As White as Snow

It was drizzling.

Not cold enough for proper snow, this still being the years of the Long Summer. Not even cold enough for proper rain, when the Drowned God and Storm God fought (or so Theon would say). No, it was only drizzle. When mist would rise up over Winterfell, preventing any from seeing more than three-hundred yards across the fields that surrounded the ancient fortress. An army could approach the castle unseen, emerging from the mist like ghosts. Not that he was counting on an army attacking Winterfell, let alone ghosts to show up in the North or any other kingdom, and yet, he wouldn't have minded. Because the mannequin he was practicing against, it was just that – a mannequin. His sword clanged against its iron chest, but it could not fight back. Straw might fall onto the ground, but it was a poor substitute for blood. He had the blood of Eddard Stark, Warden of the North, in his veins, but also the blood of a woman he would never know, and whose heritage would leave him forever an outsider within these walls. He was, he reflected, like the mannequin – between two worlds. Between straw and flesh. Good enough to keep pummelling away at his foe, but untested. Forever doomed to be so till his sixteenth name day, when he might join the ranks of the Night's Watch. A day still years divided from now.

Jon Snow kept pummelling away at the mannequin all the same. On days like this, when he was forced to stay outside the Great Hall lest he offend the guests…he was already at the Wall in his mind. Where there were those who would fight back. Where the men of the Watch would not care about his birth, for good or ill. He swung his sword, again and again, even as his arms ached. As his hands blistered. As his boots pushed ever further down into the mud. Again, and again, and again. Until finally, with one last swing, the mannequin fell down into the mud, defeated. Sometimes, the world responded to brute strength. Sometimes, even a bastard could meet the rock and smash through, escaping the hard place behind them.

"What did that mannequin ever do to you?"

He didn't turn around – not immediately at least. The words…they were the type of words that Sansa might say, but it wasn't her voice. Sansa Stark was with every other son and daughter of Ned Stark with their mother, along with Theon. Entertaining Lord and Lady Blanchard. No place for the bastard son of Ned Stark. But as he finally did turn, sheathing his sword as he did so, he raised an eyebrow. The Great Hall was no place for a bastard. But the courtyard was no place for the girl in front of him.

"How long have you been watching?" he asked slowly.

"Long enough. I didn't want to interrupt you."

Jon didn't say anything – he wanted to say "well you did," or something a bit more witty, but he didn't. Whoever the girl was, given her dress and the way she carried herself, he considered it best not to offend her.

And what was more, he didn't know why she was here. Old Gods knew that the lower part of her white dress was smeared with mud, while the upper part was sodden with the rain. Her hair, black like his, was sodden. The drizzle wasn't heavy, but it was constant, so it was clear that watching him or otherwise, the girl had been outside for a long time.

"Well," Jon said. He walked over to the mannequin and began to set it up again. "I'll forgive your interruption, but I think you should be back in the Great Hall."

"You didn't answer my question."

He glanced at her. "What?"

"What the mannequin did to you."

"It killed my father, burning him alive, and this is me getting revenge, saving the Seven Kingdoms." It was a joke in poor taste, but he was past caring. "Come the morn I'll be sitting on the Iron Throne, as the start of a new dynasty."

"Oh," said the girl. "That's a perfectly reasonable explanation. But isn't your father Ned Stark? I thought he was still alive."

The mannequin was standing again. Jon's heart was sinking. She knew. Not that Ned Stark's bastard son was a secret to the people of the North, but as someone who had barely travelled outside Winterfell, or even left the North at all, Jon had hoped that anonymity could be his shield. Apparently not. Looking back at the girl, he felt robbed of his shield, and his sword hung limply at his side.

"Jon Snow," said the girl. "You're the one that Catelyn Stark keeps out of banquets."

I know you, Jon thought. Somewhere.

"Jon?"

"Yes," he said. "But that also begs the question why you aren't in the Great Hall either."

The girl shrugged. "Maybe I don't like sitting with people who are so cruel to others."

Jon wanted to laugh. Sitting with people who weren't cruel – how many of those were in the world? Granted, Leopold and Eva presented themselves as paragons, and Misthaven was a prosperous region, but even so, he knew enough of the world to understand that pretty words were but flowers in the wind. Nice to see, but once they reached the ground, only the wind would remain. Cutting through you like a spear. He-

Oh.

