Disclaimer: I do not own Game of Thrones in any way, although I wish I owned the good ship Braime. I can't wait to see what happens in season 8, but until then, we can imagine.

Rating: M for coarse language and reference to adult themes

~Chapter One~

Jaime Lannister gazed through eyes that were slits, trying to see through the white swirl of fog and snow that battered his body and froze his face. Gods, he'd never known it could be so cold. Every injury he'd ever sustained, every tiny creak in his aging bones was magnified with each drop in temperature. He'd been convinced that he'd never make it to his destination before his flesh seized up and he became one with the frozen North. As it was, he could barely move his limbs enough to urge the horse to keep going. The beast had to be as miserable as he. But there was light at the end of their tunnel: a flickering, golden firelight that shone high upon the battlements of a keep that had once housed an ancient Westerosi family. But Starks were few these days.

Spurring his horse's flanks, he trekked the last hundred yards to the gates of Winterfell.

Man and beast almost ran head-on into the gate before Jaime could see it. The guards on either side called for him to halt. He didn't hear them over the wind, but he'd spent his lifetime in castles. He knew the protocols. Add that he was dressed like a common beggar to the fact that he was a stranger in these parts, and he could hardly blame them for pointing their halberds in his face.

Raising his hand in a gesture of salutation, as well as to prevent those halberds from poking his eyes out, Jaime dismounted.

"What is your business here?" the first guard shouted at him.

"Ser Jaime Lannister— I'm here to see the queen."

He knew he was expected, but not for another week at least. That's how long it took to muster an army as large as the Lannister forces. If they had been coming.

He sighed and hoped the guards would assume that he rode ahead of his fleet. They apparently did, for he was admitted, and the gates swung wide to receive him.

It was still colder than a crypt inside the courtyard, but at least the wind howled less fiercely. Everywhere he looked, he saw preparations being made— swords sharpened and re-forged, armor being pounded out, horses fed and watered, sacks of grain carried to the storerooms. The North knew well the harbingers of war.

A Stark bannerman strode up to him as a page came to care for his horse. "This way, Ser Jaime." Jaime followed him across the yard and into the sturdy hall of Winterfell. "I must say we didn't expect you quite so soon."

"Yes, well here I am." Jaime didn't feel like going into details. He'd have them dragged out of him soon enough.

"Would you like to rest before speaking with the queen, my lord?"

The thought of food was tempting, but the pit in his stomach at the news he brought made it seem more likely that any sustenance he downed would likely come back up.

"No, I should see her straightaway."

"Very well."

The man led him through a warren of corridors into a room he recognized— the main hall of Winterfell. It had been years since he'd been here. His mind wandered back to that time. They had all been together then, he, Cersei, and Tyrion. They'd laughed and joked with Joffrey, Myrcella, and Tommen. His children. His stomach jolted violently. All dead. He and Cersei had made love in the tower that he could just see outside the snow-covered window. His stomach plummeted. He barely heard his companion as he took his leave.

Shaking from the inner cold as much as the outer, he turned towards the roaring fire at the opposite end of the hall. His dark recollections of happier times had barely begun to settle on his mind when the door was flung open, and the dragon queen herself walked in, flanked by the Snow bastard and a host of others. Most he did not recognize, but some— including a strikingly tall, dour-faced, white-blond warrior woman, whose gaze made his stomach jolt once more— he did. Behind Brienne came Tyrion. He would have laughed at the sight of them together, the hulking maid and the diminutive advisor— probably the only two people in the world now whom he could call friends— if the situation hadn't been so dire.

The dragon queen seated herself at the center of the head table, Snow on her right and Tyrion on her left, while other advisors seated themselves around them. Brienne took up a post near the door. He watched her settle into a guarded stance, feet braced and arms behind her back. He knew, though, the rapidity with which those hands could draw the sword at her side, the sword he had given her, the sword she had named after him, called Oathkeeper. He gazed at her, but she stared determinedly in front of her, impassive, revealing nothing.

Then the foreign queen spoke, and he turned his head.

"So, the Lannisters do indeed pay their debts. I'll admit I am surprised to see you here so soon Ser Jaime. We did not expect the Lannister forces for another week, at least. I trust your journey was not troublesome?"

"My journey was fine, your Grace," he began in the smooth voice which he always adopted in matters of diplomacy. "You will find, however, that the forces you expected are significantly reduced in number."

She was silent for a beat, and the expression on her face showed that she had expected something of this nature.

"I see," she said, her voice taking on an edge. "And just what is your definition of 'significantly reduced'? How many men can we expect?"

He paused, glancing at Tyrion before dropping the hammer blow.

"One."

There was utter silence. He could have cut the tension in the room with a knife.

Her eyebrow raised imperiously. "One," she repeated.

His silence confirmed the assertion.

She looked to her left, but Tyrion seemed unsurprised by this news. She then turned to the right, to the bastard, whose face showed undisguised alarm.

"What do you mean, Ser Jaime?" the dark-haired man asked.

