" You all right?" " Mm." "Ever been north before?" "Never seen snow before." "Beautiful, eh?" "I can breathe again." "Down south, the air smells like pig shit." "You've never been down south." " I've been to Winterfell." " That's the North." "How do you live up here?" "How do you keep your balls from freezing off?" "You got to keep moving." "That's the secret." "Walking's good, fighting's better, fucking's best." "There's not a living woman within a hundred miles of here." "We have to make do with what we've got." "This one is maybe not so smart." "Davos says he's a strong fighter." "Good." "That's more important than being smart." "Smart people don't come up here looking for the dead." "So, you met this Dragon Queen, huh?" "And?" "She'll only fight beside us if I bend the knee." "You spent too much time with the Free Folk." "Now you don't like kneeling." "Mance Rayder was a brave man." "A proud man." "The King-beyond-the-Wall never bent the knee." "How many of his people died for his pride?" "You still mad at us, boy?" "You sold me to a witch." "A priestess." "I'll admit, it is a subtle distinction." "We're fighting a great war." "Wars cost money." "I wanted to be one of you." "I wanted to join the Brotherhood, but you sold me off like a slave." "Do you know what she did to me?" "She strapped me down on a bed," " she stripped me naked..." " Sounds all right so far." " ...and put leeches on me." " Was she naked, too?" "She needed your blood." "Yes, thank you." "I know that." " Could have been worse." " She wanted to kill me!" " They would have killed me if wasn't for Davos." " But they didn't, did they?" "So, what you whinging about?" "I'm not whinging." "Your lips are moving and you're complaining about something." "That's whinging." "This one's been killed six times." "You don't hear him bitching about it." "Good lad." "The first time I went north of the Wall was with your father." "He was a good man." "He deserved a better son." "Were you with him at the end?" "I was a prisoner of the wildlings." "But we avenged him." "I want you to know that." "Every mutineer found justice." "Can't think of a worse way for him to go." "The Night's Watch was his life." "He would have died to protect every one of those men." "And they butchered him." "I hate that he died that way." "My father was the most honorable man I ever met." "He was good all the way through." "And he died on the executioner's block." "Your father wanted to execute me, you know?" "I heard." "He was in the right, of course." "Didn't make me hate him any less." " I'm glad he didn't catch you." " Me, too." "Your father gave me this sword." "Changed the pommel from a bear to a wolf... but it's still Longclaw." "Lord Commander Mormont thought you'd never come back to Westeros." "But you are back, and it's been in your family for centuries." "It's not right for me to have it." "He gave it to you." "I'm not his son." "I brought shame onto my house." "I broke my father's heart." "I forfeited the right to claim this sword." "It's yours." "May it serve you well... and your children after you." "Father used to watch us from up here." "He wouldn't say much." "You probably don't remember." "You were inside knitting all the time." "I remember." "One time, the boys were shooting arrows with Ser Rodrik." "I came out here after, and Bran had left his bow behind, just lying on the ground." "Ser Rodrik would have cuffed him if he saw." "There was one arrow in the target." "There was no one around, just like now." "No one to stop me." "So I started shooting." "And every shot, I had to go up there and get my one arrow and walk back and shoot it again." "I wasn't very good." "Finally, I hit the bull's-eye." "Could have been the 20th shot or the 50th." "I don't remember." "But I hit the bull's-eye, and I heard this." "I looked up, and he's standing right here, smiling down at me." "I knew what I was doing was against the rules." "But he was smiling, so I knew it wasn't wrong." "The rules were wrong." "I was doing what I was meant to be doing, and he knew it." "Now he's dead." "Killed by the Lannisters with your help." "What?" "That's your pretty handwriting." "Septa Mordane used to crack my knuckles 'cause I couldn't write as well as you." ""Robb, I write to you today with heavy heart." "Our good King Robert is dead, killed from wounds he took in a boar hunt."" "You don't have to read it." "I remember." ""Father has been charged with treason." "He conspired with Robert's brothers against my beloved Joffrey and tried to steal his throne." "The