He was at the door of the crypts. This time, what usually was the end of his nightmares seemed to have become their beginning. And no matter how hard he tried to go back and be an animal again, to smell the winter, to taste blood, to run far away from that wretched placed that the Wall turned out to be, he couldn't. The place where he had died. He knew he was dead. He knew that his brothers had murdered him, Bowen Marsh and who knows how many others. He knew that he had become that same thing they all despised. A warg. A mere passenger within Ghost's mind. And before the red woman could entrap him with her magic he and Ghost were running, running North, running to the only family he had left, his Uncle Benjen, to fulfill the promise of going to him and find him before his life vanished away in the mind of his direwolf.
The further they would go North during the times they were awake, the more he seemed to be wandering Winterfell when they were asleep. Just like the nightmares of old, he walked through the halls, the gardens, the godswood, looking for someone, for something, and he would always end at the crypts. No matter how tired Ghost was or how much either he wanted to sleep, Jon always managed to force himself back, to never enter the crypts and hear the Starks of Winterfell whisper murder against him. Even if he was already dead.
But not this time. This nightmare have begun where the others ended, and the direwolf would let him back into his mind. It was blocking him out, keeping him at bay, like he didn't belong, the same way Catelyn Stark would keep him at the outside of her family a lifetime ago, and he couldn't help but let the tears roll down his face, a face that had no body, a body that had no life.
Jon Snow knew he was dead, and his own personal hell was welcoming him with an open door.
So on he went. He started the descent into the crypts. There were no torches lighting the way. No rats scurrying away from the cold. Just darkness, and his boots clicking the stone.
He wanted to scream. He wanted to run. He wanted to get away. He could hear them, all the Starks, the true Starks whispering among themselves, denying him entry. He could see them with their swords bare in their laps forbidding him of claiming guest right in these halls.
Except they weren't.
The builder didn't have his sword. The eldest King in the North was sitting at his post, the first gave you saw, even if you were to go deeper. Instead of his usual stern face, though, Jon now found him pensive, evaluating. Like an old master seeing his apprentice's latest work, and deciding if it had been good enough.
Was he good enough to be a Stark? Had he honored the Night's Watch enough to gain a seat in those halls? Would he be able to pass his afterlife with Robb, Bran, Rickon? With his little sister, when she finally died? Even if he had to endure Lady Stark's disappointment all eternity, it would be much sweeter if he could spend it with his family again.
-Why, Ghost? Why can't I go back inside you? Why do you want me to do this?
As always, the direwolf remained mute. Brandon's statue as well, so Jon moved forward. At the crypts, he could finally see his father for a last time and ask him if he could be a Stark.
Ask him who his mother was.
He walked the crypts by memory. He remembered the one time he had played a Ghost for the girls, scaring Sansa away. He wished he could hear her again, even if she would call her "half-brother". Or Rickon, running around laughing at their sister's panic. Where were they? Why were they not in the crypts? Had their deaths been so horrible that they were denied eternal rest? Where was Bran, no longer broken, to ask him about the gremlins and the munchkins? Where was Robb, so they could spar again with swords and wit? Where was his father, so he could finally get answers from him?
Jon had reached the end of the corridor, where his father's grave stood. And just like his brother and his father before him, there was no sword across his lap. Without it, Jon could see him as the loving and caring father that he was to him, and not as the fearsome Lord of Winterfell.
-Father. I don't belong here, do I? I am not your true son. I am no Stark. Why am I here? Is it you calling? Can I ask you who my mother was? Is she alive? Why did you keep her name from me? Father, please.
-He's not here.
The woman's voice came from behind. She was a young woman, his age, beautiful, a Stark through and through. Long black hair. Haunting gray eyes. Reminded her of Arya, if Arya had become a woman grown and accepted to wear a white dress and a gray cloak. The Stark colors, and the silver sigil clasping her cloak. And a sweet smell coming from the crown of blue roses in her head. His father's sister. The one Brandon and Eddard had gone to rescue from the claws of the dragon.
-Lyanna.
She smiled. And with her smile the crypts lit up, the torches caught fire and the cold of winter was gone from the halls. In its place now there was laughter, joy, as if a feast were happening behind the walls. The feast he always heard, the feast where his brothers and sisters would be when they finally died.
The feast he could not attend.
-My lady - he begun, but stopped when she raised her hand and caressed his cheek. She was crying, and he didn't understand why.
-My lady.
-Shh. Don't talk. Jon. Of course he would name you for Jon Arryn, he loved the man too much. He raised you well.
Jon didn't know what to say. There he was, the ghost of a bastard, speechless in front of the ghost of his father's sister. All he could think of was the beauty of her face, the sadness of her smile, and the sweetness of the roses. And suddenly she was hugging him with a fierceness he had never felt before. Not when Arya hugged him when they were saying their goodbyes. Not when Robb had played with him and called him brother. She hugged him and for the first time since Ygritte he felt loved. Truly loved.
-My Lady, what's happening? I don't understand. Why am I here? Why are you here? Where's my father? Where are my brothers and sisters?
She didn't want to let him go, but she did. And still smiling, still crying, she caressed him again. Like she wanted to prolong that moment for all eternity. And he realized he wanted it too. If they were already dead, what was waiting a little bit more?
-Ned is not here because his bones haven't reached Winterfell. They are at the Neck, guarded by Howland Reed with the same fierceness he guarded his secrets. Those you call brothers and sisters are still alive, but for the Grey Wind, and he hasn't found rest yet. And as to why you are here, well, you wanted answers, and I am the only one who can give them to you. Not all of them. But the one who can give them all, you are not ready to see yet.
