I'll say it before and I'll say it again: please don't set your expectations too high for this story and then tear into it like I'm about to publish it or something. Like I said before, I started this story just to satisfy my yearning for some GoT now that the season has ended. I have shamelessly fallen prey to several silly clichés that I'm not even attempting to avoid, and I've also pulled out the instant gratification card that I rarely play.

I'm glad a lot of you are enjoying it. It warms my heart. And, like I've also said before, constructive criticism is always welcome. But don't get snarky and say hurtful things simply because you don't like a particular aspect of my story. I've never gotten that. If you don't like something, then stop reading it; or simply point out in your review that you don't quite understand why I did what I did and ask a question about it that I can answer in a constructive, healthy way – if it's that important to you.

Or, better yet, go write your own shit that satisfies your standards. Sometimes I read something that has me rolling my eyes with how silly it is – but I'm not going to PM that author and lay into them about how wrong everything is. This is FanFiction. There is no such thing as "wrong," unless you count horrendous grammar and spelling and such. But hell, if you write a story centered around how Jon Snow gets pregnant with Ghost's child and they rule Westeros together, then more power to you. I might not read it, but I'm not going to sit there and type a whole message or review telling you how what you've come up with is "wrong." It's not wrong. It's yours. And I'll just go write mine.

Seriously…people just need to chill out. If you want professional grade stuff with good plotlines and realistic characterization, get off the internet and go to Barnes & Noble. Geez.

oooo

Tyrion looked up from the remnants of his lunch as Varys slipped through the door, looking furtively around the room to settle on Jaime, who sat opposite him. The bald man spoke immediately.

"Can I have a moment with your brother, Ser Jaime?"

Jaime paused in the middle of his mouthful, and then swallowed. "Sure," he said, his voice still thick and his eyes still red with earlier tears. He made to stand.

"On second thought," Varys interrupted, holding out a hand, "you might be useful. Stay."

Jaime sat back down into his chair, his blue eyes full of wariness. Tyrion narrowed his eyes at his old friend.

"Something bothering you?" he drawled, sipping at his wine.

"Yes, in fact," Varys said sharply, "thank you for asking."

Tyrion sat up higher in his chair, his brows furrowing at the eunuch's tone. "Care to share?"

"What do you know about Jon Snow's mother?"

Tyrion's brows furrowed. "I don't know anything about Jon Snow's mother. No one does. Ned Stark refused to say anything about her."

"I think everyone just assumed she was some tavern wench that died," Jaime said, his eyes sharpening with intrigue that dispelled his grief – if only temporarily.

Tyrion cleared his throat. "What are you suggesting, Varys?"

"I'm not suggesting anything," Varys said, his eyes full of caution. "I'm merely curious. I was in his chambers earlier this morning – discussing marriage – "

"Yes, we talked about this earlier," Tyrion said impatiently. "And you've already spoken to Daenerys about it, what does this have to do with anything – "

"It doesn't have anything to do with this," snapped Varys. "But I very much would like to know why the Queen's dragons have taken to Jon Snow so splendidly."

"They like him," Tyrion said with a shrug, ignoring the strange knot that was forming in the pit of his stomach. "Drogon and Rhaegal, at least."

"Yes, well, the green one shoved his head through the balcony doors just as I was about to leave," Varys said sharply. "And apparently he's been making a habit of it, if Snow's reaction was any indication."

They were all silent for a moment. Tyrion fiddled with his fork, staring down at the table. Finally Jaime cleared his throat. "Are you suggesting that the boy's mother was of Targaryen lineage?" he asked, his tone one of forced lightness.

"Like I said, I'm not suggesting anything," Varys returned coolly. "The interaction was frighteningly familiar. That dragon doesn't just like him. There is a deeper connection there. It was plain to see."

"So what do you expect us to do about it?" Tyrion asked skeptically. "What does it matter, if his mother had some Targaryen blood somewhere down the line?"

"But the Targaryens rarely married outside the family," Jaime said with a shake of his head. "Many of the great houses in Westeros share some ancient ties with the Targaryens, but those unions occurred so long ago that any Targaryen blood that people like you and I have," he said, gesturing to Tyrion and himself, "would be so faint that it wouldn't even count."

"Rhaegar married Elia Martell twenty-five years ago, that was outside the family," Tyrion pointed out. "Still. They only had two kids. Dead now. Daenerys is the last Targaryen."

