A Time to Heal
Authors Note: this is a rather pointless little one shot. Centred around the giant 'what if' of Jon taking the throne and what comes after. Features a cameo from everyones favourite wolf. Purely sad and depressing because it's hard right now to any of it any other way right now. Cannon compliant up to s8 ep4.
He made it a year into his reign before his advisors brought up the word Succession with him, he was surprised he'd made it so long. He dodged the subject for another fortnight before he gave in, he told them solemnly to choose a woman they thought appropriate and he would marry her. Incredulous, they asked him if he had any opinion on the matter, but he insisted he did not. He had loved, twice, and he had lost both times, the sting of grief haunted him and he feared he no longer had it in him to care. He would do as duty demanded, as he always had, he would marry to produce an heir but he expected nothing else from the arrangement.
His advisors continued to update him on their quest, assuming that he must, on some level, care about the proceeding but he was steadfast in his position. Each one in turn would shake their heads and leave, concerned for their king and friend, he was, despite everything he had been through, too young to have become so pragmatic.
Four moons after the search had commenced they approached him with the news that they had chosen a girl from one of the noble houses of the Riverlands. She was a few years younger than him, a beauty, they assured him, well educated in the womanly arts and intelligent. He reacted to their news with the same indifference he had given to all their updates on the matter. If they thought she would make a good queen he would marry her, the rest did not matter. In truth their description made him recoil, he had never had much to do with women who existed in the spheres of sewing circles and poetry reading, and the experiences he had had with such women had never been pleasant. The alabaster face of his sister briefly crossed his mind before he pushed her back into the dark corner where he was determined she would stay.
He considered simply going ahead with the wedding plans without bothering to meet the girl, but that seemed unfair and perhaps a little cowardly. She had a right to understand what she was getting into, mayhaps she would reconsider when she realized this was no fairy tale. He would not be the husband she had dreamt of.
He met her on a secluded balcony overlooking the godswood, not a proper godswood, there were no weirwoods this far south and he was felt the loss of the North once more, he would never return home, some bridges burnt cannot be rebuilt.
His advisors were right, she was a beauty, and in this they had chosen well, for she bore no resemblance to any of the women he had loved. Her hair was honey blonde, her eyes were deep dark blue, she had dimples when she smiled as she did in greeting, she was shorter than him, and more well endowed than the women in his past.
He was blunt with her, though he tried not to be unkind. He assured her he would do nothing against her will and that she would be given every luxury but not to expect that this would ever be about love, he had seen too much, lost too much and he wasn't sure he was capable of it anymore. She smiled sadly at that, a look of pain and heartbreak and he knew all too well. They had chosen well in this as well. She had loved, she told him, a boy from another noble family, her father had given permission for them to wed, he was her heart and soul, her future, but the Riverlands had known nothing but war and grief since the old king died and so she lost him, as she had lost nearly all her family. She had loved, she told him, she did not expect it to come again but she would like to have a family of her own.
They were married by the high Septon, a faith not his own, in the godswood while a raven watched from the branches of a honeysuckle. Surrounded not by family, for neither had any left, but by the nobility that considered it their right to be there. The celebrations afterward held an air of easy abandon that the seven kingdoms had not felt in many years and for the first time the king felt that perhaps things would get better.
They considered delaying the consummation until they knew each other better, but under the influence of too much wine and the joyful spirits of their guests they gave in to hope and chased away the spectres of war and loved ones. He tried to be gentle, she cried anyway. But in the morning as they lay curled together they both found that the pain was less than they imagined it would be.
She gave him a son within the year and he named the boy after a beloved brother who was once, for so short a time, also a king. Something broke inside of him the first time he held the babe, a torrent of fears and regrets, of hope and joy, he had never believed he would father a child, for so long he had been determined not to, believing he had nothing to give. He wondered now if the name he grew up despising was less of a curse than the one he would pass down to this child.
The Queen was a good mother, she nursed the babe herself, only agreeing to the use of a wet nurse in the most dire of circumstances. And the more he watched her with his child the more something unfurled within his chest, a loosening of some great pressure he had carried for so long he had forgotten what it was like to live without it. He knew she still grieved for the love she had lost as he did, he knew she traced their sons infant features and wondered what a child born from that union would have looked like, but that was alright, he searched too, not for the imaginary child he could have had but for the features that showed their common blood, a hint of silver, a glint of violet. He chided himself for it but he did it all the same.
He named his second son for an uncle who never knew of the connection between them but who cared for him all the same. He named his first daughter for the mother he never knew and his second for a good mother who died in a war his brother had begun. His third daughter, born as thunder wracked the capitol came into the world with lungs powerful enough to wake the dead and a head full of silver blonde curls. They named her for the dreamer and when her eyes turned from baby blue to gentle violet he knew they had made the right choice and instead of adding salt to the wound she helped to heal it.
Love came for them softly, on the pitter patter of toddler feet, in the way she danced circles around nobles with too much ambition, always polite, always gracious and always loyal. Her quick wit and teasing humour endured him to her. She never asked for too much, she didn't criticism or belittle, she didn't push him to act against his honour. She didn't hold back her opinions either and he found he had come to respect and rely on them. It wasn't the wild reckless passion he had known in his youth, it wasn't the overwhelming love he had found at the end of the world, it was quiet and soothing.
They named their third son for a father who had put family above all else, and when he left them not long after they grieved together, both realizing that it was perhaps the first time they had not been alone in their grief.
Years passed, the kingdom began to heal, a fourth daughter graced them, named for a sister killed before he was born and they knew that she would be their last.
One day, as the king hunted elk in the kingswood with his eldest son, now near a man grown and a fine prince, he spotted something white amongst the trees and he knew before he came close what it was. The journey the wolf and taken must have lasted months, he was old now, one ear long gone, scars across his snout, the king fell to his knees and buried his face in the snow white fur. Memories long buried threatening to break free. He knew why the wolf had come, he could feel it in his bones. Together they returned to the palace, and in darkness of night, as they lay on the rug before the fire the wolf passed from this life and the king wept for all those he had lost and all those he had failed, for betrayals and misunderstandings, for the children he had never had and those whose births had damned them to the cruelness of this world. He wept for a bastard boy who had found a litter of pups in the woods and who had wanted nothing more than a name and a place to belong, he wept for the price he had payed for both. He wept until there were no tears left.
And in the morning light he finally felt free.
If the Queen seems a little too good to be true, I based her loosely off of two of Henry VIII's wives, Jane Seymour and Katherine Parr. I figure they would find someone who wouldn't try to 'bend him to her will' (Jane) but since he likes strong women she would at least have to have some backbone (Katherine) . I imagine her as someone who, like him, is just very tired and more interested in peace than intrigue.