The sea did not roar so much as whisper.
Each morning brought a different sky above the Wolf's Wake—sometimes grey and sulking, sometimes blinding with sunlight on the waves. But always the wind, always the salt, always the steady churn of the sea. Two moons had passed since they left Kings Landing, and the Sea had proven both patient and punishing.
Cregan stood near the prow, one hand resting on the carved wolfhead railing. The ship was Northern-built—broad-hulled, fast, silent when needed. She cut through the waves like a blade through cloth.
He wore no cloak today. The wind was sharp, but he welcomed the cold. It cleared the mind. Beside him, Benjen leaned with a sailor's balance, his eyes scanning the horizon.
"Still thinking of King's Landing?" Benjen asked.
"No," Cregan said quietly. "I'm thinking of Braavos."
Benjen gave a half-smile. "Most people do that with coin and wine in mind."
"I'm thinking of what I need. And what I can give."
"Funny," Benjen said. "I thought you were going to say what you can take."
Cregan said nothing. The wind howled briefly between them like a wolf's breath.
Below deck, the Northern heirs passed time in their own ways.
Rodrik Snow sat cross-legged on the floor of the cargo hold, his back to a barrel, carving runes into a length of driftwood with an obsidian knife. A bastard of House Glover, he spoke little and listened much.
Across from him, Harrion Karstark was oiling his sword for the second time that day. His jaw worked silently as he listened to Ethan Forrester and Smalljon Umber argue about ship tactics.
"Your idea would get us all drowned," Ethan said, frowning.
"It's faster," Smalljon replied. "Speed wins battles."
"Not if the boat flips before you land."
Myra Reed ignored them all. She was perched near the port hole, sketching what she saw in charcoal—sea birds, sails, cloud shapes that reminded her of the Neck. A battered book of Braavosi tongue lay open on her lap.
She spoke first.
"Do you think the Braavosi will respect us?"
Rodrik looked up. "They respect coin. And masks."
Ethan snorted. "Then we bring both. The wolf is both rich and strange."
"Strange wins nothing," Harrion said, eyes on his blade. "But power… power does."
They all fell silent when the door creaked open.
Benjen entered, followed by Cregan.
"You've all done well so far," Cregan said, looking around the room. "No grumbling. No laziness. You've trained, worked, learned. That's why you were chosen."
Smalljon stood straighter. Myra set her charcoal aside.
"But this next part," Cregan continued, "is different. Braavos is not Westeros. It will test your eyes, your patience. Some will flatter. Others will sneer. Learn from both."
Ethan folded his arms. "Are we there as diplomats, or guards?"
"Both," Benjen answered. "And neither. You're symbols. Of the North's future."
Cregan nodded. "Which means you don't flinch. You don't brawl in the alleys. You don't insult the Sea Lord's wine, or his whorehouse, or his ships."
Smalljon opened his mouth, then wisely shut it.
Cregan paced slowly before them. "Each of you will have tasks. Myra, you'll go with me to the Braavosi library. Ethan, you'll oversee the first ship inspection. Harrion and Smalljon will tour the weapons quarter. Rodrik—"
He looked to the quiet bastard.
"—you'll map the shipyards. Quietly. I want layout, traffic, and any secrets they try to hide."
Rodrik gave a short nod.
Benjen stepped forward. "Any questions?"
Smalljon raised a hand. "Are we to be... polite?"
Cregan gave the barest smile. "Be Northerners. Just not savages."
---
That night, the stars came out like cold fire.
Cregan sat alone by the helm, a cup of chilled mead in hand, watching the horizon for signs of Braavos. The wind shifted, carrying a faint scent of foreign smoke.
Benjen joined him without a word, offering a second cup.
They drank in silence for a while.
Then Benjen said, "You're more like your father every day."
"No," Cregan replied. "I remember my father. He didn't plan enough."
Benjen studied him. "And you? Do you plan to turn Braavos into a second Winterfell?"
"No," Cregan said again. "But I plan to leave braavos with tools that Winterfell never had before."
Benjen raised his cup. "To tools, then."
"To wolves," Cregan said.
And the Wolf's Wake sailed on through silver tides, toward a city of masks, memory, and hidden blades.
---
The sea mist parted like a veil.
As the Wolf's Wake emerged from the narrow green fog, Braavos revealed herself—not all at once, but in pieces. First the sea walls, massive and weathered, rising like the ribs of a drowned god. Then the domes, copper and blue and green, glinting in the morning light. Then the canals, twisting through the city like a thousand silver veins.
And beyond it all, rising from the fog like a myth—the Titan of Braavos.
He loomed above the harbor entrance, sword held high, mouth open in warning. His stone gaze looked past ships and sails, past the harbor itself, as though guarding against time.
Benjen stood beside Cregan at the prow.
"Seven hells," he murmured.
"Not ours," Cregan said. "This is a city of different gods."
And it was.
---
The Braavosi dockmaster met them with a flourish, speaking the Common Tongue with a thick accent and a flourish of his ink-stained hands. No one commented when he flinched slightly at the size of the Northerners disembarking. Fifty guards, all in grey and black. Silent. Armored. Disciplined.
Cregan's cloak was trimmed in wolf fur. His eyes, green and cold, missed nothing.
"I have arranged for your manor," the dockmaster said. "Two levels, five courtyards, canal access. Paid in full."
"Good," Cregan said.
The dockmaster waited, as if for a bribe or thanks.
Cregan turned and walked away.
Benjen smiled faintly. "Welcome to Braavos."