Varys stared at Tyrion. "Unless…"

"Unless what?" Tyrion scoffed. "Unless one of them survived? Both of us saw those children multiple times. Both Aegon and Rhaenys, despite Martell's lovely southern coloring, still managed to be born with fair hair and purplish eyes. They looked nothing like Jon Snow." He paused. "Besides, how would one of those children have ended up with Ned Stark?"

"I'm not saying Snow is Aegon Targaryen," Varys said with a shake of his head. "The ages don't match up – and you're right, I saw both of those children, and it's impossible for the boy to have grown up to become Jon Snow."

"Then I'm not entirely sure what your point is," Tyrion said sharply.

"Tell me, Lord Tyrion," Varys said slyly. "Out of all the men in the seven kingdoms, who would you say was least likely to take a mistress and sire a child outside of wedlock?"

He frowned. "Everyone has discussed this. We've all speculated for years about why Ned Stark would act so out of character."

"Right," Varys said with a nod. "We all just assumed that he'd fallen in love. But it seems to me like Stark would have returned home and told Lady Catelyn everything, like the honest man he was," he said with narrowed eyes.

"And he didn't tell her anything," Jaime said, looking at Varys with knowing eyes. "He was frustratingly mute about the entire affair. King Robert always bitched about it – wanted to know what girl would be beautiful enough for Eddard Stark to forsake his vows."

"You're suggesting that he didn't?" Tyrion asked, leaning forward skeptically. "You're suggesting that Jon Snow was never Ned Stark's bastard after all? That he brought home another man's child and raised it as his own?" He shook his head. "Why?"

Jaime looked confused. "That idea has no credibility," he said, shaking his head determinedly. "Look at Snow's face. He has 'Stark' written all over him. Everything from his hair to his eyes to his bone structure."

Varys nodded in reluctant agreement. They were silent again, all contemplating.

"This is a dangerous conversation," Jaime finally said. "One that we shouldn't be having."

Tyrion sighed, and leaned back. "Yes. But now it's gotten under my skin." He looked to Varys, whose eyes gave nothing away. "I assume that you've already been asking around?"

"No, actually," Varys denied. "I wanted to talk to you first."

"How uncharacteristically restrained of you," he quipped, taking another sip of his wine as his stomach twisted itself into knots. He sighed. "I don't see how knowing Jon Snow's true parentage will be of any consequence to the matters at hand," he muttered. He cleared his throat and looked at Varys pointedly. "If you go fishing and don't get any bites, pull your reel back before you fall in," he warned cautiously. He looked to Jaime. "Could Bronn be of any help?"

Jaime nodded reluctantly. "I'll ask him to get what information he can. And there are a couple of older soldiers that were around back then, who knew Baratheon and Stark as young men. They might know something." He pinched the bridge of his nose. "If we end up learning something – "

"Then we keep it to ourselves," Varys interrupted. "Unless we three deem it prudent to share." His eyes bore into Tyrion's. "You know I wouldn't bring this up if I didn't have strong suspicions."

"Suspicions based on a man's relationship to a dragon?" Tyrion said, exasperated.

"If you'd have seen it, you would be thinking the same thing that I am now," Varys returned passionately.

"Which is what, exactly?" Jaime asked, his brow furrowed.

Varys inhaled. "That there is something extremely strange about Jon Snow in relation to those dragons," he said determinedly. "And I want to know what it is."

oooo

Daenerys padded down the hallway in her delicate silver slippers, her dark blue dress floating around her legs. The weather the last few days had been lousy – rain, rain, and more rain – so she was confined to the castle, and had been taking advantage of that fact to abandon the thick coats and trousers and boots she'd been wearing for some of the lighter, more feminine garments she'd donned often in Essos.

She told herself it had everything to do with her comfort, and nothing at all to do with looking pretty for the King in the North.

When she reached Jon Snow's door, she nodded at the two Northmen that stood on one side of the hallway and the two Dothraki that stood on the other side. One of the Dothraki – a man named Gorat – knew some Westerosi, and he was currently speaking in stilted sentences to the Northmen. It appeared that he was trying to teach the men some Dothraki, with varying levels of success.

Upon her arrival, they all nodded their heads respectfully, and one of the Stark bannermen knocked on the door. When there was no answer, they opened it for her, assuming that he was asleep.

Their assumption was correct. Snow was laid out on the bed, his chest heaving and covered in sweat as he appeared to be suffering from a bad dream. A deep whine sounded from across the room, and Daenerys' eyes widened as Rhaegal lifted his head from where it sat on the floor just inside the balcony. It seemed he was trying to get closer to Snow's bed, but couldn't squeeze more of his neck through the doors without breaking something.

