The week of preparation blended together like one long, drawn out day until, suddenly, the volunteers were taking their leave. They split up across the icy line between land and sea, becoming black shapes moving away from Shadowedge on the white landscape. Their figures laden with crude tools and satchels. After fiercely saying goodbye to Willa and clapping Jon on the shoulder, Tormund had left as well.
An eerie hush fell over Shadowedge as their fellow clansmen were lost to sight amongst the snow and trees.
"This will work," Jon assured Dany as the other villagers unenthusiastically turned back to their daily lives. Dany watched solemnly as Kolla herded Enda and Nerell back to their house, her voice as even as ever though her expression said otherwise. Worry and anticipation were palpable in the air. Splitting up, ever since Dorand died, seemed like a bad idea. But surely it must be a worse idea to live in fear? Dany nodded in agreement to Jon's words, but looked to Willa concernedly, only to find that she had disappeared from her side.
Somehow, Dany knew that she was not meant to follow the tracks that undoubtedly led to Willa's house. She had barely spoken to Willa since the day they discussed the sulfur and had no idea what happened, only that her friend had become evasive and distant.
That night, Dany slept badly. The handmade feather bed she loved so much felt lumpy and hot. When she stuck a leg out from under the furs, it immediately felt frozen. She was itchy. Jon was too close and too far away. Her nightshirt bunched in the wrong way, but felt strange stretched out. And she had no idea where to put her arms.
Dany did not know when she fell asleep, only that it was after multiple restless hours.
She dreamt that she was riding Drogon over the Dothraki Sea. Amongst the plains were towers of weathered stone draped in multicolored banners. They didn't belong. Drogon's chest rumbled as he opened his jaws and breathed out a huge jet of green flames. The towers crumbled away, their banners disintegrating. As the one nearest her fell, Dany saw Willa stumble alone out onto its balcony. She gripped the last bits of railing and fixed her golden stare on Dany.
It was dark in the house when Dany opened her eyes. Not even a whisper of pre-dawn light crept through the din, but she could see the dragon egg glowing faintly on the mantle. It still had not changed since it began to glow without pulsing and Dany was beginning to wonder what else she could do for it, if anything.
She heard Jon's soft snoring and felt his arm draped lazily across her stomach as he slept on peacefully, unaware of his wife's turbulent dreams. The sound was comforting, but she felt lonely without him awake and knew that sleep was not coming back. I don't think I want it to, she thought, Willa's golden gaze swimming in her mind as if it was accusing her.
Slipping deftly from Jon's arm, careful to gently rest it on her bunched up furs, Dany left the bed and quietly walked to look in on Rose. Ghost raised his head as Dany came in.
Her daughter was as fast asleep as Jon, hands raised above her head as if in celebration and a look of contentment across her small face. Dany brushed a stray curl from Rose's cheek. The toddler wrinkled her nose before nestling further into her bed.
"I love you, Rosie," Dany whispered as she backed out of her daughter's bedroom.
Her body seemed to steer itself without warning. Before she registered what she was doing, Dany had slipped into her warm clothes and boots, thrown the hood to cover her loose hair, and was headed for the door. A low whine sounded from behind her.
Ghost's red eyes had never looked sadder. He whined again when Dany turned around. Initially, Dany had planned to tell him to go back to Rose, but the whine and the faint wagging tail convinced her otherwise. Dany opened the door quietly and gestured the direwolf out.
Happily, Ghost trotted outside into the frosted air and Dany followed behind him. It would be nice to have some company for the walk.
The Haunted Forest looked different in the dark. Trees seemed to loom in tall domes, and the ice and snow looked almost spectre-like in the moonlight. Dany did not often go outside alone after dark, except to feed Embar and relieve herself. If she were being honest (seeing as no one could read her thoughts), she was afraid of the dark woods.
Almost every free folk had told her that the Haunted Forest was a brighter place now that the White Walkers had gone, but all this did was make Dany glad she only had come to the North later. Yet, as she walked on the northern path from her home's clearing, which was covered with a fresh flurry of snow, it felt safer than before.
It could have been because she was in the company of Ghost, who bounded through snow drifts with ease, crossing back and forth over the path. But Dany felt it was more so because she knew what the biggest thing in the forest was now. She wasn't afraid of dragons, so what else did she need to be afraid of?