Lannisters are treating me well and providing me with every comfort." "I beg you, come to King's Landing, swear fealty to King Joffrey, and prevent any strife between the great houses of Lannister and Stark." "Your faithful sister, Sansa."" "They forced me to do it." "Did they?" "With a knife at your throat?" "Did they put you on a rack and stretch you until your bones started to pop?" "You don't know what it was like." "I was a child." "So was I. I would have let them kill me before I betrayed my family." "They told me it was the only way to save Father." "And you were stupid enough to believe them." "I remember you standing on that platform with Joffrey and Cersei when they dragged Father to the block." "I remember the pretty dress you were wearing." "I remember the fancy way you did your hair." "You were there?" "I was there." "Standing in the crowd near Baelor's statue." "And what did you do?" "Did you come running to the rescue?" "Did you fight off the Lannisters and save Father?" " I wanted to." " But you didn't, just like me." "I didn't betray him." "I didn't betray Robb." "I didn't betray our entire family for my beloved Joffrey." "You should be on your knees, thanking me." "We're standing in Winterfell again because of me." "You didn't win it back, Jon didn't win it back." "He lost the Battle of the Bastards." "The Knights of the Vale won the battle, and they rode north for me." "While you were off, where?" "Traveling the world?" " I was training." " Training." "Well, while you were training," "I suffered things you could never imagine." "Oh, I don't know about that." "I can imagine quite a lot." "You never would have survived what I survived." "I guess we'll never know." "What are you going to do with that letter?" "I don't know yet." "Who did you show it to?" "Where did you find it?" "You're scared, aren't you?" "What are you scared of?" "You didn't commit any crimes." " No one's going to hang you." " Well, Arya..." "You're scared I'll show it to Jon and he'll be angry." "No, that's not Jon." "He'll understand." "You were just a scared little girl, all alone with the wicked Lannisters." "Do you know how happy Cersei would be right now if she saw us fighting?" "This is exactly what she wants." "This is what she's always wanted..." "to tear us apart." "You're scared the Northern lords will read it." "They wouldn't think much of Lady Sansa if they knew how she did Cersei's bidding." "What would little Lyanna Mormont say?" "She's younger than you were when you wrote this." "Are you going to say, "But I was just a child?"" "You're angry." "Sometimes anger makes people do unfortunate things." "Sometimes fear makes them do unfortunate things." "I'll go with anger." "You're the one they call "the Dog."" "Fuck off." "They told me you were mean." "Were you born mean or you just hate wildings?" "I don't give two shits about wildings." "It's gingers I hate." "Gingers are beautiful." "We are kissed by fire, just like you." "Don't point your fucking finger at me." "Did you trip into the fire when you were a baby?" "I didn't trip, I was pushed." "And ever since, you've been mean." "Will you fuck off?" "I don't think you're truly mean." "You have sad eyes." "You want to suck my dick, is that it?" " Dick?" " Cock." "Ah, dick." "I like it." "I bet you do." "Nope, it's pussy for me." "I have a beauty waiting for me back at Winterfell." "If I ever get back there." "Yellow hair, blue eyes, the tallest woman you've ever seen." "Almost as tall as you." " Brienne of Tarth." " You know her?" "You're with Brienne of fucking Tarth?" "Well, not with her yet." " But I see the way she looks at me." " How does she look at you?" "Like she wants to carve you up and eat your liver?" "You do know her." "We've met." "I want to make babies with her." "Think of them..." "great big monsters." "They'd conquer the world." "How did a mad fucker like you live this long?" "I'm good at killing people." "You don't look much like him." "Who's that?" "Your father." "I suppose you favor your mother." "You knew him?" "'Course I did." "When he was Hand, he sent me off hunting for the Mountain." "Your wildling friend told me the red woman brought you back." "Thoros has brought me back six times." "We both serve the same lord." "I serve the North." "The North didn't raise you from the dead." "The Lord of Light never spoke to me." "I don't know anything about him." "I don't know what he wants from me." " He wants you alive." " Why?" "I don't know." "That's all anyone can tell me..." ""I don't know."" "So, what's