Chapter Text
He still can't believe this is happening.
All the work, all the fear, all the hours spent in preparation...it's all come down to this. They have two dragons, an army greater than the sum of its parts, and enough dragonglass to arm every fighter in the field. The dead march on Winterfell, yet Jon Snow wishes for just one thing: more time.
More time would let him breathe. A few quiet moments would let him more strongly reconcile the actions of his...of Ned Stark, of his mother, of Daenerys. He's tried to wrap his head around it all, but only some of it sticks. The mother he dreamed of all his life spent her last breaths begging her brother to protect Jon, knowing that the new king would hurt him if given the chance. Ned Stark spent the rest of his years with a secret so heavy, he let it rest in his marriage bed, alienating his lady wife. And Daenerys...Daenerys. If Jon wasn't disgusted with her before, he is now.
No more disgusted than he is with himself, of course. Daenerys Targaryen has had her eyes on the Iron Throne for so long, she cannot or refuses to see what she steps on to get it; Jon, carrying a similar narrow-minded vision, is the man who brought her to the North, agenda in all. They can't stop the dead without the dragons, but therein lies the problem. If the Night King doesn't crush the North, Daenerys Targaryen will.
There are two Targaryens in the world, neither who ought to be trusted. Idly, Jon wonders which one of them will be prone to greatness.
Fuck, Jon thinks. I'm the mad one. His pattern of leadership remains consistent. It's a bittersweet life, where he leaves every fair bargain unhappy and never fully satisfied with the lots. Jon continues to pay a heavy price for the things he needs, time and time again, title by title. The Wall was saved, but Ygritte died; he negotiated with Stannis and the wildlings, only to be mutinied upon and murdered by his own men; Jon managed to recruit formidable allies to fight the Army of the Dead, but only after giving up his crown that the North had so generously given him.
He's been a Northern fool, all along, in so many regards. His newest error? Trusting Daenerys to do what Sansa had.
I'm not a Stark, Jon had told her, unable to rid himself of the discomfort at the idea of a Snow claiming the chambers of a Stark lord, trueborn and beloved. Ever since he was a boy, Jon wondered as much about the treatment of bastards. No one saw bastards as trustworthy, not even themselves. It was insidious and permanent. An old sore that would never heal. His name did not match, no matter what the lords offered.
You are to me, Sansa replied simply. Within the hour, the rooms were hers, but her words were the only bargain that left Jon...content.
His new aunt (Jon still squirms at the thought, just as uneasy about wearing a crown that wasn't his) had not been so generous. Instead, Jon saw only paranoia, a fire that was in its embers on Dragonstone and pitching higher and higher by the very last night before the Night King arrived.
If that were true, Daenerys accused, it would make you the last male heir of House Targaryen. You'd have a claim to the Iron Throne.
Jon can't think of one thing he wants less than the Iron Throne, but there is no telling a truth to someone who will not listen.
Daenerys is quick to leave him in the crypts, but Jon doesn't stay with his ghosts for long. Taking the most winding route to where he wants to be, Jon passes a score of soldiers and smallfolk, nodding to the few that address him. His abdication was not received warmly; Jon expected no less of the North. Suspicious of outsiders, loyal to their own. By bringing the dragons, Jon has made himself an outsider. He's always been on the fringe, even when his—even when Ned Stark raised him like a son. In the interim, the North's loyalty went back to the Starks, where it belongs.
One Stark in particular has their eye, their trust, and their loyalty. That's for the best.
Jon doesn't belong, but Sansa does. The girl who so eagerly left for the South returned a true Northerner, more than capable of managing her duties as regent, as a lady, as a sister. The North is yours, Jon had told her, and Sansa rose to the challenge with unparalleled skill. By the time Jon had set foot in Winterfell, Sansa had organized food stores, sufficiently armed the fighters, gotten rid of Littlefinger, and kept the lords from quarreling amongst themselves. The castle was the North's last stand; the armies Jon brought would not be ready without Sansa's efforts.
Sansa, Jon thinks, heaving a sigh that she might call dreamy, in the rare moments she dared to tease him. Arya would've guffawed.
