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Seeds of the Northern Kingdom	By : Sigil_of_House_Throckmorton Category: A through F > A Song of Ice and Fire Views: 99145 -:- Recommendations : 1 -:- Currently Reading : 5
Disclaimer: The setting and characters of the series A Song of Ice and Fire belong to George R. R. Martin. I make no profit from this work, and will remove it should I be contacted by GRRM or any of his legal representatives.

Chapter List
- 1-Val
- 2-Alys
- 3-Lyanna
- 4-Meera
- 5-Wynafryd
- 6-Wylla
- 7-Sansa
- 8-Arya
- 9-Epilogue: Daenerys
- 10-Omake: Dany
- 8
- 9
- 10
Life pulsed within the walls of Winterfell. A month had passed since great white ravens arrived at all the castles in the North announcing high summer after just over a year and a half of spring, and for only the third time in Jon’s life, the great summer feast was held at Winterfell.

Jon had been a boy of nine or ten when the most recent prior event was hosted by Eddard Stark. It was a tradition in the North dating back to the ages before the conquest, when Stark kings ruled independently. One moon after summer officially began, all of the lords of the North would gather at Winterfell to celebrate surviving another winter by feasting on whatever harvest was secured by the end of spring. This was also an important time in court life, where the lords could bring their requests before the Starks in plain view of each other, and served additionally as one of two regular social gatherings where highborn families across the realm could mingle with each other without traveling burdensome distances, the other being the great winter feast.

Traveling extensively to visit his vassals, Eddard Stark had been a popular lord paramount with close ties to many of his bannermen. The great feasts had seemed nothing more than revelry to Jon – a grand meeting of friends to trade japes more than to strengthen alliances.

Organizing such an event himself proved to be an entirely different experience. Jon had not been able to travel as extensively in the spring thaw, and many of his bannermen felt alienated by the lavish attention they perceived he had given to the vassals more in need of it. Half of the noble houses had been declared rebels or traitors at some point since the last feast, and blood still ran hot when families who had been on opposite sides of conflicts sat too near each other. Other families were notable for their absence – the Lockes, Dustins, Boltons, and Flints of both Widow’s Watch and Flint’s Finger would never be feasted at Winterfell again, all completely extinct due to war and winter.

The last, and largest, difficulty was the introduction of the eclectic group of new noble houses created out of the Free Folk settled in the Gift, southron knights and lords, and the few riverlanders that had turned to the North for protection at the end of the war.

While all of the Free Folk were ostensibly sworn to Tormund Giantsbane, the novice petty lords were paltry and completely unprepared for interacting with a traditional royal court, their refusal to kneel the least of the troubles they brought. Jon felt profoundly overwhelmed when he realized Soren Shieldbreaker of Stonedoor was the most polite petty lord from a castle near the ruins of the Wall. The Dogsheads of Sable Hall and Woodswatch-by-the-Pool refused to eat with utensils, Gerrick Redbeard of Deep Lake still demanded to be called ‘Kingsblood’ despite a royal fiat from Val banning the use of that name, and the odor from the blackened, crusted feet of House Hornfoot of Hoarfrost Hill were all the more pungent when they were confined within heated walls.

Morna Whitemask of Queensgate was at least unflinchingly loyal, but her (his?) odd mannerisms and ambiguous gender were distasteful to many others, especially Ser Brus Buckler of Ramsgate and Ser Malegorn Redpool of Widow’s Watch, despite their Redbeard brides. Narbert Grandison had raged when Jon legitimized Wynafryd Manderly’s little boy Wyatt, and nearly refused to attend when it was announced that the lady and her son would be attending. At least Ormund Wylde and the Masseys were amicable.

The Riverland lords were the easiest to accommodate despite never having attended such an event – nearly all the Northern lords respected the Mallisters and Blackwoods for flying the direwolf banner even after Robb’s murder, and comradery forged in arms was harder to break than Valyrian steel.

The Great Keep and the guest house of Winterfell were both filled to bursting. If not for the renovations of the First Keep, Jon and his family might have been forced to bed down behind the armory as he had once done while Lord Commander of the Night’s Watch. The last contingent to arrive, Harrion and Sansa Karstark, had been traveling slowly due to his cousin’s early pregnancy, made it to the castle only one day before the feast. Jon settled them in Sansa’s girlhood rooms before asking her to run through the seating arrangements one last time.

Even the nursery was overflowing with guests, and Jon was not sure it had ever been so full. A room that was once occupied only by his as yet unnamed son that he affectionately called ‘Pup’ now housed nearly a score of babes. The fact that almost half of them were his terrified Jon, but also fulfilled him in some primal way he never could have imagined before he met his firstborn. Sigorn Thenn the Younger lay peacefully next to Jordayne Reed, half-brothers though they would never know it. Jordayne’s older cousin Sarya Reed and Myranda Mormont, themselves cousins through their mothers, gurgled in a crib near Jeyne Massey. The infant heir to White Harbor wailed next to his cousin, younger by only one month, Gregory Mallister. Lynda Hornwood suckled at her wet-nurse while another changed and cleaned Alyria Blackwood, who also happened to have a Mormont mother, in a corner. Martin Condon screamed louder than all of them put together.

Each had travelled with their families, and Jon was suspicious that Sansa was not the only lady with a pregnancy underway. The North as a whole had suffered a great depopulation in addition to the decimation of its nobility, and Jon hoped that the smallfolk were following the example of their lords and making as many babies as they could. Each child was a step to a brighter future, and Jon would enact policies over the next few days to encourage even more of them to be made, nobles and smallfolk alike.