---
The manor was nestled along the Moon Pool canal, halfway between the Silken Gardens and the quieter scholar's quarter. It was built in the old style—narrow from the street, sprawling from within. Ivy clung to grey stone. A dozen blackglass windows faced the water. The doors were carved with wave patterns and Braavosi sea-stags.
It was defensible, secluded, and—most importantly—unremarkable.
Perfect.
Within hours, the guards had established shifts, and the Northern heirs were claiming rooms with mock-ceremonial grandeur.
Ethan Forrester shouted that he wanted the one with the balcony.
Myra Reed requested the tower chamber overlooking the canal.
Rodrik Snow simply vanished into a back hall.
---
The next three days passed in a blur of discovery.
Braavos was a city of layers. Of masks. Of contradictions.
There were temples to a hundred gods. Shrines built into trees. Entire bridges devoted to dueling. Taverns that floated, courtyards where beggars recited poetry, and alleys where a wrong turn could lead to a new market—or a knife in the ribs.
Cregan walked the streets without guards on the fourth day. He wanted to see how the city looked when it didn't know it was being watched.
He passed a group of children in purple masks dancing to music that had no rhythm.
He passed an old man sketching symbols into a dead fish with ink and a scalpel.
He passed two sailors whispering in High Valyrian behind a curtain of beads.
Everywhere he looked, the city whispered: You do not understand us.
Good, Cregan thought. That means you'll underestimate me too.
---
The shipyards were the most impressive he'd seen outside White Harbor—and twice as secretive.
Iron hulls glinted under vast black cloth canopies. Fireproof tar was poured from one barrel and into another without explanation. The Braavosi shipwrights spoke little, and when they did, it was always about the sea, never the sails.
Cregan watched one ship in particular: a sleek, low vessel with dual rudders and copper plating on the hull.
Benjen whistled low. "Built for speed and armor. Not bulk."
"I want five," Cregan said quietly.
Benjen glanced at him. "To sail where?"
"Anywhere."
---
On the eighth night, as torches lit the water and laughter echoed from the canals, a gondola arrived at their private dock.
The gondolier wore Sea Lord blue, and his scroll bore a wax seal in purple and pearl.
Cregan opened it slowly.
"Lord Stark, the Sea Lord of Braavos requests the honor of your company at the Palace of Twilight two nights hence, to join a feast in celebration of trade, prosperity, and foreign courtesy."
Myra Reed leaned over his shoulder. "Think it's real courtesy or staged curiosity?"
"Both," Benjen said. "Which makes it dangerous."
Cregan rolled the scroll and said nothing.
Instead, he looked at his reflection in the black water, framed by stars and floating lanterns.
Braavos had not shown its teeth yet.
But it had opened one eye.
The chamber was quiet but for the soft trickle of water through the manor's lower canal. Braavos slept uneasily, and so did most of the Northmen—but not the Stark brothers.
Benjen stood near the carved mirror, hood still up from his nightly patrol. Cregan sat on a bench beside the hearth, arms folded, hair damp from sea wind. The fire crackled low.
The mirror shimmered once—then again—before settling.
And then Ned appeared.
The glass did not show his surroundings. Only his face—tired, alert, furrowed with worry.
"Is the line secure?" he asked.
"Always," Cregan replied.
Benjen nodded, stepping into view. "No interruptions. No echoes. We're alone."
"Good," Ned said. "Then talk."
Cregan leaned forward slightly. "The city's more layered than we expected. The shipyards are guarded by ritual and silence. The Iron Bank hasn't made contact. And we've been invited to the Sea Lord's palace."
Ned's eyes narrowed. "That soon?"
"They're watching," Cregan said. "The way we walk, the way we dress. They already know how many guards we brought, and how few questions we've asked."
Benjen smirked. "So naturally, they invited us to dinner."
"They want to know what we want," Cregan said.
"And what do we want?" Ned asked.
Cregan stood slowly, walking toward the mirror. He met Ned's eyes in the glass.
"We want distance from the Iron Throne without needing to lift swords."
Ned said nothing.
Cregan continued. "We want a fleet that answers to Winterfell, not the Red Keep. We want Moat Cailin completed. We want trade routes that bypass the South entirely."
"And the Iron Bank?" Ned asked. "They don't give loans to boys in wolf cloaks."
"They give loans to risk-takers who don't flinch," Cregan said. "And to those who make clear they'll pay debts… or make others bleed."
Benjen raised a brow. "You planning to threaten the Iron Bank?"
"No," Cregan said calmly. "I'm planning to show them what a Northern century looks like. Quiet strength. Absolute repayment. Political autonomy."
Ned looked wary. "They'll test you."
"I expect it."
Ned folded his arms in the reflection. "And what do we offer?"
Cregan held up a ledger. "I've had the scribes tally our silver, our whiskey, and our access to lumber. That's our collateral."
Benjen stepped beside him. "He's also laid groundwork for grain imports from Yi Ti. If they take root in the Bite, we could undercut Reach shipments by next harvest."
Ned blinked. "You're moving fast."
"We have to," Cregan said. "We're not building a kingdom. We're building the knife to cut the leash."
The fire crackled louder.
"I want to build five warships here," Cregan continued. "Braavosi designs—copper hulls, twin masts, reinforced keels. One for each cardinal direction. Fast, silent, unbranded."
Benjen added, "He's calling the class Ghost Ships. Northern to the bone, foreign in the water."
Ned's eyes flicked between them.
"And what do we call this?"
Benjen smiled faintly. "The next act."
