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second pup into his arms. "There are five of them." Bran sat down in the snow and hugged the wolf pup

to his face. Its fur was soft and warm against his cheek.

"Direwolves loose in the realm, after so many years," muttered Hullen, the master of horse. "I like it not."

"It is a sign," Jory said.

Father frowned. "This is only a dead animal, Jory," he said. Yet he seemed troubled. Snow crunched

under his boots as he moved around the body. "Do we know what killed her?"

"There's something in the throat," Robb told him, proud to have found the answer before his father even

asked. "There, just under the jaw.,,

His father knelt and groped under the beast's head with his hand.

He gave a yank and held it up for all to see. A foot of shattered antler, tines snapped off, all wet with

blood.

A sudden silence descended over the party. The men looked at the antler uneasily, and no one dared to

speak. Even Bran could sense their fear, though he did not understand.

His father tossed the antler to the side and cleansed his hands in the snow. "I'm surprised she lived long

enough to whelp," he said. His voice broke the spell.

"Maybe she didn't," Jory said. "I've heard tales . . . maybe the bitch was already dead when the pups

came."

"Born with the dead," another man put in. "Worse luck."

"No matter," said Hullen. "They be dead soon enough too."

Bran gave a wordless cry of dismay.

"The sooner the better," Theon Greyjoy agreed. He drew his sword. "Give the beast here, Bran."

The little thing squirmed against him, as if it heard and understood. "No!" Bran cried out fiercely. "It's

mine."

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"Put away your sword, Greyjoy," Robb said. For a moment he sounded as commanding as their father,

like the lord he would someday be. "We will keep these pups."

"You cannot do that, boy," said Harwin, who was Hullen's son.

"It be a mercy to kill them," Hullen said.

Bran looked to his lord father for rescue, but got only a frown, a furrowed brow. "Hullen speaks truly,

son. Better a swift death than a hard one from cold and starvation."

"No!" He could feel tears welling in his eyes, and he looked away. He did not want to cry in front of his

father.

Robb resisted stubbornly. "Ser Rodrik's red bitch whelped again last week," he said. "It was a small

litter, only two live pups. She'll have milk enough."

"She'll rip them apart when they try to nurse."

"Lord Stark," Jon said. It was strange to hear him call Father that, so formal. Bran looked at him with

desperate hope. "There are five pups," he told Father. "Three male, two female."

"What of it, Jon?"

"You have five trueborn children," Jon said. "Three sons, two daughters. The direwolf is the sigil of your

House. Your children were meant to have these pups, my lord."

Bran saw his father's face change, saw the other men exchange glances. He loved Jon with all his heart

at that moment. Even at seven, Bran understood what his brother had done. The count had come right

only because Jon had omitted himself. He had included the girls,

included even Rickon, the baby, but not the bastard who bore the surname Snow, the name that custom

decreed be given to all those in the north unlucky enough to be born with no name of their own.

Their father understood as well. "You want no pup for yourself, Jon?" he asked softly.

"The direwolf graces the banners of House Stark," Jon pointed out. "I am no Stark, Father."

Their lord father regarded Jon thoughtfully. Robb rushed into the silence he left. "I will nurse him myself,

Father," he promised. "I will soak a towel with warm milk, and give him suck from that."

"Me too!" Bran echoed.

The lord weighed his sons long and carefully with his eyes. "Easy to say, and harder to do. I will not

have you wasting the servants' time with this. If you want these pups, you will feed them yourselves. Is

that understood?"

Bran nodded eagerly. The pup squirmed in his grasp, licked at his face with a warm tongue.

"You must train them as well," their father said. "You must train them. The kennelmaster will have nothing

to do with these monsters, I promise you that. And the gods help you if you neglect them, or brutalize

them, or train them badly. These are not dogs to beg for treats and slink off at a kick. A direwolf will rip

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a man's arm off his shoulder as easily as a dog will kill a rat. Are you sure you want this?"

"Yes, Father," Bran said.

"Yes," Robb agreed.

"The pups may die anyway, despite all you do."

"They won't die," Robb said. "We won't let them die."

"Keep them, then. Jory, Desmond, gather up the other pups. It's time we were back to Winterfell."

It was not until they were mounted and on their way that Bran allowed himself to taste the sweet air of

victory. By then, his pup was snuggled inside his leathers, warm against him, safe for the long ride home.

Bran was wondering what to name him.

Halfway across the bridge, Jon pulled up suddenly.

"What is it, Jon?" their lord father asked.

"Can't you hear it?"

Bran could hear the wind in the trees, the clatter of their hooves on the ironwood planks, the whimpering

of his hungry pup, but Jon was listening to something else.

"There," Jon said. He swung his horse around and galloped back across the bridge. They watched him

dismount where the direwolf lay

dead in the snow, watched him kneel. A moment later he was riding back to them, smiling.

"He must have crawled away from the others," Jon said.

"Or been driven away," their father said, looking at the sixth pup. His fur was white, where the rest of the

litter was grey. His eyes were as red as the blood of the ragged man who had died that morning. Bran

thought it curious that this pup alone would have opened his eyes while the others were still blind.

"An albino," Theon Greyjoy said with wry amusement. "This one will die even faster than the others."

Jon Snow gave his father's ward a long, chilling look. "I think not, Greyjoy," he said. "This one belongs

to me."

CATELYN

Catelyn had never liked this godswood.

She had been born a Tully, at Riverrun far to the south, on the Red Fork of the Trident. The godswood

there was a garden, bright and airy, where tall redwoods spread dappled shadows across tinkling

streams, birds sang from hidden nests, and the air was spicy with the scent of flowers.

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The gods of Winterfell kept a different sort of wood. It was a dark, primal place, three acres of old

forest untouched for ten thousand years as the gloomy castle rose around it. It smelled of moist earth and

decay. No redwoods grew here. This was a wood of stubborn sentinel trees armored in grey-green

needles, of mighty oaks, of ironwoods as old as the realm itself. Here thick black trunks crowded close

together while twisted branches wove a dense canopy overhead and misshappen roots wrestled beneath

the soil. This was a place of deep silence and brooding shadows, and the gods who lived here had no

names.

But she knew she would find her husband here tonight. Whenever he took a man's life, afterward he

would seek the quiet of the godswood.