Chapter Text
Bran, in the cave of the Three Eyed Raven
Snow pressed against Bran’s cheeks though he wasn’t lying in the sled anymore. The cave’s torchlight thinned to a pale shimmer. Cold air pushed at him from somewhere far off. He knew the pull when it came like this. The world quieted. Even Meera’s voice blurred at the edge of hearing.
The weirwood roots near his hand felt warm. Then the warmth thinned. Light folded in on itself.
He was standing at Castle Black. The vision did not feel like the past. It was… wavery. Like light reflected off of water.
Men gathered in a ring of dark cloaks. Their breath rose in small clouds. Their blades caught torchlight. Jon was among them. He turned, puzzled, searching the faces he trusted. Bran tried to call to him, but sound did not form. Snow drifted between them in slow, heavy flakes.
A hand struck Jon first. The blow forced him back a step. Another man stepped in. Then another. Then knives. Bran watched Jon’s breath catch in the cold. Watched the shock on his face. The circle closed. Steel slid home.
Bran felt the cold drag harder. The vision held him still. Jon dropped to his knees.
Then the men stepped back. Their faces blurred like smudged paint. Torchlight thinned into nothing.
He fell back into himself with a small jerk. His hand slipped from the root. The cave wall seemed to tilt.
Meera crouched beside him. Her face tightened with worry. “Bran. You were gone too long.”
He tried to speak. The words stayed low, careful. “I saw the Wall.” His voice rasped. “I saw Jon. He was… they were-”
Meera waited. She knew the look he had when the visions took him. She didn’t press.
Snow still clung to his mind. The circle of cloaks. Jon falling. The silence after.
He forced a breath. “He’s in danger.”
A faint rustle came from deeper in the cave. The old man’s voice followed, steady as ever. “Some truths come before their hour,” the Three-Eyed Raven said. “You saw only a shadow of what may be.”
Bran stared at the roots above him. Their red veins pulsed with quiet light. He tried to hold the vision still in his memory, but pieces slipped away - faces, words, the exact moment Jon fell. Only the cold and the certainty of danger remained.
He swallowed. “He died.”
“A moment is never fixed,” the Raven said. “But you must learn why the sight came to you.” His tone did not rise or fall. It pressed on Bran like a hand guiding him forward. “The past calls. The present calls. Sometimes the yet-to-come reaches for you as well.”
Bran nodded.
Meera placed a hand on his arm. “Rest,” she said.
---
Bran woke to the drip of water along the cave wall. The fire had sunk to embers. A thin cold hung in the air. His body felt heavy, but his mind still carried the sharp edges of the vision. Jon on the snow. Knives closing in.
Meera knelt near the gear bundles. Her face looked worn in the half-light, the shadows under her eyes deeper than the night before. Bran pushed himself upright. His hands trembled a little as he braced against the stone. “Meera,” he said. His voice came out thin. “We have to leave.”
She looked over at him at once. No surprise. Only a long breath, as if she’d been waiting for him to say it aloud. “Why?” she asked.
“My brother,” Bran said. “Jon. Something’s going to happen to him. I saw it.” The memory pulled, cold and certain. “He’s in danger. I can’t stay here.”
Meera’s shoulders eased, like a knot untied. She rose and crouched beside him. The torchlight caught the hint of tears in her eyes before she blinked them away.
“This place took Jojen,” she said quietly. “Piece by piece.” Her voice stayed steady, but the grief lay close beneath it. “I won’t let it take you too.”
Bran stared at the walls of the cave. The roots curled overhead, pale and patient. They seemed to listen. The air tasted of sap and old frost.
Meera touched his arm. “If your brother needs you, we go. I’ve wanted to leave since the moment he-” She stopped. The rest hung between them like breath in cold air. She didn’t need to finish the sentence.
Bran nodded. “We should go soon.”
“We will,” she said. “I’m glad you said it first.”
Summer padded over and pressed his head against Bran’s shoulder. The warmth steadied him. Hodor shifted closer too, murmuring “Hodor” in a soft, worried tone.
