A/N: hey guys! sorry to be late. I loved all the kind reviews you left! a little note here, my beta, unfortunately, was too busy to check out this chapter, so if you notice any mistakes, I'm terribly sorry.
Val I. 20th of May, 298 AAC. Beyond the wall.
The sharp coldness of smooth stones slowly doused the flaming bolts of pain in Val's tender palms. She hissed as she gripped them tighter, wishing that she had been abed instead of spending all those late hours of the evening grinding cheap spices in an old, cracked mortar. It wouldn't have mattered, she supposed; sleep had rarely graced anyone she knew for the past three days, her and Jon least of all.
Jon, who had kept thrashing and kicking his covers only an arm's reach away, once huffing and muttering, once jolting up and pacing as if the witch-leaders who attended Mance's gathering had placed a spell on him, refrained from doing so for the first time this night. Sleep was yet to attend him, however; his glassy, gray eyes were still fixed on the ceiling, shining with what little flame of golden light that still lived in the dying hearth.
Val turned to face him quietly, refusing to break whatever trance his mind was lost to. She wished he had confided in her like he was wont to when they were still children, before the sight of the Others soured his innocence, before the awkwardness piled up between them.
Would he feel better if he returned to the room he shared with his mother, then? Or would the coldness take him in his sleep after dear Lyanna had left to the south and taken her body warmth and bed furs with her?
The thought of it sent bile up Val's throat; Jon, with his lips an icy blue and his skin an even paler color. How would she look Lyanna in the eye, then? What would Dalla tell her? And what would Mance do, if he lost the one hostage he held against the Starks?
Val often wondered if that was what went through the racing mind of the younger man in front of her. If the memory of his mother, pleading and begging for her son to accompany her south kept him up at night.
"She's coddling me, I'm a man grown now and she just wants to keep me by her side as if I were still a babe!" he had said at the gathering, scowling like the greenboy he is, unaware of the gravity of the situation. Val did not have the heart to tell him what Mance had truly planned. Not that anyone would speak of it; the trust in Lyanna's loyalty waned greatly after her true story was revealed.
Many raiders and spearwives condemned the southerner spy for lying all those years, for being the blood of kneelers and crows yet sent back to safety before them. Dalla had given each and every one of the hypocrites a good dressing-down, defending her chosen sister with so much vigor that it surely reminded Mance of why he fell in love with the free women in the first place.
"Mance himself was a southerner longer than Lyanna, and a crow. Lyanna has proved herself one of us for years, and she is the blood of Winter Kings no less, no one but the Gods could help us better," Val found herself saying, loud enough to erase the hideous scowl on Harma Dogshead's face.
Lyanna had also been a spearwife even, if only for a little time. She was steadfast and enduring, always yearning for a home she refused to return to.
Some other chieftains, like the Thenn Magnar, Devin Sealskinner, and the Great Walrus, were only interested in the advancement of the Others; they had changed the topic to recall the story of the latest encounter, and from then they discussed the fellowship of Lyanna's mission. It was almost as if everyone forgot their wariness of the kneelers, clamoring and pleading for Lyanna to take them and their children to the heart of southern lands.
"I want as many warriors as peacemakers on this quest, not children! Only a handful would go, three of each camp," Mance had bellowed, adding to the frustration of many. Ghost had to go as well, per Mance's insistence. The direwolf would provide enough credibility for Lyanna's identity in the south, at the cost of Jon's increasing loneliness.
Jon had pretended to care less about that than Mance ordering him to stay, yet Val heard her friend's grumbles as his connection to Ghost dimmed with the increasing distance. It was almost as miserable as the look of dawning realization darkening his face, three nights after the meeting, two nights after Lyanna left, and the night before this one, just after Mance had gone to settle some disputes with clansmen of another camp.
Suddenly, Jon cursed out loud, startling Val. He caught himself with the last syllable, biting hard on his lips and then glancing at her apologetically.
"Now what?" she hissed, frowning a little. His reply was an antagonizing huff escaping his lips, before turning his back to her and resuming his still composure. Better than a round of bitching, she supposed, although such stillness in his behavior started to feel a little alarming. Val raised her head barely enough to glimpse his solemn expression.
