Game of Thrones: Lord of the Flames

The sky was a blanket of gray, and the earth lay buried beneath endless snow.

A small band of riders struggled forward against the relentless wind and snow, their breaths frosting in the icy air.

Eddard Stark felt his horse grow restless beneath him. A sense of unease settled in his chest.

"Lord Stark!" A scout returned from the front lines, his face grim. "There are tracks to the south—large numbers passed through recently."

"A large force?" Eddard stiffened. "Or a migrating group of civilians?"

"It's hard to tell, my lord. The snow obscures much. It could be a southern-bound noble host, perhaps refugees… or…" The scout hesitated before uttering the final possibility. "The army of the dead."

A heavy silence fell over the group.

"That's entirely possible," Eddard said finally. "If they're moving down the Kingsroad, they'd reach Winterfell faster than we would."

The rangers exchanged uneasy glances, but none dared to voice the thoughts racing through their minds.

When they had left Castle Black, the choice of which route to take had been contentious.

The fastest path south was the Kingsroad, but the northern stretch of the road wound through the Wolf's Wood—a desolate, scarcely traveled expanse.

Some had argued for an alternate route, one that passed through Last Hearth, Karhold, and the Dreadfort. This detour would allow them to gather more people as they traveled, saving as many northern folk as possible.

But that path was slower.

In the end, Eddard Stark had made the decision: saving lives outweighed speed.

"I only mean to check on Winterfell," Eddard said, glancing at the men accompanying him. "You don't need to follow me—"

"Say no more, my lord," one of the rangers interrupted. "But we should keep moving. The snow will only slow us further."

Eddard looked at their determined faces. Despite the danger, none showed any sign of backing down. He gave a short nod and led the way forward.

---

Night fell faster than expected, blanketing the world in darkness.

Fortunately, the snowfall eased, and the moon and stars cast a faint silver glow upon the landscape, offering just enough light to navigate.

"Is that Winterfell ahead?" one ranger asked, pointing toward a distant shape silhouetted against the night.

"Yes," Eddard said, his voice heavy. The outline of the familiar castle loomed in the darkness, but something about its shape was wrong.

An ominous feeling settled in his gut, but he kept silent and spurred his horse forward.

As they drew closer, the grim truth became clear.

Winterfell's walls, once proud and steadfast, were half-collapsed. Snow had piled high against crumbling towers, spiraling staircases ended abruptly in mid-air, and shattered statues lay buried beneath the icy rubble.

Winterfell had been destroyed.

Eddard felt his blood freeze in his veins.

His mind raced with terrifying possibilities, each thought more harrowing than the last. He resisted the urge to charge blindly into the ruins.

"My lord, perhaps the people evacuated before the attack," one ranger suggested, his tone cautious.

"Yes, there's no blood or bodies—no signs of a fight," another added hopefully.

"Or maybe the snow has buried them…" another muttered, earning sharp glares from his comrades.

"We'll search the ruins," Eddard said, dismounting his horse.

As they moved forward, they tried to find traces of battle among the ruins.

What gave him some peace of mind was that no body was found.

Of course, the corpses could also be resurrected into wights by the White Walkers, but they could not erase the traces of battle.

He took note of the damage. While the destruction was absolute, there were few signs of combat—no broken weapons, no shattered shields, no bloodstains on the ground.

"They must have left before the attack," Eddard concluded. "But how did the Others destroy Winterfell so completely? Do they truly have such power?"

"Perhaps they've acquired a weapon like the Horn of Winter," one ranger suggested. "A single blast might level an entire castle."

"Or something that can split the earth," another said, pointing to the deep cracks running through the ground.

Eddard crouched by one of the fissures. The cracks sprawled like spiderwebs across the ruined courtyard, their depths vanishing into shadow.

"My lord! Over here!"

The call drew his attention to another discovery—a series of massive footprints pressed into the snow.

Eddard hurried over and stared at the prints, each larger than a full-grown man. They stretched in a trail leading northward, out of Winterfell.

"Are these giant tracks?" someone asked.

"You mean the giants beyond the Wall?" another ranger replied. "Even they aren't this big."

"Perhaps… the true giants of legend," Eddard murmured, his mind flashing back to the tales he'd heard as a child.

The old stories spoke of colossal beings who had once roamed Westeros, beings so powerful they had helped build Winterfell itself.

Some said the Horn of Winter could awaken these slumbering titans from their ancient graves.

Eddard turned his gaze back to the ruins and the deep fissures. Could the legends be true? Had the giants of the earth truly risen from their slumber?

