From the Citadel, pale wings took flight across the realm.
In Oldtown, bells tolled.
In Highgarden, the news was taken as reason for a winter festival to be readied.
In the bowels of Casterly Rock, Lord Loreon resumed counting his coins.
In Riverrun, the Tullys were occupied with the latest series of petitions and counter-petitions from the Blackwoods and Brackens, and considered the question of whom would attend the marriage of Jannia Tully to Lord Jarmon Buckwell in a few months time.
At Storm’s End, Lord Corwen Baratheon is said to have dismissed the news of a white raven’s arrival, busy entertaining a Marcher lord whose daughter might suit as a bride for his own son and heir.
At the Eyrie, preparations began to shut up the castle on the Giant’s Lance, moving the Arryn court to the Gates of the Moon.
On Pyke, the Lord Reaper took in the news, and then carried on with his business, including passing sentence on half-a-dozen drunken sailors who were hanged later that day.
In Sunspear, no one cared.
In Winterfell, grey-haired Lord Cregan refrained from saying he’d told everyone so.
And in King’s Landing, King Baelor fasted for a day and a night—but only a day and a night—and prayed to the Seven that winter would be short… while the Hand, Prince Viserys, talked to the small council of the precautions to be taken if the king’s prayers failed.
The long autumn has ended, and winter now rules in the Seven Kingdoms.