the point in serving a god if none of us knows what he wants?" "I think about that all the time." "I don't think it's our purpose to understand." "Except one thing..." "we're soldiers." "We have to know what we're fighting for." "I'm not fighting so some man or woman I barely know can sit on a throne made of swords." "So, what are you fighting for?" "Life." "Death is the enemy." "The first enemy and the last." "But we all die." "The enemy always wins." "And we still need to fight him." "That's all I know." "You and I won't find much joy while we're here, but we can keep others alive." "We can defend those who can't defend themselves." ""I am the shield that guards the realms of men."" "Maybe we don't need to understand any more than that." "Maybe that's enough." "Aye." "Maybe that's enough." "That's what I saw in the fire." "A mountain like an arrowhead." "Are you sure?" "We're getting close." "Do you know what I like about you?" " I honestly don't." " You're not a hero." "Oh." "Well, I've been heroic on occasion." "I once charged through the Mud Gate of King's Landing and..." "I don't want you to be a hero." "Heroes do stupid things and they die." "Drogo, Jorah, Daario, even this..." "Jon Snow... they all try to outdo each other." "Who can do the stupidest, bravest thing." "It's interesting, these heroes you name." "Drogo, Jorah, Daario, even this..." "Jon Snow." "They all fell in love with you." " Jon Snow's not in love with me." " Oh, my mistake." "I suppose he stares at you longingly because he's hopeful for a successful military alliance." "He's too little for me." "I didn't mean..." "As heroes go, he is quite little." "I know you're brave." "I wouldn't have chosen a coward as my Hand." "So, if all goes well," "I'll finally get to meet your sister." "From everything you've told me about her, she'd rather murder me than speak with me." "Oh, first, she'd torture you in some horrible way, then she'd murder you." "Nobody trusts my sister less than I do, believe me." "But if we go to the capital, we'll go with two armies, we'll go with three dragons." "Anyone touches you, King's Landing burns down to the foundation stones." "And right now, she's thinking of how to set a trap." "Of course she is." "And she's wondering what trap you're laying for her." "Are we?" "Laying any traps?" "If we want to create a new and better world," "I'm not sure deceit and mass murder is the best way to start." "Which war was won without deceit and mass murder?" "Yes, you'll need to be ruthless if you're going to win the throne." "You need to inspire a degree of fear." "But fear is all Cersei has." "It's all my father had, and Joffrey." "It makes their power brittle because everyone beneath them longs to see them dead." "Aegon Targaryen got quite a long way on fear." "He did." "But you once spoke to me of breaking the wheel." "Aegon built a wheel." "If that's the kind of queen you want to be, how are you different from all the other tyrants that came before you?" "So we walk into the lions' den." "My brother promised me he'd keep a grip on the Lannister forces." "Forgive me, but I don't care about any Lannister promises." "Except yours." "And I promised him" "I'd keep you from doing anything impulsive." "Impulsive?" "This will be a difficult negotiation." "We're sitting down with people who want to see us both headless." "My sister is likely to say something provocative." " And?" " And you have been known to lose your temper from time to time, as all great leaders do." "When have I lost my temper?" "Burning the Tarlys, for instance." "That was not impulsive." "That was necessary." " Perhaps." " Perhaps?" "Perhaps the father needed to die and not the son." "Perhaps they both needed time to contemplate their mistakes in the solitude of a cold cell." "We had no time to discuss the possibilities before you ended their possibilities." "One could be forgiven for thinking you're taking your family's side in this debate." "I am taking their side." "You need to take your enemy's side if you're going to see things the way they do." "And you need to see things the way they do if you're going to anticipate their actions, respond effectively, and beat them." "Which I want you to do very much." "Because I believe in you and in the world you want to build." "But the world you want to build doesn't get built all at once." "Probably not in a single lifetime." "How do we ensure that your vision endures?" "After you break the wheel, how do we make sure it stays broken?" "You want to know who sits on the Iron