What is happening, Jon? What are you thinking? What are we going to do?
Nothing answered her thoughts, not even as she waited until the cold stones slipped from her loosening hands. Not even as the darkness gradually claimed her vision.
She found herself in front of an ancient weirwood tree, with a face matching the one on her brooch. A carpet of bright green grass was beneath her bare feet and a sky of bright summer blue above her head. Various birds chirped all around her, floating still in the air in colors she had only seen a handful of times. It felt like one of Lyanna's southern fairytales, where the knights saved the damsels, and the damsels married the kings, where it was too bright and beautiful and easily full of life.
The winds strengthened a little, blowing the fallen leaves against Val's face. The birds chirped louder, and the grass grew longer until it reached the tip of her hands. Val fell on her knees, praying before the Gods. She waited for the Others to come, dreading the winter they would bring to turn her dream into a nightmare. The grass wrapped around her legs, firm even as it started withering. The birds turned into crows, hunting her flesh. A shuffle and a hiss drew closer, and an appearing shadow sent her eyelids flying open.
Jon was sitting up straight in his bed, his legs crossed and his arms resting on his knees like the gargoyle of Lyanna's stories. His eyes were staring forward, the gray in them almost looking white. Val held back a scream, just as she held back the urge to get out of her own furs and smack him bloody for the scare. Or worse, stick a wooden rod in his creepy eyes.
Val reminded herself that it wasn't worth it, preferring to chase after her lost sleep instead. She knew she had missed the chance when Jon stood up and started moving, beginning his nightly ritual. She breathed sharply in annoyance and he abruptly stopped, checking to see if she was still asleep.
Time to be considerate, you cunt?
She could play that game, closing her eyes just enough to trace his silhouette without him noticing. He only spared another glance at her before kneeling beside his bed, rolling his furs tightly onto one another and stuffing them into a satchel. He moved to the candles next, picking a few up and placing them above the furs, wicks facing downwards.
Did he not know that wax was too hard to find these days? Val almost jumped up to stop him, but he strode over her to grab some of his discarded clothes, putting a piece or two above the candles and donning the rest.
He stood in silence after that, contemplating his next move while Val tried to understand what he was doing. He looked around him again. Then, he left.
Once the door quietly closed behind him, Val sat upright in her bed, confused and reaching for her nearby dagger. There was no way she could find any more sleep, not with her curious, racing mind, nor with the only two pelts Jon had left on his bed to make up for his lost warmth.
Val stood, wrapping one of her white cloaks around her slim body and hastily shoving her feet into her boots. She peaked at Jon's shadow, moving at the end of the narrow hallway and down the uneven steps towards the kitchen.
She crept after him, her fingers tracing cracks in the walls. It reminded her that she was one of the few lucky enough to live in a stone house instead of a mere tent or a tiny, wooden cabin.
Jon, on the other hand, took such things for granted. Even now, he fiddled with the herbs she had just minced without her permission, then he moved to where they had stashed some supplies, grabbing another sack to fill it with anything but grains.
Val narrowed her eyes; Jon tended to wander and brood, haunting any place like a phantom, but these actions were that of a thief in the night. Blaming her curiosity, she stepped inside.
Jon yelped, startled, then he bit hard on his lips to cover his shrieks. "What for fuck's sake are you doing here?"
"Could ask you the same thing, dear," she said, pointing at the bundle of furs at his feet. "You know all of that is not yours to take, aye?"
His response was a mere shrug, with a blush rising up his neck. Val thought of alerting Dalla, who was still asleep beside her spearwives upstairs, but her sister had long earned some rest.
He looked up at her, guilty. "Did you get cold already?"
"No, that's not what woke me up. Come, put everything back in its place and I'll tell no one you were up late again." She turned around, stopping when she noticed how he remained rooted to his spot. She strode over to him then. "Jon, whatever do you think you're doing. Stop. This is not something you've planned."
"I have planned for this," he argued, taking a step back.
