Games of Thrones: The Heavenly Demon of North

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POV: Maelen

Location: Wolfsblood Ridge – Cave System, Training Grounds

Maelen moved in silence through the tree-thick paths behind the Wolfsblood Ridge. His boots left shallow impressions in the frozen earth, vanishing quickly beneath new snow. The air held a hush, that deep, high silence that came before dawn when the world hadn't quite woken.

His wolf, Branr, padded just behind him—ears alert, tongue out.

Wolfsblood Ridge had changed since Arthur's arrival. What had once been a ruin of stone and moss now held firepits, stacked timber, and cold forges. But Maelen preferred the older trails—the places half-swallowed by the forest, the places where silence still lingered.

He ducked beneath a frost-bitten branch and stopped at the hollowed cliff edge that opened like a wound into the roots of the earth.

No one had followed him.

He slid down the slope and entered the cave.

The tunnel was narrow at first—cramped, coiled like the throat of a forgotten beast. But it opened wider after a dozen paces, revealing what he'd found weeks ago by accident: an old root-chamber beneath Wolfsblood Ridge.

Massive weirwood roots twisted along the walls, feeding into stone and soil alike. Some were as thick as his thigh, gnarled with time, pulsing faintly.

Faint carvings traced parts of the wall—First Men runes. Maelen had spent days copying them by lamplight. He couldn't read all of them, but he knew one symbol: the one that meant watcher.

Branr whined softly and did not follow him inside.

Maelen lit a small oil lamp and set it by a cracked slab. Smoke curled up, twisting.

He reached into his satchel and removed three items: a carved bone needle, a scrap of Vaeren's dried herb blend, and a strip of hide with rune markings.

The herbs weren't meant for dreams. They were used by the Free Folk to deaden pain, to loosen the mind before long fasting rituals. But Vaeren had warned him they could awaken something else in the wrong place.

Maelen wasn't sure if that was a warning—or a hope.

He placed the herbs on a flat stone, then struck a spark with his flint. The blend hissed as it caught flame, curling into smoke. He inhaled it slowly, evenly, as Arthur had taught.

His eyes closed.

He could feel it—a warmth running under the skin, through his jaw and down his spine. Not pain. Something older. Something from blood and root and stone.

When he opened his eyes, the cave had dimmed.

But not from the fire.

The roots were glowing. Just faintly. Like veins beneath frost.

And in the center of the far wall, the carvings… shifted.

Or maybe his mind did.

A voice rose. Not speech—more like pressure, like wind behind bark.

"You are not a beast of flame."

Maelen staggered back. The lamp flickered.

Another voice followed it, clearer now, but still distant—like a voice remembered from childhood.

"You are the echo of stone. What has been buried shall wake in time. But you must not rush it."

He turned to flee—but stopped.

Because before him, a figure stood.

Not a man. Not truly. A shadow formed in weirwood smoke—tall, draped in bark-colored robes, eyes like carved hollows.

The figure raised its hand.

"Your blood remembers. Your wolf remembers. Soon, you must decide if you walk as man—or beast in man's skin."

Maelen gasped as he fell backward, the herbs dying on the stone.

The root-chamber was dark again.

Branr was growling from the entrance, fur bristling.

Maelen lay for several moments, his heart pounding. Then he rose, slowly, wiping sweat from his brow despite the cold.

The carvings on the wall no longer glowed.

But a new one had appeared.

A single rune, freshly etched: choice.

Later that morning – Training Ridge

Arthur watched Maelen from a short distance. The boy was quiet. Paler than usual.

"You didn't sleep last night," Arthur said without turning.

"No," Maelen replied. "I was... beneath the ridge."

Arthur nodded. "And what did it say to you?"

Maelen looked at him, startled. "You knew?"

"I knew you'd hear something eventually. I didn't know when. Or what."

Arthur walked toward him and sat on the stone bench near the water trough. "The North remembers, they say. I've begun to think that's not just about history. The land remembers too. The roots. The things beneath it."

Maelen sat beside him. "It wasn't just a dream. It spoke. Like it had waited. Like it knew me."

Arthur's tone was quiet. "Then it did."

Maelen glanced at him. "You've heard them too?"

"Not here. But I've heard their kind elsewhere. In places where blood and breath echo through stone. Where silence is memory."

There was a pause.

"I don't know what it meant," Maelen admitted. "But I think… it doesn't want me to stay the same."

Arthur looked toward the horizon. "Nothing that grows stays the same."

Elsewhere – Redna's Report

Redna walked into Rickard's solar with a scroll in hand.

"A rider from Eastwatch brought this," she said. "A sea merchant passing Bear Island saw three longships—no banners, oars muffled. They turned back when spotted."

Rickard frowned. "Ironborn?"

"Maybe. Maybe pirates."

She hesitated.

"And there's this."

She handed him another scroll—this one in a different cipher. "It's from one of our operatives near the Dreadfort."

Rickard read it aloud:

"The snow is thin near the heart. They dig beneath the surface now. A meeting was held—one man, one merchant, one servant with red cloth. I could not get closer."

He set the scroll down.

"They're looking for a crack to drive into the North," he said. "And they'll use any tool to do it."

Maelen's Journal

That evening, Maelen sat beneath a torch in the training ridge's far chamber, scribbling by oil light.

His journal entries were uneven. Shaky.

"It said I must choose. But between what? Between beast and man? Between the path Arthur teaches... or the one beneath the roots?"

He paused.

"The others learn combat. Defense. Tactics. I think I'm meant to learn... memory. How to listen."

His pen stopped. He drew the rune he had seen—choice.

Below it, he added a note:

"Some things do not fight with blades. But they are no less dangerous."