Ghost came up beside Dany, leaning his weight into her as she walked up the steep incline that led into the Gods' Clearing. The hulking black form of Drogon was nestled beneath the center heart tree, darker than the shadows, but Dany did not see any of the other three dragons as she made her way to him. Early hunting? she wondered.
"Go off for a while," she murmured to Ghost, who shrunk back as Drogon skated his head over the snow to see who the visitors were. Ghost whined, but listened and slunk off back into the forest, no doubt in search of a sleeping meal.
Drogon's eyes blinked lazily as Dany approached him. She heard his rumbling purr of greeting and reached out to brush her hand over his nose. His scales were warm like the sun on her skin on the Dothraki Sea, so different from when she had found him at the Mammoth's Head. The hatching of his children had allowed him to rest and warm up again. It also could not have been bad for him that Saphira had stopped making their environment virtually unlivable for anyone not made of ice. What you've done for love, she marveled, thinking of their similar journeys.
"They've gone off to help you," she told her child in Valyrian, stopping near his cheek so that they could look at each other properly. "People from our clan. We're destroying the paths up the cliffs. And telling the rest of the free folk what happened on the beach. How you protected us, that you're here now, that we need to protect you."
She settled down on the ground at the crook of Drogon's neck, still running her hand over his scales as she leaned against him. "This is our home now," she told the dragon, "Two Southerners who have come as far North as they could. Do you miss it?"
Though it may not have been in response to her question, a low groan rumbled in Drogon's throat. Dany noticed his eyes had closed contentedly again. "I miss the people," Dany admitted, the faces of lost friends swimming in her thoughts. She recited them, "Jorah. Rakharo. Irri. Ser Barristan. Drogo - although I don't think he'd take kindly to Jon. Your brothers. Missandei...but none of them are there now. Except for Grey Worm, maybe. But who's to say where he led everyone after I left?
"At least I didn't lead them to their deaths as well," she said, shuffling her feet in the crunchy snow, "I can't help but feel like that's what I'm going to do to our family now." She looked at him, frowning. "Willa isn't speaking to me. I had a dream about us betraying her and it still feels real, like I've made a horrible mistake."
I can't help but doubt myself.
She remembered the night that she had left Dragonstone with Jon, when the seeds of doubt were sown into her thoughts that her leadership had led to nothing - she'd been making the wrong choice. It was true then, that's why she agreed to leave. And if it was true then, how was she to know if this time would be any different?
Multiple times over the past week, Dany had been asked why the dragons could not simply leave. Privately, she thoroughly believed that Drogon and Saphira would not leave this part of the forest until their final dragonlet had hatched. They know something, she thought instinctively, remembering her thoughts on the egg when she awoke, there's something else. But she gave a more neutral answer when asked - one she thought Tyrion would use.
"Whether or not they stay, this is where they were last seen. Do you think it will make a difference if the dragons are actually here or not?" Rallying people to protect the dragons, and themselves, from invaders was the only solution she had.
But would her plan have unforeseen consequences, like what seemed to be happening with Willa? It could be months before any Essosi showed up on their shores having heard the story of dragons. If they never came, she had successfully convinced her people to cut off a significant swath of access to their eastern shores for no reason. In the meantime, she had potentially destroyed the secrecy that had seemingly protected ice dragons for thousands of years, and opened up the remaining free folk to a spark of dissent. The people of Shadowedge may want to protect the dragons (However grudgingly, Dany thought as she remembered their faces at the meeting), but if the rest of Westeros was any indication, not everyone would agree.
How strong were the old bonds of unity among the free folk when faced with dragons? Would others embrace them like Willa, Tormund, and Kolla and be willing to fight for them? Would they remain indifferent like Birger and Ulf, who didn't care what was in the sky or the forest as long as he could fish, but went along with the plan because it was to protect dragons and free folk? Or would they be like Inniq, only wanting to save themselves and stirring trouble in the process? The scarred villager had not joined any of the volunteers, but Dany had seen him skulk off towards the forest to hunt soon after everyone left.
Dany's thoughts fell into a stalemated silence, unable to answer any of the questions she was asking. Leaning her head back, she tried to allow herself to rest against Drogon without thinking. He must be asleep, she thought, noting that his breathing was low and even. It was warm and comfortable to be nestled into his side, and Dany slowly lost herself in the stillness of the waning darkness. The world had faded from black to soft gray now, as if dawn were just beginning to peek its eyes open and decide whether or not to wake up. As of yet, nothing had stirred. There was no sign of Ghost, nor Saphira, Nutmeg, and Lavender. No little critters shifted underneath the snow, and the wind was too faint to encourage the trees to dance.
