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The Wall was too cold!
Jon Snow thought so, and the thought settled in him like a shard of ice.
When he had first come to the Wall, he had not felt it quite so keenly. Back then, the cold had seemed like an old companion… harsh, yes, but familiar enough to endure. After all, he was a son of the North, born and raised in Winterfell, a child whose every breath had been mingled with frost since the day he first opened his eyes.
Every cell of his body had grown used to living in the company of cold, as though it were stitched into his very skin.
It was true that from the day of his birth, during a false spring when the snows melted too soon, until the time his father Eddard Stark rode south, the whole of Westeros had, in name at least, been enjoying the long summer.
But summer meant different things in different corners of the realm.
In Dorne, summer's heat could roast a man alive, baking the flesh beneath his armor until it felt ready to split. Yet in the North, summer still wore a cloak of snow. There was even a name for it, "summer snow," a white veil that could fall from the skies at any time, even in the warmest months.
Jon had known since boyhood that the North's summers could bring winter's breath with them.
When he had chosen to join the Night's Watch, it had been honor that called to him, a voice he could not ignore. Yet there had been another reason as well, one he understood all too clearly.
His father, Eddard Stark, now returned to the embrace of the gods, had been Lord of Winterfell. Robb Stark, his brother, now held the North's tattered remnants together, standing besieged within the blackened walls of Harrenhal, still defying the enemy with what strength remained.
But Jon Snow… Jon had always been the one who did not belong.
The bastard who, during family feasts, was seated with the soldiers rather than at the long table.
The bastard who was shunned by the proud and the well-born, whose friendship was deemed unworthy of those with noble names.
The bastard denied his father's surname, burdened instead with the name Snow, a name drawn from the ever-present flakes that fell from the skies, a name that spoke of low birth and the bitter, unyielding chill of the North.
Jon understood all of this. He had understood it for as long as he could remember.
And that was why he had chosen to take the black. At least here upon the Wall, there were few who cared to speak of his name. Here, every man knelt together before the heart tree, swearing solemn vows to the old gods and the new, promising their brothers that they would never betray them for as long as they drew breath.
Jon longed for respect, hungered for it with a quiet desperation. Yet across the vast expanse of the Seven Kingdoms, the lordly order stood like an impenetrable wall, stretching from horizon to horizon, leaving him with no space in which to breathe.
So the bastard of the North had come to the Wall… and he had stayed for two full years.
Now, at last, he felt in his bones the truth of his family's words:
Winter is coming!
Ever since Clay had led his men beyond the Wall and shattered the wildling host in one fell swoop, the snows had begun to fall harder, the winds to howl louder. At first it had been nothing more than an ordinary snowstorm, the kind the brothers of the Night's Watch could take in stride, the kind that blanketed Castle Black in white yet still allowed the work of the day to go on.
But the storm did not pass.
With each passing day, it only grew wilder and more relentless, the wind screaming through the towers and the snow swirling so thickly it seemed to choke the very air.
Jon could no longer remember the last time he had gone beyond the gate at Castle Black to set foot north of the Wall. Had it been before Sam came down with that dreadful cold? Or was it back when Edd got soundly beaten for taunting Ser Alliser Thorne? The days had blurred together in his mind until the memories were swallowed entirely by white.
For as long as he could remember now, his daily labor had remained unchanged. He cleared away the snow that buried Castle Black deeper with each new storm. It was the duty of every watchman, for if the drifts were left to grow, they could crush what few buildings within the castle still served their purpose, and they could make the top of the Wall itself impassable.
And if the snow accumulates for too long, if it hardened from soft, fresh powder into a crust of ice, then they would be trapped within Castle Black, cut off from all other strongholds along the Wall.
So the brothers of the Watch had laid down their swords and taken up shovels, working until their arms ached and their breath came in ragged gasps, only to wake the next morning to find the snow piled deep again, as though all their toil had been for nothing.
In time, the weight of futility crushed their will. The day came when no one bothered to lift a shovel anymore.
For thirteen long days, the sun never showed its face. It was the longest stretch of darkness they had ever known.
At last, even Lord Commander Mormont, who had given the order in the first place, abandoned the effort to keep the snow at bay.
The brothers of the Night's Watch stayed huddled within the walls of Castle Black, feeding the hearths with what firewood they had left. They gathered close together in silence, their eyes dull and unfocused, listening to the wind howl like a starving beast outside their windows. There was no more talk, no more sparring in the yard. The will to speak or train had been frozen out of them entirely.