That was too much. Jon's head - did he still have a head? - started spinning. How could he lose his breath if he was a cold dead body? Was his soul so used to a physical form that as a spirit it felt like replicating the reactions of the living?
His father's bones were not in Winterfell. His brothers and sisters were not dead. Except for Robb who hadn't found peace.
And the way she said it. Those you call.
-What do you mean?
-About what part? I thought I answered all your questions.
She had a feral smile now, as if she were teasing a younger brother. As if she wanted him to take the bait. He did.
-I call them brothers and sisters. They are my blood.
-Aye, your blood. But they are not your brothers or sisters the way Bran and Ned are mine.
-They are my father's.
-But he is not your father.
Not his father. Eddard Stark was not his father.
He saw her smile falter while his world shattered. He sank to his knees once more, whatever it was that was going through his body -his anima- abandoning him in the darkness, that darkness that had left the crypts and now had taken residence in his heart. He was not Eddard Stark's son. He no longer knew who he was, then. A joke? A jape? And why had the Northern Lord taken him in his household? Why had he risked so much by having him there? His marriage? His family?
For a moment he saw Catelyn smiling at him, a cruel smile, finally proven right that he had no claim to Winterfell.
-Why?
She smiled again, more timidly. But unlike Catelyn's, hers was a smile sweet and warm as the summer sun.
-Why. Why he took you under his wing? When I was dying that summer so many years ago, when I had given all my life just to ensure you could walk the world and be proof of the love your father and I had for each other, he found me, and I asked him to take you. To hide you from Robert, that oaf, who turned his head away when the Lannisters killed Princess Elia and her children. Because you are a Stark of Winterfell in blood if not in name and I wanted you to be here, near me, so I could at least see you grow up. Because your mere existence threatened the Seven Kingdoms. And Ned would not bring himself to kill an innocent child, and especially not one that had the gray eyes of the Starks. That's why he gave you a false name and a false mother and hid you in the snows of Winterfell. Because you are my son, and I asked him to.
-You are my mother?
-Yes - her smile kept bringing light into the crypts. And now he was hearing the Starks again, but they were not rejecting him, they were welcoming him into the den, a wolf that had finally found his way back to the pack.
And she knelt with him and hugged him once more. A minute, ten, a thousand past and he could not let go of that maternal love that he had never felt before. He hadn't realized he was crying again, until he felt Ghost's tongue wiping his tears, the same way he had done for Sam when they first met him. Lyanna - his mother- started petting the direwolf and not unlike with Val they seemed a match. Ghost seemed even less of a wolf and more of a companion than ever, almost as if he had known her forever. Perhaps he had.
-You can ask.
-What?
-It's in your face. But you have to ask if you want to know. I can't give it unless you want it.
-If you are my mother, who is my father?
She smiled again. She smiled even more. She rose and took her crown and gave it to him. But when he took it the blue roses were intertwined with rubies and blood was dripping from the thorns. And when he looked back at her the white and gray cloak had changed to red and black. And the sigil that clasped it was a golden dragon with three heads. Behind her, the silver prince stood tall and proud, his hands on the shoulders of his love, his eyes looking at him the same way Lord Eddard had looked at Robb the day he had learned to ride.
-Rhaegar Targaryen
It was not a question. He knew it true the moment the name left his lips. The prince smiled at him.
-Rise, my son.
Jon did. He had heard of the gallantry of the last dragon, of his stature, of the way men and women alike awed in his presence. He could see why. Even in the black silk with red motifs that he was wearing he was imposing. And sad.
-He looks every bit like you, my love. A true son of the North. All that I was good for was to put him in your belly, you did the rest.
-Oh, shut up.
They laughed, and kissed, and laughed more. They were in love, and Jon felt jealous. More than Eddard and Catelyn, more than Ygritte and himself. For a moment he thought of Val and her golden hair under the moonlight, of her blue eyes and her white robes and he wished to be alive just so he could kiss her for the first time, for the last time.
-But if you are my parents, what does that make me? How does this change me from who I am? I was? Who I thought I was?
-Truly? Nothing. You wanted to know who your parents were and here we are. That doesn't change anything. To the world you always were, are and will be the baseborn son of the Warden of the North. And a great debt will I always owe to Lord Eddard. I will not rest in peace until he does, but the gods have not brought him here yet.
-You wanted peace, Jon, and it's all we can give you. To the world a bastard of my brother you may be, but to our Gods you are more than that. A Stark of Winterfell and welcome to rest in peace with us if you desire.
-If I desire?
-You are also a dragon, and like all the Targaryens you can choose to wander the world like ashes in the wind.
-Or stay in Ghost. Just like I have so far - the direwolf looked up to him - I need to find Uncle Benjen, and understand the threat of the Others. Know thy enemy. Maybe I can communicate with Val, she can see that I live in Ghost or something, she already knows much more than the other wildlings. I can't just die. As much as I would like to stay here and be with you, I can't. Not yet.
Jon looked at his parents and he saw that they were proud of him, of the words he had just said. They smiled more happily, but at the same time they were even sadder. Ghost nipped at his hand and then moved towards the entrance of the crypts. Jon started to follow, but he realized he truly didn't want to say good.
-Mother. My Lord.
-Go - Lyanna hugged him one more time while Rhaegar let himself muss his hair. She kissed his cheeks twice and let him go. He dared not turn back, for he knew if he did he would never leave.
He didn't hear his father's whisper. He didn't see his mother's tears turn to blood.