Breaking The Wheel: A GOT Season 8 Fanfic
By 2Littlewing aka Cerece Rennie Murphy
Notes: Well, I hoped you liked Part I 'cause it's time for another installment. Thanks for reading. No infringement intended. Viva Le FanFic!
Chapter 3: Siege
The Great War began with three bursts of the Horn of the First Men. From Sam's position atop the Broken Tower of Winterfell the sound carried to every living soul below who shivered in its haunting wake.
The White Walkers were not yet upon them; the horn was meant to signal the army of the dead's decent into the last valley before the rise to Winterfell. Just ahead of the front line between the Dothraki, the Unsullied, and the Northmen, Jon Snow sat on horseback with Ghost at his side. He couldn't afford his hesitation, yet he couldn't help it either.
They'd spent most of the night planning for this moment. Every resource, every person who could fight was in place. They had set the battlefield as far from the gates of Winterfell as they could, while still being close enough to work in tandem with the tower infantry and those running supplies. And yet, to look behind and give the order felt like condemning her and all those around him to death. How could he bear to look at her? How could he resist?
He turned to find her sharp gaze on him, every bit the Dragon Queen waiting to be unleashed. There had been no sighting of the Night King or Viserion throughout the night, nor was there a plan to fight him. Given that Dany was the only one with any experience with dragons, she was tasked with developing a strategy, but no one, including her, had ever done anything like this before. In the end, they all knew that whatever strategy she devised would hinge on her own willingness to slay her own child.
"Be careful," he'd whispered into her hair last night when he thought she was sleeping. "Please. I need you to come back to me." He hoped now she felt his solemn wish, that she would survive this day, deep within her bones as he gave the slightest nod.
Daenerys and her dragons took flight. The plan was to use Drogo and Rhaegal to burn as many wights as possible before they ever crossed into Winterfell.
The first streams of fire were terrifying, unlike anything the Northern Men had ever seen. Drogon demolished the first wave of wights easily, with Rhaegal cutting a blaze of fire into the second. Below her the Northern men cheered. With any luck, Dany thought, there would barely be a fight, but just as the notion left her mind, she heard it – a vaguely familiar shriek from behind followed by the screams of men being burned alive.
Viserion. Her stomach rolled with nausea as she turned to face what she knew to be true. He's taken my dragon. He's taken my child. Enraged and heart broken, Daenerys charged.
On the ground, Jon rode through the scattered line of men. "Get down! Take Cover!" he shouted as he barely dodged a razor of heat and blue flame. Behind him, a hundred men had been reduced to ash.
The battle has barely begun, he thought. If they were going to survive, every one of their careful plans would need to change.
From the tower, Sam watched the sky. Dany and the Night King hovered above, battling each other in ragged ribbons of blue and red flame until Rhaegal crashed into Viserion from the side, throwing the Night King off balance. Viserion roared in pain, tumbling to and fro as Rhaegal, then Drogon, pursued him. Dany managed to get the Night King across the line of their defense, but by then what remained of the 2nd wave of wights and Wight Walkers were rising up from the valley in a frenzy. With Dany and her dragons occupied with the Night King, the rest of them would have to fight the wights off one-by-one.
Sam sounded the horn once, signaling to Edd that the time had come to play his part. From the northeast corner of Winterfell, Edd put the catapult in motion, firing barrels of burning pitch and oil onto the crowd of wights. Just behind them, the Knights of the Vale's archers who lined the wall between the North Gate and the Broken Tower fired lit arrows into the hoard. Next to Sam, Bran sent ravens to pick the wights apart.
Many wights died, but many more came until the snow around them was covered with the dead.