Cregan leaned in.
"We are done begging for respect. If the South wants to forget the North, let them. We'll make Braavos remember us instead."
The mirror flickered slightly as Ned exhaled.
"Keep your swords sharp, then," he said. "And your silver flowing. The North depends on your shadow here."
The connection faded, glass going empty.
--
The Iron Bank of Braavos did not flaunt its power.
It didn't need to.
Cregan Stark stood in the cool marble hall with Benjen a pace behind him and no guards in sight. The silence was deliberate. The architecture utilitarian. There was no need for intimidation when the building itself had outlived kingdoms.
Three officials awaited him in a recessed chamber: one pale and sharp-featured, his robes trimmed in grey for logistics; one weathered, silver-bearded, and wrapped in deep green for trade law; and one younger woman, poised behind the desk, quill in hand, her bronze sash indicating contractual jurisdiction.
Cregan stepped forward with measured calm, a sealed satchel beneath his arm.
"Lord Stark," the elder banker said, bowing his head. "The North sends few envoys."
"We build slowly," Cregan replied. "And we plan for cold years."
The grey-robed man gestured to the seat opposite. "You may speak."
Cregan sat.
He didn't bluff. He didn't challenge. He unfolded the satchel and laid out a clean, annotated parchment across the table—hand-drawn maps, cost estimates, labor calculations.
"The Fever River flows from the Wolfswood east to the Shivering Sea," he began. "It is shallow, crooked, and largely unused. I plan to change that."
The three bankers leaned in slightly.
"I propose to dredge and expand it into a proper canal—deep enough to allow Braavosi merchant ships, wide enough to cut inland shipping time by two-thirds."
The woman raised an eyebrow. "You wish to cut a canal through the North?"
"We've already begun in sections," Cregan said. "But the scale required is beyond our current resources."
He pushed forward the next sheet—labour needs, seasonal timelines.
"I'm requesting a shared investment. Fifty percent of construction costs. In return, Braavosi ships will receive a 50% toll reduction for five years."
The grey-robed man studied him. "And after five years?"
"The rate drops to 15% for the next ten. Then we renegotiate. If trade is steady and relations fair, I expect renewal."
The silence held a moment.
Cregan did not fill it.
He kept his posture composed, his voice neutral. Not submissive—never that. But he understood what this place was. He wasn't the sharpest mind in the room. He wasn't the richest man. But he could be the most reliable.
The silver-bearded banker finally spoke. "Do you speak for the Crown?"
"No," Cregan said. "I speak for the North."
"That's not the same."
"Which is why you're listening," Cregan replied, calm. "The Crown's debt is steep. The North's is clean."
The woman tapped her quill. "And what guarantees do we have? If a war breaks out, your toll promises may vanish."
Cregan met her gaze. "My grandfather was burned alive demanding justice. I'm not here to beg. I'm here to build. If you lend to me, your investment lies in stone and river. Not politics."
The silver-bearded man gave a slight nod.
"That," he said, "is a better guarantee than most."
---
The discussion continued for two hours. Questions of taxation. Local materials. Who would maintain the canal locks. How many harbormasters Braavosi captains could bring inland.
Cregan answered plainly, or not at all. When he didn't know, he said so—and offered to deliver written confirmation within a moon's turn.
Benjen watched from the side, arms folded. He had seen Cregan face lords, soldiers, maesters. But here… here he was different. Not colder, but sharper.
Measured.
By the end, the woman leaned back in her seat.
"We will review the proposal. The terms are intriguing. If accepted, the first loan will be disbursed in three installments over the course of construction milestones."
"Fair," Cregan said.
The grey-robed man added, "And we will require a signatory witness from White Harbor."
"Lord Manderly will sign," Cregan said. "And the toll collection will be jointly administered through his port for transparency."
The silver-bearded man smiled faintly. "You've planned this well."
"I don't gamble with rivers," Cregan replied.
---
Outside the Iron Bank, the air smelled of salt and oil.
Benjen fell into step beside him as they crossed the dock bridges toward the market tier.
"Not bad," Benjen said after a while.
"They're not convinced yet," Cregan said. "But they're curious."
"They'll say yes."
"They'll say yes," Cregan agreed. "Because it costs them nothing to bet on a boy trying to dig a canal through the North."
Benjen grunted. "You're not a boy."
"I will be, to them," Cregan said. "Until they realize what I'm building leads past Winterfell. Past kings. Past crowns."
Benjen raised a brow. "And to what?"
Cregan didn't answer.
---
The shipyards were quieter now, the day's hammering reduced to the low thrum of tarring crews and rigging teams securing lines under lantern-light.
Cregan met the Sea Lord's naval steward in a small pavilion beside the drydock.
She was a small, hawk-eyed woman named Vellari, dressed in sea-blue and brass. She greeted them with a nod and gestured to her ledger.
"I understand you're interested in a contract."
"I want five ships," Cregan said. "Built here. To specifications I'll provide. Copper-plated hulls. Dual rudders. Narrow profile."
Vellari tapped her ledger. "Names?"
"No heraldry," Cregan said. "Just numbers."
"Registration code?"
"None."
She paused. "That's highly irregular."
"Call it Northern irregularity."
She glanced at Benjen, who offered a nonchalant shrug.
"You'll pay up front?"
"Half now. Half on completion."
She studied him a moment longer.
"Done," she said. "But don't expect flags or fanfare."
"I expect silence," Cregan said.
She raised her cup in salute.
"To ghost ships, then."
