sixthiterationlogs | receive the horizon dawn’s golden glow; honor is among us, honor is all we know

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receive the horizon dawn’s golden glow; honor is among us, honor is all we know

WHO: Eddard Stark
WHERE: Fountain/Around the Village
WHEN: March 10, afternoon into early evening
OPEN TO: OTA (Separate thread for Sansa (continuation from TDM))
WARNINGS: Mention of death/execution (will update as needed)
STATUS: Yes

// Arrival - The Fountain //
The last thing Ned could remember was the chilling, screaming sound of approaching death as the executioner used his own weapon against him. After that -

He'd ended up here. Clawed his way out of the fountain, felt the press of hard earth against his back as he stared at a sky bluer than any he'd seen before. He'd thought he'd died, been transported to some sort of afterlife, but it would've been too good to be true. Instead, he'd found himself in a village, of sorts. There were similarities, to his beloved home of Winterfell, but also -

Differences.

His belabored breathing is mottled with violent, hacking coughs - many of which force water up from his lungs to saturate the ground beneath him. He rolls over onto his side, presses a palm to the ground, forces himself up onto his knees. As he brings the back of his hand to his mouth, he feels the strange tug of the fabric around his body -

It isn't the leather he's used to, nor does it even vaguely resemble his usual garments - the ones he'd loved and left behind up North: the furs, the pelts, leather delicately woven and dark as the frozen earth. Even the pieces he'd had to wear in the warmer King's Landing are missing. He then feels the tightness of straps against his shoulders, realizes he's carrying a satchel of some sort on his back. He thinks to remove it, to investigate, but first, he has to figure out how to answer a very pressing question:

Where in the Old Gods' names is he?

// Later - The Village //
He's determined to explore more of the town, now that he's forced himself to scout the area, taking advantage of the cover of a number of trees to finally bend a knee, investigate the contents of the strange satchel he'd arrived with. He'd also taken the opportunity to peel away the saturated clothing for the dry set he'd found - marvelling at how much quicker it was to dress as opposed to before with layer upon layer. Perhaps there's something to the simplicity of it all.

He tries to retrace his steps back towards the fountain or what he believes to be the center of the town, pack lazily slung over one shoulder, long tendrils of hair still dripping and soaking the shoulders of his shirt.

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"A village with no name?" The surprise is evident in Ned's tone, eyes quickly flitting to take in their surroundings again. "I've never heard of such a thing before," he murmurs to himself before dragging his gaze back towards her face. A silent apology breaks out across his face as he shakes his head, bowing it towards her with a hand at his waist. "Forgive me, I've not introduced myself. Lord Eddard Stark of Winterfell." He raises his head again, offers a faint twitch of his lips. "Hopefully the pressing circumstances of my arrival will give good reason for an exception regarding my lack of manners."

"Not one that we've started writing down on signs, at least," says Amy, given that if people have been doing that or referring to it as something in particular, it's not something she's paid much notice to, seeing as she's pretty much just been healing lately, those lightning strikes having taken her out of commission for a long while.

"Lord Eddard," she echoes, shaking her head. "Amy Pond, of Leadworth," she introduces in turn, even if Leadworth is a whole lifetime away, at this point (literally). "Not a lady or lord of anything, even if I keep saying I should be."

"Leadworth," he echoes, running it through the list of steads and towns still memorized at the back of his mind. "Afraid I've not heard of it." Her accent would suggest she's also from somewhere on the mainland of Westeros, though not of the north. He wonders if she'd originally been a Tully, flaming hair the color of hot embers so indicative of his beloved Cat. Though there are no great houses with the surname Pond he can recall. Perhaps lack of title meant she was a commonfolk, which would explain his being unfamiliar with both Leadworth and House Pond. "Is it of the south, this Leadworth you speak of?"

"It's all right, not many people have. It's got a post office and some old crumbling ruins, but that's about it." It also has some of the highest alien activity in Britain thanks to the TARDIS' habit of landing nearby, but she doesn't think that's printed in many of the guidebooks. "It's in England, yeah," she says, annoyed mildly, because no matter how long she's spent in England, she's still Scottish to her roots.

"From what I've heard, your world, your place, it's not the same as mine. I met another woman who talked about Westeros, she had hair like mine," she supplies. "Ygritte? Something?"

