When Jon came to her rooms, he knew something was amiss.
He could feel it in his bones, a cold sense of dread that left him feeling sick. It was as if he already knew that within Daenerys' rooms, a choice had already been made that would change everything. Raising his hand, he knocks twice, and waits silently until he hears the footsteps on the other side of the door. It's Missandei that opens it for him, giving a respectful but solemn nod before she steps aside, allowing him entrance to the queen's rooms.
She stands before the table at the center of the room, a great map of Westeros spread across it. Daenerys looks grim, her violet eyes a shade darker when they fall upon him. Tyrion stands to her other side and the look upon his face is unreadable- but the one within his eyes is chilling. "You sent for me, your grace," Jon speaks with a voice that does not betray his inner turmoil. His heart hammers, his stomach sinking as the dragon queen gestures for him to approach her. Grey Worm eyes him coldly from behind Daenerys, his hand ever present upon the hilt of his sword.
"Yes, Jon... We must speak." Daenerys says as she sweeps around the table to stand before him. "It's about your sister," she says, hands clasped before her, her dragon ring glinting in the firelight. She calls Sansa his sister, reminding him that Daenerys has told no one the truth of his birth, not even these people she called her must trusted council. Her friends. "It would seem that despite the friendship I have offered to her and the North, she still defies me." Jon feels his heart skip a beat, his breath catching in his throat. No, no, no, he thinks, though his face remains passive. "Letters have been discovered, letters she intended to send to my enemies." Daenerys' nostrils flare, a telltale sign of the anger rushing through her. "Letters that name you the true heir to the Iron Throne, letters asking to support the North in an effort to overthrow my reign before it has even begun." Jon doesn't ask how such letters have been found; queen or not, she had no right searching Winterfell's own Lady's personal letters as they were being sent out.
"Sansa wouldn't," Jon begins, hoping he sounds shocked, truthfully he is, though his worry quite outweighs the shock. "Your grace, she is upset, please let me speak to her... Let me-"
"No!" Daenerys snaps, interrupting him before he can finish his plea. "You know the penalty for treason, Jon." Her violet eyes narrow as they fall upon him, as if she is threatening him to disagree, as if she dares him to defend Sansa from the crimes she's committed. "Not only has she been disrespectful to me, her queen, she has forged a lie that you are Targaryen born and thus the true heir. She means to take from me what is mine and give it to you. Your sister is a traitor and must be punished." Jon cannot breathe. But he knows if he tries to fight the decision, he will be overruled and burned too. If he is dead, then he cannot stop what is to come. "Do you understand what that means?"
And so he hangs his head and hopes he looks like a dejected older brother. He hopes he looks shamed, knowing his sister was a traitor to the one true queen. "Aye, your grace, I do." He says softly, keeping his gaze upon the ground until he hears Daenerys' soft footsteps as she approaches him. When he looks up, she's staring at him, no trace of sympathy on her features. Not even for him, the man she supposedly loves, can she feel pity for when she intends on murdering his own family member.
"At dawn then. You may say your goodbyes, if you wish." Daernerys turns away from him then, dismissing him with a single wave of her hand. She trusts him, he realizes, not to betray her to Sansa. To not try and smuggle her away from Winterfell in the dead of night. She still yet believes in what was between them, whatever it was she thought it to be. And that... That will be what saves Sansa's life.
[ x x x ]
When he returns to her rooms that night, he's certain no one has seen him. This time when he knocks, she opens it a moment later, a smile blooming at the sight of him in her doorway. "Jon," she breathes, allowing him to come in, shutting the door behind her. "I thought you would be angry with me... For what I must do." She shifts from one foot to the other, looking uncomfortable for the first time, her violet eyes flickering in the light from the fire behind her. "You do understand, don't you? I do not want to execute her, Jon, but she has given me no choice. I am her queen."
Jon steps closer to her, reaching out a hand to tenderly stroke her cheek. "You are my queen," he says softly, his words bringing another smile to her face. She leans in to his touch, her own hand sliding into place over his. "I love Sansa as any brother would, but you are my queen and it's you I've devoted my life to." The words feel empty on his tongue, but they do the trick for her smile is radiant as she falls into his embrace.
