The air is sharp, is aching in his chest.

But perhaps that is more heartbreak than cold.

He sits beneath the canopy of red weirwood leaves, the lightest of snows falling from the gray sky above. In truth, he's missed this; the ache of the cold, the sense of isolation that the godswood brings. He still remembers the last time he prayed beneath these trees... The night they had taken Winterfell back. Beneath the trees, he had listened for the whispers of his family's ghosts, wishing that his father would speak to him, to guide him. Now, his father was not who he had always thought him to be.

Now, even he was someone else entirely.

That night after reclaiming Winterfell, when he had sat in this very spot, he had wished for Ned Stark to tell him he was on the right path. That in the end, everything he was fighting for was worth it. That losing Rickon meant something, that losing nearly everyone he loved meant something. Ned Stark had never showed himself, had never spoken to him, but rather Sansa had come to him, proving to him yet again just what his purpose in life had become.

Much like that night, he hears the soft crunch of snow beneath her boots. He would know the sound of her footsteps anywhere. When he looks up, she stands there just out of reach, vivid red hair dusted with the falling snow, her cheeks pink from the cold. For a long moment, there is nothing but silence, but her eyes tell him everything. "Sam told you." He turns away, unable to face her. He can't take her pity. His eyes burn but they do not spill over, though there again is that ache in his chest.

"No," she says as she sinks to the ground beside him, a heap of black and gray wool skirts there in the white snow. "Bran did." She goes on, her gaze unwavering until he raises his solemn gray eyes to meet hers. "It doesn't change anything," she ventures on, the words thick in her throat. This revelation changes everything, but not in the way anyone else thinks. "You're still Jon, you're still my bro-" she stops, shaking her head before she reaches out to touch his hand. "You're still Jon." She clarifies and this time, a small smile flickers on his lips. "Targaryen, Stark, Snow... It doesn't matter because to me, you're always going to be Jon."

Her words mean everything to him. "Thank you, Sansa," he says quietly, slipping his hand into hers.

His mind is a whirlwind of moments; wrestling with Robb in the courtyard, Arya and Bran cheering on the sidelines. Then there's Sansa with baby Rickon in her arms, their hair matching shades of red. There's his father- for that's who Ned Stark was- telling him that their blood was one and the same, even if their names were not. Even Lady Stark is there, her severe face softening only when she once peered down at him in his sickbed. There's Sansa again, appearing through the gates of Castle Black hours after his revival, her face bruised and her soul broken. She's there over and over again, hundreds of little moments, like the warm touch of her hand or the soft glow of her smile. Maybe it was as Sansa said, all along he's been a Stark.

Maybe it was as she said, that nothing had to change.

Well, one thing has to change, he thinks as their eyes meet once again. All these months of cat and mouse, of fighting the feelings that grew between them... Suddenly, the one thing that kept them apart all this time was gone. "Sansa... I..." He begins, for what better time than now would be to tell her the truth of how he feels? They are days, no, hours, from the fight against the Night King and he knows as well as she does that either one of them could be dead when it was over. He wants her to know the truth of how he feels before then, just in case... "Sansa..." She's leaning in, so close he can feel the warmth of her breath against his skin when she exhales, her lower lip caught between her teeth. It's there on the tip of his tongue, it's there for him to say except...

"What are you doing?"

They spring apart and when they turn, its Arya they're facing. "Arya!" Sansa says, jumping to her feet, dusting her snow covered skirts off. "I told you not to sneak up on people like that!" Arya smirks but nods anyways, knowing she should honor her sister's wishes- even if she enjoyed frightening Sansa when she did. "We were just talking," Sansa goes on, looking down at Jon who still yet sits, clearly recovering from the shock of Arya appearing and catching them in a moment that they could not really explain. There was only one reason two people leaned in so close to one another and it was not a reason that two supposed half siblings should have had.

"Right, talking," Arya replies after a moment, suspicion in her dark colored eyes as they fall upon her older siblings. But she says nothing more on the subject- she's seen the looks Sansa and Jon have exchanged and she knows what those looks say. She only wishes they would be honest with her and honestly, with themselves. "White walkers were spotted," she changes the subject and that's when Jon finally snaps back to reality. "Just outside of Wintertown." When Jon is on his own feet, Arya offers him the quickest of smiles, a smile that says what her words are not. "I'll see you two at dinner," she raises her hand in a gesture of goodbye before she turns and heads back the way she must have come, her footsteps silent despite the snow beneath her feet.

"I don't know how to tell her," Jon says when she's long gone, though his stare follows the path she had once walked. Of all the Stark children, with the exception of Robb, he'd always been closest to Arya. But now... She was like a different person. He doesn't know what she'll say or how she'll react when he tells her the truth of his parentage. Again, he's full of doubt, and full of fear of what this new revelation will do to the family he's just barely begun to piece back together again.

"She loves you as much as I do," Sansa speaks quietly and Jon turns back to look at her, though she too is staring off at where Arya had once been walking. "You're her big brother, no matter what." Her gaze shifts and she smiles when their eyes meet. "Nothing will change for you two." That she knows for certain. Jon could have told Arya that he wasn't even their cousin and she would still love him the same. Jon sucks in a breath and nods, knowing she was right, as always. "We should go back... Before someone else sneaks up on us." They laugh and Jon offers her his arm, unable to help but to smile when she loops hers with his and they begin to make their way back towards Winterfell. "I mean it, you know..." She says as they walk, causing Jon to arch a brow at her, a silently posed question. "That you're always going to be Jon to me. It doesn't matter if your my brother or not, I'm always going to love you as I do." Her cheeks are two red blooms of color and he knows the color doesn't come from the cold.

He longs to say it, but he's lost his nerve, and so all he can do is lean in closer to her as they come up over the hill, her body warm against his. But he vows, before the battle begins, she'll hear the truth from his own lips.