It was then that Lord Commander Mormont realized something was wrong. Acting at once, he sent word to Winterfell using the strongest and best-trained of his ravens, pleading for the Stark stronghold to send men to aid Castle Black before the storm swallowed them whole.
But Catelyn Tully, her mind clouded with grief and distraction over her son Bran's unbroken coma, barely spared the message a glance. She passed it to Maester Luwin with a brief gesture, wordlessly instructing him to send a refusal.
Both she and Luwin knew the truth; there were no more soldiers in the North to be sent. Every able man was already committed elsewhere.
And so, all they could offer was helpless regret…
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The blizzard was endless, but the nights were far worse than the days.
Even the meager winter sun still forced its way through the clouds, giving what little warmth it could and lending men the strength to move about, if only just. But when night fell, no one dared remain outside for long. To expose oneself to that kind of cold was to risk losing a part of your body… and no man was willing to pay such a price.
Jon Snow had taken up a spot at the base of the Lord Commander's Tower. He had dragged a rough, makeshift bed close to the fireplace, piling thick, heavy furs over himself until their weight pressed him down like a stone. Beneath them, the sheets were cold as hammered iron, and he curled into a tight ball to keep what little warmth his body could hold.
Each night was a torment for him. The air was so bitter it seemed to claw at his lungs, making real sleep almost impossible.
But tonight felt… different. In the midst of a faint, involuntary shiver, Jon slipped into deep slumber with surprising ease.
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"Where am I?"
Jon jerked upright from the snow, breathing hard. His gloved right hand swept across his face, brushing away the clinging shards of frost.
By instinct, his hand went to his hip, reaching for the dagger that should have been there, only to grasp at empty air.
He looked around and realized he was sitting alone in the middle of an endless stretch of snow, the white wasteland stretching so far it seemed to swallow the horizon. Directly ahead of him loomed a vast forest, its trees so dark they looked almost black against the pale expanse.
This had to be the Haunted Forest. Jon felt sure of it.
For a trained ranger of the Night's Watch, the Haunted Forest was even more familiar than the Wall itself… after all, it was a place they dealt with almost every single day, scouting, ranging, and patrolling its shadowed depths.
He shook his head sharply, sending a spray of powdery snow flying from his hair. The thick, dark locks were dusted white, and he knew if the snow melted against his scalp it would seep into his skin, chill him to the bone, and leave him with a sickness he couldn't afford.
Every brother of the Watch who had spent years on the Wall knew that much. His uncle, Benjen Stark, had been the one to tell him so long ago.
Yet no matter how hard he tried, Jon could not recall why — or how — he had ended up here.
He turned, and there it was: the Wall, towering and glacial, rising like an unbroken cliff of ice behind him.
What stunned him most was the silence. The blizzards that had become such an unshakable part of his life were gone. In their place, sunlight, soft, low, and the color of molten amber, slanted across the snow and touched his skin. For the first time in what felt like forever, he felt the faint ghost of warmth.
Although he knew it wasn't real.
Jon still had no memory of how he had come to this place, but somewhere deep inside, he sensed what he was meant to do. The thought was wordless yet certain.
He had to find Ghost!
The white direwolf… his direwolf.
So, following that pull inside him, Jon began to walk toward the forest.
He had no weapon, and for a brother of the Night's Watch, that felt wrong. Vulnerable.
So he searched the snow for something useful and found a heart tree, its bare limbs stretching like bony fingers toward the sky. He broke off a sturdy branch, stripped away the smaller twigs on a jagged stone until he held a clean, solid staff. It was crude, but the weight of it in his hand gave him a sliver of comfort.
With the Wall behind him as his guide, he guessed, though not with complete certainty, that he was moving toward the northwest. His boots, light and made of worn fur, sank into the soft snow, each step crunching with a dry, sharp sound that seemed to echo in the empty air.
He had no idea how long he had been walking. At some point, the sense of direction he had trusted seemed to dissolve, and the steady ticking of time slipped away with it. Yet strangely, none of that seemed to matter. For reasons he couldn't name, Jon knew exactly why he was here, and he knew without the faintest doubt where he was meant to go.
And then, as if the thought itself had called it into being, the next heartbeat revealed a flicker of movement among the blackened trunks of the Haunted Forest. A flash of white darted between the shadows.
"GHOST!"
Jon Snow's voice rang out, sharp with recognition and sudden hope.