It sounded absurd, but then again, so had the Others and their undead army.

The thought brought him little comfort. Were these giants friend or foe?

He stared at the massive footprints vanishing into the northern horizon and whispered a silent prayer that they were heading to fight the Others—and not to join them.

He originally wanted to go to the crypt amd take a look, but he found that that was where the cracks in the ground were most densely distributed. If the underground giant really awakened, then it might have crawled out from near the tomb.

For now, there were no answers, only questions. Eddard turned back to his men.

"We'll camp here for the night. At first light, we continue south."

"Yes, sir."

A few people found a relatively intact tower, blocked the leaky doors and windows with things, lit a bonfire, ate something, and then fell asleep one after another.

---

That night, Eddard dreamed of Winterfell's crypts.

He wandered through the darkened halls beneath the castle, as he had done countless times before.

The statues of long-dead Stark lords stood sentinel, their cold stone eyes watching him pass.

At their feet lay stone direwolves, their carved heads turning to snarl silently in his direction.

At last, he reached the resting place of his father, Rickard Stark. Flanking his tomb were the graves of his brother Brandon and his sister Lyanna.

"Eddard, promise me," Lyanna's statue whispered. Her voice was soft and filled with sorrow. A crown of pale blue winter roses adorned her head, and blood-red tears streaked down her cheeks.

Before he could respond, the crypt erupted into chaos.

One by one, the tombs of the Stark kings burst open. The long-dead lords of Winterfell clawed their way from their graves, their decayed hands grasping rusted swords.

The corroded blades gleamed as ice spread over them, transforming into shimmering crystal swords.

Their eyes burned with an unnatural blue fire as they turned toward Eddard and let out guttural, soul-piercing howls.

Eddard woke with a start, sweat freezing on his brow despite the cold.

"Lord Stark? Are you all right?" a nearby soldier on a night watch asked.

"I'm fine," Eddard lied. "Just… a little thirsty."

"I still have some wine here, My lord"

He reached for the offered water flask but paused mid-motion.

"Do you hear that?"

The soldier froze, straining to listen. A moment later, his face paled.

"Something's outside."

The faint crunch of snow, the low growls, and the unmistakable stench of rot confirmed it.

The dead had come.

"Get the others up. Quickly."

As his men scrambled to prepare, the sounds outside grew louder.

Through the cracks in the tower, Eddard glimpsed the shambling forms of wights, their milky-white eyes glowing in the darkness.

"There aren't many wights, maybe thirty or forty in total. Remember, don't engage unnecessarily. Break through as quickly as possible!"

"Yes, my lord."

Once the men were ready, Eddard charged out first, leading the way.

The wights surrounding the tower let out guttural howls at the scent of living flesh. Like rabid wolves, they flung themselves at the riders, clawed hands outstretched.

The breath of the living seems to be the most attractive thing in the world to these monsters that crawled out of the graves. Their bodies have long been dead and their minds have been lost, they can only charge blindly towards the living.

This was the darkest hour before dawn. In the pitch-black environment, the living and the dead clashed in a vicious battle.

A ranger of the Night's Watch dodged the lunge of a wight and countered with a swift slash, severing its head.

Yet, the headless wight continued to thrash violently, clawing and kicking as it lunged toward the living.

It wasn't until Eddard drove the Stark family's ancestral greatsword, Ice, into the wight's chest that it finally stilled.

The creature froze in place, as if all its energy had been drained, before collapsing limply onto the snowy ground.

"Use dragonglass weapons!" Eddard shouted.

The ranger, suddenly reminded of the strange, dark dagger their commander had distributed earlier, fumbled to draw it from his belt.

As another wight leaped at him, he thrust the dagger into its eye socket.

The results were immediate and dramatic. The wight emitted a bloodcurdling scream, its body stiffening as icy mist poured from its wounds. Moments later, it disintegrated entirely, leaving nothing behind.

"These dragonglass weapons work!" the ranger called out in astonishment.

"Don't linger! Get out of the city!" Eddard commanded, his voice rising above the chaos as he swung his greatsword, clearing a path for his men.

The rangers understood his urgency. None wanted to risk attracting more wights—or, worse, the arrival of the White Walkers. They swiftly mounted their horses and prepared to flee.

"Follow me!" Eddard bellowed, spurring his horse into motion. He expertly navigated the ruins of Winterfell, weaving through its collapsed walls and crumbling towers.

"Charge!"

