The oldest were men grown, seventeen and eighteen years from the day of their naming. One waspast twenty. Most were younger, sixteen or less.

Bran watched them from the balcony of Maester Luwin’s turret, listening to them grunt and strainand curse as they swung their staves and wooden swords. The yard was alive to the clack of wood onwood, punctuated all too often by thwacks and yowls of pain when a blow struck leather or flesh. SerRodrik strode among the boys, face reddening beneath his white whiskers, muttering at them one andall. Bran had never seen the old knight look so fierce. “No,” he kept saying. “No. No. No.”

“They don’t fight very well,” Bran said dubiously. He scratched Summer idly behind the ears asthe direwolf tore at a haunch of meat. Bones crunched between his teeth.

“For a certainty,” Maester Luwin agreed with a deep sigh. The maester was peering through hisbig Myrish lens tube, measuring shadows and noting the position of the comet that hung low in themorning sky. “Yet given time … Ser Rodrik has the truth of it, we need men to walk the walls. Yourlord father took the cream of his guard to King’s Landing, and your brother took the rest, along withall the likely lads for leagues around. Many will not come back to us, and we must needs find the mento take their places.”

Bran stared resentfully at the sweating boys below. “If I still had my legs, I could beat them all.”

He remembered the last time he’d held a sword in his hand, when the king had come to Winterfell. Itwas only a wooden sword, yet he’d knocked Prince Tommen down half a hundred times. “Ser Rodrikshould teach me to use a poleaxe. If I had a poleaxe with a big long haft, Hodor could be my legs. Wecould be a knight together.”

“I think that … unlikely,” Maester Luwin said. “Bran, when a man fights, his arms and legs andthoughts must be as one.”

Below in the yard, Ser Rodrik was yelling. “You fight like a goose. He pecks you and you peckhim harder. Parry! Block the blow. Goose fighting will not suffice. If those were real swords, the firstpeck would take your arm off!” One of the other boys laughed, and the old knight rounded on him.

“You laugh. You. Now that is gall. You fight like a hedgehog …”

“There was a knight once who couldn’t see,” Bran said stubbornly, as Ser Rodrik went on below.

“Old Nan told me about him. He had a long staff with blades at both ends and he could spin it in hishands and chop two men at once.”

“Symeon Star-Eyes,” Luwin said as he marked numbers in a book. “When he lost his eyes, he putstar sapphires in the empty sockets, or so the singers claim. Bran, that is only a story, like the tales ofFlorian the Fool. A fable from the Age of Heroes.” The maester tsked. “You must put these dreamsaside, they will only break your heart.”

The mention of dreams reminded him. “I dreamed about the crow again last night. The one withthree eyes. He flew into my bedchamber and told me to come with him, so I did. We went down tothe crypts. Father was there, and we talked. He was sad.”

“And why was that?” Luwin peered through his tube.

“It was something to do about Jon, I think.” The dream had been deeply disturbing, more so thanany of the other crow dreams. “Hodor won’t go down into the crypts.”

The maester had only been half listening, Bran could tell. He lifted his eye from the tube, blinking.

“Hodor won’t …?”

“Go down into the crypts. When I woke, I told him to take me down, to see if Father was trulythere. At first he didn’t know what I was saying, but I got him to the steps by telling him to go hereand go there, only then he wouldn’t go down. He just stood on the top step and said ‘Hodor,’ like hewas scared of the dark, but I had a torch. It made me so mad I almost gave him a swat in the head,like Old Nan is always doing.” He saw the way the maester was frowning and hurriedly added, “Ididn’t, though.”

“Good. Hodor is a man, not a mule to be beaten.”

“In the dream I flew down with the crow, but I can’t do that when I’m awake,” Bran explained.

“Why would you want to go down to the crypts?”

“I told you. To look for Father.”

The maester tugged at the chain around his neck, as he often did when he was uncomfortable.

“Bran, sweet child, one day Lord Eddard will sit below in stone, beside his father and his father’sfather and all the Starks back to the old Kings in the North … but that will not be for many years,gods be good. Your father is a prisoner of the queen in King’s Landing. You will not find him in thecrypts.”

“He was there last night. I talked to him.”

“Stubborn boy,” the maester sighed, setting his book aside. “Would you like to go see?”

“I can’t. Hodor won’t go, and the steps are too narrow and twisty for Dancer.”

“I believe I can solve that difficulty.”

In place of Hodor, the wildling woman Osha was summoned. She was tall and tough anduncomplaining, willing to go wherever she was commanded. “I lived my life beyond the Wall, a holein the ground won’t fret me none, m’lords,” she said.

“Summer, come,” Bran called as she lifted him in wiry-strong arms. The direwolf left his boneand followed as Osha carried Bran across the yard and down the spiral steps to the cold vault underthe earth. Maester Luwin went ahead with a torch. Bran did not even mind—too badly—that shecarried him in her arms and not on her back. Ser Rodrik had ordered Osha’s chain struck off, sinceshe had served faithfully and well since she had been at Winterfell. She still wore the heavy ironshackles around her ankles—a sign that she was not yet wholly trusted—but they did not hinder hersure strides down the steps.

Bran could not recall the last time he had been in the crypts. It had been before, for certain. Whenhe was little, he used to play down here with Robb and Jon and his sisters.

He wished they were here now; the vault might not have seemed so dark and scary. Summerstalked out in the echoing gloom, then stopped, lifted his head, and sniffed the chill dead air. He baredhis teeth and crept backward, eyes glowing golden in the light of the maester’s torch. Even Osha, hardas old iron, seemed uncomfortable. “Grim folk, by the look of them,” she said as she eyed the longrow of granite Starks on their stone thrones.

“They were the Kings of Winter,” Bran whispered. Somehow it felt wrong to talk too loudly inthis place.

