===== Bran Stark's POV =====
Bran leaned his body slightly forward and pressed his foot against the nearby stone once more, making sure it was not his worst enemy - a loose stone.
If this had been any other tower, he would probably have known well whether the stone was loose or not. But this was the Great Keep. An almost unfamiliar tower, whose walls were visible from the most crowded places in Winterfell. And the abode of his parents.
Carefully shifting his weight from his foot to his whole body, Bran finally reached the wooden ridge — the protruding floor beams — and cautiously crawled along it. He moved closer to the window that would allow him to learn more about the mysterious mage who had suddenly visited Winterfell and formed a huge mirror-like circle in the center of the First Keep.
“…such… disrespect…!” his mother shouted.
“…time…” his father replied, though Bran couldn’t make out the rest.
Bran crept closer.
“…I don’t care… how many… maesters!” his mother continued.
“Maesters… Tyrells... Cat! You’re suggesting the same thing he did, to send him to crown Margaery!” Father said by very rare for him angry voice.
“If the mage’s words about Cersei’s children are true.”
“Even if only the rumors are true. If something happens to Robert, Renly’s and the Tyrells’ forces with tens of thousands of crossbows will be unstoppable even against our alliance with Tywin and Stannis,” Father said gravelly.
“He’s right. The Reach have fifty to seventy thousand swords. The Stormlands - up to thirty thousand swords.
By marriage, they will gain up to one hundred thousand."
“With full coffers and granaries and for the sake of the Crown, perhaps 30 thousands more,“ added father.
“If even one in five of them receive a crossbow, the truth of the rumors won’t matter anymore. Not to mention mages ballistae and riches,” said his uncle.
“Then lock him in the dungeons and order him to make crossbow and ballistae!” shouted mother.
“But first we should ask whether he can truly shape wood, stone, glass, and clay, but not earth. And only after he assures us that it’s indeed impossible, knowing that the Great Keep won’t suddenly sink into the ground should we do so,” Benjen said dryly.
“Or, as by Maester's words, soar up as a dragon and would start hurl burning logs... we’ve already discussed this, Cat,” his father replied wearily.
“And just because of his uses I must give him my daughters?”
“I’m telling you again, he—”
“Why do you keep defending him?!” shouted mother.
“Because now it is not you who speaks, but your mother’s heart! Once again,” father sighted. ”He didn’t ask for our daughters. He, word for word, said that he chose Starks over Tyrells because he doesn’t want Margaery and Tyrell's bonds.
Back then it sounded like a foolish joke, but now — after what you’ve heard from me, Jory, Luwin, after what Benjen has shown us — does it still sound like a joke to you?
I’m not defending him. I’m trying to make you understand that if he is somewhat right — and everyone who has spoken with him tells you that mage's words not without true — then he needs our daughters much less than our daughters need him,” his father again said in uncharacteristic for him, especially in relation to mother, grave voice.
“Aye. Of everything the mage said, that makes the most sense. If our parents were in our place, he’d already be betrothed, no matter what.
This... if this is inheritable... then Targaryens will soon fade into history as unimportant upstarts,” his typically soft and genial uncle said with likewise uncharacteristic for him vigor.
“You're saying that only because you have no children, and your parents never decided your fate," accused mother.
“You're right Catelyn. And exactly because of this...“ answered Benjen. “...my love and protection for my nieces aren't blinded where they might otherwise be.“
“Where did we start?” his father asked with a tired sigh.
“From the origin... So... We at least agreed that whether he is ‘the fifth son from Qohor who replaced someone no one has seen without a beard for years’ or someone else doesn’t matter, at least for now?” Benjen asked.
“Aye.”
“Aye.”
“Nay.”
“Next... ‘Filthy list.’ What do we do about it?” Benjen continued.
“What would you do in my place?” his father asked.
“It’s again your ’I shouldn’t have been lord’? You are the Lord, so do whatever you want.”
“As the Lord of Winterfell, I want your answer.”
