#jon snow knows something

[leesielex]

Magic Awakens | CH 64: Jon Snow XVI

Summary: With Stannis at the Wall and the Lord Commander dead, the wars both North and South of the Wall have never been more dire. Jon must find a way to save as many as he can from the Others and bring the living together to fight against them. But will he be able to do that with so much animosity, prejudice, and strong personalities fighting for dominance and leadership? His dreams haunt him with death and destruction of those he loves and the Others taunt him even as he sleeps. (I still suck at summaries).

A Preview: They stood in the great hall, Jon watching the heated discussions from the back corner of the room. Stannis had summoned those nominated for Lord Commander to convene, as he grew increasingly frustrated each day that passed with no clear winner. Castle Black had become crowded and tense once the battle below the Wall was over.

The Free Folk that were rounded up were under guard by Stannis’ men in a camp just beyond the Wall. Mance was locked in the ice cells next to Tormund while he grieved for his wife, Dalla, who died during childbirth. Gilly now tended to him, raising him with her own.

Ygritte had escaped during the chaos with who knows how many, all scattered now and easy prey for the Others. They could only pray their people survived while they advocated for them to pass beyond the Wall.

Stannis had offered Robb a chance to take back Winterfell, even offering Val as his wife to unite the Wildlings to his cause and men. Robb had said his vows to the Night’s Watch before the weirwood, to the Old Gods, his father’s gods. To break such a vow would not win men of the North to his cause, and he doubted many would rally behind him after he led so many to their deaths. When they found out he still lived they would look upon him with contempt.

What kind of King of Winter did not die honorably beside his men? He told the King he named Jon his heir, and Jon swore no oaths. Stannis summoned him atop the Wall, escorted by his red priestess, Melisandre.

The woman was beautiful, no doubt, but her red eyes made him uneasy. He nearly jumped when her warm hand came to touch his cheek in the lift as they rode to the top of the Wall. She felt like fire, just as Dany did, but something was off about her. Her warmth did not bring him comfort; it did not make him feel whole, as Dany’s did.

Jon had refused the offer as well, though it was something he had dreamed of as a small boy, to be legitimized as a Stark and become Lord of Winterfell. But he wasn’t a Stark, had never been one, though his mother was. It felt disingenuous to take the name; like he would be spitting upon his parent’s tombs.

He sat upon his bed rereading the letters from his parents after he left Stannis. In them, he could see how proud his parents were that he was a Targaryen and of the name they had given him. He had read the letters so many times he had the words memorized. After many nights spent in his dreams with Dany, and many days spent immersed in the letters, he started to feel pride in his name and heritage.

His door burst open with a bang and had Jon scrambling to put the letters out of sight as he saw Robb stalk into his room. He barely had time to throw his furs over them before his brother was in front of him, his face red with anger.

“Why Jon? Why would you deny Stannis’ offer and not take back Winterfell for our house and family?”

“Robb, I can’t be Lord of Winterfell. You know this. That doesn’t mean I won’t fight to have it returned to House Stark,” Jon vowed calmly, trying to dispel the rage he felt rolling off his brother.

“They are boys, not yet ready to rule, and Bran a cripple at that. And Arya. I love her but a woman has never ruled the North and they would not take kindly to it. You know of my struggles to keep the stubborn and wild men of the north under control. Only you can do what needs to be done,” Robb pleaded.

Jon shook his head. “No, Bran ruled Winterfell in your stead. He was trained to do so. Rickon can be his heir, or Arya. I can advise or act as regent if absolutely necessary. But I’m not a Stark and I can not be named as such, nor can I rule the seat of power of the Stark’s.”

“Jon, you have always been a Stark. Our father’s blood runs through your veins, same as mine. He would want you to do this. I know he would.”

