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Harry Potter and all of its characters belong to J.K. Rowling.
ASOIAF and all of its characters belong to GRRM
I own nothing but the original characters I make.
"Dialogue"
'Thoughts'
-Author notes-
Chapter 159: The Wall Shall Stand No More
Two years later.
The maester's chambers at Castle Black were cold.
Samwell Tarly sat at the old wooden desk, his breath misting in the air before him, his fingers stiff with cold despite the woolen gloves he wore.
A single candle flickered beside him, its flame dancing in the draft seeping through cracks in the stone walls. The light it cast was weak, barely enough to read by, but Sam had grown used to reading in the dim.
'I should ask for more candles,' he thought absently. 'And more wood for the fire. And more blankets. And more food.'
The list of things they needed grew longer every day. The list of things they had grew shorter.
He pulled his furs tighter around his shoulders and turned his attention back to the letter in his hands.
It was from Gilly.
He smiled as he read it, the familiar warmth of her words spreading through his chest like a fire on a cold night.
"My dear Sam," she wrote. "I hope this letter finds you well. I hope you are eating enough. I know how you forget to eat when you are busy with your books and your ravens. You always did."
Sam's smile widened. She knew him too well.
"The little one is growing so fast. You would hardly recognize him. He has your eyes, Sam. Your kind, gentle eyes. And he smiles all the time…at everyone, at everything. He laughs at the snow, at the birds, at the dogs in the courtyard. He is such a happy child. I wish you could see him. I wish I could see you…"
Sam's throat tightened. He wished the same. He wished it more than anything.
"Life in Winterfell is good. Lord Stark is kind to us…kinder than I ever expected from a southerner Lord. He treats little Sam like one of his own. Lady Stark is... well, she is Lady Stark. She is not unkind to us, but she keeps her distance. I understand. I am a wildling, and she is a lady of the North. We are not meant to be close."
Sam sighed. He could imagine the tension between Gilly and Catelyn Stark, two women from different worlds, forced to share the same castle. It could not have been easy.
"But Val is here, and that helps. She is teaching me to hunt, though I am not very good at it. She says I am too soft. She says I need to be harder if I am going to survive in this world. I suppose she is right. But I do not want to be hard. I want to be kind. Like you."
Sam set the letter down, his eyes stinging.
He did not feel kind. He felt tired. He felt cold. He felt like a man who had been fighting a losing battle for years, with no end in sight.
"I miss you, Sam. I miss you every day. I know you cannot leave the Night's Watch, and I know your duty is important. But I hope that one day... perhaps one day we can be together again."
Sam stared at the words for a long moment.
'One day,' he thought. That would be difficult. No, he knew it would be more than just difficult. Especially with what he was about to do next.
He glanced at the bags in the corner of the room…two worn leather satchels, packed with his meager belongings. Clothes. Books. A few precious scrolls he had copied by hand. Everything he owned in the world.
He was leaving tomorrow.
The journey to Oldtown would take months…through the Reach, past Highgarden, all the way to the southern coast. It was a long road, a dangerous road. But it was necessary.
'The Watch needs a maester,' he thought. 'Aemon will not live much longer. And when he is gone, who will tend to the sick? Who will read the ravens? Who will keep the records?'
He had been doing those things for years already, unofficially. But he was not a maester. He had not forged his chain. He had not studied at the Citadel. He was just a steward who had learned to read and write and mix simple remedies.
'I can be more,' he thought. 'I can do more.'
He picked up his quill and dipped it in the inkwell. He would write back to Gilly. He would tell her his plans and that he misses her too.
He paused.
'No,' he thought. 'I will not write. I will surprise her.'
The journey to Oldtown would take him through the Kings Road, and the road passed near Winterfell. He could stop there. He could see Gilly. He could hold his son.
The thought filled him with the kind of warmth that this cold could not take away.
He smiled, setting the quill down. 'I'll see you soon, Gilly.'
"Sam."
The voice was weak, barely a whisper. Sam turned.
Maester Aemon lay in his bed in the corner of the room, his ancient body barely visible beneath the pile of blankets. His skin was pale, almost translucent, stretched thin over the bones of his face. His breath came in shallow gasps, each one a struggle.
Sam rose quickly and crossed the room. "I'm here, Maester. What do you need?"
Aemon's eyes, milky with age and blindness, turned toward the sound of his voice. "I am cold, Sam."
'Everyone is cold,' Sam thought wearily. 'Everyone is always cold.'
The temperature had been falling for two years now…slowly at first, then faster and faster. The rivers froze and stayed frozen. The birds stopped singing. The animals stopped breeding.
Castle Black had been built to withstand the cold, but not this cold. Not the kind of cold that seeped into your bones and never left. Not the kind of cold that killed men in their sleep.
Sam walked to the fireplace and placed another log on the dying embers. The flames licked at the dry wood, struggling to catch. There were only two more logs left in the pile. Not enough for another day.
He sighed. At this rate, the Night's Watch would freeze to death before anything else.
'We need more wood,' he thought. 'We need more food. We need more of everything.'
He thought of Winterfell…of Ned Stark's generosity. The King in the North had been sending supplies for years now, ever since the declaration of independence. Without him, the Night's Watch would have starved long ago.
'I should write to him,' Sam thought. 'I should ask for more wood and more supplies.'
He made a mental note to do it later. For now, he had more pressing concerns.
"I'll bring you some hot soup. That will warm you up," he said, turning back to Aemon. "Just wait a moment."
Aemon did not respond.
Sam frowned. "Maester?"
The old man's eyes were fixed on the window, his expression strange. "The cold," he whispered.
