A.N.: I'm not a Jonerys shipper, I will point that out immediately. There are many side-effects to poor writing, and aside from the lack of chemistry, one of the things that suffered was Jon, after his apparent lobotomy. If anything, our Jon would have been far more cautious after being - you know - murdered - and less likely to tolerate the kind of things Daenerys does as a matter of course - I do want Jon at one point to make certain to Daenerys that he has no respect for her conquest, something along the lines of her being no better than slavers when she kills those who do not yield to her. Also, we've seen Jon be downright sassy before, especially when he's verbally sparring with his political enemies.

I'd also like to show a contrast between Daenerys and Alynore: One is a queen, the other is not, but one thinks like a ruler and the other is too focused on what she wants to take care of what she has…

Valyrian Steel

10

Expedience

The first hanging cage appeared two days' ride from Last Hearth, outside the boundary walls of a small holdfast clinging to the frozen shore of Long Lake. The poor man had frozen to death long before thirst or hunger could claim him. A handful of men lowered the cage and prised it open, at Larra's request: She would not risk leaving any dead unburned. And the cage was decent steel. Before the flames caught alight to burn the body, Larra noted the muscle-shells sewn to his ragged furs. One of the Free Folk, the last of only a handful of thousands to survive Hard Home, to survive the North: The last of the Free Folk.

"They say it's almost pleasant to freeze to death," Edd murmured. The wagon-train continued out of their sight, the sun low but bright, the evergreen trees laden with fresh snow and the lake to their right frozen solid. "You're warm again, before the end. It's gentle."

Larra remembered Benjen's frostbitten face, and flinched. She had heard that, as well. The burning body crackled and smouldered, and they moved on, as they had with the Night's Watchmen who died during the first leg of their journey from Castle Black. They could not afford to linger.

They were nearing Winterfell: Had not Jon pledged the safety of the Free Folk when they came south, and reclaimed Winterfell, and the North, so he could exert his influence over the Northmen to comply?

One man, alone, Larra might tolerate, maybe if he was a convicted rapist or murderer.

As the nameless man burned, Larra couldn't help remember her History lessons with Maester Luwin, arguing with her brothers: "To put something in context is a step towards saying it can be understood and that it can be explained. And if it can be explained, that it can be explained away." Some things should never be understood…should never be explained…or explained away.

Before nightfall they were within sight of the holdfast. And perhaps Mors Umber, before Brandon's nugget of information about his surviving wildling grandchildren and great-grandchildren, may have put the Free Folks' capture and torture and death into the context of the Northmen's historic hatred of and ongoing wars with the plundering wildlings. To explain the string of hanging cages and crucifixes strung up with people in ragged furs - or nothing at all - was a step behind explaining it away. Larra would not do that. She could not tolerate senseless cruelty.

Her hands gripped the reins tighter, Black Alys unnerved, perhaps by the scent of death or by her bond with Larra; Larra was upset at the sight of the disfigured bodies nailed to crucifixes, hulking birds of prey feasting on their remains, opportunistic hunters in the heart of winter.

It was the yard that did it. A small holdfast, the cottages of its smallfolk enclosed the great yard in a large square full of mucky sludge. A woman had been stripped naked and locked at the stocks, for the use of any man who wanted her, her face slack with grief and confusion, her body collapsed with exhaustion, eyes glassy. A young man's back had been opened by the lash, still strapped to the pillory, legs weak beneath him, the blood frozen on his skin and matting his furs. Inside the hanging cage, a half-naked child had frozen where he had curled up for warmth. More of the Free Folk were shackled to rings on spikes embedded deep into the great stone wall of the yard beside frozen steps up to the oak doors.

Little Jon Umber, perched in Larra's lap with a fur cloak wrapped around them both, turned his little face to hers, red-nosed, his eyes wide as an owl's.

"Free them. Let them burn their dead with dignity," Larra murmured to Edd, who had looked to her for direction. Ever since leaving Castle Black, he had started doing that more and more often; perhaps because she had advised about putting the fletchers to good use on the journey south, or because she was Jon's sister and he had assumed she knew what she was about. Either way, she had proven her instincts to be sharp, and several of the stronger men set about freeing the chained wildlings. "Don't approach the stocks."

"Why not?"

"Because you're men," Larra muttered darkly, but she needn't have worried: The woman was dead. She asked several of the men to find something to cover her modesty when they freed her, and set her down gently, covered in an empty burlap sack, before they freed the man at the pillory. He was still alive, against all odds. "Gently, with his arms. Lower them slowly. Have the maester prepare herbs for a snow-coat. And Hobb shall warm some soup, if he can sit long enough to eat a few mouthfuls."

