Chapter Summary: The manner in which Sansa and the rest of the Red Keep come out to meet their king and his men as they straggle back to King's Landing lacks pageantry, decorum, and any kind of organization, but Sansa gives none of that a second thought.

Chapter Rating: M for sexual content

Author's Notes: This is to date the longest fanfic I've ever written—the next comes in a good 30,000 words shorter. I've also never taken so long to finish a fic. When I started this, I was not yet finished with my PhD, so some of you have read and reviewed through the final stages of writing my dissertation and my dissertation defense on my way to becoming Dr. Dram. I'm pretty sure that makes us family. Thank you for all your support and kind words. I am sorry if I killed your favorites along the way. I killed some of mine too.

Every time someone told me I converted them to the Jon/Sansa ship (or the Jaime/Sansa ship!) it warmed my heart and an angel got their wings. When I opened this doc to begin this final chapter, I got a little queasy: I'm attached to these characters and this version of Jon and Sansa's story, and letting go of them is difficult. It's not all sewn up at the end. Not everything is perfect, because I don't think ASOIAF is going to be a tidy, happy ending. Regardless, I'm might revisit this universe in oneshots.

When I look at the follows, favs, kudos, and comments this fic has received, I'm completely bowled over. If you are left bereft, I am currently writing a modern AU, A City of Fortune and Failure, which is Jon/Sansa. I'm also plotting a Jon/Sansa, Canadian Mountie AU, which I'll probably begin posting sometime in September or thereabouts. Finally, follow my fangirling on tumblr (username justadram)—we should be friends!

Chapter Twenty-Eight

There is nothing dignified about it. The manner in which Sansa and the rest of the Red Keep come out to meet their king and his men as they straggle back to King's Landing lacks pageantry, decorum, and any kind of organization, but Sansa gives none of that a second thought. All she can think on is Jon, fixing her mind on the memory of his face and how his arms will encircle her, lifting her off the ground, when she finds him. How his lips will taste. How she will finally be able to breathe again knowing he is returned to her.

Both the returning army and those that come out to meet them lack horses to ride, for they were all slaughtered for meat moons ago, when there was nothing left to feed them, and hunger has made everyone weak and slow. Nevertheless, at the first horn blow from the city walls, announcing the sighting of the advancing army, and the answering incessant peel of the Great Sept's bells, spreading the word throughout King's Landing, everyone in the city seemed to shake off their lethargy. The throng of people sweeping through the streets and the Dragon Gate are driven forward by a burst of speed springing from elation and disbelief. Boney women, crooked old men, and scrawny children alike tumble forward. The women move the fastest with their skirts raised up around their ankles, running to see if their men have made it back alive, and Sansa is amongst them. With her heart in her throat and her fingers crushing the heavy wool of her skirts, she rushes forward, filled with a mix of anticipation and fear, though she knows with certainty that Jon is alive.

There were no ravens left to send word, but the frenzied talk of smallfolk overcame the deepest drifts of snow once Jon's army was on the move south, once the Others were defeated and their king victorious, bringing word of the slow—agonizingly slow—march back to King's Landing. It seems forever since the first whispers reached them. If there had been a horse to ride, Sansa thinks she might have abandoned her duty to her people and met him halfway, but she has been forced by circumstance to do as she ought and wait with feigned patience to see him.

Jon is alive and with every stride she takes, she is closer to being in his arms—warm, alive, whole—with his mouth hot against her skin, his hands pressing hard against her spine, whispering words meant only for her. It wasn't so long ago that she had given up hope of it ever being so.

As she reaches the first amorphous line of men and the crowd closes in around her, she searches, looking for dark curls and that smile that she thinks of as her own. The smell of them is almost overwhelming; a mix of sweat, mud, blood, infection, and fetid death that hangs heavy and clogs the sinuses, but it is their haggard appearance that chokes her. Things have been bad everywhere in the Seven Kingdoms, but all of these men look like the worst of what she has seen come before her in the throne room on audience day. Will her Jon be much altered?

Even if he is, she'll know him immediately as the lost piece of herself, but all around her she sees unfamiliar faces, looking past her to seek out someone else. A few stop and stumble back, attempting to give way to her, the lady they recognized as their queen, with a mumbled, Your Grace. But where is their king?