--
The gondola glided silently beneath a bridge carved with mermaids and swords.
Braavos shimmered in the evening light, golden lanterns reflecting off black water, stars gathering like scattered silver. As the Wolf's Wake contingent approached the Palace of Twilight, even Benjen Stark—rarely impressed by architecture—let out a low breath.
The palace sat at the mouth of the lagoon, built from shadowed marble and deep red stone that drank the sunset whole. Its towers were slender and strange, domed with silver-leafed tiles and latticed windows that glittered like fish scales.
"This place wasn't built to defend," Myra Reed murmured beside Cregan.
"No," he said, stepping onto the dock. "It was built to remind."
---
Inside, the palace was warmer than expected.
Not in temperature, but tone.
Musicians in silver half-masks played slow, drifting harmonies. Servants glided between the crowd with trays of translucent fruit and pale wine that smelled faintly of almonds. No one raised their voices. No one moved quickly.
It was a performance of patience.
Cregan wore Stark grey—simple, clean, finely made. No jewels. No sword. His only ornament was a single carved weirwood pin, white against his collar.
Benjen, beside him, wore black and rust, a quiet signal of rank without flash.
Myra, Smalljon, Harrion, and Ethan fanned out into the chamber, careful not to clump, as instructed.
Their masks were expressions of Northern subtlety. Stone grey. Barely detailed. Watching, not speaking.
They were here to observe.
---
The Sea Lord greeted him in the central rotunda—tall, aging, dressed in indigo silk, with a high collar shaped like a crescent moon.
"Lord Stark," he said, extending a hand. "Braavos welcomes the Wolf."
Cregan accepted the handshake briefly. "And the Wolf learns well when welcomed."
The Sea Lord smiled faintly. "I hear you've kept our scribes busy. Maps. Contracts. Copper drafts."
"I prefer to plan with detail," Cregan said.
The man gestured toward the upper hall. "Then perhaps tonight, we'll show you what detail means in Braavos."
---
The party was not a feast in the Westerosi sense.
There were no toasts. No declarations. No flattery thick as wine. Instead, guests wore silence like jewelry. Every word spoken was a calculation. Every absence, a signal.
Cregan moved slowly through the upper hall, glass in hand, saying little.
He passed a Myrish trader with rings on every finger, speaking in whispers to a magistrate from Norvos.
He passed a Lyseni noble whose mask was carved to weep pearls.
He passed a man with no visible escort, no drink, and no sleeves—his tattoos marked with black flames.
And none of them noticed when Cregan stopped walking.
They had noticed him.
But they expected curiosity.
They expected awkwardness.
They did not expect a Stark to already know which direction the current was flowing.
---
Benjen rejoined him near the indoor garden.
"Half this place smells like perfume and vinegar."
"That's what old wine becomes," Cregan said.
Benjen looked at him sideways. "You've barely spoken all night."
"They've said enough without me."
"And what have you learned?"
Cregan's gaze passed across the room.
"That man at the fountain owns eight war galleys. He's funding a dispute in Qohor."
Benjen blinked. "You spoke to him?"
"No. I listened to the man behind him with the three rings."
Benjen chuckled. "Remind me not to drink near you."
Cregan's tone didn't shift. "People drink too much when they think people aren't watching, and then they're Tongues become loose"
Benjen's smirk faded.
---
Later, as music shifted to a sharper rhythm and masks began to thin from formal to poetic, Cregan was approached by a woman in deep green, face hidden behind polished bone.
She bowed. "The Sea Lord sends his regards."
"I thanked him already."
She tilted her head. "He wonders what you seek."
"Commerce."
"Nothing more?"
"Trade," Cregan said. "Timber. Grain. Steel. Passage. Perhaps patience."
"Not gold?"
"Only if it grows something worth twice as much."
She stepped closer. "You're different from most Westerosi."
"I'm a Stark"
She gave a small, elegant laugh and moved on.
Cregan stood alone for a time, watching the city flicker beyond the palace windows.
This was not war.
This was the knife before the knife.
---
At midnight, the Sea Lord returned to him on the balcony.
"You've danced little," he said.
"I don't dance."
"A pity. In Braavos, every movement is a signal."
"Then I hope mine were clear."
The Sea Lord smiled. "Some wonder what you came here to take."
"Then they've misunderstood," Cregan said. "I came here to offer."
"To offer what?"
"An honest partner. A new route through old snow. Access to a kingdom where coin hasn't yet drowned the soil."
The Sea Lord was quiet a moment.
"Your ships will be watched."
"They already are."
He turned to go, then paused.
"Next time you come to Braavos, Lord Stark, bring music."
Cregan inclined his head. "Next time, I'll bring sails."
----
It began with the flame in Cregan's study flickering sideways, though no wind stirred.
He didn't look up from his writing.
"Most visitors knock," he said.
The figure who entered made no sound. He seemed to move without weight or breath. His robe was ash-grey. His face... was difficult. Not hidden, not revealed—like an idea you forgot mid-thought.
Cregan capped his inkwell, calmly.
"Braavos keeps its masks," he said. "But I assume you do not need one."
The man did not respond. Instead, he bowed—not deeply, but with precision. Not servant to master. Not friend to friend.
Recognition. Nothing more. Nothing less.
"The man knew a man come," the man said, voice flat, with a slight echo of someone else's tone folded behind it.
"I didn't," Cregan replied. "But I understand why you have."
Silence.
Then the man spoke again. "The man is known to the House."
"By name?"
"Not by name," the man said. "By truth."
