CHAPTER 7

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"Percy! Where are you," shouted Zoe as she walked through a dusty passage that was dark as the night..

It had been ten years since their birth and things had started to change in Winterfell. The massive castle that was unattended a decade ago had signs of repair. Sections that were abandoned over time were now refurbished and used to house various facilities. Even the town outside the massive castle, the Wintertown had started to expand.

Zoe remembered everything from the day she was born. She had arrived in a whole new world thanks to Ananke. When she first met her parents, she didn't know what to make of them. She was not close to Pleione, her mother in her previous life. Her father was mostly absent and was only seen when he came by to give them orders during the first titan war. And after his defeat, he was put under the sky on top of Othrys, a place which she and her sisters couldn't enter. So all in all she never had parental figures in her life at all.

Lyarra and Rickard Stark… from the moment she was born, they showered her with love. She remembered how her father came to their room each and every day after a hectic days' work just to be with them. She remembered her mother singing her lullabies and telling them all about her family. How her parents played with her, how they protected her and her brothers in that assassination attempt eight years ago… she remembered it all.

'Do I love them?... Yes… I love them a lot,' she thought fondly reminiscing her father's goofy antics to make her laugh. He could b suck a loving and caring person to his loved ones despite the stoic look that he showed to the public

She, a person starved for love finally had the perfect family and life she always wanted.

Most of her formative years were spent at the great library with her brothers to get to know their world. They tried to read everything they could from history, to legends to other various disciplines. What Ananke had told them was true. This world, in which its borders are yet to be mapped, was a stagnant one. There had been no new innovation since the invention for more than two millennia. And the final breakthrough had been of metal forging.

In their previous word humankind went from metal forging, which was mastered during the Roman Era, to space age in that same span of the same amount of time that had passed. Things were holding back the progression of the world. For one, illuminated people didn't come out with their new inventions like in the renaissance era of earth. Another fact that halted progress was the absence of the printing press. All books within circulation were copied by hand. To copy a tome that was over a thousand pages with the flowing artistic handwriting the people of this world used would take over six months.

Since educational material were held back from the populous, the would be scientists and scholars were stunted in the early ages if their growth. Instead of learning materials, the noble of this world considered books to be a luxury item. And unlike the wealthy that led the industrial revolution on earth, these noble kept the status quo and had halted the society to a standstill.

Another constricting factor was the organizations like the Order of Maesters. These 'learned' men didn't pass don their craft to anybody outside their order. They kept a tight lid on everything they discovered albeit insignificant as they were and kept new innovations from emerging from the populous.

She and her brothers were lucky because Winterfell boasted one of the greatest collections of books in Westeros. It helped them to understand the nature of the world and know what to expect of it. Despite being in a state of stagnancy, this world was much richer that earth. They knew so little about the lay of the land. Even today the Northerners didn't know what to expect outside the population centers. There were so many novel things that she could not have imagined existing within the realm of mortals. For one the absurd amount of sentient creatures were astounding.

On earth humans, the various nature spirits and the giant clans were the only sentient creatures. But then again only humans truly belonged to the mortal world as dryads, naiads and the giants existed due to the influence of divine might on the mortal world. They originated from the gods themselves. Even she was a nature spirit born of titan blood and blood of Pleione the sea nymph before her divinity was stripped from her and reduced to a mortal. There the gods could create and destroy life on a whim.

But it was different in this world. Unlike theirs, this world didn't allow the deities direct access to the working of the natural forces. Here the deities were the representation of nature. Most of them seemed to have risen from nature spirits themselves. For an example she believed Mother Rhoyne the Rhoynar worshipped was the spirit of the River Rhoyne of Essos. She rose up to gain a divinity because of the faith she got from the worshipping masses. She believed this because she knew for a fact that the god's power was directly proportional to the faith they got from their followers. That was why the Greek Pantheon encouraged mortals to build so many temples in their honor. But that didn't mean you would lose power once your followers started to dwindle.