"Afraid I've not heard of 'England,' but your home sounds lovely," he offers, tossing about the possible meaning of the words, 'post office' somewhere in the back of his mind. A small village, he imagines, this Leadworth. Perhaps very much like the one he's found himself in now.

Talk of Westeros and others who might be from there is both exhilarating and terrifying for Ned. He'd made too many foes his last months of life, and the paranoia that had leeched into him in the dungeon is keeping its grip quite steady. The name she mentions, however, allows him to relax - it isn't a Lannister.

"Ygritte? It's not a name with which I'm familiar." He opens his mouth slightly to ask more about this mysterious woman but then falls back on something else she's said: "What do you mean, not the same as yours?"

Maybe she's gone and described it wrong, then, because 'lovely' is not an adjective she'd think of when she thinks of Leadworth, but maybe that's just because Amy's been dreaming of time and space since that crack in her wall had shown up, pouring the universe into her head. "Well," she says, trying to make sense of the best way to explain it, "you come from a place called Westeros, but I've never heard of it in my life before."

"You've never heard of England, so either we're living in the same place and have never heard of each other, or we're from different planets," she says, like it's a logical assumption to make.

Old Gods, could she be right? Had the maps he'd poured over had been accurate, to completion? Or perhaps there were lands that lay beyond the frayed edges of parchment, the weathered borders he'd memorized? He thinks of the nights out by the Weirwood when he was but a boy of Winterfell, no title to his name, no mantle to carry. The glittering jewels of the velvet black sky overhead, how he'd wondered at them and let them mesmerize him into silence. He'd never considered there might be life somewhere out there - how could he have? Such things were nonsense.

"Your accent," he murmurs, trying to keep his footing on whatever minimal grasp of reality he might still have left, "It is similar to ours - though more common in the Southren folk. How could we sound so similar yet be from different -" He can't quite get himself to say the word 'planets.' Even in theory, it sounds too obscene to give voice to.

"Trust me, I ask the same thing everywhere I go," Amy says, because at least with the TARDIS, she could blame it on the translation circuit, which made Vincent Van Gogh sound like her, even though he's Dutch and she's very much not. Here, though, she doesn't know if it's just a leftover of that alien technology or if it's just technology. "Maybe none of us speak anything the same, but it's making it easier?"

She knows that can't be true, though, because her Hot Italian Friend doesn't exactly speak English, so why should the rest of them get exceptions? "I don't think much in this place makes sense, though," she points out.

"'It's' .. ?" Ned's hand moves up to scratch at the small hairs canvassing his chin, the sound of skin against prickling needles a strange sort of blanket - comforting, soothing. Her latter comments gets a bit of a snort from Ned, one of bitter agreement and disbelief. Though, for as true and honest as he was flesh and bone when he shouldn't have been, so was this red-headed woman - from a different world, a different land, speaking in a way he could understand. "It would seem sense is not a thing this place has an abundance of, no. Has it been difficult for you? To adjust?"

Amy gives him a bit of a smile of understanding, mainly because she remembers the first few adventures in the TARDIS and that wondrous feeling that gave way to peril and danger. She'd gotten used to it pretty quickly, even learned to like it, which is why she's forever grateful the Doctor thought to start bringing Rory along, but it'd been hard, at the first.

"It's hard being stuck in one place," Amy says, truthfully, because being out of time isn't so bad, neither is wherever they are, seeing as she's got Rory. "I never really stayed in the same place for longer than a few weeks. I'm starting to get twitchy, honestly."

"It would seem we are at opposite ends," Ned replies warmly, a hint of amusement in his eyes. "Where you float like the wind from place to place, I find myself more and more like a tree, rooted wherever I am planted." Though, he thinks, there is nowhere he could ever firmly take root except in his home of Winterfell. Even while at King's Landing, he had adjusted out of necessity - but most plants cannot thrive if uprooted and planted in a different climate, just as Ned had not further south. "The roots are not always strong or deep, but moving about is not in my nature."

"You had to get a bit of a burst of wind to end up here," Amy points out with an amused look, shrugging seeing as it's sort of the opposite for her, then, but he's right. All those years flitting about and she was going to be trapped, whether it was in New York or here, it was going to be with Rory. She's just grateful that it's worked out better than she might have hoped.