Daenerys went to him immediately, surprised at his presence. It was one thing for her dragons to favor Jon Snow – it was another thing entirely for one of them to linger by his quarters. In his quarters. She stroked his nose, and he purred lowly, his eyes flickering to her briefly before he looked back at Jon and continued to strain his neck in that direction.

"Hold on, my darling, you'll hurt yourself," she chastised softly. She looked over to Jon, and her heart broke when he clutched his chest in his sleep and cried out in pain.

She crept over to the edge of the bed, and carefully put a hand on his shoulder. "Jon Snow," she said softly. He did not stir. His face was frozen in agony. "Jon!"

He sat up abruptly, and she leaned back in shock as his head almost collided with hers. His eyes were dark and hazy with anguish, and they sharpened on her face. He blinked, breathing hard, and his gaze cleared, full of confusion.

"Daenerys?"

It was the first time he had ever said her name, at least in her presence. It made her heart do something funny inside her chest. His voice was hoarse and quiet, little more than a whisper, and she swallowed. She sat down on the edge of his bed, and grabbed his wrist, pulling his hand into her lap and feeling his pulse race.

"You were having a nightmare," she said quietly, absently running her thumb over the inside of his wrist. It didn't occur to her that she was encroaching on his personal space until her eyes flickered down to his chest, which glistened with sweat. She cleared her throat.

She expected him to pull his hand from her grip, but he didn't, merely laid back down on his back, looking up at the ceiling and rubbing his chest with his free hand.

"Will you tell me what happened?" she asked quietly.

His eyes shot to her face, dark and gleaming and unreadable. His nostrils flared. "You know what happened."

"Not really," she said with a shake of her head.

He sighed, and looked up at the ceiling, his hand still resting in her lap as his breathing slowed. "A lot of the men at Castle Black don't understand the White Walkers and the army of the dead. It's hard to grasp something like that when you haven't seen it with your own eyes. They didn't understand that all of the wildlings I let south of the Wall would have just become wights – more bodies in the Night King's army. At the time, the threat wasn't real to them. All they knew was that they'd been fighting wildlings since the beginning of time, and letting them past the Wall was akin to blasphemy." He swallowed. "Some of the brothers felt that I'd betrayed them. So they betrayed me in turn."

"It's never a betrayal to help those in need, Jon Snow," she reassured him quietly, seeing the doubt in his eyes. "I've found the world to be a cruel place – it often punishes those who choose to do the right thing. But the real betrayal would have been turning your back on the people who needed you." She looked at him earnestly, feeling affection for him swell in her heart.

His eyes flared with something that looked like gratitude. "I know you're right up here," he said hoarsely, tapping a finger against his skull, "but in here, I still have doubt." He tapped his chest. "Not doubt that I did the right thing," he clarified, "but doubt that the right thing wasn't still a betrayal of the Night's Watch."

She shook her head minutely, frustrated – but nothing she could say would be able to heal those hurts. "And this is what you dream about?"

He nodded. "They lured me down into the square. It was snowing. And they'd hung a sign – " He swallowed, and cleared his throat. "It said 'traitor' on it." He closed his eyes. "Sometimes I wake up with this pressure," he said, laying a hand over his heart. "Like my heart is going to explode. I still remember how every knife felt as it was plunged into my body." He released a shaky breath. "Nothing was ever the same after that. Nothing."

"No," she said, her voice small. "I imagine not." She sighed. She looked down at his hand, and brushed her thumb over a scar across his knuckles. "Will you tell me about this one?"

His nostrils flared. "I punched a man."

"You…punched a man," she repeated, raising an eyebrow.

He shrugged. "A few times."

"How hard did you punch him, exactly?" she asked, thinking of the assassin's bloody face.

"My hand broke," he grunted. "A bone shot straight up through my skin."

She made a face. "That's awful. Who was it?"

At this, his expression grew thunderous. "Ramsay Bolton." He swallowed. "I saw Sansa's body when she arrived at the Wall after her escape from Winterfell." His voice was quiet and rough and full of murder. "There are no women at Castle Black. As her brother, I helped Lady Brienne tend to her." His eyes met hers, and her mouth went dry at the terrifying wrath that swirled in those grey-brown-black depths. "The only parts of her that weren't bruised or cut open were her face and hands. He violated her, raped her, beat her bloody. Carved her up with a knife."

She put a fist to her mouth. "Did you kill him?"

