Chapter 5: Trial By Fire
The wolfswood was deadly silent. Jon crouched behind a massive oak, his new wand held steady despite the cold that bit through his gloves. At twelve namedays old, he was about to face his first real test of combat magic.
The wildling raiding party had crossed south of the Wall three days ago. But these weren't ordinary raiders - Jon had sensed the warging magic from leagues away. Their leader was powerful, perhaps the strongest skinchanger he'd ever encountered.
"Ghost," Jon whispered through their mental link, "circle east." His direwolf, nearly full-grown now, slipped through the shadows like a white phantom.
He'd told Robb he was practicing magic in the crypts. His brother would be furious when he found out the truth, but Jon needed to know if his spells would work against a real enemy. Theory was one thing; combat was another.
A crow's harsh call broke the silence. Jon smiled grimly. Not a real crow - he could feel the human consciousness behind its eyes. The wildling warg was scouting.
"Let's show them what real magic looks like," Jon muttered, raising his wand. "Tenebris Ignis."
Shadow-fire, one of his newest creations, burst from his wand. The black flames consumed the crow instantly, leaving no trace. Through Ghost's eyes, Jon saw the wildling leader - a tall man with a face scarred by claw marks - stagger as his connection to the bird was severed.
The battle began in earnest.
Three raiders charged his position, axes raised. Jon met them with a combination of spells he'd spent months perfecting. "Glacius Ardere!" Ice-fire erupted in a wide arc, forcing them back. As they stumbled, he followed with a silent Impedimenta, slowing their movements.
But the warg leader was the real threat. Jon felt the man trying to force his way into Ghost's mind, the attack far stronger than anything he'd faced before.
"Wrong wolf," Jon snarled. He'd spent too many hours practicing mental defense to fall to this. Drawing on both his Occlumency training from Harry's memories and the warging resistance he'd developed, he launched a counter-attack.
Their minds clashed like thunder. The wildling was powerful, decades of experience behind his mental assault. But Jon had something he didn't - two lifetimes of magical knowledge and the blood of both First Men and dragons in his veins.
Through the mental battle, Jon kept up his physical defense. A shield charm deflected an arrow. A banishing hex sent a raider flying into a tree. But he couldn't maintain both forever.
Time to end this.
"Ignis Vitae Mortis!" Jon roared, combining living fire with the essence of death magic he'd discovered in the deepest parts of Winterfell's crypts. The spell manifested as a pack of flame-wolves, their eyes burning with pale blue light. They moved with terrible intelligence, herding the raiders into a tight group.
The warg leader broke off his mental attack, eyes widening in fear. "What manner of southron magic is this?"
"Not southron," Jon said, advancing. "Northern. The old powers never left us. We just forgot how to use them."
He could end it here. The Fiendfyre spell danced on his tongue, begging to be released. But no - too risky, too destructive. Instead, he tried something else he'd been developing.
"Sanguine Glaciem Incendio," he whispered, drawing on his own blood magic. A ring of pale fire erupted around the raiders, freezing the ground beneath their feet while the air above them burned.
"Yield," Jon commanded, letting some of his power leak into his voice. The flames cast strange shadows across his face, making him look older, more terrible. "Yield and live."
The regular raiders dropped their weapons immediately. But the warg leader stared at Jon with an unsettling intensity.
"The old powers wake," the man said in the Old Tongue. "The three-eyed crow spoke true. You are the bridge-walker, the magic-changer." He slowly lowered his weapon. "We yield, jon Snow. But not to you - to what you represent. Magic returns to the North."
Jon kept his wand raised. "You know of me?"
The warg smiled, revealing sharpened teeth. "All the free folk who keep the old ways know of you. The one who walks in two worlds, who brings back the powers of the First Men." He gestured at the flame-wolves, still prowling the perimeter. "One who can command both ice and fire. The crow said you would be our salvation against the Others."
This was... unexpected. Jon had known of the three-eyed crow, of course - in both his lives. But he hadn't realized his experiments with magic had drawn such attention.
"The Others," Jon said carefully. "They're moving south already, aren't they?"
"Aye. Armies of the dead larger than any seen in eight thousand years. But now..." The warg looked at Jon's wand with naked hunger. "Now we have hope. Teach us, bridge-walker. Teach us to fight with the old powers."
Jon considered. This could change everything - having the free folk as allies instead of enemies, building a magical army beyond the Wall before the dead arrived. But it was dangerous. One wrong move...
He made his decision.
"I'll teach you," he said, lowering his wand slightly. "But first, you'll tell me everything you know about the Others. And then..." He created a small flame butterfly, letting it land on his finger. "Then I'll show you what magic really is."
The negotiations took hours. By the time Jon returned to Winterfell, he had six new students - including the warg leader, who called himself Borroq - and a network of information stretching beyond the Wall.
In his chamber that night, recording the day's events in his grimoire, Jon allowed himself a small smile. His magical experiments had just gained a new dimension. The free folk had their own traditions, their own ways of working with the old powers. Combined with what he knew...
He opened a fresh page and began to write:
"On the Integration of Wildling Magic with Modern Spellcraft..."
The candle burned late into the night as Jon worked, unaware that far to the north, the three-eyed crow watched through a thousand eyes and one, and smiled.