Throne after I'm dead." "Is that it?" "You say you can't have children, but there are other ways of choosing a successor." "The Night's Watch has one method." "The ironborn, for all their many flaws, have another." "We will discuss the succession after I wear the crown." "Your Grace, I saw hundreds of arrows fly towards you when you fought on the Blackwater Rush, and I saw hundreds of arrows miss." "But any one of them could have found your heart and ended your..." "You've been thinking about my death quite a bit, haven't you?" "Is this one of the items you discussed with your brother in King's Landing?" "I'm trying to serve you by planning for the long term." "Perhaps if you planned for the short term, we wouldn't have lost Dorne and Highgarden." "We will discuss the succession after I wear the crown." "Look!" "A bear." "Big fucker." "Do bears have blue eyes?" "We have to get him back to Eastwatch." "Flask." "Go on." "You all right?" "I just got bit by a dead bear." "Aye, you did." "Funny old life." "Right, then." "We're off." " Where did she get it?" " I don't know." "She seems very resourceful." "You're worried." "We're asking 20,000 men to fight with us in the worst winter any of them have ever seen." "The weather will be the least of their problems." "Many of them will be happy to find a good reason to go home." " You question their loyalty?" " Their loyalty is to Jon." "Jon is not here." "I haven't heard from him in weeks." "You're the Lady of Winterfell." "The king chose you to rule in his absence." "And rule you have." "Wisely, ably." "They see that." "They respect you." "Some may even prefer you." "Yes, they turned their backs on Jon when it was time to retake Winterfell, then they named him their king, and now they're ready to turn their backs on him again." "How far would you trust men like that?" "They're all bloody wind vanes." "If they found out that I wrote that letter, a woman who's already married not one, but two enemies of her house..." "By the time Jon comes back, he'll have no army left." "Arya's not like them." "She's your sister." "You may have disagreements, but she would never betray her family." "She would if she thought I was going to betray Jon." "Is that what she thinks?" "I don't know what she thinks." "I don't know her anymore." "Perhaps Lady Brienne could help." "She's sworn to protect both of Catelyn Stark's girls, is she not?" "She is." "And if one of you were planning to harm the other in any way, wouldn't she be honor bound to intercede?" "She would." " Something I've always wanted to know." " All right." "How drunk were you when you charged through the breach on Pyke?" "If I'm being honest, I don't remember charging through the breach." "Some of the lads told me about it the next morning." "Sounded like a good scrap." "Aye." "It was a proper scrap." "The ironborn thought you were some kind of god, the way you were waving that flaming sword." "I thought you were the bravest man I ever saw." "Just the drunkest." "Where's the rest of them?" "If we wait long enough, we'll find out." "Run back to Eastwatch." "Get a raven to Daenerys, tell her what's happened." " I'm not leaving you." " You're the fastest." "Go, now." "You're faster without the hammer." "Give it." "Give it!" " Come on!" " Run!" "Come on!" "Stop!" "Go!" "What happened?" "Where are the others?" "Raven, we need to send a raven." "Get the maester, now!" "Thoros?" "Thoros." "They say it's one of the better ways to go." "Lord of Light, show us the way." "Come to us in our darkness and lead Your servant into the light." "We have to burn his body." "We'll all be close behind him unless the Lord of Light is kind enough to send us a bit of fire." "Lord of Light, come to us in our darkness, for the night is dark and full of terrors." "We'll all freeze soon." "And so will the water." "When you killed the white walker, almost all the dead that followed it fell." "Why?" "Maybe he was the one who turned them." "We can go for the walkers." " Maybe we'll stand a chance." " No." "We need to take that thing back with us." "There's a raven flying for Dragonstone now." "Daenerys is our only chance." "No." "There's another." "Kill him." "He turned them all." "You don't understand." "The Lord brought you back." "He brought me back." "No one else." "Just us." "Did He do it to watch us freeze to death?" "Careful, Beric." "You lost your priest." "This is your last life." "I've been waiting for the end for a long time." "Maybe the Lord brought me here to find it." "Every lord I've ever met's been a