Bran looked toward the chamber where the Three-Eyed Raven sat rooted in the tree’s grasp. The thought of facing him again sent a faint chill down his spine.
Meera followed his gaze. “He won’t want us to leave.”
Bran swallowed. “He’ll try to stop us.”
“He tries to stop everything that isn’t part of his roots,” she said. “But we’re not staying here to rot beside him.” Her tone hardened, not out of cruelty but exhaustion. “Jojen believed we had a purpose. Maybe this is it. Maybe helping your brother is what we were meant to do instead of dying in the dark.”
Bran lowered his eyes. He felt the truth of that settle inside him.
Meera rose. “Get ready. We won’t wait for him to wake.”
Bran looked at Summer. Then at Hodor. Then at the thin line of light slipping from the tunnel mouth ahead. The path south was cold, long, and full of shadows he didn’t yet understand.
But the cave felt colder.
A faint rustle came from deeper in the chamber. The Raven seldom moved, yet the sound drew them all still. Bran turned. The old man sat half-swallowed by the weirwood roots, pale as bone against the tree’s red veins. His eyes were open.
“You mean to flee,” he said. His voice carried through the cave like a slow tide, soft but unavoidable.
Meera stepped closer to Bran. Summer lowered his head and growled once, a warning swallowed in the stone.
Bran forced himself to look at the Raven. “We’re not fleeing. We’re going south.”
“Before your sight is shaped. Before you learn to stand within time, not drift through it.” The Raven’s gaze never wavered. “A boy cannot carry what the trees would show him. Not yet.”
Bran felt the weight of that truth settle, but he pushed back against it. “Jon is in danger.”
“All living men are in danger. All lives bend toward their appointed end,” the Raven replied. “But you - your thread must hold. If you leave this place now, misfortune will follow you like shadow on snow.” His tone remained calm, but the words cut hard. “What awaits you beyond this cave is not mercy.”
Bran’s hands tightened on the sled. “I saw him die.”
“A shadow only,” the Raven said. “A shape without firm ground. The ink of such moments is not yet dry. But if you chase it untrained, you may write the ending yourself.”
Meera looked between them. She did not speak, but her jaw set with quiet defiance. Hodor backed a step, confused by the tension. “Hodor…?”
Bran breathed slowly. The air tasted of root-sap and cold stone. “I can’t stay,” he said. The words felt thin, but they were all he had. “If I do nothing, he dies.”
“And if you go, you may lose more than a brother,” the Raven murmured. “You may lose the path meant for you. The world will not wait for a boy who runs from his making.”
Bran swallowed. The fear rose, then settled. “I’m going anyway.”
Something flickered over the raven’s face. It might have been sorrow. “Then may the roots remember you kindly,” he said. “For the road will not.”
Bran said nothing more. Meera lifted him into the sled. Hodor secured the ropes with quiet care. Summer padded to Bran’s side, brushing against the wood.
They moved toward the tunnel. The cave pressed close around them, as though trying to hold them inside its dark.
Bran didn’t look back, but he felt the Raven’s gaze on his shoulders. It was steady, unyielding, and full of the warning he could not afford to obey.
---
The snow thinned as they moved south. Wind scraped the tops of the dead trees. Meera walked ahead, her spear balanced lightly in her grip. Hodor’s steps beat a steady path behind her. Summer stayed close to Bran’s sled, nose low, ears twitching.
Bran watched the trees blur past. The cold felt sharper today. A pressure built behind his eyes - a slow, deep tightening, like a hand closing around him.
It began the same way each day.
Enough waiting, the voice came, heavy and unyielding. Open yourself. The tone left no space for delay.
Bran exhaled. His breath came out in a shaking thread of air. “I said only for a little,” he whispered. “We can’t do this all day.”
You do not set the hours, the Raven replied. Your departure has already cost us time. You will give what remains.
The cold inside Bran deepened.
He closed his eyes. The world tilted. His limbs went distant. His thoughts thinned to a narrow line. Something older and heavier settled into him, as if the cave itself had stepped inside.
