"I crouch like a crow/ contrasting in the snow"

Blindsided- Bon Iver

King Jon Stark

The two palfreys cantered as one across the plains towards Highgarden, Ghost loping behind them. Theon rode tall on his bay stallion, betraying no hint of the torture he had endured at the hands of Ramsay Snow a few years past, but for his fingers. His muscle tone had returned, his endurance returned- Theon had returned.

Jon pondered the wretched creature he had found languishing in the dungeons. A white haired thing, being propped up by Jeyne Poole, who had been imprisoned with him when the fight broke out at Dreadfort.

Theon was now travelling with Jon to Highgarden to rouse the Tyrell family to Casterly Rock, in order to discuss plans to deal with Ramsay Snow's efforts to raise an army against Westeros and the powerful alliance which held it together. Jon thought of his young daughter, Violet. Her hand will buy the Tyrells, he though glumly. Daenerys was prepared to offer her hand, but Jon wasn't.

His daughter, Violet Stark, couldn't properly walk. She had babbled to Jon the morning he left Casterly Rock, her mother cradling the toddler. Jon couldn't imagine her liking boys, let alone marrying one. He was uncomfortable with the Tyrell proposal, but as Dany had pointed out, it was the one thing they could afford offer.

Theon had been silent most of the time, and Jon was grateful for that. They had both been humiliated at the council, the only two willing to go find Ramsay. Both men owed it to Robb, and the North, to find the Bastard and bring him home to answer for his crimes. There was nowhere he could hide where Jon would be unwilling to find him.

Lord Theon Greyjoy

They were almost upon Highgarden when Theon slowed his horse down. It was late, and they had been riding hard for a week straight. Theon ached from all the riding, clearly not quite recovered from his ordeal at Dreadfort. His muscles had come back, but his endurance had not. His hair was now a pale yellow instead of the straw it had once been. Jeyne had taken care of his wounds well enough, but every so often he would feel aches where they had supposedly healed.

Ramsay will pay, he thought bitterly, he will pay for everything. Theon had never hated anyone more then he hated Ramsay. All that had happened to Jeyne, to Reek, to Winterfell was connected to Roose's loose bastard.

Theon wanted Ramsay to die an agonizing death- the kind where you know the outcome weeks ahead, but you have no idea when it shall be granted to you. Theon was a Lord on the Iron Islands now, not that pathetic creature Reek, nor Theon Turncloak, nor Prince Theon of Winterfell. He could fight back now, and well.

The dreams were another matter- they found him late at night, when he was alone and vulnerable. He and Jeyne were used to waking each other with their nightmares of the same beast, but King Jon was not. They had started to take different rooms at the inns they had stayed at to avoid having to make eye contact after they were both up.

Jon turned to Theon, his horse walking beside the King's. They rode in uncomfortable silence, when the King spoke.

"We should find an inn." Theon nodded, distracted by the empty ring in his stomach. They hadn't eaten since dawn and Theon could feel it, though being hungry hadn't bothered him since Snow, in all truth.

Lord Commander Jon Snow

The Dreadfort had fallen much easier than it should have, though Jon wasn't complaining. Killing Roose had been easy, the horde of Freys, even easier. He would have spared Fat Walda and her babes, if Daenerys' Viserion had not gotten to their tower first. He and his men had explored the castle, save the dungeons. He had found no one who hadn't been burnt to the spot, and was beginning to regret his promise to Daenerys.

He couldn't change anything he had said to her though- he wanted to, but how many times had that happened in his life? He hoped he would find survivors in the dungeons at least, though according to all reports about the Boltons, they would be in miserable shape.

He descended down into the cold, wrapping his furs tighter around himself. The dungeons smelled awful, and were dank. He occasionally stepped on soft, fleshy things which he prayed weren't human. The further he travelled, the worse the smell which was now accompanied by the groans of half-dead prisoners.

Each cell revealed another hopeless cause, and Longclaw became a deep, crusted scarlet. Jon finally came to the last cell, which smelled the worst. He heard soft sobbing, and the dripping of a damp cloth. He gave Grenn the duty of guarding the door, and entered the room.

A nose-less girl looked up at him, her eyes stretched in fear, then relief when she saw him. He looked down beside her, at the old man on the ground. He looked at her again, mentally filling in where her nose had been, placing her familiar brown eyes outside of his memory, into the memory of Jon Snow, the bastard of Winterfell. Jeyne Poole looked up at him clutching the old man beside her.

"Jeyne?" he asked slowly, allowing the name to escape his lips. He had lived thus far believing all from his childhood to be dead- and now, he was blessedly wrong.

"Jon?" she choked the question out, her eyes swimming with tears. Jon realized she had been Arya- he supposed he should have been happy that she had escaped Ramsay, but disappointment settled in the pit of his stomach. He took his glove off, and put a hand out to touch Jeyne's forehead.

She leaned into his palm, her eyes imploring him to look at the wretch beside her.

Jon looked down at the miserable creature, nothing but skin stretched across bone, white hair dusting his shoulders. He knelt down to the man, and brushed a hand over the nose, touching a bump which reminded him again of Winterfell.

Lady Catelyn had banished him and Theon from a feast for the King when Theon was ten and Jon and Robb eight. Theon and Jon had started to practice their swordplay, unsupervised. Jon had hit his wooden blade upon the bridge on Theon's nose- the youth had always had a bump there since.

It was in the same place where the wretch's was, under Jon's thumb. Jon looked down, and whispered hoarsely, "Theon?"

Theon

He heard her sobbing against him and felt her warms tears on his chest. She had come down here when the dragon descended, and had wrapped him around her like a cloak. She, who had married him in the Godswood a week ago. I want to know what it is to marry someone you care about, she had whimpered to him. It was surely the work of the Gods that Ramsay had never found out, especially when Jeyne visited him so often.

Jeyne whispered against him after their "wedding" when she snuck down to visit him. She said she had drank Moon Tea every chance she had gotten- and that her womb hadn't quickened yet. She muttered about how hideous she thought Ramsay, how she didn't want to bear his children. Theon should have stopped her there, but she continued to tell him how she would rather a Kraken in her belly then a hide-less man.

She crouched over him now, as he lay on his back. Ramsay had lashed him a few times, so that he wouldn't fade from Theon's memory anytime soon. He would have died after that, if he hadn't defiantly chewed on the fact that Ramsay's wife loved him- though he used the term love loosely. Jeyne was just looking for an escape, someone to think about when Ramsay visited her.

Theon looked up at the ceiling, and let his eyes close. He prepared to die.