Faith was a complex topic even amongst the gods. They needed it to increase their power but they didn't need it to keep the power they obtained from it. There were many an arguments within the council about this. Some like Zeus wanted to force the mortals back into worshipping them, others like Athena wanted to keep quiet and be happy with the power they obtained in their prime. Some like Demeter and Hephaestus wanted to distance themselves from mortals further and let them be the deciders of their own fate.

But Zoe knew that the gods that had a constant following were the truly powerful ones. Hades had his followers in the underworld. It didn't matter who your parents were once you reached Elysium or the Fields of Asphodel. Down there only Hades mattered only he was worshipped. Another was Poseidon. He had his own followers in Atlantis. She found out about that in Elysium. Zeus despite being considered the most powerful didn't have access to either the Underworld or the Seas while his brothers went about Zeus' domain with impunity.

Coming back to the topic, because of the lack of divinity's direct hand in the evolution of life, many sentient creatures had sprung up in various locations on the planet. She had read about the giants that roamed the continent of Westeros during the early days of the era of the First Men, the Children of the Forest who blew up the arm and created the Stepstones. Though neither of these species were seen by humans for more than five millennia, stories about their existence wasn't forged as they appeared again and again through various sources. Also, there was a rumor about the existence of giants beyond the Wall.

Then, there were rumors about the 'Winged Men' from the City of Winged Men and the short, hairy and stocky humans from Sothoyros that were eerily similar to the dwarves that died out on earth a long time ago.

These were just a few examples. Because of the lack of divinity, they mingled on the mortal without a barrier like the mist making them invisible to the mortals. That 'made' them mortals as well since the barriers existed to separate the kingdom of mortals from the divine.

She loved reading about these new things. She had lived for a long time, both as a Hesperide and also a huntress under Artemis. So she was quite aware of almost everything their world had to offer since she had experienced them at least once. But here… everything was new. A world that was not a game to the higher powers.

Her sense of adventure had awoken and she wanted to travel the land. But she was constrained by an overly loving father who seemed to have a sixth sense when it came to her. So she was confined to fantasizing about the wonders the world held for now. She especially wanted to see the Wall. This massive structure reminded of the ancient walls of Troy. While the Trojan wall was only about 20 meters in height, this massive structure was almost a quarter of a kilometer in height. And it spanned three hundred miles.

It was mind blowing as it was created by mortals with no divine intervention at all. It could not be matched by any of the creations humans achieved back on earth. Shame that its method of creation was lost to time. But it also brought a sliver of pride as it had been her forefather who built it with the help of the Children.

"Percy!" she called again.

Winterfell was an expansive castle. From what she read, it as the largest castle in the Seven Kingdoms other than the mostly destroyed Harrenhal. While Winterfell was smaller when compared to Harrenhall, what they didn't count was the fact that Winterfell was a castle complex with its largest part being located underground. It was discounted when others compared castles. So you could imagine the size of the great northern keep. It was no wonder that most of the underground complex was abandoned as they didn't even know what to do with it.

Winterfell was built to be a safe harbor for the people of the North in the harsh winters by Brandon the Builder eight millennia ago. Though nowadays many keeps and holdfasts had sprung up to harbor the populous, Winterfell had never sized down. So much of the castle was abandoned. Nobody, not even the Stark Patriarch knew what lay in the abandoned parts of his home. Finding somebody down these expansive hallways was a chore and these parts were mostly avoided as many a folk who had gone down there were never seen again. And here she was trudging the same halls that she was warned to avoid searching for her wayward little brother.

She knew where Charles was. She didn't even have to hazard a guess because she knew that her brother was with their father in his solar. From when he was eight, Charles had started to help out their father in his various endeavors. Their father knew that all three of them were abnormally intelligent for their age. After haring some of Charles' advice to his problems when he started to moan about them in the night, he called for him to help him in his work. Charles was instrumental in reorganizing and redesigning the Wintertown. The town that was mostly haphazardly put together was now starting to see uniformity an order.

