The gallop eventually slowed as the Kingsroad faded into the distance. My paws were heavy, the pads raw from the sprint across the shale and roots of the Riverlands. King's Landing was nothing but a smudge of smoke on the horizon. I didn't stay on the main road. Every outrider and Gold Cloak in the city would be riding North within the hour.
I turned toward the God's Eye, moving through the thickets where the bush grew high enough to hide a horse. Ned was a dead weight on my back now. His grip on my mane had slipped, his head lolling against my shoulder. The fever from the cells hadn't left him, and the shock of the flight was taking the rest of his strength.
I used [Detection]. The map in my mind pulsed, highlighting the terrain ahead. I needed somewhere dry and defensible. About three miles in from the road, the ground rose into a series of limestone ridges. I found a shallow cave, hidden by a curtain of dead briars and overhanging rock.
I slid Ned off my back. He hit the ground with a soft groan, his face pale in the dim light of the cave. I was spent. The [Extreme Speed] and the transformation had eaten my stamina like a furnace. I couldn't stay as the Arcanine.
I pulled the heat back into my core. The suppression felt like my skin was shrinking around my muscles. Steam poured off my coat, filling the cave with a white mist and heat. My bones ground together until I was back to the size of a large mountain dog. The internal fever was a dull, constant ache in my chest.
I left the cave for a time, and caught two rabbits in the tall grass near a stream, breaking their necks before they could even scream. I brought them back, dropping them near the entrance.
Ned was shivering. The cold of the Riverlands night was settling in. I dragged him further back into the cave, away from the draft, and curled my body around his chest. My fur was still radiating the heat of the suppression. It was like a living hearth.
Hours passed. The only sound was the wind in the trees and Ned's ragged breathing.
Near dawn, he stirred.
Ned's hand moved first, his fingers twitching in the dirt. He let out a low, pained breath and opened his eyes. He stared at the ceiling of the cave, then at the gray light coming through the briars. He looked lost.
"Robert?" he whispered.
He thought he was back in the past, or maybe in Kingswood. He tried to sit up, but his body wouldn't obey. He turned his head and saw me.
He froze. He looked at my scorched orange fur, the thick cream mane, and the way I was watching him. He looked at the dead rabbits a few feet away. His memory seemed to flicker, the Sept, the fire, the monster that had launched Ilyn Payne like a sack of grain.
"I saw... a beast," Ned said, his voice a dry rasp. He looked at his hands, then back at me. "The Sept... it was burning. I was on the platform."
He reached out, his hand trembling, and stayed just out of reach. He looked into my eyes, searching for the "hound" he had known.
"I'm dead," he decided. His voice was flat. "This is the dark. The gods have sent a wolf to guide me."
I didn't growl. I moved closer and licked the palm of his hand. My tongue rough and warm. It was a simple, animal thing. It didn't belong in a dream.
Ned flinched at the contact, but he didn't pull away. He felt the heat of my body against his side. The reality of it hit him all at once. The "beast" that had carried him out of the city was the same hound that had sat at his feet in the Red Keep.
"Red," he breathed. A heavy, shuddering breath escaped him. "It was you. All of it."
He closed his eyes, his head falling back against the stone. He didn't ask how. He was a man of the North; he knew the world held things that didn't fit into the maesters' books. He just lay there for a long time, his hand resting on my head, feeling the rise and fall of my breath.
"You saved me," he said, and for the first time, I heard a sliver of the man who had been the Hand of the King. "But the girls... They are still in that nest of vipers."
He looked at the rabbits again. He knew we couldn't stay. He knew the hunt was only beginning.
I let out a soft huff, resting my chin on his chest. We were in the heart of the Riverlands, fugitives of the crown, with the most wanted man in the Seven Kingdoms barely able to walk.
I was Level 30, and the world was finally awake. I didn't have a voice to tell him we would find them, so I just kept him warm. It was the only promise I could make.