"What plan? What's this even? Taking the food Mara prepared? You know she'd kick your arse bloody if she found out." His face remained stoic and silent, and she couldn't deny the suspicious thoughts circling her mind any longer. "Jon, why would you be packing food and furs anyway?"
His steely gaze faltered at the concern in her voice. He stammered after a while, "I'm leaving, Val."
She cocked her head to the side. "Where do you plan to go? Mance had given clear orders for you to stay with us."
"I'm leaving," he repeated. "I'm going after my mother, to the South."
For a minute, she remembered her nightmare, and what she imagined the South to be like. It was a bad omen, she now knew. "No. No, you won't, Jon, and you know why."
He ignored her, and she had once again pondered between stepping forward to stop him by hand or stepping back to call out for Dalla. "Do you think you can leave so easily? That is only madness you're attempting. Your place is here, beside us, as one of us."
"Many of us have already fled there, why should I stay? To ransom the Starks should the worst happen to my mother and her quest? Or mayhaps just to appease some of the hateful cunts on our side," he hissed. "Mance had no right to trap me here, he had no right to betray my mother like that."
Val bit her lip, a part of her agreed with what he was saying; she had known Lyanna all her life while Mance had only stolen Dalla a little more than a year ago, he held no excuse to turn their lives so.
The other part of her had heard of Mance for years. She knew that he united the free-folk and defied the Others, that he was akin to a savior in their lands, that Dalla, one of the wisest women she knew, had found him worthy of her bed and her heart. Her people trusted and obeyed him, and if they were to survive, they needed to heed his will themselves.
Val shook her head, "Oh, do not speak such foolishness! You know it is but a mummer's farce; Mance loves you as his own get, for Dalla's sake. He won't do you any harm. And we cannot fight our own any more than we can fight the Others. Mance is doing what needs to be done."
Neither she, nor Jon, nor Dalla, nor Lya might like it, but Val at least knew there was no appeasement for everyone. Politics, she remembered, was the word Lyanna used for such matters.
He took a step back, wary of her judgment. "Aye, we can't fight our men any longer, but we can send mothers away from their children."
"Knock it off! You're a man grown, not a babe. You said so yourself!" Though you're acting like a child anyway. "Besides, Lya can handle her situation, what mighty addition would your company bring anyway, other than another headache?"
Jon turned to her sharply, "Mother didn't fight the Night's Watch. I did. Mother didn't listen to Mance singing and blabbering about all the ways the Wall could be taken, about the state of those houses and castles. I did. Mother did not fight the Others. I did."
Foolish; his mother had at least lived in the South. Shorter time than Mance, yes, but her tales were a lot longer. A lot better. Although Val could excuse Jon for his confidence; she held over three years against him, and three years ago she was just as hot-headed.
five and ten was a dangerous age, filled with half the knowledge and twice the recklessness. It was then when Lyanna had gotten with child, sired by some traveling hunter that died only a few months later.
The consequences were something Lyanna could not escape, yet it had at least proved a lesson for Val. She could not allow Jon to start his quest of madness, he might as well get himself killed before even glimpsing the wall.
"Jon, none of that matters. Every man and woman chosen to go was a voice for our people. Lya was chosen to go because she is the one the Starks are looking for. She knows the lands and the Starks know her, their reunion is how we bring about a truce."
He scoffed, fidgeting with a small, oil vessel before making a place for it at the bottom. "So it is true then, Mance has that little faith in my mother so he intends to keep me a hostage. Does he think the Starks wouldn't come for me, bearing bronze and steel as they had for my mother? Are they not my kin as well?"
Hardly, she almost said. Bael the bard was slain by his own son. A Stark. Although Lyanna had always loathed that story.
Half his words rang true, however. While Val doubted Lyanna to ever let a war break out, for the sake of the sisterhood, love, and understanding she had found in the true North, holding a blood leverage against the Starks would surely anger them enough.
Would they accept the truce in silence, welcoming their lost daughter and her son like the songs and the stories? Or would they detest her for it, for the untimely death of her mother, for forcing their hand on peace with their so-called enemy?
"Whom do you dare trust more, Jon? Your own people or the kneelers?"
"My blood, Val. In these times, I only trust my own blood."