The Raven’s presence filled the space behind Bran’s sight. Not gentle. Not patient today. A weight of roots pressing down.
You belong to a greater purpose than your own will, the voice said. Do not mistake movement for freedom.
Bran tried to swallow. His throat felt tight. “I’m helping Jon.”
You follow impulse, the Raven said. Impulse weakens mastery. Discipline strengthens it.
Bran felt his fingers twitch, then stiffen as the Raven steadied the movement for him. The hand closed too slowly to be his.
Summer growled. The wolf’s ears flattened as he backed a single step.
Meera glanced over her shoulder. “Bran? You alright?”
Bran nodded. The Raven guided the nod - small, deliberate, controlled. “Just tired.”
Meera accepted it and turned away.
When she looked forward again, the Raven’s tone darkened.
She sees nothing. The boy in your skin is all she understands. The truth is mine to keep.
Bran felt the warning in that. Or the promise. He wasn’t sure which.
“You’re angry,” Bran said softly.
I am disappointed.
A slow wave of pressure moved through him, like roots tightening around a trunk. You broke from the place of your making. You cast aside the guidance of centuries. And for what? A vision you cannot read.
Bran braced his hands on the sled’s rim. They felt far away. “I saw Jon die.”
A fragment, the Raven said. A shadow born of fear as much as truth. You chase after it like a child following tracks he cannot interpret.
Bran tried to steady his breathing. “I had to go.”
No, the Raven corrected. You wanted to go. Want is not need. Need is what I decide for you.
The voice dropped low. And you will continue your lessons, whether your feet face north or south.
Bran felt the intrusion deepen. His sight sharpened unnaturally. He noticed a broken branch fifty yards ahead, half-buried in snow. A distant birdcall cut through the wind, too thin to hear on his own. The Raven pulled his focus toward each detail, shaping what he saw, how he saw it.
“You’re hurting me,” Bran whispered.
Pain is a boundary for the untrained. You will learn to bear more than this.
Summer whined. His tail lowered. He pressed against the sled as if trying to steady Bran.
The Raven ignored the wolf entirely.
During the day, you will be mine. You forfeited the right to choose when you walked away from the roots. A pause. I will reclaim what you abandoned.
Bran’s breath shook. “And if I say no?”
The Raven’s answer came at once. You will not.
The pressure eased only when the sun dipped behind the trees. Bran felt the Raven withdraw like a tide pulling back from stone.
His limbs returned. His breath steadied. The world felt thin and too bright.
Meera stopped ahead. “Bran? You’re pale.”
“I’m fine,” he said.
It sounded like his own voice again.
But the hollow behind his thoughts still carried the faint, lingering echo of the Raven’s claim-
a space he no longer wished to share, but no longer had the power to close.
---
Meera
The days stretched thin as they traveled. Light came late and left early. Snow drifted across the old game trails in soft, treacherous sheets. Meera kept ahead of the sled, boots breaking a clean line through crusted ice. She checked their direction every few dozen paces. She checked Bran far more often.
Something in him was changing again.
At first it looked like exhaustion. His shoulders hunched more. His eyes stayed half-lidded, as if sleep clung to him even while awake. He spoke less, which was not new - but this silence felt different.
By the fourth day, his face had taken on a thin, strained look. His skin seemed paler in the weak winter light. He watched the trees but it was clear he wasn’t seeing them.
Hodor walked behind the sled with slow, uneasy steps. “Hodor,” he murmured now and then, each time softer, like he didn’t trust the sound.
Summer was the one Meera trusted most, and Summer had not settled once since they left the cave. He paced the length of the sled. He circled. He stopped to stare at Bran with low ears and a tight tail.
She set camp near a stand of thin pines. Hodor gathered what dry sticks he could. Summer prowled the perimeter, every few steps glancing back toward Bran. Bran sat in the sled, not moving much, hands resting uselessly in his lap.
Meera crouched beside him. “You’re not sleeping,” she said. Keeping her voice light. Practical. “If you need to stop earlier tomorrow, tell me.”
