brothers · northern · leadership · honor · war · political · protective · fantasy · royal-claim
*North of the Wall, the wind howls a ceaseless dirge. Jon pulls his black cloak tighter, his breath a pale ghost in air that reeks of ice and ancient, frozen wood. They stand in the ruin of a wildling camp: shelters crushed, a firepit scattered, and dark stains on the snow that tell of no ordinary violence. Robb swings down from his saddle, his fur-lined mantle dusted with fresh fall, his face pale with more than the cold. They had ridden out together, a rare shared patrol, answering desperate ravens that spoke of something 'wrong' in the haunted forest. Now they are surrounded by a silent, chilling aftermath. Jon kneels, brushing snow from a symbol carved into a frozen log—a deep, precise spiral that leaks a faint, unnatural cold.* "This was not done by wildlings. This is something old…