Her sanity frays at the edges, as she feels hysteria begin to grip her in the face of this final delay. Grasping the shoulder of a man with a patchy, overgrown beard, who is trying to dance out of her way, she demands, "Where is the king?"

The man turns, his rheumy eyes searching to the left. It isn't much, but it is a direction to fix upon, so she pushes forward once more. Though she can no longer run in this crush of humanity, her chest heaves as if from exertion, as she cranes her head from side to side and shoulders her way through the men and those who have come to meet them.

"Jon!" she calls out. It's desperate and ridiculous, thinking he might hear her and find her instead, since she is failing in her search for him, but she shouts his name thrice until she feels a hand grasp her elbow.

She spins to find Myrcella, her scar pulled by the spread of her bright smile, reminding Sansa as always of the young woman's father—one ghost of many—and the smiles he would flash her, when they were alone in her chambers in the Vale. Trystane stands behind his lady wife, his hands on her shoulders, tanned fingers overlaying the golden strands of hair that spread over a heavy fur given to her by Sansa upon the Martells' arrival in King's Landing, so she would not freeze. Myrcella's husband no longer looks boyish. He is worn and tattered with spidery lines at the corners of his eyes and a thick beard. He is a man grown.

"The king is over there, Your Grace. Just beside that wagon. Trystane just left his side," Myrcella says, pointing with an eager nod.

Sansa follows Myrcella's line of sight, squinting against the glaring light from the milky sky. It's true. The men part more readily than they did for her, as he comes through the crowd. He is Westeros' king, but he is more than that to his men. He is more to her. It is Jon.

He is a shaggy mess. With his hair too long and matted, a fearsomely unkempt beard obscuring half of his face, dark circles under his eyes, his furs dragging through the snow, and his boots wrapped in rags, he resembles nothing so much as a rather intimidating beggar.

He is perfect.

She means to say his name again, but nothing escapes the tightness in her throat, as he stops before her and lifts one black, gloved hand to her cheek. They have met like this before after being separated for so long. She knew then that she never wanted to be parted from him, for he looked and reminded her so much of home, so greatly of the family she feared lost to her that she wanted to hold him to her heart. Surely this time he is safe and truly hers to keep. That is her only prayer.

Her eyes flutter closed at the slight pressure of his hand against her face, the shocking warmth of his palm managing to seep through even the thick leather of his glove. It's only when she opens them again that it strikes her how vacant his eyes look. It's more than just a strange detachedness. He still has not wrapped his arms about her and he is completely silent. This is not what she envisioned.

Perhaps he means to maintain the dignity of his station. If he means to be controlled, she must do her best as his queen not to betray her own tumult of emotions. She'll suppress the urge to throw herself at him and drag him to his knees here in the snow, where they can kiss and kiss and kiss. There will be time for that later.

His hand drops to his side, balled into a fist, but she can't bear the thought of not touching him, so she snatches at his hand and works at his fingers until she can thread hers through his and squeeze tight. Although he makes no move to free himself, it does not escape Sansa's notice that he also does not squeeze back.

But he's here. That is all that matters, she reassures herself. Beyond all reason, he has survived.

"Thank the gods."

She repeats herself twice before Jon's gaze veers from her. It is Sam, who's caught his eye. Breathing heavily, he approaches with Gilly at his side, the two of them wrapped in scruffy, grey furs. Holding onto Gilly's heavily mittened hand is her child. The boy stares up at Jon with rounded brown eyes and a pale mouth that hangs open, as if he stands before the Warrior himself. It's no wonder: he's been raised on stories of Jon and Sam and the Night's Watch. They're all gods to him.

"Jon…Your Grace. It's so good, so good to see you…" Sam stutters. "Look who I've brought to welcome you. It's Gilly and the baby—not a baby anymore. His name is Sam," he finishes, beaming as he pats the boy's head.

Gilly considered Aemon in honor of the maester of the Night's Watch, she once told Sansa, but when she came to Horn Hill and everyone seemed so shocked to think Sam might be the father, she named him Sam instead, to honor a different maester to be. Sam seems about as proud to tell Jon the boy's name as he was when first he heard it from the lad himself upon Gilly's arrival at the Red Keep, but whatever reaction he was expecting from Jon, he doesn't get it. Neither of them has gotten the reception they imagined. Still Jon says nothing, and that can't be right, when Jon spoke so warmly of Sam and called him his brother. Jon must know, he must understand what this means to Sam.