Residences were erected in one sector while other sectors were designated for various professions. This redesign also helped them to incorporated a new sewer system and introduce several key community buildings such as the bathhouse. Constructions were still going on, but the smallfolk were truly grateful for the change. It had been quite some time since a Lord had started to care about his subjects like this. Their father was grateful for Charles in these matters since it was his ideas that he implemented.

Obviously Charles' hands on these matters were mostly kept secret since their family wasn't keen on going public with how gifted their children were. It had taken that singe assassination attempt to realize how strong an affect the birth of triplets to the Stark family posed to the other lords. Since then the three mostly kept within the keep and only head out when they were needed in the public.

It helped that Winterfell had myriad secret tunnels and paths that one could take to go from one point to the other. Charles just used one to get into the solar after his father entered it. Their father was very welcoming of this as Charles would take his seat in the future. He was training her brother earlier than most Lords did with their own heirs.

Percy on the other hand was mostly in the library, the training yard or skulking somewhere in the abandoned parts of the castle. She still didn't understand his reasoning to venture in these cold abandoned pathways that no one had seemed to have ventured in a long time. He was like a hound on a blood scent chasing after the same thing that had been biting him for a long time.

"Percy!" she screamed this time. Her voice echoed in the abandoned corridor eerily raising her hair. It wasn't that she was scared. It was just that most of the abandoned parts of Winterfell felt… unnatural to her.

"Over here," Percy's voice rang from around a bend.

She walked slowly and sighed as the torch gave out. This part of the castle was two layers below ground level. It wasn't surprising that these tunnels weren't lit as the other parts of the castle were.

"Light," she murmured and a glowing orb of light appeared in front of her. She held up her hand and the orb floated on to it. The darkness was chased away by the soft greenish blue light and she started to go forward throwing down the torch she had carried down with her.

She had to admit, magic was pretty awesome. They might have lost their abilities, but their access to magic negated it. She was truly thankful to Ananke for teaching her the language of magic.

She and her brothers had been experimenting with the language for a long time. Obviously they were not foolish to do so in public. Nobody, not even their parents knew of their abilities. Percy had been rather miffed to find out his affinity with water had gone away after rebirth. He may not say it out loud, but he was rather proud of what he could do with his father's domains. She had seen him churn up hurricanes, typhoons and earthquakes. He even used his earthshaker powers during sword fights to create vibrations. These vibrations came at the most unexpected times causing internal damage to his opponents. Now that these abilities were gone he forced himself to retrain his fighting style.

'Not that he had to,' Zoe thought.

He musing was broken as she saw light filtering out of the only room at the end of the corridor. The doorway to it was so large that it had double doors. It was only slightly smaller than the entrance to the Great Hall. Its archway was incorporated with statues of wolves and was covered with artistic runes that even she couldn't understand. Runes were not a subject she was familiar with. It was something Percy and Charles had studied.

She entered the room and was stunned at what she saw.

"What is this?" she asked Percy who was sitting on a throne like chair in the centre of the room reading a massive tome that had stone slates as pages.

The entire room was lit with greenish werelight. Zoe knew that it must have been Percy who had done it. The room was massive. On one corner a large hot spring bubbled giving the room a pleasant temperature. Everything in the room was made of either obsidian or jade. There was a pile of weapons in one corner that glittered ominously. Another part of the room had a single bookshelf that housed more of those slate paged tomes that Percy was currently reading. There were even chests of jewels thrown about haphazardly. Most of the other items were things that she couldn't recognize by a single glance.

But what drew her breath away was the sunken jade slate that was about ten square meters in the centre of the room right in front of the throne where Percy sat. It was filled with symbols and words that seemed to flow in a graceful picture. The more she looked at it, the more it seemed to be alive. She could read certain words that crossed its surface because she was proficient in gramarye, the written for of the magical language. But it was like staring into a hypnotizing wheel. The more she stared at it, the more light minded she felt.