Cregan stood and approached slowly, arms behind his back.
"You believe in truth?" he asked.
"We serve it," the man said.
Cregan studied him.
"I never asked for anything," he said quietly. "Not for this life. Not for titles. I found the Hallows, but I didn't seek them."
"A man bore them all," the Faceless Man said. "And that is enough."
Cregan was silent for a long moment.
"And now?" he asked. "What does the House want of me?"
The man tilted his head. "Nothing. The House does not want. It recognizes, it serves."
And then he knelt.
Then he rose, and turned to go.
"A man will come to the House," he said before vanishing, "when he is ready."
---
Cregan came the next night.
He wore no sigil, no sword, no armor—only dark grey robes and the ring carved from weirwood that Ned had given him before he left.
He told no one where he was going.
Benjen watched him leave without asking.
The Black Canal was quiet at night, more a wound than a waterway. The doors of the House of Black and White opened without a knock. The interior was colder than the sea outside, though no wind stirred within.
The stone floor gleamed with a strange sheen—like oil on still water. The air smelled of ink, ash, and something older.
She met him near the threshold.
A girl, no older than twelve, in grey robes and bare feet. Her face was soft, her eyes unblinking. Her voice was not childish.
"A man was expected."
"Then you know why I've come," Cregan said.
"We do not know," she replied. "We remember."
He followed.
---
They walked in silence through halls built for silence. No torches, no windows. The light came from nowhere and everywhere.
He passed statues of gods from a hundred lands. Some monstrous, some formless, one that looked like a crying child with no mouth.
"Do you worship them?" he asked.
"No," the girl said. "We remember that they were worshipped."
The next chamber held a long black pool. A man knelt at its edge, head bowed. He held no coin, no offering. Just breath.
"Does he pray?"
"No. He is remembering his face."
---
In the deeper halls, there were jars—hundreds of them, neatly ordered and sealed.
"They're not labeled," Cregan said.
"They do not need to be," she replied.
He understood.
---
At last, they reached a room with a single stone chair.
On it sat the man from the night before.
This time, he wore a different face. Older. Familiar in ways Cregan couldn't place.
"A man came" the man said.
"I had questions."
"And a man has answers," the man said.
Cregan sat on the stone bench provided. He didn't fidget.
"The House serves death," he said slowly. "But not for coin alone."
"No," the man replied. "We serve death because it is the only truth in life Valar Morghulis, Valar Doheiris
"You believe I control it."
"You wear its mark," the man said. "You carried the Wand, the Stone, the Cloak. You passed untouched by the Veil. In this world or the next, that is not forgotten."
Cregan studied him. "But I didn't ask for your service."
"You didn't have to."
"And what do you expect in return?"
The man tilted his head. "Nothing, a man serves death and you are its master. A man does what death master wants.
---
Cregan stood.
Cregan looked at him. "For now will watch my enemies close and my friends closer still"
The man inclined his head.
"Then I have a question," Cregan said.
"Ask."
"How many can you spare without effecting your trade in essos?:
The man did not answer immediately. Instead, he walked to a side wall, pressed his palm to smooth stone, and a slit opened.
Inside was a map.
Westeros. Braavos. Essos.
And on that map—thousands of tiny red threads stretched across the sea.
One touched the Vale. One traced into King's Landing. One coiled like a snake through the North, in pentos,southayros,dorne all over planetos the house of black and white stood in sigil."
"We see," the man said. "We do not interfere until the master orders."
"I want someone to report to me, i need a spy master.," Cregan said. "To report,to collate and to do as ordered. The Boltons. The Kings Landing everywhere.
The man regarded him carefully.
"No kills?"
"Not yet" Cregan said.
"And who decides?"
"I do," he said.
The man agreed.
---
Before he left, the girl handed him a small bundle.
Inside was a coin—black, old, cold to the touch.
Not iron. Not steel.
Something older.
She did not speak. She only bowed.
---
Cregan returned to the manor before dawn.
Benjen was waiting with a cup of warm tea and no questions.
Cregan sat across from him and set the coin on the table between them.
"Is that what I think it is?" Benjen asked.
"No," Cregan said. "It's what they think it is."
Benjen sipped his tea.
"And what do you think?"
Cregan looked at the black coin, its strange shimmer, the faint whisper in its stillness.
"I think the I just gained a spy ring that can be anyone. I think that the North just became safer."
---
The city changed them slowly.
Not with fire or blood, but with fog, time, and the constant, quiet motion of a place that had long since learned how to forget its own beginnings. Braavos was a city of masks, but the North did not wear them. The Stark banner flew plainly above the Wolf's Wake, and Cregan had not once covered his face.
The locals noticed.
They always noticed.
---
Myra Reed, ever watchful, walked the banks of the Moon Pool alone that morning, braid heavy with river-hung mist. Six moons they had been in Braavos, and still the smell of salt and smoke hung thick in her nose. She could track every street by scent alone now—brine, garlic, wet stone, sweet oil, piss. Even the temples had smells. Especially the temples.
She preferred the fog. The grey. The way Braavos spoke in whispers and half-sights. It reminded her of the Neck—if the Neck had gold and marble facades and backroom duels with glass knives.
There were parts of her that missed home already. But not many.
She stopped when she reached the base of a statue—some long-forgotten warrior with his sword rusted to his back. She pressed a palm to the stone, listening to the cold.
"He's not what they expected," she murmured. The stone said nothing.
---
Rodrick Snow had taken to climbing rooftops.
