Brienne's hand in his hair felt like magic, gentling the turmoil in his breast with each stroke. Her eyes, when she could look at him, were the midnight blue of the sky above, reflecting the same stars. He knew she was still ugly, that others would find her so, but there was no face in all the world he held more lovely or dear.
We can't choose who we love, he'd told her once, and had thought about that many times since.
We can't choose our faces, either, or our family. We can only choose our actions and our honor, and he'd never met anyone else whose choices so consistently broke him in awe or shame, who'd made him long to live up to her ideals, to be the person she already believed he was. Who encouraged his efforts, instead of mocking his failures.
She'd avenged Renly, saved Sansa, almost slain the Hound in defense of Arya. She'd seen both Catelyn Stark's daughters returned and thriving in Winterfell. She wielded Oathkeeper like it had been forged for her hand. He knew no one who deserved a knighthood more than Brienne, and many who deserved it far less.
For so long he'd wanted simply to be with her again, just to exist in the same space, breathing, no imminent battle or political morass or impending disaster. He wanted this quiet moment to last forever, but he knew what he had to say next would probably ruin everything.
"There's more, Brienne," he croaked. "She says she's pregnant." He paused, too long. "It could be mine." Though he thought it just as likely a kraken roiled in her womb, if she carried any child at all.
Her hand stopped cold, slipping away.
Her eyes stung, but she was surprised at herself for being surprised. There had been no promises between them, no expectations. She'd always known he loved Cersei, and he'd never claimed otherwise. Why would she have expected him to leave her bed? She hadn't, really – she'd only hoped he might.
"It wasn't like before," he said, haltingly. "We weren't together, but–" he stopped, struggling for words.
"You don't owe me any explanation," Brienne said, without inflection.
"I do," he said, with urgency. "Surely you know, you can tell, that for a long time my regard for you has been more than mere admiration."
She had not known, could not tell. She'd dared hope – but only late at night, fleeting moments between wakefulness and sleep, when she let herself remember his last wave to her from the battlements of Riverrun, or the way his eyes ran down her body in the baths of Harrenhal.
How could a woman like her believe such a thing, unless it was plainly spoken?
"What are you saying, Jamie?" she nearly pleaded. "Say what you mean."
"Gods, wench, must you press me so in my weakened state?" His face was red, a fever, a blush.
He fought the blankets to sit up, to face her properly. He wanted to grab her hand, but her fists were woven together, forearms flexed with tension, jaw tight and facing away from him.
He touched her cheek instead. "Brienne."
Shocked into meeting his eyes, she was consumed by their fever-bright green of wildfyre and want.
"I've never stopped thinking about you," he said.
"I've dreamt about you," he went on, fervently.
"I don't pray, and I've prayed for you." He leaned toward her, weary, falling against her strong shoulder, again. "That you wouldn't get yourself killed, that I'd see you again, and not on the other side of a battlefield."
His voice caught. "Never that." It was a plea.
"Jaime," was all she could manage, her heartbeat ringing in her ears.
"You could hold me," he wished out loud.
So she did.
The four of them set off at dawn, on three horses, with Sansa behind Sandor. A much more somber procession than had left Winterfell at midnight only days before. Sansa peered back over her shoulder wistfully at the lodge, trying to believe they'd ever be able to visit it again.
At her sigh, Sandor touched her arm, an admission that he wished, too.
The weather made no allowances for them, a storm blowing in while they were an hour yet from Winterfell's gates. They plowed on, no option but to continue.
The snow fell so thick they almost trampled the smallfolk before they saw them, a pair of figures struggling ahead of them toward the keep. Sansa leaned out to apologize, until two sets of unnaturally-blue eyes snapped to her face, and she screamed.
"Wights!" Two more materialized out of the white gloom on their flank. "Brienne!"
Sansa drew a dagger from her boot and passed it to Sandor, with his longer reach. The other she kept for herself, just in case.
"Meant to give you before," she shouted through the wind. "Dragonglass."
