The Little Wolf

An Outsider

Winterfell

"The King is coming!"

The news spread like wildfire through Winterfell. The great hall was prepped for the king, King Robert Baratheon, his Queen, children and company. More food than Lyra had ever seen was brought in, and Lyra was ushered out of each and every room as maids cleaned hastily. 

Lyra had never met the King, but she had heard tails of him. He was supposed to wed Lyanna, her father's sister, but her tragic death had changed everything. The King and her father had fought side by side over a decade prior, and had not seen each other for nine years. This meant Lyra, and her 6 -year-old brother Rickon had never been seen by him.

Nonetheless, everyone was excited for the nobles' arrival through their gates in just a number of weeks. Everyone was a relative term, however, as Maester Leland, Lyra's ageing teacher, spent most of his time in her lessons teaching Lyra how important it was to keep her mouth shut about Lev, and her "abilities".

Lyra was an Outsider, and Lev was a creature called a Helai. 

Both were feared, and for the most part exiled or alienated. That is why Lyra had to always stay silent, and keep Lev hidden, or controlled, when visitors came.

A Helai was a projection of someone's soul in animal form. They were the emotion, the personality and every sprinkle of what made the person uniquely them. A Helai's master was called an "Outsider", a term born from the alienation of their kind centuries prior. During childhood innocence, a Helai is interchangeable between species, hence Lev shifting effortlessly between bug to bird to tiger cub in the matter of seconds. However, once the Outsider ages, matures, or loses their innocence, the Helai would also grow. Maester Leland's job was to teach Lyra how to control and command her Helai, before this happened. Once the Outsider loses their innocence, if they had not gained control over their Helai, the creature would settle as a sole animal, the animal projection of their soul, and not be able to change species again. If, on the other hand, they do gain control, the Outsider can command the Helai to turn into whatever animal they desire.

"The best Outsiders are able to control their Helai's change with their minds", Leland often recounted. Lyra would always enthuse, "One day, will I be able to turn Lev into a dragon?" to which Leland would reply glumly, "That is for you to find out."

"Outsider's were once common folk-they were nobles, they were knights, they were peasants.They were from all walks of life, and had varying socio-economical statuses.This was when Dragons flew in the sky, and the Targaryen's were on the throne", the old man continued.

All Lyra knew was that that the Targaryen's used to be the royal family of Westeros, but they lost it. At the time, however, Outsider's fought side by side with them, the most powerful of them turning their Helai's into dragons. Once the throne was lost to them, Outsider's were banished beyond the wall to the "Land of Souls", any stepping foot over would be killed.Rumours sparked that Outsider's had become the wild folk beyond the wall, others believed Outsiders were as evil and inhuman as White Walkers.

From then on, the rumours sparked, and stories became what many believed a reality. Outsider's were evil and could not be trusted. A selected few, many Northerners, disbelieved these stories and agreed on the consensus that the treatment of Outsider's was unfair and unjust-but you can't stand up to a King. Thus, Lyra had been born an Outsider, and Ned was forced to keep her abilities hidden to save her life.

The rumours were so wrong, and one day Lyra knew she would have to change it.