Yet, somehow the living survived, not all, but enough to hold them off. Lord Mandalay and half his men lay dead or dying by his side. House Umber was almost extinct. Yet, with each tragedy, they rallied. The Unsullied and Dothraki numbers had thinned, but those who survived fought more fiercely than ever with GreyWorm pushing them on. From above, Dany could see that even the famed direwolves of the North had joined them, with Ghost and a grey and white wolf leading the pack. From morning until night, the dead came without ceasing, yet the living fought and held them back as one, until the afternoon of the 2nd day, when Dany managed to use Drogon's claws to rip off part of Viserion's wing. The Night King retreated into a cloud of ice and storm while the men of the North and her armies advanced.
Rather than pursue him into the storm, Dany decided to double back with Rhaegal to clear as many wights from the battlefield as possible so that they would not be engulfed by the dead.
Only after it was clear that the living had finally gained the upperhand against the wights in the valley, did she head back to Winterfell. Knowing her dragons were exhausted and hungry after days of flying and fighting, Dany pulled back, determined to find Jon, then tend to the needs of her own children.
She found him at the edge of the valley, helping one of her Dothraki soldiers with a bad wound to the leg up the hill.
Jon's beard and hair were covered with ash and snow, but he smiled when he saw her.
"Are you all right? Where are the dragons?"
"Yes. We're all fine," she assured him, trying to understand how Jon could shoulder a man nearly twice his size. "The dragons need food and rest – until the Night King returns."
"We have livestock waiting for them. I'll have them bought over, once I get him to the Maester."
Knowing she would be no help in bearing his weight, Dany explained to Jago where Jon was taking him. She could only imagine how hurt he must have been to allow Jon to help him at all. Once they arrived at the tent that Sansa had set up to care for the wounded, Jon lay Jago before Maester Walkan and left to get food for the dragons delivered.
Dany stayed with Jago as the Maester gave him Milk of the Poppy then unwrapped the makeshift bandage that was soaked in blood. After seeing the severity of the wound and the blood that still pulsed from the severed artery, Maester Walkan confided in Dany that he did not believe that Jago would survive, but she implored him to try.
"He's been with me from the beginning. Please, do all you can for him. I don't want him to suffer."
"Of course, Your Grace."
Dany stepped out of the tent just as Jon had come back to find her.
"The dragons have been fed, but you must be starving. Come and eat."
Dany hadn't thought so she, caught the smell of food nearby. Their time in the tent was brief, each taking only what they needed to get back into the fight. The lull in the fighting was welcome, but Jon and Dany knew that the war was far from over.
From across the hills, the Night King stood beside Viserion. The dragon's left wing was all but shattered, like half the Night King's army. He had waited thousands of years to fight this battle, but he did not expect it to be so close so quickly.
The army of the North had fought bravely, more fiercely that he had expected from such rootless, distracted creatures. They had concentrated all their efforts on defeating the wights, but he wondered how focused they would be if the army they fought against was their own.
The Night King walked to the edge of the ridge that served as his refuge and raised his arms high.
From atop the tower at Winterfell, Bran came out of his vision with a shudder. "Burn the bodies! Burn the bodies! They're here!" he bellowed into the storm. But, by then, Jago was already dead and Maester Wolkan soon would be.
Chapter 4: The Prince That Was Promised
After delivering the news of Cersei's betrayal to Tyrion, Jaime ran outside to find chaos everywhere. There were men in Stark uniforms attacking other Stark soldiers, except these were not men. Drawing his sword, Jaime wondered how he'd managed to arrive just in time to witness a bad situation grow horribly worse.
From the across the field, he saw Jon and Dany stepping out from the dining tents and ran towards them.
"What's happening! How can this –" Jaime started
"It's the Night King," Jon replied. "He's raising the dead." Though Jaime could see the panic in Jon's eyes, his voice stayed calm and steady.
"What! How can he do that?" The idea of what they were fighting was still unsettled in Jaime's mind, but Jon didn't have time to explain.
"Where are your men? We need more men!"
"They're not coming. Cersei betrayed us, all of us. No one else is coming. She's hired the Golden Company to take back your lands, while we die up here. We're the only help we've got."