He knew who she was. He hadn't seen her arrive (he hadn't been there to present himself with his family, per his stepmother's demands), but her dress, the necklace around her throat, her casual insults of those his father was entertaining. Either the girl was extremely foolish, or in fact she was…

"Snow," Jon said. "Of House Blanchard."

The girl frowned. "Snow White, thank you."

"My apologies." Jon turned back to the mannequin and drew out his sword again. Disrespectful, true, but his bones ached, his spirit screamed, and right now, he didn't want the company. He began hitting at the mannequin again.

"Nice," Snow said.

Seven Hells, are you still here? He began using his sword faster. Hitting it again, and again.

"Don't you ever thrust?"

"I would, if not for the breastplate." Jon looked back at her. "This is meant to build strength."

"And skill?" Snow walked over to a weapons rack and picked up a bow. "How's your aim?"

"Fine," he said. He watched her easily fix the bow string. He wanted to say that she shouldn't be doing this, but who was he to give orders? Winterfell was his home, but not his house. He watched as she took aim at one of the practice targets and let a single arrow fly.

It hit it dead centre.

"Nice," said Jon. "My sister would like you."

Snow looked at him. "Sansa?"

"No, Arya." He picked up a bow of his own. "Course she isn't meant to practice archery, but our…her, father, lets her get away with murder." He got ready to fire.

"Why not our?"

Jon looked at her. "What?"

"Her. You said 'her', correcting yourself from 'our'. Why?"

Jon turned his eyes back to the target. "Think Sansa would like you too."

"No, why? Eddard Stark is your father, is he not?"

The arrow flew and hit its mark. "He is." He looked back at her. "But our fathers are very different men, so that's not something we should discuss."

"Why?"

"Because…" Jon sighed. "Because you're the legitimate offspring of Leopold and Ava Blanchard. Your first name is Snow, not your last. From what I heard, you got that name because you were born in the winter. That your mother chose it to honour the winter, and how she nearly lost you to it."

"And?"

"And Snow is my last name, not my first." He reached for another arrow. "My mother had no say in my first name, while my last is the only name that matters."

"Don't say that," Snow said.

Jon let the arrow fly. It hit its target again, if slightly off-centre.

"Jon?"

He turned away and took the bow back to the weapons rack. His archery was fine, he told himself. When he was a ranger of the Night's Watch, he'd use such a weapon to slay numerous wildlings, but it was the sword that gave him the most joy. Even as the rain picked up. Even as thunder rolled in the air above, and the Storm God laughed.

"You should get indoors," Jon said.

"What about you?"

He looked back at her. "I'm fine."

"No, you're not."

"You're right. I'm not. And-"

"And…" Snow was getting drenched, but she nonetheless reached out to him and took his arm. Jon fought the urge to recoil – he wasn't used to such intimacy. Even while Theon sought it out, even as Robb fought to hide his amusement, he could never join in. His father had been intimate with at least two women over the course of his life. And he was the living proof of what unthinking intimacy could lead to.

"Just…keep your head up," she said. "You'll get your happy ending."

Happy…what? Jon didn't say anything, as he watched Snow depart. 'Happy ending.' Who in all the kingdoms of all the lands of all the world believed in "happy endings?" Happy endings were in the stories Old Nan had told him, before Catelyn had put a stop to them. Happy endings were in those books Sansa read, about knights, flowers, and maidens being saved by those knights, giving them flowers, and in some cases, deflowered by the story's end. Happy endings weren't meant to exist in the minds of the daughters of great lords and ladies, no matter how eccentric they might be. Happy endings were as much a fairy tale as the Children of the Forest and the White Walkers.

He would have told Snow that if she didn't finally head back inside. Apparently her distaste for the people of the houses Stark and Blanchard didn't exceed her desire to keep dry. And who could blame her? Not him. Not as he returned to the mannequin and returned to hitting it again. And again. And again.

He'd been born in a storm of swords. Come his end, the sword would still be in his hands.

That was as happy an ending as he could expect in this world.

A/N

Yeah, sorry Snow, but while you may have overthrown Regina, you wouldn't last five minutes in Westeros. Happy endings don't happen there. :P