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Lady Lyanna Mormont still has her dolls.

They are hidden deep in her chest, under leather jerkins and studded brigantines and coat of mail, but she still has them. Lord Bern, Lady Berna and their son, Ser Bernie, are carved in wood, with etched faces, hair of flax (but only Lady Berna) and clothes of wool and linen. And then there’s Princess, Southern made, a delicate creation of porcelain with mobile joints, hair of fine brown silk and a grey embroidered gown adorned with real Mirish lace. Lyanna owed Princess as far as she could remember: a gift from her cousin’s second wife, upon her arrival on Bear Island.

Her lord cousin and his second wife were long gone, nothing more than names whispered with disappointment and hazy shadows in her memories. But Princess had stayed and Lyanna had kept playing with her, just like her eldest sister had kept the gown of green silk and Myrish lace she had received from the second wife —her finest, the one she wore at weddings and balls.

Lyanna holds Lord Bern, his wife and son, and Princess in her hands. There’s an annoying itch at the root of her nose and in her eyes, like when the linden trees are in bloom.

She was playing with them when Maester Garth had told the nurse to take Alysane’s children somewhere else because “he had to talk alone with milady”.

Lyanna had pretended not to hear what he had said—how he had called her—focusing on her dolls, how Princess’ gown was a little frayed but she didn’t have any grey silk thread to mend it. Lyanna had pretended not to understand what Maester Garth meant when he said she was now the Lady of Bear Island, regent for her babe nephew.

“Where is my mother? Where are my older sisters?” she had said, the distress of childhood slithering into her voice.

Maester Garth’s face turned sad, like every time the second wife was mentioned. “They are all… gone, milady.”

Lyanna was only a child of eight and she had tears brimming her eyes—but now she was the Lady of Bear Island, regent until her nephew came of age. She had never seen her mother cry—she would neither.

What Mama would do? What Mama would say?

Her Mama was the She-bear, who fiercely protected her cubs no matter what. Lyanna would do the same, she had promised in her heart, and had kept her word since then.

Lyanna glances behind her shoulder, but no one is looking at her. She holds her dolls close to her chest, sniffing one last time the resinous smell of Lord Bern, Lady Berna and Ser Bernie’s wood—savouring one last time the silk of Princess’ hair. Something moist and salty burns her eyes and her throat contracts on a sob. There is a chill in her bones, like the one that seizes her before she gets a fever—but different. She doesn’t know how or why, but Lyanna knows it’s different.

She takes a deep breath and rolls her dolls in a length of cloth, securing them with a leather string. The chill only grows as she descends to the crypts.

It must be because only Starks are allowed down here, she tells herself to give confines and reasons to the chill.

As she walks past the door, she notices how it could be locked only from the inside—it should be safe, yet the bolts’ thickness gives her little comfort.

The chill comes and goes as she walks past the tunnels—some lit by candles and lamps casting dancing shadows on a dead Stark’s face; some like wells of darkness where the air is as still as death. Odd, how she finds comfort in the sight of the latter, while the formers make her insides squirm with… Lyanna doesn’t want to give a name to the feeling: if she does, it would only make it more real.

Women and children and men too old or weak to fight cling to each other, mothers singing soft lullabies to chase their babes’ terrors away. Lyanna finds her people with little ease. They are tucked into a tunnel, between two Lord Stark whose names she doesn’t know—there is an odd relief in seeing dragonglass blades glimmer in her people’s hands. Lyanna sits with Alysane’s children.

The eldest, Maege, is a girl of seven: slender and graceful like Dacey, with her mother Alysane’s temper, and the Mormont’s looks except for the eyes—icy blue, perhaps the only thing she got from her father, whoever he is. The youngest is the boy-lord of Bear Island, too young to rule: Robb Battleborn, the Bear-cub. Had Ali knew that she was with child, she would have stayed back in Beat Island instead of birthing in the hours following the Battle of the Whispering Wood. In the letter that had come with the babe and his Riverland nurse, Ali claimed that the circumstances of her son’s birth were a good sign for House Mormont. And indeed, Little Robb had a temper as fiery and wild as the red hair he must have taken from his father, whoever he is—his Riverland nurse has trouble curbing him, but Maester Garth says he could grow into a real lord, given the right education.

