"Your Grace," Ser Davos greets her, and seeing her bearing food for his king, he reaches for the door knob. "He was still sleeping last I checked, but I agree that we should get some food in him."
"Thank you," she gives him an appreciate smile as he opens the door for her. "You should go and eat something yourself before the others have finished it all. I can take care of him."
"You know how stubborn he can be, Your Grace."
"I'm sure you and Jon Snow have said the same of me," she replies.
After a moment, the smuggler nods and gives her a half smile, "Aye. He'll probably listen to you better than he would me. And I'm sure he'd rather you feed him than me. I will leave you to it, Your Grace."
The door closes behind her, and she takes a minute to look at the man lying in the bed. The furs have been pulled up over his chest since she had left him a few hours ago, and when her eyes trail up to his face, she finds him awake and watching her.
"You don't actually intend to feed me, do you, Your Grace?" Jon asks, having heard her conversation with Ser Davos, and wearily adjusts his body so that he is sitting up and resting back against the pillows.
She laughs as she crosses the small cabin and stands at the bedside, "I suppose that depends on whether or not you will eat on your own. I thought it best to start with something a little lighter so it's just broth and bread, but if you want more, I can get it. The options on the ship, though, are rather limited."
"This will be fine. I don't think I would be able to handle much more right now."
Daenerys offers him the bowl of broth, but when his fingers touch it, he hisses and quickly retracts his hand.
"I am afraid that my fingers are a bit sensitive from the frostbite. Though from the steam coming off that bowl, I'm not entirely sure how you are managing to hold on to it."
"I have a high tolerance for heat in addition to being immune to fire," she admits, offering him the bread from her other hand as she sits down on the edge of the bed beside his knee, still facing him. "I don't even realize things are hot except times like this when people point them out."
"When they said you were unburnt, I assumed it was a figure of speech," he says.
"It was not an exaggeration, and what Ser Davos had said about you does not appear to be either," she lets her gaze fall to the scar that she now knows is over his heart. He does not answer or look at her as he tears off a piece of bread and puts it in his mouth, and she decides to drop the subject. "I will show you sometime."
"That was how you hatched the dragons? In a fire?"
"Yes."
Jon lifts the spoon from the bowl that she still holds, giving it a moment to cool before lifting it to his lips. Finding the broth at an acceptable temperature, he reaches for the bowl once more.
"I can hold it for you," she offers, not wanting him to burn himself again, and at his nod, she moves it a little closer to him. "How did you get away from all of them? How did you get a horse?"
He swallows another spoonful of broth before setting the spoon back in the bowl, "I fought to get back to the surface. They all started to come at me when I made it back onto the ice. A man on the back of a horse appeared, fought them off, and then put me onto the horse."
"A man on a horse saved you from all of those… those dead things?"
"Not any man. It was my Uncle Benjen. He was First Ranger of the Night's Watch, but he disappeared north of the wall before I joined. We went out to search for him and found the wildlings and White Walkers instead."
"I am glad that he saved you. And I am sorry that I did not. We should not have left you behind," she says, sadness filling her voice again as she thinks about how she had almost lost him.
He quickly shakes his head, "If you hadn't left, you would have lost another dragon. And in any case, I'm not that easy to kill."
"So it seems," she gives him a tight smile.
He soaks his last piece of bread in the broth before finishing it and then tells her, "Thank you, Daenerys. I am not sure I can finish the rest right now."
She places the half-empty bowl on the small table beside the bed, and when her eyes fall on him once more, he is shivering. "Jon?" her hand covers his.
"I'm fine," he says, trying to keep his body from shaking as his fingers press further into hers, seeking her warmth. The broth had warmed his insides but it seems to have made his skin even colder.
Dany watches him for a moment, frowning at his obvious discomfort at the cold. Setting aside the emotions that their earlier conversation had brought forth, she pulls her hand from his and stands, "I should have done this before."
When he realizes that her fingers are working at the clasps of her dress, he quickly shakes his head, "Your Grace, that is unnecessary."
The black dress falls from her shoulders and she bends to remove her boots, "I can help you get warm. Dragons have fire in their blood."
"Dany, please stop," he pleads when she is upright again, fearing she will remove her tunic or trousers next.
The nickname that she had chastised him for earlier catches her attention, and her eyes meet his. Realizing now what she seems to be offering him, she blushes and looks away, "I merely meant to share my warmth with you, Jon Snow, not…"
He studies her face, and though he wants to smile at the sudden shyness that has come over the Dragon Queen, his teeth are chattering to much. "You didn't have to remove you clothes."
"My dress is meant to insulate me; it's not conducive to sharing the warmth," she looks back up at his face. "I will keep the rest on."
