fic: frozen heart, daenerys/jon
Title: Frozen Heart
Author: Ellyrianna
Fandom: Game of Thrones
Pairing(s): Dany/Jon
Word Count: 1,071
Summary: Dany versus the North: the snow, the cold, her loss, and a king.
“Stay outside, Khaleesi,” Jorah warns, ducking his head down so that he can pass into the small room in the hold where they have taken the King in the North. But Dany is frozen in the threshold, watching as Jorah and Tormund carefully cradle Jon’s body, removing his frosted clothing with deft fingers. His head lolls to the side and his lips are pale blue. His skin looks whiter than bone against his dark, curling hair.
Dany watches with numbed fascination as they strip off his fur and his leather and his fabric, as they reveal all his ivory skin. There are deep wounds on his chest: scored across his abdomen, on his arms, and, most importantly, over his heart. It’s a wound like a trench. She needs to know the full story about that one. From Davos, maybe, if Jon won’t give it up. She needs to know how - why - he took a knife in the heart and survived.
Thinking about all of this is better than thinking about Viserion. Watching them rub the life back into Jon is a much better alternative. Life: not death. Not the shrieking, stinging death of her son, one of her three children. And to die in such a place - bitterly cold, endlessly white, so unlike the warm pyre where he was born. The pyre where she laid her love to his final rest…
She won’t think about it. She grips the doorway and instead watches as Davos dips cloths in bowls of warmed water and runs them over Jon’s face and neck and chest. Jorah and Tormund have left. She did not notice their leaving. They swathed Jon in furs to the waist and Dany realizes that she longs to tug the heavy blankets up to his chin. He’s so vulnerable and exposed this way. She thinks of how she sat in the fire and held her stone dragon eggs until they hatched, and wonders if her touch could give Jon warmth.
“He will survive?” she asks. Her voice is thin and ragged. She does not want to sob about Viserion in front of these men. She will not be seen as a weak woman, a little girl. She is a queen, and queens are composed above all else. But then she pictures him tumbling into the water, so cold and unforgiving, and she feels her throat choke and her eyes fill.
Davos glances up at her. He weighs his answer, and, as usual, makes it sound lighthearted even through his gruffness. “He’s faced worse odds,” he says.
She pictures him stranded on that jagged peak in the middle of that vast lake. He was surrounded by wights, the undead. He faced them down unafraid even as she was offering an escape. If she had not waited for him, would she have lost Viserion? She turns her face away for a moment.
Davos clearly is cataloguing all of this. A servant girl comes in with a teapot and a cup. She sets it by Davos and then quietly escapes.
“Might I ask a favor of you, Your Grace?” She looks back at him. He gestures at the teapot. “I want to get something warm inside him, but I need to prop him up. D’you think you could hold the cup?”
She feels she should call back the servant, whoever she is, and tell her to do this. It is beneath the dignity of a queen. But then this is a king she is being asked to help - a king she sacrificed a child for. If not him, if not now, then when?
She enters the room, approaches his still alabaster body. Davos shifts positions so that he sits on the edge of the bed. With his arms around Jon’s waist he shuffles his king into a seated position. Jon’s head falls to Davos’s shoulder. Although he sleeps, his face is not peaceful: a shadow of pain twists it, and Dany’s heart with it. She pours from the pot into the cup and takes it in hand. Davos nudges Jon’s head upright with his shoulder and Dany brings the cup to his lips. Together, they manage to get the tea down his throat. He instinctively splutters a little, but does not wake. Davos is soon satisfied and gently arranges his king onto his back once more.
“Thank you,” he says to her, and his approval feels so wanted, so necessary. She nods with a small smile. Davos stands, hunching a little in the low room, and gestures toward the door. “He’ll be out for hours, I expect. Why don’t you go and rest for a bit?”
This seems like a wise idea. Jon has suffered a trauma, but so too has she. Although Jon nearly froze to death, she still believes her suffering and pain is worse. She remembers tiny Viserion crying into the sun with his siblings. She remembers carrying him all through the Red Waste, and the fear in her heart, which has gone unmatched all this time, when he and the others were stolen from her in Qarth. The joy she felt seeing him soar over the ocean as she made her way to Astapor…all of it, all of the memories, they weigh on her, crushing her. He crashed through the ice, felled by a frozen spear, far from the place he was born. She could not save him.
“No,” she says softly to Davos. She realizes the word is barely audible. “No,” she repeats, louder this time. Tears stand in her eyes. “I will stay here. We have much to discuss when he wakes.”
“Your Grace -“ Davos begins, but Dany shakes her head.
“I am the blood of the dragon,” she says, her voice very quiet. “Perhaps I can help him heal.”
Davos does not argue. He rises and leaves the room, shutting the door behind him after a second’s hesitation. Dany moves into his seat at Jon’s bedside. She cannot help herself from reaching out to trace her fingers over him: his face, his lips, even the scars on his chest, her fingers ghosting over their hardened ridges. Then she takes his hand in hers. His skin is still so cold. She grasps his hand in both of hers, picturing again the white wasteland where she found him and his motley crew, picturing again the frozen gravesite of her child.