He has so much to say to her, and not nearly enough time to do it. When Jon knocks and enters the solar that has become theirs, Sansa is nowhere to be found, to his disappointment. Ghost darts past him to the rug, perhaps eager to laze about and soak up as much of the hearth's heat as he can before it's snuffed out by the wights. Jon watches him, as aimless and foggy in the head as he's been since Sam pulled the wool from his eyes in the crypts, but Ghost's gaze remains fixed on the door, ears perked up like flags. Jon's timing is for once impeccable; Sansa arrives before the next candlemark, peeling off her gloves and smiling to herself. His vision sharpens to her and her alone, blocking out the rest of the world.
That smile freezes when she sees Jon at the hearth, perched next to Ghost like he did as a boy, watching over the pup ousted from the litter.
"I thought you would be with her," Sansa says, setting her gloves on the table and joining him on the floor by the hearth, her necklace clinking like old glass. He expected more hesitation, more of the angry silence he's begun to anticipate from their conversations, but Sansa just seems tired. Less frightened than Jon would've guessed, but the night is young. It's easy to be cocky in the moments before you see something impossible, but then you see it. Jon remembers seeing the first wight in the Lord Commander's rooms. Those few seconds of surprised rationalization almost cost him his life. He wishes Sansa will never see one, much less the Night King, but it's like his first wish. There isn't enough time for her to get away.
Not that Sansa would consider fleeing. The way she speaks of Winterfell, it is as if she is a captain all too willing to go down with the ship.
"I wanted to be with you," says Jon, and the light from the hearth dances across her shock. In the next flash, she's hidden it.
"With me?"
She's fond of delays like repeating questions, Jon's noticed. It gives her a moment to assess the situation, and work out a bluff. Only, Jon has no more bluffs. He's as exhausted as she is. Saying nothing of himself, placating the paranoid, even offering a public pledge to sway the South one way or the other...Jon can't do it any longer. Sansa is waiting to set a snare that Jon would rather jump into than trip over. He has so much to say, and all of it truths, desperate and hopeful truths, but there isn't much time left. They only have this—the slow moving candlemarks, the dripping wax standing for every minute. When the war horn blasts, they will have no time at all. The night will grow up, face the ancient enemy, and fight.
Jon can't think of winning or losing, only fighting. This war is all that matters. After, well...Jon hasn't considered the after, despite his promises.
"Aye."
The noncommittal answer isn't one that she wants, so she redirects, digging for more information. She isn't so subtle with him, though.
"Where were you?"
"The crypts." They're treading dangerously close to a truth, but suddenly Jon is so nervous that he's sweating. "I left a candle with Lyanna."
Sansa's voice is warmer now. "So did I," she admits, contemplative. "She always looked so lonely down there. I'm glad Father's joined her."
It's the end of the world, possibly the last night Westeros will ever have, so Jon barrels past his nerves and manages, "your father."
Sansa's been accustomed all her life to the chilly distinction of your mother to separate herself from Jon, but putting the parent they once had in common in a new category places a confused wrinkle on her brow. "I don't understand," she says, like he's gifted her with a puzzle.
"Bran had a...vision. Gilly and Sam found a record in the Citadel, too. I'm—" He wishes this felt as easy as swinging Longclaw. Her opinion matters to him so much that he wanted her to know this, amongst other things, before they lost. If they lost. "Lyanna Stark was my mother. And..."
"Rhaegar," Sansa guesses, unable to or not bothering to hide her shock again. "But everyone said—"
"He didn't. They loved each other." It's the silver lining, but Jon will take it. "He married her in secret," Jon explains, grateful when Sansa pushes a cup of mead into his hands. They drink together, with big hearty gulps, and sit quietly, companionably, and comfortably. He waits for her to say something, to work out all the details in that razor sharp mind of hers. Daenerys thought of her own claim, but Sansa? What is she thinking?
"You aren't happy," she observes, redirecting a second time and concealing her opinion for the umpteenth one. Jon takes another sip.
