Jon walked alone along a rocky path.
The path lay hidden deep within the mountain, narrow and winding, with several branches splitting off along the way.
Some climbed upward, others descended, and all vanished into darkness.
A faint smell of sulfur hung in the air, and a gentle breeze drifted from somewhere deeper within.
This was not Jon’s first time here.
On his previous visits, he had always stopped at one of the forks before waking from the dream.
Only this time had he gone farther and deeper than ever before.
After passing beneath a cracked arch of stone, he emerged into a vast underground cavern.
Black rock walls surrounded the chamber, with several rocky ledges scattered throughout.
A light breeze entered through fissures in the cavern ceiling, stirring the thin mist that drifted overhead.
On a ledge near one of the walls lay a massive white beast.
Milky-white scales covered its body.
Its long neck was curled against its chest, and its wings were folded tightly along its sides.
Even lying down, its body was broader than the strongest warhorse in Winterfell’s stables.
With every breath, a faint wisp of white smoke escaped its nostrils, gently stirring the ashes beneath it.
Jon instinctively took a step back, dislodging a few loose stones beneath his feet.
Click.
A pair of violet, slit-pupiled eyes opened in the darkness.
Jon instinctively tried to retreat, but his legs refused to obey him.
Boy and beast stared at one another across the rocky ledge.
Jon had expected it to attack, yet the enormous creature merely watched him in silence.
His fear slowly faded, replaced by a warmth rising from somewhere deep within his chest, as though something inside him were answering the creature.
Jon cautiously took a step forward.
He had no idea where the feeling came from.
He only knew that those violet eyes filled him with an inexplicable sense of familiarity.
Jon cautiously took another step forward.
The beast still did not attack.
Its nostrils flared slightly, as though it had caught a familiar scent.
Then it slowly rose to its feet, seemingly about to approach Jon.
At that moment, the entire cavern began to shake violently, and everything before him started to blur and fade.
A heartbeat later, Jon was swallowed by darkness.
“Ah!”
Jon shot upright in his bed, gasping for breath, his forehead drenched in cold sweat.
Only when the sky beyond the window began to brighten did he finally calm down.
Tonight’s dream had been different from all the others.
This time, he had gone farther and deeper, and there he had found a massive white beast.
He stared up at the wooden beams overhead and murmured, “What was that?
Why did it feel so familiar?”
Those violet eyes remained fixed in his mind, refusing to fade.
This was no ordinary dream.
Jon climbed out of bed and walked over to the silver mirror beside it.
A black-haired, gray-eyed boy stared back at him.
His face still carried the softness of childhood.
Yet his eyes were calm, without the slightest trace of a child’s innocence or confusion.
He had been in this world for four years now, but he still could not remember how he had come here.
His current identity was Jon Snow.
The bastard son of the Lord of Winterfell.
A child with Stark Bloodline in his veins, yet one who could never truly bear the Stark name.
As for his memories of his previous life, they seemed hidden behind a thick, lingering fog.
The harder he tried to remember, the less he could recall.
Only occasionally, through a dream or some strangely familiar sight, would fragments of forgotten memories surface.
Those lost memories seemed to be returning little by little, though the process was painfully slow.
Jon was in no hurry.
He believed that, given enough time, the memories concealed behind that fog would one day return in full.
The next morning.
After a quick breakfast of oatmeal and bread, Jon took advantage of the time before Maester Luwin’s lessons began and slipped into Winterfell’s Tower of Books alone.
The tower was filled with the musty smell of old parchment, candle wax, and dried moss.
Rows of tall shelves made from sturdy northern oak stood in the dim tower, packed with thick handwritten manuscripts.
Some were histories chronicling the wars fought by generations of Kings in the North.
Others recorded the lords of the Seven Kingdoms, the lineages of noble houses, and ancient legends.
Jon’s eyes moved along row after row of spines until he found what he was looking for.
Still small for his age, he had to drag over a wooden stool and climb onto it before he could search through the old volumes on the higher shelves.
He went through book after book on northern legends and enormous beasts until, at last, he pulled an old volume bound in dark cowhide from a corner.
Its title was Valyria and the Heirs of the Conqueror.
Jon quickly began turning the pages.
Halfway through, his fingers suddenly stopped.
An illustration drawn in charcoal and pigment filled the yellowed page before him.
A gigantic creature spread its wings across nearly half the page.
Hard scales covered its entire body.
Bat-like wings extended from its back, while bony spines ran along its long, slender neck.
Its enormous jaws were open, spewing roaring flames.
And beneath it was its name.
Dragon.
These were the creatures that had once ruled alongside the Valyrian Freehold in Essos.
They were also the great beasts that had conquered the Seven Kingdoms of Westeros three hundred years ago and carried House Targaryen to the Iron Throne.
The book described the glory and destruction of ancient Valyria in detail.
It also recorded the distinctive features associated with pure Valyrian blood.
Silver-gold hair and violet eyes.
But on the final page, the author had scrawled a single conclusion in hurried ink:
“The last dragon died more than a hundred years ago.
No dragon has appeared in the world since, and all believe that the Age of Dragons has truly come to an end.”
Jon closed the heavy tome and sat on the cold stone floor, staring through the window at the gray northern sky.
If dragons had truly gone extinct more than a hundred years ago…
then what exactly was the white beast he had dreamed of deep underground last night?
If it was not a dragon, why did it look so much like the dragons described in the histories?
But if it truly was a dragon…
He was only a Stark bastard raised in the North.
There was no dragonlord blood in his veins.
So why had he felt no fear when he saw it in his dream?
Why had it instead seemed so incredibly familiar?
This could not possibly be an ordinary dream.
Unable to suppress the questions troubling him, Jon put the book away and hurried across the courtyard, where the cold wind howled between the walls.
He headed straight for the Lord’s study on the top floor of the keep.
When he reached the door, he greeted the guard before knocking.
Knock, knock.
“Come in.”
Jon pushed open the heavy oak door.
Eddard Stark sat behind a broad desk, looking through tax ledgers sent from the various holdings of the North.
One hand rested on an open ledger while the other held a quill, making notes beside several figures.
A stack of ledgers he had already finished reading sat at one corner of the desk, beside several unopened letters.
Hanging on the wall behind him was the enormous Valyrian steel greatsword, “Ice.”
When Eddard saw who had entered, he set down his quill and gave Jon a gentle smile.
“Jon?
What brings you here so early?”
Jon walked up to the desk and looked up at Eddard.
“Father, I’ve been having the same dream over and over lately.”