“At your command, my Lord,” Benjen replied with a light snort. “I’d wait until tomorrow. He wants to show us something? Fine, let’s see what it is.”
“Wonderful. Let’s give the stone-and-wood-controlling mage even more stone and wood,” his mother remarked acidly.
“We’re giving him what Luwin requested?” Benjen continued.
“Aye.”
“Aye.”
“Aye…” said his mother, uncertainly and unhappily.
“What’s left, the door?” his father asked.
“Yes. But there’s nothing to discuss there. Regardless of the mage or his words, maesters must not be allowed near it.”
“Aye,” his father replied.
“I still can’t believe you hid something like that from me,” Mother said, clearly hurt.
“This isn’t amusing curiosity, Cat,” Father said angrily. “Even if the mage’s words about the Others are a lie — about which from now I will pray to the old gods and new regardless of the mage’s fate — never forget that we still rule these lands because of the Wall’s magic and nothing else.
If anything happens to the magic of the Wall, in a few years there will be no Starks, no Winterfell, and no Northern Kingdom. Especially in times of Mance Rayder’s knowledge and wits.”
“Ned is right,” Benjen said. “Aye, five thousand soldiers will defeat fifty thousand wildlings. But wildlings usually don’t fight. They hunt.
Let five thousand wildlings into the Wolfswood, and even fifty thousand soldiers won’t drive them out.
The Black Gate must not be known.”
“Aye,” Father confirmed.
Before long they drifted into boring matters about Boltons and Greyjoys, and Bran slowly began making his way back.
’Black Gate? What is that? Could it be connected to that time Father came back from the Wall with quiet and lost in thought Robb?’ Bran wondered.
Once back on the ground, he ran toward the kitchen. ’If anyone knew more, it would be the wives of the guards who had been in the First Keep when the mage appeared,’ he thought.
But soon he saw Robb, Theon, Arya, and Joanna talking in the courtyard, and ran over to them.
“Hey, squirt, do you know anything about the circle and the mage?” Arya asked, grabbing him and pulling him into a tight hug.
“Only what everyone else knows,” Bran said, not wanting to expose himself. “Do you know anything about the Black Gate?” he asked.
“Where did you hear those words?” Robb asked sharply.
“From the guards?” Bran hesitated.
“Black Gate? What’s that?” Theon asked Robb.
Robb studied Bran for a moment, then silently took him by the shoulder. “Come with me.”
“Hey, I didn’t do anything!” Bran protested.
“Hey, what do you want with him?” Arya asked, hugging him tighter.
“I just want to talk to him,” Robb replied.
“About the Black Gate? What is it? Is it connected to the mage?” Arya pressed.
“I can’t talk about it,” Robb said apologetically.
“You can’t talk? Not even with your own family?” Arya asked.
“Father made me swear,” Robb justified himself.
“It has to be something magical. Otherwise, we wouldn’t be hearing about it on this very day... So, a magical door through the magic Wall? One... Somewhere in the center? From black stone? Right?” Joanna said typical Joanna’s things.
“Black stone?” asked Theon.
“Listen,” Robb said seriously. ”This is a Stark’s secret. Father made me swear that I would never speak about it to anyone. So if you don’t want me to tell Father, promise me that you’ll never speak of it either.”
“Wardstone?” Joanna whispered thoughtfully to herself.
“Of course,” Arya said.
“Joanna, did you hear what I said?” Robb asked.
“Yes, yes, of course, I won’t talk about it,” Joanna said quickly and apologetically.
“Are you all right?” Arya asked.
“Yes, I’m fine! Completely fine!” Joanna said nervously, with a small laugh.
“Theon?” Robb asked.
“How can I talk about something I know only by name?”
“Theon…”
“All right, all right: ‘I promise I will never talk about the Black Gate.’ Happy now?”
“Bran, you’re last.”
“I won’t talk about the Black Gate if you don’t tell Father that I talked about it.”
