The Bow and the Bear: Part 1

by Arianwen P.F. Everett

Lyanna Mormont smiled as she removed her mother's bow from the cabinet that had been placed in her bedchamber at Winterfell. Due to the threat posed by the Army of the Dead, it had become more practical for each Lord or Lady of the North to maintain their own chamber at the old Northern seat for the time being, and Lyanna was grateful. It had allowed her to bring the bow and have confidence that it was locked away in an ordinary-looking bedroom cabinet, safe from potential thieves. With so many Wildlings and newcomers from the South arriving to fight the Night King and his host, she needed that assurance. Otherwise she'd have been forced to leave the weapon at home, and she craved the internal fortitude it provided her every time she touched it. It had been her mother's most prize possession, a gift from the man who'd fathered her children, of which only Lyanna remained.

Yet, for some reason Lyanna could distinctly remember her mother telling their maester and master-at-arms that the bow had been liberated from a poacher she'd captured in Bear Island's deep woods while hunting. The malefactor had been sent to the cells, the large, healthy stag he'd admitted to bringing down was carted off to the kitchens to feed House Mormont and those that served them, and the bow with the two peculiar runes carved at each end had been taken by her mother as a trophy, a message to any that would steal from their family and the people of their island home. Lyanna had long ago figured out that one story was meant to be kept between a mother and her children while the other could be spoken of in public, but the why of it she'd never understood.

Her mother had never named her father, and though most assumed he must have been lowborn, nobody on Bear Island had been dumb enough to challenge the word of the she-bear Maege Mormont. Maege Mormont had given all her daughters her name, making them trueborn by virtue of the fact that the Lady of Bear Island said they were such, and nobody in the North questioned it. Yet there were two versions of the bow's history to contend with, and Lyanna had no idea which was true. Not that she cared very much. The bow had been her mother's and that was all the history she needed to prize it and make it her own now that her mother was gone.

Putting on her mask of stern authority, Lyanna made her way to the training yard to get in some practice. She and Lord Glover had sparred again on troop placement this morning in a council meeting and this time she'd lost the battle. Even if King Jon Snow was perfectly fine with training women to fight the Night King, he wanted most of them to remain in the rear, only to be called on for reinforcements.

Greenboys were being placed ahead of battle-hardened fighters from Bear Island just because those warriors were she-bears like herself and her mother and sisters before her, and though it meant that more women would survive if they won, those women would not walk away with much glory. No songs to their names would be sung, and while the Greenboys who survived would gain a fearsome reputation, the women who fought beside them, in less strategic positions, would almost certainly be returning unheralded with more domestic futures head of them. As sole surviving heir of House Mormont, and a girl of twelve besides, Lyanna had always known she'd be held back, but she spoke for the she-bears and the other Northern women who'd be fighting and she owed them their best chance to stand as equals with their men and gain their fair share of what paltry rewards came from such a deadly undertaking as war. From her point of view, she'd failed them, and she needed to let off some steam lest she cry in frustration like a little girl.

Nearing the straw targets lined up for shooting, Lyanna had to smile as she watched Lady Brienne of Tarth toss her squire into the snow with very little effort. The young man was better than most, but against a true warrior like Brienne, he was hopelessly outclassed. Though, to give him credit, he not only knew this as fact, he accepted it and routinely dedicated himself to improvement. Lyanna had to respect that.

On the other hand, Tormund, the Wildling leader who approached the pair, was cocky and always pestering Lady Brienne. This was not to say, Lyanna objected to the Wildling presence the way some of the lords from the Vail did, but regardless of their political and military allegiance to King Jon, their kind were little better than the Iron Born, raiders, rapists, and thieves. So far they had kept to their pact with the king, but Lyanna wouldn't be surprised if they broke it the moment the Night King was defeated, assuming anyone could defeat him. Lyanna couldn't help but feel sorry for Lady Brienne to have to put up with such an unworthy and unwanted suitor.

Removing her eyes from the scene the Wildling was making, Lyanna pulled an arrow from her quiver, lined up a shot, and let it fly, hitting the target in the head, but low and a bit farther to the right than she'd meant to. She was just about to loose another arrow, when suddenly a large, meaty hand wrapped around her mother's bow and pulled it away.

