Warning for brief, ceremonial self harm, and for thirteen-year-olds having (terrible, awkward) sex. Very briefly described, and at the very end, so perfectly skippable.

296 AC

Lord Jon Stark

When, at last, a Redwyne ship bearing the House Tyrell sigil docked in the harbour, Jon could barely breathe past the nerves that seemed to tighten his chest and throat. He could not recall ever being so frightened in his life. And that was beyond silly, was it not? He was not facing some great foe or heading into battle. He was meeting the girl who, in a few days, would be his Lady Wife. But in a way, was that not as good a reason to be afraid as any other? If she disliked him, there would be nothing to do. They would still be bound to one another for the rest of their days. Whenever he let himself think on marriage, all he could think of was the playful love between his Uncle Benjen and Aunt Dacey, or the quiet, affectionate companionship between his father and Lady Catelyn. But then he would always remember how much Lady Catelyn had loathed him. It had been years since he had last been as constantly aware of the circumstances of his birth as he had been for the past few sennights. No matter what name the king had bestowed upon him, he had still been born a Sand. Lady Margaery likely had not forgotten it either. What Lady of a Great House would want to be wed to a bastard, even a legitimised one?

Loras had picked up on his fears and done his best to dispel them, telling him over and over again about Margaery's kindness and wit and graciousness, but all that had truly done was make everything all the more daunting. If Loras had told him Margaery was homely and simple, Jon might have been able to feel some confidence in their union, but as it was all he could comprehend was that he was utterly unworthy. And as she stepped into view, that belief was only further reaffirmed.

She was beautiful, with golden brown curls and eyes that were somehow blue and gold all at once. Her face bore an impish smile. She was as tall as he, if not a little taller, and looking at her, he knew he would never think of her as a girl again. She was a woman grown, and even looking upon her made him feel young and awkward and so unworthy all he wanted was to shrink into the nearest crack in the cobbled courtyard. For all that she was of an age with him, a few moons older at most, in that moment he could not help but feel like a foolish child.

It took great effort to keep his hand from shaking as he bent over hers and pressed a kiss to her knuckles. His stomach twisted with nerves, and he thought he said something or other, but he did not know what and knew he would never be able to recall it. Whatever it was, she responded with a gracious smile, her voice both strong and sweet.

He was not ready for this, he realised. Not at all. He was a boy still. How could he wed a woman? How could he even think to bed her? It was all he could do not to flush when he remembered the awkward talk Uncle Benjen had had with him a few moons back, when they had first been informed that the wedding would take place soon. He was not ready at all, and for all that the smile on her face remained unwavering, he thought she knew too. She must. He could not imagine she would look at him and see anything but a fumbling, frightened child.

Loras stepped past him to greet his sister while Jon managed to somehow keep hold of his courtesies for long enough to greet the rest of the Tyrells and their retinue. Feeling almost nauseous, he offered his arm to Lady Alerie and led the way into the Stone Drum with Uncle Arthur falling silently into step behind him.

Loras had told him enough about Highgarden that Jon knew Dragonstone must seem drab and dreary and utterly forbidding in comparison. As proud as he was of his home, he could not shake those thoughts the next day as he showed his betrothed around the castle she would be Lady of. She spoke her pretty, courteous words at many of the sights he showed her, small hand almost unbearably heavy in the crook of his arm, but they were just bland and nondescript enough that he knew she must be struggling for anything good to say. Between the stone monsters and barren cliffs and heavy black sky, he supposed that made sense, even though all he could see was a place he loved, the only place where he had ever belonged.

"Show her the gardens," Loras spoke up from where he was chaperoning them. "You will be outraged, sister. These wolves, they fuss over their Godswood, but they have no idea what to do with the rest of it."

Jon bit back a snort. Loras, to be perfectly honest, was right about that. Neither he nor Benjen and Dacey had much of a green thumb, or the patience for something as useless as attempting to restore Aegon's Garden, which, from what Jon had heard, had been half-wild even before Stannis' tenure as Lord anyway. Besides, Jon had little to no idea what an ornamental garden looked like in the first place. The glass gardens at Winterfell were mostly utilitarian, for growing fruits and vegetables even when the cold weather should have prevented it. The winter roses were the only truly ornamental thing he remembered from there, and even those were often sold for good sums, to be made into oils and perfumes. "Uncle Benjen says he tried to plant a patch of winter roses the first year he was here," he said. "They do not do so well south of the Neck, though, and when the plants died, I suppose we all just kind of gave it up as a lost cause. It was that, or turn Aegon's Garden into a cabbage patch." He only realised how he had spoken after the words had already escaped his lips. The way he had with Loras for a good long while now, honest and wry. But he and Loras had known each other for two years now. Loras knew him well enough to understand that Jon's way of speaking would always be of the North, and Jon knew Loras well enough by now to trust he would not be judged for it. He had forgotten, for a moment, that Margaery was even there, and now he could not hold back a flush at the thought of how much of an idiot he must have sounded to her ears. Turning Aegon's Garden into a cabbage patch. What must she think of him?