“I’m not, Robb. I have never been a Stark-”

“You have,” Robb yelled, getting in Jon’s face and grabbing his jerkin. Jon tried to remain calm though it became increasingly difficult. “You have to do this. You need to go back to Stannis and tell him you accept. Tell him you’ll be named as Lord of Winterfell, as Jon Stark. You’ve always been my brother so stop acting like a bastard and-”

At his brother’s words it was as if his last bit of control snapped. “I’m not a bastard. I was never a bastard. I’m not even your brother. Don’t fookin’ call me that again,” he told him as he pushed Robb off him.

At his brother’s look of shock and confusion, he realized what he let slip. He turned from his brother and ran his hand down his face as he walked towards the window, peering out. He heard his brother’s boots upon the stone floor as he approached, the only sound in the room.

Jon jumped at the hand laid upon his shoulder, but made no move to turn and face Robb. “Jon, I-” He felt the hand squeeze and heard a sigh leave Robb’s lips. “You are my brother, always. I apologize. I have made so many mistakes. It’s my fault we lost Winterfell and I pushed too hard for you to right my wrongs.”

“But I’m not,” Jon whispered, as he slowly turned to face his brother. They stood looking into each other’s eyes for a moment, trying to communicate without words. Jon wanted to tell his brother the truth but he feared what could happen if their conversation was overheard. Robb looked hurt and confused as he searched for answers.

There was one way Jon could show Robb the truth, without having to speak it, though he was reluctant to share them. They felt sacred somehow, private, but his brother deserved the truth. With a deep breath he walked to the bed, threw the covers away and picked up the letters and handed them to Robb.

“What are these? Some old parchments?” Robb asked, turning them over in his hands.

“Just read them. Father gave them to me when we visited Greywater Watch, before he left for King’s Landing and I traveled north to the Wall.”

Jon watched as Robb began to read, his face morphing from uncertainty, to disbelief, to anger and acceptance. Before finishing the first letter he stumbled over to the bed and collapsed upon it, his eyes never leaving the words written more than a decade ago. Jon sat down next to him and waited as he read the second, then the third, and the next and so on, never saying a word.

“Father lied to us, to mother, to everyone, my whole life. And you, you’ve known, all this time, and never said anything?” Robb accused, betrayal plain in his voice.

“To protect us all. For as long as the realm is at war, as long as a Lannister sits upon the Iron Throne,” Jon leaned closer and whispered in his ear. “Or a Baratheon finds safe quarter under the same roof as us, it isn’t safe for any to learn the truth. The more people who know the more likely it is to get out.”

Robb stood, handing the old time worn letters back to him. “I understand,” he replied tersely. “If you’ll excuse me.” He walked out of the room, never looking back.

Click here to read on AO3

[amber-laughs]

thinking about how catelyn always wanted the direwolves to shut up and ghost was the only one who never made a sound

something something jon’s subconscious need for catelyn’s approval being born into his outer vessel

[buildoblivionthenwewilltalk]

“Robb will rule, you will serve. Men will call you a crow. Him they'll call Your Grace. Singers will praise every little thing he does, while your greatest deeds all go unsung." - ACOK

“Jon is the only brother that remains to me. Should I die without issue, I want him to succeed me as King in the North. I had hoped you would support my choice” - ASOS

[nightswatchdisbandmentera]

Thinking about poor, doomed Young Griff and how it’s not even important if he is or isn’t Rhaegar’s real son. Because what makes him a fake goes beyond blood - it’s really down to intent and experience. He’s a poor rich man’s Aegon V, but like without the organic hero’s journey.

He’s a lab experiment pretty much. However well intentioned he is, there isn’t much indication that his journey has been authentic. Varys and Illyrio are trying to recreate Aegon V with a fake...literally down to the “let’s hide his hair” scheme. They even gave the boy Aegon’s freaking name (it’s a king’s name after all so I can’t blame them). But they missed like the biggest, most important lesson of all. Aegon V CHOSE to go out. HE made himself, no one else did. His journey was organic as it was derived out of his own autonomous decisions, not manufactured down to the smallest detail (does YG really know what it means to starve and be homeless and hunted?). And there was no promise of a reward (I.e., kingship). Egg didn’t know that he’d be king and even after his dad rose to the throne, there were a ton of people ahead of him. FFS he’s called Aegon the Unlikely. Bro just woke up one day and was like “ay wouldn’t it be nice to actually experience this realm from the perspective of a disenfranchised person?”