"Where'd ya get this bow, Little Girl?!" Tormund demanded with an angry growl, as if Lyanna had just wrenched his family heirloom from his hands.

"My name is Lady Lyanna Mormont and you will return my weapon at once!" Lyanna insisted as she raised her chin defiantly and fought her fiery temper, lest she say something that King Jon couldn't smooth over and the North lost the Wildling alliance.

Tormund looked down into the girl's face, refusing to kneel to this Southern child. He'd asked her a question and she acted all high and mighty, as if he didn't have any right to his question. "I didn't ask you your name! I asked you where you got that bow, LITTLE GIRL?!"

Before Lyanna could respond, Lady Brienne appeared behind the Wildling, grabbing him by the back of his pelts and pushing him away from the two of them. "Lady Mormont is a child and you will not speak to her in that manner!"

"Stay out of this, Big Woman! This is between me and the girl!" Tormund hissed, only to have Brienne use her bulk to knock him to the ground and pull her sword on him.

Suddenly King Jon, Lord Glover, and Lord Royce arrived and planted themselves between Lyanna and the prone Tormund.

"What is going on here?!" Jon Snow bellowed with authority, daring anyone present to give him anything but the whole truth.

"This Wildling grabbed my bow and then threatened me, your Grace. Lady Brienne came to my aid when he refused to back off," Lyanna explained, hating to be the center of attention. Still, her eyes kept wondering to the bow that had had landed in a snowbank. She would have torn the ginger-haired savage to shreds if it had been damaged, alliance or no.

"Is this true?!" Jon demanded of Tormund as he moved to get to his feet, only to be brought up short again by Brienne's Valyrian steel sword.

"Ofcourse it's true; these animals take whatever they like, whenever it suits them! I've said it before and I'll say it again, you should never have invited them beyond the Wall!" Lord Royce boomed with vindication. He'd warmed the king many times, but hopefully now the man would see it. They might need the Wildlings help to fight the Others, but they should be used as infantry soldiers, nothing more.

"Yes, I know your opinion on that issue, but I wasn't asking you. I was asking Tormund. Did you attempt to steal Lady Mormont's bow?" Jon questioned, dismissing the windbag from the Vail and his bigoted tirade. Far too many saw the Wildlings this way and would have cheerfully let them all be slaughtered by the Army of the Dead. He hoped Tormund hadn't just provided them with a rallying cry.

"I stole nothing! I made that bow for my she-bear, many years ago, crafted it with my own two hands! If you're looking for a thief, I suggest you look to your little Lady Mormont!" Tormund spat out, staring daggers at Lyanna.

Lyanna paled at Tormund's statement. The Wildling was insane, and he was trying to drag her name into the dirt with his own! In an instant, years of self control slipped away and her rage completely subsumed her. "That bow belonged to my mother, Lady Maege Mormont of Bear Island! She gave it to me for safe keeping before she left to join Robb Stark's army and avenge your father, your Grace! I did not steal that weapon, Savage! It was my legacy!"

For a moment everyone in the training yard stood in perfect silence. The Little She-Bear, as she was affectionately called in private, had her fangs and claws out and looked ready to disembowel the Wildling leader who couldn't even managed to rise to his feet without the Maid of Tarth's sword inching closer to his throat.

"Maege was your Mama?" Tormund questioned in genuine surprise, his heart and mind working a mile a minute. He saw it now, the deep brown of her eyes, the tip of her nose, the fury in her fighting stance. It was all there, but so was her pale skin, the set of her mouth, and the kiss of fire interwoven with the brown of her straight hair. In this child he saw so many he'd known, long dead, yet melded in her features, and his eyes misted at the same time his chest constricted with all the emotions pouring through him.

Unable to speak and having no wish to continue this conversation, Lyanna spat into the snow, stomped over to her mother's bow, and left the training yard with one final growl of warning for the Wildling to stay down or loose a body part.

Nobody followed. Nobody dared.