Greywater Watch did not sit upon the land.
It drifted.
One season it rose from the fog like a half-remembered dream, its towers of reed and dark wood leaning toward one another as if whispering secrets. The next, it vanished entirely, swallowed by marsh and mist, leaving behind only broken reflections and the scent of wet earth.
The crannogs shifted with the seasons, drifting through mist and marsh, impossible to find unless the reeds themselves wished it. Ravens did not linger. Spies did not return. Men who entered without invitation vanished quietly, leaving no tracks for hounds to follow.
Aemon grew there.
Too quickly.
It was the only place in the Seven Kingdoms where a king could be raised unseen.
Aemon learned this early.
They had to tell the boy about his identity early because the boy began to figure things out on his own once his study about the Great House started.
"Stillness," Howland Reed told him, standing ankle-deep in black water as insects skittered across its surface.
"The Neck survives because it does not announce itself. Power that wishes to live must first learn how to hide."
Aemon was seven and already taller than most boys of ten. His silver hair was bound back in a leather cord, his violet eyes alert, always watching—not just Howland, but the reeds, the ripples, the birds that went suddenly silent.
"How do I know when to stop hiding?" Aemon asked.
Howland smiled faintly. "When the world comes looking for you."
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Arthur Dayne trained him at dawn, always at dawn.
The Sword of the Morning believed the first light revealed mistakes that darkness forgave. They trained barefoot on damp planks slick with marsh-water, wooden blades first, then blunted steel.
Arthur did not praise.
He corrected.
Again.
Again.
Again.
Aemon learned to strike without anger, to parry without fear. Arthur taught him to move as if the blade were an extension of breath itself—inhale, strike; exhale, withdraw.
"You favor your right," Arthur said once, stepping inside Aemon's guard and tapping his chest. "That will get you killed."
Aemon adjusted instantly, reversing his stance without thought.
Arthur paused.
"…Do that again."
Aemon did. Perfectly.
Oswell Whent watched from the shadows, arms folded. "He doesn't fight like a knight," he murmured. "He fights like a predator."
Whent took over at dusk.
Ser Oswell taught him about the battles, the politics and the lies.
Where Arthur demanded precision, Oswell demanded cruelty. He taught Aemon to fight dirty—to kick knees, throw sand, feign injury. He taught him how men lied with their eyes and how fear always betrayed itself.
"Honor," Oswell said lightly, "is a luxury for the man who wins."
Aemon never argued. Questioned but never argued.
He simply remembered.
——————————————-
The old gods spoke first.
Not in words—but in pressure.
Aemon felt them when he stood beneath the heart-tree, its white bark streaked red like old wounds. He felt the weight of years press against his thoughts, a quiet, patient attention that neither judged nor comforted.
It watched.
The first time he dreamed beneath its branches, he woke screaming.
He saw a forest burning beneath a black sky. He saw wings tearing clouds apart. He saw ice cracking, and beneath it—something vast and furious waking from sleep.
Howland Reed listened without interruption.
"You have greensight," he said when Aemon finished. "Stronger than mine ever was."
"And the fire?" Aemon asked.
That came later.
The night the torch fell.
Aemon was eight. The wind was high, the marsh restless. A burning brand slipped from its iron hook and fell toward the dry reeds.
Aemon reached out without thinking.
The flames bent.
They did not go out.
They curled inward, spiraling around his hand like a living thing before collapsing into embers. His skin did not blister. His pulse did not quicken.
Arthur Dayne stared.
Oswell Whent laughed softly. "Well. That answers that."
From that night on, the red priests began to dream of him—though none yet knew his name.
——————————————
The First Warg
It was not the wolves.
That came later.
The first was a marsh frog, squatting on a half-sunken log. Aemon had been watching it absently when the world tilted.
Suddenly he was cold and wet and small.
The world exploded into color and vibration—ripples, shadows, movement everywhere at once. Panic flared, then instinct crushed it flat.
Jump.
He did.
When Aemon returned to himself, he was laughing, gasping for breath, mud on his hands and knees.
Arthur was not smiling. He knew the dangers of the magic that hilt less sword.
Although Lord Reed assured him he still worried.
"Control," he said sharply. "Power without control is death."
That night, Arthur stood watch longer than usual.
——————————————-
Blood in the Marshes
The ironborn came at ten.
A few remnants after the failed rebellion an year ago
They thought the Neck weak.They thought it undefended.
Fog swallowed their boats. Reed arrows found throats and eyes. Crannogmen vanished before steel could answer.
One ironborn scout stumbled into a narrow path where the reeds grew high and thick.
Aemon stepped out in front of him.
The man sneered. "Lost, boy?"
Aemon did not answer. He bent his legs and stood at guard, narrowing the eyes one hand holding a short sword, other a dagger. He flicked his hand through the dagger with precisions while the man was laughing, burrowing it deep in the knees.
Before the man could even react, the blade slid between ribs, clean and exact. The ironborn's eyes widened—not in pain, but surprise.
When the body hit the water, Aemon waited.
Nothing broke inside him.
Instead—warmth bloomed. Approval. Something ancient and pleased brushed the edges of his mind.
Fire does not ask permission.
He wiped the blade and returned home.
Arthur Dayne came from the shadow and knelt on one knee and put his hands on the young man's shoulders.
"You've crossed the final threshold," Arthur said quietly. "There is no boyhood left for you now."
Aemon nodded. "Good."
———————————
The Decision
The night before he left Greywater Watch, Aemon stood beneath the heart-tree.
The leaves did not move. The marsh was utterly still.
"I won't hide forever," he said aloud.
The tree did not answer.
But far to the north, roots twisted deeper, and a presence stirred—aware now, cautious.
Bloodraven felt him.
And for the first time, the watcher in the trees understood that the future was no longer his to shape alone.