"Yes and no."
"That clears everything up, Jon. Thank you."
Jon isn't sure who laughs about it all first, but suddenly they are. Ever the lady, Sansa covers her mouth with a hand to stifle the noise, shoulders brushing up against his. Jon laughs so hard that his eyes water, sending Sansa into another bout of giggles and tipping her goblet onto the floor. Not even the splash of mead bothers them—Jon stops only when he is short of breath, and Sansa manages to follow suit, flushed and beaming.
"It's just so..." Sansa muses, breathless, reflective, and relaxed, more so than she was before. He likes it. "It's so strange."
"It is." Of all times to learn the answer to a question he's had since he knew who Catelyn Stark was not to him, it would be at the end of everything. He isn't sure if it is Sam's doing or Bran's, waiting this long. Half of him regrets the knowing, but the other half? The other half is undecided.
She places a hand on his knee, surprising him. In the firelight, her eyes are luminous. "Well, you're still my family. You're still one of us."
"Am I?" He feels further away than he ever has, kicked so far from the fringe it's as if he's been banished to the Dragonpit.
"My father loved Lyanna. You know that. He loved you, so did she. So do I," she adds, pulling her hand back, but Jon catches it.
He still hasn't figured out just the right way to say it, much less think it. Feeling it is easiest; Jon finally succumbed to the tide when he gave the North to her before his mission to Dragonstone, hoping the reins of a regency would show her how much he trusted her. It was also to force himself to remember just what they were to each other, and who he never wished to be—a king who fell for someone he shouldn't.
He had to be smarter than Robb, she said, but he wasn't. Isn't.
Two of his missions were successful. He got the army, the dragons, and the allies. The trust paid off, too. Without her regency, they'd be hungry and ill-prepared to fight the dead. The final mission, acknowledged only on the last night the world will ever have, is a resounding failure.
"I don't love you like I love Arya," says Jon, tightening his grip a fraction and rushing through the words, "or Bran."
The world doesn't stop, but Jon feels untethered nonetheless, afraid in a way he's never been before. Her breath fans across his face, relief and fear palpable. She's afraid, too. The truth seems to be sticking better with her than it did Jon; her eyes are inattentive and unfocused, like she's sketching out multiple ideas and debating on the best one. "I don't, either," she admits at last, baffled in a way he rarely sees, like the puzzle's solution is a surprise. He never sees her blush anymore, either, but there it is, pooling in her cheeks like spilling ink. Her attention returns to him. "I couldn't...I didn't know what was wrong. With me," she continues, brow wrinkling again. "I couldn't speak to her without getting angry."
"Because of..." Daenerys, Jon doesn't say, but Sansa knows. In the days before Jon left Winterfell, the two of them drifted between harmony and discord, clashing in their ideas and styles like cats and dogs. Other days, the rapport was even smoother than a sea voyage, making Jon wish he had her at the Wall that much sooner. Maybe Sansa, on Jon's behalf, could've persuaded the brothers of the Watch to do anything she wanted.
"Yes."
"That's why you asked me—"
Did you bend the knee to save the North, or because you love her?
"Yes," she confesses, embarrassed. "I told myself it was for the North, but it was—it was for me."
"That's why I did it," Jon says, the warmth of the hearth and Sansa's shoulder against his making the words flow easier and faster. "For the North." For the North, for the girls, for Bran, for all the people who placed their trust in him. For Robb, for Sansa's parents, for Rickon. For him.
The naked relief on her features alleviates some of the weight he's carried with him for months. "You played a dangerous game, Jon."
"No more dangerous than asking for our independence," Jon points out, and Sansa sighs, slouching just so. For all the intimidating confidence that she exudes, one tiny sigh uncovers her. She's still young, like Jon is, like Daenerys is. They're all playing a game in the midst of an approaching war, and Jon's lit the last match to the pyre himself. The dead don't care about the Iron Throne, but what if they defeat the dead? What if?
"She wants us to kneel if we survive," Sansa says, lifting her chin like Robb at his cockiest, "I had to know where she stands."