Her own back seemed to burn with compassion, remembering all those years ago, the snap of the leather against her back, the ache in her arms, the cold kissing her bare breasts as the yard looked on sombrely, the people who knew and adored her weeping silently as the Queen smirked on. She remembered smiling dazedly at her in response, and the Queen striding out of sight, bored when the pleasure of inflicting punishment was deprived her. She remembered the snow-coat Maester Luwin had treated her with, the discomfort of sleeping on her belly on a wooden board, the scent of snow and herbs and blood mingling in the air, groggy from milk of the poppy Maester Luwin had slipped into the mouthfuls of stew she had managed, before the fever set in, and she lingered for days in a dreamlike state of pain and memories…

She didn't look too closely at the man's wounds, even as her own healed ones seemed to prickle and sear with burning pain, recommitting the pain to memory. She had recovered. She had deprived the Queen's victory through resilience alone.

Cersei had had her flogged, twenty-five lashes inflicted by the expert precision of Ser Ilyn Payne…for the crime of reminding Robert Baratheon of his beloved. For being Lyanna Stark reincarnated.

She felt a grim satisfaction, thinking, Oh, if they had but known… Lyanna's daughter. The girl Rhaegar had died for; the girl Robert had gone to war for. The girl every man in Westeros seemed to have preferred over Cersei Lannister, who had become Queen simply because, at the end of it all, she was the last of them left. The last, and the worst. It wounded Cersei's pride to be reminded of that.

The stunned wildling was carried to a wagon, arms draped around the shoulders of two Night's Watchmen. Larra stared at the hanging cage; none of the men seemed to want to dare go near it. Grown adults was one thing…a child…

He was a fragile-looking thing, no older than Little Jon, and quite a bit smaller. A mop of dark golden curls - like Rickon's unruly mane. Lush lips that would have been the envy of any girl who saw them. Vivid blue eyes stared unseeingly back at her, framed with curling black lashes a mile long.

He blinked.

"Shit!" Larra swore, startled back, heart in her mouth. "He's alive! Help me get him down!"

"How the fuck is he alive?"

"I don't know - but his arm is broken," Larra murmured, eyeing the boy, who started trying to unfurl from the tight little ball he had tucked himself into at the foot of the cage. His forearm was bruised blackish-purple, and bent at an unpleasant angle.

"Were they his parents, d'you think?" Edd murmured, as the cage was lowered. The cage was broken open by several hits of a hatchet wielded by one of the Night's Watch carpenters. The boy froze when one of the men leaned in to lift him out; Larra laid a hand delicately on his arm, and the carpenter locked eyes with her, and stood back.

She wore wildling furs.

At a glance, she thought these Free Folk originated from the Frozen Shores. To survive Hard Home, only to meet such an end…

Carefully, she spoke a few words in a dialect from the Frozen Shores she had picked up from wildlings fleeing south as Jojen and Brandon had spurred them further north. It was a strangely beautiful sound, guttural in places, the sound coming from the back of her throat as if she were about to spit, rolling her Rs musically, lots of soft V sounds, almost like the rushing of waves. It was a dialect of the Old Tongue.

The boy's lower-lip quivered as he reached out to her, his eyes on the bent arm. Carefully, she manoeuvred him out of the cage, helping him unfold from his crouch, and lifted him into her arms. He was frail as a fledgling, all skin and grief, with his broken arm and vivid blue eyes.

"Get Jon down off Black Alys, thank you. Chuck him in the wagon with Bran," Larra said gently, nodding at the boy, and one of the Watchmen helped the boy off her mare. "Jon, strip to your smallclothes and climb beneath the furs. You're to cuddle the boy as you would your brother; share your warmth, or he shall die."

"But he's a wildling-!"

"Don't give me that," Larra said sharply, as Jon rolled his eyes, sighing heavily as he tugged at the fastenings of his cloak. Brandon watched benignly from his bed of straw, draped in furs and cloaks. They couldn't risk his limbs getting frostbite; Larra didn't know he'd survive the amputation. Slowly, Brandon himself started to shift the furs and blankets from his own legs, his hands like pale spiders against the furs. "I won't tolerate that ignorance. Clothes off, now. Don't give me that look; your uncles gave me leave to smack you if you're foul. Ask Brandon if you think I won't. The back of his head has my handprint embedded in it!" She managed to climb into the wagon, setting the boy down beside Jon, who looked positively plump next to the frail, strong wilding boy. "Mind his arm, Jon. It's broken. Once he's warmed we'll have the maester set the bone, if he can. And I shall have Hobb warm some broth."

