jagged ice, sharp enough to cut the wind.
"Draw your steel, Torrhen Stark."
Torrhen looked down. At his hip was a sword—not his wooden practice blade, but a longsword of grey steel. He drew it. The metal felt heavy and dead compared to the vibrant, painful cold of his marked hand.
"Come," the Ancestor commanded.
Torrhen charged. He felt the surge of power in his right hand, that same adrenaline that had flooded him in the training yard. He was fast. He lunged for the shadow's chest, a strike that would have gutted a normal man.
The Shadow didn't even parry. It simply stepped.
It was a movement so slight it was barely a movement at all. Torrhen's blade passed through empty mist.
Before Torrhen could recover, the flat of the ice blade slapped against the back of his knees. The cold bit through his furs, instantly numbing his legs. Torrhen collapsed into the snow, gasping.
"Hot," the Ancestor criticized. "You move with anger. You move with desire. The blizzard does not want. The blizzard simply is."
Torrhen scrambled up, his face flushing with embarrassment. "I am trying!"
"Stop trying," the shadow barked. "The cold does not try to freeze the man. It simply exists, and the man freezes. You are fighting the power in your blood. You are letting it drive you like a panicked horse. You must be the rider."
The Shadow circled him.
"The Mark is not a weapon," the Ancestor lectured, his voice echoing from everywhere at once. "It is a connection. It binds you to the land. When you step, you step on your own flesh. When you strike, you strike with the weight of the winter."
The Shadow lunged.
Torrhen raised his sword to block, but the ice blade shattered his steel weapon into a thousand shards. The force of the blow knocked him backward.
"Again," the Shadow said, waiting.
Torrhen looked at the hilt in his hand, useless. He threw it aside.
"I have no weapon," Torrhen said.
"You are a Stark," the Ancestor replied. "You are the weapon. Use the Mark."
Torrhen stood. He closed his eyes. He tried to ignore the fear in his gut. He focused on his right hand. He focused on the ache, the cold that sat in his marrow.
Don't try to be fast, he told himself. Be still.
He opened his eyes. The world seemed to slow down. The falling snow suspended in mid-air.
The Shadow struck—a downward slash meant to cleave him in two.
Torrhen didn't dodge. He raised his right hand, the marked palm open. He didn't push the cold out; he pulled the heat in. He willed the air in front of him to stop.
SNAP.
Moisture in the air condensed instantly, forming a shield of solid ice inches from Torrhen's palm. The Ancestor's blade slammed into it, chipping the ice but failing to break through.
The impact jarred Torrhen's arm to the shoulder, but he held.
"Better," the Shadow growled. "But defense is not enough. Winter kills."
The Shadow dissolved into smoke, reforming behind Torrhen.
Torrhen spun, sweeping his leg low. As he moved, he didn't just kick; he visualized the ground beneath him. Freeze.
The mud under the Shadow's feet flashed-froze into a sheet of slick black ice. The Ancestor slipped—just a fraction of an inch—but it was enough.
Torrhen lunged, his hand forming a fist. He didn't punch the Shadow; he drove a spike of cold into the center of the mist.
His fist connected with the bronze breastplate.
CRUNCH.
The bronze cracked. Frost spiderwebbed across the ancient armor, turning the metal brittle. The Shadow staggered back.
Torrhen stood panting, his breath coming in white clouds. His hand was smoking with cold, his fingernails blue.
The Ancestor straightened, looking at the cracked armor. Slowly, the figure nodded.
"You begin to understand," the Ancestor said, the harshness leaving his voice, replaced by a solemn gravity. "Fire consumes. It eats everything until there is nothing left but ash. That is the enemy that comes. Fire is hunger."
The Shadow stepped closer, the blue lights in the helm burning brighter.
"But Ice... Ice preserves. Ice holds the world together. If the wall of ice fails, the world drowns."
The Ancestor reached out a gauntleted hand and touched Torrhen's forehead. The touch was agonizingly cold, like a nail being driven into his skull.
"This is not a gift, Torrhen Stark. It is a burden."
The mist began to swirl, obscuring the ancient landscape. The dream was ending.
"Wait!" Torrhen shouted. "I'm not ready! I don't know how to control it fully!"
The Ancestor halted, his form becoming translucent against the trees.
"No," the Ancestor agreed. "You are raw iron. A single hammering does not make a sword."
The blue eyes bore into Torrhen's soul.
"You must return here," the Ancestor commanded. "Every night. When the moon rises, come to the tree. Touch the bark. I will pull you down."
He pointed a gauntleted finger at Torrhen.
"We have thousands of years of Winter to teach you, and you have only a few years before the Fire comes. Do not fail to appear. If you miss a night, the cold will eat you alive from the inside. Do you understand?"
"I understand," Torrhen gasped, the cold already pulling him back to the waking world.
"Good. Now wake."
Torrhen gasped, his eyes snapping open.
He was back in the Godswood of Winterfell. He was on his knees in the dirt, his forehead resting against the white bark of the Heart Tree.
It was night. He had been there for hours.
His body was stiff, his muscles screaming in protest as if he had run ten miles. He tried to stand, but his legs were numb—not from sitting, but from the lingering unnatural cold of the dream.
He looked at his right hand.
The glove was gone, likely fallen hours ago. His hand was resting in the snow.
But the snow around his hand hadn't melted from his body heat. It had hardened. The snow for three feet in every direction had fused into a solid, perfect circle of black ice.
Torrhen pulled his hand free. The mark on his palm was no longer glowing, but the white scar seemed deeper, more defined. The wolf's head looked sharper, more predatory.
He stood up, swaying slightly. He felt drained, hollowed out.
He reached down to pick up his glove. As he bent, he saw something that made his blood run cold.
Lying in the snow, right where he had been kneeling, was a single shard of ancient, rusted bronze. It was curved, like a piece of a scale from a suit of armor.
Torrhen picked it up. It was brittle, crumbling at the edges, frosted with rime.
It hadn't been a dream.
"Torrhen?"
A voice called from the edge of the Godswood. It was his father, King Edderion. The King stood under the archway, a torch in his hand, his face lined with concern.
"You missed the evening meal," Edderion said, walking toward him.
Torrhen crushed the shard of bronze in his hand, hiding it within his fist. He looked at his father. For the first time, he noticed how tired the King looked. He saw the grey in his beard, the lines around his eyes. He saw a man, fragile and warm, made of flesh and blood.
Torrhen felt different. He felt harder.
"I was learning."
Edderion stopped a few feet away, looking at the circle of unnatural black ice on the ground. He looked at Torrhen's hand, then up to his son's eyes.
"Learning what?" Edderion asked softly.
Torrhen looked up at the weeping face of the Heart Tree. He knew he would be back tomorrow night. And the night after that. Until he was ready.
"How to be the ice," Torrhen said. "And how to preserve the North."
He walked past his father, his boots crunching on the frozen gravel. He didn't shiver. The cold didn't bother him anymore.
He was the Winter now. And the training had only just begun.
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