agogelogs | [OPEN] Oh, in dreams I have watched it spin

Not everyone climbing is a wight, but some of the ones that fall seem to begin to climb again with eyes glowing blue. Never mind fighting all of these people alone: how are they meant to kill all of them time and again, whether he does it alone or Daenerys helps him?

He can feel her fingers on his arm through the armor. They push through it as though it's soft.

When he hears the ice crunching closer to them than anyone should be, his head whips around, and when he sees the Night King, so near to him that their final battle seems imminent and inevitable, he feels cold for the first time. The dragons shriek in the sky and his lover's fingers grip his arm tightly, but not even the unnatural warmth can survive the Night King's presence.

The chill begins to hurt, begins to freeze him from the heart outward. The armor begins to solidify again so he can't move, and Jon struggles against it, but he --

Wakes up like a shot, narrowly avoiding hitting his head on the ceiling of his chamber, and rustling Daenerys, whose head had been pillowed on his chest.

"I had a bad dream," he says, hoarse.

I had a bad dream, he says as she's jostled awake with a gasp. Dead eyes haunt her as she struggles to sit up, her limbs sluggish not with sleep, but the sensation of being weighed down by ice. Filling her fingers, hands, arms... and the same with her legs. The room is warm. She is warm, especially curled against him.

There's a tremble to her hands as she presses to her knees and reaches for him. One around his shoulders to pull him into a tight hug, the other to cradle the back of his head.

"I did, as well," she whispers. If she closes her eyes, the images remain. She doesn't close her eyes. "We were at the Wall, I think."

He lets himself be hugged and likes the comfort of her hand against his head, but his limbs feel as sluggish, and it takes a moment for him to put his arms around her.

When she speaks, he pulls back and looks at her, surprised.

"At the Wall. You had a gun. The dragons were fighting each other in the air.

"I was always alone before, in that dream, and there were no dragons... just people climbing the walls. It seemed like it would never end."

Her hands slip from around him, and she settles back; his surprise is mirrored.

"Viserion was--" She shakes her head, something desperate entering her gaze. "You saw him die. He couldn't..."

...Could he? But no, she doesn't know how the dead work, and how could it possible affect a dragon in the same way? No, no this is not possible, so she focuses instead on what he speaks of.

"How often have you dreamt it? There were people we knew with the corpses, those not dead."

A redhead.

"Not often. I don't understand the armor, but maybe I was thinking of dragonglass. The sword... it's a little like Lord Beric's sword, but it wasn't like Longclaw."

He doesn't remember just now that Daenerys hasn't yet met Beric Dondarrion.

"Viserion went under the water, where the dead can't go. I'd fear that he would become a wight... there are bear wights and mammoth wights... but I know they can't touch him there."

His hand goes up into his hair, which is loose, to push it back from his face as he frowns.

"It seemed at first like I was killing everyone I knew but you."

"How often since coming here?" She's no idea what the Night King or even the wall would look like. And how would she share a dream with him? He's appeared in a number of her dreams, some morphed memories of her past, and others strange and in settings she imagines were part of his life. Also morphed and dream-like. But this, this was far too real. "I don't know who lord Beric is, Jon."

This is not her room, though it is her assigned sleeping quarters. With a quiet sigh, she shifts around so that they're sitting side by side, and she tugs the blanket up to tuck beneath her arms. Nakedness never bothers her, but tonight, it makes her feel far too exposed.

"So he's spared from that. Good." She sounds tired. She is tired. "You didn't kill me in your other dreams?"

"Coming to BASE, or finding myself with COST? I had it once in Jerusalem."

He drags his hand from his hair to scrub it against his eyes.

"I didn't kill you. Never you. And Lord Beric... he has a flaming sword." As if that explains it all; as if he hasn't killed what now feels like a hundred other people, in his dreams and out of them.

[OOC note: also I am a fool, they are in Dany's room, and he did not almost hit his head upon awaking, because there's actually clearance in that room.]

Edited 2017-12-31 04:01 (UTC)

"Never since?" How often did he have it in their world? Gods, to wake up alone from that sort of dream...

She presses her cheek to his shoulder. Her own hair is a tangled mess, loose as it is. Not worth the effort of taming it at this point. If they fall back asleep, would the dream haunt them again? Would it be a more peaceful sleep?

"Who else did you know?" How many of those faces were people he knew? Gods, she hopes not all of them. "Save the ones we know."

He leans his head against hers when she rests her cheek against his shoulder. That's a comfort, inasmuch as anything is a comfort, and if she saw everything he dreamed, then comfort is a thing they can probably both use right now.

"Never since. Some of them were my old brothers in the Watch. Some of them were wildlings." After hesitation, he adds, "Friends. My old steward."

There's one person he's conspicuously not mentioning, and he feels something inside him capitulate. He knows about Drogo -- he's met Drogo.

"The girl... did you see her?"

Edited 2017-12-31 05:25 (UTC)

It's not the only comfort. Her hand soon finds his, fingers curling around him in a familiar grip. They aren't tangled together as they've been during other nights, to the point where it was difficult to discern where one began and the other ended, and it's likely a good thing right now. She needs focus, not distractions, and he's proven to be very distracting whilst naked.