Always an eye for the details. It's a complement Jon can only identify in retrospect. Jon sees far and wide, Sansa sees near and dear.
"Now you know."
"I do. And now I know she only came here for you," Sansa allows, shaming Jon further. It's a rebuke, but she doesn't seem too disappointed in him.
He kept the truth from everyone around him save for Sam and Sansa, so telling her is a guilt-ridden reprieve. He wants to spend the last night before catastrophe hits without any regrets. Confessing his wrongdoings to Sansa, his wisest audience, is his best idea in a long while.
"She wasn't committed."
"She still isn't," Sansa reminds him, sipping what may be only mead left in the castle from his goblet. "She seems to think this is your war, not hers."
That was the crux of the matter, the very thing Jon warned Daenerys of. The North's suspicion of outsiders made alliances with the South against the Night King almost impossible. On the ship's voyage after the failure at the Dragonpit, Jon spent days worrying over what to say to them to get them to listen. Their allies were a means to an end, each linked to a common goal that would get everyone through the Long Night alive...but they came at a steep cost. Daenerys would not work with him as an equal, and resisted all attempts to coordinate without her due deference.
The North's deference to her was an unhappy one, riddled with annoyed glances, stilted courtesy, and thinly-veiled contempt, all of which Daenerys noticed. Jon wonders if this would actually become her war if his people showered her with praise, begged for help, and pledged themselves to her cause, like he did. Jon offers Sansa his last desperate lie, hoping Daenerys's mercurial nature will shift again in their favor. "She'll see."
"She won't," Sansa says knowingly. She raises a toast, her challenging smile reminding him of that night of theirs at the Wall. "To your queen."
"She isn't my queen," Jon tells her, now free to show all he feels on his face, and Sansa's smile slips, just a little.
They sidestepped what was said earlier, perhaps too frightened to pursue what it really means. Ran past it, more like. He wanted to approach the matter much slower, so neither was compelled to spit it out before a war horn burst the tiny bubble of peace and quiet the solar has given them.
"You wanted to be with me on the last night," Sansa ventures softly, like she can't quite believe it's happening.
It's a night for truth. Better to clear the slate now, Jon decides, than die with desperate misgivings.
"I did," says Jon.
"Do...do you want to know what I want?"
The blush creeps back in. Jon's intrigued. Even the suggestion of her wanting something is a new novelty. Subsumed into her role as regent and Lady of Winterfell, Jon cannot think of even one occasion where she asked for something for herself. Not a dress, when she can make one on her own. Not a lemoncake, with the stores and the season in their current states. Not even a song, not when the musician could be making himself useful with chores. Someday, Jon decides, he'll pry and pry, until she admits to a frivolous wish, and then he'll do whatever it takes to grant it.
This one doesn't seem so frivolous, though.
"Everyone's grouped off," Sansa explains, taking one of his hands in both of hers. She doesn't miss too much in her own castle. Jon always liked hearing what she observed over the course of a day when he ruled as king. She has the makings of a rather lovely spymaster, with the twist of actually being liked by her own people. "I saw Arya go into the forge, Lord Beric and the Hound talking on the ramparts...Davos heading somewhere with Brienne and Pod...and Grey Worm," she finishes, a sad little smile on her lips, "he was kissing Missandei like he'd never see her again."
"And you?"
"I was with Theon. We had the soup."
"It isn't that good."
She laughs, rueful. "No, it wasn't. The company was nice, but I missed..."
"Podrick," Jon supplies, straight-faced, and she laughs again, squeezing his hand.
"I missed you, Jon," she tells him, wistful. "I thought you might be with her, but I still wanted to see you, before..."
"Before," Jon agrees, gazing at the candle. It's getting late. Tormund's warning was not unsound. The dead could be here any moment. He glances back to Sansa. "You wanted to see me," he repeats, and everything unsaid flits in the small amount of space left between them. "Just a look?"
"That's all you did last time," she points out, and something registers with Jon.
"Last time I left you, I was your brother." He couldn't bear a real goodbye, not with this much at stake. Tonight, the stakes are even higher.