Meanwhile, our poor Young Griff is being made to go through all this with the expectation that it’s all going to pay off when he becomes king. BUT (big but!), who’s to say that he actually gets it? Like does he really get why he needs to see how this horrible feudalistic society preys on the smallfolk and makes corpses out of them? Wait, does he even know or recognize that the system needs changing? Like did Varys and Illyrio just tell him “people poor” and leave it at that? Why are they poor Young Griff? How did they get there?! Do Varys and Illyrio even get it? Do they understand that Aegon V was a radical change maker?

How hollow is it that it’s not Young Griff making the conscious decision to actually try and see how his subjects live. He’s not making the conscious decision to be a change maker, no matter what Varys and Illyrio say. People in this fandom will talk about how Young Griff will be the perfect king but…perfect for whom? In what way? In a series that critiques this entire system, what about YG screams that he’s going to actually tackle some of the systemic issues that need tackling - the systemic issues that Aegon V tried to tackle after organically going through his own journey?

WELLLLL….isn’t it cool that Jon and Dany are the true heirs to Aegon V’s legacy not because of blood, but because they actually get to the heart of Aegon V’s journey? Say what you want about them but they are radical as it gets (Jon at the Wall and Dany all over Slaver’s Bay). No one manufactured them. No one told them they had to care about people. No one told them they had to do this lab experiment to become king/queen. They actually did their own thing, while themselves being disenfranchised (GRRM identifies both as outsiders). And without the expectation of a reward (like Jon is literally told that his entire life will basically amount to nothing).

And it’s even better that they were unlikely. Young Griff is meant to happen - well someone is pulling the strings to make sure he works. He’s taking the role of someone who was always meant to be king - for Rhaegar’s son was meant to be king. But Jon and Dany are actually following the Aegon V blueprint because they weren’t meant to happen. Jon is a second son who is presumably a bastard with a contentious claim, and Dany is a daughter who was never meant to survive being sold off to slavery let alone rise to queenship. Neither one of them was meant to be on the throne. No one told them to do the things they did. No one took them and placed them in the positions they’re in. They rose to the occasion by themselves and made changes by their own volition - just as it was with Aegon V. And what makes it even better is that just as Aegon V was chosen to be king, so were Jon and Dany (Jon was literally elected into office and basically won over the wildlings while Dany was dubbed “mhysa” because of her actions in Slaver’s Bay).

[ladystoneboobs]

no of fence to jon snow fans who for some reason care about his exact age, but these discussions just annoy me no end. not only bc there's no way any weirwood flashbacks bran has to rhaegar/lyanna will come with time/datestamps, but also bc there's always comments like this:

SEVERAL turns of the moon (ie, months)?! have these people never seen a human baby before or just have no concept of their ages? even if we take into account travel time from the toj to wf, meaning jon was not a newborn too fresh out the oven when catelyn and robb arrived, there's still a difference between a newborn and a 3mo and an even bigger difference between those infants and an older baby 5-7mo. there's very good reasons these lines were cut. whatever birthdates can be worked out internally for jon and robb from when they're first mentioned as 15 and 16 don't matter in the end, bc grrm doesn't care about a consistent timeline and the actual text of catelyn's pov and ned's convo with robert about cheating on her should outweigh any guesstimates about jon's official nameday wrt robb's. catelyn may not have cared for jon, but she would sure as hell have noticed his nameday if it came before robb's and made him ned's firstborn. if jon's birthday canonically came before robb's then either ned's cover story would not involve adultery (not impossible for him to sire a bastard before his wedding), or he'd just give jon a new nameday along with his new name to fit the adultery lie. it makes no sense for him to lie about one and not the other, undermining the big lie with a little public clue of his story not adding up. whatever else she was as a stepmother, cat wasn't stupid and a bastard who was actually the eldest son being raised alongside her trueborn heir could be an even bigger insult than whether he was born of adultery or not.

