Aire Bubble

When the guard opened the door, the blast of hot air made Robb feel like he was walking into a dragon's mouth. Inside he gleamed a forge in every corner and the air reeked of smoke and brimstone. The workers looked up from the tongs and hammers just long enough to wipe the sweat from their brows, while the bare-chested apprentices continued to work the bellows.

"My lord," they gave him a brief bow before returning to their tasks.

Winterfell has three blacksmiths, Mikken and his sons Mark and Torrhen. Each one has several apprentices so the forges of Winterfell are always overflowing, if they are not forging a weapon or armor they are forging a tool. Since Wintertown is very close to the castle, the town has no blacksmith and all blacksmithing is done by the Winterfell blacksmiths.

Robb takes off his doublet and shirt, throws them over a chair, and puts on thick gloves. He walks over to one of the stalls, grabs a hammer and tongs, and starts to work bare-chested because of the heat.

The heir has been working in the forges for several moons, learning from Mikken himself. The master blacksmith knows the heir's genius and respects him as his future lord. When Robb went to his forge asking to be taught how to forge Mikken, he had to obey the young Stark's orders and teach him, but he didn't expect much from him. He hoped that the boy would get bored in a few days or find the job too tiring or complicated.

He was wrong.

Robb showed that his genius is not limited to his studies or martial matters, the boy learned in a few moons what his apprentices took years. Mikken marveled at his seemingly limitless talent and lamented that Robb was his father's heir. The master blacksmith knows that if the heir dedicated a few years to the study of blacksmithing he could become one of the best blacksmiths in the world.

After seven moons Robb is able to forge rudimentary weapons quite skillfully. His swords are still nowhere near as good as those forged by Mikken or his sons, who have been practicing the trade for decades, but they are acceptable weapons.

But Robb did not learn to forge to create weapons, no, his intentions are different.

The young Stark intends to build an artifact that allows him to explore the bottom of the pond, more precisely the silver tunnel. In order to build his invention he needs to know how to forge, at first Robb thought of asking one of the blacksmiths to do the job but he soon discarded the idea. One of the things that bothers Robb the most is having to explain his ideas, his inventions. He finds it tedious and irritating. A lot of times people don't understand his ideas, they don't understand his vision and trying to explain it to them takes forever. So Robb decided to learn how to forge to bring his blueprints to life.

In addition, knowing how to forge will be useful to give life to his other inventions.

`It took ages to explain the new harvest technique to father. If I had to spend so much time explaining each of my inventions I would go crazy!`

Robb doesn't want to have to explain himself at every step, so he's going to create his inventions himself. The invention he has been working on for several moons is a device that will allow him to breathe underwater for a few hours. Robb calls it Air Bubble.

The artifact is spherical in shape, with an iron frame covered with wood and leather, making it waterproof. At the bottom there is a part that is removable, a hatch. The Air Bubble has several hooks where Robb will attach various weights so that it sinks into the water.

Building the artifact itself only took a few days, what took him more time was deciding on the measurements. Finding the sice the bubble should have to have enough air for Robb to explore the tunnel to his heart's content took a lot of time since it can't be too big or it wont fit in the tunnel. Another thing he had to design is a pulley system to be able to control the bubble, he doesn't want it to sink too far or too fast.

Robb made dozens of schematics, plans, and calculations. And after several moons of hard work everything will be ready for his adventure in no time. He still has to make the iron chain that will hold the bubble and finish assembling the pulley system. The bad thing is that time is running out, his father will be home soon and Robb has to explore the tunnel before his father arrives.

Only the Stark family goes to where the Heart tree is, Robb does not know why, there is no rule that prohibits the servants and guards from praying before the old tree but they only go a few meters into the forest to pray.

Currently only he and Jon visit the Heart tree on a regular basis. His father goes there to pray quite often and since his father forbade him to dive in the pond, Robb knows that he has to explore the tunnel before his father gets home.

So that his mother doesn't find out what he's doing, Robb builds parts of his artifact at the smithy, then sneaks them into the forest and assembles them there. No one knows what he has been building, not even Jon; which makes Robb feel very guilty. Robb has never kept anything from his brother before, but he knows that if he tells him of his intentions Jon will try to stop him.

Once when they were younger, when they had barely learned to swim the two boys dived in the pond and being young and inexperienced they did not know how long they could hold their breath, or when it was time to ascend. They almost drowned in the pond that day, luckily their Uncle Ben was with them and pulled them out of the water in time. Since then Jon was cautious around deep waters, for a while he didn't even want to swim in the hot springs!

Jon knows that Robb still goes to the pond to dive and keeps the secret but if he tells him about his invention and his intentions...

`Jon will worry too much,` Robb finishes forging the last part of the chain and wipes the sweat from his forehead with a cloth. `Now all that remains is to take the chain to the forest and mount the pulley system. According to the letter Father sent us from Casterly Rock he will be home in four days, unless the winds are fair then he will be here sooner.`

After the war Ned went to Casterly Rock, where a Tourney was held to celebrate the victory. From there he went by ship to Barrowtown and from there on horseback, according to the itinerary he should have arrived in Barrowtown a few days ago, normally he would have written a letter to his family from Barrowtown but given the bitter relations with House Dustin it is not surprising that Lord Stark did not want to spend time in the castle

`I bet that old witch is going to complain that father insulted her by not staying a day in her castle. But if he had stayed the witch would have complained even more because she hates father.` Robb met Lady Dustin a few years ago and he didn't like the widow one bit, she was rude and contemptuous with all the Starks.

`At least Domeric is nothing like his aunt or his father.` During that visit he also met Lord Bolton's heir, and Roose himself. Lord Bolton scared the hell out of him! His pale eyes reminded him of the color of the moon, but while the moon is beautiful and brings him peace of mind Lord Bolton's eyes are terrifying and gave him the creeps.

Robb felt like those pale eyes were scanning him from head to toe, looking for any flaws so throughout the visit Robb was tense and he felt like he was being tested.

Luckily Domeric Bolton was nothing like his father, he is a quiet and polite boy, a lover of the arts and good food. The Bolton heir got along quite well with the Stark children, especially Jon; both being budding artists.

Nowadays the children write to each other quite often and Domeric has been invited several times to Winterfell to spend time with the children, they were also invited to the Dreadfort and visited the old fortress of the Red Kings once. The place proved to be as terrifying as Lord Bolton, the entire castle was engulfed in a cold and chilling atmosphere. A guard told them that at night the ghosts of the men who were tortured in the dungeons patrol the corridors, Jon and Robb were so scared that they didn't dare wander the castle alone and once the sun went down they hid under the blankets with their wooden swords hugged to their chests.

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