It is now the King of the North who looks away in embarrassment as he mumbles, "They removed my breeches… and my smallclothes."
She sets her hand on his shoulder, and he involuntarily leans into the warmth of her touch. "I will not besmirch your honor, Jon Snow."
"It isn't my honor that I'm worried about."
"Then you best be moving over so that we can get you warmed up before anyone else comes in here."
Jon knows that this is a dangerous idea. He had had feelings for her for weeks and her finally believing him - seeing that she would be a queen who takes care of her people - had just intensified those feelings. The only thing that had kept him from revealing these feelings to her hours earlier was the knowledge that the Queen of the Seven Kingdoms could never have a relationship with a bastard. Despite all of this, he finds himself scooting to his left and lying down again, unable to resist her offer of warmth when he has been unable to shake the cold.
Daenerys climbs under the furs and lays on her side facing him. When he remains on the far edge of the bed, she says, "In order for this to work, you are going to have to be much closer to me."
He adjusts so that they are facing once another in the center of the bed and waits for her to make the first contact.
She wraps her arms around his back, pressing her upper body to his and tucking her head beneath his chin. "Put your arms around me, Jon Snow," she instructs.
He follows her command. Within moments, he can feel the warmth of her starting to push the chill out of his own body, and he relaxes into her. He shifts his leg, knee bumping her thigh and his toes brushing against the top of her foot.
Startled, she jerks her foot away from him and exclaims, "Your feet are frozen!"
"I apologize, Your Grace," he says quickly, bending his knees slightly to keep his feet away from hers. A minute later, one of her knees slips between his and her other calf rests on top of his, their legs entangling. "What are you doing? You just said my feet were too cold."
"They are far colder than the rest of you, and you can't fight the army of the dead if you lose your feet. I see no other way that we are going to warm them up," she reasons.
Seeing no point in arguing with her, he is quiet for a few minutes. The silence, however, just leads his mind to stray to thoughts of the feel of her pressed against him, and he searches for a distraction. "So the fire in your blood does not make you immune to the cold then?"
"Unfortunately not," she chuckles. "I am quite unsure how anyone could want to live in such a cold place."
"It's not always so cold. And it's nicer to look at than the crowds and filth of the city."
"That was the one thing that did like about the Dothraki way of life - being more connected with nature and not tied down to one place. And I will admit that the snow was beautiful to view from the sky."
"You are the first Targaryen to travel beyond the wall. In fact, you're the first Targaryen north of the Trident in probably a century," Jon informs her. "Except for Maester Aemon, I suppose."
Comforted by the rumble of his voice in her ear pressed against his skin, it takes her a moment to realize that she is unsure who he is talking about. "Maester Aemon?" she questions, pulling back to look at his face, though with their arms still tightly around one another their noses are nearly brushing.
"He was the older brother of Aegon the Fifth. He became a maester because he didn't want the throne and then when the rest of your family was murdered or escaped, he joined the Night's Watch to renounce his claim to the throne once more. I think most people had forgotten he was even still alive though."
"I would like to meet him. Is he still at the wall now?" she asks, her heart lifting at the thought of still having some family.
"News of you in Essos did reach us at the wall, and he had wanted to meet you as well. He was 102 years old but now… I'm afraid he has died."
Hopes dashed, she buries her face against his chest once more to keep him from seeing her sadness. He rubs his palm over her back soothingly, knowing her sorrow without needing to see her.
"Jon?" she eventually says.
"Yes, Dany?" he replies, the nickname easily slipping from his lips before he can catch it, and he immediately corrects himself. "Daenerys."
"I do not mind Dany when it comes from you," she responds softly.
A small smile tugging at his lips at her approval, he repeats it, "Dany."
"You have been fighting to keep the North an independent kingdom. Despite your resistance to my reign, I had agreed to aid in your fight against the army of the dead. So why did you bend the knee?"
He does not answer.
"Jon?" she prompts, shifting so that she can look into his eyes once more.
"I meant what I said before - you deserve it, and my people will come to see that."
"I deserve it because I am the rightful heir to the Iron Throne?"
"If I thought that you should sit on the throne because of your birthright, I would have bent the knee when I first arrived at Dragonstone. I bent the knee because I see now why your people have followed you to Westeros. You care about your people, even those who have yet to acknowledge your rule. You have set your own desire for the throne aside for the time being in order to join our fight and give us a chance of survival. You sacrificed one of your children in order to rescue us even though Ser Jorah is the only one of us that recognized you as his queen."
"Now that they are grown, I had always assumed that my children were immortal. It wasn't exactly a sacrifice when I didn't know what we were up against - when I didn't know that the White Walkers I hadn't even believed existed could kill my dragons. And as soon as I knew that, I certainly didn't stick around to sacrifice another one of them, even if it meant leaving you to die," she argues.