"No," he answered harshly. "Wasn't my place. I gave him to Sansa. He'd trained his dogs to kill people, you understand. He didn't feed them, so that they were savage and hungry. So she put him in the cells with his hounds and watched as they tore him apart."

She stared at him. "It's a rare man that forsakes his own revenge to give that satisfaction to another."

"I would have kept hitting him," he said, staring up at the ceiling once more, his eyes far off in a memory where she could not follow. "I would have kept hitting him until I saw his brains in the dirt. And then I saw my sister standing there, watching – and it wasn't right for me to do it. Sure, he killed Rickon right in front of me, he and his father helped orchestrate the Red Wedding – but Sansa endured far worse at Ramsay's hands."

"She's a strong woman," she said quietly. "To have survived that."

"She's been through a lot," he said. He sighed heavily, and then pulled his hand away from hers, the emotion in his eyes fading to calmness. They were exactly the color of old weathered oak – a dark brownish grey that looked black in dim lighting.

He sat up, and she stood, moving back from the bedside to stand awkwardly next to his breakfast table, wringing her hands nervously as she watched him swing his legs over the side.

He grunted, and stood, and for the first time she was confronted with the full force of his physical magnificence. It was different, seeing him standing as opposed to lying on a bed. He was not a tall man, or overly large, but he was lean and graceful and powerful. He moved with purpose, every muscle carefully controlled. Here was a man who knew his own strength, knew his own body, knew how his hands grasped a weapon and his feet climbed stairs. Here was a man who would never stumble, never trip, never miscalculate – never overestimate or underestimate his own grace or skill.

He looked down at the wound on his ribs, and went to touch it. She snapped out of her stupor just in time to slap his hand away. He looked up at her in scandalized shock, and she glared at him.

"Don't touch it," she said firmly. "If I have to have Rhaegal bite your hands off, I will."

"That seems a bit drastic," he returned dryly. Still, he kept his hand away from the dressings. He moved past her, and she turned to watch him go straight to her smallest child, his legs slightly unsteady. Heedless of his audience, Snow wrapped his arms around Rhaegal's snout and laid his head against the scales of his forehead.

Daenerys swallowed. Something shifted in the air – something that she couldn't quite put her finger on. Her heart did something strange when Rhaegal purred and closed his eyes, leaning into Snow's touch just as surely as he would her own.

"How long has he been coming to you?" she asked quietly, moving closer to lay her hand on her son's neck. Rhaegal was the sweetest of her dragons. Always wanting to be close to his brothers, always wanting to be close to her. But he had never shown any interest in people. None except her. None of her dragons had.

Until Jon Snow.

Jon leaned back, and patted Rhaegal on the nose. "Found him on the ledge out there the first morning after we got back," he answered softly. "He's been sleeping there ever since."

She hummed. She was having a hard time keeping her eyes from sliding down to where the waistband of his trousers hugged his lean hips. He was still shiny with sweat, and she noticed two faint scars on his back, the skin puckered and white. His hair was tied back as it had been when she'd met him, but this time it was short enough that it barely worked. She couldn't decide if she liked it better this way, pulled back in a knot, or when it was loose and curly, framing his face.

"I was wondering," she said, her eyes moving back to where Rhaegal lay looking at Jon with adoring green eyes, "if you'd be up for a chat."

His entire demeanor changed. He swallowed, and his arms folded across his chest. His eyes reflected a certain wariness that she wanted to wipe away. "Yes," he said slowly. He gestured around the room. "Make yourself comfortable."

She was sure he expected her to take a seat in one of the chairs at the table, or in the padded chair next to his bed – but instead she sat on his bed, crossing her legs and enjoying the way his eyes suddenly darkened in response, smoldering with something that had her pulse racing.

He sat in the chair next to the bed, and Rhaegal withdrew his head from the room to rest it back on the balcony, still watching them with kind yellow-green eyes. The light rain that pitter-patted against his scales did not seem to bother him.

Jon cleared his throat. "So. Marriage."

She nodded, her nerves flaring to life. "Yes," she said, wiping sweaty hands on her dress. His eyes followed the movement. ""Marriage." She paused. "Varys said you had conditions."

He nodded, and poured himself a glass of water from the pitcher on the bed. He poured another and offered it to her, and she accepted it with a nod of thanks. He was still shirtless, which was entirely unfair – and totally distracting. But the injury on his side was still shiny with ointment, and asking him to put a robe on would give away her attraction to him. So she forced herself to look at his face, sipping at her water as she faked calmness.