"He's freezing!" Jon cried indignantly, shivering away. She raised an eyebrow, giving him a stern look, and tucked the furs and blankets and extra clothes over the two boys, careful of the wildling's arm. She spoke gently to the wildling boy, offering her name, and asking for his in turn.

"Ragnar. His name is Ragnar," Larra murmured. "Keep him warm, Jon. I'll come back." She tucked the heavy cloaks and furs over the two boys; vivid blue eyes watched her as she climbed out of the wagon.

"The fuck are you doing?" The bellow rang out across the yard. On the steps to the holdfast, a man in a heavy cloak appeared, the links of his brigandine glinting in the meagre sunlight, just like the unsheathed blade in his hand. His expression was murderous; few of the Watchmen paid him any mind, nor did the Umber smallfolk or the lesser lords who had gathered at Last Hearth before journeying southwards toward Winterfell with the Night's Watch.

What was one angry little man against thousands?

Larra stilled, watching the lord, reminding Larra herself of Last Shadow when they had hunted the wolfswood together. She had gained sight of her prey. She remembered this lesser lord. Not quite a Bolton, but not a pleasant companion to sit beside at feasts. Rumour said he could only get hard to rape his wife when he beat her, when she cried in pain.

"Ah… Black Jack," Larra said softly, a silky whisper that had Edd glancing at her out of the corner of his eye, wary. Black Jack strode down the stairs, heavy cloak whipping in the wind, fresh snow carried on it. "I should have realised this mess was of your making." She knew where she was, now. She remembered avoiding these lands on her journey north: Black Jack had a brutal reputation.

Her eyes flicked beyond Black Jack, to the figures huddled in the protection of their great hall. Two women stood huddled together, one young and pretty, one older, half her face swollen and purple from bruising. Her shoulders were thrown back, though, and she had her arms protectively around her daughter's shoulders. Beside them tottered an elderly man whose sigil Larra could just make out on the breast of his richly quilted tunic. Another local lord, one she remembered from the harvest feast. He'd gone through his fourth wife and sought another. His meagre lands made for rich fur trapping. A nasty, mean little man, she recalled; he had smelled of kippers and unwashed flesh.

Edd's pointed chin rose, his sharp eyes flitting to his brothers, all of whom were armed. To greet anyone with your sword unsheathed was a display of open hostility; Larra should not have been surprised, remembering Black Jack's reputation for cruelty and stupidity, that he had come charging down the stairs swinging his sword.

In a moment, one of the seasoned Rangers had Black Jack disarmed, flat on his back.

"The Free Folk were invited south beyond the Wall and are under the protection of the King in the North," said Edd, as two Night's Watchmen lifted Black Jack to his feet, restraining him. A small crowd had congregated, smallfolk daring to open their doors to watch their lord's humiliation.

"King in the North?! A bastard," Black Jack sneered. "No more than a whore's get."

"Why are your people still here?" Larra asked sharply, dread settling in the pit of her stomach. "The Starks have called their banners. All the living North are to make their way to Winterfell." Black Jack squinted at her, recognition seeming to flare in his eyes.

"You… I remember you, the bastard whore of Winterfell," he sneered, and spat at her feet. Larra raised her eyebrows, unimpressed. She'd befriended direwolves, killed White Walkers and bedded a Thenn. There was absolutely nothing intimidating about this hateful little man. She scoffed in disdain, giving him the kind of look he deserved - the kind of look she had, admittedly, learned from Lady Catelyn - seething, burning disdain.

"You ignore your King's summons and commit treason in harming the Free Folk under his protection," said Edd dangerously, hand on the hilt of his sword. "You willingly place your own people in harm's way in spite of the warnings of a threat of imminent war."

"Only threat I see is the bastard who calls himself King, who let the wildlings roam free beyond the Wall," Black Jack sneered. Edd shared a glance with Larra. It was quick, and decisive: They had no time to argue.

"You refuse the call, and willingly endanger Northmen?" Edd said quietly. Black Jack spit again. Edd sighed. "I, Eddison Tollett, acting Lord Commander of the Night's Watch, so named by Jon Snow, King in the North, charge you with treason against your king. I hereby sentence you to die by beheading. Hold him."

The Watchmen held Black Jack still - for all his cursing and screaming - and Edd struck true. One clean swing of his sword, and Black Jack's head landed with a dull, wet thump on the slush. His body was dragged beside that of the frozen wildling woman for burning.

There was a brief ruckus in the square, over before it started: On the steps of the holdfast, Black Jack's wife had taken a blade concealed by her daughter, and stabbed the elderly man in the gut a half a dozen times. The brute died clutching his belly, his expression of utmost surprise. Mother and daughter embraced, as the Night's Watch stared, and got to work, shepherding the smallfolk. Granaries and root cellars were emptied as quickly as possible, livestock driven ahead, and the vulnerable were bundled into whatever wagons were to hand, wearing every article of clothing they possessed, anything else left behind.