Absently, she ran her hands over her growing stomach, taking comfort in being in the presence of two of her children. It was so quiet that Dany thought she could have heard her baby's first kick of the day if it had not been for Drogon choosing that minute to sigh deeply and shift in his sleep, curling his long tail around to rest the tip by where Dany sat against him. Beginning to feel sluggish from the warmth that emanated from Drogon, Dany closed her eyes.
"Couldn't sleep?" said a dull voice.
Dany had drifted off just enough to miss hearing the crunching footsteps of someone else coming into the Gods' Clearing, but the words wrenched her back from the edge of sleep into the present. For a fleeting moment, she thought that Drogon had spoken to her and opened her eyes in shock.
Willa was standing in front of her.
"What are you doing here?" Dany asked, blinking to adjust her eyes to the predawn light now layered over the clearing. Even in the dimness, Dany could see that Willa's eyes were swollen. When she spoke again, her voice rasped.
"I asked you first."
"I felt uncomfortable in bed and restless, so I took a walk," she explained promptly, "I've been here since before first light. Why are you here?"
Willa ignored Dany and stepped over Drogon's tail to kneel down next to her. "Are you all right?" she asked, immediately reaching to check Dany's head for signs of fever.
"No - yes - no, I mean, I'm fine. It was just a bad night."
"Ah," Willa said, dropping her hand and leaning back on her legs. She did not say anything else, instead looking passively at the sleeping form of Drogon and then fiddling with the fur of her coat.
Dany could not help but think about how strange it was to be in this situation. Nestled in the side of her sleeping dragon in the frozen Haunted Forest before morning with her best friend casually sitting next to her as if this was an everyday occurrence that they found each other before dawn in the dragons' den whilst in the midst of a silent falling out of some sort.
From the depths of her bewildered thoughts, Dany realized that it had never truly struck her, until this very moment, how perfectly at ease Willa was with dragons.
Some people tried to act casually around them. Jon was fairly good at it, seeing as he had bonded with Rhaegal, but Dany knew that her husband would never be completely relaxed in close proximity to any dragon. Others took not reacting to dragons as a sign of strength, and it was something her allies and armies had always displayed and her enemies had tried to, but their eyes betrayed them.
With Willa, though, there was no hint of fear or apprehension. She was not touching Drogon, but it simply seemed to be because she was comfortable where she was sitting.
Unlike Willa's ease around dragons, their silence had begun to stretch to an uncomfortable length. It felt different than the normal Willa silence that came with a friend who just wasn't very talkative. Dany could feel the tension of whatever was making Willa act so differently since the day of the clan meeting and tried to lessen it by breaking the stillness. "You said you couldn't sleep?"
Willa looked up and nodded once. "The bed's too empty," she said shortly, "It's cold. I hated that part."
"From before Tormund?"
Again, she nodded. "It's the only time I've ever slept alone." She paused, looking past Dany at Drogon slumbering peacefully, as if jealous that the dragon could sleep happily whether or not his mate was there. Her golden eyes flashed back to Dany before dropping to her hands. "I've been avoiding you," she admitted quietly to her hands. Shifting, Willa slumped her legs out from under her into a more settled position.
Dany leaned forward, reaching out to touch her friend's knee. "I'm sorry," she told Willa, "For whatever I did. I didn't mean to upset you."
"It wasn't you," Willa said, "Not really. Just what you said. What I haven't said."
She tugged at the end of her braid, making the bells tinkle faintly, and smiled almost pitifully before speaking again. "I never...had my own bed before coming to Shadowedge, not even my own sleeping mat - it was too much to carry when we moved on," she told Dany. Her eyes seemed to be focused on Dany's knee, or her stomach, or somewhere just beyond. "When we made camp, we all slept together around the fire, all twenty-three of us. We would always be up late telling stories and swapping trinkets to wear in our hair or on our clothes. They always had some sort of meaning according to the giver. 'Your hair is brown and this shell is brown.' 'This feather is pretty like you are.'" She brushed her hand through her hair, revealing the eagle feather and smiling at the memory. "And I always slept in between my sisters because Tove hated Hazel kicking in her sleep - we called her Hare until her second nameday - and my brother slept across our heads. My father always took first watch. I remember that I had to look and see if he was sitting up before allowing myself to sleep. I don't ever remember being cold at night even though we only pitched a tent if it snowed.