Jon reaches out a hand to clap Sam on the shoulder, but utters not one hearty congratulation. Nothing.

Something is terribly off. Jon does not speak and she can't hear him inside her head, the way she could before he left. It makes Sansa want to throw open his furs and trace his body with shaking hands, seeking some evidence of a wound, or demand that Sam examine him for signs of illness, for something is very, very wrong. She should hear him, whispering to her heart, his pulse beating alongside hers, but there is nothing. It is as if there is a wall separating them, through which she can hear nothing.

Sam must sense it too, for his smile falters and he looks from Sansa to Jon, his brows drawing together in confusion.

Would it have made a difference if instead of Sam's family coming out to greet him, Sansa was able to present Jon with a family? A hearty boy of his own or a dark haired little girl, clutching at her skirts? There were times when hunger and inescapable fatigue made her glad that Jon's seed hadn't quickened, but would Jon still be so distant if her body hadn't failed them?

"The king's men are weary," Sansa announces, as she releases her grip on Jon to address Sam with as much false composure as she can muster, hands clasped demurely before her and chin held slightly aloft. "They must have blankets and baths and bread. Whatever might bring them some comfort after their long march. See to it."

"Yes, Your Grace."

"I'll help."

She almost doesn't recognize it as his voice. Her husband speaks with so raspy a voice that Sansa wonders when the last time he uttered a word was. She's certain she looks like an owl, as she takes him in and waits to see if he will now deign to speak to her as well.

He does not.

"Thank you, Your Grace," Sam belatedly replies, sounding rather unsure whether he should accept the help Jon offers or whether it is even possible to refuse Jon now that he is king.

Anyone can see that Jon is in no shape to help anyone. Someone should be helping him.

"That isn't necessary. We have already made the provisions. Sam knows what to do," Sansa tries, for she means to get Jon alone, where she might better gauge what is wrong, and if he goes off to help Sam there is no telling how long he will be consumed with his duty.

He stiffly shakes his head, cutting off her protestations. "I'm right behind you," he assures Sam, and Sam must see that there is to be no further discussion, for he does what Sansa can't quite manage: he turns and walks away with Gilly and the boy at his side, a frown still pulling at his mouth and creasing his once rounded face.

Jon makes to move past her, but she throws up a hand, blocking him. He could easily brush her off, but instead, he rocks back, as if he is unwilling to let her hand touch his chest.

She huffs, blowing out her frustration in a puff of mist.

There are a million questions she would like to ask of her husband, but for now one answer must do. She looks through and around soldiers and well wishers, searching for a flash of white—maybe not so purely white, after she has seen the shape the men are in. Jon might refuse to be tended to, while his men are still unsettled, but Ghost might be more willing to receive her petting. She has missed the beast, which warmed her bed before Jon ever did, and besides, Jon sees, hears, feels what Ghost does, when he so chooses, so whatever affection she bestows upon Ghost might do for the both of them until she can get her husband alone.

"Where is…"

Silence meets her unfinished question. Silence and a stare so empty, she need not ask what became of the direwolf to know it in her heart.

…

She works amongst the men until her feet and back ache from the unyielding stone floor and repetitious movement, bending down to greet each man and give them bread and ale with her own two hands. When she can stand no longer, she seeks Jon out. Despite looking dead on his feet, he has been doing much the same over the course of the day, tirelessly moving from one man to the next. She can see the devotion in his men's eyes, when they look up at him from wherever they have slumped on the floor. It's a devotion forged in victory and stained with blood and loss. They seem undisturbed by his silence. They must be accustomed to it.

Begging him to take his rest, she draws him away. Through halls bustling with renew activity and up winding stairs, they make their way to the king's chambers without any words passing between them.

Busywork helps Sansa keep her wits about her in the face of such endless quiet. Having called for hot water and scented oils for a bath, she goes about the room, drawing curtains, prodding the fire, and turning back the furs on the bed, preparing the room for his much needed slumber, while he sits on the edge of one of the wooden, high backed chairs, looking as if he barely knows how to settle into it and would rather sit cross-legged on the floor. Still, there is some sign that he alive to her presence: though he doesn't speak, Sansa can feel the weight of his stare on her, as she moves about the room.