The rangers followed, urging their horses to gallop.

The wights were trampled underfoot, some crushed beneath the horses' hooves. Yet even as they fell, the undead clawed desperately at the horses' legs and bellies, trying to drag the riders down.

Trees suddenly loomed around them as Eddard led his group across a frozen stream. Behind them, the sounds of battle and the wights' eerie cries began to fade, swallowed by the distance and the encroaching silence.

Eddard finally pulled his horse to a stop and turned back. To his shock and dismay, none of his companions had followed him.

Even more unsettling, the wights that had been chasing them had vanished.

"Grant!" he shouted. "Erik! Moors!"

There was no answer.

It was as though the entire world had been swallowed by an eerie, suffocating silence.

Ahead, the jagged remains of broken gargoyles littered the snow. He recognized the partially collapsed structure before him—it was the Stark family crypt, the place where he had spent over forty years of his life.

The wind sighed mournfully through the ruins, carrying fine grains of snow that stung his face.

Eddard felt the cold—an unbearable, bone-deep cold.

Even his horse began to tremble, its breath forming white plumes that froze into frost.

"Caw—caw—"

A lone raven perched on a gnarled weirwood tree, its beady eyes gleaming as it flapped its wings.

The moon had disappeared, and the stars had hidden themselves away.

From the darkness, a horse's head emerged. Its entire body was coated in a layer of frost, as if drenched in freezing sweat. From its ruptured abdomen spilled blackened, rotting entrails. On its back sat a rider, pale and icy as a figure sculpted from frozen glass.

Eddard's heart seized. He knew immediately—this was no wight. This was something far worse. A White Walker.

The White Walker dismounted gracefully, standing tall in the snow. Its figure was slender as a blade, its skin white as milk. The armor it wore shimmered and shifted with each step, as if alive.

It moved across the snow without leaving so much as a footprint.

Unlike the wights' jerky, clumsy movements, the White Walker's steps were smooth and weightless, like snowflakes drifting on the wind.

Yet, oddly, the creature did not attack.

Instead, it strode forward with eerie elegance, slowly closing the distance between them.

Eddard tightened his grip on Ice, every muscle in his body tensed, ready to strike.

When they were no more than ten paces apart, the White Walker halted.

It raised one icy hand and removed its frozen mask.

Eddard stared, his breath caught in his throat. Beneath the mask was a face he knew all too well—a face he had loved and mourned.

"Brandon?" His voice cracked, a mix of disbelief, terror, joy, and fury.

"No! This is impossible!" His body began to tremble uncontrollably as he stared at the face of his long-dead brother, Brandon Stark.

"You… you died. You died at the hands of the Mad King," Eddard whispered. "I buried you myself. I laid you to rest in the crypt, alongside Father and Lyanna…"

As he spoke, two more figures emerged from the darkness.

Mist coiled around them, shadows clinging to their forms.

They, too, removed their icy masks, revealing faces Eddard would never forget.

"No… this can't be…" His grip on Ice faltered, his strength failing him.

"Father? Lyanna? How… how can this be happening?"

One by one, more figures stepped out of the shadows, surrounding Eddard. They all removed their masks, and the nightmare became reality.

The ancient Kings of Winter, long dead and buried, had risen from their graves. Clad in ice-forged armor, they brought with them an overwhelming aura of death.

"Oh gods… save me… save House Stark …" Eddard slid off his horse and fell to his knees, his tears freezing on his face.

This unyielding man of the North, as strong and resolute as the icy winds of Winterfell, had finally broken.

He couldn't comprehend what he was seeing.

Was the Stark's the very source of this apocalypse?

Had the evil he'd fought against all his life been his own blood all along?

In his dazed state, Eddard saw Lyanna approach. She extended her hand to him, just as she had in the Tower of Joy all those years ago.

Her face was as he remembered it, her eyes filled with longing and sorrow, just as they had been in her final moments.

"Promise me, Ned. Promise me…"

He thought he heard her voice echoing faintly in his ears.

But when the White Walker spoke, it was not with her voice. It was the sound of ice cracking, sharp and unnatural.

Eddard took her hand. It was as hard as stone, as cold as the grave.

She pulled him to his feet and placed a crown of ice upon his head.

His vision blurred, his grey eyes clouding until they glowed an unnatural blue.

He stopped resisting, allowing his sister to crown him.

Above them, countless ravens took flight, their cries piercing the howling wind.

The storm raged on, wailing over the ruins of Winterfell.

(End of Chapter)