Somehow, despite all his fears, she laughed. Not as much as Loras did, but a short, small one that made him breathe a sigh of relief. "A cabbage patch might still have been better than leaving it to ruin," she said. "It might not have been pretty, but at least it would have been good for something."

"Well, there are cranberries there," Jon said. "They are growing wild and have mostly swallowed up everything else except the oldest trees, but at least it is good for something. Cook makes delicious cranberry preserves." He stopped, replayed the words in the privacy of his own mind, and flushed all over again. He should just keep his mouth shut now, since everything that came out seemed designed specifically to make her think less of his intelligence.

"I should like to see the Garden," she said at last, saving them from an awkward silence that would have been left for Loras to fill. "And with your leave, perhaps, in time, work on replanting it?"

Jon let out a sharp breath and nodded, turning them around and leading the way towards the Dragon's Tail. The garden truly was in shambles, overgrown and utterly wild, excepting the fledgling Godswood in the far corner. But something lit in Lady Margaery's eyes at the sight of that plot of land. As she spoke enthusiastically with her brother about plants and flowers whose names he had never heard before, her hand felt a bit less heavy on his arm. For the first time since she arrived, he felt he could breathe almost freely.

When they moved on to see the Sept, which Jon had barely stepped foot in for the past three years, her words were a bit less bland and guarded than they had been. "Do you enjoy music, My Lord?" she asked.

Jon winced, remembering his disastrous attempts with the high harp. "I enjoy listening to it," he said. "I fear I have no talent for performing, though. And I will warn you now that I am like to step on your toes at the feast tomorrow." Tomorrow, Gods, was it really so soon? The realisation made his stomach knot and his palms grow sweaty.

She gave him a soft smile. "You are graceful in the training yard, though, are you not?" she asked. "My brother tells me if you had squired with your uncle, you would have likely been knighted already." So why have you not? she did not ask, but clearly thought.

"I fear those two do not always translate," he said. "And my Uncle Arthur is kind enough to train me without expecting me to squire for him; he understands that I do not wish to make a mockery of my Gods or his by entering into an institution that holds so closely to the Seven."

"There are knights in the North, are there not?" Margaery asked.

"Aye," Jon replied. "There are also Septs and followers of the Seven. There is a Sept and a Septa in Winterfell, even."

"So if I wished to raise our children in the Light of the Seven?" she asked slowly. "If I wished for our sons to be knights..."

"My siblings were raised in both religions," Jon said. "Lady Catelyn wished for it, and I would no more deny you than my father denied his Lady wife. I know my brother Bran plans to become a knight."

She seemed to let out a small breath of relief at that, and Jon wondered if she had thought him some kind of savage, the way he knew his bannermen had when he first arrived. He would have hoped his friendship with her brother might have inspired more confidence than that, but then what had he done since she arrived other than make himself look a fool? Considering that, he could not really blame her for her misconceptions. "Your siblings were raised in both religions," she said. "Yet you were not." The question was not stated, but it was there nonetheless, and Jon could not quite help but wince.

"Lady Catelyn did not care to take any part in raising me," he said. "I believe she preferred that I never set foot in her Sept. My religious upbringing was left entirely to my father, and he is of the North." He swallowed, hated having to remind her of his own bastardy, but was it not her right to get to know him, at least a little, ahead of tomorrow's ceremonies? "Besides, Septa Mordane scared me."

She gave a small laugh at that, and Jon felt a brief flash of pride at the sound. If he could make her laugh, could continue to make her laugh, perhaps this union need not be some horrible cage for them to live out the rest of their lives inside.

Jon tossed onto his other side, rucking the bedclothes up around him. His nightshirt stuck to his back with sweat. By now, he was used to the warmth in his chambers from the fire in the grid he had ordered the servants must never go out, and the extra heat that seemed to emit from the four stones themselves. The cold of the North was more a memory than anything, and the heat bothered him far less than he had expected. It was not the heat, he suspected, that had left him drenched in sweat and unable to get a wink of sleep. It was those nerves of his again, the knowledge that tomorrow night at this time, he would be in the bridal chambers with his Lady wife, and despite what Uncle Benjen had told him, he did not think he would have the faintest idea what to do with her. It was the thought of speaking vows that would hold until his last day, the terror that if he did something wrong, made her dislike him, the unhappiness could be lasting, for them both. The thought alone made him feel sick to his stomach.

He turned over again, stayed on his back this time and stared up at the ceiling, feeling infuriatingly awake. He just wanted to sleep. Then, for a while at least, he would not have to think on any of this, and time would pass faster. As much as he was frightened of tomorrow, he also could not wait to just get it out of the way, get all these strangers off his island and see life go back to something like normalcy, whatever that would end up looking like. Besides, he had no wish to be tired and that much more miserable on his own wedding day.

