The world did not begin with a bang, but with the biting kiss of ice.
Thalion's first sensation was the absence of song. In Imladris, the very air hummed with the resonance of the earth—the rhythmic pulse of the Bruinen, the silver whispers of the birches, and the ancient, golden warmth of the Vilya's protection. Here, there was only a flat, dead void.
He opened his eyes, and the world was white.
Not the shimmering, pearlescent white of the High Elves' halls, but a cruel, suffocating grey-white that tasted of iron and old graves.
He lay on a bed of frozen needles and powdered frost, his cheek pressed against the biting earth. Every breath was a struggle against a cold so profound it felt like a physical weight pressing into his lungs.
He pushed himself up. His movements, even hindered by the disorientation of a soul torn through the veil of worlds, remained fluid—a slow, liquid rise that defied the shivering stiffness of the mortal frame. His fingers, long and calloused from centuries of the bowstring and the hilt, brushed against the fine links of his mithril mail. The metal was cold, yet it retained a faint, internal hum, the last vestige of a craft born under a different sun.
"Where is the light?" he whispered.
His voice was a ghost of its former self, thin and melodic, echoing against the gnarled, blackened trunks of trees that looked like skeletal fingers clawing at a leaden sky. There was no sun here, only a pale, sickly glow filtered through a ceiling of heavy clouds.
He reached for the source of his survival. At his hip, the hilt of his blade—Aeglosir, the Snow-Cutter—waited. As his palm closed around the white-leather grip, a pulse of soft, sapphire light bled through the seams of the scabbard. It was dim, flickering like a dying candle, but it was the only color in a world of monochrome.
The sword was singing, but its song was a warning.
Danger.
Thalion stood. He did not brush the snow from his cloak; it seemed to slide off him of its own accord, as if the winter itself were hesitant to touch his skin. He closed his eyes, extending his senses, searching for the familiar threads of the Oshari, the great tapestry of life.
It was gone.
The magic of this land was not dead, but it was sleeping in a way that felt like a coma. It was buried deep beneath leagues of stone and ice, hidden away from a world that had forgotten how to speak to it. He felt a sudden, sharp pang of loneliness—a hollow ache in his chest that no amount of elven stoicism could suppress. He was a fragment of a lost melody played in a silent hall.
Then, he heard it.
The rhythm was discordant. Heavy boots trampling the delicate crust of the snow. The wet, ragged gasps of men who knew nothing of the grace of the woods. The scent reached him a heartbeat later: stale ale, unwashed wool, and the sharp, metallic tang of rusted iron.
"Look at 'im," a voice croaked, breaking the sacred silence of the wood like a stone shattering glass. "Is it a man? Or some forest wraith?"
Thalion turned.
Four figures emerged from the gloom of the weirwoods. They were swaddled in furs that stank of rot, their faces hidden behind tangled mats of beard and filth. These were not the Orcs of the Misty Mountains, nor the refined cruelty of the Haradrim. These were scavengers—small, desperate, and radiating a primal malice.
"The armor," another whispered, his eyes widening as they landed on the shimmering mithril beneath Thalion's grey traveling cloak. "That's silver. Proper silver. We'll eat like lords in White Harbor for a year on that."
Thalion did not draw his sword. He stood with his hands at his sides, his posture as still as a marble statue in the gardens of Elrond. His silver-gold hair, unbound, caught what little light remained, making him appear like a fallen star amidst the muck.
"I seek only the path," Thalion said, his voice carrying the weight of centuries. He spoke the Common Tongue, though it felt clumsy and sharp on his tongue. "I have no quarrel with you, Second-born. Stand aside, and let the peace of the forest remain unbroken."
The largest of the four, a man with a jagged scar running through a milky eye, let out a harsh, barking laugh. He hefted a heavy, double-bitted axe, the metal notched and stained with old blood.
"He talks like a soft-handed southron lordling," the scarred man spat. "But he's got no guards. Just a pretty face and a shiny coat."
He lunged.
To the men, the movement was a blur. To Thalion, it was as slow as the falling snow.
He did not reach for his steel. As the axe swung in a wide, clumsy arc meant to cleave bone, Thalion simply... wasn't there. He pivoted on the ball of his foot, a motion so precise it left no footprint in the fresh powder.
The axe head whistled through the empty air where his chest had been a millisecond before.
The bandit stumbled, his momentum carrying him forward. Thalion's hand shot out—not a fist, but a strike with the edge of his palm, quick as a viper's tongue. It connected with the man's temple with a sickening thud.
The giant collapsed without a sound, his body hitting the snow like a felled log.
The other three froze. The silence returned, heavier than before, broken only by the ragged breathing of the survivors.
"Witchcraft!" one shrieked, his voice cracking with terror. "Did ye see 'im? He didn't even move!"
"Kill 'im! Stick 'im together!"
Two of them rushed him at once, wielding rusted shortswords. Their desperation turned them into animals. Thalion felt a flicker of pity—a brief, tragic realization that in this world, life was so cheap that men would die for a scrap of metal.
He drew Aeglosir.
The blade slid from the scabbard with a sound like a choir hitting a high, crystalline note. It didn't just glow; it breathed. A radiant, piercing azure light flooded the clearing, illuminating the terrified faces of the bandits and the ancient, twisted bark of the trees.
The air around the blade seemed to hum, a low, musical vibration that made the very snowflakes dance away from the edge.
Thalion moved.
