Arya was in no mood for gusty bloody journeys to the top of the Wall in rattling iron cages.

She had caught a diabolical cold from running about in her shift the week before and was so eager to dispel the memory of her – a Northerner – succumbing to such a lily-livered disease that she had become paranoid about doing anything that might stand the slightest chance of making it worse. She was also eager for Jo to stop remarking 'red nosie' every time she saw her (Arya was convinced that Jaime had put her up to it).

But her brother's face had been so desperately eager to please; so childlike in its desire to have the conversation that she knew they had to have, that she hadn't found the heart to say no to him.

She was leaving today with her husband and her child. She wanted to get Jo away from this place; away from the slightest chance of…whatever it fucking was happening again. She wanted her daughter's nightmares to stop, and her nights to be as untroubled as her days spent running happily about the training yard at Castle Black, playing tricks on the brothers and falling over from the weight of the sparring swords she tried to steal.

She wanted Jon to leave this place with them, but knew better than to ask him. And she knew that if she didn't talk to him now, she never would.

But we have talked, Arya thought, half-nervous, half-desperate as the cage rattled steadily upwards; Jon's hand heavy and protective on her shoulder; we've talked lots over the past week; sometimes with Jaime there, often alone; with her ghosts standing all around them. Their presence was easier here, because they were Jon's ghosts too, and sometimes when they talked of Winterfell, the lines in his face would vanish, and he would look like the boy that she had last seen seven years ago. A child of fourteen. Happy. And her brother.

He was sad now. It was like sadness had invaded him and turned him into someone else that it was somehow good for him to be. When the thought came to her, she didn't understand it.

She thought of the wound in his leg. She thought about all the other parts of his body where the walker's sword could have been buried. She thought of him, dead. She shuddered.

They reached the top of the Wall, and when Jon opened the cage with the practised ease of someone who had done it a hundred times, Arya strode to the edge with equal confidence. Jon seized hold of her at once; afraid that she would fall. When she didn't, he mussed her hair and put his arm around her, and it felt as though she were standing within a crack in time; a crack in possibility; as though it were possible that when she returned to the ground, she would find Mother and Father waiting for her, and Robb and Bran and Rickon – and Sansa – and she would have a family again.

Arya looked out at the North, and it stretched out forever.

The North. Her home. Her blood.

The cold sank into her bones like a lover, and it was a good hurt.

'You belong here,' Jon said quietly; not looking at her; 'this is your home.'

He doesn't want me to go, Arya thought, and she looked at him with tears stinging her eyes.

'I was born Northern and I will die Northern,' she mumbled; the tears beginning to freeze on her cheeks; 'but this is not my home anymore. I have a husband. We have a child. My home is wherever they are.'

Jon looked at her with cautious dismay, and for a moment, she thought he was going to cry too.

'But he's a Lannister –'

'I know.'

'But Bran –'

'I've explained.'

Jon grunted, and looked out at the North, as though her 'explanation' did not satisfy him in the least, and Arya knew, then, that she would leave this place with the breach between them standing wider and deeper than ever.

'Jon…you're my blood,' she stammered, 'you're all I've got left, apart from Sansa; I don't want us to end up –'

She stopped talking when Jon turned abruptly to face her, and kissed her forehead rather fiercely. His scent reminded her of their father.

They stood there for a moment, not moving. Then slowly, Jon turned once again to the North; his arm still holding hers.

'He's not so bad, really,' Jon almost-grudgingly remarked, 'when he isn't talking.'

'When he's sleeping, you mean?' Arya asked.

Jon smiled at her.

'And he did save my life when he could have left me to die. He could have taken Jo and run for it. It's what I would have done in –'

'You haven't thanked him, have you?' Arya interrupted, and folded her arms in satisfaction as Jon coloured with something that could very well have been embarrassment, 'or are you just trying to tell me that you like him?'

'I most certainly do not like him,' Jon growled.

'Do you respect him?'

'He fights funny.'

'He fights like me.'

'He's good at fighting funny, and I do not hate him for it. Satisfied?'

The relief she felt almost choked her. Relief. Fear. Love.

'Satisfied,' Arya mumbled. She knew that she could expect no more than that.

They stood in awkward silence for a while; no sound reaching them but the wind. Then Jon reached out and took her hand, and everything was alright again.

Jo wanted to ride with Nymeria in the litter that had been built to transport her back to Casterly Rock; the direwolf's leg being so badly damaged that she could not even manage a respectable limp.

Jaime had answered with a resounding no.

'But she'll be a lonely direwolfie if I'm not there,' Jo pouted; stamping her foot, 'it's not fair!'

'Calm yourself, my love,' Jaime insisted.

'Listen to me!' Jo insisted back.

'If you sit with her, the litter will break, and then we'll have to leave her on the side of the road.'

Jo's eyes widened in horror.

'The side of the road?' she squealed.

'Or in a ditch,' Jaime shrugged, 'that way she'd probably die sooner. It's the only merciful thing to do, really.'

At that point, Jo burst into tears, and Jaime hung his head in sheer exhaustion before scooping her up and rocking her back and forth in his arms; her head nestled against his chest as she sobbed and sobbed.

'Lighten up, Jo, I didn't mean it,' Jaime mumbled.

'But why…why do you want to kill Nymeria?' Jo sobbed bitterly, 'what's Nymeria ever done to –'

'It was just a joke, Father was joking,' Jaime told her as earnestly as he could; 'I do that a lot; I'm sorry.'

'You have such a way with children,' Jaime heard a voice remark, 'I can't think why you don't have more.'

Jaime rolled his eyes. Snow.

'My aunt Dorna loves making exactly the same remark,' Jon said; turning to face his good-brother; 'only she's less polite about it.'

'Really?' Snow remarked, 'you surprise me. I thought Southern women all walked around with universal sticks up their arses.'

'So they do, but this one is fond of mistaking the stick for the sun,' Jaime replied.

Jon made no reply to that particular observation, and the conversation rapidly petered out into nothingness; punctuated only by the sound of Joanna crying.

Then Snow mumbled something in a manner so inarticulate that Jaime did not understand him.

'Say again?' Jaime asked.

Jon glared at him as though he had misheard on purpose, then blurted out.

'Thank you for saving my life.'

Jaime's mind tipped inside-out in astonishment.

Is he joking?

It took him less than a second to reason that the boy would not be looking so awkward (or so angry) if he were.

'I could not watch you die and do nothing,' Jaime mumbled, 'my wife would have killed me. Not that that I would've let you die if – if – '

But he could think of nothing else to say, and they were saved by the rapid arrival of Arya, who immediately began to talk to Jon with all the misplaced breeziness of someone trying not to cry.

Jaime watched her face, and the bravery in her storm-grey eyes without hearing a word that she was saying. When his gaze wandered to Snow's face, he saw the same eyes; the same bravery; the same sadness: a man who loved his sister and missed her. Jaime could admire him for that. Perhaps someday he could even like him for it.

Arya embraced her brother fiercely, and broke away; allowing Jon to help her mount up. She arranged her leathers, then leaned down so that Jaime could pass Jo to her. At their child's waist, their hands touched, and she gave him a small smile. He loved her. Gods, how he loved her.

Alone and still unmounted, Jaime turned to his good-brother to find Jon offering him his hand. The boy looked into his eyes and did so without grimacing.

Jaime took his hand, and shook it; though they both gripped rather hard.

It would be alright. They would be alright.

'Farewell, Lannister.'

'And you, Stark.'