At first, he was so consumed by his worries that he did not hear the knock on his door. Then it made it through the muck of his mind, and he shot up in the bed, sucking in a sharp breath of air as shock rushed through his body. "Who is there?" he asked.

The door fell open, and Uncle Benjen stepped inside. Despite the fact that Benjen, unlike Jon, had never grown accustomed to the Southron weather, he was dressed in Northern leathers and furs, looking more like how Jon remembered him from his childhood than how he had grown used to seeing him for the past three years. "Get dressed," Uncle Benjen said, before stepping back out and letting the door fall shut behind him.

Jon frowned, uncertain what was going on. Still, that had been unmistakably an order, and Uncle Benjen did not order him around much at all these days. He had best comply. And honestly, he was more than a little relieved at the thought of no longer having to toss and turn as sleep continued to evade him. He extricated himself from his damp bedding, stumbling a little as he made his way across the floor to his trunk. After a brief contemplation, he dug to very bottom and got out his own fur mantle, following his uncle's lead and dressing like a true Northman for the first time in years.

He made his way out the door and found not only Uncle Benjen waiting for him, but his father and his brother Robb, who was wiping sleep from his eyes, as well. Jon cocked an eyebrow at Robb, but only got a shrug in return. Seemed they were both being left in the dark, then.

Uncle Benjen led the way down the hallways and out into the cool night air. A breeze was blowing through the overgrown garden, and Jon sucked in a deep breath, still over-warm from his uneasy rest and the furs around his shoulders. Even the light rain was a relief. They made their way through the brambles and plants, cloaks snagging on the thorns of the old, unkempt rose bushes, until they finally reached the Godswood. They passed the sentinels until they stood before the small weirwood with its unblemished bark. It was meant to serve as the heart tree, Jon knew, but he had never felt any presence from it, never felt the sheltering and calm he had with its parent tree in Winterfell. It had not stopped him from coming to the Godswood, but more often than not, these days, it only left him feeling sad and empty.

"Ever since Brandon the Builder," his father said, breaking the long silence at last, "Every Stark marriage has been witnessed by the Old Gods." Jon wondered at that. From what he had heard, his father had wed Lady Catelyn in the Sept at Riverrun, but then he supposed it was not out of the realm of possibility that there had been a private ceremony in the Godswood as well, like the one planned for him tomorrow. "You should not be an exception, Jon," Ned Stark continued, reaching out and giving Jon's shoulder a brief squeeze that made Jon feel a lot more grounded than he would prefer to admit. "But I fear that with no eyes in their tree, the Gods will see nothing at all."

Jon swallowed down the sudden pang he heard at those words. "So why are we here?" he asked. He wished he did not sound so hoarse, but his throat had felt clogged for days.

"We mean to give them eyes," Uncle Benjen said.

"I thought the Children of the Forest carved the faces into the trees," Robb protested.

"We are blood of the First Men," Uncle Benjen said. "But if legend is to be believed, we have a few drops of blood of the Children as well." He paused a moment. "I have no idea if this will work, but we should at least try."

Jon's father said nothing, which Jon knew very well meant he agreed and had nothing he found important to add. Instead, Ned Stark pulled a dagger from a scabbard at his side Jon had not even realised he carried. The metal glinted in the moonlight, and it took Jon long moments to realise it was not made from steel, but from bronze and iron. The blade vanished again, when his father closed his fist around it and pulled it abruptly down. When the bronze and iron became visible again, the glint of it was dull with blood. Still silent, Ned Stark passed the blade to Benjen Stark, who repeated the motion before passing it on to Robb. Robb hesitated for long moments with his fist closed around the blade, breath held and a look of apprehension on his face. When he cut himself, it was with a wince Jon had only ever seen him give in the training yard, and even then this was different.

Robb passed the dagger to Jon, and Jon did not hesitate. He supposed he would have, except he was used to drawing his own blood by now, guided by his dreams, feeding the drops to the rocks that even now lay in his fireplace. He pulled down the dagger, adding his own blood to the others'. He went to return the dagger to his father, but instead of taking it, Ned Stark guided Robb's hand to rest over Jon's, then Benjen's, then his own. Then he pushed the dagger and their joined hands to the trunk of the tree.

Jon had never felt anything like it. The blade slid through the wood as though it were warm butter. Something seemed to guide their hands. None of the others were pushing at Jon's hand. There was no pressure. But the dagger moved anyway. And rather than small bits of wood, whole chunks seemed to fall off under their hands. The dagger appeared to lift itself for a moment before digging in elsewhere, and again, and then, somehow, Jon knew they were done. Almost as one, they stepped back, and Jon looked at the tree to see a face so very different from the one in Winterfell that it took his breath away. It was already weeping red sap, but unlike the heart tree he had grown up with, this one seemed happy. Smiling. Grinning even. The eyes, despite the tears, looked benevolent.

