The broken dragon

Jon Snow

"Bastard, the burden of House Stark, you don't have honor." Those were the words that many people said when they look at Jon, his family always treated him well, they were kind with him. And now, all those words were true for Jon, he was a Targaryen bastard for many men in Westeros, he fought bravely and lost miserably.

The tears started to fall traveling from his eyes to his chin, he couldn't feel the pain anymore, he was sitting alone in the darkness, thinking about his failure, about his family; Ned, Robb, Sansa, Arya, Bran, Rickon, lady Ashara he failed them all.

Jon knew that his death was imminent, he closed his eyes and prayed one last time to the old gods, then he surrendered to darkness. Suddenly he saw a burning torch a few steps away from him, he walked towards it and saw the silhouette of a young woman holding it, she didn't look like Lyra, he quickly understood that he had never seen that woman.

The mysterious woman held out her hand trying to reach for Jon, he held her hand softly at first, then he remembered that he was already dead, nothing could hurt him anymore, then the woman pulled him closer, her face was hidden by the shadows, but Jon could recognize the Targaryen colors, the same colors the he luckily did not inherit from his father.

Her silver blonde hair looked beautiful, her body was beautiful, but her identity was a mystery for Jon, but something inside of his heart made him hug her, she was warm and hugged him too, he was safe now.

"Have you failed?" she asked calmly, her voice was sweet as honey for Jon's ears.

He thought his answer before answering the question, "Yes, I have failed, they betrayed me, my family... They… they" he tried to say the words, but he couldn't.

"They're gone?" she asked with her sweet voice.

"Yes, al of them, I failed them, I was just a stupid boy pretending to be a knight, pretending to be a king." He said as his voice broke.

"Look at the fire" she said and turned Jon's head gently to make him see the torch's fire. "what do you see?"

He saw the winter storms, a red dragon with many scars breathing fire, the body of a naked woman, he saw himself surrounded by knifes, green fire consuming everything and then he saw darkness, pure darkness consuming the light. He was confused he couldn't understand the visions.

"You must find yourself again, you must take what's yours back from those who betrayed you, those who betrayed us." She said and disappeared immediately.

Jon was alone again, but he wasn't in the same silent place, he could hear noises coming from a near place, he started to feel dizzy as the noise grew louder and louder.

"We can't leave his body here!" a girl said.

"I'll give him a proper burial my lady, but it's dangerous to take his body with us." A man replied.

"Don't worry my lady, I'll protect his grave for as long as I can" a woman added.

Suddenly he felt the air filling his lungs again and the horrible pain of the two removed bolts, he took a deep breath and tried to move, but he didn't had strength enough, he was sitting on the ground, his back leaning on a tree trunk, the morning in the Riverlands was cold and a thick fog covered everything. The girl was Arya, his little cousin, happiness invaded him, he wasn't alone after all.

"Jory! Jory! He's awake, hurry come here!" Arya yelled.

"Arya? … Jory?" Jon asked, he was very tired and confused.

"It's good to see you alive" the woman said, she was sitting right next to him, her armour and black hair were unmistakable, Jon recognized her immediately.

"Dacey?" he asked confused.

"We thought that you were dead, maybe dragons are harder to kill than men" she laughed but immediately cursed the gods, she was pressing her belly with a rag that used to be a House Mormont banner, the green was replaced with the dark red of the dried blood.

Jon was more confused than ever, "How… How did you find us?"

"They helped us when those fuckers betrayed us. The Freys and Boltons they planned this, we shouldn't had trust that greedy old cunt." Dacey said, she looked weaker than ever.

"Robb and the others are their prisoners, the Greatjon didn't make it." She continued, "your dragon helped us too, he burned many Freys." She looked pale as the mist that surrounded them.

"I failed you" Jon said, "I'm so so sorry"

"We failed together, were there together." Dacey tried to share the burden of the failure, "I need you to ask you a favor" she added as she moved Longclaw to Jon's legs. "Take care of this sword, this is the only precious thing that we have in Bear Island" her hands were shaking just as her head. "Please" she begged.

"We will take care of it together" Jon replied, he couldn't accept loosing another friend.

Dacey gave him a subtle nod and rested her head on Jon's shoulder, "Yes, we take care of it together" she said softly, her hands stopped shaking then and Jon understood that she was already gone.

"I'll take care of it for you" he whispered between sobs, 'How many friends I'll loose?' he asked inside his head. He wanted to go back into the darkness, be alone in silence for ever, he didn't want see more suffering.

Then he saw Arya coming back with Jory, they noticed immediately that Dacey was dead, Jon didn't want to be there, he only wanted to disappear, maybe he was a mistake, his parents made a mistake that brought pain and suffering to the Seven kingdoms, and now, he did the same thing.