Jon looked out as all around them, the dead came alive once more. And for a moment, he was back at Hardhome with no lake between him and the King of the Dead. Overhearing Jaime's account, Dany came from Jon's side to stand between them. The look on her face was venomous, but she stayed focused on the problem at hand.
Turning to Jon, she asked, "What do we do now?" The determination in her voice brought Jon back from utter despair.
"Create a perimeter. We'll do what we can from here."
Dany flashed Jaime one last murderous glare before rushing off towards Drogon who was already waiting for her. They took flight and headed north, searching for any line she could create between the living and the dead.
On the ground, it was every man for himself. With hundreds of dead lying on the battlefield, an attack could come from anywhere and it often did, pitting brother against brother,lords against their subjects. Lord Cerywn and Lord Yohn Royce were easily overcome, taken down by men who had fought and died by their side only hours before.
Lord Glover with few from his own army held their own, fighting back to back against their own fallen men. Ghost saved Gendry from an onslaught of wights only to have Gendry do the same when the hoard turned their attention to the wolf. After Ghost was free of them, Nymeria and her pack tore the wights to pieces.
The men of the Night's Watch, who Edd had brought with him once received news of the breach at East Watch, seemed to be faring better, but only slightly. Exhaustion and the bitter cold the Night King conjured had taken its toll on all of them and as Jon assessed the battlefield he knew that hundreds of their own undead would soon turn to thousands. Without the time to burn them all, they would soon be resurrected to kill each other anew.
If the cycle continued, they would lose. There was no other possible outcome. Immediately, Jon's thoughts ran to Arya, Bran, and Sansa barricaded and protected by Brienne of Tarth and a handful of the few soldiers they could spare within the walls of Winterfell. But would they survive? Frustrated by his inability to find a path to the answer he wanted, Jon did the only thing that he could – kill every wight in his path.
From afar Viserion released a horrifying wail of pain, then silence. The silence brought a new storm as the Night King tightened the leather tourniquet on Viserion's wing and took flight – headed straight for Dany with an ice spear in his hand.
Even from as far up as the walkway to the First Keep, Sansa heard the wights growling and scratching at the gates of Winterfell. From the chaos below, there was no way for her to tell if anyone she loved or cared for was alive outside the castle walls.
If they get in? When they get in, how will we survive?
Sansa had been following the battle closely, until the first of their dead began to rise again and it became too hard to tell friend from foe. She'd tried to keep her eye on Jon but in the melee that erupted she'd lost sight of him. Everything and everyone was covered in snow.
"Jon!" she cried out, but the bitter wind stole her screams.
"I see him!" Arya shouted beside her. "There! He's alive."
Tears welled in Sansa's eyes. "All this time, I didn't really believe him. I didn't understand."
Arya said nothing as she tracked her brother through the battle. She'd spent two days resenting being left behind the wall at Winterfell.
"You are the last of the Starks. If we fall, you must defend our family," Jon pleaded. Arya had stayed because she loved her brother, but now looking out at the chaos of the battlefield, she finally understood what he meant.
As a soldier and a woman, if he died, only her and Sansa could carry on the Stark name. Arya gripped Needle tightly and vowed she would not fail. Lady Brienne stood behind them, wanting just as Arya was to do more than hide behind the castle gates.
"Lady Brienne, instruct the guards to take my sister and the others down to the crypts and seal the door, then meet me in the courtyard. We will defend Winterfell."
Beside her, Sansa turned sharply. "No. Take Lady Mormont, Gilly, and the others, but not me."
"Sansa, you're the Lady of Winterfell. You must survive."
"I'm a Stark," Sansa corrected her. "And, if we don't win, none of us will survive." From inside her cloak, Sansa produced a small dagger made of Dragonglass.
"I'll see the others to the crypt, My Lady," Brienne answered, then moved swiftly down the stairs.
"What about Bran?" Sansa asked, knowing that he would not agree to be moved.