Jon handed Pup off to his nursemaid, a concession Val had made in solely due to the incredible workload of managing Winterfell in all of the chaos. He enjoyed bonding with his infant son, who was already saying a few words – ‘Jo’, ‘Val’, ‘Go’, and ‘up’ so far – but the one year old boy still tired easily, and now slept peacefully in the arms of a young serving girl sent from House Giant of Icemark.

Pup’s eyes, once mostly grey with violet flecks, had begun to darken with age. Over half the iris now showed deep indigo in firelight, necessitating drastic security measures to be put in place on who would be allowed to handle him. Careful arrangements were made to ensure that no lord or lady would be allowed within ten feet of the prince, and all of his maids were of the Free Folk, who knew nothing of the significance of such a coloring. Jon knew that it would be impossible to conceal such a thing forever, and making it through the Great Summer Feast was the best he could hope to accomplish for now.

Walking down the hall from the nursery, he passed a window to see some of the older children playing in the packed dirt and gravel of the inner courtyard. The Glover children shared similar ages with Torrhen Giantsbane and Edwyle Umber, and got on well with each other as they were led around by Little Sam, previously the monster, Aemon Ryder, Mance’s son with Dalla, and Little Jon, Gilly’s recently named two-and-a-half year old son who looked suspiciously like Maester Samwell.

His wife awaited him in the anteroom. She looked a Northern vision in the clothes she had worn for the feast, a white tunic over white woolen breeches, with high bleached leather boots and a white snow bear cape with the grey Stark direwolf sewn into the back and pinned with a weirwood face brooch. “I have been waiting for you, Jon. What was so important that you could not show up to your own feast on time?”

“Our son, of course,” Jon said and gave her a knowing look. “You know that I always spend time with him in the late afternoon, regardless of my other business.”

Val’s temperament softened. “Aye, you do. We should have just started the feast later. Or perhaps earlier. Some of our guests have been in there since lunch, and have been drinking the entire time.”

Jon winced to hear that and braced himself for whatever he would find inside. After Val straightened his doublet and cloak and placed his bronze and iron crown atop his head, and he placed her circlet upon hers, they entered the Great Hall together, hand in hand.

Organized pandemonium was the best way to describe the scene before them. The seating arrangements he and Sansa had spent hours poring over the night before had been completely ignored by the guests, creating situations that ranged from interesting to potentially disastrous.

Despite the fast friendship of their children, the Greatjon and Tormund glared at each other, each sporting fresh bruises on their faces and knuckles. Jon had Edd send a fresh keg of ale to that table straight away. Robett Glover and Larence Hornwood were both clearly drunk, singing a bawdy song together that was earning them glares from their respective wives. All of the Mormont women sat together, likely the first time they had been together since before the war, previously girls and now all proud mothers. Alys Thenn sat as regal as a queen among the hoard of Free Folk lords, surrounded by her Thenn guards but somehow managing to keep their debauchery to a minimum. The Blackwoods kept company with Brandon Tallhart, completely surrounding him as he was formally introduced to his fiancé Bethany for the first time – although that wedding was still years away. Roose Ryswell alone sat with his bride of only a sennight, the Greatjon’s eldest daughter Jonessa, although from the looks and pets they gave each other Jon did not think they would remain seated for long. Then Justin and Asha Massey were found japing with Patrek and Wylla Mallister, the women exchanging occasional lewd hand gestures, while Jason Mallister, Wylis Manderly, and a collection of the newly Northern petty lords from the Stormlands looked on in amusement. Harrion, Sansa, and Wynafryd sat close by, but cloistered together in what appeared to be an exclusive conversation. Meera Reed sat with Ned Wull, Young Brandon Norrey, Torghen Flint and Morgan Liddle, discussing something that somehow made them the tamest group of the whole lot.

Hundreds of other men and women packed what remaining space existed between the major houses. Jon had sat down with Sam for an hour every day for a fortnight to memorize their names and heraldry. He would be formally introduced to each of them as a part of the court proceedings in the morning, but it was good to know them now in case he had to make conversation.

The raised dais where Jon and Val normally dined with highborn guests was left empty so that no lord or family might be offended that they were not chosen for the honor – at least that part of the plan had not changed. Instead, the King in the North, Warden of the Green Fork and Lord of Winterfell sat in an unadorned chair at the first empty table they could find, which so happened to be next to the Karstarks.

Sansa Karstark looked up in surprise. “King Jon! What a delightful surprise! I thought your table was elsewhere…. But now that I look around, I see I should have been paying more attention to our guests,” she flushed, embarrassed.

“No need to worry, sweet sister. We cannot change the past, only move forward into the future,” he returned. Jon’s gaze went unfocussed for a moment as reflected on all of those that he would never see again, now living only in memories. His uncle Ned and his tragic secret. His cousin Robb, a king whose deadly mistake was in the bed chamber rather than the battlefield. Bran, who went beyond the Wall never to return. Rickon, his whereabouts still a mystery. The mothers and fathers, sons and daughters, brothers and sisters and cousins of all of his bannermen and friends who were dead and gone – the list never seemed to end as names blinked in and out of his mind. Arya, his cousin by blood but the sister of his heart who he had found and thought lost forever all at once. I am sorry, little sister. If only I had realized it sooner….

A gentle nudge in his ribs extracted Jon from his melancholy reminiscence. “You have words to say, husband,” Val coaxed him.

Jon nodded to her in confirmation and looked at her one last time. Her sharp face was as comely as ever, her thick honey-blonde eyebrows enhancing the pride she held as she looked upon him. She smiled at him with just her eyes, her unblemished high cheeks rising almost imperceptibly more. A surge of affection welled up within him, and with it confidence. If I have charmed her so thoroughly, what do I have to fear from this sorry lot?

Jon rose to his feet. The hall continued its rowdy chatter. He needed something to get their attention. Looking around, the solution became obvious. He closed his eyes.