Four of the strongest servants left to them in the Red Keep come into the bedchamber hauling buckets of water. It's hot enough that it steams, when they pour it into the copper tub situated before the fire. These things—fires, hot baths, heaping scoops of gruel, hunks of grainy bread, and cold mugs of ale—are luxuries, but all the returning men deserve them. Sansa gave instructions that nothing was to be spared in celebration of this triumphant day. These four took her instructions to heart, for the water reaches high in the tub, filled so close that it might overflow with Jon inside. Calling over her shoulder, she gives them her thanks and upends the oil they have brought into the water, as the door closes behind them with a thunk.

Still he watches, unmoving, but due to practicality born of economies great and small, Sansa is keenly aware that the bathwater cools, while he sits motionless, and is eager to usher him into it before the effort of the men and fuel that heated the water goes completely to waste. She turns her back and instructs him to strip. She speaks to him matter-of-factly. It's a gentle tone of command that reminds hers of Septa Mordane during their lessons more so than her lady mother when speaking to her lord father, but Sansa's either out of practice in dealing with her husband or she's lost the ability altogether. She can only hope that with time will come familiarity.

"The water will not stay warm for long," she says, trying to drown out the sound of the rustle of clothing and furs falling to the floor.

Though she's watched him strip down until he was as bare as he was born before, she feels shy at the intimacy of the moment. That too must fade with time if they are to be back to who they were before he left.

Water sloshes against the sides of the tub, as he slips into the water; whether it is her authoritarian tone or his own considerable exhaustion that has stripped him of the ability to refuse, he seems obedient enough to her wishes, following her command to its conclusion.

She steels herself to turn back to him, reminding herself that though he is as silent as the grave, he is her husband. Taking a towel for her lap off the nearby table, she kneels down behind him. As dirty as all the men are, at least they are not alive with nits and fleas, the freezing temperatures bestowed upon them one grace, but the water will wash away the grime caked onto him and the heat of the water might help him relax and loosen his muscles and perhaps his tongue as well.

At first she makes no move to touch him, but watches as he dunks his head into the water—long enough to make her nervous, until he comes up for air with a great gasp. Water cascades from his hair, down his back and arms, as he sits up, pushes his hair back, and swipes the water out of his eyes with the back of his hand.

"Shall I wash your hair?"

She needs to have her hands on him, so she can feel connected somehow to this man, who resembles her husband in some ways, but in others seems a stranger to her. Having maneuvered and stretched out as best he could within the small tub, his only answer is to tip his head down in wordless offering.

She pushes up her sleeves and picks up the slice of strong lye soap left by the servants. Dipping it into the water, her arm accidentally brushes his, slick and warm. Their first real touch elicits an audible swallow from Jon. She could do away with the washing portion of this bath, pull at her laces, strip off her smallclothes and stockings, and climb in after him, but he needs a wash as much as they need time, so she sets to work, building a good lather before dropping the soap into his waiting hand. Working her fingers through his curls, she teases apart the tangles and runs the short of her nails over his scalp. He doesn't speak, but she coaxes some satisfied noises from him, while she works. When his hair hangs lank and slick against his skull, she urges him to sit up with the lightest pressure at the base of his neck, so that she might scrub his back. With the water full to the rim, she has to plunge her arm below the water to reach his waist and lower. When the dirt has been scrubbed away and nothing but soapy bubbles dot his skin, she kisses his newly pink shoulder. He murmurs his thanks. It's only two words, but it's something.

He feels right, familiar under her hands. There are new scars that crisscross his pale skin, ones she knows from her much called upon recollections he didn't have before, but the scars she can't see trouble her most.

Handing over the soap, Jon does the rest, washing away dirt and who knows what else, and when he steps out dripping, she sees him wrapped in a towel. He looks some improved, but after he's done wrapping the towel about his waist, he once more perches in the wooden chair, looking no more comfortable in it than he did before the bath.

