the thaw. [arya stark]

xvi. an impossible path

CHAPTER SIXTEEN:

AN IMPOSSIBLE PATH
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...."THEY'RE COMING." Jon Snows' shaking, yet steely proclamation sounded throughout the minuscule chamber, flooding it with a truly frosty measure of fear, and sending shivers down all presents' spines. "We have dragonglass and Valyrian steel. But there are too many of them. Far too many. Our enemy doesn't tire. Doesn't stop. Doesn't feel. We can't beat them in a straight fight."

"So, what can we do?" Jaime Lannister, ever the cynic, posed his question with an insufferably arrogant quirk of his jaw. "Forgive me, but victory seems like an impossibility."

"The Night King made them all. They follow his command. If he falls..." Jon explained, somewhat defensively. "Getting to him may be our best — our only — chance." He concluded this most bitter proclamation with a grim smile, and Valeria's gaze fell. As Jaime had so infuriatingly pointed out — their path to victory, it seemed, was to be an impossible one.

"If that's true, Jon, he'll never expose himself." She whispered, her usual fire blunted somewhat by the faint trace of fear that had its' icy hands wrapped around her heart. "One cannot fight a shadow."

"Yes, he will. He'll come for me." Brandon Stark's cool voice cut through the tension, and all heads were almost instantly turned to face him — faint, quivering gasps escaping countless lips at this most curious statement. "He's tried before, many times, with many Three-Eyed Ravens." Bran continued, and Valeria furrowed her brows — perhaps she had been wrong to scorn him, for his certainty was truly brazen, and his glazed eyes spoke of a deeper, complicated secret.

"Why? What does he want?" A Lord of whose name Valeria was not entirely certain questioned, and Brandon simply sighed — a pair of terrifying, milky eyes flickering up towards the ceiling as he whispered;

"An endless night. He wants to erase this world," He paused, and Valeria felt her heart plummet. "and I am its memory." And with that, Brandon Stark relinquished his voice — anymore information and he feared the fates of all present and would crumble under the pressure of their imminent, terrible, futures.