4-Deeper Secrets

Long was the two-week journey from King's Landing to Winterfell. Most would go through the Neck to travel between the North and South, but Ned instead decided to take the easier route back via White Harbor. The journey from the docks of the capital to the cold port city was a treacherous one, but fortunately, seasickness held no sway over him in this life. A few days' ride is all it then took to arrive at the seat of power in the North and one of the oldest structures in the Kingdoms.

Despite growing up in a viper's pit of politics and treachery, Jon took to the North far better. Reprieve from the summer days irked him despite his proclivity for heat, and the people were practical, straightforward, hard-working, and far less likely to plant a dagger in your back or 'fail' at poisoning you. He felt like he was back in the barracks; he truly, for once, felt at home.

Winterfell, 291 AC, One Year Later

Jon slammed to the floor with a grunt, dropping a wooden training sword, giving him a short-lived reprieve from his training with Ser Rodrik.

"You're improving well, Your Grace. Your parrying and lunges are some of the best I've seen for a lad your age, but your footing needs some work. Ser Barristan has taught you well," Ser Rodrik, the Master-at-Arms for Winterfell, critiqued Jon with Barristan at his side.

"Could it perchance be because I'm only nine?" Jon said with a wheezy chuckle.

"He's used that excuse all too much," Barristan spoke through a smile.

"An all-too-common one you'll see most of the lads using," Rodrik chuckled as he offered Jon a hand, which he accepted.

"Do you believe I would do better with something bigger? A hammer perhaps?" Jon asked.

"Perhaps, it would be one small hammer," Rodrik laughed as he walked away, finishing their lesson.

Jon dwelt on that thought until sleep took him that night. Visited not only by sensations of constant scalding steam in a dark place but also by flashes of a statue holding a hammer, he was quickly jolted awake in a cold sweat. He knew what the statue was; it was of Bran the Builder, the first statue ever placed down there when the Starks began sculpting them in remembrance of all the Kings of Winter eight thousand years ago, which meant if the crypts were his next journey, it'd be a long one.

Quietly using a mixture of stealth, bribery, and his position to sneak through the halls, Jon quickly made his way across the courtyard unseen, cloaked by the utter darkness outside pockets of light created by torches and the ever-present wind. Attempting to open the old and heavy Ironwood doors to the crypt as quietly as possible, Jon slipped through before closing them once more, assured that no one likely heard him anyway with how many creepy noises sounded throughout the night anywhere in the North.

All the Lords and Kings had statues built to represent themselves even in death, with iron longswords placed across their laps to ward off vengeful or evil spirits. Stopping in his tracks, he looked up at a certain statue of interest. The statue plaque read 'Lyanna Stark, 265-281 AC'.

(Picture Of Lyanna's Statue)

Even if the Mad King hadn't killed his grandfather and uncle, he still held the belief that Robert would have sparked the rebellion all the same. Lyanna was the Winter Rose, a diamond in the rough. A bride of great beauty promised to Robert, as well as a way for him to truly become family with his best friend. Men have committed far greater for far less. Thoughts of who the boy he inhabited would've been without him then crossed his mind. The only words that came to mind were ignorance and death.

Moving further down the corridor, he was met with a narrow spiral staircase that led both up and down. Moving downwards for what felt like dozens of steps, he eventually reached the bottom. If one thought the air in Winterfell's keep was still, then this was the textbook definition of dead. Every breath he took was filled with a dense and foul scent enough to immediately cover his face with the end of his little fur cloak. Moving past several more statues of ancient kings, he noted how they appeared more and more eroded and fragmented the further he went, likely due to the large amount of moisture and possible seismic activity over the years.

Eventually being led to a dead end in the form of a cave-in, he had thought for a moment that his excursion would come to an end, only to then notice the faint sound of running water. Climbing the mound of fallen debris, he used his knife as a makeshift spade to dig at the tough dirt. Over roughly an hour or so of hard digging, he managed to squeeze through to the other side. He was met with an almost fantastical hot spring, likely being or at least connected to the underground source that Winterfell uses to pump hot water through the castle.

(Picture of Spring)

Sensing something important was likely near, he made his way through the cave by traversing the steep curved-in walls. Eventually reaching the end, he was met with the sight in his dreams. The statue of Bran the Builder was before him, only it was inconveniently covered in a continuous stream of boiling water.