BUT, the unknowability of jon's true birthday is not the only reason this annoys me, it's bc this is all based on the assumption that jon must be older since rhaegar/lyanna ran off together before ned married cat, as if both boys must have been conceived asap as robb canonically was when his parents consummated their marriage. and that's not how human reproduction works! even if you don't understand how fast babies grow in the first year, you should know that people who get pregnant do so through ovulation cycles and a lucky sperm finding an egg and all that, not just immediately getting knocked up as soon as one has p-in-v sex for the first time. not unless you only know mean girls sex ed where if you have sex you will get pregnant and die. (even tho lyanna did die, there's plenty of canon examples where pregnancy did not lead straight to death. also examples of people who did not get pregnant right away and even some who are/were sexually active and childless without always having moon tea on hand.) we can't know how long lyanna was having sex before that sperm+egg match happened or even how long she was with rhaegar before losing her technical virginity. if they were married, doesn't it make sense to think they didn't consummate their relationship until the wedding night either? that's the only leverage there is to ensure a status as wife rather than just mistress.

and while i just said grrm doesn't care about exact timelines and a lot is still foggy surrounding the rebellion and esp rhaegar, there is one timemarker wrt robert's rebellion he voluntarily threw in, time and time again: that stannis was besieged at storm's end for almost a whole year. that siege, which mind you, did not match the duration of the entire war. it only started after robert won his battles at gulltown and summerhall, returned to storm's end, and then went out and lost the battle of ashford, leaving his homeland open to the reachermen. the same siege which only ended when ned made a detour there after the sack of king's landing, before going to the toj. even if lyanna may not have given birth that exact day ned found her, she could only be waiting in that bloody bed for weeks at the most, not months. so if rhaegar knocked her up the very same night he carried her off and jon was still a newborn when ned found her after the siege of storm's end had ended, wouldn't that mean lyanna was pregnant for well over a year? that's not how human pregnancy works either! so, maybe that's proof that jon and robb, whichever order they were actually born in, were actually very close in age as babies, much closer than if they were both conceived asap.

and really, jon's actual birthdate does not matter imho, when he was raised not just as the bastard to robb's trueborn heir, but with robb also known by catelyn and the world as ned's firstborn (which he was, in any case, as jon was ned's nephew by birth). what difference could a birthdate before robb's make (even were there some means of discovery) after ned, cat, and robb are all dead? if one is looking only at his birth parents then he's only a firstborn child on lyanna's side, but definitely a second son on rhaegar's side. maybe he was always meant to be a second son with a not much older half-brother! even if the aegon fka young griff is not in fact rhaegar's son, he'll still be known as aegon vi targaryen, meaning jon will never be known as any father's elder son. if i may reference mean girls again, it's not going to happen.

[swordsandarms]

There's nothing more self-inserting in this fandom than the people who actually hate Rhaegar Targaryen (and sometimes by extension Lyanna and Daenerys and other Targaryens).

But with Rhaegar it's very peculiar. With either Rhaegar positive or neutral fans, you can discuss things like connections he has with characters in actual canon, by actually canon references, that give him some depth whatsoever in turn. Love RxL shippers with all the actually newer clues highlighted compared to your typical "Jon's parentage" checklists because it gives more character interiority. Love the Jon and Dany fans who've given more attention to the connections clearly drawn on purpose by the author that are also doing that.

But people who outright hate this tertiary character? The emotionally driven rants as if this man was their own boyfriend or father and wronged them specifically and that's all the focus of it? Only ever writing in "depth" about him in scenarios that are clearly made up and can only be explained as projection from some baggage none of us trying to read some book are interested in? Very odd behaviour.

[asongofstarkandtargaryen]

Jon Snow said Young Dragon rights!

