The nights in the North were cold as sharpened blades. With the Long Winter drawing ever closer, the cold only deepened by the day.
Inside Winterfell's great hall, the firewood in the hearth crackled loudly, yet the chill still seeped through the cracks between the stones, worming its way into the bones of every lord present.
Cregan Stark, the young lord, sat upon the high seat. His expression was drawn tight.
He had only just turned twenty this year. He had ruled the North for merely three years.
For those three years, he had worked diligently, never daring to slack off for even a moment.
He had believed that if he did well enough, he could lead the North safely through this Long Winter.
But that letter had shattered everything.
That letter from King's Landing.
More than a dozen men stood below him.
Bolton, Dustin, Flint, Karstark, Manderly, Mormont...
Every major house of the North had come.
And at this moment, every lord wore an ugly expression.
"My lord," one lord stepped forward, waving a letter in his hand. The parchment had already been crumpled beyond recognition from how tightly he had gripped it. "The Iron Throne is insulting the North!"
His name was Roderick Dustin, Lord of Barrowton. A man in his forties with a face full of hard flesh, infamous for his violent temper.
His house had guarded Barrowton for generations, fighting countless wars against the ironborn. He was a man who had crawled out from mountains of corpses, and there was nothing he hated more than humiliation.
"Listen to this nonsense!" He unfolded the letter and read aloud, his voice echoing through the hall.
"Given the North's suspicious ties with the traitor Rhaenyra Targaryen, I can no longer trust your loyalty."
"The shipment of winter grain is hereby suspended."
"Should Lord Cregan travel personally to King's Landing and kneel before the Iron Throne to beg forgiveness, this matter may yet be reconsidered…"
With a savage curse, he hurled the letter to the floor and ground it beneath his boot.
"Kneel and beg forgiveness?! Who the hell does Aegon II Targaryen think he is?!"
"A half-grown whelp dares summon the Lord of the North to King's Landing?"
"To kneel before him?!"
Another lord stepped forward.
"And that's not all!" His name was Omar Flint, a tall, gaunt man whose eyes were usually narrowed to slits, though now they were wide with fury.
"Look at the last line!"
"No lord of any realm is permitted to transport grain into the North. Any violator shall be treated as a traitor to the realm."
He let out a cold laugh, one filled with nothing but frost.
"The Greens intend to starve us to death!"
"My lord!"
Yet another man rose to speak.
Wyman Manderly, Lord of White Harbor, the wealthiest lord in the North.
"My lord," his voice rumbled like distant thunder, making men's ears buzz.
"We have already shown the greatest restraint possible."
"We stayed out of this war. That alone was the greatest goodwill the North could offer House Targaryen."
"And now they not only cut off our grain, but forbid the southern realms from sending us supplies as well. They mean to rip out the North's roots entirely!"
He paused and drew a deep breath.
"The granaries of White Harbor will not last through this winter. They will not last!"
Silence fell over the hall.
Lord Cregan sat upon the high seat without speaking.
He knew Wyman spoke the truth.
White Harbor was the richest place in the North. Its granaries were the largest.
If even White Harbor could not endure the winter, the other lands stood even less chance.
He remembered the words his father had spoken upon his deathbed.
"Cregan, remember this. The Starks ruled the North for eight thousand years not through strength, but through the hearts of men."
The North was too cold.
Its summers were short, its winters endless.
Every Long Winter, old men walked willingly into the blizzards so the younger generations might have more food.
Every Long Winter, children starved or froze to death in their mothers' arms.
And the duty of House Stark... was to ensure that more northerners survived.
Whenever the Long Winter came, House Stark would take the wealth it had accumulated during summer, buy grain, and distribute it among the smallfolk.
After thousands of years, the Stark treasury still held only a few thousand gold dragons.
It was not even comparable to the treasury of a southern lord.
But the people of the North remembered.
They remembered who had kept them alive.
They always remembered that it was the Starks who had led them through the winter.
The North remembers.
"My lord!"
Another man stepped forward.
It was Lord Karstark.
The Karstarks were a branch of House Stark, their blood ties still close.
He was young and powerfully built.
He slammed his right fist heavily against his chest, the impact echoing through the hall.
"If the Greens won't give us a way to live, then we march south!"
he roared.
"We'll take what we need!"
"If the Iron Throne wants to starve us to death, then we'll show them—"
"We'll take their grain, wear their clothes, and make them remember what Northerners are made of!"
"Well said!"
Lord Dustin was the first to respond. He gave Karstark a thumbs-up.
"Karstark's right! Southward! Barrowton will send two hundred cavalry! All veterans—men who've spent their lives killing ironborn!"
Omar Flint stepped forward as well.
"Widow's Watch will send two hundred! My hunters from the wolfswood shoot true enough to put an arrow through a dragon's eye!"
Lady Mormont rose to her feet.
She was a woman in her fifties, born of ironborn nobility and fiercer than most men.
In her youth, she had followed her father raiding Bear Island, only to be captured by Lord Mormont. The old lord had admired the fierce young captive and taken her as his wife by force.
Her husband had been dead for twenty years. Yet she alone had kept Bear Island in perfect order. Whenever the ironborn invaded, she personally led men to drive them back into the sea.
"Bear Island sends one hundred!" Her voice was as rough as any man's.
"All hardened fighters! Even the bears on my island are tougher than the soft-bellied weaklings down south!"
Lord Ryswell stepped forward. He was a sharp-eyed man in his forties.
"I'll provide fifty cavalry and two hundred infantry. I can also scrape together some grain."
Lord Cerwyn stepped out next. A young man who had only recently inherited his lands, his blood was boiling with excitement.
"I'll send one hundred! All cavalry trained by my house. Perfect chance to use the southrons for practice!"
Lord Tallhart stepped forward. He was the oldest among them, his beard already white, yet his back stood straighter than anyone else's.
"House Tallhart will send eighty cavalry. Not many, but every one of them was trained by my own hand. One man worth three."
One after another, the lords rose.
"We'll send sixty!"
"We'll send one hundred and twenty!"
"We can only spare fifty men, but we can provide more grain!"
Cregan looked at them, warmth surging through his chest.
This was the North.
These were his bannermen.
In ordinary times, they quarreled endlessly, each refusing to bow to anyone but House Stark.
But when life and death came knocking, they stood together for the North.
Just as their fathers had done.
Just as their grandfathers had done.
"My lord!"
Karstark looked toward the young lord, who had fallen silent in thought, and spoke once more.
"I know what you're thinking. Dragons."
"We're going to war against dragons."
He grinned broadly, baring a mouth full of white teeth.
"So what?"
"Then we kill dragons!" he howled with laughter.
"I believe Northerners can do it!"
A thunderous roar erupted through the hall.
"That's right!"
"Dragonslayers!"
"Let those southern lords—and the Targaryens—learn what the North is capable of!"
Cregan looked at them and let out a deep sigh.
He knew it was only brave talk meant to stiffen their courage.
Dragons were not so easily slain.
Over thousands of years, countless heroes had dreamed of killing dragons, and most had ended as piles of ash.
Aegon had conquered all of Westeros with only three dragons.
But Cregan could not say that.
Not now.
Not when it would crush the confidence of his bannermen.
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