#direwolfdaily

The Wildling and the Lost Boy (for anon)

AGOT – Catelyn III

"Rickon needs you […] He's only three, he doesn't understand what's happening. He thinks everyone has deserted him”

AGOT – Bran VI

"What are you doing here?" [...]

"They are my gods too," Osha said. "Beyond the Wall, they are the only gods."

[…] “The cold winds are rising, and men go out from their fires and never come back … or if they do, they're not men no more, but only wights, with blue eyes and cold black hands. Why do you think I run south with Stiv and Hali and the rest of them fools? Mance thinks he'll fight, […] but what does he know? […] He's never tasted winter. I was born up there, child, like my mother and her mother before her and her mother before her, born of the Free Folk. We remember." Osha stood, her chains rattling together. "I tried to tell your lordling brother. […] But he looked through me […]. So be it. I'll wear my irons and hold my tongue. A man who won't listen can't hear."

AGOT – Bran VII

"I lived my life beyond the Wall, a hole in the ground won't fret me none, m'lords," she said.

[…] Ser Rodrik had ordered Osha's chain struck off, since she had served faithfully and well since she had been at Winterfell. She still wore the heavy iron shackles around her ankles—a sign that she was not yet wholly trusted—but they did not hinder her sure strides down the steps.

[…]

Rickon patted Shaggydog's muzzle, damp with blood. "I let him loose. He doesn't like chains." He licked at his fingers.

ACOK – Bran V

"Osha," Bran asked as they crossed the yard. "Do you know the way north? To the Wall and . . . and even past?"

ACOK – Theon IV

Osha would need to carry Rickon; his little legs wouldn't take him far on their own.

[…]

Theon Greyjoy knew he was beaten […] Osha had deceived them with some wildling trick.

ACOK – Bran VII

Bran heard fingers fumbling at leather, followed by the sound of steel on flint. Then again. A spark flew, caught. Osha blew softly. A long pale flame awoke, […] Osha's face floated above it. She touched the flame with the head of a torch. Bran had to squint as the pitch began to burn, filling the world with orange glare. The light woke Rickon, who sat up yawning. […]

There stood Osha holding the torch, […] and the double row of tall granite pillars and long dead lords behind them stretching away into darkness . . . but there was Winterfell as well, grey with drifting smoke, the massive oak-and-iron gates charred and askew, the drawbridge down in a tangle of broken chains and missing planks.

[...] "Are we going home?" Rickon asked excitedly.

[…] Osha carried her long oaken spear in one hand and the torch in the other. A naked sword hung down her back, one of the last to bear Mikken's mark.

[…]

"Take me home!" Rickon demanded. "I want to be home!" […] They stood huddled together with ruin and death all around them.

"We made noise enough to wake a dragon," Osha said, "but there's no one come. The castle's dead and burned, just as Bran dreamed,” […]

Lady Stoneheart and the Little Night Wolf

She was of the Faith, like her father and grandfather and his father before him. Her gods had names, and their faces were as familiar as the faces of her parents. Worship was a septon with a censer, the smell of incense, a seven-sided crystal alive with light, voices raised in song. […]

If only I could have helped you. 

A thousand eyes, a hundred skins, wisdom deep as the roots of ancient trees. A greenseer. He ate.