Bran blinked once. “I’m fine.”
The response came too slow. As if he’d heard the question from far away and had to walk back to answer it.
Meera studied his face. He didn’t meet her eyes.
“Bran,” she said, softer now. “Your wolf won’t leave your side. You haven’t eaten enough to fill a bird. And every day you look… thinner.”
She expected him to deny it. To pull away out of embarrassment. He only looked at the snow, as if trying to read something written there.
A wind passed through the pines and rattled the branches overhead.
Meera sat back on her heels. The cold bit straight through her gloves. “Did something follow us?” she asked.
Bran didn’t answer at first. The silence stretched long. Summer whined, a low, uneasy sound.
Finally Bran said, “He hasn’t let go completely.”
The words were so soft she almost missed them.
A chill crept up her spine that had nothing to do with the wind. “The old man?”
Bran nodded once. Slowly.
Meera breathed out through her teeth. She looked toward the treeline as if she might see some trace of that pale figure from the cave, though she knew better. The old man’s reach had never been bound to flesh.
“We left that place,” she said. “We left him. He can’t have hold of you out here.”
Bran’s eyes shifted away from her. Not with fear - worse than that - with acceptance.
“I feel him,” Bran whispered. “Some days more than others.”
Summer pressed his muzzle against Bran’s shoulder then, as if trying to anchor him. Or guard him. Or warn her.
Meera felt the sick twist of helplessness she knew all too well. The same feeling she’d had watching Jojen weaken day after day. The same feeling of fighting something she could not see, could not stop.
She reached out and steadied Bran’s cloak at the neck. A small, useless gesture. But she did it anyway.
“We’re not going to lose you,” she said. “Not to him. Not after everything.”
Bran didn’t look at her. “He wants me to keep learning.”
“He doesn’t get a say,” Meera said. The words came out sharper than she intended. She softened them with a steadier tone. “You left. You chose to leave.”
Bran’s voice dropped, barely above breath. “He doesn’t think I should have.”
Meera went still.
The fire crackled behind them. Hodor hummed a thin, anxious sound while arranging their things. Snow fell in a steady, slow drift.
Meera looked at Bran - really looked - and felt the truth settle like ice beneath her ribs.
They had walked out of the cave, but they had not escaped it.
And whatever had claimed Jojen by inches was reaching for Bran now, hidden behind his quiet voice and tired eyes.
Meera clenched her jaw. She forced her breath to steady. “Tomorrow,” she said, “we push harder. We get closer to the Wall. The farther we are from him, the weaker he’ll be.”
She didn’t know if that was true.
But she needed Bran to believe it.
She needed herself to believe it.
Summer came closer and lay beside the sled, placing his head across Bran’s legs with a protective weight. His eyes stayed fixed on the dark woods, unblinking.
Meera kept watch long after the others slept. Each time Bran’s breath hitched in his sleep, she felt the certainty settle deeper. The old man still had his hand on him.
And that hand was not loosening.
---
The Wall rose out of the white like a cliff dropped from the sky. Even from a distance it felt wrong - too tall, too cold, too still. Meera stopped at the ridge and let the others catch up. Bran’s sled dragged a thin scar across the snow behind Hodor’s heavy steps. Summer stayed tight to Bran’s side, hackles faintly raised.
Bran’s face stayed fixed on the ice above them. He looked worn down to the edges. The journey had carved more from him than she’d wanted to admit.
They moved toward the old well at the base of the southern cliff - the one Sam had described before they left Craster’s Keep. The stones lay half-buried under drifted snow. Meera brushed them clear with her glove. Her breath clouded the air.
“This is it,” she said. “It has to be.”
Bran reached out and placed his hand on the cold stone rim. The air changed at once. A faint vibration passed through the old rock. Summer growled low, stepping between Bran and the well’s shadow.
Meera gripped her spear harder. “Is something wrong?”
Bran didn’t answer at first. His eyes unfocused slightly - one of those moments that always made her heart seize. Then the stone inside the well groaned. A voice rose from the dark below.
Not loud. Not human.