She takes from the folds of her brigantine a leather string with a carved ivory pendant. It is a reproduction of the carving on her home’s door, a woman in a bearskin holding an axe in one hand and a babe in the other. She slips it around her niece’s neck.

“When my mama left, she”—her throat tightens, as if the words are congealing around her vocal cords— “she told me to take care of our people until her return.”

Lyanna pulls from the folds of her cloak a dragonglass dagger and places it in her niece’s hand. Her Mama speaks through her mouth, or so she likes to think as Lyanna repeats the farewell.

“Until my return, you are the Lady of Bear Island, Maggie: protect your brother, your lord, and those too weak to protect themselves.”

Maege looks at her with wide eyes, the fear and the weight of the role too heavy for a child of seven. Did Lyanna had the same look on her face when her Mama entrusted Bear Island into her hands? Just like her, so many years before, Maege stiffens her back, as if to look more grown up.

“I promise, Lady Aunt.”

For a moment, Lyanna wants to hold her tight, tell her niece that they would see each other after the battle—to promise that they would play with her dolls like they used to before Lord Eddard Stark rode South—but she knows in the marrow of her bones that it would be an empty promise. Instead, Lyanna unfolds her dolls from their bundle, staring at them one last time—she wants to hold them, kiss them, but she’s the Lady of Bear Island and cannot.

“Lord Bern, Lady Berna and Ser Bernie are Northerners from Bear Island, they know how to defend themselves,” she says softly, yet her voice is stern like her Mama’s, as she hands the dolls to her nephew. “But Princess is a Southerner, she only knows how to smile and be pretty, and songs of knights: you must protect her.”

Robb swells out his already strong chest—a real bear-cub—and pats himself like a proud grown man. “Wobbie stwong! Wobbie pwotect Pwincess! Wobbie pwomise! Auntie Nanna bewy pwoud!”

Again, that prickle at the root of her nose. ‘Auntie Nanna’. An ominous voice tells Lyanna that this is the last time she is called in such a way, but she shoves it as deep inside as she can.

“Indeed, I am very proud of you. As your Mama and Granmama,” she says, her voice fraying on the edge just a little bit—not too much, but easily mistakable for pride.

Lyanna cannot hold herself any longer. She wraps her arms around her sister’s children, sinking her face into their soft hair of coal and fire. A kiss on each forehead and she stands up, cursing the crypts dusty and musty air as she sniffs.

Her eyes rest on the sealed tomb behind her sister’s children and the Riverland nurse and the chill freezes the marrow of her bones. Lady Sansa claims the crypts are the safest place in Winterfell, but are they when the enemy is Death itself?

“Why are some tunnels unlit?” Lyanna asks to the Lady of Winterfell when she stumbles into her.

“These…” Lady Sansa’s voice quivers, as if she doesn’t want to answer. “These are empty tombs, milady.”

What would Mama do? What would Mama say?

“It would be safer if you stay in those.”

Lady Sansa scoffs. “There is nothing to fear. Besides, there is no mean to light—“

“Are there candles or lamps in a wolf den?” Lyanna asks with the same defiant tone her Mama would use—the same tone the other lords couldn’t bear from the mouth of a child. “Since there are none in a bear’s one, my people will move in there.” She turns to Maester Garth—she doesn’t want to think this might be her last words to him. “Have the women and children at the very back, and those willing to fight at the front.” She pauses. “Have also Ras stay in the back: he knows how to entertain children but forbid him to tell any scary story.”

Maester Garth glances at the Lady of Winterfell before he bows. “As you command, milady.”

The chill eases a little in Lyanna’s bones, and she stays while her people move into one of the pitch-black tunnels. Some give her a dubious glance as they walk past her, few dare to speak up—to those, Lyanna reminds their home, their past great lords and ladies—she calls the children “bear-cubs”, swelling their tiny chests with renewed pride and courage.

Her niece stops in front of her, her back straight and her head high, her hand clasped around her little brother’s one.

“I wish you good fortune in the battle to come, Lady Aunt.” Her voice is firm, already into the role of the Lady of Bear Island.