She opens her eyes again in the middle of the crowded man-den. The quiet brother-mate sits by her side, unable to do what the quiet man needed. The quiet man is not her other self, but her other self loves him more than anything, so she does what he asks. Standing protectively over her litter, she throws her head back and howls, singing until the men are silent.

Jon opened his eyes once more, back at the table. The majority of the cacophony had dissipated in the wake of Nymeria’s crooning howl, high to low like a sweet sad song. Jon raised his arms and began the speech he had prepared.

“Lords, Ladies, Masters and Knights, clans and Free Folk, people of the North! You are all officially welcome to Winterfell for the Great Summer Feast!” he shouted to be heard even in the far corners of the room. “Since the age of Brandon the Builder, the Starks have gathered their family, vassals, and friends together to celebrate the first full moon of summer. Winter has come and gone, and we have survived it together!

“Many of you I am meeting for the first time, and others I feel like I have known my entire life. Some of you know me as a bastard, others as a crow. Somehow, I have become your King. My brother Robb Stark, the King in the North, reforged the bronze and iron crown of the Starks that I wear now not for his own glory, but because you asked it of him and placed it on his head.” Jon looked to the Greatjon then, but the still-too-skinny Umber man only grimaced and nodded in return.

“Robb’s will was unconventional at best – naming a bastard Lord Commander of the Night’s Watch a prince and later a king. Many of you questioned his choice, and rightfully so—I was not there in the south fighting Lannisters with the rest of you, and no man has been released from the Night’s Watch except from death. For those who still question the validity of the original document, I have it one display outside my solar for anyone to see without supervision or judgement,” Jon said. No one had approached him openly questioning the decree, but Jon knew that distrust was ripe where bastards and kings were concerned. He glanced hopefully at the Greatjon one last time, before saying, “Lord Umber is the last surviving signatory, and he may affirm or deny its legitimacy as he wishes.”

Silence spread thickly over the gathering as all eyes turned to the once giant man. Imprisonment at the hands of the Freys had been harsh, leaving his face still gaunt and bags of loose skin still sagging under his arms where muscles had once been, despite years of recovery. He would never be the man he once was. All the same, he was still tall and imposing and spry, and when he stood the audience was riveted. “I was the first man who demanded that Others-damned crown be put on Robb Stark’s head. And I paid the price in blood, both my own and my brothers’ and my eldest son’s. Crowning Robb Stark had me attacked at a wedding as I watched all of my friends get slaughtered around me.”

Jon Umber let the silence simmer in the air.

“But I did it all for a reason. We had been wronged, betrayed by two lieges two generations in a row. The Targaryens killed Rickard and Brandon and Lyanna, and the Baratheons killed Ned, held his daughters captive, and crippled his son. After we had supported their crowns and bled for their kingdoms, that was the thanks with which they repaid us. But through it all, when winter came, it was the Starks who filled our cisterns and storehouses when they became dangerously low, who negotiated trade and settled our grievances on our behalf.

“And so when Robb thought his wife barren and all his other siblings dead or lost, no offense to the Lady Karstark, I knew that I would accept no other man for my king should Robb perish than the last son of Eddard Stark! Jon Stark, THE KING IN THE NORTH!”

“The King in the North! THE KING IN THE NORTH!” the crowd chanted, pounding on their tables in varying states of drunkenness. Eventually the Greatjon motioned for them to settle so that he might speak again.

“And so it is without any reservation that I say now, on the honor of House Umber and on my own honor as a man: Jon Stark is the one true King in the North, and the man who says otherwise to me will find himself short a skull.”

Cheers erupted once again. Eventually Jon had Nymeria howl once more to suppress them.

Jon continued from where he left off. “We have had more than our fair share of suffering as a people. A disastrous war, a terrible winter, and our own childhood stories come to life to kill us all. The Wall may be gone, but that threat was vanquished, and we survived.

“Tomorrow we will convene on matters of state. We do not know how long this summer will last, but we do know that winter is coming, and we will be ready for it when it is here. But tonight, we celebrate how far we have come and mourn all that we have lost. Our lands and people may have changed, but our kingdom lives on. Share meat and mead with your neighbors, new and old, and we shall rebuild our kingdom together!”

Another chorus of raucous cheers and shouts rang out. Servants poured into the hall by the dozen carrying all manner of Northern dishes. Some plates were filled with venison, boar, mutton, beef, and pork garnished with all manner of herbs and roasted or seared, others with pheasant, grouse, and game hen stuffed with oats and raspberries or lingonberries, and still others dishes with haddock, salmon, and herring brought overland from Bear Island and Westwatch-by-the-Bridge using ice from the remnants of the Wall. The cheese made this spring was not yet cured, but berry preserves and butter were served with their hot black. The North had no grapes for wine, and almost all of their casks were empty, but ale brown ale frothing with yeast and sweat honey-mead were furnished freely to all of the guests. Even buttered frog legs from the Neck were put forward, and Jon had to admit that they tasted quite good.

No expense was spared, and the effort was obviously worth it. Despite all of these foods being sent to Winterfell as tithe or purchased recently from his own vassals, such a cornucopia was not possible to piece together in any one of the kingdom’s individual land holdings. The bounty of the whole kingdom was on display, and while his small army of cooks held far less experience or training than what would be expected at a southron court, the sheer variety dazzled the nobles present. Not that such a thing would be hard to do, after so many of them nearly starved to death not two years ago.

After Jon and Val had taken small samples of each dish and sent them around the room, they were engaged in conversation by Wynafryd Manderly, who had been sitting quietly next to Sansa since they had arrived. “Your Graces, we were discussing something earlier which I feel should be brought to your attention—”

“Wynafryd, you need not trouble their Graces with our silly gossip!” Sansa interrupted, eyes wide as she gave the busty Manderly woman a pleading look.