(Picture of Bran the Builder)

Getting closer to try and make out any details on its surface, a loose rock on the edge of the moat that separated the floor and the statue platform gave way, causing Jon to instinctively save himself by shoving his hand into the torrent of boiling water to grab onto the statue within, only for it to mysteriously not hurt at all. In the process of Jon's near-death experience, he discovered the clenched fists atop the hammer could be pulled not too much unlike a lever. Safely taking a step back at the sound of ear-piercing scraping stone, a small stone rod hidden within the statue pushed out the head of the hammer, revealing it to very likely be a storage container of some kind.

Examining all its surfaces, a small and perfectly chiseled carving caught Jon's eye on its top.

(Picture Of Glyph)

Thanks to him delving into dozens of books of history, lore, and theory over the years when his small body proved otherwise useless, Jon almost instantly recognized and deciphered the text to be the word dārilaros, or "Prince/ess" in Westerosi (English), giving him the only clue he needed.

"Sigh. Let me guess... From my blood, come the prince that was promised, and his shall be the song of ice and fire?" Jon spoke, but with no response from the magic.

"Dārilaros?" Jon guessed, but still nothing happened other than an idea springing into his mind.

Grabbing his new and now partially blunt dagger, he sliced the tops of his left hand, drawing blood that split onto the glyph, causing it to glow bright red.

"Blood magic... very clever. So it wasn't a clue to verbal activation at all, but a receptacle to a blood seal..." He muttered to himself.

Slowly scraping open, quite a surprising cloud of dust fished from within the container, eventually settling to reveal a sapphire-blue egg he knew for certain belonged to that of a dragon.

(Picture Of Egg)

He couldn't wrap his head around how a dragon egg might've ended up in a location such as this, assuming it belonged to Silverwing, Queen Alysanne's dragon when she and Jaehaerys visited Winterfell nearly two centuries ago. But that soon became the least of his concerns as he pushed questions of the past to the back of his mind. Wrapping the still surprisingly warm egg up in his coat, he slowly stuffed it into his satchel as he quickly took his leave from the depths of the decrepit crypt. Making his way back up to the top floor, he was met with what he had feared the most when coming down here.

"What are you doing down here, lad? You know it's not safe," Ned asked, standing next to Lyanna's statue.

"Exploring, couldn't sleep, my Lord," Jon said, slowly walking up to his side.

"And what did you find?" Ned asked.

"Not much, my Lord. The tunnel had collapsed on the lowest floor, leaving the rest to be sealed off," Jon replied.

"All right, be careful from now on. If Nan can be believed, there are rats as big as hounds down here," Ned slightly chuckled before looking back at the statue of Lyanna as the room fell silent.

"I can still remember her, partially," Jon said to break the silence, causing a confused look to cross Ned's face.

"You weren't even a year old at the time. That's not possible..." Ned said, furrowing his brow.

"Protect him, Ned. Rhaegar believes he can save the world of men. I have visions sometimes when I sleep, past and future both. I scoured through the libraries at both King's Landing and here, finding some, but very little knowledge on this phenomenon. The Children of the Forest once had very few among their number who could view past, present, and very rarely future events as though they were there. They were known as Greenseers, and the ability is known as the Greensight. When the Children and First Men forged their peace pact on the Isle Of Faces, some humans in very rare circumstances also began exhibiting the ability, but none more than the Starks, who possessed the 'Blood of Wolves', allowing the Greensight to present itself more often, often unbeknownst to the person in question, who believed they're simply 'dreams,'" Jon said, causing his uncle to go pale in the face from his history lesson.

"There will be many things in the coming years that will need careful attention to, Uncle, so I hope that you can trust me when I say that I not only tell the truth but work in favor of the realm," Jon said as he then walked off to go to bed, as he was exhausted, leaving Ned speechless as he turned to speak some sense to his nephew but recalled something that happened all those years ago.

279 AC, Winterfell Dining Hall

"Father, did you have the strange dream of Maester Cranwell getting bucked by a horse?" Lyanna asked, causing her father to gain an expression of mixed confusion and intrigue.

"No, dear, I don't believe I did," Rickard replied before taking another mouthful of porridge.

"MY LORD, MY LORD! MAESTER CRANWELL'S BEEN INJURED!" one of the household guards yelled as he barged into the dining hall.