Early the next morning, Aldric took his seat behind the pulpit in the Great Hall, resting on a small wooden stool. He waited in the grey light of dawn for the first brother to volunteer for the Awakening. As the horizon brightened and the sun crested the treeline, the hall filled with people, but a heavy, nervous silence hung over the pews. No one moved.
Aldric looked at the anxious faces of the seekers and sighed. He stood, his gaze finding a girl in the back row. "Beth," he called out. "Are you here to seek the Spark?"
Beth rose slowly, her fingers twisting nervously. Her voice was a mere whisper. "Captain... I know I shouldn't... but I can't help but want it."
Beth was one of the spear-women Aldric had taken from the Westerlands. He had tried to grant her the Spark months ago, but then, she had only followed Aldric out of survival, not faith. The Light had not answered her then.
"Come forward," Aldric said, beckoning. "I never spoke of my true path before; it was only natural you had doubts. Come, all of you. Every soul gets a second chance today."
Beth blinked, frozen, until Martha gave her a sharp nudge. The girl scrambled to the front and knelt.
"Beth of the Freefolk," Aldric began. "Are you willing to walk the path of the Sun?"
"I am!"
"Are you willing to be the Light?"
"I am!"
"Are you willing—"
"I am!" She blurted it out before he could finish. Aldric offered a weary, paternal smile. He summoned the Sun-Crystal, and a single drop of liquid gold fell onto her brow.
Seconds later, a golden mist swirled within Beth's blue eyes. She touched her face in disbelief, then let out a cry of joy, leaping up to throw her arms around Martha. The two girls laughed and wept together—a moment of raw, human warmth that made Aldric's own heart lighten.
In the pews, the crowd swallowed hard. For most, this was the first time they had ever witnessed a true miracle. With Beth's success, the dam broke.
Eolia, another of the Freefolk, spat on his palms, smoothed back his brown hair, and stepped forward. Aldric watched him kneel. "I remember you wouldn't let go of the Old Gods, Eolia. Have you changed your mind?"
Eolia shrugged. "Captain, you merged the Seven into Anshe. I figure when we get back to the North, the Old Gods will fit in just as well. Kneeling to you feels like kneeling to the weirwoods anyway. At least that's how I see it."
Aldric chuckled. "Remember, you don't kneel to me, but to the Sun. I am only the vessel. But when I head back North, you're coming with me."
"It's a pact," Eolia said.
One by one, the veterans of the Silver Hand who had failed their first anointing stepped up for their second. This time, every single one of them awakened. Aldric felt a profound sense of relief. It proved his theory: the Light required understanding. The seven days of the Conclave had not just taught them a religion; it had unified their souls.
However, the success was not universal. Of the new seekers, seven failed their first attempt. Six tried a second time and succeeded, but one remained in the dark: Duncan Beck of Pinkmaiden.
Aldric looked down at Duncan, his brow furrowed. "Duncan, why does your heart still waver?"
Duncan's fists were clenched against the stone floor. "Captain... I swore an oath to House Vance," he rasped. "For years, I have bled for them, taxed for them, and held their lands in trust. Lord Vance was always a fair master. I cannot find it in me to raise a sword against him, even for the Sun."
Aldric shook his head, looking out at the entire hall. "Let this be a warning to you all. To be a Sunwalker is to give your life, your past, and your future to the cause. It means saying farewell to the man you were and the lords you served. If there is an oath in your heart that contradicts the Pillar of Liberty, stay in your seats. Wait until the day you can truly embrace the Light without looking back."
A cold splash of reality hit the room. Duncan's failure was the lone black sheep in a golden flock, a reminder of the price of the Spark. Aldric helped Duncan to his feet, his touch gentle. "It is no shame, Ser Duncan. You remain a seeker. If you wish to return to House Vance, I will not bar the gate. Until then, you are our brother."
Next came "Truthful" Theodore Wells. The knight's face was a mask of grief. "I have nothing left to guard, Lightbringer," he said. "The Lannisters took my village, my wife, and my babes. If the Sun grants me the strength to see justice done, I give you my soul."
"Anshe doesn't want your soul, Theodore," Aldric muttered. "You've been listening to the Red Priest too much." He performed the rite, and the golden shimmer ignited in Theodore's eyes almost instantly.
Then came a man Aldric didn't know—a weathered brother in a tattered robe.
"I am Meribald," the man said. "A wandering brother of the road."
"Do you accept that the Sun is the source of the Seven?" Aldric asked.
Meribald hesitated. "To be honest, Ser... I don't know. The Sun is high and the Seven are far. I am an unlettered old man; I leave such thoughts to the scholars."
"Then why are you here?"
"I've walked the Trident for forty years," Meribald said. "I've seen the same good people feed me one year and be corpses the next. I was a soldier once, chasing glory and finding only scars. I am too old to swing a mace for your revolution, Captain. But I am tired of praying over the dying. I want the power to make them live. If the Sun can do that, I don't care what name he goes by. I don't think the Seven care either."
Aldric nodded solemnly. "The cause needs healers as much as warriors. Kneel, Brother Meribald." As the drop fell, a golden shimmer like a hidden spring rippled through the old man's frame.
Finally, a dwarf monk with a shaven crown stepped forward: Haggle of Saltpans. His head was disproportionately large, and his eyes were sharp.
"Lightbringer," Haggle said. "You say the Light is the Sun, and the Seven are its colors. You say the Septons cannot use the Light because they hide the truth. If the truth is all that is required, why do we need you to grant us the Spark? Why does the truth not ignite itself?"
The hall fell silent. It was a scholar's trap.
Aldric thought for a moment. "Three moons ago, I lay dying in the Whispering Woods. In a dream, the Sun's messenger told me that this land had forgotten the Light. The flowers of faith had withered, and the trees no longer bore fruit. To wake the world, I was given the Sun-Crystal—a seed-pod for the soul.
"In my homeland of Seres, it is different. Seres is a land of eternal dawn. There, the Sun is in every breath, every law, every meal. A man can awaken the Light there through sheer devotion, for the air itself is thick with it. But here? Here, the Light is a flickering candle in a gale. The Crystal is a temporary measure—a way to jump-start the heart until the faith is strong enough to burn on its own.
"It is like a man who returns to his father's bakery only to find his uncle has taken the shop and changed the recipe. The customers have forgotten the true taste of the bread. To win them back, the man must give away the finest loaves for free, until their palates remember the truth. Does that answer you, Haggle?"
"And if you die before the faith takes root?" Haggle pressed. "If the Crystal is lost?"
"Then we will have been a brief, beautiful flame in the night," Aldric said. "Our blood will stain the earth, and the story of the poor who dared to stand will be told in the hovels for a thousand years. The Light is not the magic, Haggle. The Light is the will to be free. Even if every Sunwalker falls, so long as one man remembers that he is born equal under the Sun, Anshe lives."
Haggle bowed his heavy head. "Grant me a loaf of that bread, Lightbringer. I will spend my life as your baker."
Aldric anointed him.
That day, fifty-one seekers stood before the dais. Forty-nine awakened. Seven times seven—the sacred number of the Faith. To the monks, it was the final proof. The Sun had returned to Westeros.
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