!SPOILERS FOR SEASON 7 GAME OF THRONES!
Hello folks, I have never written outside the genre of superhero fanfics. GoT is a beast I never thought I could tackle, given how much I admire GRRM's writing and am obsessed with asoiaf. But fanfics are birthed from a need to get down and get creative with a story that just won't let you go. I may add more scenes prior to 7x06 to show more of JonxDany development that we couldn't see on screen if I feel like it because most of my time is dedicated to my Daredevil fic. Nevertheless, I really wanted to write about the effect of Viserion's death on Dany since we didn't see it either. Enjoy!
Disclaimer I do not own any rights to ASOIAF or Game of Thrones.
DAENERYS
Finally she was alone, she shut the door to her room and locked it. Daenerys was reeling from seeing Jon's scars, crescent shape on his chest. It appeared as though they never healed properly, as if the cut away flesh would always remain a reminder of another lifetime entirely.
She walked to the center of the room. Her breaths becoming faster and more shallow. She had been a mirage walking up the Wall, still in shock, unable to properly give her emotions life amongst strangers, and even with Jorah. Drogon had screamed endlessly for his brother while she was atop the Wall, and in a flight of desperation she imagined that Viserion would appear from the clouds. Jorah had told her it was time to leave, but she couldn't.
I can't leave now. He will return to me. I can't abandon him.
Nor can I abandon Jon Snow.
Thus she waited as long as she could. Holding back the dam. The cold winds biting on her cheeks as she stared out at the barren forests below her. She only rose from her reverie when from some miracle Jon returned on the black horse. She wanted to burst into tears immediately but held them back. Dany was glad he was alive, more than glad, it was a temporary rush of warmth through her veins in this hostile tundra.
But Jon Snow's pale blue and white skin disappeared from her mind, even the sheer relief he somehow made it out alive from the icy death and destruction of the white walkers could not hide the true agony this journey beyond the Wall had brought down on her.
That familiar tug of Viserion that was latched onto her soul was no longer there. I can't feel him anymore. It wasn't real, it couldn't have been real, she still could not fathom it even her in her solitude. She would walk to the deck and see his shimmering gold and cream scales as he flew above her head; maybe he is home, resting on the windy cliffs of Dragonstone.
But neither of those was the bitter, gut-wrenching truth. She knew it. Felt it. There was no bond in her heart where he should have been, only a raw, gaping hole that was tearing her apart.
Dany inhaled and shattered into sobs that wracked through her entire body. She closed her hand over her mouth to quiet them but there was no stopping the waves of grief pouring out of her eyes.
Every moment of the battle rushed to her and flashed in her mind's eye at an overwhelming speed. The army of dead men with their peeling flesh grasping at her and Drogon, the Night King with his crown of ice. The feral, tortured, pained cry of Viserion as he sailed downwards to his death, a curtain of blood pouring out of him into the frosty air. He is a dragon. He is a dragon. He can't fall, he can't die.
But he did.
He clung to the edge when he crashed into the lake's frozen surface, pools of his hot blood smoking on the snow.
Fly my love, FLY she willed him to follow her orders with her thoughts, like she could with all of her children. Fly, please… she desperately begged in her horrified silence. But his eyes, the colour of molten gold, dimmed and closed forever.
A burst of rage ignited in her and she kicked the chair by the table out from under it. But it changed nothing of how she felt. I will never have anymore children. He is taken from me forever. Dany's knees were weak, she flattened her hand over her heart, her chest was as heavy as lead, pulling her down. Shuddering, gasping, she was crippled on the middle of the floor. It hurts so much. Tears ran down her face, they stung and tasted like salt, fresh ones replaced the old and it was hard to even breathe.
...
She could not say how many hours or days passed. She was exhausted, but she couldn't recall if she really slept. Dany was curled into a ball, clutching her stomach tenderly as if it had been kicked in a dozen times. A few knocks came and went, but she answered none of them. She needed to be alone; nobody could see her in this state of absolute vulnerability.
She had taken off her gloves, kicked off her boots, and lied in a shift beneath the covers. This far north the sky was always dull; the sun barely breached the barrier of clouds. Dany stared through a haze of tears at the circlet of light on the floor, it disappeared when night fell, and returned with a soft gold when the sun rose, gold like Viserion's eyes.
Silent tears rolled down her cheeks and stained her pillow whenever she remembered him. The cabin was cold; making her joints stiff and aching, she could see her breath fog in front of her. Not that she cared any longer if she froze to death.
The Iron Throne was hers by right. I have fought for it my entire life, I have suffered for it my entire life, escaped death. I endured my brother's cruelty, I accepted my fate with Drogo, I freed the slaves, I gained my wealth, my titles, my people, my ships. I have my dragons. The Iron Thrones was within her reach mere months ago. But a new knot twisted her belly as the realisation struck her like falling bricks;
I have to let it go.
That pained her almost as much as the loss of her child. The end was coming for them all. What do I do now? Who am I now? Her mind was a swirl of darkness and chaos, with no sight of the future. The hole in her heart may stop growing but it was never going to heal. In her dreams there was still three of them, roaring flames around her. She regretted ever chaining Rhaegal and Viserion below the pyramids of Meereen. They should have been free.