"The redhead?"

So she did see her.

He makes a little noise of agreement, and a few seconds pass before he collects his thoughts enough to say more.

"Ygritte."

Then, after another few seconds, "I told you once, I was sent to spy amongst the Free Folk. They didn't like Crows. I was just eighteen or so."

Ygritte. A Wildling girl he'd met when he was still a boy learning the ways of the world, in some respects. Not all that different from her time with the Dothraki, is it? No, he doesn't say as much, but she recalls their other conversation, so many weeks ago.

She shifts, releasing his hand to catch his cheek, coaxing him to look at her. If he does, she'll reach up to tuck wayward curls behind his ear, her touch painfully gentle--much like her eyes.

"What happened?"

He looks up at her, but he's hesitant, and without the gentle coaxing, he probably wouldn't. He'd continue to stare down past the surface of the blanket. As it is, his expression is troubled. He might have told Daenerys more of this in time -- or he might not have. He might have kept it locked away forever.

"I was told to do whatever they asked of me. The first thing I had to do was kill a man I respected, on his own command, to prove I was a turncloak. We'd captured Ygritte... she was a sentinel and I was meant to kill her to keep her from alerting her people, but I couldn't. The Halfhand and I wound up getting captured by her people in return."

She couldn't blame him if he had. It's not easy to talk about the past, sometimes. What good does it do, save for dredge up memories best left forgotten?

We don't have to talk about her, she's about to tell him, all because of a simple look. He's told her some of this already; there must be a 'but...' in there, somewhere. We were captured by her people in turn, but--but what? She thinks she knows. He had to prove he was no longer a Crow, hadn't he? Revoke his vows.

A fierce wave of protectiveness roars to life in her chest. She didn't know him when she was seventeen or eighteen. She'd had her own struggles, her own people to lead. But, but, but. There's always a but.

She's cupping both his cheeks now, her eyes bright. "You did what was necessary to survive."

"I did." The look in her eyes is melting, and he melts a little along with it, presses one side of his face into her hand. Does she understand what that really meant, and does she understand that, even so, it's still an excuse, at least half horseshit?

"I did whatever it took. But some of it was easier to do than the rest of it. Killing the Halfhand was... he was the first man I ever killed, the first living one. If I'd failed after that in the task he had set me, he'd have died for nothing.

"Breaking my vows with Ygritte wasn't hard at all."

Affection warms her gaze due to the motion. There and gone, as she listens to what he says.

"You don't enjoy killing." She remembers. He'd said so at Dragonstone. "Of course that was hard, someone you knew?"

It wasn't easy to kill Drogo. Gods, it's never easy. Even ordering the murders of those with the Lannisters who directly stood in opposition to her... But this is not about her, and he's seen far, far too many battles. And all the faces at the Wall. If even half of those were people he knew who were now dead?

If only she could wrap her arms around him, hug him close, and will his hauntedness away.

"She was beautiful." Not that it's an excuse. Drogo was handsome. Daario was handsome. Jon is handsome. It doesn't matter. Looks are so very fleeting, and he was a young man, thrown into a different life. "Did you love her?"

"I don't know if she was beautiful. I thought at first that she wasn't... that she was common... then I thought that she was, more and more every day."

A pause, and he presses his lips together. He's made the decision to tell her everything, but it still doesn't want to flow out of him: it comes out in bits and pieces, each one tugged past his reluctance to speak of it.

Sam and Tormund are the only other people who really know any of it.

"I loved her. I left her anyway, when I could, to go back to Castle Black and warn them that her people were planning to attack." A low, uncertain laugh. "She put three arrows in me. One in my leg, two in my back. And then some of the officers at Castle Black wanted to hang me for a traitor."

He loved her, she concludes, when he speaks of how she grew more and more beautiful each day. He confirms it moments later, but during that pause, her thoughts twist inward: nothing ugly manifests at the idea of him loving someone else. She thought it would. She thought, because this is so sweeping and all-encompassing, what they share, that she would resemble the dragon card in the deck she'd received.

The girl is dead. How would she feel if their positions were reversed, and it was not Drogo who walked the halls, but Ygritte?

"She shot you." There's disbelief in her tone. Indignance on his behalf. "And they viewed you a traitor because you fought to survive? Even despite you warning them?"

She doesn't like Ygritte very much, after all.

Jon speaks slowly when he answers her, but the words themselves come out with less difficulty now.

"There was no record of the Halfhand's orders, no proof that I hadn't truly turned. I freely admitted to breaking my vows with Ygritte, and the master-at-arms at Castle Black had hated me almost from our first meeting, but Maester Aemon spoke for me. He saved my life... more than once.

"And why would I have gone back there to warn them if-- well. It doesn't matter very much anymore. I could have stayed with her, I could have broken my vows in truth, but if I had, I would have died with her."

He leans back against the wall, encouraging Daenerys to follow and rest against his chest.