It’s so unfair. We are children, we should play and run in the sun and say silly things, not act and talk past our age.

“I will see you on the morrow,” Lyanna says instead. She leans a little over her nephew. “Be a good boy: listen to your sister, Maester Garth and your nurse.”

Robb twists his face in discontent and open his mouth, but it’s not the expected whine that comes. His expression hardens as much as a child of three could.

“Pwomise, Auntie Nanna.”

Even he knows… even he feels the chill. Still a babe and already so old… how unfair. How unfair…

After making sure all her people are settled and armed—If anything comes stirs in the tombs, strike before it could get out—Lyanna has no more excuses to stay in the crypts, to prolong those moments with her people, with her niece and nephew. Her steps ring up the stairs, soon the chill stillness of the crypts make place for the frantic chill of the courtyard.

Men run from the forge and the storerooms to the battlements, carrying baskets of arrows, crates of daggers and swords and axes, bundles of long spears—each one with blades and points of black shiny dragonglass. Lyanna’s eyes dart to the forge. Her eyes catch the Southerner smith, the big one with hair as black as soot and eyes as blue as the summer sky—he is still working, still beating dragonglass despite the battle will break in a few hours. Lyanna wishes to talk to him with the same ease as Lady Arya, thank him for his work, for arming her people, but her tongue is all a knot, like every time she approaches him—he’s the first one that makes her loose her words and Robb’s Riverland nurse had told her what it means. ‘A maiden’s crush’, she had called it: nothing to worry about, only a sign that she’s approaching womanhood.

The Riverland nurse was also the first to notice her budding bosom, the breasts no bigger than hazelnuts, one day that Lyanna bathed with her niece and nephew. I give one year and a half before your first bleeding, my lady, the nurse told her, because she was the only woman Lyanna could talk about such secrets instead of her Mama and sisters. That was fifteen months before.

The chill again—would she ever see her first moon blood? Would she die as a lady in a child’s body?

“What are you doing up here?”

Lyanna narrows her eyes at the Dragon Queen’s man—that craven of her cousin, who fled instead of facing his overlord’s judgment for his crimes.

What would Mama do? What would Mama say?

“Leading my men, of course.” She stresses the ‘my’ on purpose, her voice as sharp as Valyrian steel.

“You are the future of our house; you should be in the crypts.”

Lyanna’s throat tightens. She wants to cry, to spit on him that it’s his fault if she couldn’t stay in the crypts with Maege and Robb and all the other children—she would if he hadn’t married that Southerner whore, if he hadn’t given in to each one of her stupid whims. That her Mama and Dacey and Alysane would still be alive—that Maege and Robb wouldn’t be orphans—that she would still be a child if only he hadn’t married that cursed Southern whore.

“I am the Lady of Bear Island,” she says instead, because this is not the time to pour on him all her bitterness and anger. She will, after the battle. If we both survive. “I’ve trained my men, women and children to fight: I won’t hole myself like a scared mouse.” I am a she-bear, like Mama and Dacey and Aly. “I wish you good fortune, cousin.”

It’s what you would have said, right, Mama?

She walks away, ramrod straight, as if there is no chill in the marrow of her bones, as if she doesn’t want to push away the burden of leadership. Lyanna cannot, her men need her and she wants her Mama and sisters to be proud of her. Even the man who fathered her, whoever he might be.

“We Mormont women are skinchangers: we mate with bears to ensure our line”, her Mama once had told her, when she had asked why all the other highborn children had a father and she not. For a long time, Lyanna had tried to change into a bear, but failed.

Alysane had laughed, but not at her. “You will after you’ve seen your moon blood and are old enough to bear a child.”

Now, Lyanna knows that time might never come.

The chill in the marrow of her bones grows with the quiet restlessness of the prebattle.

Lyanna hesitates to join the other Northerner Lords, she would not be welcome—she’s a child, a girl, and way too often she had put them in shame. Like Mama would have done. She wouldn’t be welcome there.

Lyanna thinks about joining the Southerner Lords, but fears they wouldn’t welcome her as well—she is a child, a girl, not a grown warrior like Lady Brienne, who has proved her worth many and many times. She wouldn’t be welcome there.