Arya frowned, but could not escape the truth. "We need him where he is."
"Then, I'll go to him," Sansa replied.
On their way down the steps, the entire castle suddenly shook with the impact of something massive.
"What was that?" Sansa cried after barely keeping herself from tumbling down the steps.
"Those are the dragons," Arya replied before racing down the stairs.
Atop the Broken Tower, Sam stood at Bran's side, watching him warg in and out of various animals and men on the battlefield. The Vale and the Night's Watch archers continued to fire lit arrows and pitch on Sam's command, but making sure they only hit the dead was becoming harder and harder to do.
Above them, Dany wasn't faring much better. With Viserion's wing badly damaged, the Night King's flight pattern was completely unpredictable, charging on moment, then reeling off course the next, all the while shooting flames at anything in his path.
Even with his erratic flight pattern, half the archers on the Northern corridor of the castle had been burned to ash before Rheagal could stop him. But flying so close to Winterfell had cost him. Rhaegal rammed into Viserion just as he was making his assent, sending the Night King and his dragon crashing into the solid wall that made up Winterfell's exterior.
Viserion's right wing thrashed about, then caught Rhaegal's side, sending them both spiraling down to the ground. Pressing himself to the edge of the wall, Sam watched as they landed less than fifty feet apart. To Sam, Rhaegal looked more stunned than hurt, but what did he know? Sam had never seen a dragon before two days ago.
Beside Rhaegal, Viserion shrieked in agony. Unaccustomed to ignoring the cries of her children, Dany flew towards her dragons. She circled above where they lay on the ground, inspecting Rhaegal for any harm and in her distraction, the Night King took aim.
The sudden motion of his arm helped Dany to find him, hidden behind a snow bluff, but it was too late. She pivoted, banking hard to the right, away from the castle towers, but it was not enough. The javlin caught Drogon in the arm of his right wing. He shrieked as his body jerked back in pain, causing him to tumble so fast that Dany lost her grip and fell out into open sky.
She landed on top of a deep snow bank that had been piled hi the night before to ensure that supply wagons could make their way to the front lines. Though her initial landing was softer than she had any right to hope for, her body continued rolling down the mound until she hit the frozen ground hard.
Dany could hear the small popping sound of the bone in her right forearm as it broke. The pain shot through her like a knife. Dazed from the shock of her fall, Dany, stumbled to her feet just in time to see the Night King descending upon her. Somewhere out of her line of sight, she could hear Drogon, howling in pain as he ripped the spear from his own arm with his teeth. Viserion's mouth looked oddly misshapen as it gaped open, preparing to unleash his fire upon her.
This is it, she thought with a strange sense of peace. The moment of my death.
From far across the battlefield, she could see Jon racing towards her, screaming her name, but there was no time and nowhere to run. Nothing left to do, but stand her ground and face the strange blue fire until Jorah threw himself between her and the blue flames, knocking them both to the ground as she screamed.
Dany opened her eyes to find most of her clothes had burned away. Before her, Jorah was reduced to nothing more than a charred statue. Tears fell as she loosened her grip on his back to stroke the pained expression from Jorah's face only to have him crumbled to ash in her arms.
By then Rhaegal had recovered enough from his fall to bite Viserion by the back of his tail and fling him across the battlefield followed by a trail of fire in his wake, but Dany hardly noticed. Her dearest friend, her oldest confidante was dead.
By the time GreyWorm reached her, Dany could not longer hold in her grief as he covered her with the cloak that Missandei had given him to fend off the cold, then ran with his Queen back to Winterfell. From across the battlefield, Jon watched in terror, then followed them in.
As the only person with any medical training, Tyrion exchanged places with Sam so that he could go to the First Keep and care for Dany.
"It looks like a broken arm," Sam announced after a quick assessment. "A clean break, by the looks of things. I can set it for you, but I don't know where Maester Wolkan kept the Milk of the Poppy."