That was his wolf. There was no mistaking it. He felt it in his bones.
But something was wrong. This time, instead of bounding toward him the way it always had, the great white direwolf stopped only long enough to glance back over its shoulder. Its red eyes met his for a fleeting second, unreadable, before it turned away and continued its steady lope toward the northwest.
Jon didn't understand. He only knew, with the same surety that had guided his steps this far, that Ghost wanted him to follow.
Gripping the short wooden staff in his hand, he cast one last look over his shoulder. Through the dark lattice of tree trunks, he could still just make out the pale, distant outline of the Wall. Then he turned and ran after the wolf.
Ghost seemed to know exactly how fast his master could move. The wolf's pace never became a full sprint, yet it was swift enough to make Jon push himself to keep up, always close enough to see the bright shape moving ahead through the gloom.
Man and wolf slipped deeper into the forest, running for what felt like an eternity. Neither of them tired, neither of them slowed.
At last, the white figure stopped. Ahead, a small hill rose sharply from the ground, its appearance so sudden it might have been hidden until this very moment. Ghost had halted at its base, his massive frame silhouetted against the snow.
There at the foot of the hill was the dark mouth of a cave, low and narrow, barely half a man's height. The wolf paced before it, back and forth, restless and uneasy.
The scarlet in Ghost's eyes caught the faint light, reflecting his master's image back at him. In their depths was something almost human… a flicker of urgency, of worry.
But Jon couldn't see it. His eyes weren't sharp enough to catch such detail.
All he saw was that his usually elusive wolf had finally stopped running, and relief washed over him like a breath of warmth in the cold.
He was already thinking that once he got this wolf back to the Wall, he'd lock him up for a while… yes, maybe even let him go hungry for a meal or two… just to see if that might teach him not to dash off on his own again.
Closing the distance in a few quick strides, Jon reached the familiar shape of the great white direwolf. He slid the short stick he carried into his belt, then leaned forward and began to reach out, intending to rub that thick, snow-white fur between Ghost's ears the way he always did.
But this time, the wolf did something he never had before. Instead of leaning into the touch, he snapped his jaws around Jon's gloved hand — not hard, just enough to hold on — and began pulling backward, tugging with insistent, unyielding force, as though trying to drag Jon somewhere.
Jon froze for a moment, staring in surprise. His wolf had never acted like this, not once.
He had always believed Ghost was the most intelligent and perceptive of all the direwolves that had once belonged to the Stark children, the one who seemed to understand more than the others ever could. And now, with the white wolf gripping his hand and straining with all four legs, Jon understood well enough what he meant: follow me.
Lifting his gaze, Jon studied the low, dark opening ahead. The mouth of the cave could not have been more than half a man's height; it looked like the sort of place only someone Tyrion's size could walk into without crouching.
"You want me to go in there?" Jon asked, his voice caught between disbelief and curiosity.
The answer came in the form of Ghost giving a solemn, deliberate nod.
For reasons Jon could not explain, he didn't even think the gesture strange, though it was something only a person should be able to do.
He glanced once more at the direwolf, whose eyes made it plain he would not give up until Jon agreed. A small, helpless smile curved Jon's lips, his own curiosity now tugging at him as strongly as the wolf's teeth.
Then, from the darkness of the cave came a scent, faint but undeniable, fresh and green like the cool breath of leaves and grass after rain. It was a strange thing to notice here, and Jon couldn't be sure if he truly smelled it or if it was only his imagination. Still, the feeling lingered.
Bending low, he ducked his head and began to crawl inside.
It was odd. From the outside, the cave had seemed utterly black, the kind of place where you could not see your own hand in front of your face. Yet once he was within, he found it was not so dark after all.
A soft, muted glow came from strange, round plants clinging to the walls, each one like a dim little candle, their pale light breathing life into the shadows.
Beneath his hands and knees, the ground at first felt like the cold stone he knew so well and hated from the Wall, but soon that changed. The surface became something different, something almost alive, and he realized with a slow, creeping wonder that he felt as though he were crawling along the great limbs of some enormous tree, its twisting branches carrying him further into the depths.
The strange fragrance was growing stronger, wrapping around him, filling his lungs. And all the while, Jon had the distinct sensation that he was moving downward, deeper and deeper into the earth.
What would be waiting ahead?
The question turned in his mind as he kept crawling forward, the answer lying somewhere beyond the dim light and the scent of green things.
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[Chapter End's]
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