Game of Thrones

EXT. CLEARING - DAY

Snow drifts across the bodies of the fallen dead. Eight

corpses lie frozen on the ground-- men, women, and children,

wearing heavy furs. The wind whips through their long hair.

At the edge of the clearing, WILL (20), a young ranger

dressed all in black, surveys the grim scene from the back of

his gelding. He gathers his reins and guides his horse south.

EXT. FOREST - DUSK

Will rides hard between the towering pines, his horse’s

hooves kicking up fresh-fallen snow.

He comes to a halt and dismounts beside two tethered horses.

His comrades, GARED (50) and SER WAYMAR ROYCE (18), crouch

beside a stream, filling their skins with cold water. They

rise and look to the newcomer expectantly.

Ser Waymar is gray-eyed and graceful, with an aristocrat’s

air of command despite his youth. He wears a supple coat of

gleaming black ringmail and a lush sable cloak.

Will and Gared also wear the black of the Night’s Watch, but

their clothes are far less regal, their leather and fur

battered from hard usage. Gared wears a hood for warmth.

WILL:

We should start back. They’re all

dead.

Gared offers Will his water skin and Will takes a drink.

SER WAYMAR:

Any blood?

WILL:

Not that I saw.

SER WAYMAR:

How close did you get?

WILL:

Close enough to see they was dead.

SER WAYMAR:

(skeptical)

Or sleeping?

GARED:

If Will says they’re dead, they’re

dead. We should head back to the

Wall.

2.

SER WAYMAR:

(with the hint of a smile)

Do the dead frighten you?

GARED:

Mormont said we should track ‘em.

We tracked ‘em. They won’t trouble

us no more.

SER WAYMAR:

You don’t think Mormont will ask us

how they died?

He walks toward his horse. Gared and Will exchange a troubled

glance.

EXT. EMPTY CAMP - NIGHT

Moonlight shines down on the clearing, the ashes of the

firepit, the snow-covered lean-to. If there were corpses on

the ground before, they’re gone now.

The three riders enter the camp. Their horses seem spooked,

as if they smell a predator nearby.

SER WAYMAR:

Your dead men seem to have moved

camp.

Will looks around, confused. He knows what he saw.

WILL:

They were here...

Spotting something shimmering on the ground near the firepit,

he walks his horse closer, dismounts and looks down.

Lying at his feet is the hilt of a steel longsword. The blade

has been shattered into a thousand shards.

Will stares at the shattered sword. He knows what this means;

the dread on his face is unmistakable.

From his horse, Gared looks at the ground. The indentations

where the bodies once lay are still visible-- as are the

faint but unmistakable footprints leading away from them.

GARED:

We have to move. Now.

He is interrupted by a neigh. Will’s horse, riderless and

panicked, bolts from the camp site.

3.

Ser Waymar’s horse rears back on its hind legs, throwing its

rider to the ground before galloping after the first horse.

Gared struggles to keep his own horse under control. Ser

Waymar stands unsteadily, brushing the snow from his cloak.

WILL:

(terrified)

Gods...

He’s staring into the darkness at the edge of the clearing.

Ser Waymar turns to see what the young tracker sees: a shadow

emerging from the forest.

A figure steps into the moonlight, tall and gaunt, with flesh

pale as milk. It slides toward the rangers on silent feet.

Its armor appears to be carved from ice. Its sword is

translucent, a shard of crystal so thin it almost seems to

vanish when seen edge-on.

Ser Waymar’s voice cracks like a boy’s:

SER WAYMAR:

Stay where you are!

The OTHER keeps coming. Ser Waymar draws his sword with

trembling hands. Will, standing near the fire pit, and Gared,

still on horseback, draw their own swords.

The Other halts. For the first time we see its eyes, bluer

than any human eyes, a blue that burns like ice.

They emerge silently from the shadows, on all sides of the

clearing. Five of them... six... seven... their strange

swords shimmering in the moonlight.

Gared can no longer control his panicked horse; it bolts from

the clearing, ignoring its rider’s commands.

The Others watch Gared flee. They turn back to Ser Waymar and

Will and begin to advance on the young men.

As the circle closes, the Others speak to each other in a

language we’ve never heard, with voices like cracking ice.

Waymar and Will stand together, class distinctions forgotten,

two boys about to die. They steady their sword hands and

mutter quick prayers as the Others descend upon them.

CREDIT SEQUENCE:

4.

CLOSE on a pair of ancient, gnarled hands writing a message

on a small parchment scroll. The old man (we never see his

face) tightly rolls the scroll, binds it with a black ribbon,

and ties it with a leather strip to the leg of a BLACK RAVEN.

The old man lifts the raven off his desk; it flaps its dark

wings and flies out of the open chamber window.

The raven flies away from Castle Black, a large and ancient

fortress dwarfed by what lies behind it: the Wall. Older than

history, this is the 800-foot-high barrier of ice and stone

that guards the northern edge of the Seven Kingdoms.

As the raven gains altitude, the landscape below it

TRANSFORMS into a map of Westeros. The Wall is revealed to

cross the entire continent, a boundary between the Haunted

Forest to the north and the civilized lands to the south.

The raven flies south over the map, on which the cities,

regions and features of the land are named: Winterfell, the

Kingsroad, Moat Cailin, the Riverlands, the Vale of Arryn.

Occasionally the bird dips down, and the map resolves back

into reality for just long enough to give us a view of some

points of interest: Winterfell’s old stone towers, full of

cold beauty. The foreboding Eyrie castle high atop the Vale

of Arryn, a feat of montane architecture that would have been

impossible for medieval engineers.

When the raven reaches King’s Landing, the map resolves back

into reality as the bird drops down into the dirty sprawl of

the capital.

The raven flies through the open gates of the Red Keep, a

massive compound with red walls the color of blood. The bird

flies through an open window into the throne room, to land on

the Iron Throne itself-- a throne built from the hammered

swords of a thousand defeated enemies.

The raven pecks at its wings, cleaning itself after the long

journey, alone in the empty throne room.

END CREDIT SEQUENCE

EXT. HILLTOP - DAY

LORD EDDARD “NED” STARK (40) sits on his motionless horse,

his long brown hair stirring in the wind. His closely-trimmed

beard is shot with white. He has spent half his life training

for war and the other half waging it, and his face conveys

both authority and a haunted sadness.

5.

He is accompanied by a dozen members of the HOUSEHOLD GUARD,

all on horseback. Over their heads flaps the Stark banner: a

gray direwolf racing across an ice-white field.

South of the Wall the grass is still green and the sun is

shining, but the air is cold enough to cloud the breath of

four guardsmen as they escort Gared toward the stump of a

massive oak tree.

Rate this script:3.8 / 6 votes