Still in shock from the death of Jorah, Dany could barely speak. Outside, she could hear the screams of the living growing louder and louder.
"No, I need to be able to fly. My dragons. Where are my dragons?"
"Your dragons are fine, Your Grace," Sam assured her. "The big one looks a bit hurt but he's still stomping about, breathing fire on anything that comes near him, and the smaller one is flying around, looking for you, I think."
"I should be out there. I need to get back to them."
"Your Grace…" Missandei began before Sam intervened.
"That's not a very good idea," Sam warned as he tightened the bandage around her arm. The pain bought tears to her eyes, but Dany refused to let them fall.
"I need to fly," she said again to no one in particular.
"Daenerys, I don't think that's going to happen." Jon could not hide the relief on his face as he walked in and sat down beside her.
Her expression mirrored his as she saw him, frozen and bruised, but still alive. The heat from his body next to hers reminded her of what was at stake if she could not return to battle.
"We're losing, Jon, and we can't afford to lose."
"We're not dead, yet," was all he could muster as he leaned closer. Jon took her hand in his just as Beric rushed through the door.
"Jon, we have to leave. We're losing too many men. It's time."
Escape? Jon could barely comprehend the words as he turned to Beric angrily.
"And go where? This is my home. Everything that means anything to me is here." Jon tightened his grip on Dany's hand, but Beric only smiled, looking no less weary after two days of battle.
"That's not what I meant and you know it. It's time for you and I to meet our destiny. It's time to kill the Night King."
Jon could hear it all around him, the grunts and the screams of the living. Over the last hour, they'd grown less and less, despite the reinforcement of RiverRun's army and all the brave men and women who fought.
"How? He flew away after attacking Daenerys. How can I get to him when he's probably a hundred miles away by now?"
"You fly," Dany said from beside him.
Jon turned to find her eyes blazing into his. Dany tightened her grip on his hand.
"Take Rhaegal, find the Night King, and end this, Jon."
"They're your children. No one can fly them but you. I'm not a Targaryen."
"But, you are…" Sam blurted out before Dany could argue. The entire room turned to Sam in shock.
"I'm sorry to have to tell you like this. I know it's not the right time, but it's true. Your father – I mean Ned Stark kept it from you all these years to protect you – to keep Robert Baratheon from killing you on sight."
"What are you talking about, Sam? There's no time for games."
Sam sighed, knowing there was no easy way to say what needed to be said.
"What I'm saying is you're not Ned Stark's bastard. You never were. You're the trueborn son of Lyanna Stark and Rhaegar Targaryen. She was never kidnapped. They loved each other, Jon. They were married in a secret ceremony, after Rhaegar's marriage to Elia was annulled. Your parents died protecting you, Jon. Your father at the Trident and your mother, after you were born. She made Ned Stark promise to protect you."
Dany was the first to turn from Sam to Jon and drop his hand. He's Rhaegar's own. My brother's son. I'm in love with my brother's son. Slowly, she lay back down on the bed as Jon got to his feet, reeling, but determined to keep his balance.
"That's not true. It can't be. My father would have told me."
"He couldn't. He couldn't risk Robert finding out. He knew Robert was determined to kill every living Targaryen. Ned knew that if Robert found out – if he'd trusted anyone with the heir to the Iron Throne - you would have been killed. I know it sounds crazy, but Bran's seen it and I confirmed it at the Citadel before I even knew what it meant. Jon, I swear it. You've never been what you thought you were."
Jon had yet to meet Dany's gaze or anyone else's. She could only imagine what he must be feeling. To her he looked frozen in disbelief, but she knew, now more than ever, that what he needed to do was right.
"Jon take Rhaegal and go. He'll let you. I know he will. You are of the dragon, too."
Finally, he met her eyes with a lost gaze of his own that was a million miles from where he stood. "I can't…"
She needed to bring him back, but how? Panic gripped her as she realized she didn't have the words to reach him, but then she remembered the one thing that drove Jon no matter what it cost him.