'Look at the fire' he thought, the words of the mysterious woman ringing in his ears, 'They shall pay for what they have done' he thought, but those were his thoughts, the reality was much worse, he was an outlaw now, Arya and Jory too, they needed to find a safe place to hide, loosing Arya again wasn't an option for him.

The solution for his problem was hanging from his neck, a silver coin that an old friend gave him, a silver coin from the other side of the Narrow Sea, he took the coin from the collar and showed it to Jory. "We need to find a ship with this sigil" he said.

"I didn't know this sigil, your grace" Jory replied respectfully.

'Your grace' he thought 'I'm the king who lost his army and his people, I'm not a king at all.'

"I'm not a king, Jory, not anymore" he said with a sad tone. "This coin is from Essos, from the city of Yermak, it is the only place where we will be safe, I can't ask you to come with us, but Westeros isn't a safe place for Arya and me, not anymore." He said.

"We shouldn't run away and hide our heads under the sand! Look what they have done to us, to our family!" Arya replied, she was notably angry and Jon understood that she was right.

"Your cousin is right my lady, you can't stay here anymore, my uncle always said that we shouldn't run away from the battle, but right now Lord Snow is to weak to fight any battle. I shall go with you wherever you go, I made that promise to your father, little lady." Jory said with the respectful tone that he used to address the little girl.

"But they killed my father, they have my mother and Sansa!" Arya argued.

"And that's the reason why I can't loose you too." Jon took a deep breath and tried to get on his feet, it was a struggle, but pure will was stronger than the tiredness or the pain, he walked towards the horses. "I had lost enough people, please, trust me." He said with a subtle desperate tone.

Somehow his words made Arya's stubbornness disappear, she walked towards him and looked him straight in the eyes. "Do you promise to never leave me alone again?"

"I do" Jon replied with a solemn tone.

"And I will go wherever you go?" she asked.

Jon smiled then and tried to kneel in front of the girl but he didn't know if he could rise after doing it. "I promise you that my one and only objective now is take you to a safe place, I will not look for revenge until you can fight with me, side by side."

"Then we should find a ship as soon as we can" she said smiling.

In that moment, they heard a couple of howls and a dragon screech coming from the mist.

"They are alive" Jon said.

"Of course, we saved them from being butchered in the Twins" Arya replied.

With that they began the long journey to find a ship from Yermak.

A few days later...

The docks were a dangerous place, but they needed to find the ship, the smell of the sea filled Jon's nose, the wind promised him good fortune, or at least that was what he thought. When he thought that they wouldn't find the ship there, he saw it, the biggest ship that he had ever seen, it was beautiful and the blue banner with the iron mask was on board dancing with the wind.

Jon walked towards a man that looked like a member of the ship's crew. He was a big man with copper skin and a long black beard, he wore a blue surcoat. "Excuse me good sir, do you know where I can find the captain lf this ship?" Jon asked politely.

"The captain is busy boy, what do you need from him?" the man replied roughly and with a distinctive accent, the same accent that Vogonos had.

"I need him to take me and my companions to Yermak" Jon answered.

"Do you have gold?" the man asked.

"No, but I have this" Jon showed the silver coin, and noticed that the man was surprised. "Vogonos Vollaan gave this to me, he said that I only had to give this coin to a captain from your city to cross the narrow sea, now, can I speak to the captain please?"

"Don't worry boy, I'll take you and your companions to Yermak, you must be very important for Vogonos if he gave you that coin." Then man said, "My name is Lirio and this is my ship 'the swimming lizard'"

Jon walked back to the inn where they were hiding, he walked through the streets filled with people from many nations and cultures, he saw the ugly houses, they were all white and small, until he reached the inn.

He made his way back to the ship again with the wolfs, Arya and Jory. Caraxes knew exactly where they were going and followed them from the heights.

"You never told me that you had dogs with you boy, anything else that you want to tell me?" Lirio asked annoyed.

Jon was about to tell him when the crew started to scream, Caraxes was standing on the pope, the white and red dragon had a small cow between his claws.

"We will talk about the payment when we reach Yermak, captain, I promise" Jon said a little embarrassed with the situation. "I can assure you that he won't hurt any of your crew members"

"Well, you're asking me to take a dragon, a real dragon with us, what if it burns my ship and we drown in the sea?" captain Lirio asked worried.

"I give you my word that it won't happen, I promise you that by my honor as a knight." Jon said with a solemn tone.

"Then we should go now, before they notice your dragon." Lirio spat bitterly.

They had a long journey ahead, but Jon was sure of something, he was safer in Essos with the slavers and savages than in the treacherous lands of Westeros. But then again he thought about his friends and family, he was a broken man, a broken dragon, nothing would erase the stain of being betrayed by your allies, the disgrace of loosing the ones you love.

He felt fear of the unknown lands, maybe he would find something that he didn't want to find there, a long lost relative or something worse.