Lyanna even considers about joining her cousin and make her peace with him and her ghosts, but Ser Jorah has been tasked to lead the Dothraki and those foreigners make her uneasy, with their coppery skin and harsh tongue. She wouldn’t feel welcome there.

“You should rest, my lady,” her guards’ captain advices. “May I suggest the forge? It wouldn’t be comfortable, but it is warm.”

Lyanna lifts her shoulder until her furs half-hid her face, glad that the chilly wind reddens her cheeks. Would the Southerner smith be still there? Would he already on the battlements, in his position? Would I muster to talk with him?

“Does a bear den have fires?” she replies, her voice fraying on the edges.

This man knows her since she was a babe at her mother’s breast, and he had been the closest thing to a father she and her sisters ever had.

“No, my lady; but bears love to bask in the sun, while the cold make them drowsy,” the captain says, with a cheeky smile that in the torchlight reminds her of Alysane’s. “It’s night and it’s winter, the only warm is inside. Besides, the forge is close enough to our position, my lady.”

Lyanna glances at the forge. An apprentice come out, holding up his leather apron heavy with dragonglass weapon. Is that Southerner blacksmith still inside? And what would she tell him anyway? She’d embarrass herself.

“It won’t hurt to have one more dragonglass dagger. You never know.”

The forge is empty, silent; its darkness defied by the embers and a dying fire at the back. The Southerner blacksmith isn’t there—or anybody else, for what it matters. And it is warm; still, the chills return, clattering her teeth.

Lyanna wraps her furs around her body, sitting as close as possible to the dying embers, casting a reddish ominous glow around her. The air smells of soot and burned wood, of horse piss and oil. She tried to find comforts in those smells, in the prebattle noise coming through the windows and the cracks in the walls—in the distance voice of a talented soldier singing a farewell to his beloved.

Soot and dusk prickle again Lyanna’s eyes. She is alone, in the dark, curled under the bearskin Dacey offered her for her seventh namedays.

“Mama… Mama, I’m scared...”

In the darkness broken by the glow of dying ember and heavy with soot and dust and the prebattle, Lyanna lets herself cry as quietly as a little mouse.

“Mama… Mama, help me…”

She holds her knees, makes herself as small as possible, hiding into the shadows as much as possible—she’s the Lady of Bear Island, she can’t be weak or scared—she is but a child, she can be weak and scared.

When the battle horns blast the first time, Lyanna presses her hands over her eyes, gulping deep breaths—forging her quivering chest to stay still.

When the battle horns blast the second time, Lyanna wipe her face with a rag she finds by the quench bath—smearing her face with oil and iron.

When the battle horns blast the third and last time, Lyanna opens the forge’s door and cross the courtyard—setting her face in the hard and emotionless mask everybody knows and despite.

Mama… Mama, help me…

When the Red Priestess lit the Dothraki’s weapons, Lyanna doesn’t gasp in astonishment, yet her heart trembles, catching her cousin leading the fiery charge—she should have made peace with him when she got the chance, instead of clinging to pride and resentment.

When the Undead swarm under the walls, Lyanna doesn't flinch despite the stench of burnt flesh and decay seizing her stomach--she would throw up, press her nose into Lady Berna's resin-scented dress, but instead she swallows acid and bile and orders to reinforce the gates.

When the Undead overflow Winterfell’s high walls, Lyanna doesn’t move despite the enemy is like a swollen river and she—she is but a toy bridge, built by summer children.

Mama… Mama, I’m scared…

“Here we stand!”

Lyanna yells so hard that her throat and lungs hurt.

She is Lady Lyanna Mormont, the Lady of Bear Island, the most loyal bannerman of Winterfell, and these are the words of her Ancient and Noble House.

Here she stands, facing dead warriors, with slashes exposing rotting guts and unmoving hearts—facing dead women, with breasts filled with old sour milk and dead babes dangling between their legs—facing dead children, with white skin over their rattling bones and oozing pustules on their faces.

Mama… Mama, help me…

“Hold your position!”

Lyanna yells so hard that her throat and lungs hurt.