“On the contrary, Lady Karstark, I swore to speak to the king of this matter immediately should there be any news!” Wynafryd insisted, causing Sansa to pale at her blunder.

“What my wife means to say, Your Grace,” Harrion Karstark cut in, “is that there have been disturbing rumors from our coastal holdfasts. Raids on the shore from the Skagosi.”

The first disruption of the peace, not counting the incident with the Eyrie. It was bound to happen at some point or another.

“Is this outside of your power to deal with, Lord Karstark?” Jon asked, speaking formally should anyone else in the Great Hall overhear them – he must always speak like a king while so many guests are present, lest he seem overly familiar.

“No, thankfully. I only bring it up because of the information we acquired after interrogating a few of the captured men and women – there is a king of Skagos, if they are to be believed,” Harrion finished with a grim twist to his mouth.

“That is what I wanted to discuss with you, Your Grace,” continued Wynafryd. “I was able to find a sailor from Lord Sealskinner’s men who spoke the Old Tongue, and sent him to gather what intelligence he could.” She paused, centering herself before saying, “The king is but a boy, barely nine years to his name. But he is spoken of with awe by the people there, who claim his hair is made of fire, his eyes made of ice, and that he is guarded by a monstrous black beast at all times. They say he is from a line of ancient kings, and that he wishes to take back what is rightfully his.”

Jon locked eyes with Sansa. It was obvious what she had been trying to hide – likely for the same reasons Wynafryd had hid the information originally, when there had been no more than hints and suspicions. He made a mental note to have an extensive conversation with her later, in private, where they could—

SCREEEEEEECH!!

Commotion and revelry slammed to a halt. Servants and lords alike jumped at the ungodly sound that pierced the castle walls like Valyrian steel through an Other.

More screeches followed, louder now, followed by screams from men on the battlements.

Jon stood and looked to the door as Hallis Mollen threw them apart, panting as though he had just run for his very life.

The normally reserved and disciplined captain of the guard looked out of his mind with terror.

“Dragons, Your Grace! Living, fire-breathing dragons!”

Murmurs of disbelief rose first from the crowd, carrying notes of incredulity and doubt. Those all vanished when a pillar of black and red fire flared through the doors and melted the flesh off Hallis Mollen’s bones.

Bedlam ensued. Women cried out in horror, men scrambled to the side doors to retrieve their weapons, or more likely to find somewhere to hide. Tables were overturned in the madness, the contents of the feast scattered across the stone floors.

“I must see to the children,” Val said as she disappeared calmly into the throng.

Servants and guards tried their best to lead the guests into the cellars and empty passageways between the buildings, normally meant to protect them from high snows in winter and now half-filled with the bounty of spring. Still, they would provide better protection than anything else if these dragons did burn down the keeps.

Jon sat still in the disarray until he felt a cold nose nudge his hand. Ghost looked up at him, red eyes filled with purpose. “You are right, my friend,” Jon responded, and let Ghost lead the way out of the Great Hall and into the bailey.

At the foot of the steps was a great winged beast, covered in black scales with blood-red claws and horns and teeth. Its eyes were red like Ghosts, but burned with desire for vengeance. It dominated the bailey, towering over men and parapets alike.

Chains wrapped twice around the dragon’s belly, just above the wings and just below them, securing an iron saddle to its back. Upon that saddle, enthroned for all of Winterfell to see, was a woman. She might have been short, had she not towered above them all from atop her mount. The invader had silver-blonde hair that cascaded over her shoulders in the summer dusk, and from this distance Jon could just barely make out her bright violet eyes. Her chin and nose were dainty, her face skinny and beautiful.

The strange woman’s manner of dress was the more odd part of her appearance, he decided. She clearly wore breaches covered in thick riding leathers on her legs, but her torso was largely bare, except for a finely painted horsehair vest under which her breasts swayed freely. Her shoulders were draped with what appeared to be the pelt of an enormous white lion. Finally, crowning her head was a crown made of smoky, red and black steel and encrusted with rubies.

Their eyes locked and the dragon bellowed once again, discharging a lance of black flame into the sky. Jon could smell his beard singe from the heat, some twenty paces away.

Two other dragons, a dark green one and a cream one, circled in the skies overhead, having already set fire to the guard towers brave enough to fire arrows upon their master.

Jon held a fisted hand high into the air and the arrows stopped.

And rather than say anything to this bewildering and uninvited guest, he waited.

Burning purple eyes bore into smooth grey ones, demanding his submission, but Jon offered only an impassive stare, ice-cold after years of seeing the impossible and accepting it for lack of any better options. This was far from the most terrifying situation he had ever been in, and he would not be cowed by this girl who could not possibly be any older than he was. And as Jeor Mormont once said, controlling the conversation means doing the opposite of what your opponent wants.

Eyebrows so pale they were almost white drew together as the girl’s otherwise perfectly smooth forehead wrinkled in frustration.

Jon continued to stare placidly, and offered her a small smile.

Finally, she submitted first. “I am Daenerys Targaryen, the Stormborn, Queen of the Andals and the Rhoynar and the First Men, Lord of the Seven Kingdoms, Queen of Meereen and Khaleesi of the Great Grass Sea, the Unburnt, Slayer of Lies and Mother of Dragons!”

Her decree echoed across the empty bailey. Not a man, woman, or child made a sound, although the other dragons continued to screech off in the distance.

“A fine name, Your Grace,” Jon replied, well aware of the crown still atop his head and what she must think of it. “I am Jon Stark, the King in the North.”

He was rewarded with a bewildered expression across her pretty face, but that quickly dissolved into fury.

“So the rumors were true. Tell me Stark, do you have any last words before you are given to Drogon’s fires as justice for your family’s crimes?”