cunt." "Don't see why the Lord of Light should be any different." "My lady." "My lady?" "It's an invitation to King's Landing." "My lady, you are the Lady of Winterfell." "I am, and you will represent my interests at this gathering as you see them." "They invited you." "They want you there." "I will not set foot in King's Landing while Cersei Lannister is queen." "If they want another Stark prisoner, they can come and take me." "Until then, I'll remain where I belong." "I have work to do here." "It's not safe." "Ser Jaime will be there." "You said he treated you honorably before." "I'm not worried about me." "It's not safe leaving you with Littlefinger." "I have many guards who would happily imprison him or behead him whether or not you're here." "And you trust their loyalty?" "You trust he hasn't been speaking to them all behind your back?" "Let me at least leave Podrick behind to watch over you." "He has become a competent swordsman..." "I do not need to be watched over or minded or cared for." "I'm not a child," "I am the Lady of Winterfell, and I am home." "This is the safest place for me." "My lady," "I swore an oath to protect you and your sister." " If I abandon you..." " The trip to King's Landing is long, Lady Brienne, and you won't be traveling on summer roads." "The sooner you leave, the better your chances of making it on time." "Yes, my lady." "You can't." "The most important person in the world can't fly off to the most dangerous place in the world." " Who else can?" " No one." "They knew the risks when they left." "You can't win the throne if you're dead." "You can't break the wheel if you're dead." "So, what would you have me do?" "Nothing." "Sometimes nothing is the hardest thing to do." "If you die, we're all lost." "Everyone, everything." "You told me to do nothing before and I listened to you." "I'm not doing nothing again." "Dumb cunt." "Oh, fuck." "Fuck it." "Yah!" "Yah!" "Fall back!" " Fall back!" " Come on!" "Help me!" "Go!" "Jon!" "Go!" "Go now!" "Leave!" "Uncle Benjen!" "How?" " You ride for the pass." " Come with me." "There's no time." "Go!" "We'll meet again, Clegane." "Fucking hope not." "It's time to go, Your Grace." "A bit longer." "Rider approaching!" "Open the gate!" "Not what you're looking for?" "I have hundreds of men here at Winterfell, all loyal to me." "They're not here now." "What are these?" "My faces." "Where did you get them?" "In Braavos, while I was training to be a Faceless Man." "What does that mean?" "Back in Braavos, before I got my first face, there was a game I used to play." "The Game of Faces." "It's simple..." "I ask you a question about yourself, and you try to make lies sound like the truth." "If you fool me, you win." "If I catch a lie, you lose." "Let's play." "I don't want to play." "How do you feel about Jon being king?" "Is there someone else you think should rule the North instead of him?" "Those faces, what are they?" "You want to do the asking?" "Are you sure?" "The Game of Faces didn't turn out so well for the last person who asked me questions." "Tell me what they are." "We both wanted to be other people when we were younger." "You wanted to be a queen, to sit next to a handsome, young king on the Iron Throne." "I wanted to be a knight, to pick up a sword like Father and go off to battle." "Neither of us got to be that other person, did we?" "The world doesn't just let girls decide what they're going to be." "But I can now." "With the faces, I can choose." "I can become someone else." "Speak in their voice, live in their skin." "I could even become you." "I wonder what it would feel like to wear those pretty dresses... to be the Lady of Winterfell." "All I'd need to find out... is your face." "I'm sorry." "I'm so sorry." "I wish I could take it back." "I wish we'd never gone." "I don't." "If we hadn't gone, I wouldn't have seen." "You have to see it to know." "Now I know." "The dragons are my children." "They're the only children I'll ever have." "Do you understand?" "We are going to destroy the Night King and his army." "And we'll do it together." "You have my word." "Thank you, Dany." ""Dany"?" "Who was the last person who called me that?" "I'm not sure." "Was it my brother?" "Mm, not the company you want to keep." "All right." "Not "Dany."" "How about "my queen"?" "I'd, uh, bend the knee, but..." "What about those who swore allegiance to you?" "They'll all come to see you for what you are." "I hope I deserve it." "You do." "You should get some rest." "There is only one war that matters." "And it is here."