the thaw. [arya stark]

xviii. the song of ice and fire

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN:
THE SONG OF ICE AND FIRE
｡･:*:･ﾟ★,｡･:*:･ﾟ☆

I. VALERIA / DAENERYS
the forgotten sisters become distant strangers

Darkness smothered Valeria from the very moment she awoke, her heart falling cold as she rose from those ravaged sheets and the faintest trace of a frown crossing her lips at the bitter revelation that Arya was gone. She must've stumbled away earlier that night, and by Valeria's reckoning, rightly so — for the clatter of hurried footsteps and panicked shouts swamped her ears informed her that they'd finally reached the end of the o' so deadly precipice that had loomed over them those past few weeks — and now, they'd have to confront it.

She snatched up whatever clothes she could find from the floor, and sprinted from Arya's chamber — her footsteps marked thunderous and desperate as she rounded towards her own quarters, where she strapped her sword to her waist, her knife to her thigh and a silvered dragon pin to her chest before setting off into the night, fearful, yet not discouraged in the slightest.

Reaching the yard, Valeria approached the stable master with all the urgency she could muster — and, after being handed the reigns to a snowy, wild—looking horse, rode straight through Winterfell's iron gate, her magnetic gaze fixed upon the slated ledge just half a mile from the keep — where she knew her sister was waiting for her.

"Adhirikydho, boy." She whispered, feeling the horse gathering speed by the second with a grateful smile. This night was to be a long one, yes, but the time for stalling was up, and the time to fight was nigh — a fact that filled Valeria with an unquenchable thirst, a desire to fight — to prove herself against the unfathomable evil that lurked, waiting, within the twilight.

Nearing the ledge, Valeria could just make out her sister's silhouette, rendered ghost—like in stark contrast to the almost luminous hides of their two dragons, Rhaegal and Drogon, whose gilded coats glittered like stars in the darkness. Jon Snow, too, lurked beside her, clad in the grey garb of his noble house, and marked deadly by the truly magnificent sword dangling from his hip — ice.