The pieces of Black Jack were left to burn beside the body of the wildling woman he had murdered.

In the wagon, trundling ahead to reach a convenient place to shelter that Larra remembered from her journey northwards, she checked on the boys. They were curled up together, as brothers might, wrapped in furs and blankets, Ragnar's eyes closed, head nestled against Jon's chest, his features relaxed in sleep; Jon's were turned on Bran as he told a story in his calm, eerie voice. Larra checked whether Ragnar had gained some body-heat, worried that he might take on a fever if he didn't die of hypothermia - that was the word Maester Luwin used. As soon as they reached the sheltered place in the woods Larra remembered, she would wake Ragnar for broth and have the maester see to his arm. She ducked out of the wagon again, and climbed onto Black Alys, who snorted and stamped her feet restlessly; she trotted ahead to catch up to Edd.

"How's the boy?"

"Warming up nicely," Larra said softly. She adjusted her furs, squinting in the gentle snows. At least they would have a mild night: It only ever snowed when it was mild, never when it was freezing. Snow was a good sign. She had to bat her eyelashes to get rid of the snowflakes clinging to them. "How are you?"

"Don't know how Jon did it. The boy…even in the circumstances."

"Still, it was right you swung the sword."

"Aye. I know; your way is the old way," Edd nodded. "I passed the sentence."

"Why did you?" Larra asked curiously. She knew why she had given her support.

Edd sighed. "There's what, two hundred more of us, just from that holdfast? That's two hundred people who won't be joining the Night King's army. Two hundred fewer we have to fight if we want to live… His wife and daughter seem to be bearing their grief well enough." He gave her an ironic little smirk. "Have you seen them?"

"His wife apologised for his rudeness; how she managed to with a face that bruised…the maester's had a look at her. Her cheekbone will heal," Larra said, eyes widening slightly. "If there was the time I'd teach knife-skills, the maester had to bandage a wicked cut on her palm."

"Jon used to tell us stories about your training in the yard," Edd chuckled. "Said you learned through experience. That's why you fight with sword and knife." He had never seen her fight to know that: Jon had talked about her among his brothers.

"Not because I was any better than them," Larra said quietly, as they ambled along. She sighed. "Quite the opposite; I was a danger to myself if I had nothing in both hands. I almost lost fingers because I tended to grab out in the midst of a skirmish. When we were twelve, Maester Luwin managed to save my finger; I still have scars from the stitches. Couldn't do anything with the hand for weeks." She fell silent, lost in memories of the training-yard, of Ser Rodrik and Mikken, of Tomas her stable-boy, and Hodor, of her brothers hitting each other with sparring-swords and shields, Arya being chased by Bran as Rickon's giggles echoed on the gentle summer air and Father watched from the walkway above, a content smile on his tired face…

"How long since you've been home?" Edd asked, guessing where her thoughts were.

Larra sighed. "What is the year?" she asked. Edd told her, and she stared at him. The snow started to fall more heavily, but she didn't see it.

"Six years," Larra croaked disbelievingly, and Edd nodded slowly. "Nearly six years since we fled Winterfell."

Seven since she had last seen Jon.

She wondered whether they had passed their name-day. Were they twenty-three or twenty-four years old?

"How many more miles've we got, d'you reckon?" he asked thoughtfully, gazing out at the horizon, limited by the mountains surrounding Long Lake, and the snows.

"Two hundred and fifty miles, give or take a dozen, once we reach the southernmost shore of Long Lake," Larra said, doing the sums in her head. Her journey north all those years ago had taken far longer, even without the thousands of refugees and livestock. A would-be castellan bastard-daughter of a High Lord; her crippled brother and his simple giant carer; her wild, wrathful baby-brother and his earthy wilding surrogate-mother; two Reeds; and three direwolves. They had made an odd party, even before reaching the great heart-tree… And they had been on foot, avoiding any main thoroughfare or holdfast, hunting to survive and hoping not to get caught for poaching - on her father's land! The blisters on her feet had long since turned to tough leather; her wool dress and hose and cloak she had traded for furs; and less than half their party might ever see Winterfell again.

She would see Jon again.

A.N.: Maybe I listened to 'All of Them' from Hans Zimmer's amazing King Arthur soundtrack when I was planning my outline for this story! That film's influence on me definitely shows in this chapter!

I'm off to the Zoo tomorrow with my school class, so I thought I'd treat you all to a midweek treat.