Chapter One
The morning dawned clear, sunny and cold, with that smell to the air that spoke of snow and the end of summer. They set forth at daybreak, twenty men or thereabouts to see a man beheaded.
Jen was allowed to go along with her father and brothers because she had been the one to find the man.
His name was Will and he was barely more than a boy, just seven and ten, just the same as she. She had come upon him on her morning ride through the Wolfswood three days previous and after she'd shot him he'd fallen to his knees and clutched at her skirts raving about creatures from Old Nan's stories and begging her forgiveness.
A few well laid comments had been enough to convince her brother Robb that she needed the closure of watching him die. And Robb had convinced father.
Her brother Bran was convinced that he was a wildling from Mance Rayder's army. The boy was only ten and this would be the first time he would be called upon to witness their father's justice. He was excited and nervous in ways that showed how young he was still, in truth. She had not the heart to tell him that the man was a deserter from the Night's Watch.
The boy, Will, was just as scrawny and pale as the last time Jen had seen him. Bound hand and foot and waiting quietly between Jory Cassel and Ser Rodrick. All the fight had gone out of him. Though he was afraid and trembled faintly with it, he also seemed to be at peace. Not frantic and fevered as she'd seen him last.
Robb's hand on her knee jolted her out of her musings and she looked away from the deserter as father questioned him in a quiet voice.
"Alright, Snow?" he asked his face smoothed of concern but for the tiny wrinkle of his brow that he couldn't quite erase, the one that made him resemble father despite his lucky hair and Tully blue eyes.
"I'm fine, Robb," she answered, "Stop fretting over me and look to Bran, father will want him to see this."
Robb gave her knee a warm comforting squeeze, and then turned to their brother.
Jen turned her eyes back to the proceedings, no longer sure why she had wanted to be here. Father stood, tall and solemn in the grey-blue morning, the wind stirred his long brown hair and the grey streaked through his beard made him look older than his thirty-five years.
Bran would say that he'd taken off father's face and replaced it with the Lord of Winterfell's. Jen would like to say that she knew better but she could see very little of her father in the man holding Ice, so stern and immovable.
They dragged Will to the ironwood stump, stained red-brown and silky smooth from years of being polished with blood. Jen's eyes found his and he stared at her hard no longer paying father any mind.
"In the name of Robert of the House Baratheon, first of his name, King of the Andals and the First Men, Lord of the Seven Kingdoms and Protector of the Realm, I, Eddard of House Stark, Lord of Winterfell and Warden of the North, do sentence you to die. If you have any last words, you may speak them now."
Sitting there upon her gelding with her eyes locked in his it felt like he was talking directly to her.
"I know I broke my oath, and I know I'm a deserter. I should have gone back to the Wall and warned them but—" he broke off shaking his head, "I saw what I saw. I saw the wights with their dead blue eyes, and I saw the White Walkers. People need to know. You need to tell them."
And Jen, Jen believed him. Strangely enough, the way she hadn't when the fear-madness was on him and he was tearing at her hems like a wild thing. There was something in his eyes that made her feel like he was telling the truth and a chill that had nothing to do with the cold crawled down her spine.
"If you can get word to my family, tell them I'm no coward. Tell them I'm sorry."
Father waited to see if Will would say more but he said nothing, just stared at her like she was the only thing that was real to him even as one of the guardsmen forced him to his knees and he laid his neck against the stump, starting to shake now in earnest.
"Forgive me, lady. Forgive me."
Father hefted the greatsword, Ice, the Valyrian steel glinted darkly as it swung a smooth arc and severed the boy's head from his neck in a single sure stroke. Blood spurted, red and dark like summerwine and soaked into the ironwood stump, the grass and trampled dirt around it, until finally it reached the snow.
Jen kept her gelding steady more by force of habit than any real control. She wasn't like her sister Sansa to swoon at the sight of blood and death, but this was the first time she'd seen a man die. A person her own age who'd spoken to her and begged for her forgiveness.
Bile rose in the back of her throat and she wondered again if she'd been mistaken in coming here.
Bran did well, he kept his pony in hand and Jen could tell by Robb's proud expression that he hadn't looked away. Robb, of course, was an old hand when it came to the justice of the North. He'd been riding out with father since he'd passed seven name days.