It felt like a slap to the face. "Do you truly believe that Mance betrayed you, when it's your words that are most ungrateful?"
He seemed distracted enough, thinking of a retort. Val took the opportunity to yank the bag away from his fingers, and he pushed her in retaliation. Val punched him then, dragging him by his arm towards the stairs right after. She called for Dalla as loud as she could, but he immediately clamped her mouth shut.
They wrestled around the kitchen, his grunts and shuffling as muted as possible. Her elbow jabbed his neck. His knee slammed against her stomach, all fighting for the bag she now held. She leaned back, kicking his groin, and in her moment of victory, she grabbed the other heavy satchel around his shoulder, only to have her head jerked backward, hair pulled to the ground.
Jon pressed his arm against her throat, waiting to see if anyone woke up with the chaos. Val instinctively reached for her knife, but the pain and despair in his gray eyes stopped her.
She stopped kicking, waiting for him to remove his arm. He let her go with a sigh of relief, crawling away while moaning in pain. They both sat on the ground, the two filled sacks between them with half the contents spilled outside.
"That's a bitch move you did," he hissed, still covering his crotch.
She ignored him. "Why did you not tell me, at the very least?"
"Why? You asking why? I had not seen you putting up such a glorious fight when Mance denied you a place in mother's campaign. You had left her alone, too." He threw his arms up, still panting from their fight.
"She's not alone, Jon. She has got Tormund, Sigorn, Jarl, Morna, Willow, Ghost-"
"She doesn't have me! She wanted me by her side where I should be!" He yelled, wincing at his raised voice. Jon was damn lucky no one had taken refuge in their hall that night. Or maybe he had just planned the day of his departure well.
"That's not what you said at the gathering, remember?" Her kind tone was uncharacteristic of her husky voice, Jon couldn't help but scoff at her. "You still cannot just leave. How can you? Mance got Lya and her group smuggled in some of his boats. What shall you do? Swim all the way past the crow lordlings? Or maybe climb the Wall yourself?"
"I found a way," he simply said, packing more bread, dried meat, and salted fish. He glared at her all the while, daring her to stop him again.
"A boat, then. How will you pay for it? Do you plan to steal it?" He didn't answer her, but the blush rose up to redden his entire face.
"YOUR PLAN IS TO STEAL A BOAT?" she yelled, her eyebrows climbing up to her hairline. Jon immediately clamped her mouth shut once again, hushing her desperately.
"No, I'm not stealing a boat! I just… found someone who can take me south. That's all."
That wasn't enough of an answer. Val glared at him again until he relented, quietly revealing his scheme.
Some huntsmen who were yet to yield to Mance were apparently seeking another raid. Other poor souls were slowly losing faith, they had sought a way to go south.
They would ride to the coast of hardhome for half a day, from then to the south until they were close enough to the mouth of the haunted forest. One of the raiders Jon knew had spoken of a man there building and renting some canoes every now and then to travel to the Gift, with a deal with some Night's brothers that eased up his work.
Val scrunched her nose in disgust. She knew of the man; Ulwik was his name. He rented girls he stole to the fresh set of rapists that took the black, girls who hadn't even flowered. In return, some would turn a blind eye to a few lonely boats floating away, should they ever be spotted whilst docking.
It was hardly different from Mance's plan, yet hardly any safe either; many of those rapists Ulwik relied on were caught, gelded, and killed, some by their own brothers no less. Lyanna and Mance had called those men ironborn, and even Lyanna's own people detested them.
"You can't use the aid of that wicked man! Do you how many lasses were taken by him? What would Mance think? What would your mother think?"
"She would understand better than you." He stood up slowly, hoisting his haul over his shoulder."Don't try to stop me, Val. I'm going. That's all I could think about these days, that they need my help. Me staying here is only bound to cause more trouble and you know it well enough."
"Yet we only survive if we stay together."
His eyes softened. He held his hand out to help her up. "Come with me then. Come with me, Val, and we can help them quicker."
"You've truly gone mad, methinks," she laughed, watching as he scowled before leaving.