Blood pounded in Jon’s ears. His burnt hand clenched into a rigid fist and did not release. There was only one means he had to prevent immediate death, and he took it.

“Kill me and be cursed as a kinslayer, Daenerys Targaryen, my father’s sister!” he shouted over the inhalation of the dragon as it prepared to boil his flesh and melt his bones.

The queen’s eyes widened in surprise and jerked the monstrous head up and away from him, torching the nearby sept instead, blowing out its walls with the force of the blast.

Daenerys looked shocked and then appalled by her own actions, but Jon could see the realization blooming in her mind. “The wolf bitch could have whelped. You claim to be my brother Rhaegar’s get, then. Have you any proof?”

Being honest with himself, Jon was simply grateful he had correctly guessed the relationship this girl would have with Rhaegar Targaryen. He had only known that two Targaryens had escaped into exile, and calling her Rhaegar’s sister rather than a daughter or a cousin had apparently saved his life.

The first crisis averted, Jon focused on the new one. Dark Sister was the best proof he had for his ancestry, but then again it had been missing for years and could be easily falsified … although not quickly. Arya had it, regardless, and where she took it he did not know. That left only one option available to him, as much as he would despise himself for it.

“I have suspected for some time such a thing, but my only proof is in my son. He has dark indigo in his eyes that could only have come from me,” Jon admitted, ashamed to endanger his family so.

Daenerys considered him carefully, dissecting him with her sharp eyes. “I will meet you atop the tallest tower, out of view of your archers. You will bring the child, and his mother too. My children will circle the keep, and they will not hesitate to make Harrenhal appear inviolate in comparison to this Winterfell should anything happen to me during our conversation.”

Before he could respond, the dragon beat its wings and ascended to the top of the Great Keep while beats of scalding air pulsed across Jon’s exposed face.

Inside the foyer of the Great Hall, Jon’s high lords had gathered. Lords and ladies, masters and clan chieftains and major landed knights, nearly all of the primary vassals sworn directly to Winterfell were gathered before him. They had watched the spectacle, it seemed, and were awaiting his instructions. Jon searched out the one person whose advice he needed the most at the moment, and singled her out.

“Lady Reed. What exactly was the message you heard from the old gods on the day we met?” he demanded, voice quick with urgency.

“They told me: ‘The king of ice shall clash with the queen of fire, and their realms shall be spared blood only by the hidden seeds that he has planted.’ Word for word, Your Grace,” Meera said without hesitation.

“Well, we seem to have found the ‘queen of fire’. I will negotiate with her amongst the crenels of the Great Keep. Do not disturb us, or she will burn us alive,” Jon said, thinking quickly on what he needed to do. “Someone find Iron Emmett and tell him he is the new captain of the guard, for now. Larence, go into the hall and find me some bread, salt, and wine if you can. Do it.” He left quickly and without protest, stumbling only slightly through the charred remains of the doors. “Lord Manderly, should anything happen, you will execute my last will,” under the guiding hands of your daughter, he did not need to say. “Lord Umber, this woman will not have come alone. Should the worst happen, muster whatever armies you can and garrison Moat Cailin. Lord Glover, you shall take Val and my child and keep them safe in Deepwood Motte until he comes of age.” Sybelle Glover was wonderful around her children, surely she would not mind overmuch. And that was assuming his wife and son even outlived him. “I name my lady sister Sansa as his regent, as well as his heir presumptive. It is imperative that she lives in the First Keep, even if you have to rebuild it from scratch. Maester Samwell will know how to do it correctly. There must always be a Stark in Winterfell. I cannot stress that enough.”

The absolute necessities secured, Jon branched out into contingencies. “Lord Tytos, gather however many archers you think you can while escaping notice and sneak into the godswood. Brandon Snow once thought weirwood arrows might kill dragons – that could be our best chance.” The elder Blackwood nodded and left. “Lady Thenn, if the dragons attack again, get Wun Weg Wun Dar Wun to smash one of the smaller ones.” She replied in the Old Tongue, which Jon understood just enough of to know it for a confirmation of his order.

Jon considered his next words carefully, and decided that the situation was too important to disregard his next idea for the sake of propriety alone. “Lady Mormont, gather all of the skin-changers you know of. That means you too, Tormund. If things go badly, I want each of them trying to break one of those dragons – but do not do it unless I am already dead, we don’t know how the dragons will react.”

Many of those still gathered stared at him as though he had ordered her to stand on her head, but others – more than he expected – simply nodded.

“Meera, the prophecy one last time, if you would,” Jon asked. She repeated it as Lord Hornwood returned with a mostly whole loaf of bread, a container of salt, and a skin of wine. With everything set up as well as it could be, he dashed back across the bailey and into the Great Keep, up the stairs with Ghost a silent white wisp behind him.

He stopped at the nursery, finding Val standing in the doorway with their son in one hand and her ironwood spear in the other.

“What does she want, Jon?” Val growled at him, every bit as fierce as a mother wolf with her young threatened.

“We need to show her. She must see the Pup,” he told her softly, shame dripping out of his mouth with the words. “She will not like the spear, either.”

Her face hardened to him, but she nodded and dropped her weapon to the floor. They made their way up the steps in the center of the keep, Val’s decision to set a fashion of breeches for women rather than dresses proving serendipitous to their speed. The Pup stirred some at the motion, but curled peacefully against his mother when they crested the stairs.

Jon and Val passed through the roof house and onto the high balcony overlooking the castle, carrying their beloved son and followed by Ghost, soundless as ever. Daenerys Targaryen stood with her back to them, watching the three dragons circle high about the suddenly less-impressive guard towers along Winterfell’s walls. Her quicksilver hair whirled in the chilly summer wind, swirling with her white lion cloak. A gust blew hard enough to expose her back, muscular from riding and naked above the waist.

