Work Text:
"A Bloom In The Cold Winter"
Daenerys
Little mounds of snow had piled up on the windowsill when Daenerys took a closer look at it —at the perfect uniqueness of the snowflakes. Its texture soaked everything it touched or where it landed, be it clothes, hair, and even the dragons when accrued on their scales before slowly melting down their sides. It was something so magnificent that it must have come from the gods, Dany thought. Like the dragons themselves.
The door rattled open behind her and the sound brought her out of her thoughts. Tyrion stood there.
"Everything is ready, Your Grace," he announced, watching her with unconcealed apprehension.
Daenerys let out a soft breath and headed for the door. When she stopped to face Tyrion she could see more closely that a shadow of fear and worry had darkened his features.
"Is it too late to advise you against it, again?" he asked her.
It was, Dany thought in response but instead of speaking it she gently touched his shoulder and walked past him into the hall where her guards would escort her to her destination.
She was resolved to do what she must.
After traversing the long passage to the outside, they had to follow a windswept snowed path until they reached the arches of the barbican of Winterfell, meeting on the way with several suspicious glances that followed their steps. Daenerys felt as strange as the first time she walked through her then-new husband Khal Drogo's Khalassar. Clearly, she could tell, marrying into a clan did not make you part of the clan.
However, this time she was not going to be cowed into submission. She looked up ahead and continued walking with a steady step.
Once outside the walls of the imposing ancient Stark fortress, Dany looked back to capture the image of its inhabitants, among them the cold figure of the last Stark children that were looking from the battlements.
Her sight traveled back to who was ahead, the only ones that mattered to her more than life itself.
Drogon on the one hand, Rhaegal on the other, and last but not least, Jon Snow.
She smiled slightly, a discreet gesture. She felt thousands of eyes boring into her like thousands of daggers.
They are watching you, judging you even. Carrying out with this was more than proving them she was not what they think of her, it was to prove herself she wouldn't be controlled by the prejudice wearing down on her.
She was not a faltering flame in the wind, she was a bloom in the cold winter.
Daenerys broke away from her guards and walked forward, shedding her fur coat and surrounding to the harsh winter.
Jon
He hid his trembling burying his hand into Ghost's furry neck, terrified as he had been other times in his life. It was at the moment that he saw Dany emerge from behind the great gates of Winterfell that Jon realized it was worse than ever before.
Jon felt a tremendous urge to close his eyes and imagine himself in another place, although he knew that more than ever she needed him there. Sometimes he asked himself if he was as strong as others believed him to be.
Behind Dany were many people who gathered to watch the event unfolding, as if they were once again lighting the pyres of the fallen from the Battle of Winterfell a few weeks ago. This was perhaps the only entertainment they would get in a long time. Behind him, the dragons snorted as if they wanted to tell him something.
Dany took off her coat as Jon's heart skipped a beat. The small frame of her clad just in a thin beige gown that covered the parts of her body undiscovered to others and he couldn't help but want to wrap her into his arms and return her to the safety of the castle.
When she approached him, she had a smile on her face and her eyes lit up with something only he understood.
They both took deep, shaky breaths. He watched her shivering body.
"Up here is very cold for a southern girl," he reiterated in a humorous tone, though his spirits couldn't be lower.
She raised her hands to rest them on his forearms as he held her from her elbows.
"Then you will keep your queen warm," she quietly affirmed.
So she did something that little they did in front of so many eyes on them. And even when he had already taken her before the heart tree in the Godswood to make her his wife, Jon couldn't help but blush and warm inside every time she joined her lips to his. Inadvertently, his hand slid over her front, reaching out the swollen belly that had their child growing inside.
Another miracle of the mother of dragons.
Jon pulled away, foreheads pressed together as his other hand caressed a cold cheek.
"It will only be a moment. No more," he warned, looking firmly into her eyes. His heart hammered against his armored chest as if it wanted to get out of it.
Dany nodded but she didn't say anything else.
Below them, to one side, was the hole in the ice above the frozen pool. This was something he had flatly objected to when she suggested it first. An ice bath. An ancient ritual from the north that was hardly practiced anymore but that, for some reason of fate, had reached Dany's ears.
She, the one who had walked through fire and awakened dragons from stone, could not help but want to try, bringing up to him the time she ate the raw heart of a stallion.
"If this is part of you, and will soon be a part of our child, then it has to be part of me," she said.
"You don't have to prove anything to anyone," he insisted.
"I'm not doing this for them, Jon Snow. And you better than anyone should know I do it because I have faith that I can do it." She gave him a wicked smile. "Later we could try how well you make it walking through fire."
He smiled back at her and shook his head.
"I love you. And you know it. Right?" He asked her, resting a hand on her belly. "What if it's not the best for the babe?"
Dany wrinkled her nose thoughtfully.
"It'd be just a dip," she decided.
Only after receiving reassurance from some people more knowledgeable than him on the matter did Jon agree, although Dany never changed her resolve.
The one who finally brought him some peace of mind was Tormund.
"Our women throw themselves into the waters of the shivering sea from time to time while heavy with child. It helps to keep the heart beating!" he told them.
And here they were. Dany about to dive into icy water just for the sake of performing an ancient ritual. Always the stubborn one his wife.
The wind blew cold and enveloped them. A layer of fine snow fell on them from the horns of the dragons that moved to watch closely over their mother. Jon felt Rhaegal's unease through their bond.
Before taking the first step, Jon instinctively stopped her, recalling his own experience sinking into the cold waters beyond the wall. However, there was too much determination in those bright amethyst eyes of hers, so his firm hold loosened as his hand slid her arm to grab her hand.
After that, Jon himself helped Daenerys down into the water.
Daenerys
Sharp breaths got caught in her throat and they struggled to come out. Dany felt herself being enveloped in an intermittent and throbbing pain in various parts of her body until it all gradually became numb.
She could hear herself gasping for breath as the dragons swayed uneasily and huffed in discomfort. When Dany raised tortured eyes to Jon, she saw the darkness of the core taking over the shades of light gray. They could be purple when reflected in the right light, she thought.
"That's enough," he said in his heavy and deep voice. His hand tried to drag her up but she categorically refused. I can do this.
She closed her eyes and allowed herself to drift into each sensation. There was pain but there was also a raw sensitivity as if she could feel her body struggling to keep her and her babe alive and warm. It was something strangely captivating and wholesome. Her eyes widened and fell on Jon and then Daenerys realized that the feeling was assimilable to how she loved him.
He was vastly different from her. Cold where she was hot. Thoughtful when she hot-headed. Hard where she was soft. Unforgiving while she was given to be more forgiving. He completed her and she completed him, as this cold for the first time gave Daenerys the meaning of a new kind of strength.
"Enough," Jon said again, this time steadfastly.
He brought her up, and with all of his might, he drew her to the surface with him.
"Gods, you are bloody stubborn, Daenerys," he cursed as he wrapped her in his own coat. She knew guards would soon drag her back to the castle but at that moment she didn't care for anything else in the world. She embraced him nonetheless while Drogon and Rhaegal stretched their wings and screeched loudly to the sky.
Cheers of celebration came from Winterfell.
"And I love you, too," she answered, feeling that in this surrender she'd found the force of a thousand fires.