[shieldofmen]

Day 10 - Echoes of the Past

Listen I got stuck on the idea of Odin- ‘but why?’ You ask and the answer is i saw a meta on it once and thought it was nice

[catofoldstones]

jon snow? you mean fucked up medieval england magic naruto?

[eruherdiriel]

On the surface, it's funny that show!Jon threatens to kill Littlefinger "himself" like it's some special thing when he routinely passes the sentence and swings the sword like his father uncle taught him to. On another level, it reflects how, even after all the killing he's done, taking a life still carries weight for Jon.

But also, I think Jon might feel that if he did kill Littlefinger, it wouldn't be the "right" way or maybe even for the "right" reasons (protecting Sansa is reason enough for me but probably wouldn't be for some of Jon's bannermen). He'd just snap and do it.

[zadien]

Always - A Chenford 6x10 Spec Fic

The whole operation had gone to shit. 


From the shoot-out in the laundromat, to Tim’s desperate leap onto the fleeing vehicle, everything had gone to hell.

Using the last of his ammunition to blow out the rear window of the speeding truck had been a tactical decision that he was paying for as he found himself yanked into the truck, all but upside down, into the passenger seat. 

At least he’d managed to wrestle the man’s firearm from him, but now Tim found himself alone in the cab with an unknown suspect and no backup.

Managing to wriggle into a somewhat defensible position, he reached for his taser, weighing up the cost of tasing the guy versus how fast he could get control of the truck before it rammed into a civilian.

Sensing his intent, the driver yanked hard on the wheel, sending Tim careening backwards into the door, head slamming against the glass hard enough to see stars. He grunted and blinked against the pain that ricocheted through his skull. 

The pointed blade of a scalpel arced towards him and he jerked back, breath clogging in his lungs. 

Read the rest on AO3

[dirtytransmasc]

self indulgent got concept.

Ned brings Jon home, Cat hates the boy, everything stays the same... until Robert Baratheon is charging through the halls of Winterfell looking for the babe, ready to butcher the poor thing where he lay helpless in his cradle.

in a matter of moments Catelyn learns three things:

The babe was never a bastard, Ned had only lied to her to protect Jon, and that she would die before she let Robert lay a finger on the babe she'd previously wished death upon.

cue Catelyn Stark snatching Jon from his cradle, holding him, protecting him, loving him as she would her own son, risking it all to keep him safe, all care for herself thrown to the wind.

like they say, what a mother's love holds no bounds, and what it makes her capable of had no limits.

[empressofmankind]

Remember that sketch of Euron playing the accordion? I figured I do another sketch for the same fic on the other page, featuring something I am not remotely as confident at: kids.

So, have a complicated picture of Euron's A+ parenting involving taking a nine-year-old that can't swim (Dany) and a ten-year-old that'll crawl into every flood crevice in sight (Joan, i.e. Jon) to a tide beach. And just. Not paying attention.

[gazpachoandbooks]

299 AC - The King in The North, Robb Stark, and his brother Jon Snow ride south to avenge the death of their father, Lord Eddard Stark, and to bring their sisters Sansa Stark and Arya Stark back home

Tobias Santelmann as Robb Stark

Alexander Dreymon as Jon Snow

The War of The Five Kings AU - Jon rides South with Robb

[chelsealorine]

in the year of our lord 2022 my jonsa jumped out.

[transmasc-wizard]

hrng. trying 2 figure out how to get a sensitivity reader for a fic (not now. its not Written yet. but it is an idea for the future) without, like, being an asshole

elaboration: i cannot pay someone online for "im a minor and cant ask my parents to set that up" reasons (and also idk if thats legal when it comes to fanfic?), but i also don't want to be like "hey will you do this work for me :) for free in all senses of the word :)". the main thing i've got considered so far is like a "trade" where in return i'd read over something for a chronic pain/queer/OCD/autism check, but i highly doubt there is Such a specific person out there that they both 1) are the demographic im looking for (filipino), 2) also need a sensitivity reader in MY demographic, 3) are willing to do that in the future, and 4) are in the TMA fandom or otherwise willing to read for it . wails