There was a cart prepared to take the body away, though to where Jen didn't know. Two of the men from Wintertown wrapped the body in a shroud and hauled him away with a practiced motion.
Theon Greyjoy, a lean, dark lad of nineteen who found everything amusing kicked the head up into his hands and punted it into the cart. The ass.
"Come on, Jenny," said Robb, urging their horses forward with a click of his tongue, "Nothing more to be done here."
Robb was right of course, the party was already dispersing, and father had pulled Bran aside to talk with him.
Jen arched a brow, "You haven't called me that in a good long while, Robb Stark."
"Yeah, well, you were brave today sister-mine. I'm proud."
"I was brave?"
Robb shot a dark look over his shoulder at the circle of standing stones and the ironwood stump, "He had no right, singling you out like he did."
Jen shook her head, a little pleased and a little annoyed, "Someday you are going to have to admit that I am a woman grown and can take care of myself, Stark."
"The man was a deserter, and there is no man more dangerous, Jen. They don't flinch from any crime because they know their life is forfeit."
"He wasn't dangerous to me," Jen said thoughtfully, for the more she thought on it the more she believed it, "The way he looked at me was more like the way father looks sometimes at the Heart Tree, the more I think about it the more I think that he didn't really see me at all. I could see it in his eyes."
"The Others take his eyes," Robb said, "He hadn't seen a beautiful girl since he took the black. That's all there was to it. Race you to the bridge?"
Jen snorted, but let the argument go, "If you're so eager to lose again, Stark who I'm I to deny you?"
She tucked her billowing skirts up under her legs and spurred her horse forward with a tap of her heels. She could hear Robb following, first cursing and then laughing and whooping as they gathered speed until they were flying down the Kingsroad.
Jen felt her hair tumble free of its pins and plaits streaming out behind her like a banner as she leaned over her horse's neck, urging him to greater speeds as she caught a glimpse of Robb in the corner of her eye.
She cantered over the bridge a nose length ahead of her brother, and threw up her fist, triumphant.
"Winner," she panted, flushed and grinning, "And still champion."
"One day I am going to beat you," Robb growled, mussing her already tangled curls.
Jen swatted him away, her gelding dancing under her obligingly, "Not likely, brother, I am the better rider and it's time you just accepted it."
"The seven hells I will," said Robb, "I—what is that?"
His hand dropped to the sword at his hip and Jen looked over her shoulder, there in the shadow of the bridge half-buried in the remnants of last month's late summer snows was the largest wolf that Jen had ever seen.
It was lying on its side unmoving and it wasn't until after her heart was done leaping up into her throat that she noticed the antler broken off in its neck.
"That's—not possible," she muttered, swinging down from her horse.
"It's a direwolf," muttered Robb, in awe. "There aren't any more direwolves south of the Wall. No one has seen one in hundreds of years."
"Now there are five," said Jen, "Look Robb."
Squirming around in the thick fur of their mother's belly were a parcel of fluffy grey wolf pups squeaking and yipping as they nosed at their dam's teats and the corners of her mouth.
They crept forward, up to their ankles in snow, wary and reverent despite clear evidence that the great beast was dead. The flies buzzed thick around her head and there was rust all down her front her teeth bared in a permanent snarl.
Robb bent and stroked a cautious finger along the spine of the nearest pup. The fluffy creature was darker than all but one of its sibs and it turned and stared at Robb for a long moment before fastening its puppy fangs into Robb's glove and wrestling it off.
Robb scooped the pup up like it was their youngest brother, Rickon, and held it close against his chest wrapping it in the flap of his cloak and chuckling as it nosed at his face licking at the corners of his mouth and jaw with a yip.
"Hello little one," he said.
Jen could see his heart melting, like summer snow and she couldn't blame him not when four adorable pups were milling around the snow sniffing at her hems and boots and letting her stroke their fur.
"Robb? Jen?"
The party had caught up with them finally, Jory Cassel had jumped off his horse and was leaning over the side of the bridge.
"Down here," called Robb.
"Gods!" Jen heard Theon all but shout.
"Robb get away from it!"
"She's dead Jory," Robb said with a laugh, "Nothing to fear."
"It's a freak!"
"It's a direwolf," father pronounced, watching as Bran slid down the embankment with a great deal of speed and very little caution.