Alone in the kitchen, the scent of herbs was only more intense. Val stood up and walked towards the hall between the stairs to the upper rooms and the once-sealed exit leading to their small stables, where it all felt surreal.
Val thought of waking Dalla again. She, her sister, and three spearwives would be more than enough to win a fight with Jon, knock him out, even. Yet did she truly wish to stop him?
Lyanna had indeed looked too disheveled when she was forced to leave, to the point where it broke Dalla's heart; she had already fought enough times with Mance over it.
Jon's disappearance would be another disaster altogether, but it would hardly be a disappearance then; her folk could find him in mere days, as long as he hadn't reached the shore.
He would fight and argue, until he would certainly be named a southern traitor and Dalla wouldn't be able to protect him, then. They all had faced enough accusations from Harma's and Rattleshirt's vile tongues.
No, Val couldn't allow that to her sister. Dalla was more graceful, kinder, and sweeter. Val had to protect her.
What of Lyanna, then? The she-wolf was just as much of a sister to Val. Almost a mother even. Lyanna was the one she knew to be truly in distress. Was it still worth the trouble?
Maybe Dalla's wise words wouldn't work anyways. Maybe it was too late to wake her up; Should Dalla and her spearwives startle Jon, he could easily run off, and only Val was quick enough to track or race him.
It all fell back to her again, she only had to chase him.
When she caught up with him, he paid her no mind. Instead, he checked the hooves of his silver mare and adjusted its reins. He placed his baggage on either side of the horse after, keeping only his sword and his knife on his body.
The silver mare was the same one Mance had gifted Lya. Its company was incomparable to Ghost's, yet Lyanna had been just as fond of the animal; she taught it tricks and rode it as much as she could, drawing experience from her childhood memories. Lyanna had even named it 'Snowball,' after the very first pony she had owned.
Snowball neighed and whined softly, contrasting the snoring of their supposedly guarding hounds and the harmony of the hooting owls outside. It stomped its hooves against the ground in disapproval when Val meant to pet it. Another bad omen.
"It's not too late to turn back, Jon."
He ignored her again, straddling his horse and adding another bag to the previous ones.
He must have really planned for this, she thought, snatching the bag away desperately and holding the dagger at her hip firmly this time. Knock him out, put enough sense in him.
He sighed, holding his hand out to her. His eyes, however, were only pleading for her permission. "You know I have to do this, Val. It's like the Gods are giving me a sign."
The Gods have given her a sign too, and not a good one. All signs are fickle, but they are signs nonetheless.
She couldn't stop him by hand, nor by words. A part of her truly wanted to go with him, even. Just as she had asked to accompany Lyanna, but Mance wouldn't let Dalla lose both her sisters.
By the Gods, she had to think.
Jon was just as good at riding as his mother, knowing of the land and going as far and quickly as he could. Yet should Mance return anytime soon, Jon would eventually be either caught or named a thief or a craven or a traitor, even if they tried to hide it.
Maybe hounds would track her scent of herbs quicker, and her fellowship would slow them down as well, even calm Dalla's fears. Val could lie that Jon was only stealing her then, just as her sister had once foretold. That would do well to save the grace of her foolhardy friend.
Yes, that is what she would do. In the meantime, she would convince Jon to return home as quickly as possible.
Val leaped on the other steed next to him, her dagger back at her hip, and the other pouch slung around her back. "If you're going, I'm going with you."
He looked back at her, caution mixed with relief. He smiled, then kicked his mare forward.
To the south then.
A/N: sooo... lots of worldbuilding here, so the style is more different than the other chapters. if you're wondering about characterization then I should remind you that:
A: Jon is not a motherless northern bastard growing up in winterfell with pure honor ideology while having the wight of the entire fucking wall on his shoulders in this AU :).
Val, on the other hand, well... in canon we don't actually know much of her??? other than 10 quotes and descriptions from a POV of a depressed, deprived, pining teenager. this is her *own* POV and she's surrounded by her family in her own home, so yeah I do think she would let her guard down. Lyanna also left a southern influence with interesting songs and stories! I did say Lya grew up with Dalla :P
ironborn at the wall. fuck yeah!