289 AC, Winterfell.
A year had passed since Jon first came to know Daenerys in his dreams.
A great deal had happened at the castle in that year.
Catelyn had given birth to another daughter, named Arya Stark.
In between, there had been a war.
Ned had led the armies of the North to put down a rebellion in the Iron Islands, and had brought back a boy of House Greyjoy.
Jon, now seven, had grown taller still, and his grip on the wooden sword had grown far steadier.
Sparring with Robb now, unless he held back on purpose, Robb’s sword couldn’t so much as graze the hem of his coat.
They practiced swordplay together, sat through Maester Luwin’s lessons together, and were, now and then, hauled out of the kitchens by Old Nan.
At night, Jon still slipped into the dream.
From their talks, he had slowly learned that Daenerys was the last surviving blood of House Targaryen, and now lived with her brother Viserys in Braavos.
Though Ser Willem Darry looked after them, life in exile overseas was far from comfortable.
Daenerys never complained of it.
When she spoke of Braavos, she told him instead of many things Jon had never heard of.
“Once, I went down to the docks with Ser Willem.”
Her voice carried a note of excitement, as though she’d remembered something amusing.
“I saw a huge ship there, with a sea monster painted on its sail, claws bared and all.”
“It frightened me at first. I really thought there was a sea monster hiding in the water.”
Daenerys couldn’t help laughing at that.
“Ser Willem told me afterward it was only the shipowner’s family sigil.”
He listened closely to all of it.
Over the past year, they had met in the snowfield many times, and had grown steadily closer.
They had become friends who kept nothing back from one another, though most of the time it was Daenerys who talked, and Jon who listened.
Dany would tell him of the fog that never lifted over Braavos all year round, of the merchant ships flying flags of every color in the harbor, of the vendors selling grilled fish along the canals.
And of the honeyed sweets Ser Willem once bought her, which she said were the best thing she had ever tasted.
Once, she’d even carefully packed snow into the shape of one of those sweets and pressed it into Jon’s hand, insisting it was the very same candy.
Jon thanked her with the utmost solemnity, which made Dany laugh so hard she nearly doubled over.
The white dragon from deep in the pit would come out each time, most often lying quietly beside Jon, and sometimes playing with the two of them.
Jon had even given her a name.
“Frostflame.”
The frost and snow of the North, and the fire that burned within the dragon.
The white dragon seemed to understand the name at once, her violet, slitted eyes lighting up.
Rrrmmm—
A low, pleased sound rolled across the snowfield, lingering long after.
The next time Jon stepped into the snowfield in his dream, he did not find Daenerys in their usual spot.
The snowfield lay empty.
He was alone.
“Dany?”
His voice carried far across the snow, but no answer came.
A nameless unease rose in his chest.
He quickened his pace toward the pit, the snow crunching faintly beneath his feet.
Just as he neared the mouth of the pit, a faint sound of crying reached his ears.
Jon’s heart clenched, and he ran at once toward the sound.
Daenerys was curled up there, her face buried against her knees, her shoulders shaking without pause.
Her worn yellow dress was streaked with mud at the hem, her bare feet red with cold, her head bowed as she wept without end.
“Dany!”
Jon rushed over to her.
At the sound of his voice, Daenerys’s body trembled.
She slowly lifted her head, her small face streaked with tears, her eyes swollen red as peaches.
The instant she saw Jon, she threw herself into his arms.
“Ser Willem is dead!”
“He had a fever… it went on for days… everyone said there was nothing to be done for him.”
She was crying so hard she could barely breathe.
“Those men took all the money, and threw us out of the house…”
“My brother says we have nowhere to go…”
Jon froze where he stood.
The girl in his arms shook as she cried, her burning tears soaking through his leathers to his chest, and he could not find a single word to say.
He knew of Ser Willem.
Dany had spoken of him many times: the kind old man who had always looked after her, taught her her letters, comforted her whenever she was afraid.
He was the person she trusted most, one of the very few she had to depend on in this world, and now he was dead.
Jon suddenly felt a heavy weight pressing on his chest.
Daenerys was on the far side of the Narrow Sea.
He knew exactly where she was, and yet there was nothing at all he could do.
He didn’t even know how he might help her.
As things stood, he didn’t even have the means to leave the North.
In the end, all he could do was reach out and gently pat Daenerys’s back.
Frostflame stepped slowly out of the darkness.
Her body had grown larger still since the year before.
Sensing Daenerys’s crying, it seemed, she came to the two of them and let out a low, mournful sound.
Then she spread one wing wide, sheltering them both beneath it.
The wind and snow were shut out beyond the wing, and only the broken sound of Daenerys’s sobbing echoed softly within the shelter.
“My brother won’t stop losing his temper. I’ve never seen him like this. I’m so scared.”
Jon looked down at her and only held the girl in his arms a little tighter.
“I’ll stay with you in the dream, always. I won’t leave you.”
“Really? You promise?”
“I promise.”
The wind and snow slowly stilled.
But the distant snowfield had begun to blur, and even the snow beneath their feet seemed to be slowly fading away.
Jon’s expression changed.
He knew the dream was about to end.
“Dany, I have to go.”
Dany’s body shook, and she quickly threw her arms around him.
“Don’t go…”
The next moment, the whole snowfield began to collapse, the sky splitting into countless fractures, everything dissolving away in an instant.
Jon felt darkness take him, and his eyes snapped open.
He sat up.
The warmth of the dream still lingered in his chest, and Dany’s crying still seemed to echo in his ears.
Jon threw off the blankets and went to the window, pushing it open a crack.
Cold wind mixed with snow poured in, and he shivered faintly against the chill.
At the same time, in a cold, damp alley in Braavos, Daenerys, leaning against the corner wall, slowly opened her eyes.
A light rain was still falling.
Shallow water had pooled in the alley, trickling slowly through the cracks between the paving stones.
Viserys sat beside her, his back against the cold, wet wall, the worn old book still clutched tight against his chest.
His face was pale, his eyes full of restrained fury, his fingers trembling faintly.
Dany touched a hand to her chest, where some warmth from the dream still seemed to linger, and she found, suddenly, that she was not so afraid anymore.
She tugged gently at Viserys’s sleeve.
“Brother, let’s go. We’ll find somewhere to stay, I’m sure of it.”
Viserys blinked, and looked down at his little sister.
Her eyes were red and swollen, her face streaked with dirt, her clothes already soaked through with rain.
After a long silence, Viserys rose slowly, took her hand, and the two of them, brother and sister, walked out of the alley together.
Neither of them noticed that, not far away, a few figures were watching them.