"This, dear sister is the heart of Winterfell," Percy spoke breaking Zoe out of her trance.

"What?" she asked trying to get her mind together.

"You asked me what this was, didn't you? Well… this is the heart of Winterfell. The entire castle was built around this room."

"Percy," she warned irritably because Percy was skimming around her inquiry just to get a rise out of her.

She loved Percy. That affection became more prominent ever since they became a real family after their rebirth. But the boy loved to tease her and get her riled up. During their younger days their mother, bless her, had found her giving Percy a thorough spanking for switching her clothes with Charles'. Lyarra had been mortified and scolded her despite Zoe's protests about Percy's mischievousness. Percy was rather close to their mother, even more so than the rest of his siblings. Maybe it was because he was the only one to grow up with one. Maybe it was due to his 'wild' nature that he seemed to have inherited from their mother more than his siblings. But what she knew was that he knew how to suck up to her to get his way.

That day her mother had forbidden her from 'punishing' her brothers. With the threat of bodily harm gone, Percy had started to tease her in subtly in front of their mother as he knew that he would get beaten up away from her. Though she did manage to administer he brand of punishment away from her mother's hawk like eyes, it only ended up with the duo doing something completely unrelated like getting together to prank Charles or their little siblings.

"Hehe…," giggled Percy and gave her a crushing hug after putting the book down.

Despite being a young adult in the body of a ten year old and having the mentality of a war veteran, Percy was often childish. Especially around his immediate family. He didn't show this naïve happy go lucky attitude to anybody other than his elder siblings and his parents. Say what you will, but being born again and given a new chance brought down the serious emotionally stunted attitude of Percy by quite a bit. In fact rebirth had been a welcome gift to all of them. Even she knew that her personality had changed subtly.

"Alright alright," she pattered Percy on his head. "Now tell me what is going on. And we need to go back because father wanted to see us all after dinner."

"What time is it?"

"A little after lunch. You didn't eat anything didn't you?" she questioned him threateningly.

"Ah… I totally forgot about it. Meh… I just have a double serving for dinner. I'm not that hungry anyway," Percy dismissed his overtly concerned sister.

"Percy… you promised not to skip meals. You know mother's getting a bit worried about you because you disappear down here for the most part of the day. Even father questioned me what you were doing."

Of the three siblings, Percy was seen as an eccentric individual. Charles was considered a genius because of his never before seen skill with numbers. He even had a few inventions out in the public that had vastly improved life in the castle and the Wintertown. She helped her parents and was a regular member of the hunting party ever since her mother gave her permission a year ago. She also went down to the Wintertown to help those who were in need and most of these time she was accompanied by Charles or Percy.

Percy had the least amount of public exposure. He was mostly seen in the training grounds fighting in a manner no northerner or any westrosi for than hatter had ever seen. But she knew it was a mix between the traditional Greek fighting style mixed with aspects of both Atlantean and Roman styles. Other than that he was mostly absent from public view. It was almost as if Charles and Percy had switched their personalities with each other. Percy was highly reserved and had a limited number of people he communicated with familiarity. Those were the people he trusted or respected.

Their mother was worried about Percy's detached behavior from society despite Percy telling her that it was his persona. Albeit Percy's nonchalant dismissal about him missing meals, he knew that if their mother found out that he was in trouble. Not that she would punish him, it was her sad disappointed look that he couldn't stomach.

"Don't worry… I won't be missing meals ever again," he promised. "I found out what I was searching for these past two years. Sister… I know you made fun of me because I spent time down these uninhabited, undocumented parts of our home. But the joke's on you. This finding will help us tremendously. And this wealth… it can be used to fund our little experiments on a larger scale. And it will also provide us with the capital we need to make North independent again."

"You still haven't told me what this room is," she huffed.

"Come here sister," he dragged her to the sunken jade slate. "What do you see when you look into this?"