He was a whirlwind of silver and blue. He did not hack or hew; he danced. A parry that sent sparks flying from a rusted blade, followed by a pommel-strike to a solar plexus. He spun, his cloak billowing like a cloud, and with a single, elegant flick of his wrist, he disarmed the second man, sending his sword spinning into the high branches of a pine.
He stood in a low guard, the point of his glowing blade inches from the throat of the last standing man.
"Yield," Thalion commanded.
The bandit dropped to his knees, his hands clawing at the snow. He wasn't looking at Thalion's face; he was staring at the sword, his eyes wide with a superstitious dread that bordered on madness.
"White Demon..." the man whimpered, his teeth chattering. "The Others... the White Walkers have come for us..."
"I am no demon," Thalion said softly, the blue light reflecting in his starlit eyes. "And I know nothing of your 'Others.' Go. While the mercy of the Eldar still holds."
The men did not need to be told twice. They scrambled backward, tripping over their own feet, abandoning their fallen leader. They disappeared into the treeline, their screams echoing until the forest swallowed them whole.
Thalion sheathed his blade. The blue light died away, leaving the world feeling darker and colder than before. He looked down at the unconscious man at his feet. He could hear the heavy, irregular beat of the human's heart. It was a fragile, thumping thing, so different from the rhythmic, melodic pulse of his own kin.
He looked up at the grey sky. "Father," he whispered to the silence, "into what broken realm have I fallen?"
The silence did not last.
The wind shifted, bringing with it a new sound: the rhythmic, disciplined thunder of many horses. These were not the frantic movements of desperate men, but the steady approach of soldiers.
Thalion did not hide. He stood in the center of the clearing, his tall, slender frame a stark contrast to the dark, gnarled wood. He smoothed his cloak and waited, his hands resting lightly on his belt.
Out of the mist emerged a line of riders. They wore heavy grey cloaks trimmed with thick fur, and their armor was dark, functional steel. At their head rode a man who carried the weight of the mountains in his shoulders.
His hair was brown, flecked with the salt of early winter, and his eyes were the color of the storm clouds above. Beside him rode a younger man, his face a softer mirror of the leader's, and a leaner, dark-haired youth with a smirk that didn't reach his watchful eyes.
The riders pulled their mounts to a halt. The horses shifted uneasily, blowing plumes of steam from their nostrils, their eyes rolling at the sight of the golden-haired stranger.
The leader dismounted. His movements were deliberate, the actions of a man who lived by a code as cold and hard as the land he ruled. He looked at the unconscious bandit, then at the elegant, ethereal figure standing before him.
Thalion felt the man's gaze. It was heavy with justice and a grim sort of honor. This was a lord of men, a king in all but name.
"I am Eddard of House Stark, Lord of Winterfell and Warden of the North," the man said, his voice a deep rumble that seemed to command the very air. He reached for the hilt of a massive greatsword strapped to his back, but he did not draw it. "You stand on my lands, stranger. You've done my work for me with these ruffians, it seems."
Ned Stark stepped closer, his brow furrowed as he took in Thalion's features—the pointed tips of his ears peeking through his hair, the unlined perfection of his skin, and the ancient depth in his eyes.
"You wear the clothes of a high lord, yet I know of no House that bears your likeness,"
Ned continued, his tone hardening. "In the name of King Robert... who are you? And where is your home?"
Thalion looked at him. He saw the honor in the man, but he also saw the shadows—the scent of blood and old secrets that clung to him like a second skin. He realized then that his tongue would not find the words this man needed to hear. The Common Speech of this land was a blunt instrument, incapable of describing the towers of Tirion or the light of the Two Trees.
Thalion bowed, a slow, graceful inclination of his head that belonged to a court that had passed out of memory.
"I lû daras..." he began, his voice like the chime of silver bells. "I lû mornë, ar i mardor fanyar. Nan Thalion, i nírë o Imladris."
The riders shifted. Robb Stark gripped his reins tighter, his knuckles white. Theon Greyjoy let out a low whistle, his hand straying to his bow.
"What's he saying, Father?" Robb whispered, his voice tinged with awe and a hint of fear. "Is it Valyrian?"
"No," Ned replied, his eyes never leaving Thalion's. "I've heard the speech of the Free Cities and the dragon-tongue of old records. This... this is something else."
Ned Stark took another step forward, his hand dropping from his sword. He saw the loneliness in the stranger's eyes—a weariness that he recognized, though it seemed magnified a thousandfold.
"I do not understand your words," Ned said, his voice softening slightly but losing none of its authority. "But you are a long way from wherever you belong. There are wolves in these woods, and worse things than bandits."
Thalion remained silent. He could feel the cold deepening as the sun—hidden though it was—began to dip below the horizon. The shadows of the trees lengthened, stretching out like dark hands toward the small circle of men.
He felt the gaze of the Northmen upon him—suspicion, wonder, and a growing, uneasy dread. He was a piece of white quartz dropped into a sea of black iron. He was the last light of a dying world, standing at the threshold of a world that was just beginning to bleed.
The wind howled through the branches, a long, mournful sound that seemed to echo Thalion's own heart.
The Lord of Winterfell gestured toward a spare horse. "Come. The night is falling, and the North is no place for a man alone. We will find the truth of you at Winterfell."
Thalion looked at the horse, then back at the dark wall of the forest. He felt the fading pulse of his magic, a dying ember in a vast, frozen dark. He had no path. He had no people.
He stepped forward, his boots making no sound on the ice.
The silence of the North settled over them all, heavy and prophetic. The Last Eldar had come to Westeros, and the song of the world was about to change.