Chapter 4 – The Awakening of Alaric Arryn Part (1)
The Eyrie, 285 AC
The wind was restless in the Eyrie that week, howling louder than usual across the high passes and narrow stone courtyards. In the chill of early spring, the mountain fortress stood cloaked in veils of mist and snow, as if the sky itself mourned the small boy who lay unmoving in a feather-stuffed bed.
Six-year-old Alaric Arryn had not stirred for two days.
The maester had spoken of a fever, of chills and fire warring inside the boy's slender frame. He'd tried poultices and broths, prayers and herbs. Still, the boy's skin burned, his body convulsed in sweat-soaked sheets. The servants whispered in corners, fearing the death of another heir.
But on the third day, Alaric's eyes opened.
And the world was never the same again.
At first, there was only light.Blinding. Weightless.
Then came the flood—a deluge of names, memories, books, voices, boardroom debates, election victories, business deals, reincarnation novels, statistics, and war strategy games.
Then, silence.
The boy who sat up in the Eyrie's bed had the body of a six-year-old noble. But behind those pale blue eyes, once soft and playful, now flickered the soul of a man who had lived forty years in another world.
He was himself, but more.
"My name… was Alaric there too," he whispered aloud, voice hoarse, still raspy from fever.
It was almost laughable. The irony. The same name in two worlds.
The healer had stepped out briefly. Alone for once, Alaric rose from the bed. His legs trembled, but his balance returned fast—too fast for a child. He stood near the narrow window and stared down the mountain slopes that had cradled him all his life.
But now he saw them.
Strategic bottlenecks. Trade limitations. Hidden passes. Opportunities.
He laughed—a quiet, short laugh that carried more in it than any child should know.
"I'm back."
Over the next few days, Alaric pretended to be weak. He drank the bitter teas Maester Colemon brought. He winced when expected. But in truth, he was testing his mind—and the strange instinct whispering at the edge of his thoughts.
There was a tingling awareness inside him, like a presence ready to be shaped.
He didn't read about this in novels—no magical chant or glowing circle. But he knew, as surely as a hand knows how to close, that he could create a being—an extension of himself, yet entirely new.
So on the seventh night after his fever broke,
Alaric slipped out of bed once the moon hung high above the Eyrie.
A day after Alaric's fever broke, Maester Colemon sat beside the boy's bed, his fingers wrapped around a steaming cup of willowbark tea. His chain clinked softly as he leaned forward to examine the child.
"You're lucky, my lord," he said, voice gentle but weary. "The fever took others last winter. Yet you survived."
Alaric smiled faintly. "I'm stronger than I look."
The old man chuckled. "So you are. But strength is more than muscles. It's patience. Discipline. Temperance."
"I'll remember that."
Colemon nodded, but something in the boy's eyes gave him pause. There was no trace of the childish laughter that usually danced there. The lad's gaze was calm. Too calm.
Still, the maester dismissed it. "There will be extra lessons when you're well. History, numbers, some high Valyrian."
Alaric leaned forward. "Can you teach me about the Great Houses? Their bloodlines. Their weaknesses."
The maester blinked. "Weaknesses?"
Alaric gave a little cough and smiled innocently. "I meant… histories. Their strengths. Their banners. I want to be a good lord."
Colemon relaxed slightly. "Ah. Of course. That's noble of you, my lord."
The boy nodded, his eyes unreadable.