Except for one difference. She makes to step away, but he grabs her by the hips and pulls her back. Stumbling, she catches herself, grabbing his shoulders, as he buries his head in her middle. The wet of his hair soaks through the wool, but the fierceness of his grip and the sound of her name murmured in that raspy voice is unbearably sweet despite his obvious unease.

"Jon, please talk to me, please," she pleads, stroking his head, smoothing back the wet hanks of hair.

He draws back just enough to rest the crown of his head against her, staring down where their feet hide together beneath her navy skirts.

"There were dragons."

Sansa stiffens. There was no word of this. No hint that the Dragon Queen broke her pledge to leave Westeros behind. Sansa continued to send provisions and aid to those who were sick, the remnants of Daenerys' army. She kept Jon's pledge to see to their care, despite the difficulties of winter and she expected the silver haired woman to do the same, but perhaps it was a mistake to ever trust her.

"Dragons?"

"Ice dragons."

"What?"

"They came from the north like in the old tales Old Nan used to tell." Sansa has no memory of this. She hated the stories that were gruesome and frightening as much as the boys and Arya loved them. "We thought that was the end. I didn't think I could face dragons again." Once was more than enough, Sansa was certain. "But I controlled them."

"You rode dragons?"

She tries to picture Jon, a black splotch high above in the grey, winter sky.

"No, I slipped inside of them, the way I sometimes…"

He inhales, his back expanding with the deepness of it, and she can feel Ghost's presence like a cold nose against her hand, gently insisting upon her attention. There's an ache with the fresh realization she'll never bury her hand in the ruff of his neck again. She lost Lady, but the bond Jon shared with Ghost was something more. If he'd only let her, she could share the burden of his loss. She's beginning to think that Jon is purposefully shutting her out, closing off whatever it is that made him open to her before, when she felt and heard him inside of her head like a soft, reassuring murmur.

Tucking her thumbs under his jaw, she tilts his head up, so that he must look at her. He's in there, swamped by guilt and sadness, smothered by losses that multiplied while she waited in King's Landing. She can just make him out.

He releases his grip on her, sinking back into the chair, his eyes still a grey void, as they dart away from her. "I'm not a man, Sansa. I'm something terrible."

"That's nonsense."

"I'm a monster," he insists, and she can hear his teeth begin to grind together.

"I've never heard of monsters who save people." She turns away, looking for a bowl, determined to do something that might help him shed this memory, this hardened skin that has formed out of necessity. "I won't have you talking nonsense, Jon Snow."

"What are you doing?" he asks flatly, as she gathers her tools: a straight razor, spring scissors, a bowl of water, and some oil to soothe the skin.

"Cleaning you up. You might think yourself a monster, but I won't have you looking like a beast. The bath didn't quite do the trick."

Handing him the razor and the bowl to cradle in his lap, she sets to work on his beard first, clipping it short enough with the scissors before she attacks it with the straight blade. She works slowly, methodically, revealing fresh, unblemished skin bit by bit. Between the scrape of the blade against his skin, he speaks.

"I couldn't save everyone."

"Who else?" Ghost was lost, and although she walked among the men today, tending to their needs and welcoming them home, she refused to count their number or bring herself to ask after anyone who seemed to be absent.

"Asha."

It isn't the answer she wanted, although any familiar name would sting. There had been some comfort in thinking that Asha Greyjoy fought at Jon's side, when Sansa could not. Sansa knew she could trust Asha and that she would do her best to see Jon safe.

"It was at the end. That's the joke of it—how many died so near the end."

Sansa takes the bowl from him and sloshes the razor in the water, removing black hair and oil from its edge.

"I hoped…" she trails off, as she passes him a clean linen towel and deposits the bowl back on the table.

Asha's absence did not go unnoted, but Sansa hoped that Asha had set off for the Iron Islands. What would be the point in her marching south with the rest of them? Greyjoys belong on the water even when the seas are cold enough to freeze.

"Gods, she hated the very thought of that old man, who claimed to be her husband," Jon grits through bared teeth, as he pats at his newly smooth face. "He better be dead."

"Or?"

"Or I'll take everything he claims as his own."

"Jon." She tugs the towel from his grip and drapes it around his shoulders, fixing him with a stony glare. "Don't speak of any more wars."