The lack of any reaction to their presence, despite it being impossible for her to have not heard the door close behind him, allowed Jon to infer that she too knew how to manipulate conversations. She was going to make him call her attention.

Instead, Jon walked up to her side, keeping his pace easy and his hands visible, should one of the dragons become concerned. After a few paces, he rested his arms on the crenellation next to her. She was much shorter than he had expected, the top of her head barely meeting his shoulder. When she still did not respond, Jon removed the bread, salt and wine from the pouch on his belt and sat them directly in front of her.

She looked down at his offering, clearly perplexed.

“Bread and salt, Your Grace,” he explained. “And wine, if you prefer. It is a Westerosi acknowledgement of guest right that has been a tradition for thousands of years, by the reckoning of the maesters. It is a promise from me not to harm you or yours during your stay, as long as you do the same for me and mine.”

The Valyrian woman had the grace to blush. “I have been to many castles in Westeros. All of them bowed before me, while you claim the right to kill me if I do not eat or drink your ‘gift’, which might very well be poisoned,” she said. She was certainly fluent in the Common Tongue, but this close to her Jon picked up the looping vowels typical of a bastard Valyrian accent in addition to some guttural noises he had never heard before.

“I will share it with you then, to convey my good intent,” Jon said with a shrug. He took the loaf and split it, steam rising out of the warm center into the chilly dusk. Salt sprinkled over both halves, Jon placed one piece in front of her again before biting into his and taking a swig of the wine.

After a few moments of consideration, the mother of dragons acquiesced, taking a rather large bite out of her bread.

“Had I known you were coming, I would have invited you to our feast,” Jon said conversationally. He made every attempt to sound confident and relaxed, and could only pray to the old gods that he succeeded. “It’s ruined now, of course, what with the tables overturned in the commotion, the doors burnt to cinders, and my captain of the guard dead in the entrance to the Great Hall.”

“Enough with this nonsense, Stark. Show me your child, and pray to whatever gods you keep that I see my brother in him,” she said imperiously. The dragon queen spun on her feet, facing Val for the first time, the Pup nuzzled contently against her bosom. Daenerys glared at the taller woman, but Val kept her face defiant.

Ghost was nowhere to be seen, which was not entirely unusual.

His aunt approached his wife and extended her arms, silently demanding Val to relinquish their first born. A single tear slipped down her face as she placed the Pup in the queen’s arms.

The Pup opened his eyes at the none-too-gentle way Daenerys handled him. Jon knew then that other than the dragons, she had never held any children of her own.

Indigo like a calm mountain lake surrounded by whorls of grey stared into the dilated pupils and bright violet rings that were Daenerys Targaryen’s eyes.

“You then, look at me,” she indicated to Val. The volatile queen grabbed at Val’s chin and pulled her close to inspect her eyes as well. Jon realized that she might accuse him of bringing a different woman than the child’s mother, if she truly wished to prove him false, but the flecking pattern of Val’s own eyes was distinctly hers in the entire castle, which meant likely in the entire North as well. She had passed on this duality to their son, which the Targaryen queen recognized as well, quashing any plans she might have had to name him a liar.

The dragon queen glowered at Jon with so much disdain that he thought he might catch on fire just from the brilliant fire behind her eyes. She thrust his son back at Val. “He has indigo in his eyes, like many have said my brother Rhaegar possessed. I do not like it, but you are likely my nephew,” she grudgingly spat. “I will not become a kinslayer.”

Sighs of relief escaped Jon and Val both at once, like a mountain of air escaping from his chest. The king began shaking as tension slipped out of his fingers and toes to be replaced by a cloudy exhaustion.

“However, you still come before me wearing a false crown,” Daenerys threatened. “I will not kill you, son of my brother, but I will travel to every holdfast if I must and burn all those who swear fealty to your crown over mine.”

Anxiety rushed again into his veins, and the sounds of leaves rustling in the wind could be heard from the godswood in the silence that followed, even all the way up here.

… the hidden seeds that he has planted….

“That is also ill advised, Your Grace, if you truly wish to avoid kinslaying,” Jon replied, placing the safety of his entire kingdom in the hands of the old gods.

Daenerys exploded with ire. “What could you possibly mean!?” she screamed, her normally soprano voice squeaking with rage.

Focusing his lord’s face, Jon responded to her with a calm and soothing voice. “Half of the children of the Northern lords are mine as well, with as much Targaryen blood as my trueborn son. And not one of them will submit willingly to you, Your Grace,” he told her as her eyes danced with fury.

He felt his own self-control discharging as well. “None of my lords will submit to a girl who disrupted their feast, burned their men, and threatened their king. You know nothing of the North, Your Grace, nothing of its people! You do not know about old men going hunting on dark winter nights so that their families have one less mouth to feed, or being forced to consume your dead neighbor so that you do not starve. You do not know what it is to be so cold you wish you could just sleep, even though you know you might never wake up. You do not know anything of the Free Folk, or the clansmen, or the crannogmen, or even the ways of the First Men! You do not know how to ensure your lords save enough of their harvests come summer, when it is you who must remind them that Winter is Coming! You know nothing, Daenerys Targaryen!”

The self-proclaimed Queen of the Seven Kingdoms gaped at him, stunned.

“My lords only just earlier renewed their pledge to me, and confirmed their desire to bow to no king but the King in the North,” Jon said, allowing his scarred fist to unclench. “We are tired of being sod and fodder for the conflicts of the south. The south butchered our loved ones and made monsters of our lords. When the Others returned with their armies of undead, it was the North who threw them back. When Hodr, the Great Other itself, struggled against its imprisonment here, where first winter fell, it was Northmen who sacrificed their very lives to bind it once again.”

Jon paused for a moment to catch his breath. The Valyrian queen radiated impotent fury.

