Work Text:
weapon - wit - wonder
ruined reflections
in some ways, we are all prisoners to our pasts
i.
When they meet again she isn’t Sansa Stark, her last name has been swallowed by a new one, it still stumbles on her lips and tastes bitter like the wine she drank on her wedding night.
Hardyng.
Sansa Hardyng.
Was it worth shedding the identity of Alayne Stone, gaining back her first name but replacing her last in the same breath?
ii.
When he sees her again for the first time after he and his wife’s coronation his initial thought is that he should have done something more to figure out if the rumours of her survival had been true.
The second thought he has is that neither of them wear the Stark colours.
Perhaps they are past those childhood longings.
Sansa has been garbed in the colours of her new husband’s house, apple red and snow white gowns of fine silk. The red clashes with her auburn hair that she wears in loose curls down her back.
Jon wears deep onyx and blood red, the traditional Targaryen emblem emblazoned on his cloak that he can feel, even on his back.
iii.
Their eyes lock. For one breath they are Sansa Stark and Jon Snow, not Sansa Hardyng and Jaehaerys Targaryen. They are the wolves of their youth.
It’s like looking in a mirror to the past.
iv.
Daenerys clutches Jon tight enough to leave claw marks in the soft flesh of his forearm.
Harry’s grip on Sansa’s waist takes on a possessive edge as he pulls his wife closer to his side.
It is almost as if they both fear the same thing, if they let their respective spouse embrace the last remaining member of the family they thought lost, then they will never get them back.
When Sansa and Jon finally pull their eyes away from each other and turn back to their spouses they both suspect that Harry and Daenerys aren’t far off in their fears.
Inside their chests, two wolves awaken, ready for Winter.
v.
It is hours later that Sansa finally gets to speak with Jon properly after their frosty reunion. They had received the invitation weeks ago, her and Harry, and she insisted they go, she needed to see Jon, needed to confirm that he draws breath with her own eyes.
Harry had been wary of the optics. It was still the early days after Daenerys consolidated her power and her throne, driving out the Lannisters and marrying Jon in one fell swoop. Jon, who had been revealed to be a Targaryen all along.
It still doesn’t sound right to Sansa.
Even as she approaches Jon and sees his Targaryen cloaks, she can’t fully reconcile the whispers that follow him around this very room. She knows very little of Daenerys, but if the whispers are true, the marriage is more political than even her own.
“They say he is Jaehaerys Targaryen, son of Lyanna Stark and Rhaegar Targaryen.”
Sansa swallows the bile building in her throat and tries to roll the unfamiliar name on her tongue, too clunky, too long, too regal for Jon.
But now he’s in front of her and she musters her courage, that Stark spite.
“Your Grace,” Sansa says with a curtsey, “I was hoping to join you in a dance.”
If Jon were anyone but who he is, Sansa would never risk such presumption, but she finds that every step she has taken since she left Winterfell has brought her here, to this hall where she can ask Jon to dance.
Jon’s head whips around from the lords he entertains and when he realizes it is she who speaks he can’t quite hide the grin from creeping across his face. It’s curious, that they are here now, when in their youth they barely spoke. But they remain, the last of their kind, the final scraps of a nostalgia that is rapidly dwindling.
“Of course, my Lady.”
Jon takes her hand and spins her easily onto the dance floor. He has only been in the South for half a year, but the transformation he has undergone is anything but subtle. Jon Snow, bastard of Winterfell never moved with such ease and confidence, never took ladies into his arms and twirled them through rooms of dancing people.
It’s enough to leave Sansa breathless.
They were robbed of even a proper embrace upon reuniting with each other and she can’t help but wonder how long it will be until they are forced to part again, if she is lucky they’ll have two dances. She doesn’t have to turn around to see the Queen’s eyes on them, she can feel them burning into her skull.
“You look well,” Sansa says and she hates herself for the rigid formality, for the awkward lilt of her words.
Jon doesn’t notice though, “You as well.”
They continue dancing, and they can’t draw their eyes away from each other. It seems unreal, that she is here with him now, that he is even alive is a miracle in itself. She thought herself alone for so long she fears if she blinks he will disappear. He looks at her with the same longing.
“I wish we had more time,” Sansa laments, “To speak properly.”
“I fear we might never get that chance.”
There is an unidentifiable tremor to his words that chills Sansa. He fears…she suspects she knows that fear too intimately. But the bravado is back in place before she can pinpoint its exact cause.
Sansa is about to say something more but Jon’s next words come out urgently.
“Are you safe Sansa? Is Harry a kind husband? Is there anything I need to know.”
His lips barely move as he keeps guiding them through the other dancing pairs. Eyes follow them but somehow Sansa keeps her own on only Jon’s face, for once not caring about the attention.
She thinks it just might be the first time someone has shown genuine regard for her since her father died. She forces the already welling tears down and focuses on his question.
Since Littlefinger’s death, Sansa has had less to worry about, she need not worry Jon about petty concerns.
“Harry is a kinder husband than many, I could do much worse.”