She is Lady Lyanna Mormont, the Lady of Bear Island, the most loyal bannerman of Winterfell, and her presence must encourage her men—her bravery must prickle the lords and knights and soldiers’ pride so that no one would say they didn’t fight half fiercely as an unblooded girl of twelve.

Mama… Mama, I’m scared…

The gate breaks under the fist of Wun-Wun the Giant, Undead swarm in behind him. His feet crush men not fast enough to get out of the way—he sweps Lyanna off his path as if she is nothing but a peeble.

Mama… Mama, help me…

“My Lady, are you hurt?” her captain asks.

She can tell something is broken in her leg—it hurts as hell and the boot twist in a funny angle. But she is the last daughter of Maege Mormont, one of the fiercest warriors in the Seventh Kingdom! She is the younger sister of Dacey Mormont, who till the end fought to protect her king—she is the younger sister of Alysanne Mormont, who fought in the Battle of the Whispering Woods while bearing the pains of labour!

She is Lady Lyanna Mormont, the Lady of Bear Island, and she is nothing short of her mother and sisters!

Mama… Mama, I’m scared…

“Don’t let them through!” she yells, to the captain, to any man who can hear her.

She can’t let the enemy get any closer to the Crypts. No matter how strong the bolts are, the people inside—her people—Maege and Robb and Maester Garth and the Nurse—could only survive that much with the food and water they have!

Mama… Mama, help me…

But the number of enemies only grows with every passing moment. They only have that many Dragonglass arrowheads—there are only this many Undead a man can cut through before being overwhelmed.

Mama… Mama, I’m scared…

Wun-Wun head to the Crypts doors, as if something inside there calls for him.

Lyanna’s heart squeezes in her chest with the same strength she squeezes her axe.

Mama… Mama, help me…

She is Lady Lyanna Mormont, the Lady of Bear Island, and here she stands and she won’t let no one of hers get hurt.

Lyanna yells at the top of her lungs, rushing toward Wun-Wun—dragging her broken leg as fast as she can and ignoring the pain like certainly Alysanne did in the Whispering Woods.

Mama… Mama, I’m scared…

Wun-Wun picks her up as if she’s Lady Berna—but she feels more as a delicate creation of porcelain like Princess. The steel of her cuirass crushes into his grip, and her ribs as well. Her grip on the axe loosens.

Mama… Mama, help me…

Wun-Wun lifts her to his mouth, as if he wants to eat her like in the tale of the Master of Animals that Alysanne used to laugh at.

Mama… Mama, I’m scared…

Lyanna can’t take her stare off Wun-Wun’s only eye, of an eerie, unnatural, glowing blue and without a glint in it. His breath, stinking of death and decay, makes it even harder to breath.

Mama… Mama, help me…

Despite the pain puncturing pain in her lungs—despite her sight turns blurry and her head spins—Lyanna gathers all the strength she has left. She aims for the only thing she can distinguish—the glowing blue orb of Wun-Wun’s eye.

Mama, help me!

Lyanna is the Hero of the Master of Animals’ tale, and blinds the monster’s only eye. But unlike the tale’s Hero, Lyanna knows she’s not fated to win. She knows for certain that she won’t survive.

Mama… Mama, I’m scared…

As she falls down with Wun-Wun’s remains, Lyanna feels as if she’s drowning and each breath is shorter than the previous.

She doesn’t get the mercy of hitting her head, or crack her neck when she hit the ground.

Mama… Mama, help me…

Lyanna can barely move her eyes.

She can only hope for someone to notice her—to stop long enough to give her a mercy.

Mama… Mama, I’m scared…

She should have made her peace with Cousin Jorah. She should have listened to him and stayed with Maege and Robb in the Crypts.

Mama… Mama, help me…

Lyanna doesn’t want to die. Not if her death could be useless—not without knowing that Maege and Robb and her people will survive and see Spring.

Mama… Mama, I’m scared…

Lyanna doesn’t want to die. Not at twelve, not without growing up—not without kissing the Southern Smith goodbye.

Mama… Mama, help me…

Lyanna doesn’t want to die. Not like that, not without the certitude that the Night King won’t make her rise and turn against Maege and Robb and her people.

Mama… Mama, I’m sca