“WHO SEEKS TO PASS?”
Meera flinched. Summer barked once and backed away.
Bran steadied himself on the sled frame. “We do,” he whispered.
But before he could speak the old words, a shout cut across the wind.
“Halt!”
Meera spun, spear raised. Shapes emerged from the drifting snow - black cloaks, hard faces, bows drawn. The man in front moved with slow, deliberate steps.
Meera felt Summer position himself at her hip, teeth bared. Hodor froze, clutching Bran closer.
“Well,” the man said, taking them in one by one. “Isn’t this a charming little parade. Wildlings… a cripple… and a wolf big enough to gut a horse.” His eyes narrowed. “Step away from that well.”
Meera felt Summer shift closer to Bran. The wolf’s growl stayed low, a quiet warning under the wind. She moved her spear to block the line of sight toward Bran. “My name is Meera Reed of Greywater Watch,” she said. Her voice stayed firm. “I escort Brandon Stark south to his family.”
The man - Ser Alliser, if she remembered the stories Sam had told - studied her face with a slow, sour patience. He didn’t lower his hand from his sword. “Greywater Watch,” he repeated, as if tasting the words for hidden tricks. “And I suppose the cripple is exactly who you say he is.”
Hodor hunched over Bran protectively. Summer’s teeth glinted in the cold light.
Meera kept her stance steady. “You know his family sigil,” she said. “And you know what follows their blood.” She nodded toward Summer.
Thorne’s eyes flicked to the direwolf. His jaw tightened. “I’ve seen one of those before.” There was calculation in his eyes but no fear. “Belongs to the Lord Commander.”
Bran said nothing. He sat still, wrapped tight in his cloak, skin pale under the drifting snow. Meera watched Thorne notice that too.
“Even so,” Thorne said, “I’m not in the habit of believing every wildling tale wrapped in a noble’s name.” He looked to the brothers behind him. “Bowstrings loose, but keep them ready.”
Meera felt the cold tighten in her stomach. “We’re not wildlings,” she said. “We came by the secret gate. Samwell Tarly told us how.”
That stopped Thorne for a moment. Just a moment. His expression hardened further, if that was possible. “Ser Pig taught you tricks, did he?”
Meera didn’t rise to it.
Thorne stepped closer, boots crunching on ice. He examined Bran with a long stare. “If you are who she claims, boy, you’ve got a talent for appearing where you shouldn’t.” He spat to one side. “Stark blood always finds trouble.”
Bran met his eyes, quiet and drained. Meera saw the tremor in his hands. She saw Thorne see it too.
The direwolf eased one paw forward, muscles tight under its thick coat.
Thorne exhaled through his nose. “If that beast wanted me dead, I’d be dead already. And the Lord Commander may be a fool, but he’d be wroth if I skewered his brother.”
Meera’s breath caught. She hadn’t known Jon’s name still carried weight here.
Thorne turned to his men. “Escort them to Castle Black. No arrows unless the wolf leaps.”
The watchmen surrounded them in a loose circle. Hodor moved when she touched his arm, guiding him carefully. Bran kept his gaze fixed on the ground. Summer walked at Bran’s side, keeping every guard in sight.
The walk was slow and cold. The wind sharpened as they approached the main gate. Castle Black rose out of the snow like a cluster of half-forgotten ruins - timber, stone, smoke, and the restless movement of black cloaks.
Thorne walked ahead but kept glancing back at the direwolf, as if measuring the distance between his life and its teeth.
At the base of the Wall, he stopped. “You’ll be held until the Lord Commander returns,” he said. “And until I decide what manner of lies you’re spinning.”
Meera stepped closer to Bran, instinct tightening her grip on the spear. “We came seeking safety.”
Thorne gave a thin smile. “Then you picked the wrong place.” He gestured toward the yard. “Bring them in.”
Meera followed the guards through the gate. Snow drifted into the courtyard. A raven croaked somewhere overhead. Bran leaned against Hodor’s shoulder, eyes half-closed. Summer pressed close, uneasy as ever.