Not for mischief, as in his youth, but to watch. Braavos from above was no less strange than from below—every rooftop a different height, a different color, a different age. The city was built like a lie told in layers.
He watched the Braavosi carry crates into the shipyard, sail past in narrow-skiff tradeships, talk in five languages before breakfast. Once, he saw a masked woman slit a purse string without pausing her stride. Once, he saw a child slip into a manhole and never come back out.
He did not speak of it.
Rodrick didn't speak much anymore, except to Smalljon, who would have mocked the whole city to its face if not for the food.
---
Smalljon Umber hated the city and loved its firepots.
"They've got bloody baked eel inside bread, Rodrick. You ever seen that before? Bread! With stuff in it! You think that's magic?"
"No," Rodrick said.
"Damn near is."
Braavos confused Smalljon. Everyone bowed differently. Their coin had faces of dead men. They let women run guilds and kissed both cheeks and never once spoke plainly.
But they hadn't disrespected Cregan, not once. Not openly. That counted for something.
The Sea Lord treated him like a man grown. The Iron Bank gave him silver without smirking. The shipbuilders called him "Lord Stark" without raising brows.
Smalljon still didn't know how he felt about that. But he liked the eel.
---
Asher, the quietest of them all, had taken to walking the long stone bridges at night, fingers brushing the rails, memorizing the turns. He spoke little, but he was watching everything.
At night, when the others slept, he sketched naval designs by firelight—new hull shapes, rudder variants, sloped copper ribs. Braavos wasn't just teaching them trade. It was showing them how the sea moved.
Asher saw it first: Cregan wasn't building ships for war. He was building a network. Copper-hulled traders. Silent-running scouts. Barges for canal-borne grain. And hidden beneath it all, a shape that hadn't yet revealed itself.
He didn't ask. Not yet.
---
Cregan rarely explained.
Each morning he rose before the others, walked the edge of the Grand Canal alone, and returned to their quarters with salt on his boots and nothing to say.
But the orders kept coming.
Trade with Lorath to be extended via third-party Braavosi brokers.
Trade with Yi-Ti for rice grain to be expanded with backing from the Iron Bank.
A contract written for a dozen glassblowers to arrive in White Harbor by winter.
The reinforced harbor plans for Sea Dragon Point approved and drawn.
Quiet inquiries to Carcosa and Qarth for obsidian supply made via silent intermediaries.
He sent Myra to the shipyards. Smalljon to the harbor authorities. Rodrick to track whispers in the canals. Asher to map what the Braavosi weren't showing them.
He never called them spies. Never gave them blades. Just tasks. Always one at a time.
And it worked.
Because they trusted him.
Because Braavos, for all its smoke and shadow, was beginning to realize that this Stark—young as he was—wasn't here to be impressed.
---
By the end of the sixth moon, the talk had shifted.
Not just "a northern boy with old eyes."
Now they whispered: "the wolf who doesn't blink." "The boy who doesn't bow, and doesn't need to."
The Braavosi library did not announce itself with towers or domes. It sat low to the water, plain and wide, as if trying to hide its own significance beneath stone and restraint.
Benjen Stark passed under its carved archway just after sunrise, accompanied only by Marwyn. Cregan had not come this time. "They've seen enough of my face," he'd said the night before. "Let the rest of you cast shadows."
The entrance was guarded not by men, but by stillness. Even the city's ever-present gulls dared not cry overhead. Braavos treated knowledge as sacred—but also dangerous.
Benjen entered with a purpose.
---
Inside, the scent of wax, parchment, and dust struck him like memory. Though smaller than the Citadel's grand towers, this library felt older. Not more ancient in age—but in attitude. Books were kept here like secrets, not trophies.
Long tables stretched beneath stained glass windows. Vellum and silk scrolls lay wrapped in iron-spined folders. Some texts glowed faintly, others hissed when touched, as if resisting being opened. Scholars in grey robes moved in silence, their eyes marked with small dots of ink—one for every decade they'd served.
Marwyn was already grinning.
"They store half their older works in iron leaf to stop sorcerous decay," he muttered as they passed an archivist. "And look—no chains. They trust no one, but they don't bind their books. That's philosophy."
Benjen didn't answer. His fingers brushed the pouch at his belt, feeling the smooth cold weight of the rune-stones inside.
Three dozen. Black basalt, each carved with mirrored glyphs.
Just like Cregan had used in Oldtown.
He stopped by the far window table—a position that caught light but avoided full sun. From here, he had a clean view of all four main shelves. He let his hands rest casually on the wood.
Then he began.
One by one, he dropped the stones—lightly, soundlessly—into hidden places:
Between the split in the stone flooring.
Beneath the cushion of a warped wooden stool.
Inside a shelf gap behind a crumbling folio on pre-Valyrian freeholds.
Each drop was nothing. Each stone hummed the moment it touched stillness.
Copying. All of it.
---
Across the room, Marwyn distracted a younger scribe with questions about memory-stamped vellum.
"Do you know how to neutralize a fire-etched curse without dampening the binding layer?"
The scribe blinked. "Sir, we don't—"
"You don't, but I do," Marwyn said, cheerful. "See this one? Smells like wine? That's a blood-preservation rune. Not common. Only shows up in shadow-compendiums and—"
The archivist shooed them both away, grumbling, but the distraction had worked.
Benjen finished placing the last rune-stone beneath a cracked pedestal near the Braavosi war records. A faint whisper brushed against his skin—the same chill he'd felt in the crypts of Winterfell.
It's working.
