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“Mother… Father…”
Sansa was instantly roused by her eldest daughter’s voice. The queen sat up and saw Joanna clutching her lion doll carefully in her arms. “What is it, sweetling?”
“I had a nightmare.”
In an instant, Jon was up from bed and went to the door, picking their girl up and carrying her to the lord’s bed. He set her down so she could sleep between himself and Sansa. “What did you dream, sweet girl?” Jon asked, pulling the covers over the three of them. “What has scared our lion cub so?”
“I dreamed of fire and a crumbling tower,” the girl whispered. “I dreamed of fire and ice and sad green eyes.”
Sansa pulled the girl to her and Jon wrapped his arms around both of them. “It was only a dream, sweetling.”
—
Joanna grew to be more beautiful every day.
Some people would whisper how she was a lion and couldn’t be trusted. Some people whispered about how she had traitor’s blood running through her veins. But none of House Stark allowed such words to become more than echoes of the few.
Bran Stark would give the girl stories of a brave knight who cared nothing of his own honor and a queen who did all that she was able to protect her children.
Arya Stark would teach her dancing. Water dancing so that she might be all that the woman who birthed her had been unable to be.
Jon Stark would listen to her council and let her voice be heard just as much as her younger brothers and sisters.
Sansa Stark loved her as her own mother had been unable to love Jon. She loved the girl more than the woman who had taught her to love no one but her children had loved her.
The pack survived as the years went on. But it carried not just wolves, but stags and a lion as well.