Once the discomfort of her raw throat became an issue she couldn't ignore in her depression, she rose to sit and pour herself some water. Dany wiped away the dry tears and sipped. It made her feel marginally better. She glimpsed at her three-headed dragon pin attached to the white dress discarded on the floor. The Gods gave me three dragons. I still have Rhaegal and Drogon, she told herself. I still have my armies, I have, she gulped as her heart and mind came to terms with it... and I have him.
Dany wanted to wallow for another week, sleep forever. But she was tired of wallowing. And nothing could be accomplished if she did that. We are not lost. The Night King had ruthlessly ripped her child from the sky, and he wasn't going to stop until he conquered the world and plunged it into ice and darkness for eternity. When that blood witch robbed the moon of her life and her human child from her she made it her duty to take back the Iron Throne from the Usurper as was her birthright, to lead her people to refuge out of the Red Waste. To forge a better world.
The only way she could see herself handling this grief was to replace it with something else just as mighty.
Jon Snow had been right. In his seemingly random and deranged proclamations he had been right. There could be no Seven Kingdoms, no Westeros, and no Iron Throne if the Night King and his army won.
I should never have left Essos, she vaguely entertained the notion. But that was not her homeland, yet here I am, and most of my allies are dead. What chance do we stand? She had seen the Night King's legions; he can raise thousands more with his magic. If I fight for Westeros and I lose Drogon and Rhaegal in the process? How will I live? I should have learnt my lesson when the Lannister bolt went into Drogon's shoulder.
Dany swallowed hard. Either path was cursed.
If I knew of the white walkers, I would have taken all three of them years ago and flown to somewhere warm and vast where they could roam and hunt freely, where no man has gone, somewhere winter will never touch. When she closed her eyes Jon Snow was there with her in this dreamy haven, and that was all she needed. They would run off and be blissfully ignorant to the white walkers and the Cersei's of the world.
But that was not reality. And that was not Daenerys Stormborn. And luckily for all of them, and to her deepest admiration, that was not Jon Snow either. Indeed, she was terrified to her core of losing more children. And everyone and everything I have ever known.
But she could not, would not, cower. I protected the slaves from their masters, and I must do the same and protect mankind once more against a deadlier, more sinister threat to the country. I am the Protector of the Realm. Being Queen, breaking the wheel, those hopes may never come to fruition, as painful as it was to admit it. She could not decide what her long term plan was.
But she knew she had to fight.
With this newfound purpose pulsing through her veins, setting her heart to a rising, steady thrum, she made herself decent. She had a black dress, the appropriate mourning attire. Dany washed her face and did her hair with cool resolution. Her eyes were red rimmed and puffy, mouth set in grim determination, she held her queenly posture and kept her thoughts in check.
Dany opened the door and stopped a servant who looked at her with wild eyes as if they had not expected to see her. She instructed him to tell Jorah and the others she was awake but to leave her be for now, she knew the knight would be worried about her. Food was brought to her, even without the appetite she managed a few bites to regain her strength.
Once she was ready, she immediately made her way to Jon's room. She needed to tell him. She had to let him know that finally—after all his pleas and explanations and her commands for him to bend the knee—she understood.
He was still sound asleep when she entered, the furs rising with each breath he dragged in. Dany sat on the bed beside him, her eyes weighing a tonne from all the tears she spent. To be honest, she wasn't sure if she had cried out the last of it. She would hold her composure as best she could before him. I will be brave and strong, a dragon, like Viserion.
She wasn't sure how long she sat there staring at him. Sometimes he was so still she thought he might be dead too. He was at peace, black curls framing his ashen face, as the sun rose higher she could see that some colour was returning to him. Asleep, he looked younger than he acted with the duty of King thrust upon his shoulders. Her fingers were interlocked on her lap but she longed to touch the scars on his chest, as appalling as the idea was, she wanted to feel how deep they went, learn how he survived. Just hear his rumbling Northern accent once more.
She was almost a hundred percent certain how she felt about him, she could no longer deny it to herself. Most unfortunate souls never find someone they can love and respect as an equal in their lifetime. He challenged her at every turn to become better than who she was. But again, she needed to be resilient, to not cry, to hold herself back as best she could. She had no intention of saying how she truly felt out loud, for if it was said out loud then it could never be taken back. With the threat of the Night King already here, both their lives were on the threat of being cut tragically short. Would I cry just as much as I cried for Viserion if I lose him in the wars to come? Dany doubted she could bear it. She needed to be strong for her remaining children and for her people. There was no point to add more complicated, open wounds to the one she was scarcely healing from. Simply being here and showing that she cared and would fight with him would have to be enough.
And then, he started to rouse from his slumber, a shaky breath at first. Dany steeled herself, her heart hammering as fast as a hummingbird. She leaned a little closer. He opened his eyes slowly; they were almost as black as his hair. Her resilience was fading as tears pricked her eyes. And their gazes met.
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