"We will make this world a better place, you and I," she says softly, her voice muffled from where her face is buried into his chest. He raises a hand to touch her silvery hair and it forces her to tilt her head back to look up at him, violet eyes shimmering with happy tears. "I knew I could always trust you." She says softly, before she rises up to her tiptoes, pressing her lips against his without another word.
Jon kisses her back, one arm snaking around to press against the small of her back. The other moves quickly to his waist, to where he's secured a dagger. It's over so quickly, Daenerys has no time to react aside from a quiet cry that leaves her once smiling lips. She looks down at the blade plunged into her chest and then back up at Jon, shock replacing the happiness as she sags towards the ground. Jon doesn't move as she falls, but rather stands over her, unaware of the breath he's holding until he lets it go when her chest goes still.
A moment later, he cleans his blade and puts it back at his hip, tossing the bloodied linen into the dying embers of the fire. And then he steps around Daenerys' now lifeless body, heads out into the hall, and back to his rooms. Never seen, never heard, no one will ever know who claimed the dragon's queen life.
[ x x x ]
The next morning, all of Winterfell is woken by Missandei's screams and Grey Worm's shouts. It is Missandei that discovers her queen's body that morning when she goes to help her dress and braid her hair as she did every morning, albeit earlier than usual to prepare for what was supposed to occur that day. Her cries alert Grey Worm who was coming down the hall and the soldier rushes from the room, shouting for Jon Snow and the Lady of Winterfell.
Both are lodged in Sansa's rooms, Jon having gone to her room as he often did in the morning, nothing out of his ordinary routine. Sansa is sliding the last pin into her hair when the door flies open, nearly off its hinges, and Grey Worm storms in. "Murderer!" He screams as his eyes fall upon Jon, unsheathing his sword and pointing it at his chest. "Murderer!" His bellows can be heard throughout the castle and already, Brienne is rushing through the room, placing herself between Sansa who now stands and Grey Worm who's frenzied stare swivels from one face to the other.
"What is the meaning of this?" Sansa demands, fear paling her face, though her blue eyes narrow as she stares Grey Worm down.
"Jon Snow has murdered my queen!" Grey Worm shouts, near hysterics now, his sword still yet aimed for Jon. "Your treachery against the queen was discovered and just last night, she sentenced you to die! Now we wake to find her slain in her own room?" Grey Worm is beside himself, his sword shaking in his hand. Sansa blinks, swallowing down whatever retort she had prepared. "This very morning we were to come for you but now she is dead? Jon Snow, you will pay! And so will you!" Grey Worm surges forward, but Jon parries the attack the moment he's unsheathed Longclaw and Sansa cries for them to cease sword play, though Brienne forces her back from the scuffle. "I will avenge my queen!" Grey Worm screams as his blade connects with Jon's yet again, sparks flying.
It takes but several more swings for Jon to knock the blade from the now weeping man's hands and it's then that Northern soldiers have descended upon the room. "Take him in chains!" Sansa cries as she comes around Brienne's protective form. "Brienne, go to the queen's rooms." Though she looks somewhat reluctant to leave her side, Brienne nods and exits the room, following after the soldiers that drag Grey Worm between them. "Secure Winterfell," she commands of the other soldiers, all of whom nod, sprinting from the room to do as she bid.
The moment they have all gone, Sansa drops into the chair she'd once discarded, her heartbeat wild within her chest. Jon at once turns to her, Longclaw back at his side where it belonged. "What is happening?" She asks, turning her blue eyes upon him, the breath leaving her shaking as badly as her hands in her lap. "Is what he said true?"
Jon regards her for a long moment before he comes closer, dropping down to the floor beside her chair. Without a word, he reaches for her hands, squeezing them gently. She's staring at him but her expression tells him everything that her words don't. It's as if she understands him completely. "I told you I'd always protect you," he says finally, releasing a shaky breath of his own. Her lips twitch with a smile but she thinks better on it and she merely nods, giving his hands a squeeze back. His vow held true, no matter who he had to protect her from. Queens, kings, monsters, or men... He would protect her from them all for as long as he lived.