Brienne and Jaime both held Valyrian steel, and even with him wounded and feverish they fought as one unit, turning three to dust in the time Sandor had to stab the one lunging at Sansa. It was not much of a fight, but she was shaken all the same.
"They've never been this close to Winterfell," Sansa said in his ear. "Something's happened."
The storm died shortly before they reached the gates, but they rode directly into the violet-eyed wrath of Daenerys Stormborn instead. The dragon queen confronted them in the yard as they dismounted, not even waiting for them to enter the hall.
It seemed Pod and Bronn had broken the news, whether they'd wanted to or not. Between Sansa's small rebellion and Cersei's betrayal, Daenerys was enraged, convinced the two events were related.
"You dare," she fumed, "to run off and marry a Lannister liegeman, and then bring my father's killer right to our gates?"
"It's not like that," Sansa began reasonably. "Well, all right, it's exactly like that, I suppose. Your Grace."
"Is this some Lannister plot, to sow discord in the North?"
The more the Queen raged, the calmer Sansa became. "No, Your Grace. I've married for love, to a husband of my own choosing, as Jon promised I would."
The slight silver-haired woman whirled on Jaime. "Where is your army, Kingslayer?" Daenerys demanded, though she knew the answer.
Taking his cue from Sansa, Jaime responded in placid tones. "I'm afraid it's not coming, and it's not my army anymore."
He spread his hands wide, theatrically. "I must have been declared a traitor to the realm, by now. Surely you've gotten a raven or two?" He paused. "No, I suppose not."
He addressed Daenerys, but found the eyes of Jon and Tyrion as he spoke. "Cersei never intended to join you, and Euron Greyjoy's not fled to the Iron Islands. He's gone to fetch the Golden Company, to conquer from the South while you die for the North."
"And what about you?" the queen asked, coldly.
Jaime shrugged, as though it hadn't cost him everything. "I said I'd come North to fight, and so I have."
She laughed, a mocking, joyless thing. "You really think I would trust you, a man with no honor?"
"Ser Jaime is a man of honor, Your Grace," Brienne dared to interject. "He kept his word to Catelyn Stark."
"It hardly negates his other deeds," Daenerys responded. "I've a mind to let Drogon decide."
Her smile was a dreadful echo of her father, and Jaime shuddered. Drogon had probably not forgotten Jaime's ill-fated run at him when last they met.
"Yes, I think I shall." She spoke a sharp command, in Valyrian, and the night-black creature descended as though it had been waiting.
"He'll decide the fate of the Kingslayer – and perhaps his Hound, too."
Tyrion and Jon both spoke at once, attempting to appeal to reason without raising her ire further. Meanwhile, Drogon turned to face them fully, flames already kindled in his belly and licking out of his fearsome snout.
Sansa knew the fire wouldn't touch them, that the queen cared too much for her nephew to risk harming his family, and would never risk losing the support of the North. Even now Sansa stood between Sandor and Jaime, Brienne at her back. This was a play for power and domination. Jon's queen was as threatened by Sansa's audacity and agency as any purported fear of Jaime or Sandor being loyal to Cersei.
Sansa was not afraid. She was overcome with a fury colder than Winter, colder than death.
Of all things, to threaten her husband with burning alive, he who had already been nearly destroyed by fire. Of all things. I'll never forgive her.
This one fear, Sandor couldn't hide, not his terror of fire in the face of a creature breathing flame, who roasted men in their armor and ate them whole. He shook at her side like Sweetrobin with a fit, and Sansa would not have it. She cast out her mind with a desperate determination she hadn't felt since jumping into the void with Theon.
But Lady, Lady was gone, Nymeria was wild and far, and Ghost was locked to her, close at Jon's heels. There was nothing nearby that might defend them.
She despaired, until she searched above–
She opened her mouth to shriek, but the sound that rent the sky was no human sound, as her eyes opened white.
She was a dragon, meant to rule the sky, tethered by a chain of ice.
She was a dragon, breathing blue flame and rage.