Zoe looked at it hard despite the out of body feeling she got when she stared at it for a while. Despite looking at it with keen eyes, she could only catch little glimpses of words. She could see that the slate was written in more than three languages with their words jumbling over and the sentences not making sense at all. The pictures and symbols that adorned it gave it an out of the world feeling. She could see direwolves, dragons, chimera, manticores, griffins, wyverns… all sorts of magical creatures within it. All of their eyes gleamed as if they were alive. But she still couldn't understand the purpose of this tablet at all.

"It looks… magical. I don't know what it does… but it… I can't even look at it without feeling dizzy."

"That because you are not supposed to look at it," Percy said as she turned to him. He smiled after seeing her questioning look and gestured to follow him back to the throne.

Zoe didn't properly see it earlier because her eyes were on her brother. Now that she came close to it and observed it she could only gasp in wonder. The throne was made of ice. It was not a regular ice that you could come across in nature… this was almost like it was made of Stygian Ice.

Stygian ice had a deep purple coloration with black markings across it. But the throne was made of an ice that was more bluish. But it had purple and black colorations all over it. She could feel the air hum around the throne with magical potency. The top of the throne was decorated with a snarling direwolf. The backrest, arms and the legs were crafted with such perfection she could see the tiny details that added to its beauty. The throne itself had no cushion of any sort. In that regard it was like the Iron Throne of King's Landing. This was a seat made to signify power. It wasn't there for comfort.

"You didn't think that the Starks ruled the North on that Weirwood Throne in the Great Hall did you sister? This is the throne of the Winter Kings. This is how our family symbol became the direwolf. The throne only the closest vassals knew about. In fact this was the room where all significant meetings regarding the Northern Kingdom were carried out for a long time until it was gently faded into obscurity on purpose."

"But why?" she asked. This throne signified power. Even more so than the Weirwood Throne. Just by being near it made one bow down in deference.

"This seat signifies the power of our family. Nobody outside our blood could ever grace it. In the early days this throne was considered to be a symbol of power... a symbol that the Starks were the magically superior family. An item that a person could lust for their whole life but never obtain. Many a family had tied to force their claim on it. But none succeeded. According to this book King Jorjen Stark decreed to hide this throne to quell the rumors that it was the throne that gave us our powers after the Boltons and several Stark offshoots rose in rebellion. But who know whether this was the original intention or not. You and me both know not to believe everything we read, especially when it comes to history."

"So the throne was moved here? Wonder how they pulled it off," she wondered.

"The book says that the other families believed it to have been destroyed due to infighting within the family during that turmoil. Also most of the people who participated in the uprising were put to the sword. Did you know that there used to be five different branch houses of the Starks? Not the Karstarks or the Greystarks… but others?"

"No. And aren't the Greystarks extinct because they were wiped out during the last Bolton uprising?"

"Yeah… the Greystarks weren't the first Stark branch to rebel and they weren't the first to be wiped out either. I say… we are born to a family with a rather bloody history haven't we?" Percy grinned knowing her distaste on the bloody and barbaric practices the Boltons carried out in the past. She was quite vocal about it.

It was ironical. Zoe had to give him that. The Starks the Westerosians knew were a noble family that was honorable and not bound to conflict. Too bad history never seems to survive orally. Otherwise they would have been painted in the same light as the Martells, the Greyjoys and the most recently the Lannisters. There were so many secrets when it came to the Starks that the history forgot. Even the dusty library or the journals of the past Stark patriarchs didn't paint a clear picture about their family prior to Aegon's conquests.

"You still haven't told me what that was. And where are we for that matter?" Zoe pointed at the slate and asked him..

"That dear sister is the wardstone of Winterfell and you are currently gracing the Nexus of Winterfell."

"Wardstone?"

"Do you remember the feeling e had from our younger days that there was something heavy and otherworldly about the aura around our home?"

"Yes. And you wanted to find out what caused it and headed down to the crypts only to be dragged by our father. I remember him giving you quite the spanking on your tushy tushy and made you promise not to head down there alone. Even mother didn't take your side that time," Zoe giggled reminiscing the incident. No matter how much Percy yelled, their father didn't let go of the punishment.

