Episode one: A Cold Whisper {Game of Thrones} (COMPLETED)

Elena Caron

The wind breezed a whistle through the crack in the prodigious stained glass window. The castle was stunned in a silence that seemed it would last a decade. The girl stood, knees quivering with the weight of her, shivering out of pure horror. The sun disappeared behind a pearl-grey cloud. The hall was plunged into a solid darkness. On the other side of the coloured windows, a bird could be heard singing a tune in the shadows.

Elena stood beside her brother Wren, lost in her empty mind, absent of all rational thought. She allowed herself to sink into nothing, to lose herself in the song that the little bird was singing just outside the castle.

Elena heard somebody burst into tears. She didn't care who. She just stood, and listened.

Wren. Wren was all she had left. Her brother, her friend. The last two Caron's stood side by side in the grand hall of Nightsong, Petyr Caron having not yet been located. The doors to the grand hall were pushed open. Elena did not turn to look. She did not care who had entered the hall. It was not Petyr, or her mother and it was not her father.

Rolland sauntered across the hall until he was stood before the two Carons, and a large bulk of the Caron army, Ser Jared standing at the front. Maester Yandel was also there, along with a young Dornish girl by the name of Tauri, to whom Elena had taken as her permanent handmaiden. A crowd of small folk also stood in the hall, paying their respects to house Caron and waiting expectantly for someone to speak.

Rolland stood at the end of the grand hall, hands on hips, staring harshly down at the ground beneath him. The silence remained in the great hall. Almost as a display of respect, nobody said a word. Nobody seemed to want themselves to be the first to break the stillness in the room.

Elena's short strands of hair allowed a breeze to hit the back of her neck, quickly drying the hot and sticky sweat that plastered the nape of her neck like a slimy skin. She felt the cold air on her neck and flinched. She wished her hair would hurry up and grow back. She prayed before she slept that she would wake up from her slumber with her hair back. She begged all the Gods to give her her pride and dignity back. No man would take her seriously without her long, thick and desirable brown hair. Whenever somebody looked at Elena nowadays, they looked at her in pity. Whenever she looked at herself, she saw the shell of who she used to be. A vacant void of flesh, blood and bone. The crust of a Caron.

Elena swallowed what saliva she had in her mouth. Her tongue and lips were dry, her eyes dark and bagged from countless sleepless nights. Most of Elena's time nowadays was spent in her chamber, where she would lay in her bed and not arise. She would attempt to sleep the entire day away so that she didn't have to get up or even think at all. So that she didn't have to remember where she was, who she was, what has happened to her, and to all the people that she loves.

She stared at her bastard Uncle Rolland, who stood, gazing at his feet, not sure of what to say that may console the hundreds of anxious looking people all watching his every move.

"Petyr Caron is missing."

He stated the obvious.

"He is not dead."

Elena could feel Wren's entire body tense at Rolland's pathetic, foolish choice of words.

"We mustn't lose hope," he spoke solidly, "Nightsong will not fall. We still stand, even stronger than before."

A lie, she thought, we are not strong, you are not strong, I am not strong.

"We will never stand down," he called, "they will never break us. We are united as Carons. We are greater than our enemies."

Another lie, you are not a Caron, bastard.

Someone in the audience sneezed. Elena listened to everything. To every word.

"Lord Wren and Lady Elena will not fail us." he spoke, more to himself than to the rather intimidating crowd.

"My niece, nephew, if you could please come with me, I wish to have a word, alone."

Elena and Wren hesitated. Elena was the first to obey, however even then, not entirely. She turned on her heel, and stalked out of the hall.

Once Elena was out of the great hall and away from the crowd, she stopped in her tracks. She didn't turn to look back, but she heard the doors close behind her, and could feel the presence of not only two, but three men behind her. She turned slowly, and found Uncle Rolland stood beside Wren, and Maester Yandel.

"What is it?" Wren asked, only choosing to speak out of sympathy for the Maester, who was gazing sadly at Wren, looking incredibly dejected. Elena knew that the Maester hadn't taken the news of Petyr's disappearance well at all, they had been very close, Petyr choosing to speak with the Maester over his own father sometimes, but only now that she was seeing him up close, could she tell what he was going through. His eyes were bloodshot and drooping. He had spent every night before sleep in Petyr's room, praying for his return. However according to his drowsy looking appearance and his bagged up eyes, he hadn't been sleeping at all. He looked even older than his seventy years, with pale, almost white skin, and few tufts of grey, wiry hair.

Rolland twisted his lips in contemplation, "you're not going to like this."

"Get on with it then."

Rolland gritted his teeth together and stuck out his jaw. He looked to Wren, "you are going to take Elena. You are going to travel east. You will take your sister and get on a ship to Essos."

Wren spluttered in shock and rage, "I will do no such-"

"Caron is a marked name," Rolland continued, "you will take the name Peasebury. Your mother's sister, Aunt Clarys and her daughter Kaela are waiting for you in Maidenpool. They have a ship. They can take you to Essos, to Pentos. You need to escape, you need to get the fuck out of here, while you still can."

"I will never leave Nightsong! My people need me! I am their Lord!" Wren yelled, despairingly.

Maester Yandel closed his eyes. He looked ready to cry.

"Be reasonable! Somebody, whoever the fuck it is, wants all Carons dead! What do you think will happen if you stay? They've gotten this far, they aren't giving up. We must get you to safety. We must protect our Lord."

A silence followed this statement. Everybody was shaking.

"Maester," Elana whispered, "you have served my family for many, many years. You have got us through the toughest of times and stuck with us. In our moment of need you were by our side. I will take your council. What do you suggest we do?"

The Maester let out a sad sob before hardening his gaze. He held back his tears and spoke softly, "you must protect the family. You must protect the Caron name," he turned to Rolland standing beside him, looking tough and whimpered, "I love you both very dearly," he smiled slightly, but soon dropped it, "I don't care where you are, as long as you are safe, happy, and breathing. Do as your uncle says," he looked to the ground, "but never forget who your true family are."

Maester Yandel looked the siblings in the eye, "you are not Peaseburys, you are Carons. You will always be Carons. Lady Elena Caron, and Lord Wren Caron, of Nightsong."