He straightened, nodded once to Marwyn, and quietly moved toward the far end of the hall.
---
Later, outside the library, they sat on the edge of a rain-wet dock.
"That'll copy… everything?" Benjen asked.
"Everything in the library's memory field," Marwyn confirmed. "The stones don't steal words—they imprint magical residue. Then we'll transcribe the echoes back home."
"Is it theft?"
Marwyn snorted. "Of course it is."
Benjen watched the boats for a while, then asked: "Would Cregan do this if the books were just stories? If there were no power in them?"
"He wouldn't waste the effort."
Marwyn turned to face him. "He understands what no one in Oldtown ever dared admit. Knowledge isn't neutral. It's a blade. And now the North holds the hilt."
---
Benjen didn't answer, but he touched the rune-pouch at his side once more.
Somewhere beneath the Braavosi stones, the ancient library was whispering.
And now, Winterfell would listen
---
The Iron Bank of Braavos had no windows. Its walls were black stone, polished to a mirror sheen. Its doors did not creak. Its clerks did not smile. The only thing that moved quickly inside was gold.
Cregan Stark stepped through the archway with Benjen at his side. No guards escorted them. They did not need to. The Iron Bank had no fear—not of blades, not of kings.
They had seen dragons fall.
A clerk greeted them with a bow deeper than the last time. Not warm, not friendly—respectful. Progress.
"This way, Lord Stark. Your ledger is ready."
They were led down a silent corridor into a private chamber. Everything in the room was spare: a polished table, three chairs, one brass lamp, and a single thin folio bound in blue leather.
Behind it sat Magister Kollis, the same Braavosi who had negotiated the preliminary arrangements months ago. This time, he stood to greet them.
"We are pleased with your early returns," Kollis said, gesturing to the folio. "Copper procurement, canal surveys, and transit contracts with Lorathi merchants have all reached phase two thresholds. The initial loan is confirmed as safe."
Cregan didn't sit immediately. He studied the man's face, then the folio.
"Speak plainly. Will you release the next tranche?"
Kollis inclined his head. "We will. Twenty thousand golden dragons, in Northern silver equivalent. The next portion will follow on construction milestones for the Fever River locks."
Benjen raised a brow. "That's enough coin to fund four keeps."
"Or one kingdom's throat," said Kollis, mildly.
Cregan took the seat across from him.
"We don't seek a throat," he said. "We seek arteries. Connect the North. Feed it. Strengthen it."
Kollis steepled his fingers. "And in return, you offer us guaranteed access to the White Knife and Fever River canal routes for all Braavosi trade. Taxed modestly. Enforced fiercely."
"You've read the agreement."
"I helped write it."
They sat in silence a moment, the lamp casting low shadows.
Then Kollis reached into a side drawer and placed something on the table.
A silver key, etched with a faint sigil—half direwolf, half iron coin.
"This unlocks the merchant vault we've created for your House," he said. "Under Braavosi law, its contents are protected from all foreign seizure—including by Westerosi kings."
Benjen's eyes narrowed. "Even Robert?"
"Even dragons, were they to rise again."
Cregan picked up the key, weighing it in his palm.
"No interest."
"No debt," Kollis agreed. "A partnership. You do not borrow from us, Lord Stark. You build with us. And if you fall, your fall will cost us. That is why we intend not to let you fall."
There was something chilling in that—the cold confidence of a banker who believed in numbers more than men.
But Cregan welcomed it.
It meant the math worked.
He stood, placed the key inside his cloak, and gave a slow nod.
"Then we begin phase three."
---
Outside, on the canal steps, Benjen exhaled long and hard. "You know, I'm still not sure if we walked out of there richer… or more bound."
Cregan didn't look back.
"Both."
---
The Sea Lord's palace rose like a cresting wave at the edge of the city—a domed hall of pale stone, with banners stitched in silver and sea-green silk drifting in the breeze. The guards did not wear armor but layered robes marked with the glyphs of ancient oaths. There were no trumpets, no declarations—just the soft ringing of wind chimes as the Northern party entered.
They came not as strangers now, but as participants.
Cregan led them, flanked by Benjen and Marwyn, with Myra, Rodrick, Smalljon, and Asher behind—each cloaked in subdued Northern grey, their House sigils small but clear. There was no fanfare. Only silence, and the scent of salt and sandalwood.
The Sea Lord's court had changed since their first visit.
This time, there were fewer masks.
Not gone—but lowered, tilted, set aside when speaking. Braavosi fashion still ruled: curved collars, feathered shoulders, black silk and sea-glass beads. But now, faces were visible. Now, names were spoken clearly.
They had been accepted.
Or at least... weighed.
---
Myra Reed moved like a shadow, eyes darting from scribe to envoy to merchant. She counted six new faces she didn't recognize—two Lorathi, one from Pentos, one in red silks she'd bet came from Volantis, and two who didn't speak at all.
The Braavosi were observing. Testing. Measuring Cregan not by age, but by traction. She could feel it in how they stood straighter when he passed, how their gazes lingered on his hands—his rings, his posture, the curve of his jaw when he didn't smile.
This was no longer a boy to them. He had become a movement.
---
Rodrick Snow kept his eyes on the floor tiles—blue glass laid in weeping wave patterns. He didn't speak, didn't shift, didn't blink more than he had to. In Braavos, stillness was a weapon.
Cregan had taught them that. Not with lessons, but with example.
He remembered the first audience: tension, masks, unspoken jabs.
Now? The Sea Lord greeted them with a bow.