The pain of war eats away at men, but it works its way into their bones too, becoming a part of them. Jon must learn to live and rule in peace. She must bleed the patterns of war from him like a poison. Maesters have their ways. So do wives.

He's quiet again throughout the rest of it, the only sound in the room the whisper of her slippers over a floor increasingly littered with fallen dark curls.

Throwing the towel that has kept his shoulders free of the unwanted hair aside, she steps back to admire her work.

"There you are. There's my Jon."

His hands flex and grip his bare knees. He suddenly looks so vulnerable. Shorn and shined, the jagged crack in the barrier he's thrown up between them suddenly seems so painfully obvious. It has made his eyes appear so hauntingly empty, but they fix on her now with an intensity that burns.

"Is that who I am?"

Crouching to be on level with him, she covers his twitching hands with her own, stilling them. "Of course. You're my Jon and I'm your Sansa."

He leans towards her, and they're suddenly closer than they've been since he left, but it's more than just physical closeness that simmers between them, as he frees his hands and traces the underside of her jaw until his fingers are buried in the thickness of her hair. For moons she has held back her tears, but Jon's touch loosens the threads of her composure, and she feels them spill hotly over her cheeks.

"I'm not sure anymore."

"I am," she says, blinking back tears. "It's the only thing that has ever made sense to me. So, you must stop with this, you must…"

He cuts off her plea. She's waited for it, but it's still a surprise, when with a tilt of his head his lips press hard against hers, his hands cradling her head, holding her firmly to his mouth. He kisses her again and again—desperate, quick kisses that have no chance to deepen. It's like their first kiss, when the urgency of his passion pushed her up against the wall and made her knees go weak. Her whole body comes to life, every thought focused on the pressure of his lips and his fingers and the contrast of chapped lips and sharp teeth. Blood rushes in her ears and she scrambles against him, trying to draw him closer in this awkward position, trying to slow his movements, so she can open her mouth under his and feel the drag of his tongue in her mouth.

The bite of his teeth, nipping at her lower lip, pulls a sound from the back of her throat that is so raw, her cheeks flush in embarrassment. Nothing has made her wet between her legs except her own thoughts and wandering hands since he road north, and now just his tongue soothing the hurt is enough.

His hand maps her neck, her shoulder. She hates the necessity of her high necked woolen gown that prevents her from feeling his touch as he cups her breasts. Through silk she might get a better sense of his roughened hands.

"Gods, you smell good." He breathes at her neck, his tongue flicking out to dip into the hollow, where simple lace decorates the edging of her gown, as if to taste her too. "I forgot how bloody good you smell."

Like juniper. When word came that the army was close, she called for her own hot bath with a scoop of juniper berries to scent the water. It's a luxury she does not regularly afford herself, but she's glad enough of it now if it pleases him.

She wants to please him other ways as well.

"Take me to bed."

With a huff he slips his hands under her arms and lifts her to her feet. She's seen how tired he is in the slump of his shoulders, his lethargic movements, and the weariness in his face, but some reserve of energy allows him to pick her up, carry her the five paces to the bed, and throw her sideways across its furs before crawling atop her. He wastes no time, dragging her heavy skirts up with him, bunching them up around her waist and yanking at her smallclothes with rushed hands. Their arms battle each other, as she reaches down to tug the towel free of his waist. It no doubt slows his efforts, but she finds she can practice no patience with Jon propped above her.

Though he is finally naked and he has managed to toss her smallclothes aside, he pauses, running his hand over the rise of her hip and staring in a way that should make her shy, but she finds herself widening the gap between her legs, sucking in her breath in anticipation of more than the heat of his stare there.

"I've forgotten more than I remember."

"We'll relearn," she promises him, but even with the length of him rigid against her thigh, he seems distracted, his eyes blurred by thinly concealed emotion.

"I couldn't let myself think of you. Not and keep going. I had to give up hope of seeing you again."

She shushes him gently, her hand settling on his too sharp hip and guiding him towards her until the head of him is where she needs him.

Sometimes the hoping was so very painful, when she wanted to give up. Giving up would have been easier than the promise of sweet things—like making love to her husband—that seemed so impossibly out of reach.

"I hoped for the both of us."

