After receiving word from Winterfell, Jon left Castle Black for a time and returned home.
This time, his return happened to coincide with his sixteenth birthday.
By evening, the great hall was ablaze with light.
The hearth fire burned high, rolling waves of heat driving off the North’s chill.
The long table was laden with bread fresh from the oven, venison legs roasted till the fat sizzled and dripped, and steaming bowls of beef stew.
Servants moved back and forth, refilling cups and bringing out fresh dishes now and then.
Eddard Stark sat at the head of the table, Catelyn beside him, watching the children’s antics with a smile.
Robb had already had two cups of ale, and a little tipsy, was loudly telling some joke that wasn’t actually funny.
“Seven save us, Robb, that joke wasn’t funny at all.” Sansa rolled her eyes.
“I’m not a bard.”
Robb raised an eyebrow, entirely unrepentant, and the hall broke into good-natured laughter.
Even Hodor, passing by with a great platter of roasted meat, grinned along and cried out: “Hodor! Hodor!”
Jon looked at Bran, Arya, and Rickon gathered around him, and a smile crossed his own face too.
Rickon, the youngest, clung to his leg and simply would not let go.
At the height of the feast, everyone brought out the gifts they’d carefully prepared.
Bran gave him a rough wooden dagger he’d whittled himself.
Arya practically shoved a crooked, lopsided wooden wolf she’d carved into his hands, chin held high with pride.
Sansa gave him a grey woolen scarf she’d sewn herself, its stitches fine and warm.
Last, Robb stood, pressed a fine steel sword into his hands, and grinned, thumping him on the shoulder: “Take it. Next time you’re back from the Wall, we’ll have ourselves a proper match.”
The hall filled with laughter and cheer.
Theon Greyjoy sat on the other side of the long table, a cup of ale in hand, that same careless, mocking smile still on his face.
But his gaze kept drifting, without his meaning it to, toward Jon at the center of it all.
He watched Arya throw herself at Jon in a hug, watched the warmth in Ned’s eyes as he looked at his bastard son.
Theon suddenly found himself thinking of Pyke.
No one there had ever thrown him a feast like this.
Lord Balon barely even remembered his birthday, most years.
Theon lowered his head and took a hard, bitter swallow of ale, forcing the sourness back down, muttering to himself with self-mockery:
“Hells… it’s enough to make a man jealous.”
Just then, Steward Poole hurried into the hall, his face urgent, and murmured a few words into Lord Stark’s ear, presenting him with a sealed letter bearing King’s Landing’s wax.
After the feast ended, candlelight flickered in the lord’s solar.
“The king is coming to Winterfell?”
Robb stared at the sealed letter on the desk, his face full of astonishment.
Ned’s brow was furrowed tight, a faint worry showing in his eyes.
“King Robert doesn’t say why exactly. Only that the matter is urgent. He and Queen Cersei are bringing the family north, and they’re already on the road.”
Jon, standing in a corner of the solar, asked: “Do I need to leave?”
Ned understood well enough what he meant, and nodded slowly.
“Best if you leave within three days.”
Jon nodded at that.
Ned walked to the window and looked out at the snow-covered mountains in the distance.
“Robert isn’t only bringing the royal family this time. There will be a great many lords, knights, and attendants besides.”
“The more people, the more eyes.”
He turned, his gaze settling on Jon.
“Frostflame must not be discovered by anyone.”
“Her existence would upend the whole balance of Westeros.”
Jon understood exactly what Ned meant.
A dragon meant conquest, war, and power enough to topple a dynasty.
Once word of the dragon got out, there would be no more peace for Winterfell.
Beside them, Robb, hearing the name “Frostflame,” felt a flicker of curiosity cross his eyes, and had just opened his mouth to ask, when Catelyn gently pulled him back.
Beneath his cloak, Jon’s hand tightened without a sound.
From the fragments of memory still left to him, he knew, it all began the day King Robert first set foot in Winterfell.
Unfortunately, all he had of it were scattered, broken fragments; whatever had actually happened, he could not find in what remained of his memory.
All he knew was that, in the end, House Stark had been left with only a few of its members surviving.
His father, Catelyn, and Robb had all died, for reasons he could not recall.
But now, with him here, and with the dragon’s help, all of that tragedy could still be changed.
Night deepened.
The feast had entirely broken up, and all of Winterfell had settled into quiet.
Back in his own room, perhaps because of the news he’d heard that day, Jon slept very poorly.
Caught in the pull between waking and sleep, his mind sank once more into that empty white mist.
The world around him gathered and took shape once more.
But this time, the silver-haired girl who always smiled at him in these dreams looked entirely different.
When she saw Jon, her violet eyes were filled with helplessness and despair.
“Dany? What happened?” Jon’s chest tightened, and he crossed to her quickly.
Daenerys lifted her head, tears spilling out at once: “My brother… Viserys is going to sell me to a Dothraki khal… as a bride.”
“What?!” Jon stared at her, unable to believe it.
In his mind, the memories of his past life were full of gaps; some things he knew, others he had only in fragments.
Of Daenerys’s future, all he had ever glimpsed was that she would become the Mother of Dragons, with three dragons of her own.
Beyond that, he knew nothing at all.
“I saw Khal Drogo today…” Dany wrapped her thin, fragile arms tight around herself, as though trying to hide inside her own body.
“He’s a savage.”
Daenerys hugged her arms tighter, and remembering the way Drogo had looked at her, couldn’t help a shiver.
“When he looked at me, it was like looking at prey that’s already been tied up and ready.”
Jon asked, holding back his fury: “Has Viserys lost his mind? What is he even trying to do?”
“He thinks if he sells me to the khal, he can convince the Dothraki to raise an army and carry him across the Narrow Sea to take back the Iron Throne.”
Daenerys’s eyes swam with tears.
“He’s lost all reason. All he thinks about is the Iron Throne.”
“To him, I’m nothing but a bargaining chip to trade away for what he wants.”
“I told him I didn’t want this. I begged him. But he didn’t care at all. He even threatened me.”
As she said this, Daenerys’s voice dropped lower.
She clenched the hem of her dress, her body trembling faintly, as though remembering something terrible.
“What did he do?”
Jon’s expression darkened.
Daenerys didn’t answer at first, only lowering her head, tears falling, and it was a good while before she spoke, her voice choked.
“He grabbed me by the hair and threw me to the ground.”
“He said I had no right to argue. That if I ever defied him again, he’d wake the dragon that sleeps.”
Jon’s fingers curled slowly tighter, and he was silent for a moment before forcing down the fury churning in his chest.
“When is the wedding?”
“In twenty days. In Pentos.”
Daenerys answered weakly.
“Khal Drogo is gathering his khalasar…”
“Dany. Wait for me. I’ll come find you.”
Jon promised, at the last.