---
"Lord Stark," the Sea Lord said, descending two steps to meet them. "Six moons you have walked our streets. You have not stolen, threatened, or begged. And yet, you have left marks."
Cregan inclined his head. "Then we've done well."
The Sea Lord smiled. "Come. Let us speak plainly."
They followed him into the sunroom beyond the audience chamber—an oval gallery open to the water on one side, the walls etched with a history of ships and storms.
Tea was poured. Soft citrus, light and clean.
---
Smalljon didn't drink his.
Too delicate. Too still.
He stood at the edge, eyeing the horizon through the arched opening, one hand resting lightly on his belt. He didn't speak unless spoken to—but his presence loomed like the weight of winter behind a closed door.
Braavosi respected that.
---
The Sea Lord spoke softly, but without hesitation.
"We have confirmed extended access for your traders through the Black Canal and the Lorathi Straits. In exchange, your sealed agreement holds: tax regulation, harbor privileges, anti-slavery alignment, and exclusive cold-season grain routes from the North."
Cregan nodded once. "It will be honored."
The Sea Lord turned toward the rest of the group.
"You travel with good watchers, Lord Stark. Your men do not gossip. Your women do not flatter. Even your ghosts do not speak too loud."
A chuckle from Marwyn. A glance from Myra. Silence from Cregan.
The Sea Lord stepped closer.
"You were right, six moons ago, when you said the South does not understand the North. But Braavos does. We do not kneel. We remember. As you do."
He reached into a long pocket and drew out a glass token, shaped like a teardrop, etched with the mark of a ship's wheel and wolf's fang.
"From this day, the North may anchor in Braavos without question. You are no longer visitors."
Cregan took the token, turned it once between his fingers, and bowed—not deeply, but precisely.
"Then our long winter will have a port."
---
Asher watched it all from the edge of the gathering, noting how the Sea Lord's servants recorded everything—every gesture, every phrase. Braavos knew the power of memory.
When they walked out into the open air again, he whispered:
"You weren't negotiating in there. You were being welcomed."
Cregan didn't respond.
He didn't need to.
---
The doors opened without sound. They always did.
The House of Black and White stood unchanged—no banners, no guards, no signal of status or time. Just the carved gods above the entrance, each face expressionless, timeless, deathless.
Cregan passed beneath them in silence.
The air inside was cool, still, and smelled faintly of smoke and salt. The candles hadn't moved since his last visit—six moons ago, when he first came not as a petitioner, but as something stranger.
Master of death, they'd called him. A title he hadn't claimed. But they had given it freely, and now it followed him like a shadow.
He walked the same path as before—left past the still pool, right at the hooded statue of the Stranger, and down a corridor lit only by small braziers.
At the end of the hall, she waited.
She wore no name, no face he could remember from before. But her eyes were the same—grey, unblinking, sharp as carved stone.
"You returned," she said.
"I said I would."
The girl—woman, really, though she moved like wind—bowed slightly. "And what do you bring?"
Cregan reached into his cloak and withdrew a velvet-wrapped bundle. When he unwrapped it, the obsidian mirrors inside caught no flame, no reflection—just the shape of absence.
"One Hundred," he said. "Each carved and linked to a twin in Winterfell for whoever is chosen to join me. They will be in charge of running the Spy ring, everyone will report to them who reports to me.
The woman stepped forward and took them from you"
She took one in her hand, cradling it like blade.
She nodded once, then turned.
Another figure stepped from the shadows behind her—a young man, faceless for now, wearing grey robes with hands folded. Cregan met his eyes.
"This one will come with you," she said. "He will do as you wish."
---
The sails unfurled just before dawn.
No drums. No calls. No fanfare. Just the sound of ropes tightening, water lapping against hull, and gulls wheeling high in the salt-stained sky.
The Wolf's Wake was fully loaded—five chests of copied Braavosi knowledge sealed beneath deck, crates of obsidian mirrors bound for the North, contracts inked in three languages, and a dozen new faces in Northern grey. Scholars, smiths, and quiet-eyed thinkers—all handpicked or drawn to Cregan's shadow.
On the docks, the Sea Lord's steward watched in silence. The deal was done. The wolf had taken nothing he hadn't earned.
Benjen stood at the prow beside Marwyn, eyes narrowed against the light. "Feels strange," he muttered.
"What does?"
"Leaving. After all this… it doesn't feel like we're going home. It feels like we're bringing something back. Like we're carrying… winter in our bones."
Marwyn smiled behind his beard. "That's because you are."
On the deck, Smalljon checked the rigging while Rodrick walked the perimeter in silence. Asher leaned over the side, watching the harbor fade into mist. Myra sat cross-legged with a thin Braavosi journal, its spine cracked, her eyes unreadable.
Below, the young faceless man moved unseen among the shadows of the hold. He said nothing. But Cregan had given him a name: Whisper.
Cregan stood at the stern, facing Braavos as it slowly disappeared behind them. The Titan's legs framed the narrowing mouth of the harbor. In his hand, he held the Sea Lord's token—the glass tear etched with wolf and wheel.
He turned it once in his fingers, then slipped it inside his cloak.
No one spoke.
There was nothing left to say.
They had come in silence.
They left with steel and shadow, trade and truth, death and memory.
When the last glimmer of Braavos vanished into the fog, Cregan whispered:
"The South will learn. The North does not beg. It builds."
Then he turned toward the wind, and the sails caught full. The Wolf's Wake surged forward, cutting through the black water like a promise. The cold promise of home.