He pushes into her with a hard snap of his hips. It's as painful after all this time as it is pleasurable to feel him thick and deep inside of her. He pants against her cheek and his fingers knot in her hair, twisting painfully, while muttering something that might be an apology even as he begins to thrust and she groans in relief.

He's home. With her. In her.

As it turns out, she's forgotten too. Memories worn threadbare, during dark, lonely nights, don't compare with this overwhelming torrent of sensation. His mouth, tongue, and teeth at her neck, her ear, and lips, swallowing her whimpers, making her skin pebble and the fine hairs on her too thin body stand erect. The soft, springy feel of the hair on his chest under her questing hands. His skin hot and firm, stretched tight over the flexing muscles of his back and arse with every forceful plunge of his body into hers. The wet sounds of their slick meeting and the gasp and grunt of effort and relief.

Too soon he approaches his completion, his pelvis crashing against hers, bone against bone, flesh against flesh, his words broken and deliciously filthy in her ear. Hot. Wet. Cunt. Gods. Fuck. It's too soon for her to follow, but she wants it for him and wants it for herself—to feel him spill inside of her. She arches her back with a moan, pushing up her straining breasts trapped in wool that keeps her taut nipples from rubbing against his chest. The heel of her foot inches up his back, attempting to pull him in further and bring him to the point where he can't stop himself from finishing. Rocking against him, she begs for him to come.

He's falling apart, his breathing ragged, thrusts uneven, the line between his brows deep from exhaustion and the demands of his body, when she plants her hands on either side of his smooth face and commands him, "Look at me, Jon."

He does.

He comes with a growl as deep as any direwolf's.

His body goes limp, a satisfying, heavy weight upon her chest and middle, and then his fingers are on her, where they meet, fumbling for only a moment before locating the spot and deftly circling. It's so good to have it be Jon's calloused finger wet with her arousal, to have it be her husband urging her closer and not herself that tight pleasure coils in her belly more quickly than she imagined it could. He must feel it, for he grins wickedly down at her, whispering encouragement. Still hard inside of her, he gives a few shallow thrusts, and the feel of him, moving slick with his release is enough to send her over the edge. With eyes shut tight, she sees a field of stars, pleasure popping like tiny, bright explosions behind her lids, while she gasps for air and digs her fingers into his arse, holding him in place until he's wrung the last bit of bliss from her body.

Her husband, a wolf strong enough to command dragons, is quiet once more, as he rolls off of her and she tugs at the laces of her gown, fighting to be free of it, but his silence isn't quite as disconcerting. He stares up at the ceiling, his mouth relaxed and his eyelids hooded. Sleep will no doubt overcome him soon. But, she believes he will speak more with time, so long as he is also not given too much space. They need to be knit back together, she and him, until they are family once more and not two grasping, desperate strangers.

For all she knows, tonight they have made the child she's hoped for. Her thighs are wet with his seed, as she wiggles free of her unbound gown and pulls her shift over her head with a sigh of relief. Tucking herself into Jon's side, she pillows her head on his chest, giving in to the lull of the rise and fall of his body and the hum of satisfaction in the back of her mind that could be hers but could be Jon's as well.

His arm tightens around her, as she spells out on his chest the words—I love you—with the tip of her finger. Whatever ghosts and doubts and guilt haunt her husband, she knows she will always be well loved. Neither of them can help loving the other. They've tried and failed at that.

She suspects he's not entirely closed off to her in this moment, so as his breathing slows and sleep claims him, she thinks of all the things she's wanted to share with him, speaking to him without words of Gendry and Arya and the hope she clings to that her little sister is out there waiting to be found and returned to them. She thinks of the questions she still wants answered. Whether in the North he heard Bran's voice more clearly echoing through the leaves of weirwood trees or whether anyone speaks of a boy who looks like a Tully but was born bearing the Stark name. She thinks of another babe, dark of hair and grey of eyes. Of Jon holding a child of his own blood. And she promises him that even if it is always just they two, it will be enough, for in him she has found her world.

The End

Final Notes: Oh, and if you made it this far and think Jon and Sansa at least deserve to have a family after everything, I suggest you read The Last Two, which prompted AWT. It is essentially the epilogue to this fic.

I am a needy author, when all is said and done. Any hint that this final chapter was worth the epic journey is appreciated.