One of you awesome reviewers asked if I update this story on AO3 as well. Yes, I do! I also tend to post a little more discussion and writing process in my notes on there as well out of habit if that interests you.
Also if anyone has seen "The Dragon Prince" tv show, imagine that for our flashing egg only silver with some scattered golden scales.
In the month since Jon and Dany had returned from their journey, life regained the steady pace of normalcy that Dany had not realized how much she had missed. Aside from the silver and gold egg that had taken up residence by the fireplace and glowed to remind the other residents it was there, not much had changed. It was calming to her to wake up every morning having a general idea of what would take place. Each day she and Jon went about their respective chores before either heading into the village or working on larger projects at home. Their sheep-less barn had been damaged while they were gone, and both were working to fix it up and now look for sheep in earnest.
After putting Rose to sleep, they would often find each other in bed, the yearning kindled after they had left the Mammoth's Head still burning and being put into quiet action each night with soft touches, gentle kisses, and whispered words of love into each others' ears.
The most unpredictable part of life had, in some strange way, become Rose. But the unpredictability was exciting. Rose seemed to be reaching new milestones of her tiny life every day. She could now pull herself up to stand for a few moments, and enjoyed shouting at whoever was closest (usually Ghost) to show off. Whether or not she was over-personifying Rose, Dany thought that her daughter quite liked the attention and could not help but grin each time she saw Rose hollering with delight and standing with two hands on a chair, a shelf, or one of her parents.
Rose had also begun to form a semblance of words in her speech. Her babble had turned much more distinctive. Whenever she started this around Willa, the healer eyed her closely and Dany had come to believe that Rose may have already said her first word, though she did not mind Willa keeping that to herself.
Though it may not be her true first word, Dany and Jon enjoyed bantering about whether she would say "mama" or "papa" first. She claimed it would be "mama," but secretly, Dany thought it would be a delight to see Jon's face if their daughter said "papa" first.
Rose's personality had also taken a distinctive turn for the bold. Jon said she was becoming quite reminiscent of a young Arya, adventurous and unable to sit still. She was now quite mobile, grasping the concept of crawling and zooming across the floor whenever she could. They already had to keep everything grabbable out of her reach sitting, and now standing and crawling were added into the mix. She definitely knew the word for "no," given that one or both of her parents said it quite often whenever she tugged too roughly on Ghost's tail...or anything else. However, all adults still melted at her baby-toothed grin, and Dany found herself having to learn to work on her stern face for her daughter.
"I know we really want her to walk," Dany said to Jon late one morning as she turned Rose away from the fireplace where she had been angling to reach, "But if she keeps grabbing anything she can, I'll begin to have doubts."
Jon chuckled in response, briefly glancing up from fixing his boots. He, Dany, and Rose were dressed considerably lighter than they would have been a month ago. The passing storm from the north (which Dany was certain had something to do with Saphira) had dissipated and the days had started to become longer and more sunlit. To a Southerner, it was still very cold in comparison to somewhere like Winterfell even, but Dany enjoyed it. Although she sometimes missed the feeling of true heat from the sun on her body, she found that the cold reminded her more and more of home.
Her dreams no longer took her on an escape to the house with the red door and the lemon tree outside her window. Instead she would find herself inside her and Jon's little house by the Antler, a wood door they made themselves and a flourishing winter rose bush outside her window.
"Ready?" Jon asked Dany. She nodded, reaching down and picking up Rose, who had found a spot to sit under the table with a favorite toy: a ladle.
Outside, Ghost greeted his family with a wagging tail, bounding around them happily. His mouth was stained pink, and Dany guessed that he had already had breakfast that morning.
Jon went over to the lean-to and emerged moments later shouldering furs and some of the tools he had carved recently. They set out as a family on the well-beaten path to Shadowedge. Dany and Jon's hope was that they could eventually trade goods for a sheep or two when one passed through the village. Jon had settled into a role of both tanner and carpenter, preferring to dabble back and forth as not many free folk were particularly specialized, nor did they need coin and instead preferred to trade goods such as what Jon made. Saphira's storm had caused an influx of nomads in the area and word traveled quickly about the villages like Shadowedge that provided a few nights' shelter and good trading.
It was beginning to remind Dany of the Free Cities, although people only came from other parts of the north. There were less tongues exchanged and a less exotic nature of goods and people, but one never knew what they day could bring. Dany was starting to be able to tell where the travelers and nomads were coming from based on their look and dress.
There were those adorned with bone of walrus and seal from the frozen western shores past the Frostfangs. Hornfoots without anything on their leathery black feet. Strange silent free folk with pale eyes and faces dyed odd colors like purple and blue who Jon said lived in caves all over the north. Nightrunners, who were extraordinarily nimble on their feet and wore clothes that made very little sound when they walked. Dany even saw two spearwives riding snow bears once, though they didn't get much hospitality as everyone keenly avoided the bears.
Another time, several women dressed in sealskin strangely came up and began to pet Dany's hair, marveling at her in Old Tongue. Willa later explained that they believed she was blessed by the gods of snow and ice because of her silver hair - they wanted to touch the blessing. Thankfully, it hadn't happened again.
Today, Shadowedge was not quite what Dany considered bustling, but she heard several hagglers jabbering in Old Tongue as she and Jon walked into the village. Dany had not yet gotten the hang of Old Tongue (which was much more harsh sounding than Dothraki in her opinion), but she was learning to discern the tones of voice used in the harsh language. Often, however, she could not tell if people were threatening to kill each other or talking about the weather. The day the women pet her hair, Dany had feared they might be deciding how best to cook her.
Ghost gamboled along, tongue lolling out as he put on his dopiest face for unsuspecting travelers to hand over a piece of food.
"You already ate!" Jon called cheerfully after his direwolf. On village days, Ghost generally had five breakfasts.