Osha smiled. “Winter’s got no king. If you’d seen it, you’d know that, summer boy.”

“They were the Kings in the North for thousands of years,” Maester Luwin said, lifting the torchhigh so the light shone on the stone faces. Some were hairy and bearded, shaggy men fierce as thewolves that crouched by their feet. Others were shaved clean, their features gaunt and sharp-edged asthe iron longswords across their laps. “Hard men for a hard time. Come.” He strode briskly down thevault, past the procession of stone pillars and the endless carved figures. A tongue of flame trailedback from the upraised torch as he went.

The vault was cavernous, longer than Winterfell itself, and Jon had told him once that there wereother levels underneath, vaults even deeper and darker where the older kings were buried. It wouldnot do to lose the light. Summer refused to move from the steps, even when Osha followed the torch,Bran in her arms.

“Do you recall your history, Bran?” the maester said as they walked. “Tell Osha who they wereand what they did, if you can.”

He looked at the passing faces and the tales came back to him. The maester had told him thestories, and Old Nan had made them come alive. “That one is Jon Stark. When the sea raiders landedin the east, he drove them out and built the castle at White Harbor. His son was Rickard Stark, not myfather’s father but another Rickard, he took the Neck away from the Marsh King and married hisdaughter. Theon Stark’s the real thin one with the long hair and the skinny beard. They called him the‘Hungry Wolf,’ because he was always at war. That’s a Brandon, the tall one with the dreamy face,he was Brandon the Shipwright, because he loved the sea. His tomb is empty. He tried to sail westacross the Sunset Sea and was never seen again. His son was Brandon the Burner, because he put thetorch to all his father’s ships in grief. There’s Rodrik Stark, who won Bear Island in a wrestling matchand gave it to the Mormonts. And that’s Torrhen Stark, the King Who Knelt. He was the last King inthe North and the first Lord of Winterfell, after he yielded to Aegon the Conqueror. Oh, there, he’sCregan Stark. He fought with Prince Aemon once, and the Dragonknight said he’d never faced a finerswordsman.” They were almost at the end now, and Bran felt a sadness creeping over him. “Andthere’s my grandfather, Lord Rickard, who was beheaded by Mad King Aerys. His daughter Lyannaand his son Brandon are in the tombs beside him. Not me, another Brandon, my father’s brother.

They’re not supposed to have statues, that’s only for the lords and the kings, but my father loved themso much he had them done.”

r’s father but another Rickard, he took the Neck away from the Marsh King and married hisdaughter. Theon Stark’s the real thin one with the long hair and the skinny beard. They called him the‘Hungry Wolf,’ because he was always at war. That’s a Brandon, the tall one with the dreamy face,he was Brandon the Shipwright, because he loved the sea. His tomb is empty. He tried to sail westacross the Sunset Sea and was never seen again. His son was Brandon the Burner, because he put thetorch to all his father’s ships in grief. There’s Rodrik Stark, who won Bear Island in a wrestling matchand gave it to the Mormonts. And that’s Torrhen Stark, the King Who Knelt. He was the last King inthe North and the first Lord of Winterfell, after he yielded to Aegon the Conqueror. Oh, there, he’sCregan Stark. He fought with Prince Aemon once, and the Dragonknight said he’d never faced a finerswordsman.” They were almost at the end now, and Bran felt a sadness creeping over him. “Andthere’s my grandfather, Lord Rickard, who was beheaded by Mad King Aerys. His daughter Lyannaand his son Brandon are in the tombs beside him. Not me, another Brandon, my father’s brother.

They’re not supposed to have statues, that’s only for the lords and the kings, but my father loved themso much he had them done.”

“The maid’s a fair one,” Osha said.

“Robert was betrothed to marry her, but Prince Rhaegar carried her off and raped her,” Branexplained. “Robert fought a war to win her back. He killed Rhaegar on the Trident with his hammer,but Lyanna died and he never got her back at all.”

“A sad tale,” said Osha, “but those empty holes are sadder.”

“Lord Eddard’s tomb, for when his time comes,” Maester Luwin said. “Is this where you sawyour father in your dream, Bran?”

“Yes.” The memory made him shiver. He looked around the vault uneasily, the hairs on the backof his neck bristling. Had he heard a noise? Was there someone here?

Maester Luwin stepped toward the open sepulchre, torch in hand. “As you see, he’s not here. Norwill he be, for many a year. Dreams are only dreams, child.” He thrust his arm into the blacknessinside the tomb, as into the mouth of some great beast. “Do you see? It’s quite empt—”

The darkness sprang at him, snarling.

Bran saw eyes like green fire, a flash of teeth, fur as black as the pit around them. Maester Luwinyelled and threw up his hands. The torch went flying from his fingers, caromed off the stone face ofBrandon Stark, and tumbled to the statue’s feet, the flames licking up his legs. In the drunken shiftingtorchlight, they saw Luwin struggling with the direwolf, beating at his muzzle with one hand whilethe jaws closed on the other.

“Summer!” Bran screamed.

And Summer came, shooting from the dimness behind them, a leaping shadow. He slammed intoShaggydog and knocked him back, and the two direwolves rolled over and over in a tangle of greyand black fur, snapping and biting at each other, while Maester Luwin struggled to his knees, his armtorn and bloody. Osha propped Bran up against Lord Rickard’s stone wolf as she hurried to assist themaester. In the light of the guttering torch, shadow wolves twenty feet tall fought on the wall androof.

“Shaggy,” a small voice called. When Bran looked up, his little brother was standing in the mouthof Father’s tomb. With one final snap at Summer’s face, Shaggydog broke off and bounded toRickon’s side. “You let my father be,” Rickon warned Luwin. “You l............