Then the tears fall, and they are warm.
Author: Ellyrianna
Fandom: Game of Thrones
Pairing(s): Dany/Jon
Word Count: 1,071
Summary: Dany versus the North: the snow, the cold, her loss, and a king.
“Stay outside, Khaleesi,” Jorah warns, ducking his head down so that he can pass into the small room in the hold where they have taken the King in the North. But Dany is frozen in the threshold, watching as Jorah and Tormund carefully cradle Jon’s body, removing his frosted clothing with deft fingers. His head lolls to the side and his lips are pale blue. His skin looks whiter than bone against his dark, curling hair.
Dany watches with numbed fascination as they strip off his fur and his leather and his fabric, as they reveal all his ivory skin. There are deep wounds on his chest: scored across his abdomen, on his arms, and, most importantly, over his heart. It’s a wound like a trench. She needs to know the full story about that one. From Davos, maybe, if Jon won’t give it up. She needs to know how - why - he took a knife in the heart and survived.
Thinking about all of this is better than thinking about Viserion. Watching them rub the life back into Jon is a much better alternative. Life: not death. Not the shrieking, stinging death of her son, one of her three children. And to die in such a place - bitterly cold, endlessly white, so unlike the warm pyre where he was born. The pyre where she laid her love to his final rest…
She won’t think about it. She grips the doorway and instead watches as Davos dips cloths in bowls of warmed water and runs them over Jon’s face and neck and chest. Jorah and Tormund have left. She did not notice their leaving. They swathed Jon in furs to the waist and Dany realizes that she longs to tug the heavy blankets up to his chin. He’s so vulnerable and exposed this way. She thinks of how she sat in the fire and held her stone dragon eggs until they hatched, and wonders if her touch could give Jon warmth.
“He will survive?” she asks. Her voice is thin and ragged. She does not want to sob about Viserion in front of these men. She will not be seen as a weak woman, a little girl. She is a queen, and queens are composed above all else. But then she pictures him tumbling into the water, so cold and unforgiving, and she feels her throat choke and her eyes fill.
Davos glances up at her. He weighs his answer, and, as usual, makes it sound lighthearted even through his gruffness. “He’s faced worse odds,” he says.
She pictures him stranded on that jagged peak in the middle of that vast lake. He was surrounded by wights, the undead. He faced them down unafraid even as she was offering an escape. If she had not waited for him, would she have lost Viserion? She turns her face away for a moment.
Davos clearly is cataloguing all of this. A servant girl comes in with a teapot and a cup. She sets it by Davos and then quietly escapes.
“Might I ask a favor of you, Your Grace?” She looks back at him. He gestures at the teapot. “I want to get something warm inside him, but I need to prop him up. D’you think you could hold the cup?”
She feels she should call back the servant, whoever she is, and tell her to do this. It is beneath the dignity of a queen. But then this is a king she is being asked to help - a king she sacrificed a child for. If not him, if not now, then when?
She enters the room, approaches his still alabaster body. Davos shifts positions so that he sits on the edge of the bed. With his arms around Jon’s waist he shuffles his king into a seated position. Jon’s head falls to Davos’s shoulder. Although he sleeps, his face is not peaceful: a shadow of pain twists it, and Dany’s heart with it. She pours from the pot into the cup and takes it in hand. Davos nudges Jon’s head upright with his shoulder and Dany brings the cup to his lips. Together, they manage to get the tea down his throat. He instinctively splutters a little, but does not wake. Davos is soon satisfied and gently arranges his king onto his back once more.
“Thank you,” he says to her, and his approval feels so wanted, so necessary. She nods with a small smile. Davos stands, hunching a little in the low room, and gestures toward the door. “He’ll be out for hours, I expect. Why don’t you go and rest for a bit?”
This seems like a wise idea. Jon has suffered a trauma, but so too has she. Although Jon nearly froze to death, she still believes her suffering and pain is worse. She remembers tiny Viserion crying into the sun with his siblings. She remembers carrying him all through the Red Waste, and the fear in her heart, which has gone unmatched all this time, when he and the others were stolen from her in Qarth. The joy she felt seeing him soar over the ocean as she made her way to Astapor…all of it, all of the memories, they weigh on her, crushing her. He crashed through the ice, felled by a frozen spear, far from the place he was born. She could not save him.
“No,” she says softly to Davos. She realizes the word is barely audible. “No,” she repeats, louder this time. Tears stand in her eyes. “I will stay here. We have much to discuss when he wakes.”
“Your Grace -“ Davos begins, but Dany shakes her head.
“I am the blood of the dragon,” she says, her voice very quiet. “Perhaps I can help him heal.”
Davos does not argue. He rises and leaves the room, shutting the door behind him after a second’s hesitation. Dany moves into his seat at Jon’s bedside. She cannot help herself from reaching out to trace her fingers over him: his face, his lips, even the scars on his chest, her fingers ghosting over their hardened ridges. Then she takes his hand in hers. His skin is still so cold. She grasps his hand in both of hers, picturing again the white wasteland where she found him and his motley crew, picturing again the frozen gravesite of her child.
Then the tears fall, and they are warm.