"I remember," Percy grimaced thinking back on the rather painful experience. It was the first and last time he had ever punished by his parents in this life and the last.

"Come on brother, you can't be still upset about that," Zoe bumped her shoulder on his.

"I know what he did was because he cared about me. It still hurt so much. And I remember you laughing at my predicament," Percy glared at her without any anger. "But back to the topic…The truth is that I never gave up the search. I was more careful to let no one find out my whereabouts. Even now only you and mother know that I come down here. I tried scrying spells, pointing spells… nothing worked. So I started to explore the abandoned parts of the castle because I knew that whatever was causing the phenomena was not within the parts we knew. And after spending all this time in darkness, I found it. This was the thing causing the feeling."

"When did you find it? And most importantly… what does it do?"

"About a month ago."

"And?"

"This is what keeps Winterfell together," Percy said. After seeing Zoe's questioning look he began to further elaborate. "Have you wondered why a castle that was eight thousand years old is mostly fine with no major degradation over time? This here is the key to it. From what I found out this wardstone focuses ambient magic in the air to stop decay over time. It also has various other uses such as transporting hot water through a pipe network inside the walls to keep the castle warm. It also repels unholy creatures from entering the premises."

"Unholy creatures? What are those?" Zoe asked with a blank look. From the tomes she had digested over the years, she knew that there were countless creatures in this world some of which were only figments of imagination on earth. Most of these creatures were only seen and heard in legends of the land. Even she knew not to dismiss those stories as there was a plausible and tangible truth behind the origination of those stories.

"According to this book, they are creatures of darkness and misery… demons of some sort. It's mentioned that they are used as assassins by a cult in Essos. Don't know much about them because even the descriptions are vague."

"What now?" Zoe questioned looking around. This room had much to be catalogued. She knew for a fact that Charles would be thrilled to take a look at those odd glistening weapons. The jewels were not a resource they could openly use. The world worked on gold coin basis. To use these items, they would have to exchange them first and she wasn't even sure she wanted to do that. These items were family treasures. They had been hidden down here for a long time to protect them from undesirables. She wasn't even sure she wanted anybody outside her family down here.

"You know we have to bring father down here," she added.

"I know. That is why I was going through all of these materials. You haven't even seen the half of it. There are so many storage rooms down here. Most of them are empty and we can use them for our purposes. The other rooms… come let me show you something," he said suddenly and dragged Zoe heading to the far edge of the room.

Zoe once again had to marvel the size of the room. Following Percy she could see that this was no man made creation. The room itself was a natural cavern under the castle. Brandon the Builder had utilized it in his design. The rocky walls were mostly comprised of various rocks. She could identify obsidian, amethyst and jade. The werelight that Percy had conjured bounce off these surfaces to give off and ethereal look. She knew for a fact that if they were to mine this cavern, they could obtain a huge amount of wealth as both amethyst and especially jade were considered expensive in this world due to their veins being found in remote inaccessible locations. Jade trade in Essos was a lucrative business.

At the end of the cavern was another doorway. This one didn't have any decorative arch or even a door for that matter. Percy conjured another werelight and strode forward. They entered a winding pathway that snaked in all directions. Temperature started to drop and rise throughout the journey and by the end she could already hear tilling of birds.

She wasn't ready for what came next. The moment she exited the tunnels she was met with one of the most beautiful sights she had ever seen. They were in a massive underground cavern. Shafts of light streamed down from the top and hit various locations giving a feeling a peace. This cave already had a thriving eco system. Though she didn't see any large animals from her vantage point, she could see trees that were lush and thick.

She had been to Son Doong cave in Vietnam during one incursion with Artemis. That had been one of the most wonderful and relaxing experience she had with Artemis. This cave despite being larger than that, the aesthetics was the same. It had only two entrances. One being the tunnel from which she entered. The other was the massive cave mouth in the far distance. She couldn't formulate words. She just basked in its beauty.