"The people who knew my tribe said that we wandered more than anyone else in the north. My father didn't believe in fighting, so we never stayed anywhere long enough to get into an argument, only long enough to trade and exchange news...and heal the sick. We were good at that. Most of us had average healing skills, but once in a while there was a real woods witch in the tribe. With the superb healing and the dreaming and the innate skill. I've been told my mother was one...and I was one too...I guess. I had dreams of the future - usually where we should head next or avoid - and the people I healed always seemed to get better faster. Even from the worst of sickness, they recovered. I just knew how to help. Until the disappearances started."
At this, she stopped. Dany stared unabashedly. Willa had never talked about her past, although Dany knew that she had been with Mance Rayder, at Hardhome, and finally in the crypts at Winterfell...and that her tribe had called her Little Bear.
She was unsure if she wanted the story to continue. After all, she knew the end.
Nonetheless, Willa began to speak again, but her smile had shifted. Her voice sounded cold and emotionless. "We'd never been scared of the woods before, scared of sleeping at night or foraging on our own. By the time we joined Mance as healers, there were eighteen of us left. Tove was one of the ones who disappeared, only the moon before. When we got to Hardhome, there were sixteen. Arrows to the back when we ran from the ambush. My brother was one of them. I wanted to stop to help him, but he shouted to stay with Hazel. I remember him trying to crawl...
"Then there were three of us. My father pushed our boat away from the shore at Hardhome. He made sure we all got on, tore the pouch from his neck and said to look out for Hazel, and then he turned around and ran to help another boat."
Dany stopped herself from opening her mouth, but Willa seemed to already know the question she was going to ask. "The sulfur," she said, "that I showed you the other day. I never found out what it meant to him. I...try not to remember it too much, but it was a gift.
"After Hardhome, we joined up with the survivors and ended up at Winterfell. We shared a sleeping mat still. Then you came with Jon, Saga chose to fight, and Hazel and I went to the crypts. And when the dead rose," she sucked in a breath, suddenly speaking thickly and very fast, "I - I -" She broke off, rocking and holding herself close, eyes seeing more than Dany and Drogon.
"I couldn't look out for her, Dany, there were just too many of them," she finally said in a hoarse whisper. "And after Hazel died, they just kept dying. My family was gone, my home was gone, and my people just kept dying. All I had left of them was a bunch of trinkets in my hair. When I met you, I was going to Shadowedge because I had only dreamt of the sea since Hazel died and foolishly thought someone from my tribe could be there. That I wasn't alone. Nobody was, of course, I knew it was foolish. So I planned to visit you once as promised and then disappear into the woods like Tove had. There was no one left to remember - "
Unable to bear it anymore, unwilling to hear the rest, Dany lurched forward and held Willa in a desperate hug. Dany could feel hot tears slide over her hands as she brought them to Willa's cheeks and pressed their foreheads together.
"I would remember you," Dany told her fiercely.
Taking in a shuddering breath, Willa nodded in Dany's hands. "I know now," she said, blinking several times to stop the tears. She searched Dany's face and suddenly broke into a watery smile. "The minute you walked into my tent unannounced, told me you found a place to build a house, and handed me a huge bird to pluck for your damn mattress, I think I knew then."
Willa took Dany's hands from her face and held them between their laps, brushing up against Dany's stomach. "Things are better now," Willa insisted. "I just...after seeing the sulfur and the woods witch comment and Tormund leaving and everything that's happened, I just really needed to tell you. Tell someone."
"I understand," Dany said, "It can make you freer when you let everything out to someone - I learned that with Jon when we left Dragonstone." Willa nodded in agreement, Hazel's eagle feather slipping into the dark brown locks and out of view.
"I hate the past," she said darkly, "but I'm afraid to let it go."
"You don't have to," Dany replied.
For a few moments, the women simply knelt together, encircled by a still sleeping Drogon, as the sun peeked between the trees into the clearing. Then, the baby kicked again and Willa's hand jerked. Dany, who had closed her eyes to enjoy the feeling of the light, could hear Willa smile. She felt her friend shift, and was soon being pulled upwards to stand.
"Come on," Willa said, her voice stronger than before, "Let's give him some peace and quiet and get to your house before Jon starts panicking."
Dany nodded, looping her arm through Willa's, unwilling to let go just yet. As they stepped over Drogon's tail and began their way out of the clearing, Dany glanced back at her child. His nostrils flared in his sleep and she smiled, grateful.