"Am I still your Queen?" she asked with as much authority as she could muster.
Immediately, she could see the shift in his eyes. Just as she'd hoped, duty, honor, his word, brought him back to her.
"Always," he replied.
"Then I command you to ride, to be The Prince That Was Promised."
"Daenerys…I don't…"
"Listen to me!" She forced herself upright again on the bed. "It doesn't matter what you believe, I believe in you. The North believes in you. Be whatever you have to be. Be what we need you to be."
"What if he won't follow me?"
Jon would try. She knew this, but he still couldn't see his way. She wanted to take his hand, but the thought of what it should mean, but couldn't anymore held her where she sat. But she could still reach him.
"They'll all come to see you for what you are," she said softly.
It took a moment for the words to sink in, for him to receive the gift he had given her returned, but eventually she reached him and he returned to exactly where he needed to be. The faintest smile between them was all that was needed. Jon bent down beside her bed and kissed her hand.
"I will find him and I will finish this."
"I know you will," she replied.
Jon did not look back as he left the room, so that Beric had to hurry to catch up, but before he could meet Jon at the stairs, Sam called him back.
"Sir Beric! Sir Beric, wait! You'll need this."
When Beric turned Sam was standing directly behind, with Heartsbane extended out to him.
"If you're going to kill a white walker, you'll need Valerian steel. It's the only thing that will stand against their weapons."
Outside the castle's Northern Gate, the line between the living and the dead seemed less than the breadth of one heartbeat. The gate had yet to collapse, but Jon knew that it was only a matter of time. The dead were closing in. As he ran towards the place where he'd last seen the dragons, Jon caught sight of Jaime.
"Pull them back before we're completely overrun," he ordered.
Jaime nodded. "Where are you going?"
"To kill the Night King. It's our only chance. Hold them off as long as you can."
Jaime wanted to say something to this young man who was so clearly riding off to his death, but words escaped him as he watched Jon and Beric disappear in a squall of snow.
"There he is," Beric called, looking up with amazement as Rhaegal circled then landed in front of them. North men and the dead scattered leaving a clear path for them to follow.
"How does she do it? Does she just call them with her mind?"
"I have no idea," Jon admitted as he moved forward slowly. Beric watched Jon remove his glove. At first, Rhaegal snarled, then cocked his head to the side as Jon lifted his bare hand higher. Beric stepped back as the dragon began to approach, shaking the ground between them, but Jon couldn't afford to back away. From farther down the battlefield, Drogon roared and, to Jon's surprise, by the time Rhaegal reached him, the dragon turned and lowered his wing just as he had seen Drogon do for Dany.
With the memory of Dany's command echoing in his ear, Jon rushed towards Rhaegal and mounted him.
"Amazing," Beric remarked as the beast settled beneath Jon.
"Let's go," Jon whispered just before Rhaegal took flight, lifting them into the heart of the storm.
With Arya and Greyworm's assistance, Dany made it back on to the battlefield in time to see Jon and Rhaegal's assent. Sam, Greyworm, and Missandei had tried to stop her from rejoining the fight, but Dany insisted and Arya spoke up for her.
"My entire family is on the battlefield," she began, rising to her feet. Dany did not say their names, but there was no need. Those around her understood her meaning perfectly. "And as long as I have life to give, I will do what I can to see that they survive."
"Let her go if that's what she wants," Arya added, standing beside Dany. "She is the Dragon Queen. She has the right to choose her death just the same as any man."
Drogon welcomed her on his back as she took her perch gingerly, with a one-handed grip. Below her Drogon stood with one wing tucked closely to his body to protect his wound.
Dany stroked his neck gently to soothe him. "It's ok. We both have clipped wings, but that won't stop us, will it?"
Drogon roared in response and the sound gave her new life. Shifting Drogon's position towards a throng of wights heading over the hill, Dany smiled.
"Dracarys!"