She continued to sit as he explained his terms – keeping her anger and pride in check. When he was finished, she cocked her head.

"Why are you so certain I don't know how to rule the North?" she asked, pushing down her fury over the "dictator" that he had casually dropped in association with her name.

He steepled his fingers. "In the same way I'm certain I wouldn't know how to govern Mereen," he said, his tone even and amiable. He was a very agreeable kind of person. Easy to like, easy to get along with. Even when he was looking the Mother of Dragons in the eye and making demands.

It was kind of irritating.

Her nostrils flared. "I will learn – "

"Yes," he interrupted sharply. His tone was not unkind, but was serious. "You will learn. With help," he added. "From me." He sat back in his chair, looking far more at ease than she was feeling. She didn't like it. Usually he was the one that looked uncomfortable, and she was the confident one. "Like I said before, it will have to be a partnership."

He sighed, and looked up at the ceiling. "I very much would like to settle back into the life of a soldier and not have to worry about ruling anything," he said softly. "I very much would like to see you sit on the Iron Throne – you and you alone. But the reality is that I am King in the North, and that can't change just because I wish it. I now have a responsibility to the people of the North - and now the Riverlands as well, and the Vale. Therefore, as much as I would like to hand the reins over to you, I simply can't do that."

He paused. "You are a strong, capable woman," he continued, his voice soft and his eyes sincere. Her heart tripped. "As I've said before, you will make a fantastic queen. You were made to rule. It's in your very nature. But I won't have you brush aside my counsel like you sometimes do with Tyrion or Varys. Any decisions that are made will be made together. My guess is that we'll see eye to eye on most things. But in the cases where we have a difference of opinion, I expect there to be discussion and compromise on both sides."

She swallowed, and thought of Missandei's words earlier. He is a king, Khaleesi, she had said. You have acknowledged him as such, especially with your proposal. He is in a position to make demands. And you are in a position to deny him, of course. But if you want to marry him, then you might have to compromise.

She looked into Jon Snow's eyes. His stare gave her confidence – empowered her. She nodded. "Okay."

"Okay?" he asked, raising an eyebrow. "That's it? No 'I'll have my dragons roast you alive' or 'I'm going to string you up somewhere north of the Wall' or 'You're going to rot in the dungeons for the rest of your life'?"

She felt anger and offense rise within her until she saw the way his lips quirked. She scowled, and threw a pillow at him in a childish move that would have had Tyrion shaking his head in disappointment. He caught it easily, his reflexes those of a hardened soldier.

"I'm not that bad, Jon Snow," she said hotly, narrowing her eyes.

"No," he denied easily, grinning. His smile was achingly beautiful, and she wanted to bottle it up and keep it to herself. "Close, though."

She glared, and then she was smiling as well, and they both chuckled softly before he tossed the pillow back on the bed and got to his feet. She stood as well, and realized that they were only a foot apart before he quickly stepped away.

"I'm going to wash," he said, not meeting her eyes, "and then I thought I'd walk some before dinner, start to get my strength back. I'd like to hear more about your experiences in Essos, if you'd care to join me. I found some of the Dothraki customs that you mentioned in our conversations last week interesting. I'd like to know more about them and their government."

Her eyes widened a fraction, and her heart stuttered. He had been listening to her. When they'd conversed, he'd actually been listening.

She was Daenerys Targaryen. She was used to being listened to – when it mattered. When she was the queen. But she had never really been listened to before just as a person. Daario had had the attention span of a fly, sometimes. As much as she had loved Drogo, he didn't often want to just talk to her. Missandei sometimes did not grasp the complexities of certain things. Tyrion was always so worried about the state of affairs that it was hard to have a conversation with him that wasn't about her campaign. And Varys was never really around; the Spider was always working from the shadows.

But Jon Snow had been listening the whole time, and for some reason this was the revelation that pushed her over the edge.

She was starting to fall in love with him.

She nodded jerkily. "I'll send someone in with warm water for a bath, and fetch the maester to redress your wound." She smiled up at him, her heart pounding out a rhythm on the inside of her ribcage. "I'll wait in the conference room."

He walked her to the door, and as she exited she didn't think she imagined the feel of a hand trailing along her floating skirts, as feather-light as the fabric itself.

oooo

So I was made aware recently that in the books, Viserion is described as being the mildest, most agreeable dragon, and Rhaegal a bit more difficult. I haven't read the books, however, and no such distinction is made in the show, so I kind of just made up their personalities.

Anyway, thanks for reading!

xoxo

Giraffe :)