She cocks her head just like she did at the Wall, the bluster almost hiding all of her hesitation. "You aren't now, are you?"
That's the thing, Jon knows. They don't have any time to wonder about the how or why when the truth is staring them straight in the face and an army that doesn't tire approaches Winterfell. What he wants is right here. Peace, quiet, a cup of mead, Ghost, a warm fire, and Sansa. Sansa.
"No, I'm not." He wasn't much of a brother when he left, either. "What do you really want?" He asks. She's fishing, Jon sees. Waiting with her snare.
"Can you kiss me?" Sansa asks, and then barrels through an explanation herself, perhaps to avoid any further embarrassment. "I just—nobody has. I've had kisses, but..." She is never one to shrug, but Sansa shrugs, flitting between forced nonchalance and elaborating on a dear wish. "None from any who loved me the right way," she says, flushing bright red. The idea's planted so quickly and dangerously that Jon would like to just as much as she does, though he lets her finish with bated breath, trying not to lick his lips like a starving man. "The war's finally here, and...everyone's doing the same thing," Sansa adds, sheepish. "They're spending time with the people they love for the last time. And I—I want that. With you, Jon."
Jon's surrendered everything he has since he left Winterfell, first as a boy and again as a man, but this kiss is one more thing he is happy to give up. Sweetness has been out of their reach for years and years; if this is truly a parting gift, Jon will give it to Sansa without question.
It goes like this: Jon curls a hand around the soft swell of her cheek, his scarred fingers folding into that lustrous red hair. They share breaths, noses brushing so lightly that Sansa's huffed, amused laugh pulls a grin out of Jon, an incredulous snicker that hops from one mouth to the next, like they've worked something out on one of their better days as a pair at the high table, serving the North to the best of their varied abilities. Then, he's kissing her, uncertainly at first, unsure of what is allowed and what isn't. She's had enough kisses in the past that hurt, and Jon—Jon just wants to make this one the best. He doesn't want what may be the last good thing for both of them in this world to hurt. He nips, she gasps, and finally, time slows to a stop. If it isn't the only night for they'll ever have, Jon hopes it will be the first of thousands to come. It never hurts to hope.
UHHHHHOOOOO.
Sansa's steadying hand on his chest tightens its grip when Jon draws back, listening. Ghost rolls over, getting to his feet.
"One blast," Sansa breathes, appealing eagerness unraveling into anxiety. Jon isn't any better. His heart's in his throat. "Rangers returning."
The men of the Night's Watch have died, fled, or joined the dead. There are no more rangers.
UHHHHHOOOOO.
"Two," Jon croaks. "Wildlings." He hears Ygritte's sobs. Like the giants, most of the wildlings are gone. Which means...
UHHHHHOOOOO.
They jump to their feet and dash headlong for the door, Ghost galloping at their heels. In the yard, the people are panicking. Families split in half, sending some mothers and children into the crypts and other mothers with their husbands or lovers, armed to the teeth and ready to fight. Servants flee to their stations, horses are bustled hurriedly toward the barracks, and then Sansa is tugging on Jon's arm, getting his attention.
"Come back, Jon," she orders, fingertips resting on the twin direwolves on his gorget. "This isn't our last night."
It's a good night, not a goodbye. They're finally on the same page.
The dragons screech distantly as the gates creak wider, letting the first line of soldiers onto the field between Winterfell and the wolfswood.
"It isn't," Jon promises, letting himself think of the after in the few seconds left before hell breaks loose. He can't kiss her here, not again, but the memory of it is like its own shield, a buffer between him and the dead things in the wood and a buoy between him and the enemies to the south.
He'll have all the time in the world after the battle. All the time to fight for what he wants that he thought he would never have.
Where will we go? Jon had asked, unmoored in all aspects but one.
The only place we can go, she had answered, brave and assured in the face of Jon's uncertainty. Home.
Jon watches her and Ghost enter the crypts with one last look and one last resolute wave, and unsheathes Longclaw. Aye, they're all finally home.
It was time to defend it.