He was quickly becoming bored. Why could they not comprehend the situation? "I mean that the only person who has come to help the North is myself. You can expect no aid from my sister. She lied to you at the dragon arena. She never intended to help at all." He did not let them see how much it cost him to speak these words aloud. But Tyrion knew, and he avoided his brother's probing gaze.

There was silence once more. It seemed as if they were too stunned by this treachery to muster coherent thoughts. He knew the feeling well. In a moment, the queen spoke again.

"So, you are telling me that we must face the army of the undead alone, with numbers that, even were they bolstered by the southern forces, would never be enough?"

"It appears so."

"You have come all this way to tell us that we are doomed?"

"I have come all this way to keep my word, even if my sister will not." He chanced another glance at Brienne, glad that she at least would know his words rang true. Still she did not look at him, but he thought he saw a small smile curve the corner of her mouth, and he could almost say that the journey had been worth it for that.

"And why should I believe you?" His gaze snapped back to the Targaryen girl, on his guard once more. Her voice was rising, its edge transforming into full-blown contempt. "Why should I trust the word of a Lannister, the word of the Kingslayer?" She spat it with horrible emphasis. Tyrion seemed on the verge of speaking, but had not uttered more than "Your Grace—" before her next words drowned him out. "Are you not the same man who stabbed my father in the back when you were supposed to be guarding him during the usurper Robert Baratheon's rebellion? Are you not the same man who charged at me full-tilt in the Battle of the Loot Train, a spear in your hand, ready to gut me?"

At these words, Jon Snow and a few of the others stood up, glaring daggers at him, hands reaching for their weapons.

Before they could take a single step toward him, however, he sensed a movement to his left, and, unbelievably, saw Brienne stride across the room to put herself between him and the queen.

"Please, your Grace," she stated in a cool voice. "I can vouch for Ser Jaime's character. Whatever mistakes he has made, whatever debts of honor he has accrued, they are in the past. Ser Jaime is a noble knight, and a man of his word. I give you mine on that score."

Jaime didn't think he'd ever been more humbled in his life. He wished she would turn to look at him, but her eyes were still on the queen. Daenerys looked stone-faced, but was silent, seeming to think over Brienne's words.

Finally, she spoke. "I do not want to waste my time and energy on a fight that in the end will mean nothing if we do not focus on the larger picture at hand. For now, I will trust you Ser Jaime. If not on your own merits, then on the word of my Hand—" she tilted her head in Tyrion's direction— "And upon Lady Brienne's. I have never met her like before."

"Indeed, Your Grace, there are no women like her. Only her."

Jaime could imagine the blush suffusing Brienne's face upon hearing such compliments to herself, and indeed he saw it a moment later when she had bowed to the queen and once again took up her post by the door. He wished he could speak to her instead of about her, but he was sure they were both thinking of his words from long ago: There are no men like me. Only me. How that argument seemed decades from where they stood now.

"I come here with no ill will Your Grace," he began again. "Once I learned that Cersei did not intend to keep her word, I could no longer turn a blind eye to her willful ignorance." He looked at Brienne when he uttered his next words. "I have left her."

As he'd hoped they would, the words seemed to startle her out of her dutiful mask, and she met his gaze for the first time since entering the room.

Jon Snow's voice issued forth, forcing Jaime to break his connection with Brienne. "Does this mean, Ser Jaime, that you are ready to pledge your loyalty to the rightful Queen of the Seven Kingdoms?"

All eyes were upon him. He had expected something of this nature on his journey up here, and hadn't known how he would respond. All his life he'd been loyal to one person only. She had been his north star, his moral compass, his guide, his anchor. He could lie, murder, cheat, and break his oaths, if it meant that she would be safe. All sense of right and wrong had begun and ended with her. And now he had let her go. He was a man of his word now, and by the gods he would not stain his honor, whatever remained of it, by making a false promise. He felt the stirrings of his own conscience inside him, the voice that knew what the right path was, the voice he had silenced for so long, because every impulse he'd ever acted on was wrong, and he knew it. Slowly, that voice rose within him, and he let it have free rein over his heart and mind. He listened to himself for the first time in a long time, and heard what his honor demanded.

"I will swear my loyalty," he said in a confident, ringing voice, "to whomever Brienne of Tarth has pledged hers."

This was definitely an answer that no one had anticipated. The silence seemed to question him, to ask for justification. He turned his gaze to her, and found her staring at him. He had a feeling her mouth had gaped open at his words, and she had just now closed it.

"I hope the person she has chosen to follow knows that they probably do not deserve her."

Brienne looked, if possible, even more embarrassed at this.

"The Lady Brienne of Tarth has sworn her sword to Queen Daenerys," said Jon Snow. Jaime had not taken his eyes off of her. She nodded, and this was all he needed.

"Then I, Ser Jaime of House Lannister, do pledge my sword and my service to Queen Daenerys of House Targaryen."

Author's Note: Thank you for reading! Now that Jaime's finally gotten his royal butt up to the North, what will befall him? Stay tuned...