I'm still hoping to get back to Homecoming one day, but I'm all about Game of Thrones and Jonerys at the moment.
Arya.
Jon can hardly believe it as he leaves her and Bran beneath the weirwood tree and heads back out to the battlefield. Sansa is safe in the crypt, which leaves just one member of his family unaccounted for.
The fires have almost burned themselves out when he emerges from the courtyard, the smoke clearing to reveal the extent of the carnage.
Bodies, everywhere. Dothraki, Unsullied, Free Folk, and Northerners. Some he recognises; many he doesn't.
He's relieved to see Sam still standing. Any other time he would have stopped to help him, but he couldn't risk the Night King evading them again. If he had, it would have all been for nothing.
He passes Tormund, and Davos, and Gendry, and Grey Worm… But one mammoth figure stands out among the survivors.
Drogon.
He's curled on the ground at the far end of the field, guarding something, or someone.
'Dany?' Jon calls, running towards them, the urgency in his voice increasing with each repetition of her name. 'Daenerys!'
He almost doesn't notice her, her white winter coat blending in with the snow, until he spots her silver braids atop one of the piles of bodies and everything inside him turns cold despite his heavy furs.
She's so still that for a moment, he's afraid to go any closer. Is she…? She can't be. Those can't be the last words they said to one another. If he'd thought they would be, he never would have ruined their last night together by telling her the truth.
When he reaches her side, he drops to his knees, using her shoulder to turn her over. He doesn't want to look, to see, but he forces himself...
...and is rewarded by the sight of her beautiful red-rimmed eyes staring back at him, her face and clothes streaked with soot and blood, but every bit as alive as when he left her to fend for herself on the battlefield.
'Jon?' she whispers, as surprised as he is to see him standing before her in one piece.
They almost didn't make it. If Arya hadn't arrived when she did, the Night King would have won, and they would all be marching in the army of the dead.
As he lifts her to her feet, he discovers the reason for her tears.
Jorah is dead. That's why she isn't.
He offers up a silent prayer for the man who laid down his life so that she would live to take her rightful seat on the throne.
And so that he would have the chance to make things right between them before she did.
'Are you hurt?' he asks her, holding her at arm's length so he can look her up and down.
He notices her performing the same mental inventory on him. 'No,' she assures him.
The blood soaking into her coat must be Jorah's, he realises. He shouldn't be glad, but he is. 'Good.'
She takes a step back from him, freeing herself from his grip. 'Is it?' she demands, struggling to compose herself, to be the fearsome Dragon Queen he first met at Dragonstone.
The words pierce his heart worse than any dagger. She may not want him dead, but she hasn't forgiven him. Maybe she never will.
'Of course it's good that you're unhurt, Daenerys,' he tells her. 'Why wouldn't it be?'
No matter what happened between them, how could she think he would ever be anything other than grateful to know that she was safe?
She seems less sure of herself as she continues. 'With me out of the way, there'd be nothing standing between you and your birthright.'
This again. He realises that she's testing him. Testing his loyalty. Testing his love. Trying to find evidence of his treasonous betrayal when all he's ever done to her is love her.
'You really think I want to put you in the ground so I can take the throne for myself?' he insists.
The idea is so absurd, he almost laughs. His whole sorry existence feels like some kind of cosmic joke. All his life, he's wanted to know who he was, where he came from, and now that he does, he wishes more than anything that he could go back to believing that he was nothing but a stain on his father's good name. An unloved, unwanted bastard.
'Why not?' she challenged him. 'You'd have every right.'
To what? Kill her? Watch the life drain from her eyes? The same eyes that light up every time he walks into a room? He would sooner die himself.
'I could say the same about you,' he reminds her, even though he doesn't believe for a moment that she could ever be that cold hearted. If she were really as ruthless as she pretends to be, he'd already be dead. He almost was.
She gapes at him in shock at hearing the accusation turned back on herself, angry, just as he knew she would be. 'I saved your life. You would've been overrun if Drogon and I hadn't come to your rescue.'
'And if the situation were reversed, I would've done the same for you,' he agrees. It has never and would never occur to him to do anything else.
'Because you need me to defeat Cersei,' she supplies, and seeing how pained she is at the thought that their alliance might really be nothing more than a means to an end for him, he wants to take her in his arms and kiss her doubts away, but he doesn't know how she would feel about that, so he takes her hand instead.
'No, Dany,' he insists, willing her to understand what he's trying to tell her. 'Because I need you.'
He thinks he must have got through to her, because she lifts their entwined hands to cup his cheek, a soft smile gracing her features.
'Good, because I need you, too, Jon Snow, or Aegon Targaryen, or whatever you decide to call yourself. I can't do this without you.'
'Yes, you can,' he assures her with a wry smile. 'You're Daenerys Targaryen. The Mother of Dragons. There's nothing you can't do.'
'You're right,' she allows. 'I could. But I don't want to.'
He pulls her to him then, and they hold each other for so long that Davos comes looking for them.
They'll talk about it all, Jon tells her, and come up with a plan like they always do, but right now they have fires to put out and bodies to burn and an army to debrief.
They may not have a label for it yet, but what he does know is that he wants her by his side for whatever comes next, because together, they're unstoppable.