Sam glanced at the fireplace. The log he had just placed was already burning, the flames leaping higher. "I know. It will get warmer soon. I promise."
Aemon shook his head slowly. "No. The cold... it is not from there."
Sam felt a chill run down his spine. "What do you mean?"
"The cold is here, Samwell," Aemon said. "It has come for us all. It has… it's… here."
His eyes closed.
Sam stared at him, his heart pounding. "M-Maester? Maester Aemon?"
The old man did not move.
Sam rushed to his side, his fingers pressing against the maester's neck. No pulse. No breath. Nothing.
He was dead.
"Oh no…" Sam stood there, frozen, his mind blank.
Maester Aemon had been older than anyone he ever knew. He had been at the Wall for decades, had served the Night's Watch faithfully, had been a source of wisdom and comfort to generations of brothers. He had been blind, but he had seen more clearly than most men with eyes.
And now he was gone.
'He was the last of his kind,' Sam thought. 'The last Targaryen in Westeros. The last son of House Targaryen. And now he is dead.'
He felt tears prick at his eyes. He had known this day would come; Aemon had been failing for months, but knowing did not make it easier. Knowing did not fill the void that had opened in his chest.
'What do I do now?' he thought. 'What do I do without him?'
He was about to move, to close the old man's eyes, to call for help, when the ground trembled.
The tremor was violent, shaking the very stones of Castle Black. Books fell from shelves. Bottles shattered on the floor. The fire in the hearth scattered, embers flying across the room.
Sam stumbled, catching himself on the edge of the desk.
"What in the seven hells-"
Outside, people were screaming.
Sam ran to the door and threw it open.
The courtyard was chaos. Men in black were running in every direction, their faces pale with terror. Some were shouting orders; others were screaming. The horses were shrieking, rearing against their tethers. The dogs were howling.
And then Sam saw it.
The Wall.
The massive black wall that had protected them for thousands of years…the wall that Joffrey had transformed into a magical black stone…was now collapsing before his eyes.
Great chunks of black stone were falling, crashing down into the frozen ground with a thunderous roar.
Massive cracks spread across the surface like lightning bolts, splitting the stone apart. The wall was breaking, shattering, crumbling into dust.
"The Wall!" someone screamed. "The Wall is falling!"
Sam stood frozen, unable to move, unable to speak. He had spent years studying the Wall, studying the Others, studying the ancient texts. He knew, intellectually, that the Wall was not eternal. He knew that it could be broken.
But seeing it, seeing it happen, was something else entirely.
'It's not supposed to happen like this,' he thought. 'It's not supposed to happen at all.'
The Wall had stood for eight thousand years. It had survived wars and winters, invasions and rebellions. It had been the greatest monument to human achievement in the history of Westeros.
And now it was falling.
"The castle!" a voice shouted. It was the Lord Commander, Cotter Pyke, his face twisted with fear. "Everyone out! Abandon the castle! It's going to come down on us!"
The men obeyed. They ran on foot, on horseback, some dragging wounded comrades, others carrying weapons and supplies. Sam ran with them, his heart pounding, his breath coming in ragged gasps.
Behind them, the Wall continued to fall.
They stopped a mile from Castle Black, at the edge of Mole's Town. The men gathered together, their faces pale, their bodies trembling with fear and cold.
Sam turned to look back.
The Wall was gone.
The great black structure that had stood for thousands of years, the greatest monument to human achievement in the history of Westeros, was nothing but rubble. A mountain of broken stone and ice, stretching across the horizon like a scar.
'It's gone,' Sam thought, his mind struggling to comprehend what he was seeing. 'It's really gone.'
He thought of all the men who had died defending it. He thought of all the men who had lived and worked and prayed within its shadow. He thought of all the generations who had come before him, who had believed that the Wall would stand forever.
"The Others," someone whispered. "The Others are coming."
Sam felt his blood run cold. He almost forgot.
'The Wall was our only defense,' he thought. 'And now it's gone. Nothing is stopping them. Nothing is standing between them and the rest of the world.'
He thought of Gilly, in Winterfell. He thought of little Sam, his son. He thought of all the people who were going to die.
'They don't know,' he thought. 'They don't know what's coming.'
"We need to warn them," Sam said. "The North. The other castles. Everyone."
Cotter Pyke looked at him, his eyes hollow. "And how do you propose we do that? The ravens are dead. The rookery is buried under a mountain of stone."
"There are other castles," Sam said, his mind racing. "Other keeps. We can send riders. Men on horseback. We can spread out, go to every holdfast, every village, every castle in the North. We can warn them."
The Lord Commander was silent for a long moment. Then he nodded slowly.
" Aye…riders," he said. "We still have horses. We still have men. We can send them out. Our duty is to protect the realm."
He turned to the gathered brothers, his voice rising.
"Listen to me! We cannot stay here. The Wall is gone. The castle is gone. We need to move. We need to warn the North about this."
The men looked at him, their faces a mixture of fear and confusion.
"I want volunteers," Cotter Pyke continued. "Men who are willing to ride. To spread out. To go to every castle, every holdfast, every village between here and Winterfell. Tell them what happened. Tell them what's coming."
A few men stepped forward. Then a few more. Then a dozen. Then two dozen.
"Sam," Cotter Pyke said, turning to him. "You will go to Winterfell."
"Me?" Sam asked.
"Aye. You know the King in the North. You were friends with Jon Snow as well…you will be well received by the King. And I know you have that girl there…you want to see her, yes?"
Sam stared at the commander. "Yes, Lord Commander, I do."
The Commander nodded. "Then take my horse and go. Do not fail."
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