Her stomach won't settle.
For three days now the sickness has plagued her, rolling through her innards and twisting her into knots. She blames the Northern food – all heavily salted meats and thick, rich stews. The Winterfell servants are kind and attentive, offering aid and various remedies, but after the fourth maid suggests another bowl of stew to set her to rights, she orders Missandei to keep them all out. Curling into a ball on the soft furs covering her bed, she tries and fails to settle herself, closing her eyes and taking deep lungfuls of air through her nose.
In and out. In and out. In and out.
It doesn't work.
A frustrated scream threatens to spill out along with the meager contents of her stomach – again – when a soft knock sounds against the wood of the door. Groaning, Daenerys silently vows to dismember whoever managed to get past her trusted advisor. If it's her bloody hand, she's going to–
"The maester says you're ill, Your Grace?" a low, muffled voice inquires through the barrier.
Jon.
He has not called her his queen since their last time at sea, since they sailed north from King's Landing over a month ago, a truce blown and a war to wage. That last time at sea, when the waves rocked and his fingers tangled with hers as he pressed her deeper into the bed, the rough scrape of his beard dragging wonderfully against the sensitive skin of her throat. And her stomach. And her thighs.
Enough.
Ever since that night, being his queen has seemed different – somehow both an ill-fitting term for the intimacy they share and something she still desperately wants to be. It had been one thing to demand the allegiance of a stranger-king, someone she didn't know to be friend or foe. It had been quite another to have that man – an equal – offer his fealty based on mutual respect and belief in, well, her.
She doesn't quite know what to do.
He seems to sense this, and so they've retreated back to the safer ground of old formalities.
It takes most of her remaining energy to stand and cross the room, but she keeps her head high as she swings the heavy door open. He's there, dressed simply in a black cotton tunic and pants, all of his usual leathered armor gone. It's disconcerting to see him without it, as if a barrier that usually protects them has been removed. His hair is damp, and she diligently tries to not think about him bathing, but his clean scent reaches her and it's all she can do not to lean in and press herself against him.
Instead she steps back. "I am as you see," she tips her chin up and squares her shoulders, dismayed when she sees the corner of his mouth tick up. She's lying and he knows it.
Damn it all.
Relenting, she steps aside to allow him entrance before moving to sit at the small table tucked next to the fireplace. He follows and stands before the fire, staring into the dancing flames. There is a nervous energy about him, a tension she can now see along his jaw and feel in the air as silence falls. And then it hits her.
"You're leaving." It's not a question.
He turns to face her fully. "I am."
She raises an eyebrow at him when he says no more, only looks at her with dark eyes that send heat dancing along her skin. She tries to focus. "And am I just to sit here and knit by the fire as you fight this war?"
He huffs a quiet laugh at this, as if there's a joke she's missing. She eyes him curiously and he at least has the grace to blush a little, a shy grin blooming as light pink tinges above the day's growth of beard. "There's no fighting yet, Your Grace. Simply checking on the banner houses, assuring their defenses are ready for what's to come. No need for one such as yourself to bother with it."
"One such as me," Daenerys echoes.
"A queen."
"Hmm. Yet you can bother yourself with such tasks? Are you not a king?" she quips, folding her hands smoothly on her lap.
He shakes his head slowly. "Not since I took up your banner, my queen."
His emphasis on the moniker rings through the room, loud and clear as a bell. Flashes of him abed on the ship, prone but resolute, flicker in her mind. She remembers the way his rough hand reached for hers as he pledged himself, how his voice never wavered and his eyes held steady. How it had ignited something within her, something that threatened – still threatens – to consume her whole.
My queen.
She clears her suddenly dry throat. "I'm not sure your people see it that way."
"Our people," he gently corrects. "And I think they do. If not, they will." He is assured where she is not, and she is reminded once again of this unexpected balance they have struck. She thinks of his face in the war room at Dragonstone the day she declared her intent to handle the Lannisters herself. Uncertainty and worry had marred his dark features, but he had nodded and allowed her to be sure enough for the both of them.
It had meant more than he could know then, just as it did now.
"There's nothing I regret. Nothing I would change." His eyes are steady on hers, as they always are, willing her to see the truth in his words. And she does.
"That's good, as I think we've broken that wheel beyond repair anyway," she teases, and it's a close as she'll come to acknowledging what transpired between them. He laughs at this, and for a moment, she actually feels better. For a man of few words, she's never found it this easy to converse with someone. So easy and…enjoyable. He meets her as an equal, he doesn't cower or fawn or threaten like so many others. He respects her, but he's not afraid of her. And it draws her to him like moth to a flame.
But it's all too short lived.
"As for your leav–" She's about to continue when another wave of nausea rolls up within her, and she barely makes it to the bedpan before she loses the bone broth that constituted her dinner.
Jon is immediately at her side, all pretense of formality dropped. "Dany, what can I do?" his voice soft and worried, his warm hand rubbing circles slowly on her back. Mortification suffuses her being, and she loathes feeling so exposed and vulnerable.
"Nothing," she curls into herself, shrinking away from him. "Just leave me be."
"Bollocks to that," he says succinctly, shocking her a little at such a gruff turn of phrase. Before she can respond, his arms are under her, scooping her up high and secure against his chest. He sits on the side of the bed and holds her for a while, not saying anything. He's good at that, this Jon Snow. He seems to know that sometimes words aren't necessary. That sometimes quiet and stillness are a tonic all their own. His heartbeat is strong and steady beneath her cheek, and she can't help but to lean into it. If only for a moment.
It's been so long since she's been held. Just held.
It's rather nice.
"You should get some rest," he murmurs eventually, lips brushing her ear as he slowly shifts her onto the mattress. Stay, hovers on her lips, begging for release, but she bites it back. Instead she watches him as he reaches down the bed, tugging the furs up and over her body, tucking her in like a nursemaid. His hand brushes her abdomen as he does, and suddenly a strange fluttering echoes deep within her. The kind of fluttering she hasn't felt since…
Oh gods.