It’s the truth, she knows he will never hit her, or beat her, or even humiliate her as many men do. He may have other women, and he may expect sex regardless of her feelings on the matter, but she was trained to be a wife, born to be one even, and she will do her duty, she always has.
It is not the love match she dreamed of as a girl, but those flights of fancy died years ago.
Jon is studying her expression intently and it causes a faint blush to rise on her cheeks.
“What have we become Sansa?”
The ache in Jon’s voice is enough for Sansa to briefly stumble over her feet, but Jon catches her and rights her before she has time to even let out a gasp of surprise.
She considers his question.
vi.
The Sansa he dances with is not the sister of his childhood; she is not the wistful girl who dreamed of princes and happily ever after.
She is nearly unrecognizable and it breaks his heart.
When she finally answers his question it takes a moment for him to come back to himself.
“Weapons,” she repeats, “We’ve become weapons.”
Jon puzzles over her words.
Their first dance draws to a close but nobody is converging on them just yet, they may still squeeze out one more before people get dangerous ideas of what their reunion could mean.
It’s not something he has been deaf to overhearing, even as he has learned how to pretend he doesn’t hear half of what goes on around him. He plays Southern politics as adeptly as anyone now. So he hears the desires of the Northmen, how could he not when their words reach him even in King’s Landing?
From the sounds of it, Sansa has heard them as well, and understands as he does why their spouses are so desperate to keep them apart tonight, why their advisors too watch them closely as they glide through the room, every single eye on them.
Sansa isn’t looking at them though, she’s looking only at Jon and he suspects she is the only one here who still looks at him as a Stark, not as a Targaryen. It forces him to consider the rumours he has tried not to think too much about.
The North continues to rebel, and there are enough of them to raise concern, but not as long as Jon and Sansa remain apart. Because the North still wants its independence, with a Northern ruler, whatever that means.
Even if it means they have to overlook Jon’s Targaryen father and marry him to his once sister, now cousin themselves, it’s what they will do to fight for Northern independence.
(Is this what Robb envisioned his legacy to look like? The man he thought brother married to his eldest sister? Is the North worth all that? Jon wishes he could ask.)
It’s the question that is on everyone’s mind even now, as they watch the Bastard of Winterfell and the eldest daughter of Eddard Stark dancing close together.
“I don’t quite understand,” Jon admits.
He needs to be sure, needs to make sure what it is that Sansa speaks of now. This is too dangerous to be anything less than certain.
An unfamiliar expression crosses over Sansa’s face, she looks almost sneaky, something he has never seen before flashes in her eyes. She glances around before leaning ever closer and moving her lips as little as possible to whisper words of treason.
“We’ve only gotten this far on our wits Jon,” Sansa’s breath heats his ear, “The rest of our family died, in one horrible way or another, but you and I, we’re different. For some reason we survived, and I choose to believe it is our keen intelligence that allowed that. And the trials we faced, well all the better for our enemies Jon, because now we are weapons perfectly placed in our enemies' lairs, poised to strike when the moment is right.”
Sansa gazes at him, one eyebrow raised in silent challenge.
They haven’t seen each other in years, haven’t ever had a foundation of trust between them, but the bonds forged in the North, in the shadow of Winterfell’s keep with direwolves nipping at their heels, are not easily forgotten. And as he looks into her eyes now, he knows he can trust her.
Sansa is changed, but perhaps she is more the same then he first realized. She has always been a Stark, and her marriage doesn’t negate that.
Jon was persuaded, forced, threatened, whatever you want to call it, into this marriage with his Aunt, just as Sansa obviously has been with Harry Hardyng.
Sansa is Harry’s key to the North, to a greater lordship and legacy, and Jon is Daenerys’ insurance that he won’t become a rallying call to those who think his claim to the Iron Throne is greater than her own, she solved that problem with a marriage before it could come to fruition.
But between them, is there enough wit to overcome the shackles that have forged them into steel, into weapons they never wanted to be?
Jon clears his throat and looks at Sansa, who still waits for his answer. In his peripheral vision he can see Daenerys’ cutting glare, she is watching closely for any hint of betrayal, and Harry is standing with his arms crossed, making sure his little wife doesn’t get any ideas too big for his own grand plans.
In Sansa’s eyes Jon sees hope that died when he approached the altar with Daenerys. It fills his own hollow heart with heat, stoking a fire within him he thought long extinguished.
“I wonder what that future looks like,” Jon breathes.
He is scared to say more.
The music dies and the second dance ends. Jon drops his hands to his side and Sansa steps away, never breaking eye contact with him. All around them couples find new partners.
Jon can see Daenerys and Harry moving quickly towards them.
“I wonder too Jon,” Sansa says out the corner of her mouth.
The spell is broken in the next moment as Harry seizes her hand and drags her away for a dance and Daenerys’ hand finds Jon’s back, whispering to him already about what his stupid bitch of a sister was saying.
Jon doesn’t dare let his temper flare at Daenerys’ insults.
In the South, Jon has learned, everything is a test.
But in the North, it is patience that wins.
For the first time in a long while he has someone by his side, and he knows that one way or another he and Sansa will fight their way out of this, together.
Winter is here, and the wolves have returned.