Benjen swallowed audibly.

Jon's father gasped. "The laughing tree," he breathed. His arm wrapped around Jon's shoulder, suddenly, pulled him tight against his side. "By the Gods."

Jon glanced over at Robb, who looked just as confused as he felt, but still Jon was fairly certain they both felt the weight of the moment, felt the way that true presence was filtering into the Godswood, felt how it was becoming a true Godswood. A peace he had all but forgotten spread through him, and suddenly he was staggering on his feet, absolutely exhausted. His father's arm tightened around him, and then he felt himself float through the air only to be cradled against Ned's chest and carried through the Godswood. "Come on, lad," his father said, voice soft. "Time for you to get some sleep."

Jon's wedding day seemed to pass almost unbearably quickly. First, there were the vows before the laughing Heart tree, and then the far more complicated ceremony in the Sept where he tried and failed and tried again to recite his vows properly.

All he remembered of the feast was the tight knot in his stomach that made him feel sick when he tried to eat and made him actually think he would vomit when he attempted to sip his Arbour Gold. He did his best to dance, and probably wrecked his bride's feet beyond repair. When the bedding was called, he avoided everyone's eyes, felt a flush rise on his face. Gods, he could not believe he was doing this, could not believe that everyone currently gathered in Dragonstone was going to know. As the Tyrell ladies gathered around him, pulling at his clothes, it was all he could do to even keep breathing.

He was deposited in the bridal chamber, and he could only imagine what a sight he must have presented, stripped down to his smallclothes, struggling to breathe, eyes probably wild with the panic that made his heart pound and his hands shake.

Margaery was there all of a sudden, dressed in just her shift and smallclothes, and just as beautiful as she was in her elaborate dresses. She reached out, trailed her hand down his cheek, and Jon felt his breath catch. He could not help but feel small before her, unworthy. Once again, all he wanted was to disappear into the shadows, but there was nowhere to go. "Come on," she said, voice soft, as she pulled him towards the bed.

How was she so brave? And how was it that he could not find it within him to be the same? Still, he let her pull him with her, up onto the bed and closer, until he was hovering over her, her small hand on the nape of his neck pulling his face down. Then he was kissing her, or she was kissing him, and it was nothing like it had been in the Godswood or the Sept. This made something fiery blaze alive in the pit of his stomach, made his hands tremble with something more than just apprehension.

He wanted to touch her, he realised, but he did not know how, did not know if she would let him or if it would even be proper. And if he did something wrong, he would have to live with her scorn for the rest of his life. He did not dare, he realised, did not dare to do anything more than keep kissing her, and by the Gods, he almost thought he could do that for days without tiring of it. Her fingers carded through his hair, and he could not help but groan at that. Shivers raced down his spine as he broke their kiss, gasping for breath he had not even been able to tell he had grown short of.

After a few moments, she pulled him back down. He tasted wine on her lips, and the sweetness of the desserts that had been served at the banquet. He wanted to tell her he did not know how, wanted to tell her they did not need to do this tonight, that they might wait, like most couples wed as young as they did. Before he got the chance, his smallclothes had somehow ended up pushed down to his thighs, and she, he realised, had not been wearing any, regardless of what he had assumed.

She was the one who pushed at the small of his back, and suddenly all he knew was a tight, pressing heat. She let out a pained gasp, and Jon fought to hold himself still, make sure she had not been hurt, but his head was a flurry and he could not remember how to think, how to, well, anything really.

It took maybe five thrusts before he was panting his relief against the silken skin of her neck. Her fingers were still absently smoothing through his hair, and Jon felt at once as though his whole body had melted with more pleasure than he had known he could feel and a humiliation that made him want to die. He wanted to roll away, to be alone, but she held him fast. He could have broken away easily, but he had embarrassed himself enough for one night. Throat almost painfully tight, he hid his face in the crook of her neck and let her hold him until he fell into an uneasy sleep.

A/N: This chapter was in large part dominated by Jon's fears, which might make it seem slightly OOC, but I dare you to find me a decent thirteen-year-old boy who would not be frightened of having to be married to a virtual stranger, especially given each their backgrounds in this case.

Margaery is not as 'smooth' here or as good of an actor as in the show 'verse (I honestly don't remember much of her from the books, but then again it has been years...), but she is also years younger than her show counterpart, and I doubt she has quite matured into her grandmother's teachings. Besides, she is probably frightened as well, uncertain of the situation. And there might be lingering resentment about having to wed a bastard. Then again, we only see her from the outside, so who knows what's going through that pretty head of hers?

Next up: Olenna has her job cut out for her. And what, exactly, is going on across the Narrow Sea?