"And she is dead. She died..." (a breath, and he frowns), "... when her people attacked the castle. You have to understand, it isn't defensible from the south. The Watch takes no part in the kingdom's wars."

She huffs an exhale, disgruntlement diminishing in painfully slow increments... flaring to life upon mention of the master-at-arms, and soothed upon mention of her great-uncle. If only she could have met the man. If only she could thank him for what he did, even if he'd done it for Jon. If he hadn't, where would Jon be, today?

It's stupid, is what it is. Holding these grudges, disliking someone for no reason.

"I learned to love my chains," she carefully says, not following him right away, but instead allowing her fingers to purposefully trail down his chest. She regards the puckered scars there, a troubled look flickering in her gaze, gone as her palm settles on his thigh. The blankets hide his skin from view. No way to find the scar, so she looks him in the eye. "Yours freed you in some ways, and tightened around you in others."

I understand, is what she means to tell him with that. So, so much more than she could ever articulate. A dead lover, a heart still aching over the memory, as much as she can, she understands. And could she not also relate to Ygritte in some ways, as well? Granted, she hadn't shot Jorah with arrows.

With a sigh, she scoots closer to him, tugging the blanket with her as she rests against his chest. He's warm and alive and he's home.

"I'm sorry it all happened that way. Were you with her when she--" Her tongue darts out to dampen her lips. "--when she fell?"

His tongue feels thick again, remembering it, and leaden; he's never really spoken of it before.

He hadn't killed Ygritte, and he hadn't really even been responsible for her death, but he'd still felt guilty for it. The choice had been to betray her love or to betray everything he'd ever known and everything he was, even his father's memory, and the faith that people like the Old Bear and Maester Aemon and Qhorin Halfhand had had in him. So he had betrayed her love. The fact that it was the better choice didn't make it any less a betrayal, and it didn't make her any less dead.

He could have been free, but not with honor, and not for long.

"She died in my arms. I took her body north of the Wall and burned it."

She stiffens against him. Involuntary her reaction might be, it comes forcefully. Just as swiftly, she's craning her neck to peer at the corner of her room where a simple and small box sits. It's not a simple box at all, though. And inside it... She squeezes her eyes shut.

Did you kill her? What use would his answer be? Certainly nothing to make either of them feel better about, and it's clear he still carries the guilt for her death, no matter his role in it... or hers.

"The Dothraki believe that every star in the sky is one of the Great Stallion's fiery khalasar. In order to ride with the Great Stallion, their bodies must be burnt so that their ashes can rise to the heavens."

Talking about this... she doesn't want to do it. But if she doesn't, he'll become lost in his own memories, won't he? If I look back, I am lost. With a sigh, she sits back up, not meeting his gaze, not looking at the box with the fragments of Drogo's remains, but instead, she stares at the remnants of the egg she'd failed to protect and drags her fingers through the ends of her hair.

"His wound became infected, and I made an agreement with the witch to save him. But she used blood magic." Her fingers snag on a knot. She falls silent, working the strands loose. "That magic took his soul, turned him into something that was half alive, and killed our son. He didn't return. Do you know what she said to me, when I demanded she return him to normal?"

He'd burned Ygritte's body under a heart tree, which had seemed right at the time. He'd built the pyre himself, alone, and walked away from it as the flames rose with the Old Gods presumably looking on. He hadn't gone back to that spot since; he hadn't wanted to see her as a pile of ash and bone.

He doesn't understand at first why Daenerys pulls away, but it doesn't take long for it to come to him, particularly after she begins to speak. He rests his hand against her leg above her knee.

"What did she say?"

That there's nothing after death, no feasts, no Great Stallion, no halls to walk with the great and the good, just an encompassing void of nonexistence? He can attest to it, but he doesn't think that's what Daenerys is about to say.

"When the sun rises in the west and sets in the east. When the seas go dry and mountains blow in the wind like leaves. When your womb quickens again, and you bear a living child." Now, and only now, is there a waiver in her voice. Not because of a dead lover, but because she's lost any and all chances at a child or family. "Then he will return, and not before."

She meets his eyes; her own are dry. The first time telling someone of those exact words. By the time she finishes speaking, she feels exhausted, as if speaking the words again somehow has cursed her once more.

"I smothered him with a pillow," she says, voice blunted and dull. "And then I burnt his corpse on the funeral pyre. The witch and I burnt with him."

She glances toward the box again, and her fingers resume with her hair.

"I don't know if you killed her, or if someone else did. It doesn't change that having someone you love die in your arms feels like a part of you is dying as well. But you were with her. She didn't die alone."

"-- And you."

All of that, and this is what he seizes on. The idea of her burning herself in a pyre makes him heartsick.

"I didn't kill her, though for a long time I thought I might as well have. Someone shot her thinking they were saving my life... the boy you saw. He might have been right." He doesn't tell her now what Olly did later.

"If you died, it would feel like all of me went with you."

Would he say that if it weren't the middle of the night? If they hadn't flung themselves into wakefulness, if they hadn't been losing track lately of where one of them ends and the other begins?

Edited 2018-01-02 03:41 (UTC)

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