"How?" She finally spoke.

"If you are asking me how this cave came to exist, you know don't have the answer to that. This cave is probably one of the many reasons Brandon Stark built Winterfell here. There are only to entrances to this cave. One is the tunnel behind us, the other is that opening you can spot over there in the distance," he pointed to the large cave mouth.

"Then where are these beams of light coming from?" she pointed to the shafts of light that littered the cave illuminating the otherwise dark cavern. Due to these beams of light she could see fish swimming gracefully in the brooks and ponds that were scattered across the cavern floor. All in all it was a heavenly sight to see. This was a place that time had failed to touch… a pace that had not been disturbed for a long time.

"Well… the cave mouth is made of some sort of crystals. They reflect the light that hit them and what you see is the result of it."

"Percy this is a monumental find!" she grabbed his arm and shook him. They were at a loss to find a place to bring out the creatures that Ananke gifted them. Now they had a space that they raise them provided no one else knew of this place.

"You don't know the half of it. I scouted the place roughly. The cave mouth leads to a valley within the Wolfswood that is bordered by high cliffs. I don't think anyone could ever reach the valley except from air. And it's mostly shielded. So we don't need to worry about the winter. I plan to turn this into one of our bases in the North to raise the Storm Dragons and the Kirai. They can live here without human interference."

"I want to see more of it but we need to head back because it's getting dark outside. We don't need father to organize another hunting party to search for us like the last time. Mother is worried about us as it is. Come let's go. We'll come back with Charles, mother and father tomorrow," she said with reluctance.

"Fine, just let me grab a few stuff. We need to show them to father."

Zoe followed Percy back to the room in which she found him earlier. Once he got there she started to rummage about picking a few items and also the large tome that he had been reading earlier. She had to thank their physical abilities because no other ten year old or even a twenty year old could have handled the book like Percy did otherwise.

She had to admit, Winterfell had many secrets needed to be rediscovered. That cave for an example would have been an ideal place to weather turmoil in the kingdom. Starks were not novices when it came to rebellions. They have put out so many hostile movements throughout the history starting from the Dawn Age that they had lost count and forgotten about them. Entire sections of their history were blank due to wars and turmoil. So it wasn't surprising to see key aspects of their family forgotten over time. For an example she had read that there were many Starks with the ability to warg. Even greenseers weren't uncommon in the family. But nowadays the abilities themselves were considered myths. Even though the Starks nowadays may have the potential to be one, the process and the training procedures were nonexistent. So much had been lost to the sands of time.

She couldn't wait until she was sixteen. It was the age which her father said she could be out in the open roaming the land after the historical argument with him. There was so much the world had to offer. And both she and Percy wanted to see it all. They wanted to roam Avalon.

Avalon… that was the name which she and her brothers had started calling this planet. Westerosians didn't have any concrete information of anything beyond the Slaver's Bay in Essos. But that didn't even cover a quarter of their adjacent continent. Beyond the Slaver's Bay was Assahai and the Shadow Lands, Jade Sea and Yi'Ti, Vas Dothrak and the land beyond the Sea of Poison. So much was unknown. And that was even without considering the mysterious Sothoyros, the land of deserts and forests where mythical creatures were rumored to dwell. They didn't even know the true extent of the Summer Isles. For all they knew the islands themselves could be part of a landmass that was large enough to be considered a continent of its own.

The most frustrating thing to her was the lack of information of the lands beyond the wall. It was so close, yet they didn't even know the true reason why that massive structure was created in the first place. Sure there was the story of the Long Night where undead and creatures that were eerily resembled necromancers invaded the land of the living. But that was eight thousand years ago. Stories tend to deviate from the truth over time as they were exaggerated. She believed there was something beyond the wall that caused the living to unite. But what it was… was up to debate.

So Avalon it was. It denoted the fact that the world was magical and mysterious like the legendary island on Earth… a land which stoked the curiosity of adventurers and opened new paths in life.

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