agoge | >>FROM:@AEGONNER

[And almost Robb says his name. Jon. Gods, he just needs to know. He just needs to know that his brother has returned.]

I will.

[After that he stumbles outside and wraps his cloak around him, still amazed that his leg isn't throbbing and the wound has disappeared completely. He walks fast, the look on his face serious and resembling that of an old man.

When he sees Jon he notices that he grew older, way older and that scars are visible on his face. But despite all that, it is still Jon, and, thank the Gods, he lives.

Robb does not speak and just moves to wrap his arms around his brother, pulling him into a tight embrace.]

[It's Robb, when he appears -- it's Robb. Jon's first impression, a brief one, is that Robb looks younger than he remembers. But it's been years, and Robb had been young, very young. He had died so young.

His impression is only brief because, before it can become more thorough, he's hugging Robb, and Robb is hugging him back.]

I had hoped that one day -- but here you are, and it's -- you can't know how sweet it is to see you.

[In the back of his mind Robb realizes that a lot of difficult conversations were to be had. He had to speak to Jon about the rain of arrows, a possible death. That he named him his heir, that he should go and claim the North in the name of Winterfell.

But now is not the time.]

I hoped for this...many times... I feared... [Robb sighs and slowly lets go to rest his hands on Jon's shoulders.] ...you were dead. Just like the others... [Like Bran, like Rickon and possibly his sisters.] But you are not, thank the gods, Jon...you live.

The others? [He shakes his head, taking in Robb's face at the same time.] No. They're alive, all but Rickon, and at Winterfell, though I've only seen Sansa.

What do you remember? The last thing before you found yourself here? What do you know? Have you gone to Edmure Tully's wedding at the Twins?

[This is agonizingly important. It doesn't even occur to him to be troubled by the fact that Robb has the right of it, in a way: Jon has died, but he isn't dead now, and it's not something he owes to COST.]

[Robb shakes his head in reply.] No, Theon killed them. And Winterfell...it is nothing but a ruin... [The frown on Robb's face grows deeper.] I am to blame for it... [He opens his mouth and wants to tell Jon about all the should have's and could have's of King Robb but instead of that he just sighs and hangs his head briefly.]

Arrows... [Robb shrugs as if they are nothing important. That they did not predict a gruesome death due to betrayal.] They suddenly appeared...many of them. [Finally he pauses and shakes his head.] I do not want to speak of it...

Not now, Jon.

[Robb knows, then -- or he knows enough, and he wants to talk about it as little as Jon wants to talk about knives in the night at the Wall.]

Years have passed since then. Theon Greyjoy never killed Bran and Rickon; he lied about it. The Boltons took Winterfell, but they rebuilt much of it while they had it.

[He hesitates, pressing his lips together, and his look darkens.]

Sansa and I took it back from them.

You look older. [Robb nods slowly. If he would be younger he would've joked about it, calling Jon an old man. But now he is tired and his head is full.] The Boltons? [Did lord Roose betray him? It would not be much of a surprise, House Bolton has a bad reputation as an ally to house Stark.] Why would they take it?

[To betray him.] Was it lord Roose's bastard?

[And despite everything the questions start piling up.]

Gods be good, Jon...what happened?

Come to my capsule.

[He pauses, grasps Robb's forearm, and shakes it, then jerks his head in the direction they'll be walking in.]

I'm twenty-four now. I don't know how long you've been here, but look out for the crows. They're one of the commanders, all of them together.

The wedding. It was part of a deal to make Roose Bolton Warden of the North. They made his bastard -- Ramsay -- a Bolton and married Sansa to him... a Stark, to solidify his rule. Ramsay was very cruel to her and she escaped him and made her way to me at Castle Black. I was Lord Commander of the Watch. And then, near as I know, Ramsay killed Roose.

[Capsule, what kind of word is that anyway? Just call it 'chambers' or 'room'. Robb pulls a bit of a face while Jon pulls his arm.]

I just arrived. I have not aged much. As you can see.

[He follows Jon and notices how heavy his head feels. It is a lot of information to take and there is only one conclusion he can make because of it.

He does not exist in Jon's world anymore... His siblings are undoing the mistakes he made.]

And I am dead... The arrows will kill me. [Like he already expected. There was no way he could escape the Twins.] Is it not?

[He can see it, but still, still, when Robb asks that question, Jon is surprised. It goes through him like a spear, and he realizes that because he's lived the longest of any of them, it's his fate to have to deliver bad tidings again and again.

The face he turns to his brother is haunted, regretful, and his hand rises to cup Robb's shoulder. His voice is softer, more reluctant: he pushes the words out.]

Aye, the arrows, or someone's knife.

It was Bolton and Frey and Tywin Lannister -- it must have been, because of what Bolton got from it.

But it may be that there's a time when it never happened. It's only what I know, what I remember. You're married... what's your wife's name?

[Robb is not sure if the mention of his dead shocks him. Every lackwit could figure out that he would not make it out of the Twins alive, yet something turns cold inside of him. He thinks of all the things he wanted, the plans he had made, the promises he made.]

What did lord Bolton got from my death? [Robb asks it with a voice that lacks any sort of emotion.] The North? [Then he snorts.] As if the North would obey a bloody traitor.

[Finally he frowns, gazing at Jon when he speaks about times where things might not have happened.]

What does that have to do with the name of my wife?

The North. Winterfell. They obeyed him well enough when his bastard was flaying anyone who didn't. Karstark and Umber fought for the Boltons; Glover and Cerwyn and Manderly wouldn't fight at all.

[Now they're both frowning, and Jon searches his mind for a way to explain the answer to Robb's next question.]

I had heard that you'd married a foreign girl named Talisa, and that she'd died, but there's another girl who says she's your wife. Jeyne.

>>FROM:@AEGONNER

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