"Is there something bad about it?" she asks. "You get to see new things, meet new people, have new adventures!"

"Not inherently, no, I wouldn't think," Ned replies thoughtfully, "Though it ended up quite poorly for me." He smiles warmly at her excitement; it's a refreshing sight, though there's no part of him that can relate to it or feel it with her. He has always been far too stern and serious a man for thoughts of adventures and far off lands. It's only gotten more pronounced as he's aged and had children. "I think that I perhaps find comfort in the familiar."

Amy has never been that way, truthfully, unless the familiar was rocketing around the universe in a big blue box with a mad alien who thought he knew everything, but definitely didn't. "Maybe this one will turn out better for you," she suggests, aiming to be positive even without knowing anything about the man's background. "I mean, it's sort of miserably and grimy and awful," she complains, her own negativity shining through (or is it practicality, in this case), "but I mean, apart from that?"

"Okay, maybe I'm not making the best case," Amy confesses.

Ned barks a quip of laughter and shakes his head appreciatively. She hasn't made the best case for it, now, but he rather appreciates her honesty - however blunt it might be. Given the most recent events in his previous life, honesty feels a bit like an unattainable dream - it's nice, he thinks, to be reminded that it's a possibility, that not everyone is so entrenched and blackened out by manipulation and greed and betrayal.

"There would be many who would say that me and my kin prefer the miserable, grimy, and awful, I believe."

"You don't seem that miserable or grimy," Amy says, mainly because she's definitely seen worse. "I mean, we could all use a shower," she says, because yeah, she could definitely use about two hours with a loofah, some decent body wash, and shampoo. Conditioner would also be nice, but that feels a little like Amy's asking for too much.

"Not to mention, I've definitely met more awful," she guarantees. "You don't even crack the top ten."

"You've only just met me," Ned replies with a twinge of sarcastic humor. "Give it time, and perhaps you'll come to know just what I mean." He'd been known as the Quiet Wolf, in his previous life - the Starks were rumored to be as bleak and dreary as the Northern climate they inhabited. And, perhaps, there had been some truth to it. Living in Winterfell, even during an abnormally long summer, required a certain thickness of skin, a certain sobriety that those further south did not seem to possess. But Ned knows no other life; he is a Stark, a man of the North - and will be, until the day he dies. Again.

"That's kind of you to say; I will not actively attempt to increase my ranking, but you cannot say I did not give you fair warning if I do."

"I'm a miserable grump myself, sometimes, I have a radar," Amy announces imperiously, as if she's made the decision and no one will sway her, at this point. "Maybe I'll give it time and find you're cheerier than most people I know," she retorts, seeing as she's met enough grim-faced people during her days travelling that she's used to them.

"If you end up trying to ascend the ranks, keep in mind, I can see through that bullshit," she says knowingly. "But maybe you'll earn it rightfully."

"Something to aspire to," Ned replies with a bright quip of laughter. "It is always good to have goals, is it not? Even if they are lofty and for no one's benefit but your own pride?" A shiver quickly runs down his spine as he bows his head a bit, offering a silent manifestation of his gratitude. "Old Gods look down upon you favorably; you have done me a great kindness. I believe I will seek shelter and a meal now, let my old bones dry themselves out near a fire. You are more than welcome to join me, should you wish, but I would also not seek to hoard your company more than I already have."

Amy gives him a sympathetic smile and a nod, feeling like he's right. Fire and a good meal sounds good. "Maybe I'll drop by and visit later," she says, "I've got a husband to go back to before he starts worrying where I've got off to," she admits, seeing as she also doesn't want to stray too far from Rory, honestly, not after nearly losing him in New York like she had.

"Just remember, I'll be watching you, Grumpy," she warns, with a playful smirk.

"Please do feel free to do so whenever you wish, if only so I can show you how I have continued to excel in my dour expectations," Ned replies warmly, before quickly changing his expression into one of sternness and sobriety - at least for show. "Please also extend an apology to your husband on my behalf; I would be glad to explain, should he require it."

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receive the horizon dawn’s golden glow; honor is among us, honor is all we know

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