“I will not tell you which keeps house my children, but suffice to say burning even one noble family risks you committing the foulest of sins.”

The diminutive woman spun on her heels, showing them her back. The motion caused the wind to catch her vest, exposing a small but shapely breast midway through the rotation. She did not seem to care.

“Then your barbaric vassals can keep their bloody castles!” she shouted into the cold, Northern sky. “At this very moment, an army of Unsullied and thousands of knights and men-at-arms from the Vale march up the King’s Road. Dragons kill indiscriminately, but men can be instructed to avoid children well enough. I will liberate the smallfolk from you Northern savages and scatter any of your bannermen who resist across the sea.”

Daenerys made to signal something to her dragons, but Jon interrupted her.

“Is that what you do, Your Grace?” Jon asked, pressing his luck. “Show up unannounced to people’s castles and threaten to burn them alive and slaughter their people if they do not immediately submit?”

She spun to look at him again, becoming only more frustrated when she had to angle her neck severely due to his proximity and height. “Yes! That is what I do, because their lands and castles are mine! I am the rightful queen of the Sunset Kingdoms of Westeros, the last true Targaryen alive, and they all owe me fealty! If they do not kneel, they are usurpers or rebels and they burn!”

She is mad, Jon realized, or near enough as makes no matter. Reasoning with her would be nearly impossible, but Jon had to try.

“And do your people cheer you for it?” he asked her.

“All of King’s Landing cheered when I burned Cersei Baratheon and the Kingslayer together in the Dragon Pit,” she told him, an execrable smirk displaying her impeccable white teeth. “There were no Lannisters of the Rock left after that, and the westermen were happy to welcome me back as their rightful queen. They praised me for burning Edmure Tully and his spawn and razing Riverrun to a smoldering pit! Stormlanders and reachmen alike chanted my name when I burned the pretender Aegon Blackfyre and his Golden Company in the fields of Grassy Vale!”

Gleaming violet eyes widened in excitement as Daenerys Targaryen, Slayer of Lies, continued. “The Lannisters, Baratheons, and Tullys were all dead, and so were the Starks from what I had been told. I went to the Vale to burn the Arryn whelp, only to find him dead as well. Lord Hardyng bent the knee immediately and fashioned me a crown of Valyrian steel! He did me great service by telling me that the Starks were not as dead as they should have been, and I flew here to verify his claims for myself.”

Half of these events were unheard of in the North. Traders from the Free Cities visiting White Harbor had been mentioning upheaval in the southron lands, but things must have happened quickly for so many important events to be completely overlooked. Sansa had asked him once what happened to Edmure Tully, but no raven sent to Riverrun had ever returned, and his Rivermen lords claimed that the roads were still too dangerous to scout the area without a tremendous force.

“He told me how you stole his wife and murdered the Lord of Harrenhal in cold blood, and betrayed even Robert Arryn, your ally and kinsman!” she raged at him. “I still cannot conceive of how you convinced the Faceless Men to spare you, and only Balerion knows how you have convinced me not to kill you where you stand.”

The desire to correct her rose within his chest, but he quashed it swiftly. She is wrong on so many accounts. She has no skill for telling truth from convenient lies.

“I learned long ago that helping the least of your people only leads to betrayal. Acceding to the wishes of your vassals makes you weak, and only leads to rebellion. Fire and Blood are what make people submit to a ruler, and they will make me great!” she rambled at them, her violet eyes gleaming wild with madness.

“That is not how I rule my kingdom, Your Grace,” Jon sad softly, feeling suddenly sad for whatever circumstances must have been to produce this broken queen in front of him. He should be terrified of her, should drive her away and pray that she never returns, but this frightened girl was as much his family as his uncle Eddard. Sansa and Arya were damaged when he found them, and he could not fathom leaving them to their fates any more than he could this lady in front of him. “Call off your armies and pacify your dragons, and you may sit with me for the next three days. I will show you what it means to be a ruler rather than a conqueror, one Targaryen monarch to another. What say you, aunt Daenerys?”

Jon held his hand out in front of him, the burnt and wrinkled skin reaching out to help, if only she would take it.

The dragon queen’s features softened, imperceptibly at first, but more and more the twinkle of madness in her haunted eyes faded away, and in that moment she looked like a poor, lost little girl more than anything else. “If I look back, I am lost…” she said to nobody in particular, before locking eyes with him once again. “And please, my family calls me Dany.”

She said something in Valyrian then, but Jon had not spoken in that language at all since his meeting with Tycho Nestoris years ago as the Lord Commander of the Night’s Watch. The debt … I suppose I am still responsible for that, dissolution of the Watch or no. Especially with Harrold Hardyng trying to kill me.

Val tensed beside him and responded to her in the most eloquent and perfect High Valyrian Jon had ever heard. As children, Maester Luwin had told them how it should sound, but even he faltered on certain sounds every other use. Val spoke as though she had been fluent from birth.

Whatever she said caused Daenerys first to scowl, but then to smile and finally to laugh, mirth bubbling out of her petite body until she approached Val and leaned into an embrace. The women separated and began to speak amicably, seeming like to old friends reunited at last. Jon stared in absolute confusion as they egressed through the roof house and down the stairs, arms interlocked.

Jon was left alone on the roof of the Great Keep, only Ghost for company as he rounded the corner he had been hiding behind.

“Ghost, how the fuck does Val know High Valyrian?” he demanded of his stalwart companion. Ghost only sat down in front of him, gaze at eye-level, and cocked his head.

Echoing up from the stairway, he heard Val shout, “You know nothing, Jon Stark!”