"I believe in you, Dany - in your good nature, in your ability to be just yet compassionate, in the new and better world that you want to create."
"Do you really think we can form a truce with Cersei and convince her to join us against the army of the dead?" Daenerys asks timidly.
"Honestly? No, I don't think this will be successful."
"Then why did you risk your life if you truly believe we stand no chance?"
"Because without proof of the army of the dead, there is absolutely no chance Cersei would agree to a truce. You didn't even believe in its existence until you saw if for yourself. I don't think she will agree to a truce even with our proof, but at least this gives us a sliver of hope."
"Why did you come to me for assistance instead of Cersei in the first place?"
"You had the larger army. And dragons. And seemed like a more reasonable person to deal with. Plus I had presumed that the price of an alliance against the army of the dead would also be tied to an alliance in the war for the Iron Throne. The Lannisters are responsible for murdering my family and thousands of Northern men; while I know that it will be hard for my people to accept you as their queen, I am certain that they would never accept Cersei."
"So how do we win this, Jon Snow? It is unlikely we will be receiving any aid from Cersei, and she may in fact force us to fight two wars simultaneously. And as we have come to learn, my dragons are vulnerable."
"Dragons had disappeared from the world more than a century ago. I had heard the rumors of you bringing them back, but I didn't believe it until I saw them for myself. I don't want them to disappear again; I don't want you to have to lose another child. But I don't see how we can stand a chance without them."
Daenerys lifts an eyebrow at his words, "You didn't believe in the existence of my dragons until you saw them and they had only been gone from the world for a short time? You had fought White Walkers, who haven't been seen in so long that they were thought to be no more than a myth. You have faced the mindless killing bodies that have been raised from the dead."
"Not all of those who are raised from the dead want to murder the living," he replies.
Her hand moves from his back to in between their bodies, her fingers finding the deep scars that she had seen on his torso before. He doesn't move away from her touch, and their eyes remain locked on one another. "And why are you different from the others, Jon Snow?"
"It wasn't the Night King who brought me back; it was a Red Priestess."
"But it was he or his army that killed you?"
"No. It was my brothers from the Night's Watch."
She continues to stare at him for several long moments before speaking again, "Perhaps if you had told me that you rose from the dead, I would have believed you about this army of dead men that you wanted me to help you fight earlier."
"It isn't exactly a thing you share with someone you've just met. And had I told you, you probably would have just thought I was mad."
"I'd have thought you a man who believed he was a god because being king wasn't enough for him."
"This from the woman who can walk into a fire and emerge unscathed," he counters.
"I am no god," she looks away from him. "If I had thought so before, I know now that it is not true… not now that I know my dragons may soon cease to exist."
Jon does not answer for fear of getting himself into trouble. Certainly he could tell that she thought very highly of herself from the moment he met her, and while she has made many miracles happen, he knows that she is just as mortal as anyone else. She buries her face against his neck again, and the fingers of one of his hands trail done her spine to her lower back. Feeling her shiver against him, he asks, "I am not making you too cold, am I, Your Grace?"
"No," she mutters, not wanting admit that the shiver had nothing to do with the temperature. "Are you feeling any warmer?"
"Aye," he answers somewhat reluctantly, not wanting her to leave his bed quite yet.
"Good. If I wasn't providing enough heat, I thought I might have to get Drogon to warm you."
"I shall thank the Gods that you are warm because I am certain that I am not fireproof."
Daenerys laughs, "I know that, Jon Snow. I meant that the fire in his blood is much hotter than mine, though I am sure he would not be a very good bed partner."
Laughing in agreement, he says, "You are definitely the better option. Softer… less spikes and teeth. Won't crush me in my sleep. Although sometimes from the looks you give me I get the feeling that you too would like to set me on fire."
"I do not wish to burn you."
"Dany…" he whispers, a hand moving to cup her cheek.
She lifts her chin and stares into his dark eyes for a long moment before leaning in to brush her lips over his. Eyes still closed, she rests her forehead against his.
Fearing he will wake and find this all to be a dream brought on by the frostbite, he presses his lips to hers once more, wanting to savor this moment for just a little bit longer. He reluctantly parts from her lips, wishing that he was well enough to take advantage of the fact that she is in his bed right now, but his body is still drained.
"You should get some rest," she repeats the same words she had said earlier before she had left.
His arm tightens around her, "Don't go, Dany."
"I shall stay and keep the cold from returning while you sleep," she assures him.
"You should rest as well. Ser Davos said you stayed at my side from Eastwatch until I woke earlier today."
"I can't. All I see when I close my eyes is death."
"Please try, Dany, for me. I will keep you safe," he promises, lips meeting hers again in a gentle kiss before they both close their eyes to find some rest.