The Little Wolf

Companionship with Darkness

King's Landing

She twisted at the rusty nail with steady endurance. Her brow was furrowed with concentration, and her eyes rarely blinked. An Outsider always has a plan, she told herself. 

Inside her mind was ticking, planning, plotting and hatching an elaborate plan. Her mind never switched off and she was still, at her core, very clever - even though her Soul was not there. 

Outside, though, she was broken. She had been beaten, burned and brainwashed. Her body shook frantically, and her finger tapped the floor boards psychotically. It tapped at her mind and seized her control - Vicious little monster, there is no such thing as mercy.

The darkness loomed over her, to which she did not mind. She embraced its presence now and welcomed it like an old friend. The demons living in it no longer frightened her and an odd respect fell upon them. She felt at ease without the existence of light. The dead in the corner of her eye no longer seemed as scary as they once were, and the wind simply refused to whisper her name these days. The darkness was once perceived as evil, yet now Lyra saw it as companionship. 

The darkness never betrayed her, while light often did.   

"There is no such thing as mercy!" she screamed at the emptiness repeatedly, "There is no such thing as mercy!" 

Only one fear remained: the monster in the mirror. 

No matter how dark her world could become, she would still beg not to be with such a beast. The memory of its icy face in her mirror sent shivers down her spine, and fear crept back in. 

"Monsters only feed on other monsters" Old Nan had told her once. It was a ploy to help her sleep better, to settle the young lady's mind. She had been up all night, nearing her third Nameday, running down the halls of Winterfell, throwing open the the doors to all her siblings' chambers. She screamed that the monster was there, that he kept on staring at her. Jon and Robb had run into her chamber with their wooden swords, ready to defend, only to find it empty. They never saw the monster. Her mother scooped her in her arms and planted kisses all over her face, Old Nan soothed her with stories of flowers and the summer, yet nothing but her Maester's sleeping draught would ease her out of her frantic state. 

As Lyra drifted off to sleep that night, Old Nan leaned in and said, "My child, never forget that Monster's only feed on other monsters. If you don't want to be eaten by a monster, don't become a monster."

At the time, Lyra was innocent and had only pure thoughts. She liked to run and play and pretend she was a knight. Her becoming a monster was never likely. Maester Leland feared it, though, and when he entered back into her chamber, he had scolded Old Nan for such a story. 

Now she was a monster, and she feared what the monster in her mirror would do. She was scared it would appear again. She was scared of her own reflection. 

Then Lyra stopped and wondered - if I were to look in my reflection, would I see a girl or a monster? Maybe she WAS the monster in the mirror. Maybe she was merely frightened of herself. The thoughts distracted her briefly, until she heard the cruel boy's footsteps head toward her locked room.

She had to ignore her fears, and embrace the monster. She had to rise from hell and bring regret and misery upon all who unleashed her darkest demon. 

"There is no such thing as mercy!" she spat at the darkness, telling herself. The door lock clicked and the door swung open. Lyra could here the toad of a boy bash Wolf against the Wall, before sharpening it with a whetstone and snarling, "This might be a stupid little blade, but it sure would be fun to skewer you with it."

"There is no such thing as mercy", Lyra growled again. She believed it - or, at least she wanted to believe it - for it would make what she was about to do easier.  

Lyra counted the seconds. She had been planning the very manoeuvre she was about to perform, down to the last second, for weeks. Yet, she felt so unprepared. For weeks she had memorised the movements the boy made, and each day he was unaware that he was making a dozen stupid mistakes. Lyra, precocious as always, lapped up his stupidity and locked it in her mind. She would learn from him. 

Never did he change his actions; he always made the exact movement, in the exact time span. Worse though, he made a mistake even the line of stupid Kings of the past wouldn't be foolish enough to make: he never closed the door behind him. 

He was secure in his power and Lyra's frailty. Yet the idiotic boy did not know that Lyra was stronger now, and had been mocking her frailty over the past weeks. She was merely deceiving him, and ultimately distracting him. 

Poor, stupid boy, Lyra thought with a smile. If you dance in the light for too long, eventually the shadows will catch you, and the monster that lurks in its darkness will dance you to your grave.

The boy knelt down by her side, and Lyra felt Wolf's cold blade against her neck. The boy ran the blade across her neck multiple times, getting harder with each stroke. Soon, blood had been drawn and pain met her. 

It is time, a voice whispered in her head, and for a second Lyra thought it might be Lev, but she didn't have time to wonder.  

In her head had she escaped a million times, only did her Soul have the wings to fly away - Lyra just had to pray the God of Death was looking down on her mercifully. 

The boy knelt down further, and smirked in her dead eyes. Lyra cocked her head, and spat in his face. A smirk crept across her sullen face, as the boy growled and readied Wolf for one final blow.

"Die, Monster!" he screamed.

In the shadows, the monster danced, embracing the darkness like a long lost friend.

"There is no such thing as mercy", Lyra whispered to him.

With a smile, she drove the rusty nail into the boy's neck.