"Can I hold one?" asked Bran.
"Here," said Jen, scooping up the nearest one, a cheerful looking lad with a little brown to the grey of his topcoat.
It was love at first lick, much as it had been for Robb, meanwhile father knelt and pulled the antler from the mother's throat.
"Tough old beast," he said, tossing it aside. "It's a shame."
"What will they do?" asked Bran, "Their mother's gone."
"Direwolves loose in the realm after so long, I like it not," said Ser Rodrick.
"It's a sign," agreed Jory.
"'Tis only a dead animal, Jory. Still, they won't survive long in the wild," said father, exchanging a look with Ser Rodrick and the horsemaster, Hullen, "Better a quick death."
"Father, no," begged Bran, the pup in his arms making a sad little sound.
"The sooner the better," Theon agreed. He drew his sword. "Give the beast here, Bran."
"No!" Bran cried out fiercely. "It's mine."
"Put away your sword, Greyjoy," Robb said. For a moment he sounded as commanding as their father, like the lord he would someday be. "We will keep these pups."
"Robb," started father, but Jen could see that Robb was going to be stubborn about this. And she couldn't really blame him, half in love with these pups herself.
"Ser Rodrick's big red bitch whelped just last week, only two of the litter survived, she'll have milk enough."
"They'll tear her apart when they try to nurse," insisted Harwin, Hullen's son.
In an instant the answer suddenly came to Jen and before she was aware of standing she was tall and straight-backed before the men and speaking.
"Lord Stark," she said, formal, "There are five pups."
Father gave her a strange look, one that Jen couldn't quite interpret, but cocked his head, curious.
"What of it Jen?"
"Two are female, three male. One for each of the Stark children. The direwolf is the sigil of your house, you were meant to have them."
Father kept on giving her that queer piercing look, "You want no wolf pup for yourself Jenny?" he asked quietly.
Jen gave her father a wan smile, "I'm not a Stark."
There was a long silence between father and daughter that Robb rushed to fill, sensing his chance.
"I'll nurse them myself," he said, fiercely, "I'll soak a towel with warm milk and give them suck from that."
"Me too!" cried Bran, "Please, father."
Her father finally turned away from her, looking over at his sons contemplatively, Jen was not too proud to admit that she held her breath. Waiting to see if her gambit would pay off with father the way she could see it had paid off with the men of Winterfell. Superstitious as they were.
"Easy to say, harder to do," father said, at last, "I won't have you bothering the servants with this. If you want to keep them you will feed them yourselves, you will train them yourselves, and if they die you will bury them yourselves. Is that understood?"
"Yes, father," agreed Bran, elated.
"Yes," nodded Robb firmly.
"You will need to be firm about their training, the kennelmaster will have nothing to do with these five that I can promise you. And the gods help you if you neglect them. A direwolf is not bred to beg for a treat and slink away at a kick. They are wild creatures and they'll be able to tear a man's arm off before they're fully grown. If you want them, however, they are yours."
"Thank you father," laughed Bran, cuddling his pup close.
"Desmond, Jory, gather the rest of the pups, it is long past time we were back to Winterfell," he ordered, striding away.
Warily the two men of the household guard each accepted a wriggling pup into their arms, and Jen scooped up the last one, a fierce little girl who wagged her bum and growled playfully, that she thought would suit Arya very well.
She had taken only a few strides when she paused, hearing something.
"Keep up Jen, girl," called Ser Rodrick.
"Just a moment," Jen called back, handing Arya's wiggle monster to Robb who gave her a curious look as she stepped around the body of the dead direwolf and bent down next to the roots of a tree.
There curled up against his mother's back snuffling was a puppy the same color as the snow with eyes as red as the blood of the deserter. She was smaller than the rest, and quiet, not making a sound as Jen bent to scoop her up.
"She must have crawled away from the others," said Jen.
"Or been driven away," said Ser Rodrick, eyeing the pup's snow-white fur.
"A runty albino bitch?" laughed Theon, "She'll die even faster than the rest."
Jen leveled her father's ward her coldest look, "I think not, Greyjoy. This one is mine."
AN: I freely admit I only have the foggiest idea of where I'm going with this. I wanted a badass fem!Jon and that's all I've got really. Any feedback is much appreciated since it's my first time writing for this fandom.