Jon shook his head at the spectacle of it all. He had no clue how he would explain to his lords why he was tutoring a crazy woman who had already burned down parts of his home and killed the man who had faithfully waited years in the Neck to return Eddard Stark’s bones safely to Winterfell. Truthfully, it did not matter overmuch. They respected him, and more importantly trusted him. Their trust might weaken when he explained the true circumstances of his birth, but somehow he now doubted it. Given their other options, he might not be the worst king they could have.

As the last light of the sun faded into the western sky, Jon called softly, “Arya, you can come out. They are all gone.”

Nothing happened for a moment, but then a shadow rose from the shingles of the roof house before turning into his little sister-turned-cousin, who slipped down the slope to join him.

“That was a close one, brother. I don’t think even I could have protected you from that black dragon,” the young woman confided.

She was dressed in grey wool breeches and a grey tunic, with hard leather boots and her curly, brown, shoulder-length hair unbound. Her long face had become more than comely in womanhood, but the Valyrian steel sword hilted at her waist showed that she was no courtly lady.

Arya approached Ghost and allowed him to smother her face with licks and nuzzles. Nymeria and her pups could be heard whining from the kennels far below.

“I was more concerned that you might try to kill the queen herself,” Jon replied taking her hand and sitting them down together with their backs against the crenels. “It would not have been difficult, but who knows what the dragons might have done.”

The three great behemoths no longer circled the castle, but seemed to be flying off somewhere to the east. Jon could not fathom their intent, and so he did not try to.

“Aye, that’s true. The old me might have killed her for what her family did to ours, or for even threatening to harm you, but that would have likely doomed us all,” Arya said with a dejected sigh.

“Thank you again for saving me, Jon,” she beamed at him. “It seems you have soft spot for girls with troubled pasts,” she said with a knowing smirk.

Jon punched her in the arm. “None of that, now. I learned my lesson. Allowing myself to lose control like that almost lost me my favorite cousin.” He ruffled her hair affectionately. “Unless Val is in the room with me, no fucking. That’s the rule.”

Val had been furious once he eventually told her what happened with Wylla, and Sansa, and Arya most of all. More so when she met the would-be assassin for the first time, her mind and personality locked away by the programming of the Faceless Men. Jon wanted to blame the rutting Ghost and Nymeria had apparently been doing at the time, but he knew that it was his own failings that had allowed that disaster to happen.

When Val explained the new rules to him, Jon held no illusions that other women would frequent their marriage bed. It had yet to happen at all, actually, but Jon had no problems with that either. Making love with Val was never boring, and the affections they shared always felt the most sincere out of all the other women he had fucked, Ygritte included.

That is not to say Arya did not tease him mercilessly for it once she began to recover, though. The process was slow, and she still had lapses of lost time where she would not respond to her name. The memory of her time in Braavos was spotty at best, but she insisted that no (half-decent) assassins would return to Winterfell. Despite all of this, Arya was very comfortable expressing her affection for Jon, and hinted frequently to Val that when the queen was ready, she would be willing to join them in their bed.

Val herself was silent on the matter, but with her fetish Jon guessed that it was just a matter of time – if not for Arya, then perhaps should one of the Northern ladies ask for another child.

The three of them sat on the roof for a while more, until cold starlight broke through the last pangs of dusk, twinkling in the clear summer sky. Jon and Ghost went down the stair to oversee the resetting of the Great Summer Feast while Arya slipped away once more, silent as a shadow, protecting the King in the North from all harm. It was impossible to guess when she would be ready to show herself to people besides himself and Val, but that day would surely come soon.

Sparks crackled from the fir logs burning in the hearth. A wrought iron screen protected the rushes from the volatile embers desperately trying to escape to set the keep ablaze. The frequent pops were accented by the melody of quiet love-making.

The feast was done for now, and Queen Daenerys Targaryen, First of her Name, had been only pleasant company and was retired to the former king’s chambers in the Great Keep. Jon, of course, thought about none of this as he pleasured his wife.

Val softly moaned as Jon pumped leisurely between her thighs. He was fixated on her half-lidded expression, but he blushed when she noticed and grinned back at him. He could feel her velvet heat close tighter around him, like the sweet embrace of a lover after too long spent away from home. Jon acquiesced to her silent request and increased his speed, but he did not last long at the new pace.

“Val,” he breathed into her hair as he shot hot dollops of semen inside of her, his pelvis and brain vibrating in ecstasy. “Thank you. You cannot possibly imagine how badly I needed that after the madness that was today,” Jon confided to her after a moment of recovery, twisting wisps of honey-blonde hair from the nape of her neck around his finger.

“Hmmm….” she replied, stroking his back with her calloused hands and holding his hips tightly to her with her strong thighs. “It was no chore, Jon. I needed it too. That was the best sex I have ever had.”

Jon pulled back to look at her incredulously, making every effort to convey his disbelief. “You must be joking,” he said in a half-question, half-statement. “I’ve had you over tables, against walls, in a river, atop a tower, and even up your arse. I’ve fucked you so hard you had bruises! And after all those times, you liked that one the best? You didn’t even finish!”

“After all this time, you still know nothing, Jon Stark,” she chastised. “Seeing that look in your eye… It was the way I feel about you, looking right back at me. Jarl never did that. While I love our adventurous fucking, that moment made all the other times seem trite in comparison.”

Waves of contentment and affection crashed over Jon, causing his cock to burgeon once again inside his wife’s cunt. He wanted to make her feel those things all over again, to satisfy her and make her his.

Val let out an airy gasp. “Jon. We have a long day at court tomorrow … we must sleep at some… Oooh, Jon…”

The slept after they made love again. Jon distantly hoped their love would blossom into another child soon as he drifted into somnolence. Life was challenging, but then again there was never a time that it was not. Jon had a kingdom, a castle, the respect of the realm, many children, and the love of a beautiful woman. He slept peacefully that night; Val curled into his arms, ready for another long summer day.
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Seeds of the Northern Kingdom