Jon readjusted the furs slung over his shoulder and Dany did the same with Rose on her hip as they crunched over the icy ground towards the village center. We should just hook Ghost up to a baby dog sled, she thought as her arm tingled in protest.
They found Tormund right by the central fire pit used for gatherings, speaking quickly in Old Tongue to a particularly laden trader, and Willa a few feet away looking on intently with her arms crossed over her chest. As they came up, Tormund threw his hands down, raising his voice slightly.
"Have they had an argument?" Dany whispered as she went over to Willa, while Jon walked over to Tormund.
Willa moved her head from side to side. "Sort of. Tormund's trying to trade to use the man's spyglass, and he's not being agreeable," she explained, scoffing, "I mean. He just wants to borrow the damn thing!"
"What about Dorand's spyglass?"
"Missing," Willa told her, "I guess that's what happens when you barely use something." The village shared Dorand's single spyglass - a valuable object in the North - for everyone but it was usually only taken out when they went on larger hunting expeditions to follow herds of deer.
"Why does he need it?" Dany pressed, watching Jon now offering some of his furs to the trader as Tormund translated. Rose fussed, reaching out for Willa from Dany's arms.
Without paying much attention, Willa took the baby from Dany and settled her into position. Frustrating for Rose, Willa's beaded hair was tied up today (Willa learned quickly after having Rose as her charge for a month) and she could not reach any of the pretty ornaments.
"A group of people came from the shore cliffs saying they saw boats in the distance. We wanted to get a closer look, you know, just in case. Although it's probably just Thenns who think they're too important and civilized to walk," she snorted at the last statement. Both Tormund and Willa had a very poor view of Thenns (almost as poor as cannibals), who acted more like Southerners than free folk. Dany had never met a Thenn before, as they did not often come away from their mountain home. Of the free folk ways and clans that had been laid waste to by the Night King and the Army of the Dead, the Thenns had walked away relatively unscathed in comparison to the rest and had gone back to their original home after the war.
Tormund barked something at the trader before turning on his heel and lumbering over to where Willa and Dany stood. His face was red and Dany had no other word for his composure than "tetchy."
"I need some of your nutmeg," he hissed to Willa.
She looked at him aghast. "Do you know how hard that is to come by?" she snarled.
"What? Are you planning on spicing chicken for a fucking lord later?"
Unmoving, Willa crossed her arms harder over her chest and fixed Tormund with a blazing look.
"For the gods, woman, just do it!" he snapped, pointing at her house.
Surprisingly, this made Willa listen and she walked off towards her house with Rose. Dany caught a couple loudly muttered phrases of "oaf" and "lunatic" and "calls me woman," but Willa still returned a few moments later with a small pouch of nutmeg for Tormund.
In minutes, the trader left more laden than before with nutmeg and half of Jon's furs, while Tormund was left holding a bronze spyglass.
"Sorry about the furs," Tormund grunted to Jon as they walked up to the women.
Jon shrugged. "No need, no sheep to be seen today anyways. And we'd better have a look at what's out there."
"If they are Thenns," he muttered angrily, "I'll kill the lot of them before they make it up the cliffs."
Together, the four of them plus Rose headed out to the cliffs past the eastern end of Shadowedge. Jon and Dany's curiosity had been piqued as much as Tormund and Willa's for sightings of any boats on the Shivering Sea were incredibly rare. A few fishermen ventured out on odd occasions, but they never strayed too far from the shore.
Old Dryn told stories about Tyroshi slavers growing bold enough to invade the north and snatch free folk children in the dead of night. People used to hide whenever their ships were spotted. It was a shameful time for the free folk.
The slavers were ruthless, not caring if they killed or kidnapped. They had no code of honor, which Dryn proudly pointed out as a difference between the attacked free folk and the slavers. It made them nearly unstoppable, and, in the end, the free folk preferred to run rather than have their clans completely decimated. Even Tormund remembered the slavers from when he was a boy, when the kidnappings began to dwindle. Although he proudly boasted about killing a "Tyroshi cunt" when he was eleven, Dany saw a small flicker of fear cross his eyes whenever he told the story.
They tread carefully along the frosted ground up to the edge of the cliffs. Small footpaths dotted down the cliff faces to the shores below, where the children often went to find seashells or anything else that may have washed ashore. It was windy by the sea and Dany, who had taken over transporting Rose again, hugged her daughter close to shield her from the worst of the biting wind.
"I don't see anything from here," she said loudly to combat with the noisy wind.
"It'd be further out on the horizon," Tormund told her, fumbling with the spyglass to put it up to his eye.
For a moment, nobody said anything, three of them scanning the sea while Tormund twiddled and adjusted the trader's glass. "Ah! Hmm," he said at last, causing everyone to turn towards him. Tormund fiddled with the glass more and Dany tried to see what he was looking at. If she squinted very hard, it did look like a black dot could be a bit above the horizon. Although it could be an iceberg as much as a boat, she reasoned. It would be too far out to be a Thenn boat that was skirting down the coast unless the Thenns were very off course.
"Are they Thenns then?" Jon asked, squinting towards the horizon as well, "They're very far out if that's them. Tormund?"
Tormund didn't answer, seemingly transfixed on the black horizon dot. His mouth had parted slightly as he continued to look through the spyglass.
"Tormund!" Willa snapped impatiently.
The red man started, uncharacteristically almost dropping the spyglass. Wordlessly, he handed it to Jon and Dany saw a curious look flash on his face. It wasn't the fear that passed over his eyes when talking about slavers, but Dany would be lying to claim that it wasn't close.
She couldn't see how Jon reacted, but he placed the spyglass onto his eye as well and adjusted it as Tormund had, fixating on the same spot.
"Oh no," he croaked.