“You’d better not,” Robb warned.
===== Howland Reed's POV =====
He laughed, gods be damned, how he laughed.
Three days and three nights of laughter. And even during sleep.
Frightening Jyana and the children even more than during his longest brooding stares at the gloomy sky.
’But, damn them,’ he thought and howled with laughter from the highest point of Greywater Watch.
’Damn them all!
Damn the Starks!
Damn Lyanna!
Damn hers another wretched dragonspawn!
Damn the North and its kings! Of the past and the future!
Damn all of Westeros, the ungrateful fools!
But most of all? Damn these goddamned small fuckers who brought me to a relic of the past only to state that it should take away my future!
Who deceived me by ’greendreams do not lie’!
Who showed me ’my’ ’unchangable’ cursed fate: to give away entire of my own — part of the Starks, my children, so many friends, my time and mind — all for the sake of others!
’...for the sake of others...’ Others...’
Howland Reed giggled like a little girl, and then bellowed with an unstoppable torrent of laughter and silent damnation again.
’Yes... It’s good! Almost like HOWLand Reed!’ he thought with a half-mad mind about ANOTHER greatest joke known.
Feeling a lightheadedness, he took a deep breath, raised his head, and with a hoarse voice stated to the murky sky: "Damn fate!"
”So hoarse; my throat is so hoarse...” he noticed absentmindedly.
’So hoarse... so hoarse...’ he muttered and began to cry again.
”19 years... 19 years — under increasingly quiet music — I sang that useless song of action and inaction... and now it’s over... at last... it’s over... my strings are cut... I’m free again...” he muttered to himself.
”You hear! I’m free!” he tried to shout but broke into a cough.
”I already know...” he muttered straight to sky. ”Hence, no more. Just go find another fool." he half-vowed half-pleaded. ”With voice, with voice... when mine is faraway.”
Author's Note:
Here is my theory about Howland Reed:
Before the Tower of Joy Howland Reed visited the Isle of Faces, where children of the forest and Three-Eyed Crow, via Root Internet, showed him some of the ’Song of Ice and Fire’ — not like perfect video about the future, but as set of symbolical prophetic dreams — and made him one of the singers.
Perhaps the main choir’s voice. Because despite Howland’s insane inaction throughout the entire plot, without Ned’s salvation at the Tower of Joy and subsequent actions of his children — also started from prophetic dreams — the Song just couldn't go on. In no way. Jon Snow would be dead, and ’the last greenseer’ wouldn’t have an heir with a talent equal to his own.
Therefore, when the Song of Ice and Fire fully ended after the MC's transmigration, Reed was set free.
SPOILER!
Information isn’t quite important for the plot, but will be used a few times in it.
SPOILER!
IMHO, taking into account the show’s plot, the great ending for ASOIAF, and this fic canon is this:
The most important events were orchestrated by main Game of Thrones player who had TWO of the greatest forms of power, wits and magic, Brynden Rivers. Who had two goals:
Defeat the Others by guiding power of the ’Prince That Was Promised’ prophecy into most preferable form for himself.
Take over Bran's body to become king.
Both of which he achieved at least in the show. With great help from Howland Reed, whose main role was to do nothing despite his own knowledge of the future. Singing by silence.
So, by the end of the last book:
Prince That Was Promised: Jon Snow, because of the two most powerful magical lineages of Westeros needed to withstand the ’Great Sacrifice.’
Nissa Nissa: Daenerys Targaryen and, perhaps her link to dragons, used as fuel for a ’Great Sacrifice’ ritual.
Biggest twist: Tyrion Targaryen as third dragon’s head. Related coincidences have too much potential to be just thrown away.
Best GoT player: Brynden Rivers (magic and wits). Second best GoT player: Tyrion Targaryen (two wits lineages).
Obvious Monster of the Week groundwork and perhaps a hint for the last chapter of the books: Aeron Greyjoy and the aquatic humanoids mentioned in the Strange Stone manuscript. New Others.