The sky grew even darker.
Lynn had planned to spend the night inside the return capsule and wait out the coldest hours. But the fire earlier had been way too visible. Better to get moving fast.
From Bloodraven's memories, the Cold God's followers had been hunting the last greenseers for a long time. The protective magic had kept the Three-Eyed Crow and the Children of the Forest hidden pretty well. Now the whole hill had burned and collapsed, so that protection was probably gone for good.
He didn't mind the cold himself, but he worried about the baby dragon. Bloodraven's memories had zero record of dragons operating in this kind of freezing hell—especially not a newborn.
His spacesuit was cutting-edge tech, built for extreme cold and heat. Almost completely airtight. Normally it needed active ventilation and cooling, or even in sub-zero temps he'd start sweating after a few minutes of movement.
The high-density battery on the back could run low-power mode for thirty hours. If needed he could manually vent or pressurize it.
Down here in atmosphere the suit's only real downside was how bulky and stiff it felt. Battery dead? Just pop a few connectors and let some air in.
So before full dark Lynn climbed back into the capsule, grabbed the emergency survival kit, and used the rare-metal weapon he'd found beside Bloodraven's bones—Dark Sister—to cut several soft fire-resistant padding panels from the inner walls. He stitched them together with fishing line into a simple sling bag.
He transferred every useful item from the kit into the bag, then lined the empty box with the thermal blanket. The baby dragon curled up inside perfectly.
Valyrian steel really was something else. It sliced through the material way easier than his multi-tool knife. The sword felt ridiculously light. Even with zero sword experience Lynn could swing it without effort. No wonder legends called it magic-forged.
The blade was a smoky gray covered in flowing forge patterns. Too bad the fire had burned away the wooden grip and leather wrap, leaving only the bare tang.
He wrapped the hilt and tip with spare material so he could use it as a walking staff.
The bag now held the multi-tool knife (magnesium fire starter, fishhooks, line, and water purification tablets in the handle), a basic water filter, two bags of water already turning to ice, packs of compressed biscuits and self-heating meals, and a small medical kit.
He left the satellite phone and locator beacon inside the capsule—useless now. Kept the emergency whistle and flare marker.
The compass was spinning uselessly, probably some local magnetic weirdness, but it weighed nothing so he kept it.
Finally he gave Bloodraven's charred remains a quick, respectful placement inside the capsule. No time to dig a grave, and letting the old lord rest inside a vessel from another world didn't feel disrespectful.
By the time he sealed the hatch, night had fully fallen.
Lynn ate one of the self-heating meals to restore his strength. The baby dragon stayed curled in the box, already asleep. The cold was hitting it hard.
It refused the seasoned meat cubes he offered. Dragons, big or small, apparently only ate fresh raw meat.
He'd have to wait until they reached less frozen ground and use the skinchanger ability to hunt something.
After eating he sealed his helmet, hung the sling bag around his neck, activated the temperature and humidity control, picked up the dragon's box in his left hand and Dark Sister in his right, and trudged out of the ruined hill in his clumsy suit.
The road ahead looked uncertain.
Right now the so-called King-Beyond-the-Wall, Mance Rayder, was gathering his people to attack the Wall, but Bloodraven's memories were fuzzy on exactly how far along that was.
Ever since the red comet appeared the Others had grown more active. The lands beyond the Wall were extremely dangerous.
Lynn's rough plan was to cross the endless Haunted Forest and reach the Wall. He hoped to find help from Bloodraven's descendant, Maester Aemon Targaryen, who served at Castle Black.
Aemon was over a hundred years old and probably couldn't do much, but it beat wandering around like a lost fool.
Right now Aemon might be the only person in this world Lynn had any connection to.
The dragon was obviously going to be a problem.
A living strategic weapon that had been extinct for over a century. The second it showed up every faction would come sniffing—especially in Westeros, a land ruled by dragonlords for nearly three hundred years.
(At this point Lynn had no idea that far across the Narrow Sea Daenerys Targaryen had already hatched three dragons of her own.)
For now he could only take it one step at a time. First he had to survive the Haunted Forest.
Even though he didn't fear the cold, the spacesuit made movement a pain and his supplies were limited. If food ran out before he could hunt, he and the dragon might eventually have to decide who ate whom.
After nightfall Lynn was surprised to find the walking wasn't as bad as he expected.
Years of snow covered everything, keeping the forest from turning pitch black. Near the Land of Always Winter the trees weren't too thick and the ground was relatively flat.
But moving fast was impossible. The snow came up to his knees. Every step fought the snow and the stiff joints of the suit. He could only manage a few hundred meters before stopping to rest and vent heat from his helmet.
The suit's thermal system was built for zero-gravity space, not heavy movement on the ground. He hadn't expected that.
By the middle of the night he had only covered four or five kilometers—roughly one league in this world's terms.
Direction was easy enough. He just kept walking toward the side of the trees where the branches grew thicker. Even in the North there was some sunlight every day, and the south-facing side always grew denser.
Deep into the night, exhausted and drowsy, Lynn found a large fallen tree and lay down against its sheltered side. He was asleep almost instantly.
Before sleeping he had slipped into the dragon one last time. The little one was still a bit sluggish but overall stable. The metal-coated thermal blanket worked great and kept it comfortable.
The next morning Lynn woke to the sound of many feet crunching through snow.
He jerked awake. For a second everything was white and he thought he'd gone blind—then realized it was just a thin layer of snow on his helmet visor.
He stayed perfectly still. The footsteps were heavy, numerous, and very close. He silently cursed that the snow wasn't deep enough to bury him completely.
Shouts rang out in the Old Tongue of the First Men.
"They're too many!"
"Can't outrun them."
"Fight! Fight!"
"Magnar! Magnar!"
Thenns. Wildlings from the far north.
Then came the sounds of frantic shouting and steel clashing.
More footsteps—closer now. So many that Lynn's scalp went numb.